Chapter Text
Louis is getting ready for the last show of his European tour when Liam barges into his green room fuming with anger and a magazine Louis has never seen in his life in hands, waving it around and saying many words that Louis can’t distinguish, because he is a tad high and a lot drunk.
“… And this is why you’re going on a break before recording your next album whether you want it or not”, his manager finishes and shoves the magazine in Louis’ chest, before turning around and collecting bottles of beer, placing them on a table.
Liam is the same age as Louis, although most of the time he acts like a forty year old – when Louis doesn’t like him very much. Yes, he has his moments; yes, they are friends; yes, Liam knows him better than the entire fucking world; yes, Louis loves him – but he doesn’t necessarily like him. Louis doesn’t like many people these days.
When they first met, Louis was eighteen and had just signed his first real contract with a management company that had gotten him a great deal with a major label in the UK. Liam was an intern, still in uni and struggling to pay his bills, and Louis had related to him then.
Now, at twenty five, seven years and four albums later, Liam has grown into an uptight, rich son of a bitch and Louis wishes he was a bit different, if only not to scold him so much all of the time.
“What are you talking about, Liam?” He finally gives in and asks, looking down at the magazine that has Taylor Swift on the cover. He fucking hates her. Or has he hated fucking her? He does not remember. Hopes it’s not the latter.
“Fucking read it, Louis”, the man replies and Louis does so, sitting down on the couch and trying to focus on those tiny, tiny letters.
YOUNG MUSIC IS OFF THE RAILS, SAY EXPERTS.
Recently The Royal Academy of Music decided to write pieces on new musicians and the effect they have on people’s music tastes – and lives. With a great group of renowned professors and dedicated students, the article promises to come with surprising names on it.
Truth be told, it was about time someone took today’s English music seriously enough to write about it. We just didn’t know it wouldn’t be a good review at all – especially for Louis Tomlinson, world-wide sensation that, for what we can tell, is listed as the most plastic singer of our time, and, we quote “is going through a boy-bander crisis without ever being a boy-bander”.
“What?” Louis whispers and re-reads the last sentence.
The article continues, but Louis decides not to read it, because they start talking about other artists he doesn’t care at all.
“What the fuck is this and who the fuck wrote it?” He asks as angry as Liam was a couple of minutes ago, feeling a bit more sober now and sitting by his side.
“I don’t know, the article hasn’t come out fully yet- only some people had access to it to generate a buzz, I guess.”
“Well- they write bad things about me all the time, it’ll go away, yeah?” He tries to convince himself and Liam. He isn’t even lying. Louis has lost count of how many times people called him bad names throughout the years, he’s definitely got a thick skin.
“This is The Royal Academy of Music, Louis”, Liam looks at him concerned. “If it hits Social Medias, it’s not gonna be good.”
“I don’t wanna take a break, Liam”, Louis rolls his eyes and opens another Corona; he needs to get drunk again. “Now get me that cigarette over there, please”, he says and sags into the couch.
Liam doesn’t reply; he doesn’t get him the cigarette either. He only gets up with his frustrated expression on the highest level and tells Louis they will talk when he decides to take his career seriously for once. Louis ignores him, of course he does, looks up to the ceiling and waits for the nicotine and alcohol to work on his blood again so he can go on stage in half an hour.
Everything’s okay, he’s got it under control.
-
The article comes out at the end of January, when Liam is far away with his girlfriend and their families, somewhere in South America, and Louis is alone at home with Netflix and pizza. (And a few other substances he uses whenever the night’s too tough to deal with.)
Louis has some alerts set up on his phone to let him know what people are talking about him out there – not that he cares about what they say, he’s way past his phase, but since his manager is out, he promised he’d take a look at the articles every now and then.
He pauses in the middle of a gangster film and opens The Royal Academy of Music’s website, because that is where the source pointed anyway.
There are many names in there and many familiar ones listed, but Louis scrolls down until he finds his – it’s a link for a review on his first and his latest album as much as it is of his personality and who he is as an artist. There is a black and white picture of him and he scoffs at that, he can barely remember that photoshoot, but he remembers he hated it.
He braces himself to start reading the long review ahead.
Louis is livid. Actually losing his shit. Who the fuck does this… This Professor Harry Styles think he is to write these things about him? What now, just because he’s majored in music and works for the Royal Academy of Music he has the right to trash the last seven years of Louis’ life? He wants to murder this guy, but first he’ll check if his fan base isn’t doing it for him.
The fan base Louis loves. The fan base Louis has not forgotten. The fan base he most definitely does not ignore.
And then he goes on twitter. And then he realizes the last time he was online was to thank people for the birthday wishes… On the twenty-fourth of December. Okay, so maybe he hasn’t been that active. But he’s on a break (a forced one, but still a break).
Louis has been working nonstop since the first day he signed his contract. He’s always doing something – whether it is touring the world, recording collaborations, attending parties or taking small parts on TV shows, because he acts a bit –, so all of his songs were written on the road, about things he saw happening, about how fickle this world is. They are somewhat genuine and the reviewer can shove it. God, Louis is so angry.
(If Liam were here right now he’d tell him to not comment at all. He’d tell Louis to wait until somebody called his rep (meaning: Liam himself) asking for a comment and he’d tell Louis to lay low because he would handle it. But Liam isn’t here, now is he? No, Liam is probably tanning somewhere in Brazil, drinking caipirinhas and having lots of sex, while Louis is, for the first time in a long time, absolutely bothered with what he’s just read.
So he just types a thank you message to the fans, telling them not to worry, because some sixty year old guy who reviews music instead of making it can’t be right.)
It’s not even that he thinks the industry will stop caring about him or that his fans will suddenly realize some music expert is right, again: Louis is very rarely affected by what people think of him.
