Uni (A Larry Stylinson Story) ✅

Double Edged Sword

Liam's Point of View 

Trigger warnings: drug abuse/addiction, suicidal thoughts, suicide attempts

I thought about texting him a million times. I typed out thousands of different messages, drafted hundreds of emails. I tried to call so many times. 

But I could never bring myself to go through with it. 

In a lot of ways, I felt like Louis had ruined me. When we first got together, it was just supposed to be temporary, casual. I was just discovering my sexuality and I was nowhere near out of the closet. I wasn't supposed to fall for him -- but I did. Head over fucking heels. 

I have never connected with a person the way I did with Louis. I've never had that kind of chemistry-- you know the kind, physical and emotional. Romantic, but sexual. The kind of feeling you get inside when you have a deep, burning desire to fuck someone, but you also want to be with them all the time and hear every detail of their day and make sure they're happy. 

That's how Louis made me feel. 

But it was my wonderful idea to make the whole thing a god damn secret. Because I couldn't come to terms with being gay. Because I thought my teammates wouldn't accept me. Because of me, and my selfish reasons and insecurities and close mindedness. 

So of course, we tried to hide it. Of course, we kept our relationship behind closed doors and out of sight. But eventually, even that wasn't enough. We were caught redhanded. 

What I should have done in that situation was fess up, come to terms with things. Admit to myself -- and to the others -- that I was gay. But I didn't do that. 

Oh, of course I didn't do that. Instead, I did the most disgusting thing ever imaginable. I accused Louis of RAPING ME.

That's right, fucking raping me. Honestly, it was the most pathetic, lowly thing I've ever done in my life. I accused the love of my life -- the person I made love to every night, the person I cared about more than anyone or anything -- of raping me. 

I still felt sick to my stomach just thinking about it. 

I didn't just feel disgusted. I felt guilty. I felt remorseful. I felt heartbroken. I had just pushed away the only person I had ever gotten close to. Not only did I push him away--I broke him. I fucking broke him down to the point that just a few weeks later, he was a fucking skeleton walking around campus with gash marks all over his body and an empty space where his heart should be. 

Whenever I saw Louis around, which was often, I thought to myself: You did that Payne. You fucking did that. He's dying. He's literally dying and you're the one who's killing him. 

And I know -- I know I should have apologized. I know I still can apologize. But an apology is only a small fraction of what I owe to Louis. Through just one simple sentence, I had obliterated his self-esteem, gave him lifelong trust issues, and pretty much destroyed whatever bit of happiness the kid had left. And that was something that was truly unforgivable. 

Louis had never been happy as a clam -- even when we first started seeing each other. He had always been a little pessimistic. He had his share of body issues and insecurities. But now, it was is if I had taken the light from his eyes. The color from his cheeks. The soul from his body. I was a fucking monster, and I knew it. And I wanted to kill myself for it. 

Every day, I wished I could just trade places with Louis. I wished I could be the one suffering, the one going through all the pain. Because I god damn deserved it. 

But of course I couldn't do that. So I trudged along, using football and studying to keep me busy during the day. But at night, when nobody else was around, my heart ached. And I sobbed and sobbed until I physically couldn't produce anymore tears. 

After a while, even crying wasn't enough of a release for me, so I turned to pills to help cope. They drug tested athletes at my uni, but my teammates and I had ways of getting around it, swapping urine samples with clean athletes and using drugs that didn't show up in tests. 

I quickly developed an addiction, shoveling down pills every night and hoping I wouldn't wake up in the morning.  Why should I, anyways, after what I've done? I was worthless. 

When I saw Louis that day in the cafeteria though, everything changed. He wasn't broken, he  wan't damaged anymore-- or least not as much. He would probably be mentally scarred forever, but at least he was doing better physically. Lou had color in his cheeks again, muscles on his arms, a twinkle in his eyes. And by the looks of it, it was all thanks to that curly-headed kid he was eating with. 

In the cafeteria, Louis ran out seconds after spotting me. I wasn't planning on talking to him -- especially not in front of the team. But damn, did he run. That's the kind of effect you have on him, now, I said to myself. He used to love you, and now he can barely look at your lowly, homophobic self. 

As I sat there next to my teammates, pretending to eat my burger, I couldn't stop staring at the curly-haired kid. I saw the way Louis had stared at him, with that flirty look in his eyes -- the some look he always used to give me before we kissed or got physical. 

I had never seen the kid before, so I assumed he was a fresher. I asked one of the first years on my team if they knew who he was. They said he was Harry Styles, a music major. Lived in Miranda Hall. That's all I really needed to know. 

A few days later, I spoke with my friend Kelly who was an Intro to music TA. I asked if she knew a kid named Harry and she said she had him in her tutoring group which met on Saturdays. I asked if she could do me a huge favor and let me teach part of the section -- even though I wasn't a TA. 

She found my request super odd, but after I bribed her with free drinks, she agreed to it. To justify why I was doing this, I told her I knew Styles and wanted to play a prank on an old friend. Harry and I both had British accents -- so she believed it. Dumb, Americans. 

The plan was to talk to Styles after the session and tell him to take care of Louis. To not make the same mistakes I had made. To let him know he's special. To show him that I had been wrong, all wrong. And most importantly, to tell him that I was deeply, incredibly sorry. I couldn't face Louis myself. I just couldn't. But maybe Harry could help deliver the message. 

It almost worked -- almost, but it didn't. 

My plan was going swimmingly when out of the blue, Louis fucking showed up in the library and saw me. I saw Harry run over to him, and I watched as Louis yelled furiously and punched Harry in the fucking face. 

Once again,  I had fucking ruined everything -- even my attempt to god damn apologize had created more pain and despair for Louis than I could have ever imagined. Everything I did seemed to just hurt him more and more. I honestly wanted to disappear and never come back to this school again. 

I remember, in a daze, helping Harry up after he was punched -- and so desperately wanting to tell him my apology. Tell him everything really. But when I looked into those big green eyes, all I could think of was Louis looking into them as they fucked, as they told each other they loved each other. And I wanted to vomit. 

So I did the worst possible thing I could do. I trashed Louis. Hard. And then I got kneed in the dick.

That night, I went to bed and mixed my pills with alcohol, hoping it would either ease the pain or take my life. I didn't care which. 

Unfortunately, I woke up the next the morning -- completely fine. My roommate told me that the mixture was enough to kill a fucking horse-- so I either mixed it wrong or just got extremely lucky. 

Either way, I was given a second chance to live that day. And I wasn't going to let it go to waste.

I knew exactly what I had to do to atone my sins: Apologize to Louis. Face to face.