Imprisoned In My Heart: A Larry Stylinson Fanfic

19.

Sleeping in a chair wasn’t the most comfortable experience.

Louis groaned as he woke up and felt his whole body start aching in protest as he stretched. Sleepily rumpling his hair, he sat up and wrinkled his nose, reaching for his phone to switch off the alarm that had roused him.

He carefully got to his feet, stretching again, and then picked up the white sheet from the floor and draped it over Harry’s chair. At home, he hadn’t been sleeping – it had only been a week since Harry had left, and only a week since they had last seen each other, but it was one week too long. Louis couldn’t seem to force his eyes closed; he could only lie back in bed being drowned in his own misery and playing their last conversation over and over in his mind. No other memories would come, only the feeling of both of their hearts breaking, and the thought of how they had wrenched apart only seconds before their lips could touch. It was too much; he couldn’t seem to close his eyes, and he wasn’t risking taking any unnecessary medicine again. In the end, he’d taken to spending his lunch break napping in Harry’s chair; it smelled like Harry, and it was the only place where he could fallen asleep. On the pretence of wanting a less shabby chair, he’d moved it to the back of the room and draped a sheet over it, replacing it with a far neater one from a furniture store. The thought of anyone else sitting in it and tainting the last of Harry’s smell with their own was horrific. If it stopped smelling like the curly haired boy, his last little piece of Harry would be gone.

He checked his phone, wondering stupidly why he would have set the alarm – and then his heart leapt.

On the screen, in plain black letters, clearly was typed ‘WHITEHALL – VISITING HOUR STARTS IN FIFTY MINUTES.’

Louis didn’t remember ever running so fast in his life. Before he could do any more than snatch his car keys, he was wrenching his office door open, leaving it unlocked and not even stopping to slam it behind him, and then he sprinted for the exit as fast as he could go.

He drove like a madman, and nearly caused several traffic accidents.

By the time he had swerved violently into the car park at Whitehall, he was almost afraid for his own life; he had nearly slammed into a huge lorry on the way in. Still, he was alive – and painfully close to Harry. Smoothing his shirt, which was creased and made it quite obvious that he had slept in it, he ran nervous fingers through his hair to neaten it up a little bit and then headed for the main reception, wondering what it would be like to visit a prison instead of work there. His whole body tingled with anticipation – he couldn’t hug Harry, but he might be able to touch his hand or brush his fingers against his arm, and that was enough.

Unfortunately, when he was greeted and shown through to the visiting area, Louis gaped in dismay. Harry was already waiting for him, beaming all over his face, which made his chest radiate with a deep and undeniable longing that was enough to move him closer – but he couldn’t help staring in utter disgust at the setup. He wouldn’t be touching Harry anytime soon. That long week ago in his office, he’d assumed that Harry had been making some kind of dark exaggeration when he’d spoken of glass partitions…but sure enough, In front of Louis was a long row of stools, one opposite each prisoner, a desk sat in front of the stool, and then on the far side of the desk sat all the men in their bland prison uniforms; drab and unflattering grey tracksuits with the name of the prison printed on the chest like a school logo. But dead in the middle of the long table that stretched across the room was a huge sheet of thick glass, a window separating the prisoners from the public, and the only way of communicating seemed to be by the telephones placed strategically in front of each seat.

Louis sat down in a rush, and snatched up the phone. Mirroring him, Harry grinned in greeting, and pressed it to his ear with a welcoming look in his eyes.