His problem, right now, is that Professor Harry attacked his music. His problem is that the guy said he hasn’t evolved from his 18 year old self. His problem is that while everyone is trashing the guy now on social media, Billboard is agreeing with the Royal Academy of Music and pointing his flaws on twitter. His problem is that he doesn’t want to believe what he’s just read about himself… But he kinda does.
And if there is one thing that Louis hates more than doubting himself, is doubting himself because of someone else’s words.
Louis’ phone rings in his hand and he’s only half-startled by it.
“You’ve already tweeted, great!” Liam says resigned, like he’s just seen it.
“Well, the guy was a prick.” Louis replies not even hinting to be sorry. He isn’t.
“And why is it so hard for you to let me do your damage control for once, Louis?” His manager whines on the phone; Liam might be a bit drunk, Louis reckons. He is too, so.
“Always had some trouble biting me tongue”, he shrugs knowing Liam won’t see it anyway.
“You’re proper pissed, aren’t you?”
“What gives?”
“Your monotone voice”, Liam tells him. “It’s always worse when you’re not screaming.”
“Maybe I just wanna match it with my monotone music…”
“Lou.”
“Don’t patronize me, Liam.” He cuts him off. “We’ll deal with this when you come back, yeah? I’ll stay away from social media if that’s what you want.” He offers.
“No- it… It’ll be good to interact with fans, keep doing that, show’em you care. Just—I know Harry”, he finally says.
“What?”
“The guy who wrote the piece on you. I mean-- I didn’t know he worked for them- haven’t seen him in ages, but I know the name.”
“He’s an idiot, clearly.” Louis states and an idea starts to form in his head. He cannot tell Liam about it, because chances are he’ll fly back to London just to stop him.
“Let it go, it’s already out there anyway- I’ll call some people tomorrow.”
“Yeah, yeah, whatever. I don’t care that you know him, can we hate him? I kinda hate him.” Louis goes for moral support and Liam chuckles on the other line.
“Yeah, Lou. Yeah, we can hate him from afar.”
They wrap up the conversation and Louis presses play on the movie again, promising himself he won’t think about this article anymore. Louis is fine: he’s got two more years of contract and he just knows they will renew it with him again and again and again, because he’s worth millions of pounds anyway; he’s about to start writing for his fifth album and the DVD of his latest tour will come out in a few months and sell brilliantly. Everything’s fine.
He still wakes up angry on Monday. Partly because he forgot to turn on the heater the night before, partly because he wishes Harry Styles had been a little kinder and less dickish towards his work. So after a well-deserved, super-hot shower, Louis finds himself driving to Marylebone where The Royal Academy of Music is located. He isn’t being petty; he just wants to know why.
Traffic’s not too bad and even though he needs to pay a toll, it’s still better than taking the underground and being recognized by at least five schoolgirls on their way to class. He hears his latest single on the radio and cringes at it, kind of hates it and turns it off, driving peacefully silent the rest of the way.
-
“Excuse me- hm”, he clears his throat at the front desk. As it turns out, the place is fucking huge. Louis thought he’d be able to just barge into the man’s office and ask for some explanation, but, well, he’ll have to adjust.
The blonde girl takes her eyes off of the computer screen and they widen with recognition as soon as they lay on Louis.
“Oh, hi, good morning”, she says, only a hint of flirt in her voice. Louis snorts internally and kind of wishes he could, better, wanted to flirt back.
“Morning, love”, he smiles. “Can you tell me where I can find Professor Harry Styles, please? I mean, is he even here today? Do you know him?” He asks as an afterthought. This place is so big that certainly not everyone knows everyone.
“Yes, everyone knows Harry”, she smiles back, brighter than before.
“Well then?”
“He’s here, but—it’s almost lunchtime, he’s probably at the cafeteria now”, the blonde says as if this is any help. “I can take you there, if you’d like? D’you have an appointment with the Professor?”
“No, hon, sorry. Just want a quick word, will that be possible?”
“It’s up to him”, and she seems to do her best not to shrug now. “Come one, I’ll take you there. Cover for me, Danny?” She turns to the guy by her side and he nods, politely nodding at Louis as well as they walk away. “I’m Jade, by the way. I actually study here, but I needed some money and they were hiring…”
“I get that”, he tells her.
“Right.” Jade snorts. “You seem to be doing pretty well for yourself, Louis Tomlinson”, she says.
“I was going to politely introduce myself you know?” He jokes as they walk. Everything around him is beautiful, balancing old and modern. She is lucky to be able to study at a place like this. Louis barely finished sixth form.
“There’s still time…”
“I’m Louis, nice to meet ya”, Louis laughs.
“Any chance I get a photo with you or is this a pretty secret visit?”
“Are you sure you want a picture with me? Won’t Professor Styles reprimand you for being a fan of such bad music?” He asks her and they both laugh. “Course you can.”
They stop for five seconds so she can snap a picture on her phone. Louis doesn’t remember the last time he took a picture with a fan – and it’s either because he was too stoned to remember or because it’s actually been too freaking long. Neither option is good anyways so he does not dwell on it.
Jade walks him for two more minutes and they finally reach an open area in the back of the college, where there are a few people chatting that pay no mind to them.
“Over there”, she points to a table where two guys are talking animatedly. One of them must be Professor Harry and the other seems to be a student.
Louis thanks her as politely as he’s been taught and makes his way to them, grateful that no one looks for too long or whispers where he passes by. It’s a nice feeling for once.
He didn’t know how he’d approach the man, but thankfully he doesn’t have to, because the student notices his presence as soon as he stops by the table and smiles up at him – too much lips and too bright teeth; Louis can consider that a gorgeous smile (to match his gorgeous face, because fucking hell, that guy could sell out stadiums just with his looks and curls; he’ll get back on that later).
