Tattoos Together || Larry Stylinson

Chapter 4

I wasn't sure if he meant the kiss or laying the port. He didn't seem to be expecting an answer at all.

Harry had climbed to the foot of the bed and shut down the laptop, then put it back in his pocket. After that, he came back, lifted the blanket, which we would be forced to share, and slipped under it. That Harry would stay here was an unspoken fact, in which I had little say, but gladly accepted it.

If no one was with me, I would probably have gone crazy. In all likelihood, at some point I would have been so paranoid that I would have started scratching the IV port out of my arm.

Harry's body came a little closer to me, we were arm to arm and I could feel his chest rise and fall in a calming rhythm.

"Harry?" I whispered softly.

He turned his head to the side and looked at me. I could only imagine how worn out I must have looked. I didn't want him to notice how broken I was.

"What's wrong Lou?"

"If, if I'm somehow strange, or have breathing pauses, or whatever... Please call for help, yes?"

Harry smiled, turned on his side so that he was completely facing me and pulled his hand out from under the covers to put it on my cheek.

"Lou, don't you think it's time for you to explain everything to me?"

His eyes searched mine to fix them, but I avoided his gaze.

"My life just hates me Harry, that's all and I advise you to run while you still can."

"What nonsense Louis."

"Don't make promises that you can't keep."

Harry stared at me expectantly. "Just tell me Louis. I promise and I will keep."

I knew he couldn't. He wasn't the first and he wasn't going to be the last either. But I didn't want to lose him, not now that I didn't even really have him. I decided to leave out that one detail. That one detail that would ruin everything. I would keep it for myself in all my limitless egoism. Sooner or later, he would find out by himself and I accepted that it would break him psychologically. But right now, I didn't want to. I apparently wanted him to first attach himself to me emotionally.

Oh Louis, you fool.

"You know Harry, I lost my mother two years ago... Leukaemia."

Harry swallowed audibly, his hand still laid on my cheek and exuding a pleasant warmth.

"I loved her very much." I felt a tear run down my cheek. Every inch it left with a wet line on my face, felt like a cut. Harry stopped it with his thumb by wiping the tear away.

"I'm sure she is proud of you Louis. She has a wonderful son." He removed his fingers from my cheek and instead grabbed my hand to give it a gentle squeeze.

I thought about his words for a brief moment. I wasn't sure if she was proud of me. I hardly deserved it.

"I watched for two years how she slowly passed away. Every day a little more." I interrupted myself with a quiet sob.

Harry was clearly worried. "I didn't want you to cry, you don't have to go on talking, everything is fine Lou."

I shook my head and didn't respond to what he just said.

"The night before she died, she told me that if she was unconscious and the question if life support devices should be turned off would get asked, I should make sure that this happens."

Harry seemed to be starting to cry too. He clung to my hand and suffered with me.

"She knew it was going to happen, she suspected it, felt her own death." My voice was just a thin, choked breath.