Archive of Our Own

Louis opens her eyes to greet the familiar sight of her bedroom ceiling; the one that’s been in the same place for years, giving her the feeling that it’s about to tell her something new. Clean enough to hide the paint blemish and to allow her to count its cracks, yet abstract enough to make her avoid counting the cracks in her own life. An exercise she finds preferable in the morning to waking up and facing the consequences of simply being alive. 

For one glorious second, she thinks this might be a day where she doesn’t have to wake up. Maybe this is one of those rare moments where she can manage not to notice the warm, breathing body next to her, or in other words; when time hasn’t caught up with her yet–and she closes her eyes again as if taking this responsibility very seriously; because opening her eyes would let in not only the light, but also…Acceptance.

What a big word with a shit ton of letters. Can anyone even say that in one breath? Sits goddamn heavy in the chest, too. 

Acceptance is, however, not something Louis is particularly good at, especially when it comes to time, because time, for some reason, has never been her friend. Punctuality’s always been a privilege denied. 

Her head throbs, and her mouth feels as though it’s been marinating in pure regret overnight. Being used to the feeling, hangovers are not alarming in themselves; this is London, after all. This is what happens when you say yes to one more glass of absinthe because you don’t want to go back to a flat that costs more than it deserves and smells heavily of damp no matter how much bleach you use. Not that the city pays enough attention to judge, but it definitely has Louis’ tabs open, peeking and laughing at her whenever she’s on the edge of ruining things. 

This is probably one of those moments, Louis thinks, as the body next to her shifts, heat chasing heat, inching closer than welcome. Louis dares to open her eyes again, staring resolutely at the ceiling. She doesn’t even know her name. She rummages through her brain with the urgency of thinking you’ve lost your phone because you can’t find it in your pocket, but comes up absolutely empty. Not even a single letter. Not even a vibe-based approximation she can lie to herself with. 

Oblivious to Louis helplessly drowning in her own stream of consciousness, the girl groans, rolling onto her back, blinking at Louis like she’s surprised to find her there, but she smiles anyway. Girls in her bed always smile like this. They think Louis’ approachable and friendly, until they get close enough to hear what she is thinking. 

“You don’t remember my name, do you?” 

She is either too close or a mind reader for real. 

“I remember you hating small talk.”

The girl exhales a brief laugh. “I hate most talk, to be fair.”

“Me too,” Louis answers. “But I cope a little bit differently, I guess.”

“Yeah, you avoid it.”

Oh, so, she’s been paying attention. 

“That I do.”

“Someone has to,” she says, nodding. “I mean, we’d hate each other by Monday, anyway.” 

“I’m busy on Monday.” 

The unknown girl lifts her eyes to the ceiling, as if trying to understand what Louis finds so fascinating up there. “Then why didn’t you leave me alone last night?”

Louis shrugs. “You kind of seemed tolerable in the dark.”

“Wow,” she says. “High praise.”

“I don’t give it often, you know.”

“Figured.” The girl eyes her for a second. “Well, this has been way too intimate, Lewis,” she says, reaching for her own clothes. “Now, if you’ll let me, I need exactly ten minutes to emotionally recover.”

Okay, that’s actually pretty funny. 

Louis huffs a laugh before she can stop herself. “Alright, I should go before this turns into an actual conversation, then.”

“God forbid.”

She sits upright, which is a mistake she pays for instantly because her skull is ringing inside her head. She reaches for a t-shirt, probably from yesterday, but Last Penny opens at eleven and she’s running far too late to put together a decent combination of clothes. 

She finds one boot and her leather jacket she’s had since Doncaster that she will probably die in. It’s worn out and smells like an ashtray, but it’s cheaper to outlast fashion trends; wait long enough and your junk will be trendy again, sooner than you can consider participating in whatever new, flashy shit everyone’s following. 

When she has a decent enough amount of clothing on to step outside, she pauses at the door, turning back to the girl who is still staring at the ceiling. 

“Take care?”

“Will do,” she says easily. “Try not to remember my name halfway down the street.”

Louis smiles. “No promises, love.”

And then she’s gone. 

✧ ✧ ✧

Outside, Peckham is unusually loud for a Saturday, as busy as a late morning ever gets. The city looks characteristically tired, people easing themselves into the day. Everything smells of fried food and grease, and Louis takes her time walking to work, not bothering to care about the smell clinging to her clothes. They already smell awful and way past saving anyway, having been soaked in enough vodka the night before to qualify as a fire hazard. Her jacket seems to be eager to prove that point when she lights a cigarette, cupping the shaky flame with her hands and inhaling slowly, like the world can wait while she finishes a drag, like she has all the time in the world. 

But the world is already on its feet to remind her that it's not the case. She doesn’t have all the time in the world. In fact, she owes the world roughly thirty-five minutes. 

She slows down even more. It gives her the illusion of control, even though control means losing money. And losing money means eventually having to explain to her mum why she’s still behind on rent despite having a Master’s degree–a truly irreplaceable achievement that continues to impress absolutely no one (but most importantly, her landlord). 

By the time she arrives at the pub, the shutters are already up, though the sign is still dark, which means Last Penny has been open for no more than fifteen minutes, which also means Niall has covered the morning shift for her. 

Louis stubs the cigarette under the heel of her boot, and pushes the door open hard enough to make it bang. 

Niall looks up from the bar with an easy grin, blue eyes flicking over her. “Afternoon, sunshine.” 

Louis glares at him. “Why are you so chirpy?”

“Why are you not wearing a bra?”

Louis’ hands instinctively move to her chest. Right. That would be it. To be fair, she did have the unsettling certainty that something of critical importance had been left behind. Something like support –not that she’s used to having that around here– but still, she draws in a slow breath, hoping the damp Peckham air might contain a measure of patience today. 

It doesn’t offer any. 

She drops her hands off her chest and accepts the consequences and lets gravity do its thing. 

Niall doesn’t wipe the annoying grin off his face, polishing a pint glass slowly. “I like it. Free-range.”

Louis rolls her eyes as she moves to the other side of the bar, crunching down to duck under the counter. “Don’t talk about my tits, you prick. I haven’t even had my first coffee yet.”

“Be nice to me,” Niall says, throwing the towel at her head. “I covered your shift.”

Louis tosses it back without looking. “Against my will.”

“Still I did it.”

“Very generous of you, lad, obviously,” she mocks, already running through the opening routine like Niall isn’t even there. “Less generous with the announcement, though.”

“God forbid if I take a bit of credit for my sacrifices.”

Louis puts on her apron, and silently, for the first time, feels thankful for the apron for hiding her inconveniently hard nipples. “You want a medal, mate? Maybe I should lead a parade around the block.”

“Just a bit of appreciation is enough,” Niall says lightly. “Maybe a tight hug with no bra on, to be extra nice.” 

Louis ignores him. “I thanked you.”

“You called me a prick.”

“Affectionately.”

“Affectionately,” Niall parrots with an over-the-top play on Louis’ accent. “Abuse before breakfast. That’s what I get for coming here and doing a fuck ton of unpaid labour for the British,” he punctuates every single word with a dramatic flair. 

Louis smiles sweetly at him. “You lot chose to cross the water, man.”

Niall gapes. “Did I though?”

“No one dragged you, eh?”

“History suggests otherwise.”

Louis finally looks at him, one hand on her waist, head tilted to the side. “You opened the bar for only an hour, give me head a rest.”

“I opened the bar for you.”

Louis raises an eyebrow. “And I’m here now.”

“Yeah,” Niall shakes a pointer towards her. “Here being an ungrateful slag.”

Louis rolls her eyes, turning the espresso machine on. “Shut up, Irish cunt.”

Niall shouts behind her. “You shut up, coloniser.”

