Cracks in Anchors

“Hey Harry, Harry, Harry-”

I tried to block out the incessant prods of Louis and his index finger, starring at the TV screen, my eyes straining on a pixilated mole on the face of some redneck-looking man. This didn’t deter Louis, though, as he kept repeating my name in different tones and pushing his finger deeper into my side each time. Finally, after a good few minutes of him and his nagging and poking, I turned to look at him, hoping to convey my “what the fuck do you want” face.

He just laughed at me.

“What do you want Louis?”

Whenever I looked at him, whenever my deep pools commingled with his ocean ones, I always wondered why we were friends. Granted we were so alike; we liked the same music, liked the same food, liked the same everything; I still didn’t know how we made it that long. How we made it through the clouds and sunshine and shit. How we made it through that one time in sophomore year when I fucking hated him because he had a girlfriend(who was a bitch, fyi) and I didn’t. How we made it through that one time in junior year when Louis convinced me egging our principal’s house on Halloween would be a good idea and then when we got caught a block down the rode Louis let me take the fall. I always thought it was Louis’s conniving way of payback for the year before, but I had yet to hear Louis say it out loud. Or, rewind a few years, when we first met in fourth grade. Louis was sitting by himself at one of those little kid tables, coloring outside the lines in a coloring book, when I was escorted into the room by a young-looking teacher. She patted my back, smiled down at me and pointed over at Louis, telling me to go sit by him. Me being a young lad obliged and sat myself down on the rug besides Louis. Louis, like the asshole he was, immediately took the crayons I was about to grab out of my reach and told me they were his and that I better get lost. Let’s just say I cried for a good ten minutes before me and Louis’s friendship became concrete. And the rest was history, which is still weird for me to think about; how him being mean made us forever bonded.

But I guess it was always just me and Louis; sure we had Niall and Liam and Zayn, but they were never as close to us as me and Louis. Me and Louis went through everything together; we got into hood-rat shit together, we kissed the same girl(not together), we took hits and kicks and bruises together. We ran over hurdles and cried and lost together. We laughed together; we lived together.

But I digress.

“I’ve heard there are even more rumors about you and that student now since everyone found out that you are recently single.”

I passed him an eye-roll and skeptical glare.

“Where’d you get this information? Starbucks?”

But when he just quirked his eyebrows and held his tongue inside his cheek I knew that he in fact did get this information from Starbucks and that he did take my previous comment to offense.

“Oh my god Lou, you aren’t a high school girl, stop listening to gossip and stop going to that Starbucks, for Christ’s sake.”

He looked deflated as he scoffed, kicking his bare feet up onto the coffee table and snatching the remote from my hands.

“I guess I won’t tell you then,” He murmured as he changed the channel, settling on a sports review after a few flips.

Sighing, I decided that it still would benefit me if I knew what I was supposedly doing with underage high school girls, and the only way to know would be to cave in and reason with Louis.

“Okay I’m sorry I made fun of you and your Starbucks. Just tell me the rumors, please.”

I pouted my bottom lip like a fucking child and watched as Louis smirked, tried to hide his laughter behind his hand but failed, and turned to face me on the couch.

“Okay so either A) you broke up with Jolene because you want to be with Suzy-” “Sullivan.” “-Sullivan. Or B) you broke up with her because you found out she was cheating on you and you found out the baby wasn’t actually yours.”

It hurt, I won’t lie, to know that some people thought these festering stories were truths and that my life was led like this. Like I was a man full of grievances; that my fiancé was cheating on me and I wanted to be with a teenage girl. I couldn’t say the latter wasn’t true, because maybe I always wanted to be with her in a small way(I just wouldn’t get it until later), but I knew deep in my soul that the first was a lie. Because Jolene, no matter how annoying and naggy and bitchy she was, was an honest and kind woman. She was loyal and cared for people too much, and maybe that was her downfall.

Maybe caring for people was the real fault in humans, that caring made it easier for you to be broken. But I wouldn’t know, I never cared for anyone that hard, minus Louis and my parents and Sullivan of course. Maybe people needed to stop caring, but if that happened then what would have society come too? It was already shitty as it was.

“All bullshit, I know, but still.” Louis broke the silence and rubbed my shoulder, nodding like he knew what I was thinking and silently agreeing.

I coughed, “I think I need a guys night. Let’s call over the lads.”



Niall’s blonde head was in Zayn’s lap while he stared at the TV, Liam was sitting cross-legged on the floor, Louis was looking from his phone to the TV then back again, and I was leaning my head against the bottom part of the couch, sitting on the floor next to Liam. Because, if you don’t already know, Liam was(is) the smartest, level-headed one out of all of us. So I sat next to him when they arrived an hour ago and let him into my fucked-up world. He nodded and listened and looked with wide eyes as I told my story, leaning closer and closer as I got deeper and deeper. And when I finished, a whopping six commercials later, Liam cracked his fingers like he was getting ready for a lecture.

“I say fuck all those kids. Do what you want; if you want to still talk with the girl than do it. If you’re afraid than don’t. Plain and simple - let your heart decide, Harry.”

It was the truest words I’d heard about the situation, and when i thought about it later that night in the bed beside Louis, I realized Liam couldn’t have been anymore right.

“How’s work, Harry?” Niall spoke up from the couch, lifting his head only for it to be pushed back down by Zayn.

“It’s alright, not to hard or anything. What have you been up to, still studying like a good boy?” I laughed, knowing fully well that Niall rarely studied and instead spent his time with Zayn or texting, so it was funny to rag on him about how a horrible student he was.

“Eh, only so much studying I can handle man.”

Niall was in college, the same one as Liam, and while Liam spent his life on school and was hell-bent on becoming a vet, Niall was blowing off his becoming a Military-expert-something or other. They lived together in the same apartment a few towns away and annoyed each other to no end but still ended up being close friends. It reminded me of me and Louis.

But what dumfounded me the most was Niall and Zayn’s relationship - it was oddly peculiar, not something you’d see between two platonic male friends. Sure, none of us had a problem with Niall and Zayn hugging one another often or sharing food or sharing seating space, but that one time when Liam caught them pecking each other on the lips in the living room of their apartment, I think we all looked at them differently. Louis liked to joke they were both gay and would eventually confess to one another and get married and then he’d be an uncle, but Liam and I always just watched from far away and let them be.

They were still our closest friends; gay or not.

But back to Liam.

I knew he’d say something witty and meaningful, I just didn’t expect it to be so short. So when he finished his “speech” and turned back to the show playing on the TV, I looked around before deciding that was all Liam had to say and going to fetch drinks for the group of us.

I guess Liam was the cause for everything that would happen next.

Fucking Liam Payne, that witty son-of-a-bitch.