Half the world away.

Chapter 12

"Did you call him?" Zayn asked.

"Yeah, I think his phone was shut off during the flight...he didn't call me back, though," Harry answered with a sigh, only feeling hopeless.

"Maybe he's been busy?" Zayn suggested with a smile.

"It's been a week... He left me behind and obviously doesn't want to keep in contact." Harry typed some awards on his document for his business report.

"Shit, I'm sorry, Harry." Zayn placed his hand on Harry's shoulder and squeezed slightly.

"It's not your fault."

Zayn only sighed and nodded, putting a smile on his face, leaving Harry to work on his report.

At week. It had been a week. They had already gotten their new assignment, some report on how companies worked together and cooperated with the help of conquerence. The worst part of starting school again was the absence. His absence. The first day, the teacher called out the names in the course, he'd called out "Louis Tomlinson?" but paused afterwards and crossed out the name, mumbling something along the lines of "Right, the lad left."

It was heartbreaking to see how the seat, normally taken by Louis, now was unoccupied and cold. Neither Zayn or himself bothered with changing seats, a constant reminder of Louis being gone.

God. You'd think he died. He hadn't... or hopefully not, Harry couldn't really know because the guy had completely ghosted him since their last encounter at the airport, which he was now contemplating if it had really happened. He could've imagined it. It could've been anyone, really.

He just wished he could get something. Anything. 'Hello Harry, I'm back home now. I don't want us to keep in touch. Goodbye'... that could even work, he just wanted something. The silence was killing him.

It was January 14th, precisely a week since Louis went home. He looked at the clock on the wall, this time last week he was still in his meeting with Dr. Richard, wasting time instead of saying goodbye to the person who currently meant most to him. So fucking imature. And it was like his therapist had said, he regretted it, and he would never let it go.

He only had Zayn now. And his mom and dad, sure, but they didn't really understand. And he'd rather not explain.

He tried his best to focus. It was hard, but he tried. There wasn't much else to do, really. Being in his head wouldn't get him anywhere.

Like some sick joke, they were starting a new project in Music. And guess what the theme was... Sad love. SAD LOVE. The universe was just mocking him at this point. He did have an advantage with the theme, though. Being mostly sad for months was proving useful, and his notebook, filled with heartbreaking lyrics he'd thought about, came in handy.

He remembered the song he'd started writing a while back, the one that was cheesier than Christmas rom-coms... he found that one, and looked at it. Like, really looked at it.

He found some things that he could change, and also changed the lead narrative from a broken friendship, to a broken relationship (He could relate to the latter a bit easier).

The song was generally good. With some nice instruments it could be even better. He thought about it for a while, he was usually drawn to using an acoustic guitar... but maybe, this time, a piano would fit better. He knew some chords on piano, not as fluently as he did on guitar, but he could easily learn.

When he'd rewritten the lyrics, made them more deep and fitting, he went over them. Over and over again. So many times. He gave up after a while, or, he didn't give up , but he put the project aside for later, and then it just kind of stayed away for a while.