Cowardice

It's surprising what an hour long round journey, four hours in an A&E department and a quick trip through Asda can do for a pair of relative strangers.

Chelsea's already feeling slightly better from the anti-sickness tablets she'd been given and then prescribed and the IV drip they'd shoved in the back of her hand to help her hydration levels which had dropped worryingly, but not shockingly, due her stomachs irritation.

Louis was just happy to see some colour back in her face and the fact she' s probably not going to either be sick or pass out on him.

Chelsea had been a little taken aback when she'd come back through the doors into the waiting area to find Louis sipping out of a Styrofoam cup and flicking quickly through an old home decor magazine, sat on one the plastic chairs, wrinkling his nose every time the teenager in the corner hacked a cough.

She was secretly relieved he'd stuck around.

"Can I ask a question?"

They're almost at the end of their journey home but Louis' been fidgety the whole way and Chelsea's not at all surprised that he's been holding something back all this time. She was hoping he'd let whatever it was drop and they'd maybe forget this whole debacle. Go back to polite nods over the garden fence.

"Sure. I owe you at least that, I suppose."

"Where's the Dad? Or like, you're family?" Surely someone should be close by for her, especially for moments like today.

"My families back in Coventry." She sniffs, before she turns to start looking back out of the windscreen, "The uh, Dad, he's just not around anymore."

Louis' mildly happy that he hasn't just stuck his foot in it and that she hasn't just told him that the father is dead.

"Does he know?

"Course he does." Chelsea scoffs and frowns in his direction, looks downright insulted that Louis would even think such a thing, "Are you always this intrusive?"

"Hey!" Louis lifts his hands off the wheel in a show of innocence, "You brought this to me."

"I'll think better of it next time."

The air's tense and Louis kicks himself mentally for so hastily ruining the companionable silence they'd fallen into, "M'just nosey, alright? Can't help it. I'll leave it be."

"Dunno' what it is about you, but you bloody rile me up." Chelsea quite easily admits, turning to lean against the window like she's trying to get comfortable even though they're five minutes from home, "Do you do it on purpose?"

"Annoy you? No!"

"Seems like it. Always getting on my nerves."

"We've spoken, what? Three times? I know I'm a bit brash sometimes but usually it takes longer than that for someone to decide they don't like me." Louis feels a little put out now, having to drive someone who dislikes him back through the village.

"I never said I didn't like you, Louis. You just know how to wind me up."

Louis pulls down their gravel drive with a sigh, ready to go back to just glimpsing Chelsea through the front window when he walks back from the shops or in the back garden when he's out having a smoke. Clearly, despite his earlier thoughts, there's no chance of a friendship here.

Chelsea gets out of the car and makes towards her front door without a thank you and Louis guesses that's just how they're going to leave it until she swivels back to face him, "Don't suppose you want a cuppa'?"

Louis had three while he was waiting for her and a can of Red Bull, so he's definitely had his fill of caffeine for the day but he finds himself nodding and following her as he hits the lock on his car keys and shoves the house one back into his jean pocket.

Now he's finally getting a good look around her cottage, he can see it's an exact mirror of his and that's where the similarities stop.

While his place boasts all the mod cons, from a flat screen TV to a brand new kitchen, Chelsea's looks like something out of Victorian history book. There's an old TV that he's surprised can be tuned into the satellite dish drilled into the side of the house, the sofa looks like it emit a cloud of dust if he sits on it and the dining table squashed into the corner seems to have a book wedged under one of the legs to keep it steady.

He scoots around the edge of the room and steps into the kitchen after Chelsea, happy to see her filling a shiny electric kettle with water, having had disastrous visions of her having one of the old-school pots that has to be heated on the stove top and whistled at an ear-piercing pitch once done.

"Sorry it's not tidy."

Surprisingly, considering the clutter of bookshelves being affixed to every wall and there being a general air of old, the house is spotless. Clearly Chelsea keeps a clean abode.

Unlike his place, all the dishes are stored in the glass fronted cupboards, not even a rogue piece of cutlery in the sink, and Louis can't even understand how someone who has been ill for the past couple of days has managed to keep the cleaning this strict.

"Do you take sugar?"

The kettles boiled while Louis' been glancing around and musing and he shakes his head almost violently at the spoon hovering dangerously over one of the cups, "God no."

Chelsea's eyebrows shoot into her hairline and she dumps into the other mug instead, "Someone's a tea purist."

"Don't see the point in changing the taste that much. May as well drink sweetened milk." He wrinkles his nose as he watches her weaken her tea down to a barely recognisable cream colour with the milk before she offers it to him to pour into his own, "Jus' like that."

"Not asking you to drink it, am I?" She cocks her head and then takes a sip, "You gonna sit?"

She plonks herself down at the little breakfast nook, carefully placing the cup onto a coaster and then offering him one.

"Bit OCD with the cleanliness, aren't we?"

She shrugs as she twizzles the drink around on the mat, "Don't want to leave a mess whenever I decide to go home. Nan would kill me."

"Seems like a headstrong woman."

"Stubborn." Chelsea laughs, "You can say stubborn."

"Yeah, alright, that's what I meant. Didn't wanna' insult her again, did I?" He snorts, "You feelin' better then?"

"Yeah, much. Just hope these tablets work out." Louis can see her rubbing her thumb over the plaster on the back of her hand, a little spot of blood being the only indication that she'd had an IV needle stuck in it, "Bit of a pain getting to see someone when I feel shit."

"I don't mind giving you a lift." Louis blurts out, half way through his sip of tea, "You know, if you want?"

Chelsea sends him a soft, genuine smile, "Thank you. Can't ask you for that though. Couple of weeks on my internet connection doesn't mean you need to become my personal taxi service."

"Could be months before they agree to come out." He chuckles, shaking his head, "Might owe you that much by the time you pack up and leave."

"We'll see, huh? No point in making promises we don't know we can keep."

Louis wants to correct her that he always keeps his word, and driving her to see someone about her health is something he would do regardless of whether he knew her WIFI password or not.

He instead shrugs and takes a healthy gulp of his drink.

+

"I'm not compromising on this, Liam. They promised a break and so I'm fucking taking one." Louis finds himself snapping at his friend, despite the saying 'don't shoot the messenger' floating round his head.

"But we're all going, mate. Fans'll think you've left altogether if you don't turn up."

"I'll tweet or something, but I'm not coming. I've already told them."

"We can have a lads night out if you come down. Ni's flying in from Thailand especially. God knows when we'll see him again."

Louis can't help his frustrated sigh. Of bloody course the golden boy is making a special trip home for this, "Still not coming, lad. They can't make me, so I'm not."

"But-."

"They're damn wax figures, Liam! We've had them before, I sat and let them measure my face for hours even though it was supposed to be my day off - I am not travelling all the way back to London for a couple of photos with a creepy doll."

"Well, the details are all in the email if you change your mind." Liam sounds downtrodden and his eyes have probably started resembles those of a scolded puppy even though Louis isn't there to fall for it.

"Pigs'll fly before then."