we'll live to tell the tale (l.s.)

these foolish things

tw// purging , eating disorder , implied past abuse

hi, i'm back. this chapter feels weird, let me know if there's too much like non-dialogue and stupid details. also i write weird. i probably use too much past perfect tense (had + inf) or whatever, too many commas, too many long sentences, etc. but whatever man. 

also i'm surprised some of you are still here because MAN my beginning chapters are so bad and unbeta'd. i need to go back and fix them (they're also really short) sometime but i have no time ahahaha. it's 20:42 which is the latest i've posted a chapter (i usually write at like 2 in the morning and finish during the day) so oops. 

anyway, thank you for sticking with me all this time, and if you've left a wonderful comment, know that i appreciate you a lot. take care of yourselves! also if you want to be friends with me... don't be shy... ...... ... ... . . seriously......

twitter: @louflymehome 

-

days went on like this—despite the original threats of having to drink the calorie-filled supplement drinks with every unfinished meal or snack, harry never actually enforced it. watching louis writhe in discomfort at just barely half a meal already was too heart-wrenching to experience. and in truth, louis was never able to eat more than a bite or two of his snacks; harry would always have to be the one to finish them for the boy to avoid wasting food.

it was also more difficult because harry hadn't known what louis actually liked, or if he had any preferences for food at all outside of what was driven by his illness. it would be much easier, he realized, if he knew louis before everything went to shit, and maybe even have prevented this all in the first place.

but it wasn't that easy, and he knew that. there was so much more to the boy that hadn't been revealed yet. questions and assumptions, of course, drifted through harry's mind at various magnitudes—from passing thoughts to more persistent ones that he worried he would accidentally utter aloud if he were not careful.

for both of them, it felt like time was not measured in days; but in meals. like every single second not eating would be spent marinating in anxiety in anticipation of the next meal; and every second spent eating would be spent wishing they were anywhere else in the world.

he also wasn't oblivious to the fact that this kind of radical change, this abrupt attempt at recovery, was taking a huge toll on the ocean boy. unable to stomach it all, harry stopped counting after the amount of times could no longer be housed by both hands, where he'd find the boy in the bathroom, fingers stretching down past his larynx, muttering awful things about himself, how unworthy he was.

some nights were so tiring. he'd hear the shower running, straining to cover the sound of louis retching into the moldy toilet (which they still hadn't gotten around to cleaning), and he'd find himself unable to get up to comfort the boy. in this state of unshakable exhaustion that was present no matter how much he slept, he'd just listen to the gagging and sobbing, hating himself for not doing anything about it.

nevertheless, he decided that this was progress. louis was eating, and that's what mattered. it didn't matter that the boy now had what seemed like a permanent appearance of red-rimmed eyes and puffy cheeks, that his breath tasted sour no matter how much louis tried to scrub it out, or that he never allowed harry to wrap his arms around him anymore.

maybe, they'd both wish, on every dandelion and star and candle and eyelash, he'd wake up one day and be better, as if nothing had happened at all. as if they'd met under normal circumstances and were a normal happy couple with normal problems.