By this point, the morning shift operates entirely on muscle memory, with their brains largely uninvolved. Machines on, floors wiped with that citrus cleaner which makes the place smell like it hasn’t been opened since the nineties, chairs fixed because Niall does them wrong every single time even though there are only so many ways a chair can exist properly next to a bloody table. Louis checks the toilets, refills whatever’s empty, then pulls an extremely cold Carlsberg for Viking Sam before he has to ask. 

Viking Sam is a regular at Last Penny who doesn’t enjoy asking for things because he thinks British politeness is inefficient and Irish cheer is extremely suspicious. Still, when a customer is rude to Louis, he always leaves a big tip. He never knows which day it is, but he knows when it’s eleven. Technically he knows when it’s 10:55, because every morning he stands outside impatiently like he’s waiting for boarding to begin. No one remembers him arriving for the first time, so he kind of belongs to the building now. 

A little after noon, some pompous arse wanders in and asks if they “do food”. Louis says no. He asks again later, as if a tiny chef might have crawled out of Louis’ arse and suddenly started flipping pans in the air. Not long after that, a white American calls her babe, and she stares at him until he remembers nametags exist, and apologises to the room at large. When a group of older men start a sentence with “Back in my day,” Louis suddenly needs to stock something at the far end of the pub, and forces Niall to cover their table until her shift ends. 

That’s more or less the day.  

Until something bizarre happens before Louis’ shift is about to reach its glorious end. 

A girl stands at the end of the bar whom Louis clocks immediately because whatever that is, definitely doesn’t belong anywhere near this pub. Or anywhere near Peckham really. That’s not even a human being. That’s a decorational prop someone dropped on one of the bar stools as an experiment to see how long she can survive in this dingy environment. 

For starters, she stands far too straight, shoulders back with her weight professionally balanced on those ridiculous nine-inch heels. She has an open and expectant smile on, and a skirt that is objectively way too fucking short to exist somewhere like Last Penny where the standards are–genuinely speaking–lower than sea level. The thing doesn’t even properly reach below her thighs. Her white shirt is too clean, too neat –and frankly too brave with what seems to be a cleavage that goes on for days– flashing itself under the unfortunate pub lighting that has never been kind to anyone else before. 

Louis can’t work out why she’s here; which is aggressively irritating to begin with. She doesn’t look like she’s waiting for someone, or about to order a drink. She seems unsettlingly present in a way that pumps suspicion instead of blood to Louis’ tar black heart. 

Why would someone like her choose this place at this hour? Just as Louis is busy pondering like an old lady who needs a billion cats to survive, the girl catches her eye, and smiles. 

Louis’ immediate reaction is to squint.  

This isn’t good. 

“What is that?” she asks, elbowing Niall as he’s halfway through queuing the next tune. Serious business, that. 

“Dolly,” Niall answers without looking up, still scrolling. 

Dolly? Is she an escort? 

Louis squints even harder. “Right.”

“Bit loud,” Niall adds. “But you’ve got to respect it.”

Louis watches as the girl shifts her weight, skirt riding up, eyes travelling around the pub with that unearned glimmer. “She’s got a lot of nerve.”

“Unapologetic.”

“That’s one word for it.”

“Ain’t got a single cell that’s not confident,” Niall says mildly. “Built a whole career on it, actually.”

Oh, God. They really are branching out, serving prostitutes at 4 pm and all that. 

Louis blinks. “Doing that?”

“Mmh,” Niall agrees. “Never toned it down, the legend.”

Louis snorts, eyes taking in the wild curls reaching to the girl’s waist. “Still a bit much for this time of day, don’t you think?”

Niall hums along as Jolene swells through the speakers. “Any time of day’s Dolly time, mate.”

Louis’ eyes flick between the girl and Niall. “You’re being weirdly progressive about this.”

“Ugh. How could I not? She breaks my heart every time.” Niall huffs, still scrolling his three kilometres long Spotify playlist. “Practically begging on her knees, very polite about the whole thing.”

The girl pouts, her glossy pink lips curves at the edges. 

“Begging,” she repeats. “For dick?”

With an aggressively disappointing look, Niall finally looks at Louis. “For her man not to be taken,” he says hastily. “Are we not listening to the same song?”

Louis stares at him for an extremely quiet second as her ears finally catch up with the lyrics.

Please don’t take him just because you can.

She slaps Niall on the back of his head.

Niall winces. “Why would you do that for–”

“I’m not talking about Dolly Parton, you idiot” Louis hisses. “‘m talking about the prostitute over there.”

“Uh, wha’?” Niall turns down the bar, hand on the back of his head still. When his blue eyes catch on the girl standing there, he grimaces. “Shit, that’s the new girl, not a prostitute.”

Before Louis can ask what the term new girl entails, the prostit–the new girl turns towards them, lifting a hand, waving her long fingers adorned with far too many silver rings. Then she hops across several stools like a bloody hare, unnecessary cheer literally dripping out of her…dimples? Christ. How disgusting.

“Hiya!” she says. 

Oh my god, rip apart my limbs and bury them in different continents, Louis’ inner voice replies. 

Harry steps fully into the place between them with ease. You could almost quote Niall from earlier and call it unapologetic, but Louis can’t really think about that right now because the girl smells heavily of vanilla and it's currently attacking Louis’ windpipe in full force. It burns all the way down her stomach. She’s actually nauseous. And a little bit dizzy. 

“Hi, sorry, hi,” she says, carefully sliding on the stool right next to Louis, mouth curling at the edges with another flood of dimpled cheer. “Hi.”

God. She is practically breathing the same air as Louis. Has proximity ever cost her anything? 

Oblivious to Louis’ struggles, Niall lights up immediately, angling his body toward her with the masculine enthusiasm of a man who’s decided that this is now the best thing that’s happened to him all day. 

“You must be Harry,” he says, already maxing out his nonexistent charm. “First day, huh?”

“Yeah,” Harry says, voice soft and syrupy warm and also annoyingly pleasant to listen to. “I’m hoping I don’t mess it up badly.”

“You could set the whole place on fire,” Niall beams. “And we’d forgive you.”

Jesus Christ. Louis is far too sober to endure all of this. 

“Why,” she tries to cut in between Niall’s attacking wave of man pheromones to get their attention, “did I not know about this?”

Harry turns fully to her, her smile still in place. “You must be Louis.”

Louis ignores her. “Niall?”

Niall shrugs. “I’m pretty sure I told you.”

“When?”

“When you were not listening, that’s for sure.”

Louis glares at him. “What? She’s full-time?”

“Yeah,” Niall replies. “Since you always moan about waiting tables every shift, we hired a waitress, so you can stay behind the bar and feel important while pouring cheap beer.”

Louis blinks a few times. She does moan about waiting tables at every chance she gets. 

Harry smiles sweetly between them. “I don’t mind waiting tables."

Your smile is like a breath of spring...

“Good,” Louis says instantly. “Cloth’s under there, and table five is already waiting.”

With a pleased little hum, Harry tucks a long curl behind her ear, exposing more of her chest, and bends down to grab the cloth. Louis –very deliberately– tries not to look at the way her hair falls around her shoulders like a soft little blanket. 

With flaming locks of auburn hair…

“So,” Harry says, straightening as she ties the cloth on. “What’s the system here, Louis? You bark and I fetch?”

Louis doesn’t even blink. “I don’t bark.”

Harry smiles again, green eyes glinting under the dim lights. “You just did.”

Ivory skin and eyes of emerald green…

Niall makes a sound close to choking. Louis has to keep her temper in check not to go over the counter and smack the back of his head again. Or imagine scenarios where she pushes him into traffic like she always does when the Irish pain in her arse starts making unfortunate noises during unfortunate situations. 

Instead, she clears her throat once, trying to gain a little bit of composure. 