“Louis Tomlinson”, the student says blinking rapidly at him.
“Hi” he says back and hopes he doesn’t sound too dismissive. “Professor Styles, I was hoping I could have a word with you…?” Louis asks trying to contain his disgust for the white-haired man. I knew he was sixty.
“And you intend to talk to me while looking at Professor Brown because…?” The younger man asks with a smirk on his face.
“I- you are- but.” Louis is seldom speechless.
Professor Brown laughs quietly and sips from what looks like orange juice.
“Professor Harry Styles, very nice to meet you”, the man stands up and wow, okay, unfair. Because he is tall. Taller than Louis. He’s also kind of gorgeous all over, not just his stupid face.
Harry Styles, who is most definitely not sixty, has mile long legs that are enveloped in the tightest pair of black, skinny jeans Louis has ever seen in his life (and that’s saying a lot, because Louis pairs are quite tight too), and defined torso and arms that are visible even though he’s wearing a thick brown sweater that matches his brown boots.
The young man in question wears glasses, but they are positioned on his head, holding his long, curly hair back and his eyes are so, so green that Louis can only imagine if he’d be blinded by the spark on them were they in the sun. He tries not to check him out and fails miserably, and he gets his composure back a few seconds too late.
“You’re a Professor? Seriously?” He asks completely thrown off balance.
“I am.”
“Well- we—we need to talk.”
“It’s my lunchtime, and Professor Brown was telling me a delightful story about his wife and a violin…”
“I’m pretty sure he can tell it later”, Louis responds. He’s not one to take sassiness from anybody. He’s the king of sass. “Can’t you, Professor Brown?” He turns to the older man again.
“Dinner at my house tomorrow, Harry?” He asks. “Daisy’s going to love to see you; you can bring Ben, of course.”
“Oh we-” Curly blushes. “We’re not- hm, together. Anymore. We. Yeah. I’d love too. If you’d have only me?” He asks in a completely different way from how he treated Louis and Louis watches the exchange absorbing the most important message of it all: Harry Styles is not straight. One more reason for him to keep his distance, clearly. He’ll just ask what he needs to know and go away. It’s a solid plan.
“Sure thing, Harry.”
“Bye then, Paul. Have a nice day”, he says and grabs his coat from behind the chair.
“You too- tell Cami to work on her semibreves—they were a bit shaky on her last test.”
“Will do, thank you”, he smiles one more time and then looks at Louis. “Shall we?” He asks leading the way. Louis hates to be bossed around, but complies with it and follows him anyway.
It’s an endless, painful walk. Endless because the place is big, as it has been previously stated, and painful, because Harry (Louis refuses to refer to a guy who looks his age as a Professor) has an insistent smirk on his face, glancing furtive looks at Louis like he’s in on a joke Louis knows nothing about. Also, it’s painful because Louis struggles not to ogle his small bum when he’s a few steps ahead.
Louis hates when this happens. He hates checking men out and he hates it even more when he can’t quite control whether he does it or not.
Finally, after they bypass what it sounds like a choir room, Harry opens a wood door to what seems to be his office.
The space is broad and still cozy; it has a piano, a guitar and a violin in display – Louis wonders if he plays all three instruments. It also has a huge, comfy-looking sofa and a desk, which is by an enormous window that faces a garden. There are a few pictures on the walls – pretty ones, if Louis says so himself – and a bookcase very well organized.
“Welcome to my office”, Harry says and closes the door as soon as Louis enters.
“Was expecting more”, Louis lies. “I mean, for someone with so much shit to say, I’d hope you’d have more trash bins around…”
“That is extremely impolite and I can forget it if you want to start again…” He says furrowing his brows.
“And why would I be polite with you?” He asks kind of exasperate, struggling not to laugh out of nervousness, suddenly remembering all of the things Harry said about him.
“If I were older, would you be less of a prick? Or it doesn’t matter because you’re too bitten about what I wrote?” Harry asks and sits down on his own couch. “You can sit, by the way.”
“I’d rather stand.”
“Fine by me”, he shrugs. “So, what do you want?”
“I—” Louis thinks. “I can’t believe you’re this young. How are you even a Professor? Shouldn’t you be in uni still?”
“First of all, I’ll have you known that the average age for completion of a Ph.D. degree is around twenty-six in the UK, which I intend to achieve. Second of all, I finished uni at 22, at which time I was already working here as an assistant, because I am that good and had already published some articles when I was still a student.” He points to a few magazines on the table, probably the ones in which his articles were published.
The most recent one Louis knows pretty well. He wants to shred that.
“Now that I hope I’ve gotten your prejudice with my age out of the way… What do you want?”
“How old are you?” Louis asks, still wanting to punch him. He can’t be gorgeous and have brains and be so young and- Damn.
“Twenty-four today”, he replies.
“Today’s your birthday?” Louis is incredulous.
“And you interrupted my birthday lunch, so. What does rock-star Louis Tomlinson need from me?” Harry claps and props one leg under his bum, sitting sideways on the couch before Louis can ask why Harry was having his birthday lunch at work with a guy who is probably triple his age.
And… How does he move underneath these clothes?
“Why did you write that about me?” He finally asks him. “I mean, it would’ve made sense if you were old and rejected current music, but you’re- you’re supposed to get it.” Louis frowns.
“Now, that’s just ridiculous”, Harry cackles. “I do not reject current music, Louis. Old people do not reject current music. We, at the academy, just don’t like bad music, which’s what you’ve been doing.”
“How- how d’you even- music is personal.”
“Lyrics are personal. Music is a science”, he argues.
“Well, you trashed my lyrics too.”
“They’re bad lyrics.” The other man says dismissively.
