A Piece of His Heart / larry uni AU

chapter nine

"What the fuck is Harry doing?"

 

Louis snorts into his mobile's receiver, nearly causing Cassandra to drop his tea. She flashes him a crooked look, her Santa hat nearly falling from her head, and Louis mouths apologies fervently. A small smile tugs at her lips as he takes the warm cup from her hands.

 

"Louis?" Zayn groans, finally.

 

"Yeah. No cigar, mate," Herbal/Louis is scrawled across the plastic lid in red ink, as if the two are interchangeable and Louis is some sort of variant of the beverage. He's drunk so much of it lately he might as well be. Sandwiching his mobile in the crook of his neck to fish out two pounds, "I ask myself that question every day—thanks, love—and I've got no answer, as of yet."

 

"Have a good one, Louis!" Cassandra calls as Louis tucks his wallet back into his beige chinos. He waves her off, and then readjusts his fringe with the quick brush of a dry hand.

 

When he bounds through Arch's set of chiming red doors, another happy elf painting seeing him out, he brings the cup closer to his nose. He inhales the rich earthy scent. It doubles as a personal heater, just barely burning the pads of his fingers and the insides of his icy nostrils, but it feels heavenly nonetheless. It takes a considerable amount of effort not to hang up on Zayn and shove his other hand in his tea.

 

"So, I'm walking back from Stratner's, right," Louis hears Zayn continue over the sounds of the street, to which he hums in acknowledgement, "Hood up, earbuds in, minding my own... that until I pass Crane East. There were posters everywhere, Louis. Literally, not even three feet between each one. And just what did I think when I slowed down to read one?"

 

"What the fuck is Harry doing?" Louis supplies, having downed a long sip of the brownish-yellow liquid. The words fall from his tongue far too easily, reigniting some type of love-stuck warmth in his chest, "I ran into him mid-plaster last week."  Louis adds.

 

"And you didn't think to... I don't know," Zayn scoffs on the other end of the line. "Give me a little heads up?"

 

"What does it have to do with you?" Louis stops to punch the 'walk' button on a fairly decorative street pole. Traffic flows in either direction before him. He scowls at the tiny red hand, which is impeding him from the warmth of his flat. Bastard.

 

"I have to be seen with you idiots."

 

"Well, how'd you know it was him?" Louis asks, genuinely curious. Harry hadn't put his name on the poster. Or a photo of himself, for that matter.

 

Zayn doesn't hesitate. "The posters greet the public in forty-six different languages, who bloody else would it be?"

 

"That is true," Louis snorts, crossing the white-striped tarmac, "And slightly hilarious."

 

"And maybe I've seen his handwriting before. Look, why's he doing it?"

 

Louis takes a deep breath, crunching a stray leaf under his shoe. "Basically, I don't like spooning, so he's trying to find a new spooning partner," Louis almost laughs as he says it, "This is his way, I guess. Selflessly donating to a help organization. That's what the GSA meeting was about."