You Can Hear It In The Silence

Chapter 24

"Louis." He could hear it, but it was muffled as if something was stopping it from reaching him properly. He listened to the voice call his name again, and it seemed a little closer. When he heard it a third time, he knew it was Liam's voice.

He looked up to find Liam, but he couldn't see anything. He tried to open his eyes but couldn't... because they were already open. "Louis."

There was something heavy on his arm, and he knew if he could just focus on the feeling of it, he would be able to find Liam. The weight stayed there and then Louis felt it squeezed. Louis felt the pressure and softened himself into it.

Slowly, the fog surrounding him cleared, and he saw that the pressure on his arm was a hand.

His eyes travelled up the hand to the arm, shoulder, and Liam's face.

"Mm?" Louis answered.

Liam's brow furrowed. "You were doing it again."

"Doing what?" Louis asked.

"The zoning-out thing," Liam said as he rubbed his forehead.

"No, I wasn't." He wasn't doing it on purpose, at least... It just kind of kept happening. "What were you saying?"

"When did you last eat?" He asked hesitantly.

There had been a lot of that from all of them. A lot of hesitating, a lot of worried looks.

Not many words, though.

Louis wondered if they would have preferred for him to get black-out drunk. He had considered it, not because he thought that would help- he knew it wouldn't- but maybe if he did, everyone would be annoyed at him instead of whatever all this was.

"Louis," Liam's voice came again.

Louis turned his head in the direction he thought it had come from. He hadn't even realised he'd looked away. Once Liam came back into focus, he said, "Yeah?"

"When was the last time you ate something?" Liam's voice was tight, and Louis hated the sound.

"Oh." Louis wasn't sure how he could tell Liam that he had no idea without freaking Liam out more because he already seemed pretty fucking freaked out. "What time is it?"

"Lunchtime," Liam answered.

"Oh," He repeated. That didn't really help him. Had he had breakfast? When had he even woken up? He realised then for the first time that he was in the kitchen. "What day is it?"

Liam pursed his lips and stared at him without blinking. The hesitancy was gone, and the concern was back in. "What do you want to eat?" he asked instead of answering Louis' question.

Louis thought about it, but nothing came to him. "Not really hungry, actually," he said as he pushed away from the bench. He remembered again that he was in the kitchen, but he still couldn't remember why.

He walked to the living room and was surprised to find it empty, as it rarely was. He sat on the lounge and looked around the room before his eyes landed on the black screen of the telly. He wondered where everyone was.

It was weird that Niall and Zayn weren't there if it really was lunchtime. They were probably back at work. If Liam had told him what day it was, he could have worked out whether they should be home.

If he knew where his phone was, he could look at the calendar, and that would tell him, but he'd misplaced it ages ago and was pretty sure the battery was dead now.

He realised he was holding something and looked down to find a plate with toast on it resting on his hands. When he looked up, Liam was there, watching him, one of the various looks of concern on his face.