The Fosters (On Hiatus)

Chapter 3 (Louis)

I woke up and heard soft crying a few rooms down. Heading to the noise, I see a figure sitting in the bed. Carefully, I walked in.

"Hey bud, you ok?"

The boy stops crying. I turn on the lights to see Michael with puffy red eyes.

"Hey what's wrong?" I ask softly. He pulls his knees to his chest and doesn't answer.

I walk over to the bed, careful not to scare him. He backed away a little when I sat down however. I heard feet quietly walking towards the room, watching as Michael hid his face and the person stopped in the doorway. It was Ashton.

He looked confused and protective at the same time. "What are you doing?"

"Nothing. I just came in to check on him." Looking back to Michael, Ashton looked unsure. "Promise."

He went quiet. Nodding after a moment, he left the room. I looked back to Michael who hadn't looked up yet. Moving up the bed a little, I felt a wet spot. Oh.

I look up at the boy hiding his face. "How 'bout we get you some dry clothes and we can wash the blankets?"

He looked up at me cautiously. I noticed new tears on his cheeks. Not Moving from his spot, he shakes his head rapidly.

"No, no. It's ok." I look at him. He's in a ball. "C'mon Michael. It's ok." I offer my hand. Looking unsure, Michael quietly moves further away. "You're gonna fall off the bed. Please be careful."

He looks behind him and back to me. "I-I'm so-orry."

"Hey. It's ok. Let's get you some warm clothes though ok?"

"P-please do-on't b-be ma-ad."

My heart breaks. "Why would I be mad?"

His teary eyes looked down in embarrassment. He shrugged.

"I'll be right back," I look carefully to him. He didn't move.

I go into the closet and get some spare clothes that we have. Heading back to the room, I notice Michael looking scared.

"Here are some clothes." I hand him the clothes. "Would you like me to leave the room for you to get changed?" He nods a little. "Ok. I'll be outside the door if you need me."

A few minutes later, he opens the door slightly. It's still pretty dark out so I assume it's not that early in the morning yet.

"All set bud?" He nods. "Ok. Let's take care of the wet clothes and sheets then ok?" He blushes and nods.

I help him take off the blankets and sheet off the bed and he picks up his clothes he changed out of. We head down to the laundry room and put everything in the washer. I can tell Michael is embarrassed by the incident so I choose not to bring it up. Instead, I ask if he knows how to work the washer. He shakes his head. I show him what to do and then show him how to turn it on.

"That's pretty much it," I finish telling him. He nods in understandment. "Would you like to get some water before we head back to bed?" I ask as we start to head back. The clock reads 1:32 am.

He nods and I get a couple glasses of water. Setting one in front of him, I sit at the table with him.

It's silent before he whispers, "Thank you."

I smile at him. "You're very welcome bud.... Would you be ok sleeping in my bed tonight?" He looks scared for a minute. "It's ok if you don't. I just don't want you sleeping in your bed until we get it taken care of a little."

"Uhm." He blushes.

"Michael you still need to sleep. Do you wanna sleep in a bed or on the couch?"

He looked up at me and whispers, "My bed's fine.."

"Your bed has nothing on it and it isn't clean yet though."

"I can still sleep on it," he says. "It's fine."

"No I'm sorry. I can't let you do that, it's freezing." He stays silent. "Why do you want to sleep in that bed?"

He shrugs and looks down. Before anything else was said, I heard voices in the living room. I saw Ashton and Niall. It looked like Niall was crying.

"Are you ok here for a minute?" I ask Michael, who nods.

I walk over to Ashton and Niall to see the younger boy crying badly. He was shaking his head to something.

"You two ok?" Ashton looked at me worried. I look to Niall, "Hey, it's ok. What happened?"

The poor boy cried harder and fell to the ground. Well, almost. I caught him as he fell. Ashton looked over to us and then into the kitchen.

"Michael's in the kitchen if you wanna talk to him," I offer. He looked back to Niall, unsure. "I got him."

Ashton nodded and walked into the kitchen. Sitting us down on the sofa, I held Niall closer to me a little. He started shaking from his crying.

"Shh. It's ok," I try to soothe. "It's ok."

I start rubbing his back and he whispered out a quiet 'no' and 'p-please no'. He tried pushing away but I didn't let him.

"Hey bubba. It's ok. Hey, hey, look at me."

He looks up with teary eyes and says, "It w-won't st-stop."

"What won't stop?"

He shook his head. Trying again, Niall pushed on my side. "Stop!" he whispered.

"Niall-"

"N-No! G-go. Stop!" he screamed as if he was scared.

Liam and Zayn came running down the stairs, Ashton and Michael coming from the kitchen. I tried to soothe Niall when Liam came over.

"Hey what's wrong?" he asked as he crouched down in front of us.

"Stop! Leave me alone!" Niall screamed. He kept fighting against me. "P-please stop!"

I saw Zayn run upstairs and come back with a blanket and a bottle of something. He walked over to us and looked at Niall, who wouldn't stop screaming for us to leave him alone.

"Ni-"

"N-No!"

"Shh. Ni look at me," Zayn gently told him. "Niall please look at me."

"I-I c-can't." He pushed away again.

I let him and saw how he turned to Zayn. Zayn hugged him.

"Please." Niall quietly looked up to him but looked away again.

"N-No!"