“Mind the bar line, will you?” She says coolly, crossing her arms over her chest in a subtle attempt to claim dominance. “That’s my territory.”

Harry’s eyes flick down to where the gravity is doing far too much of the heavy lifting, and then back up again with a soft tilt to her lips. “Oh, don’t worry,” she says sweetly. “I’m very good at staying where I’m put.”

And just like that, she is off to table five like it’s her daily routine to do so, leaving Louis and Niall alone, impaled to their spots with gaping mouths. 

There is a bit of silence while Jolene keeps playing in the background. 

Louis takes this precious moment to exhale slowly through her nose in the usual way she does whenever a small inconvenience happens, like, say, burnt chips starting a kitchen fire, or suddenly becoming very aware that the new girl has teeth hidden under that sickeningly sweet smile. 

“Oh, you’re cooked, my friend.”

Across from her, Niall makes a delighted sound as Dolly continues to sing her poor heart out: I cannot compete with you, Jolene.

Louis clenches her teeth. 

Not on her watch. 

✧ ✧ ✧

Harry learns the tables in a day, regulars in two, and by Wednesday she calls the men twice her age ‘darling’ with such unearned sweetness that men literally line up to hand her tips as if she’s running sort of a charity campaign instead of a bar. The tip jar these days is filled to the brim.

By the end of her first week, Harry is able to remember orders without needing to write them down, and somehow manages to listen to stories about lawnmowers and cholesterol levels with genuine-looking interest instead of running away like Louis always did. 

Louis watches all this from behind the bar, drying pint glasses that were not dirty to begin with, squinting with irritation as Harry floats gracefully between the tables during happy hour. Maybe they should call it happier hour now, since Harry does nothing but look happy while working her ass off, jumping from one table to another like a bunny on cocaine. 

It is, quite literally, sickening. 

And Louis is not coping. At least not in that quiet, internalised British repression way. She is coping in a way a cat copes when a second cat is introduced into the house, which is to say: loudly. So loudly, in fact, that Niall slams an empty pickle jar onto the counter one day and writes STYLES JAR on it. 

“Five pounds,” he says and nothing else. 

Louis looks up from the till. “What?”

Niall just points at the pickle jar. 

“You charging for oxygen now?”

“Only yours,” Niall replies. “Because you start hoarding it every time you look at the new girl, and the whole bar pressure drops.”

Louis opens her mouth to answer, but then closes, and then opens again. “I’m just breathing.”

“And it’s your initial sign to say something mean, everyone can see you gathering momentum.”

Louis looks at the jar accusingly. “And this is what then? A swear fund? Am I in primary school?”

Niall nods. “Five pounds, please.”

“Absolutely not.”

“Absolutely yes,” Niall says. “You’ve been in a mood since Harry arrived, and frankly, you’re ruining everyone’s day with your useless commentary. We keep getting bad reviews on Google.”

 “I will not–”

“One more word and it’s thirty pounds.”

That shuts her up. She digs into her wallet, unwillingly, to pull out the cash and lets it fall into the jar.

It would almost be endurable if Harry was incompetent at table waiting. If she spilled beer, or dropped a few trays here and there, flinched or snapped at least once and got scolded publicly, maybe it wouldn’t bug Louis this much. But she does absolutely none of that. When the bar is busy, Harry moves fast and slow when it isn’t. She calibrates herself to the room as if it’s a god-given skill. She even apologises to the customers. And thanks without simpering. With non-wavering eye contact and shit. 

As Louis sails through a whole week waiting patiently –no, actually, dutifully–for her demise, the downfall finally arrives on a benign Tuesday morning. Quite literally, as it turns out, because one moment Louis is minding her own business, existing peacefully without bothering a single soul in this establishment, and the next she had a fully grown, adult woman landing in her lap. 

Entrances, as one would reasonably imagine, are not a competitive sport, and flying is not a skill typically attributed to human beings. So, when the bar door flew open with a violence horribly resembling a police raid, and a hurricane in human form came hurtling in, Louis could hardly be blamed for freezing on the spot. Particularly when it became immediately apparent that the girl had forgotten a small but crucial detail of the entrance: stopping. 

And then, well, yes. Girl in her lap. At ten in the morning. 

Happy days.

“Hi,” Harry says, breathless from her little missile launch. 

Louis tries really hard to say something else, literally anything, anything but a soft and unsure: “Hi?”

It makes Harry giggle. “Hi,” she repeats, shifting a little after realising she is still halfway draped across Louis, scrambles upright with an apologetic wince. “Right, sorry, uhm, a bit of…momentum here.”

“Bit of–” Louis stops and shakes her head. “You nearly took the door off its hinges.”

“Yeah, well, you see,” Harry mumbles as she brushes her hair off her face. “I’m late to work.”

And as if Louis asked for an explanation, Harry carries on with a story Louis’ poor little brain cannot even comprehend. Not even a little bit.

“There were birds,” Harry says with wide eyes. 

Louis tries to school her expression into something…less dumbfounded. 

“There were birds?”

“Baby ones,” Harry clarifies unhelpfully. 

For a moment, the silence fills between them, and it would be the perfect length for a pause where a laugh track would be warming up in the distance had this been a sitcom. 

“They were tiny!” Harry exclaims. “Like,” she gestures with both hands, “--this small.”

Louis squints a little with a tilt of her head, trying to make sense. “Okay?”

“They were learning to fly.”

Christ. Is this girl always so opposed to making sense? 

“And?”

“And there was a cat acting real suspicious.”

Louis’ eyebrows climb slightly. “Cat acting suspicious?”

“Yes!” Harry shakes her head madly. “Watching the baby birds learn how to fly for the first time.”

Oh my God. Louis covers her mouth to stifle a laugh. 

“Just trying to see if I understood the situation correctly,” Louis says slowly. “You were on your way to work.”

“Yes.”

“You saw birds.”

“Baby birds.”

“You saw a cat too.”

“That’s correct.”

“And you decided to supervise a bird flight school?”

Harry nods earnestly. “There were five of them, five baby birds.”

“And you thought,” Louis continues, sarcasm settling in her voice yet again, “that the survival of these five baby birds depended entirely on you standing there.”

“When you say it like that–”

“That is exactly what you said, Harry.”

“It was their first flight!” Harry cries out, pout evident in her voice. 

Louis has to bite the inside of her cheek so as not to lose another fiver to the Styles Jar. “Birds have been doing their first flight without you for several million years.”

Harry frowns. “But the cat–”

“THE CAT IS SUPPOSED TO BE THERE–” Louis cuts in, realising how loud her voice is. Five pounds. Fuck no. She tries again, softer this time. “That’s the entire point of cats.”

“I had to make sure the cat didn’t eat them, okay? How was I supposed to just turn my back on five baby birds? I had a chance to give them a chance.”

“You–” Louis cuts off again, her mouth opening and closing several times. Harry is looking at her with such unwavering sincerity that the words stall somewhere between her brain and her tongue. She exhales through her nose and leans back against the bar, hands raised in surrender. “Okay, you know what? I don’t care.”

Harry’s eyebrows shoot up. “Are you seriously saying you wouldn’t help them?"

She’s being judged for five hypothetical birds she didn’t rescue. God help her. 

“I’m just saying,” Louis replies with all the patience she could gather, “if those birds wanted my help, they should’ve clocked in for their shift.”

For a second, it looks like Harry might argue, fiercely Louis must add, but instead, the edges of her mouth start to curl upwards. Then, finally, she lets out a laugh. It doesn’t grate on Louis’ ears like she thought it would. 

“They would have…” Harry presses a hand to her mouth to contain her giggles, “such tiny uniforms.”

Her cheeks have gone pink with it, genuine amusement clear as day on her pretty face. The laugh itself is ridiculous, a fine mixture of giggles and breathless wheezing, and the whole situation is so spectacularly stupid that Louis feels the corner of her own mouth threatening to betray her. 

