The sound of footsteps catches Louis’ attention, and he rolls over to see Harry coming back into the living room, a guitar in hand.
“Where’d you get that?” Louis blurts out stupidly, his heart suddenly hammering a mantra of he’s still here he’s still here he’s still here in his chest.
Harry shrugs. “Your room,” he says, sitting down on the floor beside Louis. Louis pushes himself into a sitting position, shifting so that he’s facing Harry. “Zayn said you used to write songs but gave it up. I thought, there’s no way you would give it up that easily.”
“I haven’t touched that guitar in years,” Louis lies weakly, but Harry holds a hand up, strums the strings.
“Perfectly tuned,” he says, sounding pleased. “What, you tuned it this morning or something?”
Louis sighs, shakes his head. “Yesterday,” he admits.
“Perfect.” Then Harry holds the guitar by its neck, tries to pass it to Louis. “Play me something.”
Louis sputters. “Uh, no.”
“What, why not?”
“I don’t know anything.” It’s not technically a lie; Louis has spent hours teaching himself songs on the guitar. The only problem is he can’t remember them when he’s drunk and put on the spot.
Harry cocks his head, looks at him questioningly. “Write me a song, then.”
“What?”
“Zayn said you used to write songs, write me a song that sixth form Louis would write.”
“Uh,” Louis says. “But sixth form Louis was shit at writing songs, he’d say the most stupid shit and just C-G-A-minor-F everything.”
“Hm.” Harry pulls the guitar closer to him. “You know, that’s not actually a bad chord progression.”
“It’s not,” Louis replies, “if you want everything you write to sound like a Taylor Swift song.”
“Fair point.” Harry strums those four chords, and Louis tries not to stare at the movement of his fingers on the guitar. Harry’s got gorgeous hands—they’re huge, his fingers long and deft. Louis thinks that he wouldn’t mind holding Harry’s hand, just for a little while.
“You should play me something.” The words tumble out of Louis. “Or write me a song.”
The corner of Harry’s mouth ticks up. “Write a song about you,” he says. “I can do that. I mean, I’ve done it before.”
Louis rolls his eyes, trying not to smile. “Right. And what happened to those songs you wrote about me?”
“I sold them and earned a lot of money,” Harry says cheekily, before strumming the C-chord on the guitar. “Okay, I’ll C-G-A-minor-F it, because you love that chord progression—”
“Obviously,” Louis butts in, now unable to stop himself from smiling. His heart is fluttering in his chest, a warmth spreading throughout his veins, to the tips of his fingers.
“And I’ll start…” Harry cocks his head, thinks for a moment. “Oh, Louis.”
“Always a good first line.”
“Shut up,” Harry says, then he’s strumming in earnest. “Oh, Louis,” he sings. “You are so…gooey.”
Louis snorts. “What does that even mean?” He asks.
Harry ignores him, just continues strumming. “You make me smile, like nothing has for a while,” he sings, “and you remind me of…chop suey.”
Louis can’t help it, he laughs. “Okay, that’s horrible,” he reaches for the guitar. “Give me that, please.”
Harry shakes his head, his eyes dancing as he strums. “Oh, Louis,” he sings loudly. “You don’t like…boobies.”
“Really, Harry—"
“You used to play footie, and got a big booty…”
“See, now your lyrics are just getting worse and worse—”
“Oh, Louis, I’m falling for you.”
It’s that last line that makes Louis stop, and all he can do is stare wide-eyed at Harry as Harry tries his best to launch into a guitar solo on Louis’ acoustic guitar. Oh, Louis, I’m falling for you, he thinks, and that’s…that’s just random, right? Of course Harry’s not falling for him, he was probably just drunk and making up random song lyrics. After all, most songs are about love, so there’s no wonder why Harry would sing that. He was probably just making a parody of a love song. Yeah, that’s probably it.
“Grammy-winning!” Harry shouts, brandishing the guitar in the air, before running a hand through his curls. He smiles mischievously at Louis, his green eyes sparkling, his dimples deep in, and he’s so beautiful that Louis is struck dumb, finding himself unable to breathe. Harry’s beautiful and singing about falling for Louis and Louis wants to kiss him and Louis has kissed him before, loads of times, and suddenly it’s all he can see, him and Harry kissing and him and Harry holding hands and him waking up to Harry right next to him again and he can’t breathe, can’t think, can’t—
“Your turn!” Harry says, handing him the guitar, and Louis feels himself exhale, the overwhelming feeling suddenly disappearing again.
It’s probably just the alcohol, he tells himself. I’m just so, so drunk.
But, as he takes the guitar from Harry, looks into Harry’s beaming, excited, drunkenly-beautiful face, he starts to think that maybe a forever like this won’t be so bad. Maybe forever doesn’t need Zayn; maybe he can have a forever just like this, just him and Harry, drunk and writing shitty songs on his guitar.
Yeah. That doesn’t sound so bad at all.