Impulse

chapter Thirty-Nine

*NARRATOR'S POV*

Louis sprinted out of the kitchen where he could no longer stand the silent tension of his abuse. 

Harry had hit him and that broke so much of his trust that Louis could barely use his legsproperly without a breakdown. His thighs felt like mass jelly and his head hurt like a knife had beenplunged into it.

 As soon as his feet hit the ground though, he escaped to the safety of their bedroom. Here he wasprotected by a door and it made ignoring Harry's desperate cries for him easier as he backed awayfrom it, chest heaving and mind empty.Violence was no longer a fear or trigger for him. It was a brightly coloured warning sign for thedetrimental downward spiral of his mind. Ever since he had seen what no mother's son should -irrespective of circumstance - any indication of violence put him in a great disadvantage.H

e began to feel himself slipping again, the wound on his head tipping his entire core over and hisdrop to delirium becoming inevitable. In the bathroom, he kneeled over the toilet and everythingthat entered his system in the past couple of hours burned an outward route through his oesophagus. 

Gagging and tearing up, Louis' body trembled with the internal fire combating the horror of frozentile. He choked on air and tasted his own tears, muscles weakening drastically until his stomach wasempty and he sagged against the clawfoot tub.Louis' cheek was bruising and his forehead was swelling up. He looked like a mess with purple skinand blood dripping down the side of his face, each one timing a second left before he fellunconscious. Now that everything foul had been rebuked and ejected, he no longer felt like he wasdecomposing from the inside. 

He regretted pressing the subject of Harry and Edward's mother. It was also not his fault because hewas going to apologise when stupid Harry didn't listen long enough. Nagging at the back ofhis mind, is the reminder that he cannot forgive this. Not now at least.Harry only hit him last in the Madhouse before anything drastic to come to exist between them.There was no love and no affection at the time, just his lust and Louis' submission.

 For Harry tohave repeated that act of domineering unkindness, it forced Louis to think back to that day and howa love could be so weak that Harry thought nothing to hit him.Maybe he didn't really love him and said it because he could. Louis shivered to think of it. Heknows Harry feels strongly for him without an ounce of doubt, but he's supposed to be betteringhimself and not relapsing. One way or another, Louis is not going to let this one slide.Everything became darker than it actually was for a moment, before coming back to life. His mindwas slowly re-tipping itself onto the right axis so that his sanity was restored, his strength all butdiminished.

 "Petal?" Came a voice so sound in its protective nature, the tone of husky enquiry lacing it. 

Louis mentally reached out to it with both hands but all his physical form did was turn his head inthat direction. The bathroom light came on and Edward stood in the doorway, frozen with twohurricanes for eyes.

 "Petal?!" His voice became more urgent, and in return a little muted, as Edward's knees hit theground by Louis' hip and he hauled the boy into his arms. 

This is where Louis appreciated being most, wrapped up in the arms of someone who loved him. Heknows Harry loves him but the awful throbbing inside his skull begs to differ. Edward inspects theinjury with careful precision, standing up with Louis seated on a closed toilet seat after flushing.Louis comes back down to planet Earth in time to dry heave unattractively into the front ofEdward's shirt, trying to get as much clean air in as possible. 

"Petal. Baby, look at me." Edward kneels with a clean wet hand-towel in his hand, the whole limbtrembling involuntarily as he wipes the wound clean.