Take Me Home

Chapter Eight

Zayn always goes to the children's home at four in the afternoon on a weekday to see Louis and Harry (and Liam too).

Today when he walked in through the door, he was surprised to see that Niall, the blond, angry, unhappy child whom he had only brought to the children's home the day before, was grinning and chatting Liam's head off.

"And then we played tag on the playground, didn't we, Lou? Luke said I'm a fast runner, didn't he?" he said, blue eyes darting from Louis - who was sitting at the kitchen counter - to Liam, who was cooking dinner.

Louis nodded slightly, looking tired. Zayn assumed he had been too excited at the thought of having a new roommate to have gotten a good night of sleep last night and turned his attention back to Niall, who had managed to climb up to sit on the counter beside Liam.

"You be careful running around with those ribs of yours, Ni," Liam told him, gently.

Niall just frowned. "Aren't you happy I made a friend? Luke's so cool, isn't he, Lou?" he asked, grinning again.

Louis smiled back at him slightly. "Yeah. Luke's nice."

It was only then that Niall noticed Zayn's presence, hopping off the counter top and running up to him with a grin.

"Zayn, I went to school!" he yelled, jumping up and down like an excited puppy. He pointed to a sticker on the front of his school jumper. "Look, the teacher gived me a sticker because she said my drawing was good in Geography. Louis got one too, 'cos we worked together. We drew an elephant, didn't we, Lou? It was the best in the whole class!"

Zayn grinned at the small boy. "That's awesome, Niall. I take it school isn't so bad after all, hm?" he said, smiling.

"No, I love it there. Liam, can I watch the TV?" he asked, in a way that was almost polite. Zayn was quite taken aback.

Liam chuckled at the taller man's expression and then nodded at the seven year old. "Course you can, sweetie."

"Louis, want to come? You can put on that superhero movie you were telling me about! I never watched a movie before," he rambled on, taking Louis by the hand and leading him away to the living room.

Zayn let out a surprised laugh, sitting on one of the stools at the counter.

"Wow. I don't think I've ever seen such a sudden change in a kid before," he commented.

Liam smiled. "I know, bless him. I think he just needed to be surrounded by kids his age, you know? He's spent his entire life surrounded by adults, and not nice ones at that. It's obvious to tell the poor kid just uses that anger to cover up how scared he is of living a normal life," he murmured.

Zayn nodded in agreement. "He's got a long way to go...you think he'll open up about whoever was hurting him out there at some point? We're gonna need to find out eventually so we can tell the police and they can find the bastard and throw him in jail," he said, his tone lined with anger because he only wished that nobody on the planet would hurt their kids but he knew that wasn't the case. He knew that very well...

"Hm," Liam sighed, turning to look at his close friend with warm brown eyes, pushing away all the apologies he wanted to spew out at him for pushing him away for so long, to explain to him just how much of an ass Michael was. He turned his thoughts back to Niall instead. "I don't know, Zee. I've worked with kids like Niall before, the ones who've been physically abused and hurt in so many ways. They either talk about it a lot or they don't talk about it at all."

Zayn leaned against the counter, folding his arms over his chest. "Well, I hope he decides to talk about it. I can't wait to see whoever hurt him behind bars. I know he's got a little temper on him but he's a good kid..." He smiled when he heard an unfamiliar giggle from the living room, knowing that it had come from the small blond. "At least he has Louis, though, huh? Those boys are good for each other."

Liam nodded slightly, then shrugged. "I don't know. I think something's up with Louis, have you noticed? He seems down about something, he's been clingy since this morning - he always seems to hold onto me before school lately. I think something might be going on," he stated.

Meanwhile, Niall was bouncing up and down on the couch beside Louis. The TV was on, an old cartoon of spiderman playing.

The blonde haired boy couldn't seems to keep himself still. He really had enjoyed school, and he was already picking up on his English and maths fast. But he knew he had to calm down, otherwise people might get mad at him, and he was worried that that was already the case with Louis.

The brown haired boy had barely said a word to him since lunch time, it felt as though they had swapped places. Niall couldn't tell if Louis was angry or otherwise, but he was sure that he had done something wrong - why else would he be ignoring him?

"Why aren't you happy, Louis? You told me this was one of your favourites," he said, finally settling down on the couch with a cushion on his lap.

Louis shrugged, keeping his eyes on the screen. "I am happy. M'just tired," he said.

Niall frowned, thinking for a moment before he nodded. "Yeah, me too. School was fun, but it went on forever. Do we go again tomorrow?" he asked, curious.

Louis nodded, almost regretfully. "We go every day, 'cept for Saturday and Sunday." He chewed his lip. "I hate it," he mumbled to himself, knowing that by now, Niall was staring at the TV again, not listening.

After perhaps ten minutes or so, Niall interrupted the silence again. "How come we get so much food here?" he asked, smelling the chips that Liam was cooking in the kitchen.

Louis shrugged. "I dunno, Liam and Cal buy it all from the shop."

Niall paused, frowning to himself as he remembered how he had ended up in the hospital - a store manager chasing him after he had stolen from his shop, a car coming out of nowhere, the pain -

He gulped and looked away from the TV as spiderman caught a thief.

"Um, I don't think I want to watch this anymore," he mumbled, his stomach flipping.

Louis frowned, glancing at the no longer grinning blond boy. "What? But I thought you -"

"I said I don't want to watch it anymore!" he snapped, crossing his arms over his chest.

Louis looked ready to cry, not liking being yelled at. He'd had enough of that for one day. He sighed as Liam called them for their dinner, turning off the TV. He watched Niall stomp ahead a little, wondering what he had done to make him mad - but then he remembered what Zayn had said once again, about how Niall was just scared and he wasn't used to any of this, about how sometimes he got angry because he didn't know what else to be.

His thoughts turned to more recent events instead, the events that made school unbearable. Suddenly, he didn't want to eat dinner anymore.

#

Later that night, Louis got into bed before everyone else. He pretended to be asleep when Zayn entered and tucked the duvet around him, pressing a kiss to his forehead.

When he left, he rolled over and cried silently into his pillow. He hated how he had truly believed that having Niall there with him would make it stop. He hated that he never defended himself, that he let them push him around and call him names, that he let himself get hurt and upset by it.

Then Niall came in, and Louis stopped crying and held his breath instead. He listened to the other boy pull his duvet off of his bottom bunk and set himself up on the ground instead, listened to him toss and turn and finally fall asleep before he too allowed himself to drift off.

But not before he thought about how bad tomorrow would be all over again...

EDITED 08.12.21