Orphans | Larry

5

Louis POV

Zayn's loud, and quite frankly obnoxious voice soon filled the room. I was pulled into a 'bro-hug' as he proceeded to say how excited he was to see me.

"Tommo! Mate it's been too long." He spoke out happily. His behaviour was quite adorable actually, it was much similar to that of a puppy after its owner had been away for a while.

I smiled back and mustered out a small, "yeah, it has." Not really knowing what else to say. My response was filled with little energy and this flipped some sort of switch in Zayn.

"Oi! Louis, I'm not gonna accept that. It's been what 2 months now?" I lifted my gaze from the floor to finally look my friend in the eyes, they were different. Sad almost. And I felt bad because it was obvious that he had missed me. And I'd made no effort to contact him back. "I mean look at you Tommo. It's almost as if you've been in hibernation or some shit."

I let out an airy laugh. I really had no excuse to why I had been isolating myself from the world. Other than the fact that I realised, finally, the promise that myself and my childhood friend had made all those years back was unlikely to happen. I had no way to contact him, and he sure as hell wasn't making an effort.

"I'm sorry." I said, and I really was. my façade was starting to fade and effect others, and I couldn't let that happen. No one could ever see how broken I truly was, I wouldn't allow it. And if that meant wearing long sleeves at all times then I would. My sadness didn't deserve to be brushed off onto other people.

Zayn nodded and pulled me into another hug, a proper one this time. And for the first time in months, I felt comfort. Maybe it was the look in his eyes when he was explaining how much he missed me, or maybe it was the way he knew when I needed to be hugged, but I felt myself tearing up. Zayn may be an asshole to others, he may be the most vain person you'll ever meet, but to me, he was honestly one of the greatest friends I could ask for.

After a couple of minutes of just being in his embrace, I pulled away. Wiping my eyes as I did so. Surprisingly though, Zayn didn't tease me like I thought he would. Instead he grabbed my arm, and literally dragged me out of the apartment complex. Luckily, I had remembered to grab the keys that were hanging by the door just in time. Because I honestly was not in the mood to spend the night outside my flat.

Zayn rushed to get into the car first, for a reason unknown to me. Leaving me on the curb. Not long after though, the window was being rolled down, and Zayn's head stuck out of it.

"Get in loser, we're going shopping." Zayn said in an accent that he always seemed to do. I rolled my eyes but didn't need to be told twice. English weather was fucking freezing.

Zayn went to turn the radio on and I sighed because he and I had a very different taste in music. He was more into the R&B/HipHop type of thing, which if I was being completely honest gave me a headache, whereas I was more into the alternative side of things. However, that was quite a generalisation, because sometimes I was in the mood for another genre.

Just as predicted, Zayn turned the radio over to a station called 'Kiss' that held all of the 'mainstream' songs. I leaned back further and prepared myself for the drive to the shopping centre.

-

"Fucking finally." I mumbled to myself. However Zayn heard, and this just lead to one of his rants about how great his taste in music was and how I was just jealous. I scoffed at this but decided not to bring up the fact he was completely wrong, in fear of him becoming butthurt.