“People relate to them Harry, isn’t that what music is supposed to do?” Louis doesn’t risk raising his voice, but man does he want it!
“Yeah, but do you?”
“I wrote them!”
“And that makes it even worse- how—are you really proud of them?”
It hurts. A lot.
“Well I-”
“Shit”, Harry curses under his breath.
“That was mean”, is what Louis ends up saying. “But then again you wrote a mean article, so I should’ve expected it.”
“I’m not a mean person, I just… I judged what I listened to, okay?” He explains. “And what I listened was a bunch of bad bridges and repetitive chorus, too much auto-tune in your voice that didn’t translate those words. Except that sad one—about not falling in love... Terrible things, is it?”
Louis thinks for a second.
“So, let me get this straight, the only song you liked in all of my four albums was the one about my now dead father telling me about my then dead mother?” He asks and Harry nods, seeming unaffected. “Why?”
“It’s the only genuine one; your voice is clear in that song and—”
“My voice breaks in that song, Harry”, Louis tells him and finally flops down by his side. “It’s why I never perform it live.”
“Your voice breaks because you feel. Because it’s genuine. It’s not bad, it’s emotional.”
“Tell that to my label”, he snorts.
“They made you into—this. But you could’ve changed by now and you didn’t. This is what the article is about, you know? All of the articles, not only the one we wrote on you”, Harry explains again, patiently. “We get it, it’s hard to make it in this world and you guys need to fit the pop industry for a while there… But you’re established enough to change and you just… Don’t.”
“Keep the praises coming”, he laughs bitterly. Deep down, he wants to know where this is going.
Harry pauses for a while and then speaks again. Louis doesn’t like the way Harry makes him feel about himself at this moment.
“What is culture to you, Louis? When you think about music culture, what comes to your mind?”
“You mean classic music? We can’t all make classic music, Harold, it’s boring!” He argues.
“First of all, classic music is divine, not boring. Secondly, my name isn’t Harold.” Harry corrects him.
“Nice to know you care more about music than your own name…” Louis teases.
“I care more about music than I care about most things in life; it’s why I’m here. And I’m guessing it’s why you’re here too. So tell me.”
For that, Louis doesn’t need to think much. The names of his favorite bands come to mind in a heartbeat.
“The Beatles. The Police. The Rolling Stones. U2.” He’s a big fan of The Script, but he doesn’t dare put them in the same category as the others.
“They’ll live forever, won’t they?” Harry asks again like he’s explaining to a fourth grader instead of a twenty five year old man. Louis nods. “They are fixated culture. Fifty years from now, they’ll still be remembered.” Louis couldn’t agree more. “Will you?”
“I don’t know, I’ll have to wait and see it, won’t I?”
“No, Louis, trust me, you won’t”, he sounds frustrated. “You have potential, yeah, but you’re- like, rotating culture. You work for this generation, but they’re just waiting for the next big thing.”
“My music isn’t authentic enough, it’s what you’re saying.”
“Your music isn’t authentic enough.” Harry states.
“Thanks, Harry”, Louis says and gets up. He was expecting this Professor to be some kind of a jerk, and he still thinks Harry is a jerk, but he wasn’t expecting to be even more affected by his words in person than he was by the ones on the article.
Louis has a lot of thinking to do.
“Look, I’m sorry, okay?” Harry says getting up as well. “I don’t know everything, but this is what I study—this is what I’ve been studying for years, Louis. Your songs all blend into one and your lyrics are-”
“Fuck you, honestly!” Louis loses it. “You don’t know me. How do you even know I don’t relate to them?”
“Have you ever even had sex with a girl, Louis?”
“What does that have to do with this conversation?” He asks completely outraged.
“You have tons of songs about sex- and they’re just awkward like you don’t enjoy it at all, isn’t familiar with enjoying it. So you’re either very bad at it or in the closet and no one’s showed you properly how good it is.” Harry finishes.
“This is very invasive, Professor Harry Styles”, Louis responds. He could have him sued. “What a fucking waste of my-”
“You are in the closet, aren’t you?” Harry then asks. “Fuck”, he chuckles. “You’re trouble, Louis Tomlinson.”
“You’re a dick.”
“You like dicks, so.”
“You go around assuming everyone’s sexualities?” Louis spits.
“Only when they’re good looking rock-stars that check me out whenever they think I’m not paying attention”, Harry answers cheekily.
“Okay, I’m outta here”, because he’s had enough. “You can take your article and shove it up your ass, and I’ll go back to my loaded bank account and my enormous fan base, which I love, by the way, and keeps on growing.”
“Hey, if that does it for you”, Harry raises both of his hands defensively and walks towards the door. “It was a pleasure meeting you, Louis.”
“Wish I could say the same”, he replies offering him a brittle.
“Oh, by the way…” Harry calls before he goes. “I’d rather have other things shoved up my ass, although I often prefer the other way around”, he blinks.
“Happy freaking birthday”, Louis says and walks out of that room.
-
It takes two more weeks for Liam to arrive, because as his family came back to England, he and Sophia – his now fiancé – decided to spend Carnival in Rio de Janeiro; fuck them, really. But when he gets back what he finds isn’t much different from what he left: Louis on a couch with spliffs around him and now an empty bottle of vodka. He isn’t even paying attention to the TV, but makes Liam ring the doorbell for at least two minutes before he gets up and walks towards the door.
He stumbles a bit on his way and struggles to fit the right key to unlock the door, but when he finally manages it, he’s faced with a way too tanned Liam – or maybe three of him.
“You’re drunk”, is the first thing he says when he sees Louis.
“I missed you too, Lima bean!” Louis salutes him and smiles big, saying the words a bit louder than necessary.
“Hello, idiot”, his friend smiles and hugs him. “Shower, now. Gonna make coffee, we got work to do.”
