Burn to ash

Chapter 12

"I'm going to die," Louis whined mournfully from his position lying prone on the rehearsal floor. "Like actually die."

"You're not going to die," Liam chided from his own position on the floor a few feet away. Louis rolled his eyes, despite that the movement took nearly the last ounce of energy from his body.

"Hypocrite," Niall called out. "You all are fucking hypocrites." His voice went high and squeaky and Louis wondered for half a second who he was attempting to imitate with it. It better not be him. "Tour's easy peasy. A total cinch."

"Trust me, I never thought it would be easy," Louis groaned. "I knew it would be hard as fuck. I still underestimated."

They've just been through the dress rehearsal for the show and four of the five of them were currently on the floor, having decided that moving was a concept that was vastly overrated.

"Harry, you're like a fucking bunny," Zayn griped. "What the fuck are you still doing upright?"

Louis told himself he wasn't going to lift his head. He wasn't going to lift his head and he wasn't going to turn it and he definitely was not going to look at Harry's stupidly cute face.

Instead, he did all three, and was rewarded with a smile that probably could have solved world peace.

"I'm happy," Harry drawls, all bright teeth and sunny eyes. "This was so awesome."

"Awesomely awful," Louis groans. "As well as being in absolute shit form, it seems we're rather terrible now."

"Oh, Lou, we weren't all that bad," Harry chides.

"You were total shit," Bernard adds in, and Louis still really wants to punch him in the face. And totally not because his words might dim Harry's smile.

That would be a boyfriend thing to do and Harry is most definitely not Louis' boyfriend. But they are kind of friends now. Since they talked last night, it's become a little easier for Louis to see Harry and not want him.

He thinks he'll always want Harry, that isn't ever going to go away, but now that they've agreed that part is on hold, Louis can focus just on trying to salvage their friendship.

They started friends, after all, and no matter what they were going through, no matter how much they loved each other, Louis knows their friendship was always the foundation of everything.

"We'll get better," Harry insists optimistically despite Bernard's words.

Bernard mumbles under his breath. Louis doesn't catch the exact phrase, but it sounds something suspiciously like "you'd better," and he can't help but agree. They're supposed to be professionals. Well, they used to be professionals. Now, they're lucky if they make it through a song without a weird note somewhere, or a forgotten lyric or running into each other on stage--and not in the cute, puppy pile way that used to make the fans scream. They're adults now and there's a weird sort of pressure that comes with their age.

Should they even be acting silly? Louis sure fucking hopes so because his sense of humor is most of what he has to bring to the stage these days. Despite the last five years and the last few months, he can still laugh at himself.

He glances over at Harry again, who's still smiling, practically a human sunflower, and it strikes him that Harry is maybe the only one of the five of them who really misses the stage. While the rest of them were off doing god knows what to occupy their time, he's been trying to remake himself from the inside out. And even more impressive, he's actually done it. As a "congrats, you're sober" gift, a tour is maybe a bit on the extravagant side, but then Louis always liked being generous.