Drowning || Larry Stylinson

chapter three

After the initial shock the media and fans had after Harry's coming out, things were rather calm on the boys' feeds. They didn't really see questions from the fans asking if they always knew or what their first reactions were. The only things that really popped up were fans asking if Harry had a boyfriend yet, or if he was looking for one. There were occasionally some off-colour things posted onto their Instagrams, like calling them all slurs or saying they were going to burn in Hell. But it was nothing that a quick block couldn't handle.

It was after a month of Harry coming out that the news changed on his relationship status.

Louis had gotten used to the fact that Harry hadn't told him right away about his sexuality. While he still felt just the least bit betrayed at the fact Harry waited almost a whole year to tell him, he wanted to move on. He hated that he always felt so awkward around Harry. He was afraid it would come off as something more or like he didn't want to be around Harry anymore. But it just wasn't the truth. Louis still loved his best friend and couldn't imagine a life without him.

The betrayal seemed to boost, though, when Louis found out Harry was seeing someone through Perez Hilton's blog. 'Harry Styles has a New Beau?!' the title read with a picture underneath of Harry hanging around some man's neck. A man Louis had never seen before in his whole entire life. There were a few crudely drawn hearts around them in Perez's signature style, which kind of made the picture cute. But Louis still couldn't help but feel upset that he was seeing his best mate basically snack on some random dude's neck. He didn't even know this guy!

Louis instantly saved the picture, sending it to Niall first, who he knew would be just as upset if Harry hadn't told him. But seconds after Louis had sent the photo, Niall was replying back.

'Yeah, that's Ricky. Harry's been seeing him for about a month,' the text had read. Louis had stared at the text for a while, his mouth going dry. Not only had Harry been completely hiding his sexuality, he was also hiding a relationship?

Louis couldn't believe it. Harry was supposed to be his best friend, yet he was starting to become the last person to know things. It was usually Niall who was rather innocent about everything, not knowing something until basically the whole world knew. But now it was the complete opposite. Louis was finding out personal things about his best friend along with everyone else in the world.

'Lou? You there?' Niall texted, obviously knowing that something was up. He probably didn't want Louis to have some sort of freak out on Harry, who usually never meant anything with ill intent. He just wasn't the type of person to do things out of spite, or anything of the sort. He just made mistakes sometimes, and Louis was hoping this all was just a mistake.

Although he couldn't see how not telling your friend something was a mistake. Harry had to have gone out of his way to hide the whole thing from Louis. The boys had known for almost a year. That was a whole nine months that Harry had hid from Louis that he was gay. A whole nine months that he had to pretend he was enjoying the company of girls, and didn't go home to some mystery man named Ricky. Nine months that Louis was completely blind about everything and didn't know that his best friend was trying to come clean.

'Yeah, I'm fine. Just a bit tired hearing things from the news,' Louis said, sending an upside down smiley face afterwards. He sighed, turning his phone on vibrate before throwing it near his pillows. Instead of being snarky about the situation, Louis should probably go talk to Harry. The latter had probably just forgotten to tell Louis that he was seeing someone. There was nothing more to it.

Louis grabbed his roomkey before heading out, wanting to just clear his head of the ordeal. He wanted to know if there was anything else going on. Maybe Harry was also a secret agent undercover, working for the Americans or something. He couldn't imagine Harry ever being graceful, though, as he knocked on Harry's hotel door. He stood off, looking down at the ground as he waited for Harry to open up the room to him. Louis felt nervous, suddenly, as he heard Harry near the door, his footsteps solid against the ground. When Harry opened the door, Louis was about to back out, just going to talk about maybe going to lunch or something. But, then, Louis saw movement behind Harry's shoulder on the bed.