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

for whom the moon shines

tw// self harm , eating disorder , suicidal ideation 

this chapter is kind of a limit test, so i'm sorry nothing really happens. i need to set things up a bit more before the story can keep moving. though, i am proud of some of the rhetorical choices i made here. 

thank you, as always. and thank you riyaaa (i think that's how many a's there are) on ao3 for making my day with the lovely comments. they mean a lot to me.

twitter: @louflymehome

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he woke up only three hours after he'd fallen asleep, despite the strength of the fatigue. he was used to this, of course, but a heavy feeling still settled in his chest after having been thrust so ruthlessly into the world he'd worked so hard to forget.

harry remained asleep on the couch. the boy's eyes cheeks were wet with tears, curls a mess. neither of them showered upon returning home, despite the fact that both were in desperate need of one. the slight smell of alcohol still clung to their clothes, a nasty reminder of everything that had happened.

louis tried to convince himself that he wasn't so affected by it; it was something he should have been used to, if anything, but it was undeniable that the large man in the bathroom had begun to unwind years of carefully wrapped-up evidence of his uncleanliness, reminding him of what it had all felt like once again.

harry was beautiful, though, acting as what seemed to be his one and only solace. the only thing that he felt provided closure. it was another one of those starless nights, where he would normally smoke and stare at the moon, wondering if it knew about how he lived, or if it knew how he would die. or if he was so insignificant that the moon wasn't looking back at him at all, but rather gazing coldly, mockingly, into nothingness.

the moon, usually so lonely, so close yet so far from the sun, however, gave harry's skin a dewy glow. he was colored this whitish-blue, accentuating the length of his eyelashes. he'd realized how tired the younger boy was as well, with dark circles forming like purple bruises beneath his eyes. guilt sunk through him like an anvil, crushing all this organs in the process. he was the cause for harry's exhaustion. he was the reason why the boy had looked like he was wilting recently, soft edges unable to hold themselves up, brittle and void of true light.

and he'd never be able to provide that true light. not with how damaged he was, and would always be.

he'd decided to read, unable to gather the heart to disturb harry from the sleep he looked like he was so starved of. the sun also rises is what he started after finishing great expectations. he found it from dan's collection of books back at home, and he'd let him take the copy after seeing his interest.

"i am always in love," he would read, and wonder if there was any truth to the statement. of course, taken out of context, it could mean a variety of things. but love, in the presence of aimlessness, of frivolity, he felt, could never exist. not in tandem.

could one be lost and be in love at all? did the feeling of being lost come from love?

was he lost?

the idea of loving harry was terrifying, so he settled on being lost. the last time he told someone that he'd loved them was in manhattan, five thousand feet above the ground, after being told that no one would ever love him like that again. that he was nothing. that he was made to be hurt. that it was all he was good for.

after jean, he'd vowed that he would never love someone again. he didn't want to make the mistake of getting attached to someone only for them to change, and he didn't want to subject someone to his brokenness. especially not someone as perfect as harry. not someone who could do so much better.