Orphans | Larry

2

LOUIS POV

I peeked over my cheap, metal framed bed to check on Harry, leaving me confused when I realised he wasn't there. I imagine that he would be upset upset after his nightmare last night. I was quite shocked actually that he had another night terror, I thought they had passed. He used to suffer them badly and regularly when he first got here, but after a month or so they soon faded. Last night was the first time in a while that he had one and from what I can recall it was one of the worst he's had. Usually I would just wake him up and he'd fall back asleep; last night was different. I decided to take a shower to calm my nerves.

The slightly too hot water cascaded down my back, instantly relaxing me. I hummed softly along to a random tune as I took time to look around the bathroom. The walls were a dull grey colour and the room seemed to be water damaged, which was no surprise really considering the age of this Orphanage.

I momentarily stepped out of the shower to reach out and get the small bag I used to contain my basic toiletries. That was another thing that annoyed me about being stuck in this place, we had to use communal showers. Luckily you could shower whenever, so there wasn't usually a hold up. I sighed as I looked to see the water that had escaped onto the floor. I'd have to clean that up later.

I picked out my highly affordable 2 in 1 shower gel and shampoo from the small bag and began to transfer the liquid onto my body and hair, taking extra time to massage it into my scalp. Once the soap had foamed up, I stepped back under the now cooling water in order to rinse myself off. Unfortunately, some of the shampoo got into my eyes and I winced as I tried to get it out. The stinging and burning of my eyes soon subsided, and with that, I forced myself to turn off the shower.

I shook my soaking wet hair. Beads of water hitting the ugly, constricting walls around me.  I grabbed the rough towel that was lazily slung over the metal rack and wrapped it around my waist. I shivered as the air outside of the water hit me. I sighed once again reaching into my toiletry bag for my tooth brush.

HARRY POV

I sat there for I don't know how long, re- thinking everything I was taught. I swung my legs slowly, backwards and forwards, as they hung over the edge of my all ready made bed. I heard the door to my dormitory open and there stood Louis. And God was he beautiful. I realise that beautiful is quite an unusual way to describe a boy, but that's the only word I can think of that seems to fit him.

"Alright Haz?" Louis asked, raising an eyebrow as he took in the blush that was already spreading across my cheeks.

I nodded but didn't reply, not trusting my voice.

-

We were in a comfortable silence for a while as Louis picked around the room, cleaning up random bits, when for the second time today the door to our dorm opened. Miss Roberts was stood there, hunched over her manly figure. Next to her stood two people, a couple I assume but I could be wrong. The woman was quite tall and the man stood next to her was about the same size, perhaps slightly smaller.

"Boys, we have two people here who are looking to adopt!" Miss Roberts forced an excited tone and although I may not be the brightest lad I knew it was put on. I felt pity towards Miss Roberts actually. She had always seemed lonely and I don't think in the entire time I've been here I'd seen her smile. My guess was that she was around the age of 30, but her constant frowning had made her age a lot more noticeably.

-

"Hello, I'm Anne." It was nice to see that the woman stood behind Miss Roberts finally decided to speak after an awkward silence. Honestly though, that makes me so angry. Like who on earth goes to a quite frankly piece of shit orphanage to look at some half broken children, and barley speak two words the whole time? And that's excluding the man that she's bought with her, he's even worse. He's just stood there with a stupid, smug look on his face and I honesty have no idea why.

"Yeahhh," Louis said after a while of even more silence, "I'm just gonna go. I'm really not in the mood to discuss some housing arrangements that never work out."

Anne looked genuinely confused at what Louis had just said, "I-uhm what exactly do you mean?" She spoke.

"Oh don't worry, Angela is it? I'm quite aware of how this whole adoption shit works." Louis scoffed.

"Care to clarify?"

Louis laughed without a trace humour at that, "Sure, shall we talk about my first, second or even third adoptive parents?"

"Louis." Miss Roberts spoke in a failed attempt to calm him down.

"So according to my first adoptive parents, I whined too much. And to my second ones I apparently wasn't, and I quote, clever enough. But wait for it, my third family had a particularly amusing reasoning to why they wanted to get rid of me. After about 3 months of being in their care, they got bored of me. And I'm not even guessing this, no they told me right to my face!  So this, Anna, is why I really don't want to stay and chat!" Louis was almost shouting at this point, and if looks could kill, Louis would've been dead instantly from the glare that the man next to Anne was giving him.

Honestly, I could understand why Louis reacted like that. From what he'd told me, he'd had his hopes raised multiple times at the thought of a new family, only to be crushed after a short period of time under their care.

"My name is Anne, not Angela, or Anna." That was the only thing she said and I swear I heard Louis mumble to himself, "Close enough." Soon after, she dragged the rest of the adults in the room out. Leaving Louis and I to take in what had just happened.

How dare she? Louis just tells her about all of his failed adoptions, which we could all tell was a touchy subject for him, and she doesn't even have the decency to come back with a proper response. She just corrects her name and leaves. That tells me a lot about her character.

Before I could register what was happening, Louis' fist collided with something hard. The once white wall now had a fairly large indent and a couple of drops of his blood smeared across it. My heart began to race as I saw Louis stare down at his bruised and bleeding knuckles, tears creating an endless stream down his face.

(A/N comment on any mistakes and I'll do my best to correct them ASAP. Please vote and comment and all that.)