Fine Line || L.S.

Someone I Can't Live Without

"You seeing anybody recently?" Louis asked, looking at his latte on the coffee table.

Harry shook his head, "No, not since September."

Louis nodded, "You get lonely?"

Harry looked at him, "I'm always lonely."

Louis glanced at him, "Me too."

"Even with Eleanor?"

Louis nodded, "Yeah. I think the loneliness might just be a symptom of the amount of fame we had."

Harry looked at him, "I never felt lonely with you."

Louis looked back at Harry, sitting on the other side of the couch, "You didn't?"

Harry shook his head, "I felt like you got it."

Louis nodded, "I did. I do."

Louis wanted to tell Harry that he was always an antidote to his loneliness, even at its most overwhelming, but he couldn't. It felt too forced. He had confidence Harry knew how Louis felt, even if that confidence was shaky.

"Are you excited to start touring again?" Harry asked Louis, watching his back as he leaned over his knees, looking straight ahead.

Louis nodded, "I miss touring, I'm excited. It's gonna be so different, though."

"Being up there alone?"

"Yeah. So different. I'm nervous."

"You'll be great," Harry told him, "don't be nervous."

Louis wanted to tell Harry everything he felt, from his sadness over how he treated him after losing his mom to watching him sleep this morning. That maybe he still had feelings for Harry, and maybe if he got drunk or high enough, he wouldn't be able to control himself. Louis hoped Harry would also express the same sentiment, but he couldn't be sure. So he couldn't say anything, not yet.

After a long silence, Harry said, "Louis, I don't really know what you want our relationship to be after this, and whatever you want is fine, but I just have to tell you that I am really sorry. About everything that happened. I regret a lot of things, and most of them are the way our relationship ended. I look back, and I can't believe that the time I had with you I spent like that. Drinking and fighting. I really regret it."

As he spoke, Louis felt his throat burn and eyes water and felt suddenly out of control.

"It was me too, Harry. Mostly me. I think any mistakes we made were not two-sided. Sometimes I feel like we kind of make decisions that mimic each other, like—"

"We're two sides of the same coin?"

"Exactly," Louis continued, finally looking at Harry, "and a lot of it really haunts me. I want to get us straight, right. I can't live with my idea of us as it is. It's really broken in my mind, and I can't stand it."

Harry subtly moved towards Louis on the couch, "You want to fix it?"

Louis nodded, "Of course. Do you?"

Harry nodded, as earnestly as he ever had, "Of course. I've wanted to fix it since the last time I saw you."

Louis looked at Harry, feeling red in his cheeks, "That was a mess."

"Yeah," Harry smiled, moving one more time closer to Louis, "hot mess."

Louis remembered following Harry back to his suite in London, with a beautiful view of the Thames, and the way the river looked as he watched Harry put on a condom. The only time he had ever seen it, and what a strange sight it was. That night had managed to be completely loveless, just marred by freakish devotion, and on the other side of that, a rotting resentment.