MUTE

12. Gay or Straight?

Louis awakens the next day with a horrible hangover and he doesn't remember what happened last night, the only thing he does remember is that he left his phone downstairs with multiple unread messages and unanswered calls.

The first proper thing he sees when he opens his eyes is blood. His pillow has a small dried up blood right in front of his face. When he looks at his table, he sees that the blue box is opened and that's another problem added to his list.

Actually, it's re-added, he had that problem before, but he crossed it out of his list because he managed to deal with it, but now it's back.

Razors – that's his re-added problem, he used to be fascinated by those things and he knew they were killing him, so he stopped, but now, with his drunken stupidity, he used them again last night.

He knows it won't be easy to get rid of them and he can tell that using them will kill him, especially if he's drunk because drunk people usually don't know what the fuck they're doing.

Louis is not suicidal, that is a fact, but that's just a way of relieving himself from the pain he feels most of the time. He knows that cutting is painful, but at least he can control where the pain is.

'What's the pain he feels' you ask? Well...it's mostly emotional pain, considering the physical pain from the abuse stopped, but he can't control them, also, they have always been there. He can't explain them, because like I said, it's always been there.

Most of the time he feels empty and sad, but he keeps telling people, but mostly himself, that he's happy and that nothing can change that.

A knock at the door brings him back to reality and he rolls his eyes before getting up from the couch – he's been sitting on for the past ten minutes – and walking over to the front door to look through the peephole. Standing there is a guy he has never seen before, he looks to be about the same age as himself, so Louis decides to open the door. "How can I help you?" Louis questions, casually looking the other boy up and down. "Sorry to disturb you, but... I'm new in town and I live next door, *motions to the house on the left* I kinda need a hand with unpacking, but the other neighbors weren't so keen to help me...would you maybe –," he explains but he isn't able to finish his sentence, because Louis already stepped out of the house, closing the door behind him.

"Of course I will give you a hand," he informs earning a smile from the other boy. "I'm Frank by the way," the shorter of the two informs, "And you're American," Louis points out and Frank nods his head before shooting Louis a look "I'm Louis," Louis responds "Nice to meet you Louis," Frank informs as they step inside the house.

"Aren't you supposed to be in school right now?" Frank questions as he puts a box on the table to have better access to its contents. "I called in sick today," Louis lies as he puts the clock on the wall, "But you're not really sick, are you?" Frank asks and Louis shoots him a look that says it all.

"I don't want to be offensive, but you smell of alcohol," Frank points out, not even bothering to look at the other boy and Louis shrugs as if Frank can see it.

"I woke up like thirty minutes ago. Don't be a judgmental bitch," Louis informs and Frank chuckles because he can tell that Louis didn't mean for it to be rude. "I can tell," Frank says motioning to his eyes as if showing Louis eyes "Really?" Louis questions grabbing the mirror from the box to look at his face and he's not very surprised when he sees the dark circles under his eyes because he only slept for one hour or so in the past two days.

"Don't worry, it doesn't look that bad," Frank reassures, emphasizing the 'that' and Louis raises an eyebrow at him, "I look like a fucking ghost," he says putting the mirror back in the box it was in.