The Finish Line

“Hey!” A quirky voice radiates through the room causing Harry’s neck to nearly break as his head shoots up from the magazine he was just reading.

Entering the room is none other than his brown haired best friend. Dressed in a pair of jeans, the ends rolled up to show off his tanned ankles and a clean striped shirt. It’s evident he’s finally taken a shower, both in his dripping wet hair and in the absence of the horrible smell he carried with him until today.

As Louis grabs a box of cereal from the cupboard a small smiles appears on Harry’s lips. “Hey mate. How you doing?” He asks, quickly pushing away the magazine and making some room for his best friend to sit next to him.

“Oh… you know…” Louis mumbles, the smile on his face starts to fade for a split second but the brunette catches himself and forces the smile back on. “It’s a new day…” He then responds after a minute of painful silence.

Louis is trying his absolute hardest to smile through everything. He wants to make sure that he’s not an addition to Harry’s list of things to worry about daily. Although there’s still a painfully empty feeling in the pit of his stomach that sometimes turns into an aching around his chest area – he’s determined to make it through the day.
He doesn’t really have a choice because life goes on and he has work to do.

“Do you have anything planned for today?” Louis asks Harry in between two spoons filled with milk and Cheerios. Louis is in serious need of some fresh air, as he hasn’t had any since he got back from tour.

“Um… well… I was going to go to Holmes Chapel… visit mum and stuff.” Harry mumbles, scratching the back of his neck while giving Louis a pained look. But Louis just shrugs it off. “S’alright mate, enjoy.” Louis says before patting Harry on the shoulder. He then gets up to put his bowl in the dishwasher before he makes his way over to their living room.

An unexpected sigh escapes Louis’ lips as he looks around, remembering the painful events of Esther leaving him, but once again he quickly shakes off the feeling and turns around to face his best friend. “How long will you be gone for?” He asks Harry in order to distract himself from any other thoughts coming to mind.

“Three days. Do you… wanna come?” Harry offers, noticing the struggle in his best friend’s features. “Nah… it’s alright.” Louis forces a small smile before quickly heading upstairs into his bedroom.

It’s as if all the bad energy Louis is so desperate to leave behind is dancing around in their living room. Poking him and slapping him with all the memories of what happened, trying to push him back over the edge and into that depressed, stinking version of himself again.

As Louis rests on his bed, with his feet up against the wall, he tries to clear his mind from Esther but is always sucked back in by something reminding him of her. That until he feels his mattress shift underneath him, when he looks to his side Harry is sitting there with his back against the wall.

“I don’t like seeing you this way.” Harry says, giving Louis a small smile. And Louis knows that if Harry were in this position he’d feel just as terrible. He’d feel horrible for any of his four bandmates being in a situation like this.

“I’m really trying to turn it around. Give me a couple of more days. I don’t have time to weep over her, when you get back from Holmes Chapel I’ll be fine. I promise.” Louis says, holding his fist out for Harry who presses his against it with a small smile.

“If you need to talk about it, we can though.” Harry tries causing Louis to laugh at the awkward tension filling the air between the two of them.

“It’s alright. I’m just trying to find the positive in this situation.” Louis says, offering Harry another smile to which he gladly smiles back. “I know that I learned something from the two and a half years I spent with Esther… I know that she’ll always be special to me, I’ll always carry her in my heart for the things she taught me about love and life… and I really hope I did the same for her.”

With every word Louis speaks his heart seems to weigh heavier on to his already heavy chest. The words seem to slowly take away the empty feeling and replace it with a sense of hurt and pain.

“I just don’t understand how she could walk away. How we can both be forced to go separate ways and not look back again… I figured she would’ve called me by now? Or texted or some kind of contact but it’s as if it all goes away… and the worst part in all of this is that… I’m turning into some jealous idiot, I’m constantly checking up on her… because that’s the ability I have with all these fucking social media!” Louis kicks the wall angrily before running a hand through his hair and blowing out a deep sigh.

“I’m starting to notice every little thing she does… she followed some guy on Instagram and I couldn’t keep myself from checking to see who this dude is…” Louis laughs at the thought of how pathetic he must sound right now. He went from not wanting to speak a word to putting every single thing that races through his mind on his best friend’s shoulders, the shoulder’s that already carry far too much for Louis’ liking.

“I’m turning into some sick control freak… and I feel like the only way it’ll ever stop is if I get rid of her in every possible way… but I don’t think my heart can carry that burden. I don’t think I’d be able lose every single form of contact with her.” Louis then pulls himself up from the bed to walk across the room and grabs a picture of the two together. He holds in tightly in his hands, carefully rubbing his thumb over Esther’s face.

“The only way I can manage to live without her now is because I’m able to go check out her Twitter account, check out her Instagram, see her Facebook page and all that…” Louis then looks at his best friend with a sad smile. His eyes are red from the tears that have started to form.

“And what hurts the most about all of that is that… I see the number of photos decrease… I see memories disappear… she’s already doing what I can’t even think of, she’s already pushing me out of her life… and I’m still so desperate to be a part of hers.”