Gold Rush

(In which Louis and Harry are both 18, and it's the summer after senior year.)

Never in a million years would Harry have thought that people on the internet idolized him. He was just... Harry. Although he'd been called model-esque and beautiful before, he didn't think his silver lip ring or his sleeve of miscellaneous inkings up his arm was anything special to marvel about. But Louis Tomlinson thought otherwise. Louis, who, to be honest, was the complete opposite of Harry, was to be considered a Tumblr boy. He spent most of his time of the internet, the bridge of his black circle glasses resting on the inward arch on his nose. Occasionally checking out other blogs. But the blue eyed boy had to admit, he 'stalked' this one blog. The owner of the blog posted pictures of boys, mostly punk boys. But Louis was smitten on this one boy. The boy had dark, spirally curls, a ring through his bottom, plump pink lip, and eyes the color of the grass in the spring, rimmed with black on the outer corners of his irises. The boy was Harry. One picture. One picture was all it took for Louis to fall in love with Harry. All of Louis' online friends made fun of him for it, told him that Harry was just a model. A fucking hot model that is. Louis didn't even know the boy's name, yet he was smitten. So, when he contacted the blog that posted the picture, he didn't honestly think he'd be able to track down Harry. And when he learned that he could, well. You could say he got a little excited. But then it dawned on the caramel skinned boy. Harry has no idea who Louis is. And that took the excitement away, just a bit. But still, Louis just needed, needed to meet Harry, to make sure he was actually real. Although he was quite positive that Harry was a drawing. I mean, nobody could be that flawless unless of course they were fake. Nobodies skin in that pale and soft-looking, nobodies hair is that dark and curly, nobodies lips are that shade of red, the color of strawberries. But then Louis had to strongly, strongly consider what he was doing. He was falling inlove with someone he'd never met, much less talked to. Through maybe two weeks, Louis found himself staring at the picture, observing every single square inch of it. Until he mentally decided he needed to meet this boy. "Louis, get off ya computer." Louis' mother swings the door open, exposing Louis sprawled across his bed on his belly, fingers striking across the keys. He glances at his mother, Jay. "Knocking would be nice," He mumbles, giving the picture one last glance before shutting his laptop, tossing it onto his pillow at the head of the bed. "Yeah, yeah. Dinner's almost ready. One a your dad's colleagues is here to eat with us." Jay smiles at her boy. Louis' father worked in some stupid toy company, and often he brought one of his colleagues to meet his family. "Colleagues" as in boring men in their forties that just made the dinner table rather bland. He sighs and opens his computer back up, just for moment, long enough to catch a glimpse of the photo before snapping it back shut and hurrying downstairs, for if he was even 30 seconds late, his sisters would hog all of the food. As he makes his way downstairs, he hears chatter, mostly his mother talking, joined by a voice he was sure he'd never heard before. "Thank you for inviting us, Mr. Tomlinson. I hope you don't mind, I brought my son along." Louis raises his eyebrow and stops at the middle of the staircase. Son? He takes an inquiring step and then makes his way into the kitchen. Not even bothering to say hello or look at the colleague as he opens the fridge and grabs a water bottle, raising it to his soft pink lips. "Louis, come say hi to your father's friend, Robin Styles and his son, Harry." His mother speaks. Louis almost chokes on his water. Harry? No, it couldn't be. No, not like this. Not when he's in sweatpants and a t-shirt. Louis cautiously turns around. And his suspicions are correct. It's Tumblr model Harry. Fucking Harry Styles is in his kitchen. Dark curly hair, bright green eyes, his skin littered with black ink and black eyeliner lining his eyes. Louis gulps and bites his lower lip, making his way over to the table. "Louis, this is Harry, he's 18, like you." His mother chirps. Shut up mom, Louis thinks. Harry is in his kitchen. Harry smirks, those fucking red lips streching just a bit, that silver ring through his bottom lip catching the light. And here's Louis, looking like he just rolled out of bed, in which, he did. This isn't how he wanted to meet the boy. Louis slowly pulls out his phone and texts under the table, just two words, to his friend Zayn. "He's real."