Our Brother is a Superhero

29

Louis begrudgingly followed Liam into the living room while Zayn and Harry snuck away to the downstairs playroom so Harry could play and Zayn could watch TV in peace. Niall stayed clinging to Liam though and stayed firmly on Liam's hip as he marched into the room, being cradled on Liam's lap once the older man took a seat on the couch.

Louis took a seat on the couch across from his brother, in his mind trying to make points to address in his arguments, even though he knew his arguments were futile because Liam was right.

"So, how was last night?" Liam decided to start off with light conversation, knowing this made Louis more angsty as he had to wait for his scolding.

"T'was fine. We watched a few movies n' then went to bed." Louis said shrugging, trying to play cool when his mind was doing overdrive on what Liam was going to say about his 'tantrum.' "I'm sorry for giving you attitude last night, I came down to apologise later but you'd already left. Figured you were just mad at me." Louis pouted and looked at his lap, where his hands were rested.

Liam smiled to himself as he looked at Lou with his head down. He knew that the younger tended to be impulsive and would get extremely angry and end up throwing a tantrum like a toddler and then later he would feel really guilty and put himself down until he was forgiven. He reached across to where Louis was sitting and put his pointing and middle finger under the younger lad's chin to lift his head up.

"I was never mad at you, just disappointed." Liam said, yeah that's right, he was pulling that card. "But you do have to consider other people when you get angry Lou, and I know you've probably thought of your bad attitude but I want you to see it from my point of view as well. You're 15, you're at your friends' houses basically every weekend, sometimes twice in the one weekend and that's great! It's brilliant that you have a lot of friends since you're clearly a social butterfly. But, I'm still 18, only three years older than you and do you know when the last time I went out was?" Liam asked, normally he wouldn't pull this card but he felt it was needed for Louis to respect his decisions, since he couldn't pull the 'you're living under my roof so you must abide by my rules' one. Louis shook his head sadly, becoming more and more disappointed in himself.

"Neither do I bud, neither do I. Any other time I would've let you go to your friends house but I needed you to stay because this is the first time Andy has babysat you guys where he had to put you to bed. I knew something was bound to happen, whether it be Harry freaking out that I'm not there, or having an accident and not wanting Andy to change him. Or Niall getting distressed because of someone who usually doesn't put him to bed was doing so." Louis understood that he'd been a brat, but this was just really hammering home the fact that he had been cheeky for no reason.

"I'm really sorry Li, for shouting at you and having an attitude." Louis repeated and stood up from the couch as Liam patted the space next to him. "And slamming the door." He added as an after thought.

Once he was seated beside Liam, who still had a sleeping Niall on his lap, which Lou was thankful for because he had a suspicion if the one year old wasn't there he would've been pulled onto Liam's lap, he was brought into the older man's side as Liam wrapped his arm (that wasn't cradling Niall's head) around his little brother's shoulder. "Slamming doors is a big no-no boo, you should know that. But I'm glad you apologised and you're all forgiven."

Louis let out a sigh of relief as he cuddled closer to Liam, relaxing as Li drew soothing circles into his arms. "Why's Zayn going over to Andy's tonight?" Louis asked, after a moment of silence in the room.