So she snorts softly before she can stop herself and immediately grabs a glass to dry, turning her back to Harry under the thin excuse of work. “They’d make better colleagues than you.”

Louis can still hear the grin in her voice when Harry answers: “Maybe, but I wouldn’t have to tackle them to get their attention, no?”

That nearly gets her. With her back still turned, Louis lets a small, harmless smile slip out. By the time Harry pushes off the bar to get ready for her shift, Louis has mostly arranged her expression into something neutral. 

“Harry?”

Harry pauses, slowly turning back to her on her heels. 

Louis watches her for a moment, and then vaguely nods toward the door. “Did they, you know, manage to fly?”

The girl’s face lights up immediately. “Yeah, all five.”

She looks ridiculously proud. Louis watches her disappear towards the back with a little extra bounce in her steps. She then picks up another glass, shaking her head. 

“Fucking nutjob,” she mumbles to herself. 

And then, after a brief moment of uncertainty, she drops five pounds in the jar even though there’s no one to see. 

✧ ✧ ✧

It’s another morning shift where Louis has to pretend she has her shit together and doesn’t want to burn the whole building down. A delicate balance, that. Especially when she spots Zayn already parked outside the locked door, copping a drag from his cigarette every two seconds as if there’s an organised crime ring waiting round the corner to snatch it straight out of his mouth.

She digs into her pocket to find the keys as she gives a small nod to the man. He doesn’t react, just holds his red Marlboro pack like a greeting. Louis sighs as she abandons her search for the keys and reaches to grab a cigarette, leaning her back against the damp bricks of the building as she does so. Zayn tosses her a lighter as well. 

When she inhales the smoke in, she closes her eyes in contentment. 

“What’s with the…” Zayn points vaguely at her outfit.

Louis hesitantly glances down at her crisp white shirt. She has jeans on. And a pair of worn out Vans. She looks like how she always looks: edging towards disheveled but somewhere shy of overdressed. 

“I beg your pardon?” she asks. 

“You look too clean,” he answers, blowing out a plume of smoke at a quick pace. “Polished even.”

Louis almost lets out a short laugh, mostly out of disbelief. “I work in a pub, Zayn.” 

“Well, you look like a cop who came to shut it down.” 

“I might shut it down after this shift.” 

Zayn shakes his head slowly. “No one trusts a clean bartender,” he says, unimpressed. “I told Niall not to hire that barbie doll. ”

Louis opens and closes her mouth a couple of times like a stupid goldfish. “Excuse me? Are you implying that I dressed up because of the new girl?”

“Yes,” he says, all nonchalant. “First the shirt and then you start to smile. Slippery slope, you know.”

Louis freezes for a moment as she thinks of Harry who is always bright, sweet, running around the tables like she brought her own lighting with her, all dimples and thank you so muchs, customers throwing money at her for the privilege of being noticed. 

Now people think Louis has the same disease. As if optimism is something you can catch. As if she woke up this morning and thought, you what would improve my life? Ironing my shirt to become more like Harry. Absolutely fucking not. 

“If I start smiling,” she begins flatly, “You have my permission to put me down.”

Zayn nods before putting out his cigarette. “I’ll bring the shovel.”

Later that day, Harry makes a delighted little noise and reaches straight for Louis’ collar with her long fingers. “Oh my god. Twins!”

Behind the bar, Zayn doesn’t even look up but Louis can practically hear his thoughts. 

✧ ✧ ✧

It’s almost three in the morning and Louis is behind the bar, sleeves rolled, pointlessly wiping glasses that will be dirty again in approximately nine hours. Her hair is a mess, feet aching, and she desperately needs a shower to get rid of the alcohol and sweat sticking into her skin like a second layer.

Harry’s tipping chairs onto tables with an eerie quietness, which is a far cry from her usual –annoying as fuck– cheerful personality. It feels a bit off, but Louis doesn’t question it. Too tired to pay any mind to the girl, but not too tired enough to miss the way her hair has fallen out of whatever attempt was made earlier to contain it in a careless bun. The corners of her mouth are pulled down slightly, like she’s holding onto unwanted thoughts. Louis swipes the same spot on the counter and stays quiet. Harry’s troubles are none of her business. 

Just when she’s about to close the counter and call it a day, the door slams open. 

Harry reacts unnaturally fast. One second she’s across the room, and the next she’s behind the counter, dragging the stupid little curtain with her and disappearing into it as if she’s not a deer with six-feet-tall legs. She presses herself right up against Louis, her hand catching tightly at the back of Louis’ shirt. 

“Fuck!” she whisper-shouts. “Tell him I’m not here.”

Louis doesn’t turn. Partly because there’s a woman breathing her beer-scented air directly onto the back of her neck, and partly because if she acknowledges this, it becomes too real. Harry is behind her. Like a soft, and incredibly annoying coat behind her back. Feels really warm, too. It’s a huge fucking problem. 

When the man approaches the bar, he quickly becomes her problem too. 

She inhales slowly, straightening her spine just enough to suggest that she is, in fact, prepared to ruin someone’s night if she needs to. The man is tall and broad after all. Covered in enough hair to survive a very harsh winter without the assistance of a coat. A hunk, if you will.

“You still open?” he asks, already halfway in. 

Harry makes a small, distressed sound behind her, and Louis can only hope that she is not currently standing between Harry and a serial killer like a human shield. 

“No,” she answers flatly. 

“I’m looking for–”

“Closed,” Louis repeats, a little too aggressive. 

The man steps closer, eyes searching around the bar. “The girl with curly hair,” he says, hands moving vaguely. “A bit too nice.”

Harry goes still behind the curtain, and Louis seriously considers reaching for a knife just in case she needs self-defense. Christ. 

“Not here.”

He squints. “She works here.”

Louis puts both of her hands on the counter, squaring her shoulders. “Then she clearly has better working hours than me.”

“Look, I’m not trying to be a creep,” the man says, holding his hands up. “She said she’d like to see me tonight. Look."

He holds his phone forward, a chat open on the screen. Louis leans in, and her shoulders relax a bit. For fuck’s sake. She was two seconds away from commit a crime over a fucking situationship. The thought of a serious fight loses its spark immediately. She’s not about to get murdered, just inconvenienced, which is, arguably, a worse fate for someone like Louis. 

She taps the phone once, exactly where Harry’s face is smiling up at her in a selfie with far too much cleavage. “Yeah, that’s her. She works here.”

A sharp jab at her back follows immediately, but Louis ignores it. 

The man looks relieved. “Where is she?”

Behind her, Harry is practically fused to her spine, grip tightening in escalating threats. Louis tries to hold back a grin. 

“She’s here.”

That makes Harry stop moving.

The man perks up with glee like a lovesick puppy. “Yeah?”

Louis nods. “Bit busy though.”

“With what?”

Louis tries not to grimace in pain when Harry’s fingers start to dig holes into her sides again. 

“Quality control, I believe,” she croaks out, shifting her weight like she’s just adjusting her stance and not being physically attacked. “Very hands-on.”

“I can wait,” the man chirps. 

Of course you can, Louis thinks. He definitely looks like someone who can wait. 

“Or I can just call her out for you–”

“Louis!” Harry whispers sharply behind the curtain. 

“That’d be perfect,” the man replies. 

Louis would definitely let that cheerful spirit hang in the air for an extra second just to enjoy Harry’s misery if she wasn’t currently being pinched to death. 

“She actually said not to disturb her, though,” Louis says flatly, kicking Harry further back into the curtain. “Big on boundaries, that one.”

“W–what boundaries?”

“She’s been working on herself lately.”

The man frowns. “At three in the morning?”

