the royal family of the music industry

14. Habit

Harry Styles, 2017

"Do you still have feelings for me?" Harry asks with force, storming into the room.

After he had read that note that he had been supposed to read two years ago, he was awake for hours and hours sitting on his window sill, staring at the dark grounds of the castle and the moon, thinking and overthinking everything in his head.

What the fuck is wrong with Louis?

He had been sending Harry the most mixed up signals over the last weeks and now Harry finds out that he had promised him to love him forever?!

So when he woke up to the first beams of the sun, announcing a new day, he decided on going back downstairs, see where Louis is and confront him. After swallowing an aspirin against his headache of the hangover.

So here he is, standing dumbly in the doorway of Louis' room that is warm and cozy and smells like Louis, making Harry dizzy again.
He doesn't even know why he is doing this. It's irresponsible to force this topic that early in the morning and in such a state but he needs an answer.

"What?" Louis asks, dropping the t-shirt he had been folding and spinning around to face Harry, who stands in there, hand still on the handle of the door. 

"Do you still have feelings for me?" Harry repeats his question and Louis stares at him.

"What are you talking about?" Louis asks, furrowing his brows and Harry steps into the room, handing the letter over to Louis, who looks at it confused for a moment before the realization hits him and he sighs.

"Do you?" Harry asks again, crossing his arms in front of his chest.

"I don't-" Louis cuts himself off and sits down on the edge of his bed.

"You don't...?" Harry says and looks at Louis expectantly.

He just wants to hear it.

Because Harry still has feelings for Louis as strong as they had been 2012, he's sure.

"I don't know." Louis says quietly and looks down at his lap.

Wow.

Well. Fuck.

Calling him friend, promising to wait for him, not making a move on him and writing love songs about him, talking to Lottie about him, but he doesn't know if he's still in love with him?

He didn't think about Harry's feelings before doing all this?

"You can't sing a love song about me without being sure. That's not- that's not fair." Harry feels his throat getting tighter. He hates crying and he doesn't want to cry in front of Louis right now. It had always been so easy, showing emotion in front of him, like the late night deep talks about modest and how he had always felt like he was in a prison. He had cried in Louis' arms and had told him everything he had felt. Sometimes, it wasn't even an emotion he told him about. He would say "I feel empty."
And Louis would understand because Louis always understood. Louis would nod and keep Harry safe in his arms. He would kiss the pain away.

Now, that Louis was the reason, Louis being responsible for that pain, made it hard for Harry to show these emotions. Because after all these years, he still put Louis before him. And he doesn't want Louis to feel bad, to know that he is the reason for Harry's tears.
Because Louis is so, so important and it would break him.

But Harry needs to say something, because he can't let himself be treated like that any longer without any form of explanation.

Louis lifts his gaze and looks at Harry questioningly.