The Rusty Old Minivan

Chapter 15

It was strange waking up in the trailer with no Niall there. Sure, he'd slept elsewhere from time to time while he'd lived at Louis', but this was different. His mess of a duffel-bag wasn't tripping Louis as he stepped out of bed. His things weren't on the floor, framing his mattress like a fence to keep people from stepping on him. And, well, his mattress wasn't there at all. Stripped off of its stinky sheets, folded up and stuffed under the bed. It felt wrong. Like tea without milk. Like a bed without a pillow. Like an old family photo with one face cut out.

Most of all, it felt quiet.

Louis had gotten so used to the constant machinegun-laughter streaming from Niall, sort of like a soundtrack for the home. Now that he wasn't here anymore Louis could actually hear his own thoughts for once. He didn't like it.

"I'm calling in sick today," he told Fizzy as he sat down on the kitchen counter, feeding Freddie his bottle.

He'd tried telling Lottie first, since Fizzy didn't give a fuck anyway, but Lottie wouldn't listen. She just kept this blank stare, like nothing anyone could say would get through to her. Louis tried asking her if she was hungry, if she was coming down with something or if she just needed to talk. Every time, she just shook her head and said 'no, I'm fine' in the same scary toneless way. Louis wasn't stupid. He knew that the word 'fine', especially coming out of a girl's mouth, - especially coming out of Lottie's mouth - didn't mean 'fine'. But he also knew that it wouldn't get more 'fine' by constantly nagging her about it. So he let her be. He'd nag her tomorrow, maybe.

"I have to look around for Niall's coke and the money. He's got to have left it here somewhere. If not, I'm going to have to track him down, get it from him and then break his neck," Louis continued.

Fizzy nodded. "Sounds fair," she mumbled around a mouthful of cornflakes.

Lottie pushed out of her chair then. "I'm leaving."

"But school doesn't start for another hour."

"Then I'll wait outside school till they open." She slung her bag over her shoulder, jacket over the other and then she was out of the door.

Yeah. Louis would definitely have to nag her tomorrow.

He started his search when Fizzy and the twin girls had left for school.

He pulled every box, every spare mattress and every bag of summer clothing out from under the bed; nothing. He ripped out every cup, every plate and every hidden little money-stash from the cabinets; nothing. He checked every nook and cranny of the loft bed. He looked under every carpet. He looked behind the radiators, the toilet, the bathroom sink pipe. He even went so far as to walk outside, lie down on the asphalt and check under the entire fucking trailer.

Nothing. Nada. Not a penny, not a gram of fucking flour. Nothing.

When Fizzie came home from school, Louis had been lying in the big bed with all the little ones, staring at one spot in the ceiling for two hours straight. He still hadn't reached the point of anger yet. It should be quite alarming for him, considering he usually blew up like a freaking bomb within seconds of something aggravating happening. But now, there was no one to blow up on, no one to try and explain their reasons. There was no explanation. Well, except for the one he still couldn't wrap his head around, at least not if he wanted to ever trust again; that Niall had just taken off with it. That the only other adult he'd ever trusted since Briana, really trusted, had just proved to him that he'd been a fucking idiot for doing so.

"Lots got sent home from school today," Fizzy said.

"Huh..."

"Louis," Fizzy jumped down beside him on the bed, making the mattress bounce, but it wasn't quite enough to jolt him out of his trance. "I said, Lottie got sent home from school today."