I Want to Write You a Song

We Gotta Get Better

Louis is isn't dead, but he isn't alive either. He's a skeleton with flesh and a pulse. A pulse, but not a heart. That died with Harry.

It's been a week since Harry's death, and Louis is deteriorating. The problem is, he simply doesn't care.

He lies motionless on the carpet. His muscles eventually go stiff, painfully stiff, but moving to the bed is out of the question. It's haunted by ghosts of sleepless nights, tangled up in each other's limbs. By lazy morning kisses with sunlight warming their skin through the window. By pillowfights, movie nights, and sloppy drunk sex.

Yeah, he can handle the pain in his muscles. Welcomes it even. It's the first thing he's felt in ages.

Eventually, there's a knock on the door.

Louis wants to scream "Go away! Leave me the fuck alone! Let me rot in this fucking bedroom I don't fucking care!"

But he doesn't say a word. He hasn't uttered a single word all week, and wonders if his voice would even work if he tried.

The door opens anyways.

Liam takes in the scene around him, and feels his heart being tugged at. Unmade, unwashed bedding, dirty clothes, molding dishes, and empty cigarette cartons litter the room. Louis lays slouched over in the eye of it all, tiny and pale.

Louis isn't the only one at a loss for words.

Liam stares at him for a moment. His eyes are full of hurt, but still warm. He tries to read Louis' eyes, but all he sees are glassy shells. Empty.

Liam sighs. "I'm so sorry, Louis."

Louis is unreadable, as his lips tighten and he further curls in on himself. Liam kneels slowly beside Louis, moving dangerously slow as if to not spook him.

"Can't just... stop living..." Liam stumbles on his words, "because then... then he's really gone."

Louis laughs coldly, and utters his first words all week. "That doesn't make any fucking sense," His voice is full of so much venom that it doesn't even sound like his own. It isn't really his though, is it? It's all his pain talking. That's all there is left now. Pain. "I hate to break it to you, but clearly he's fucking gone."

"Not really though..." Liam pauses, searching for the right words, "When I think of you, I think of him. I can't help it. And when I think of him, I think of you too. It's always been like that and it always will be."

Louis' face contorts in confusion. Where was he going with this?

Liam continues, "You... you are an extension of him. If you keep living... it's like he's still here... kinda. Live for him, okay? So he can live on too in a way."

...

That night in his dreams, Louis visits the beach alone.