Joy of Missing Out

Chapter 10: Since we were 18

It was our second night in Charlotte. We had three more shows until the end of our sold-out stadium tour and we had just finished recording our fourth album, appropriately named 'FOUR'. That was enough of a reason to celebrate but Louis and I also celebrated our first engagement anniversary.

We agreed on postponing it a few days, until we're back home and away from the public eye. That's why we overslept, blaming it on the alcohol we consumed the previous night. Still, I got up before Louis because I wanted to surprise him somehow but I had nothing planned. For a few minutes, I watched him sleep, creepy as that sounds. I appreciated having him besides me and smiled through it. Then I had to get up and do something about the surprise. I ended up getting room service instead of going to the restaurant with everyone else and I asked someone from our crew to go buy a bouquet of sunflowers. Of course, I had to get out the room to call them and later on collect the flowers and the trolley before Louis wakes up. It made my surprise even more surprising that Louis was already up when I entered back.

"Sunflowers from my sun?" he was joyful.

"Sunflowers for my only sun," I confirmed and handed them to him while leaning in for a kiss. "Happy anniversary."

"Happy anniversary, love. They're wonderful!"

I took a sheet from our bed and spread it across the floor. He helped me serve our breakfast on it then we sat down to eat, but not before both of us complained how uncomfortable the floor was and how it would've been better to just eat in bed. It's more romantic this way, we established. I was also uncomfortable with the amount of grease in our food but I knew we would burn the calories during sex at some point of the day.

I tried to ignore my phone during breakfast. However, when I took it to check time I had an idea I knew Louis wasn't going to like and I immediately regretted it myself. "Let's do something. You won't like it."

"Oh God! Are you going to tell jokes?"

"Hey!"

"What"

"I'm good at that."

"Oh no, you're not. So what's that thing you wanna do?"

"Read fanfictions."

"Start telling jokes right now, I allow it."

I don't remember which ones we read, particularly because I momentarily tried to erase from my memory what we had just read. Some made us laugh, some made us swoon, some really disturbed us. I must admit I was at times curious about what fans thought our relationship is like so I returned to reading them a few times afterwards, but never thoroughly.

Louis liked my next idea more. I got us a piece of paper and we composed a song, 'Perfect', the first one we co-wrote that would a year later end up on our last album. We took turns writing lines on a single piece of paper and in an hour we had a draft.

"I love that we feel this way about each other," Louis told me after we were finished. We were lying on the floor surrounded by sunflowers.

"Thank you for making me feel this way," I said before kissing him.

We still had to work. In the afternoon we went to a sound check and then spent another couple of hours in the dressing room and around the stage before they opened the doors for fans. Before we went on stage Louis was particularly clingy. Or maybe I was. Anyhow, we walked with arms around each other until everyone was pissed off with our behavior.

"Guys, gay is okay but please don't be that gay right now. We gotta put on a show!"

We didn't get offended by Liam's comment and also didn't disregard it because he was right. Although Louis and I had been putting on a show for years, we separated and took our microphones before going under the stage. After the concert all of us went bowling. Some were really bad, some people surprised everybody with their skills. Niall, for example, was terrible at it and he even made sure to complain about it on Twitter. But, as always, Louis and I were amazing with balls.

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Of course we wouldn't have a photo of them on their anniversary so I went with this photo of Harry bowling (just imagine Louis took it, alright). I know this wasn't in Charlotte. And Niall did tweet they all went bowling on that day. I also wanted to make a comparison because Harry took the same photo in that same place like two years before but didn't for two reasons. Firstly, it doesn't go aesthetically with the rest of the photos of JOMO chapters. I would have to crop it because the other pic I wanted to compare it to doesn't show his feet. Also, look at Harry's rainbow shoes!!

Q: Don't go after Liam, I was joking, I'm not making him homophobic here. Do you think Niall, Liam and Zayn made such remarks, that they minded their affection at times?