“Soooo serious always Leeeyuumm.” He rolls his eyes and turns around, grabbing a floor lamp for support and almost knocking it over. “What work?”
“The article? Remember? You have two radio interviews- one of them is American.”
“Ain’t I on a break? Break means no interviews”, Louis whines and draws a no in the air with his finger.
“Just those two, so other people have something to work with”, one of the Liams in front of him reasons. “Shower. Now.”
Louis listens to him and goes to the bathroom. Liam is probably the only person that gets in his nerves but also convinces him to do stuff – maybe it’s some long-life bond. Go figure.
After 15 minutes and the water going cold, Louis steps out of his bathroom and into the bedroom, lying on the bed enveloped on two towels and in desperate need of a nap.
One day, in the future, Louis is going to tell Liam how much he loves him and how thankful he is for having him, because when he wakes up again it’s dark and he’s wearing joggers and a jumper, he’s under the covers and Liam is still there, by his side, scrolling calmly on his tablet waiting for Louis to speak.
“Coffee’s cold, but it’ll do its job”, he says when he notices Louis is still a bit lost and then hands him the cup.
Louis sips from it and “argh, I hate this”, he voices hoarsely. His voice’s always shit after he drinks too much and goes straight to sleep without having tea (or hot coffee) and water afterwards.
“Did you put me in these?” He then asks, referring to his clothes.
“I’ve seen your dick too many times already, I swear to God”, Liam chuckles.
“Yeah, yeah. Thanks.” Louis replies and sits up. “So, congratulations are in order then…”
“Thank you”, Liam smiles sheepishly and scratches his neck. He always does that whenever he’s nervous or shy. Or both. “Louis, are you okay?” He asks knowing he won’t get an answer. Still. He asks.
“I’m paying for your wedding”, is what Louis replies.
“No way.”
“Yes way. It’ll be my gift. Just—just give my credit card to Soph, yeah?”
“You don’t have to do that.”
“I know. I want to”, he shrugs. “Plus, I need to soften you before you lecture me on drinking and smoking every single day for the past month…” Louis chuckles. “And then you’ll scold me even more when I tell you that I went to talk to this Harry Styles…”
“You- WHAT?” He’s alarmed. Yeah, Louis imagined he would be.
“But, strangely, there was no repercussion—no one wrote anything about it, so”, he says dismissively. “They only wrote about me going out twice after the article, and both times I was buying frozen food and alcohol.”
“I’ve already told you, you can have someone bring this stuff in for you—I’ve lost count of how many articles exist out there about you having an alcohol addiction…” Louis knows where this is going, so he doesn’t respond.
You see, Liam is sure Louis is an alcoholic. But Louis isn’t. He can go a couple of days without it if he puts his mind to it, he just doesn’t see a reason to, and so he doesn’t put much effort in it. Alcohol is liquid – Louis needs liquids. Win win.
“So… You met Harry.” He states then.
“He’s not sixty”, Louis responds and Liam frowns.
“I never told you he was sixty…”
“I assumed.”
“Only you, Louis…” Liam smiles. “Nah, we went to school together, when my family moved to Holmes Chapel, and then we went to uni together… He was a good friend, we had plans to continue being friends, but life took us to different paths…”
“’S why the internet’s there, dear Liam!” Louis jokes and his friend shrugs, pointing he doesn’t exactly want to talk about it so Louis lets it go. “Hey, when are my interviews?”
“One’s tomorrow, the other is next week—figure we’d keep the buzz going”, he says. “Your fans seem pleased you were online recently”, Liam goes into manager mode, hinting that Louis should do that more often. “You should do that more often”, he then proceeds to voice these thoughts. Louis snorts. “It doesn’t hurt to tweet, Lou.”
“There’s nothing to tweet about, Liam.”
“You can tweet about your charities!” He suggests like it’s a brilliant idea. For some people, maybe.
“So what? They’ll say I’m just trying to gain sympathy which would actually be true and I- that’s not why I do charity.” And… Louis also doesn’t know exactly why he does it.
Of course he is very rich, to the point where he doesn’t know what to do with his money anymore because there’s just too much of it and no family to spend it on, no friends to spoil and no personal desires to fulfil. At first, charity was the obvious choice: every celebrity does it, right?
Nowadays, though, Louis finds himself caring more than he did a couple of years ago, when he started. He’s met with the kids a few times, but it’s been a long while if he says so himself – mostly because he was nine months on tour during 2015, but also because in order to play with them, he’d need to wear less eyeliner, brush his hair and not smell like a mixture of Heineken and Marlboro.
He still thinks it’s important to donate, though. Most of those kids really need all the money they can get, and he every now and then checks how they’re doing on the love-department as well (thankfully all of them have parents or representatives of parents around)… Even if they’re all probably going to die soon, which is the saddest part and one of the reasons Louis fights Liam every time he wants to make this public.
“Tweet about football. Celebrity Big Brother. Tea. Whatever. Answer a few questions, show you care…”
“I’ll do better, promise”, he says as a means to finish this conversation. “Also—d’you still have that Niall guy’s number?”
“The Irish song-writer?” Liam asks. Louis doesn’t know why he asks when he already knows, but Liam is the kind of person who always needs to triple-check everything. He just nods. “Probably. Why?”
“I wanna collab with him- for my next album. Can we make this happen?”
“You only need to start thinking about your next album two months from now. You’re only going back to the studio in May- plus, you said he was shit.” He points.
Niall Horan is good, actually, which is probably why Louis hated him at first: he could write about things, feelings that Louis couldn’t. He isn’t famous, he doesn’t care about being famous and he uses pseudonyms to make sure he stays not famous.
“He’s different. I wanna try something different”, he shrugs.
