i sleep naked ➸ larry stylinson

fourteen

confidence isn't something you just have.

even the most beautiful of people can be insecure about themselves, although beauty is known to radiate happiness and courage.

confidence is all about how you feel, not what you look like.

and harry was the exact opposite of that.

every time he looked at himself in the mirror, he wanted to take a straightener to his unruly, stubborn curls.

he wanted his eyes to look like louis'; blue and beautiful and sparkly.

his lips looked like a girls, which he didn't like at all.

and his nose was too big.

but no, that wasn't the only thing that lowered his confidence.

if he was in a large group, he felt so incredibly small. like every person in there could crush him with one word. he felt as if everyone secretly hated how quiet he was, how thoughtful and shy he was.

he could practically hear their thoughts, telling him that he's a crybaby and he's too sensitive.

and yeah, he had started off high school with two amazing best friends, the greatest, most caring best friends you could ever ask for, but when he walked through the hallways on the first day, he thought he was going to cry.

until he saw louis tomlinson.

then, it wasn't about him. it wasn't about his insecurities and awkwardness and clumsiness. it was about louis. louis and his sunshine smile and his baggy sweatpants and long, shaggy hair. and his plaid boots that harry happened to own the same pair of and his loud laugh that he could hear from a mile away.

so his confidence, although low, didn't seem to matter much until niall and zayn became more popular and started forgetting harry, even though they slept over together every friday they talked about people that harry dreamed to be.

harry, being watchful and thoughtful, noticed how niall started bleaching his hair blonde and how he started to dress more like the popular kids. he saw how zayn styled his hair into a quiff and began to say phrases that didn't even sound like himself.

he noticed how they went to large high school parties that harry only saw through pictures on twitter.

but he didn't say anything. his confidence just went down, lower and lower, until the day he started talking to louis for real.

the fact that louis actually took time out of his wonderful life to speak to harry was unbelievable.

and that made harry feel just a little bit better.

and for a week, there was a smile on his face more than half the time, which was quite different than usual. he felt like he had laughed more that week than he had in a whole year.

but the best moment, the biggest burst of confidence, was when they walked into school on monday morning.

louis and liam were on his left, with louis with a hand on his waist. niall and zayn were on the right, and he couldn't help but smile, because he, awkward weird quiet harry, was in the middle.

and louis was touching him.

zayn had volunteered to drive all of them to school when they had finally left the putt putt course. harry was very eager to agree, as was the rest of the boys.

so harry felt like he was on mean girls, strutting down the hallway in the black skinnies and white t-shirt that zayn had let him borrow again, and a beanie upon his curls. louis and him were almost matching, except for the fact louis was wearing his usual tank top, but their beanies were the same color and louis was the one that had styled his hair.