Louis nods. “Prime time, mate. Very spiritual hour if you think about it.”

Harry makes a muffled noise. 

“But she told me to come–”

“That was her pre-reflection era.”

“Her what?”

“Incredibly short lived, though.”

“Are you taking the piss–”

“For God’s sake, man,” Louis cuts in, throwing her hands up in the air. “You’ve been ghosted.”

The man blinks. “What?”

“She’s ignoring you.”

“She didn’t even say anything.”

“That’s sort of the point,” Louis says. “I’d take the hint, if I were you.” She kicks Harry again. “Gently, of course.”

The man looks suspiciously somewhere behind Louis. “Is there someone behind you?”

Another pinch and Louis’ done. 

“No, but there’s a door behind you, my friend,” she says impatiently. “Big wooden thing, you can’t possibly miss it.”

The man visibly hesitates.

“What are you gawking at, buddy? Freedom’s that way.”

The man’s shoulders finally drop. “Fine,” he says. “Tell her to call me, please.”

Louis rolls her eyes. “I’ll tell her you tried.”

When the man gives up and finally leaves, Harry hastens to come out of the curtains and smacks Louis’ shoulder.

“What the fuck, Louis!” she shouts. “You nearly sold me out.”

Louis looks her up and down, unimpressed. “You were already sold.”

Harry puffs a breath, blowing the loose strand off her face. “I was trying to avoid him.”

“By inviting him to your workplace?”

Harry groans. “I thought he’d take the hint!”

“I highly doubt sending him your boobs made that easy.”

Harry’s eyes are huge. “You saw that?”

“They were hard to ignore,” Louis blurts out. 

Harry lifts a brow. “Were they?”

Louis clears her throat. “Objectively.”

“You had time to form an objective opinion?”

“Yeah, I noticed the very noticeable thing you sent, silly old me.”

Harry smirks. “Did you like them?”

Louis almost chokes on air. “Jesus, Harry–”

“What?” Harry shrugs. “I just want to know.”

“Go back to work.”

Harry closes her mouth shut, probably to contain a stupid, dimpley grin. 

Louis blows out a frustrated breath before she pushes through the swing door and goes to grab her jacket to end this godforsaken night. The jar practically winks at her as she passes by.

✧ ✧ ✧

Louis soon figures out that Harry Styles has a system. 

It always starts the same way: a dimpled smile that’s soft enough to disarm, careful enough to aim where it should land, the kind that makes people think they’re chosen by God and this is the light at the end of the tunnel. It makes men sit a little too straight, talk a little too much, making them think they’ve just had a spiritual connection with the most gorgeous girl within a five mile radius. Every day, they come back to feed more into it; leaving tips and their dignity to ensure that the connection is still there. Harry lets them do it. She leans in close, laughs at the right pitch, and touches their arms like it matters to her. 

It never does. 

Louis is the one who deals with the painful aftermath. All those lingering, hopeful customers who have no idea that the whole thing was a carefully curated show by someone who has the most angelic face but an absolute little devil under that innocent mask. They never get it. That would require at least a basic level of self-awareness, and judging by the way they always come back for more like one of those cartoon characters floating in the air, stupidly following the sickening vanilla scent that’s oozing from the evil pie, they’ve never had a moment where the feeling bloomed inside their tiny brain. Grown men, by the way. Fully formed and shit. Paying their taxes while losing control of their limbs, brains leaving the building and body left to fend for itself by this pointless hypnosis alone. 

Louis may be a dramatic bitch, but she can only watch it unfold, arms crossed, deeply unimpressed with this –possibly– social experiment that no one actually bothered to explain to her. She doesn’t get the appeal. She can admit Harry is attractive, even more so with tonight’s chosen floral shirt that leaves nothing to the imagination, but is it really that life-changing when she leans in like she gives a fuck? 

Louis snorts quietly to herself, reaching for another glass to clean. She’s obviously immune to this epidemic of craving the evil pie. She doesn’t even like pie. And the smell of vanilla makes her want to vomit her guts out. 

“Jar,” Niall whispers as he passes by, head pointing at the monument of Louis’ economic downfall that’s overflowing with enough money to make this deeply embarrassing situation actually worth it. 

Louis glares at the pint glass she’s drying off. “I didn’t even say anything.”

Niall blows her a kiss. “Your stupid face did.”

Thankfully, he disappears before Louis figures out a thousand creative ways to use an empty pint glass as a murder weapon. She exhales to calm herself down, reaching for another glass when–

“There she is!” Harry practically shouts, and then she’s on her with no warning or hesitation, arms wrapping around her shoulders in a strong enough embrace that almost makes her drop the glass. “My girlfriend.”

Louis can only stay still as Harry beams at the same man from two nights before, as if she’s just solved a problem instead of creating several new ones. And on the top of the list of those problems, there lays the fact that Harry is yet again, in her space, pressing her pies against her back, vanilla smelling, chin brushing against shoulder and–

Louis swallows hard, she’s not one of those idiots floating after the scent of it. She can keep it under control. 

“Your what, now?” the man shouts. 

And that’s exactly what Louis would say if she could gather enough sanity to articulate her thoughts, or if her brain wasn’t short-circuited somewhere between my and girlfriend. 

Harry clocks that fairly quickly. “Don’t say a word,” she whispers into her ear. “Let me handle it.”

That’s actually a fantastic plan, because Louis wouldn’t even know where to begin.  

“You’re…” the man starts, his gaze dropping to the exact spot where Harry’s hand is on her waist. “Gay?”

He says the word like it’s something that needs verification. Louis hates him immediately.

Harry on the other hand doesn’t seem bothered, she just purses her lips, nodding. “Apparently.”

The man huffs. “Well, that’s a bit of a cop-out, isn’t it?” he says. “All that flirting, and then, what, you’re suddenly into girls?” He gestures between them. “You don’t just switch like that.”

Harry’s grip on Louis’ shoulder tightens. “Are you saying I can’t be into girls?”

“I’m saying,” he continues, “don’t mislead guys by sending them your tits,” he says, shrugging as if that’s not wrong for so many reasons. “And don’t pretend you don’t know what you’re doing.”

“And what exactly am I doing?” Harry asks in a sharp tone. 

The man frowns. “You’re being a slut.”

The word is too ugly and casual, far too comfortable in his mouth. It rings in Louis’ ear several times before she sets the glass down with a loud thud and steps forward. 

“What the fuck did you just say to my girlfriend?” 

The man falters for a second. “I didn’t mean–”

“Yes, you did,” Louis pushes forward. “You called her a slut and you meant it.”

“Well, she did–”

“Don’t explain her to me,” Louis cuts him off. “She didn’t do anything except not want you.”

“She did not say that!”

“She ignored you,” Louis says. “That’s her saying it, but you don’t want to accept that because you don’t like how it sounds.”

“I was not–”

“No,” Louis cuts him off again. “You don’t get to have her time and attention, and you certainly don’t get to stand in my bar and call her that.”

When he still doesn’t move, Louis closes the distance between them to an uncomfortable degree. 

“Get the fuck out,” she says sharply.

The man mutters something under his breath that doesn’t quite qualify as dignity, and Louis watches the door catching too loudly behind him as he leaves. She relaxes her shoulders as the air shifts and becomes lighter by exactly one less nuisance. 

Not two though. 

“Well,” Harry says, dragging the word out. 

Louis closes her eyes for a second, just one to let herself hope that Harry may not be there when she opens them back. But no such luck. Harry is still in her space, still holding tight. 

“You handled that beautifully, girlfriend.”

Louis pushes her arm away. “Someone had to end that bloody conversation.”

“You didn’t have to say it with your chest.”

“Certainly more effective than hiding behind a curtain and faking your coming out, don’t you think?”

“Who says I faked anything?” Harry shrugs. “I like girls.”