“Is it because of the article? Lou, you don’t need to make music you’re not comfortable with because Harry said it isn’t good.”
“Do you think it’s good, Liam?” Louis asks him.
If he thinks hard enough, he’s sure he can remember Liam criticizing his first album when it came out, but he doesn’t want to.
“I like it, Louis. But most importantly, your fans love it.”
“Do they love it or do they love me?” He retorts with a question. Liam’s speechless. “They like me, therefore they listen to my music and they buy it—but for once I’d like them and other people to like my work before they like me as a person”, Louis confesses and leaves out the fact that most of the time he doesn’t understand why they like him as a person. He isn’t a very good one.
“You shouldn’t have been this affected by an article- shit.”
“I’m not, I just- I wanna do better, I don’t know.”
Deep down, Louis wants to find out if he can do better, because he isn’t entirely sure of it.
“I can call Niall, of course- we can set up a meeting for the first week of May, yeah?” Liam offers him a small smile. Louis nods and smiles too, getting up to order some pizza.
-
For the next week Louis’ job is to stay sober. He does the radio interview the next day and he sets up a new record: he’ll stay sober until, at least, the next radio interview on the other week.
He slips twice and has a few beers at dinner with Sophia and Liam on the weekend – when he himself gives her one of his credit cards, because Liam was pretending he had never offered (Liam hates taking things from Louis – “you already pay me a salary, stop spoiling me”) –, but, apart from that (that meaning he was driven home because he wasn’ stable enough to drive), everything went okay.
It’s been two weeks now, though, and he didn’t know this break would be so fucking hard. Maybe it’s nice for people who have lots of friends to go out with and travel, maybe backpack somewhere unusual, but for Louis it just means the same old walls from his apartment and binge watching more TV shows than he can remember the name.
For a world-famous person, it’s a weird, very weird life, the one he lives. It’s not that Louis doesn’t know people – hell knows he’s acquainted with at least sixty percent of Hollywood and London’s high society. He’s got connections in fashion and in music, of course. Even on TV. But those are—what were the words Harry used? oh Rotational. Those are rotational friends. Louis can’t see himself being friends with them fifty years from now and he sure as hell can’t see himself spending more than a few hours with them nowadays either.
His soberness is lost when he starts thinking about what the fuck is so wrong with him that people never stayed in his life. Or, better yet, why he never stayed in other people’s lives.
It’s easy to say that people always leave, because it’s 100% accurate. Louis happens to be one of them and he can say, first hand, that he isn’t better off because he is the one doing the leaving, especially because of the reasons he never allows himself to stay. He doesn’t think about that often and, when he does, it’s because he’s on his seventh beer.
On the ninth beer, he calls Liam. It’s nine pm on a Friday, so of course his manager doesn’t pick up. He tries three more times, just to be sure, but it’s a lost cause already. He then decides to do some writing, but he can’t hold the pen, because his vision is blurred and so is his mind.
Everything is blurred and everything is spinning and he is quite sure that if he moves from the kitchen floor right now he’ll fall down and hurt all over, so he just folds himself against the stove and closes his eyes, praying that his back doesn’t hurt too much when he wakes up.
If anybody ever found him there, what a great headline that would provide!
-
Lou, talked to Niall and scheduled a meeting, he says he’s excited to work with you and he’ll be in town in two weeks – we should hang out and schedule studio hours and everything together... Dinner at mine or pub for pints? It rhymed!
Have a nice weekend, mate.
Louis reads Liam’s email first thing in the morning when his mouth’s still dry and his back is most definitely killing him and even if he’s feeling bad, physically, he manages a small smile – a cautious one. Louis is cautious about everything, but mainly about being happy. Happiness is a feeling that is very easily shattered and Louis can’t quite handle things breaking around him anymore – not like he used to, anyway.
He’s still hangover when he goes out for breakfast (after brushing his teeth and changing his clothes) and he allows himself to play how the conversation with the lad will go, which brings him to another internal debate, one he’s been avoiding since his conversation with Liam: how does one simply make good music out of the blue after seven years doing the same thing? What is considered good music?
He calls Harry. Well, not Harry. He calls The Royal Academy of Music after doing a quick research on google, typing with one hand and holding a mocha latte with the other.
“Hi, I’d like to talk to Harry Styles?” He kind of asks.
“I’m sorry, sir, Professor Styles is not in on Saturdays…” The guy voices.
“Oh, hm- could I- could I have his number?”
“I’m sorry again, sir, but we’re not allowed to disclosure Professors’ personal information…” He says politely. “He’ll be here first thing on Monday, maybe then…?”
“Yeah, yeah, sure. Thanks.” Louis says a bit crestfallen and doesn’t do much for the rest of the weekend, doing some research on the Academy and reading the other articles the professors wrote on some other artists.
He wasn’t the only one who got criticized, but he definitely took one of the hardest hits, which only makes him even more invested in doing better now. He still kind of wants Harry to go to hell with all of his musical-superiority, but when he enters The Academy on Monday afternoon, being annoyingly papped as he does so, he’s also a bit more open to hear what he has to say – that is, if the guy doesn’t act like an asshole. Louis has an asshole quota in his life that he fills all by himself, he doesn’t need another one.
It isn’t the Jade girl on the front desk this time; apparently she’s from the morning shift and is only there until one pm. Instead, he’s faced with an older lady that has a kind look on her face but shows toughness when she tells him that he can’t go into Harry’s office without scheduling an appointment.
“But I called!” He argues. “No one said I had to schedule a damn- sorry- hm, anything”, he says.
“Well, dear, I can see if he’s out of class and willing to talk to you… What’s your name again?”
And. Louis doesn’t expect everyone to know who he is, he isn’t that smug, but it’s weird when people don’t recognize his face these days.
“Louis Tomlinson”, Louis tells her and she nods unimpressed, picking up the phone.
“Harry, my love!” She says with clear affection in her voice. She smiles a bit too. “You’re not in class, good! There is a young man here who claims to be Louis Tomlinson that wants to speak to you, but I don’t know if he is the real one…” Well, at least she knows who he is, just not what he looks like. Louis is secretly a bit more pleased.
“Hm, lemme see” the lady studies him. “Smaller than you, for sure. Blue eyes. Wants me to think he’s better than everyone else…” Louis frowns at that. What? “Definitely him, dear. I’ll send him in”, she smiles and hangs up the phone.
Louis wants to protest that he absolutely does not think he is better than everyone. Or anyone. She definitely doesn’t know him. Harry doesn’t either. He shouldn’t be surprised or hassled by their conclusion, so he ends up saying nothing. Maybe things are getting under his skin too easily – he keeps in mind to ask his dealer for something other than just marijuana next time he calls him; Louis is never hassled when he’s floating.
“Harry says you can go in, d’you know the way?”
“I-hm, I think I can remember, yeah”, he tells her. “Thank you”, Louis tries his kindest smile and she’s only half impressed.
The woman doesn’t respond and Louis nods, making his way into the hall on the right.
When he went to Harry’s office exactly three weeks ago, he was going from the cafeteria, so it takes him almost fifteen minutes to locate himself around the place and get to the right room.
It isn’t a bad walk, though. Louis goes around admiring the architecture but also listening to some people that are still in their classrooms. He can hear voices singing but he can also hear cellos and what sounds like acoustic guitars as he walks by each room.
There aren’t many people in the hallways – he figures it’s late enough that most of them have already gone home or to their dorms, but the few that he passes by recognize him, and he tries and keeps a low profile. Louis is never the first one to talk to people wherever he goes, it doesn’t really matter if they’re fans or not.
He knocks twice and the door opens almost immediately.
“Took you long enough”, Harry says.
“Seems like you were eagerly waiting for me by the door…” Louis responds and lets himself in, hearing the soft click of the door when Harry closes it behind them, much like he did the first time.
“Don’t flatter yourself, I was actually going out, thought you’d given up.”
“This place’s just pretty big”, he defends himself and Harry laughs a bit, nodding and agreeing with him.
Harry looks different today. Louis didn’t want to notice, but, once again, it’s not like he’s got much control over this kind of thing; he just kinda… Notices it. Him.
The professor is still wearing skin-tight jeans, but today his boots are black – very shiny, but not sparkly, they just look brand-new. He’s not wearing a button up this time; instead, he has a loose grey shirt on that is a bit too informal for this place.
None of that is what throws Louis off balance, though. When they met, Harry had his long hair falling onto his shoulders, but now he’s got them up on a loose bun with few curls escaping it. And he is wearing his glasses.
Professor Harry Styles is a freaking view at this moment – one Louis only admires from afar and for very few seconds.
“You get used to it”, Harry shrugs pulling him out of his thoughts. “So, what do you want?” He asks.
If it were anyone else saying it, it could’ve seemed either smug or plain rude, but Harry asks with genuine curiosity, and Louis makes himself comfortable on that huge sofa once again.
“I’m still trying to understand how you’re a professor being so damn young…” Louis confesses even though this is not why he is here.
“I’m good, Louis”, Harry shrugs and laughs hoarsely. “I finished high school early, started and finished uni early… I’m actually working on my PhD right now.”
“You’re kidding me”, Louis scoffs.
“I’m not.”
“In what?”
“Music education”, the curly one replies easily. “As much as I love it here, I’ve always wanted to work with kids who are into classic music, because it gets pretty boring when you start that early on, and I think it’s important to know how to handle them and make them love it as much as I do…” He tells him. “By the time I’m twenty-six I’ll be able to start doing that, I hope.”
Harry says it and then shakes his head as if he shouldn’t have spoken so much. It took him longer than the average human would’ve taken to say those few words, but Louis didn’t mind.
“I ramble a lot”, Harry kind of apologizes.
“’S okay”, Louis finds himself saying. “Have you always loved it? Music, I mean.”
“Always, but my sister played a major role in what I chose to do with my life…”
“How so?”
Harry eyes him suspiciously like he doesn’t understand why Louis is so interested in his interest for music and if Louis is being truthful, he doesn’t quite know either, but he just nods encouraging him to continue speaking. Harry sits across from him on an armchair before he starts talking again.
“Gemma’s always loved classic music and bugged mom to take us places, since we were little—as a kid she’d prefer to stay home and watch the Orchestra on TV than cartoons and stuff, and I looked up to her so much that I wound up loving it too.” Harry kind of travels somewhere else when while tells his story, Louis watches as he goes. “Got my first guitar at fourteen and it was love at first sight”, he chuckles.
“Where’s Gemma now?”
“She plays violin at the London Symphony Orchestra.”
“You’re shitting me!”
“No”, he laughs. “She’s the youngest there too… But she is very, very good. Always nagging me about my violin skills.”
“How many instruments do you play?” Louis is doing his best to not turn this into an inquisition.
“A few”, Harry answers sheepishly. “She masters one of the most difficult ones, though, so—don’t know, I think it’s more impressive.” He pauses. “What about you?”
“Me? Oh. Hm. Guitar, electric guitar and the piano…”
“The p- when I researched you there was no—you play the piano?” Harry asks perplexed and Louis nods while he ruffs out a laugh. “Why does no one know that?”
“My songs don’t allow me to play it, now do they?” He asks and sounds only a little bit bitter. “It’s something I like to keep to myself, ‘s all.”
“You seem to keep many things to yourself”, Harry hints.