“You could’ve mentioned that before I got promoted to girlfriend, you know.”

Harry places her hands on her hips, clearly having more to say and narrowing her eyes at her, pointedly. “You don’t think I can be into girls, do you?”

Louis turns, heading back behind the bar thinking distance might fix this, but Harry grabs her by the arm to hold her exactly where she wants her. And just when Louis is mentally preparing herself to lose another five pounds to the jar, Harry pulls her close enough to share the same air. 

Which is closer than what Louis needs at that point. She is the kind of person who thinks face to face conversations are worse than having her limbs ripped apart, so now, she has to actively remind herself how to breathe without inhaling that toxicating scent. Or not to look into her eyes, sharper than she has even seen them before, shimmering with something new– something that doesn’t resemble the fake performance she puts on to attract more customers. 

Louis tries to hold her ground. “That’s not what I said.”

“It’s what you meant,” Harry says, voice low, another thing Louis has never experienced before. “You think I made it up to get rid of him because I’m a slut who can’t deal with the consequences of my actions?”

Her lips are flushed, shiny because she keeps licking them every two seconds, and Louis’ brain stalls, not sure how to operate this conversation with her sanity intact when a million different urges that are far too inconvenient are waiting for a green light from her stupid brain. Maybe that’s why she fucks it all up next. 

“Alright, fine,” she says, wrenching herself free with a strong move of her wrist. “You want to hear it? Then listen, because I’ll actually say it with my chest this time.”

When Harry’s eyes widen, Louis lands the final blow. 

“You’re as fake as it gets with all your little smiles and that–” she points vaguely at Harry, furious at herself for noticing every small thing about her but never managing to put them into words, “–that stupid thing you do. And the second shit gets real, you leave me to handle the consequences of your mindless flirting because you’re a scared little shit,” she says in one single breath. Then she inhales another one because it’s on now. “You can’t stand there and blame me for not taking you seriously when all you do is blur the fucking line with everyone and call it nothing after.”

The heated stare goes first–the fire in her eyes dies down in an instant, and Harry goes incredibly still. Something in Louis’ chest flickers, but she can’t control the way breaths come in and out of her as if she’s been chased by all the heavy feelings she’s always meant to ignore. There’s no way she can catch it before it spreads. It’s who she is: not a problem-solver, but a problem-destroyer. 

She exhales, dragging a hand over her face like it might reset her mind or something. It doesn’t, of course, but it gives her a moment to hide the miserable feelings currently displayed on her face. She reaches a hand out, ready to back out of it. 

“Look–” she tries to say but Harry takes a step back, eyes still wide. 

“You don’t regret what you just said,” she says with the kind of certainty that hadn’t been there before.

“Harry, I–”

Louis can’t finish her sentence because suddenly the Styles jar comes flying, and she barely has time to duck before it smashes against the wall behind her back, coins exploding everywhere. She turns to Harry, mouth hanging open, properly caught off-guard, and if she’s being honest, a little bit turned on. 

“There’s your jar if you wanna talk!” Harry screams. “Why don’t you take your stupid feelings out on your wallet like you always do because that’s not fake at all!”

Louis can only stare at her, rooted to her spot as she stares at the wall behind her where the jar is sacrificed in the name of emotional honesty, coins bouncing and rolling. She drags a hand over her mouth, trying to contain whatever is about to come out, because she might laugh, which would be inappropriate, or she might retaliate, which would make things worse. Even though she was attacked a second ago, she kind of feels relieved, because she obviously isn’t the only problem-destroyer here. And isn’t that so freeing? 

“You’re mental,” she says, sounding dangerously close to impressed.

Harry lets out a disbelieving laugh and blinding reaches for whatever’s within reach, and Louis watches her grab a handful of coasters with wide eyes. 

“JAR!” Harry screams as coasters come flying and hit Louis in the shoulder. 

Louis brushes them off. “I would, but you broke it!”

A lime flies next, almost hitting Louis on the head. 

“Oh, you poor thing,” Harry mocks. “However will you cope without your little emotional support jar!”

And that is her final straw, pun fully intended because Harry is, yet again, reaching for something else, and from her peripheral Louis can see the straws she’s currently about to launch. 

“For fuck’s sake–” Louis tries to swat them away, but a stack of napkins quickly follow. “Can you stop?”

“No,” Harry fires back immediately. “I’m gonna keep throwing shit at you until you tell me why you’ve been paying money to insult me!”

Two more limes come flying.

“Because I can’t fucking stand you!” Louis screams. 

The room feels like it’s knocked out of place for exactly three seconds, and Louis doubts neither of them knows how to put it back in its place. She can’t do anything but exhale through her nose, already hating that creeping feeling crawling up the back of her neck. 

Her words stop Harry, finally breaking through her guard, leaving her standing there defenceless for the first time since Louis has known her. 

“Right,” Harry says quietly, which is infinitely worse than her fruit-throwing. “Of course, you can’t.”

She steps back, putting real distance between them this time, making the bar feel too big and too empty. Louis watches her move, silently walking out of the door, leaving coins, lemons and the remains of a system that used to keep everything under control scattered on the floor. 

Louis stares at the empty space where Harry was a second ago, wondering how she somehow managed to make things worse by trying to make them simple. 

✧ ✧ ✧

Harry doesn’t even look at her anymore, and somehow that only makes Louis notice her more. 

She refuses to interrogate the reason behind their last conversation, solely because that would require a level of honesty she has historically avoided with great success. So she starts paying attention to things that are practically observable, and therefore, in her mind, safe. Like the way Harry no longer takes unnecessary detours past the bar line when there’s no reason to pass at all, or the way she avoids giving half-muttered commentary for Louis to latch onto, no loose ends in any of her conversations that used to feel like invitations for Louis to join. The precision of her absence is too loud to ignore. Maybe that’s why Louis finds herself tracking every adjustment and reading into every withheld glance. 

Niall never replaces the jar, because Niall somehow notices everything worth noticing. He probably knows something is broken, and this one is clearly not something you can tidy up and put back in its place. If it were, Louis knows Niall would’ve done it already. Instead, the space where the Styles jar used to sit stays empty, and Louis can’t help but reach for it like some sort of muscle memory, fingers brushing against loose coins as if there’s still a place she can put them. 

And it happens at the worst times; when Harry laughs at something a customer says, or when she does that thing where she makes them feel noticed, which Louis spent weeks hating. Or maybe pretending to hate it. She still needs the jar. Not to insult Harry –that apparently has lost all its appeal now– but she needs it to insult herself. For her stupidity, her stupid timing to say something real for once, and a dozen other things she despises about herself. Her easy little transaction that made everything feel handled is gone now, and she’s left with the heavy awareness that the jar was never about the insults, but about everything she refused to admit to herself. 

It’s another one of those nights where the bar empties out quietly, and Louis finds herself dragging out the closing routine in ways she didn’t used to bother before, repeatedly wiping down already spotless surfaces, drying squeaky clean margarita glasses, just anything to keep her hands busy and not pay any attention to the fact that Harry’s on the other side of the room, probably doing the same thing with the chair arrangements. The only sounds are the occasional clink of a glass, the low hum of the fridge, and Niall’s ‘70s country playlist drifting through the speakers. 

Suddenly, Jolene comes on. 

Louis almost drops the glass in her hand. 

“--fuck!”

It takes her a moment to react, not because she doesn’t want to, but because she’s not sure how to move around Harry anymore. As the swearing gets louder, Louis suddenly drops the cloth in her hand and listens to Harry rushing to the sink at the side of the bar. 

She takes a deep breath before turning toward the sink. 

“Are you alright?” she asks, voice uncharacteristically unsure. 

Harry makes another whining sound, shrugging it off, dismissive, but Louis can see the blood mixing with the running water. 