“Do not go there”, Louis warns him and turns cold immediately. Harry notices it and averts his gaze, clearing his throat and waiting for Louis to speak again. “What makes music good for you? What do you listen to? Apart from classic stuff.”
“Lots of things”, he replies. “From Ed Sheeran to Beyoncé.”
“I know Ed!” He’s one of the few people in the industry that Louis, on his good days, would consider having in his life fifty years from now.
“Yeah, me too”, Harry rolls his eyes. “He’s- Gemma kind of, hm, slept with him? Once or twice? We all went out for drinks, made a fool of myself of course because he had just released a new album and it was the only thing I’d been listening for weeks…”
Louis laughs. He quite likes the idea of Harry acting like a fan boy. Okay, focus.
“What makes Ed’s music so good, then?”
He tries not to sound jealous and he doesn’t know if he accomplishes it, but Harry is kind enough to not point it and answers him.
“It’s authentic”, he says simply. “It’s simple and it’s authentic and the way he handles the guitar is insane—he’s got some runs that Jesus. Plus, some of his lyrics speak to me- like, on a personal level.”
“And mine don’t.”
It slips before he can control himself and Harry looks into his eyes for the first time in a long time half alarmed. His intention was not to hurt Louis and Louis knows that, isn’t even hurt per se, just kind of disappointed in himself.
When he was younger, he had a vision of what his life would turn out in case he ever made it. Now he’s made it and it’s 80% of what he imagined it’d be – most people would consider this a success. For Louis, it just proves how dumb and naïve someone is at 15 when they start thinking about becoming famous. Granted, back then he still had his dad, but. Things change. He should’ve adjusted and he didn’t. Now here he is.
“It’s why I’m here”, Louis rushes to say before Harry apologizes. He knows he was going to. “I want your help.”
“Are you sure validation isn’t the right word?” Harry frowns. “Because, Louis, my professional opinion won’t change just because you’re being nice.”
“I don’t want your professional opinion on my work to change. I wanna do better work, so you and everybody else can have a new opinion”, he states simply.
“You- what?”
“Look, Harry, I don’t care about much in life nor do I have much in life that is actually worth caring about. Do not give me a speech, it is what it is and I’m okay with that. But-” he pauses. “I do care about music. My music. And I want it to live. There’s only one thing worse than being dead, and that is being forgotten. I wanna leave something good here and I don’t know if I can, but I’m kind of invested in finding out.”
“Okay…”
“So. Will you help me? I can pay you, of course; can have my manager ask the lawyers to draw up a contract and whatnot…”
He’d tell Harry that his manager is Liam Payne and ask if he remembers him, but he doesn’t want the Professor’s decision to be biased.
“How would I help you?”
“Anyway you could…” Louis offers. “You’re clearly qualified and not nearly as stupid as the people I usually work with, so—whatever you have to- like, teach me—I’m up for it.”
“Can I think about it?” Harry questions him and for the first time tonight Louis can see the tiredness in his face.
Although still very handsome, Harry’s got purple circles around his eyes and seems to be in need of a lot of sleep.
Louis nods and Harry seems to even breathe better.
“Ok, hm- can I have your phone contact? And I’ll call you once I’ve made a decision?” Harry asks standing up and Louis understands it as it’s time for you to leave, so he does the same. “I’m not being an ass on purpose I just- with the PhD and the teaching thing… It’s just really hard to manage time and I need to check my schedule.” It seems that there’s some other reason behind those two, but Louis doesn’t point it and just goes along with Harry’s answer.
“It’s fine, mate, don’t worry”, Louis tells him and takes Harry’s phone from his hand, typing his number. “Here, you can save me as the one who wants to evolve”, he snorts.
“Gonna save you as Lou for now, if that’s okay”, Harry smiles at him and Louis smiles back. Control your damn face, his brain tells him. “I’m big on nicknames”, Harry shares as an afterthought. Louis doesn’t buy it.
“Yeah, whatever”, he dismisses it. “Thank you for your time, Harry”, Louis tells him and moves to leave.
“How did you get here?” Harry asks. “Did you drive?”
“Nah, took a cab, I drank a few beers earlier- it’s never a good idea to mix those two.”
Louis drank lots of beer after lunch, to say the truth. And then smoked some weed. He was starting to sober up when he came here, but the idea of this conversation going wrong also brought I’m gonna drink afterwards feelings, so he thought it’d be better if he didn’t drive at all. If anything, Louis is a responsible addict. Not that he is an addict, not at all.
“Smart”, Harry points. “I can give you a lift, if you’d like, I’m going home myself now…”
Yeah, a car with Harry... Not gonna happen. He can’t be getting any ideas for the sake of his own mind and body.
It’s a bad thing, and he’s sort of aware of it, but anytime Louis starts to pay too much attention to a guy, he finds a girl to be his next girlfriend. He doesn’t like it much, but he doesn’t mind the sex – much, also. He doesn’t want to go through the emotional distress of handling a relationship right now, so he just avoids paying attention to any guy at all.
It may seem counterproductive to ask Harry to help him, in this circumstance, but he figures that, with time, he’ll stop being so mesmerized by his sight and handle it a lot better. One day, for sure. Today is not that day yet.
“Thanks, I still got a few things to do and I’m sure they’re out of your way.”
“No, I can-”
“Thank you, Harry, that’s very kind of you. Bye”, he says and then leaves the room, less smoothly than he intended to, but, as he said: it is what it is.
At ten pm, when Louis has given up on being productive and curled up in bed with a book he’s always wanted to read and some really hot tea, he gets a text from an unknown number confirming that yes, he will be able to help Louis – mainly on weekends, but they can make it work.
Absentmindedly, Louis saves it as Hazz. Maybe he’s big on nicknames too.