“Shit,” she mutters before rushing to her, grabbing the same cloth she dropped. “Give me your hand.”

“I got it,” Harry shoots back, trying to push her away, but it’s half-hearted at best. Her fingers slip against the white porcelain as the water runs over the cut on her hand. 

“You clearly don’t,” Louis says, catching her wrist before she can retrait any further. “But if you wanna bleed out to death in a dingy bar, then that’s fine by me.”

“I’m not bleeding out,” Harry mutters, but it’s too weak to convince anyone. 

“Yeah, not yet,” Louis says, a bit quieter now, already pressing down the cloth with a firm but careful grip. “Hold still.”

They both don’t bother to fill the silence, Louis too focused on what she’s doing, Harry too still and too close for comfort. The water runs over her skin and Louis’ knuckles in the process, cool and soothing, and she adjusts her hand without thinking, thumb pressing lightly at the base of Harry’s wrist to ground her in place. Louis can probably feel the shift of her breathing if she pays attention, too aware of the small details like the warmth of her hand despite the running water, the way her fingers flinch every time Louis comes too close to the cut. She wonders if this would be easier if Harry said something annoying like she always did before their fight. But she doesn’t, and the quiet stretches into something thin and maybe even ready to snap. 

Her thumb presses lightly at Harry’s wrist, just tight enough to feel her pulse, and she realises quickly how easy it would be to move, to step back, and to let go. 

But she doesn’t. 

“Didnt mean all of it,” she says all of a sudden. 

Harry stares at her. “Fuck you, Louis.”

Louis nods. “Yeah.”

For a moment, Louis thinks Harry’s about to pull her hand back again, so Louis tightens her grip without thinking, not ready to let this go yet. 

“Harry, please,” she says. “Let me–” 

“I think you’re done fixing it–”

Louis pulls her hand even closer. “No,” she replies. “I’m not even close to fixing it.”

Harry watches her, dark lashes fluttering like she is trying to figure out Louis’ next move, which is definitely in vain since even Louis herself doesn’t know what she’s doing. 

“I didn’t mean–” she says, but her voice comes out rough, so she clears her throat, stalling a bit to buy herself some time. “No, that’s not right.”

“Clearly.” 

God, she is difficult. 

“I didn’t mean to call you fake, it’s just that–” she stops again, “you make it look so easy with people,” she finally says, shaking her head out of frustration, “you’re just bloody good at it.”

Harry frowns. “What?”

“Talking, flirting–whatever,” Louis continues. “I mean, I don’t know how to do that. How to approach people gently and try to see the best in them.”

“And that makes me fake?”

“No,” Louis says far too quickly. “I should’ve never called you that, I– I was being a dick.”

Harry hums. “Yeah, you were.”

Louis exhales slowly, her gaze dropping to Harry’s wounded hand again. “It’s easier for me to be a dick than…whatever the alternative is.”

“What’s the alternative?”

The corners of Louis' mouth curl slightly upwards. “Throwing a swear jar at someone’s head and demanding an explanation.”

Harry looks unimpressed at first, probably trying so hard not to find that funny. 

“You’re not funny,” she says flatly, but her mouth twitches anyway. “And I didn’t throw it at your head, I aimed for the wall.” 

“Reassuring, that.”

“You deserved worse, to be honest.”

“For what it’s worth, I’m glad you did it,” Louis says, fighting the corners of her mouth threatening to form a smile. “Maybe I only notice things once they’re hurled at me head. Survival instinct’s great for getting a bit of blood up there, you know.”

Harry lets out a quiet breath, looking softer despite her best efforts. “You’re so useless,” she says, gently brushing her pinky against the side of Louis’ hand. “Making me do crazy shit just to get your attention.”

Louis looks down at their hands. “I’m sorry.”

Harry nods. “It’s okay.”

She sounds so soft and sincere, Louis immediately hates her for accepting the apology too fast. Shaking her head, she quickly lets go of her hand a bit too quickly, turning to reach for something she didn’t plan to use tonight. Something she avoided even looking at. It takes her a second to find it, and when she does, she steps back into Harry’s space again. 

She’s already annoyed at herself (and a little bit afraid) of what she’s about to do. 

“Give me your hand,” she says, quickly, like she might chicken out any minute. “The good one.”

Harry doesn’t fight it this time, offering her open palm with a confused look on her face. Louis presses the note into her hand first. It’s creased and softened at the edges, having been folded and unfolded many times. 

“This is for calling you fake,” she says, already reaching for another fiver. 

Harry glances down at it, and then back up, but Louis doesn’t give her any time to speak. 

“And this is for being a dick when I should’ve been supportive.”

“Louis, what are you–”

Coins clink softly as she adds a handful in her palm. 

“For thinking you can’t be into girls just because you flirt with men.”

Harry snorts at that, looking down at her palm with disbelief written all over her face. 

Another note. “For not knowing what to do with you.”

Another. “For taking the piss every time you tried to be nice and gentle with me, because all I know is how to push people away and pretend that’s what I want.”

Another. “And for letting all of that stupid shit build up only to take them out on you like that–” Louis cuts herself off, dragging a hand over her face, blowing air into her palm. “God, I can’t believe I’m doing this.”

Harry closes her fingers around the mess of notes and coins, a quiet laugh slipping out. “Louis.”

“Oh, right,” Louis quickly adds another fiver. “For thinking you’re a prostitute the first time I saw you.”

“What?”

“That’s more on Niall, to be fair,” Louis mutters before reaching for more coins. “I, uhm– shit, there’s one more.”

Harry stares at her with wide eyes. “What is it?”

Louis takes an encouraging breath, working the corners of a new fiver between her fingers as if she can flatten her own hesitation out with it, and then says, almost reluctantly: “For pretending I don’t care about you.”

Harry stills, her gaze settling on Louis’ face like, holding her breath. 

Louis closes her eyes, like that might undo it. “Even when I clearly do,” she adds before she can regret it. 

For a long moment full of darkness and anticipation, Louis refuses to open her eyes and accept that it’s all out there and can’t be taken back now, just holding both her breath and at least three more fivers. But then, Harry exhales a soft, almost amused breath, placing one hand over hers, fingers brushing against her knuckles softly. 

“Can’t believe it took you half the bar’s takings to admit it.”

Louis’ eyes snap open at that, taking in their intertwined hands first, and Harry’s ridiculous dimples second. When that doesn’t help, she blinks a few times, hoping for the rest of the explanation to arrive. 

“Thats–yeah,” she says when Harry doesn’t say anything else. “Takes me a minute and a bit of funding, apparently.”

“You’re an idiot.”

“I—uhm—”

“And financially shaken because you couldn’t just say you liked me,” Harry continues, clearly waiting for this moment, like she’s enjoying it a bit too much, “which makes you a pussy as well.”

“Harry—”

“I’m not finished,” Harry says, leaning in slightly. “You’re a scared little shit, too, hiding behind your jar instead of just…, calling me a fake while hiding behind that stupid jar instead of looking in the mirror.”

In that insufferable moment where her words hover between them uselessly, Louis stands there, trying to make sense of what’s happening, about saying things out loud and letting another person hold them, turn them over and hand them back. It’s unnatural and itchy, like she’s in someone else’s body and now the simple things like moving, breathing, and standing tall are unmanageable. 

Her brain, ever helpful, tries to figure out an exit, maybe make a joke, or say something flippant, but thankfully, Harry doesn’t let her drown in all of that. 

She huffs out a laugh. “But I really am fake, and you were right,” she says, wavering her hand around, turning slightly toward the bar as if she’s looking for something in there. “Hang on, it should be somewhere–” she slips out of Louis’ space and walks straight past the bar. “Yeah, there it is.”

There’s a brief clatter near the shelves, Harry mutters to herself and then she reappears with–

A jar.

Louis’ eyes flicker between the thing and Harry’s face several times before she clocks in. Harry sets the jar down in between them on the counter, coins and wrinkled notes are visible from where Louis stands. And there’s a label saying TOMLINSON JAR on it. 

“You did not–” Louis tries to say, but cuts herself off, trying to get her brain to work again. “You’re taking the piss.”

Harry taps the jar lightly with her long fingernail, making that stupid sound Louis’ heard a thousand times before. Except now the sound feels like a nail into her skull. 

“We’re not as different as you think, you know?” Harry says, amusement clear on her face. “Two sides of the same coin.”

“You’ve got a Tomlinson Jar?”

Harry nods. “Every time you’re being insufferable, I put money in it,” she says easily, taking out a note and holding it between her fingers. “Five quid in just from last night.”

Louis lets out a disbelieving laugh, shaking her head slowly like it’s too much to process. “You little–” 

When the meaning of all this is finally comprehensible to her thick brain, she slowly steps in Harry’s space to snatch the note in between her fingers with a proper smile this time. 

“I’m taking this because suddenly I’ve got a lot more to say about you,” she says, leaning in close enough to let their noses brush once before, “and none of it is particularly polite.”

Harry bites her lip to suppress her smile, but she fails –beautifully, Louis might add– and then her gaze travels over Louis’ face, only to stop somewhere dangerously close to the curve of her mouth.

“If you’re so willing to pay for it,” she murmurs, eyes flicking back up to Louis’, “you might as well make it worth my time.” 

Louis knows that’s not a dare, not technically, but with everything tipping into that familiar kind of recklessness that usually ends badly, she can’t help but play into it. She’s already invested enough money anyway.

Louis stares at her ridiculously soft lips in a way she could probably not defend with dignity later, and lingers long enough to confirm what she’s been persistently ignoring for weeks now, which is that Harry Styles is, in fact, the most perfect, infinitely miserable piece of her messy puzzle of a life, because this is not one of her performances for the audience. There’s no reason for Harry to be doing whatever it is she’s doing here, in Louis’ space, tucking her own problems into a pickle jar and handing them to her. 

And what else Louis could have done, if not lean in and kiss her? 

With just a small shift forward that turns into something else before she can second-guess it, she holds onto Harry, connecting their lips in a brief and uncertain press, like it’s more of a test than a calculated move, checking if Harry’s actually going to let her get away with it. 

But then Harry’s hand comes up, catching at Louis’ shirt and pulling her back in before she can retreat, and Louis lets out the faintest huff of surprise against her mouth before kissing her back properly this time. 

It lasts long enough for Louis to realise she doesn’t want to pull back ever. But when she finally does, her forehead knocks into Harry’s as she lingers there for a second. 

“Fucking nutjob, you are,” she breathes, still smiling through her insult.

Harry huffs out sometimes that could have been an insult, and without warning, her hand catches Louis by the front of her collar and pushes back. Louis barely has time to register the movement before her back hits the wall, breath catching as Harry steps in again, closing the space once more. 

“Yeah?” she murmurs, breath warm against Louis’ lips. “Money well spent at least.” 

And then she kisses her again.

✧ ✧ ✧

Louis opens her eyes to greet the familiar sight of her girlfriend sleeping; the one that’s been in the same place for weeks –in her bed, giving her the feeling that she’s about to wake up any moment; still enough to hide her soft breathing, and to allow Louis to watch her face before she wakes up and demands acknowledgment like she always does. An exercise Louis finds preferable in the morning to waking up alone and facing the world without Harry by her side. 

For one glorious second, she thinks this might be a day where she doesn’t have to wake her up. Maybe this is one of those rare moments where she can take her time to feel the warm, breathing body next to her, or in other words; when time hasn’t caught up with them yet–and she fights to urge to reach out, to trace the curve of her soft mouth, following that familiar line that starts with her cupid’s bow, and ends somewhere between her thighs. She knows the road all too well, fingertips deeply familiar with the smooth textures of every little detail of her body. 

Harry’s hand moves slightly where it rests against her, fingers brushing absentmindedly against Louis’ side. She looks like an angel when she’s sleeping, quiet and unguarded, a far cry from the absolute menace the moment she wakes up. But Louis loves her sharp edges and all those annoying bumps that don't fit into her stubborn curves. She loves how they form a truly shitty puzzle together, and how there’s always something being thrown in the air, aimed half-heartedly at Louis’ head, and they always fall somewhere that doesn’t hurt. 

Two sides of the many coins they collected instead of getting here, naked in the same bed to greet another morning. Those coins are set aside somewhere now, to save up enough money to fund their first getaway together. At least insulting each other served some purpose. 

The thought makes Louis smile, and she can’t control her movements anymore, eager fingertips brushing lightly against Harry’s chin. She traces nothing in particular, just following the line of her mouth, testing the shape of it rather than actually touching her. It's ridiculous how something so small can feel like this much. 

Harry shifts slightly, her breathing still soft, so Louis keeps going, placing a soft kiss on her shoulder while sliding her fingers down to caress the soft skin hidden behind the blanket. Judging by the change in her breathing, she’s probably already awake. 

Harry hums faintly without opening her eyes, shifting just a little bit too consciously, and it immediately gives her away.

“Mmh,” she murmurs, voice thick with sleep, “you’re such a creep.”

Louis snorts quietly. “That’s going in the jar, love.”

Harry gets comfortable under her hand, leaning into her touch without hesitation. “I’ll put my money where your mouth is, don’t worry.”

Huffing softly, Louis is already aware where this is going, and she has no intention to pretend it wasn’t her initial plan to slide her hand from where it rests over Harry’s chest. 

“I’ve got better places for my mouth than your money,” she says, brushing just past her lips instead of lingering there. 

She presses several kisses along the line she’d been tracing earlier, waiting patiently for the exact moment where Harry’s breath usually hitches and–

“Shit, yeah–that’s–” she murmurs. “That’s a much better use of your mouth, actually.”

With a smug smile, Louis glides her fingers down to the soft curve of her belly, tracing the warmth there as it rises and falls under her touch. She lingers there for a second before her palm shifts lower, following a line she already knows by memory. And then her mouth follows, painfully slow, like she’s got all the time in the worldI to take this exactly where she wants. She can feel the way her body reacts under her, all those small, involuntary movements she tries but fails to hide. 

Her fingers dig into her taut muscles, heat twisting somewhere deep within her as she breathes in her arousal, her vanilla-scented perfume mixing with something inherently her. It’s Louis’ favourite thing in the world now. 

Harry’s hands find her shoulder, fingers tightening slightly, usually the indication of asking for more, so Louis’ head dips further, closing the space between them for good. She likes to take it slow just to hear Harry squirming and whining in protest, because god forbid the princess doesn’t get her way, but she doesn’t have it to take her time right now. 

She lifts her hips to wrap them around her neck, not wasting any more time to flick her tongue against her folds, then pressing it hard between them, licking a fat stripe from her hole up and stopping just short of her clit. Harry moans at that, hooking her knees over Louis’ shoulders and thumps her back with her heels, pulling her even deeper. 

She tastes a little too sweet, a little too bitter, and it’s unfair how it settles somewhere on Louis’ tongue each time and insists on remaining something Louis needs to survive. The little sounds Harry makes spurs Louis on immeasurably, attaching her lips once more to her clit, adding a finger just to hear her hear moan even louder. 

When she comes with a sharp cry, she’s loud as always, because when is Harry Styles ever not loud? 

Louis sits up to admire her handiwork, taking in her rosy cheeks and messy hair. And then, because she physically cannot help herself, leans over her with a smug smile. 

“Yeah,” she mutters. “Guess you can’t put that in the jar.”