may these memories break our fall

by bravestyles

Summary:

Harry and Louis' four-year-old son has a terminal brain tumor. In his sickness and death, they navigate the hurt and grief together.

A story about mourning.

Notes:

title: long live - taylor swift

i hope you like it <3

Chapter 1: chapter one

-

Jack was only two and a half when he was first diagnosed. He was still at the age that Louis insisted on telling everyone that the twins were thirty months old instead of saying their age in years, and then, suddenly, Jack was two and a half, in hospital, and the doctors were using words like pediatric anaplastic astrocytoma and radiation and surgery and prognosis. Madison was sat in Louis’ lap, clinging to him and staring down at the tablet that was playing Doc McStuffins into her ears. She refused to let them talk to the doctor on their own, not when she was so sad about Jack. Jack, her twin brother, was sick and she just didn’t know what to think of that. Harry and Louis promised her over and over again in the beginning that he would be just fine. They still make those promises; not because they have any truth to them, but because she’s now four and has no idea how to conceptualize that her brother is dying.

They make those promises to Jack, too.

In the beginning, everything happened so quickly. One second, they took their child to the emergency room because he had a seizure in the middle of Louis’ mum’s kitchen, and the next, he was being prepped for surgery. They wanted to remove what they could of the tumor, said it was Jack’s best bet, and it was. It bought him time. But they couldn’t remove the tumor completely because of where it is in Jack’s brain, what part it’s clinging to, so they moved onto talking about radiation.

Harry and Louis weren’t sold on radiation, not right away. Not with all the risks it has for kids, not when Jack was so little and, for now, so was the tumor. Harry asked to speak with the doctors, and she was polite enough to listen to his concerns. As Harry explained to her his worries about long-term effects of radiation on kids, Louis slowly started to go quiet next to him. It took Harry ten minutes into the conversation to realize why: the long-term effects didn’t matter because Jack wasn’t long-term. He wouldn’t make it far enough to even see those possibilities. We’ll just have to keep monitoring him, the doctor said when Harry accused her of lying to him and giving him false hope. But Harry heard it loud and clear, and he’s been hearing it ever since -- his baby isn’t going to be able to grow up.

Harry blinks, hard, and sits up straighter, gets a better hold on the steering wheel. He should’ve taken Louis’ offer of driving him home, but he didn’t want to leave Jack alone at the hospital. Harry gets too far into his head sometimes; that’s why Louis sent him home tonight. They’re tired and tense and terrified, but Harry can’t sit still and wait as good as Louis. He’s far too restless, and it makes Louis anxious, so he asked him to go home for the night. Said Harry needs a proper night’s sleep, which is true. Harry has gotten about seven hours of sleep altogether since they’ve been at the hospital, and it’s been five days.

Jack isn’t going to die tonight, that’s not how this works. Harry doesn’t have to fear leaving him at the hospital. Logically, he knows that, but that’s his son, of course he doesn’t want to leave him. And deaths more sudden have occurred. Every time Harry leaves his side, he’s taking a risk of not being able to say goodbye.

When he pulls into the driveway behind his mum’s car, he sits there for a few minutes, trying to soothe the nausea piling up inside of him. He didn’t tell his mum that he’d be coming home tonight, so she won’t expect him. He has all the time in the world to sit her and try to get a grip.

Harry’s been given a lot in his life, but his mother’s undying love for him and his children is probably the thing he’s most thankful for. His parents are wealthy, proper wealthy, so Harry doesn’t have to work if he doesn’t want to. Neither does Louis, but he does anyway because he was raised to work hard and wasn’t as into the idea of being a stay-at-home dad as Harry always had been. And Harry -- God, he doesn’t know what he would do if he couldn’t be with Jack all the time. Louis, either; the minute something is worse than normal, Louis can take time off work without thinking about it. They can be around to care for their son all the time, and so can Anne, and they can afford to pay for Jack’s care, and still, that’s not enough. Nothing can save Jack, not money or love or good healthcare. Nothing.

Anne’s been living with them since a month after Jack’s diagnosis. In the beginning, after the surgery, it was difficult. One of them always had to be with Jack, and neither of them wanted to leave his side to go do the dishes or cook dinner or look after their daughter. Anne moved in without a second thought, and even though things have settled down as much as they could and he probably doesn’t need his mum’s help in everything, he’s glad she hasn’t moved out. But at the same time, Harry can’t deny the truth: she will only stay here until there is no longer a reason for them to be at the hospital all the time or distracted by other things. In other words, she’s only here for as long as Jack is. Harry tries not to think about it like that.

He’s been sitting in the car for ten minutes when Louis texts, Are you home yet? He must’ve been waiting for Harry to text him that he made it home safe like Harry promised he would. He grabs his phone and responds. Yeah, just made it back. Is Jack still asleep?

Louis’ reply is immediate. He must’ve been worried. Yes. I’ll let you know if he wakes up. Call me before bed ok?

Okay, Harry sends, and then he gets out of the car and heads inside.

Their house is large, something that they both justified by their plan of having a million babies and a few pets, too. Eventually -- too soon -- it’ll just be he, Louis, Madison and their dog Cooper. (And Louis would sigh and tell him not to say that, or if he’s in the wrong mood, cry and snap at him for thinking that way. Louis is so much better at taking it one day at a time than Harry is. Harry has mourned Jack over and over and over again by now.) Harry has no idea what the plan is once Jack dies. They haven’t thought that far ahead, when in reality, that time could very well be not too far ahead.

“Madison, is that you?” his mum calls from somewhere. Harry follows her voice to the kitchen, stopping at the doorway. She’s cooking something even though it’s nine o’clock and she usually makes dinner at six -- she’s distracting herself.

“Where’s Madison?” Harry asks. “And Cooper?”

“Oh, love, I didn’t know you were coming home today.” She comes over to him and grabs his face, smiling up at him. “Madison’s at the neighbors watching a movie. Ms. Owens promised to walk her home, don’t worry. And Cooper is outside.”

“Oh, okay. What are you making?”

“Lasagna for tomorrow. But how is Jack, baby? Is he feeling better today?”

Tears cling to his eyes and gather in his throat, and he tries to smile. “You know how he is, Mum. Doesn’t ever really complain. But he’s. . . I mean, yeah. He’s okay.”

“When can he come home?”

Harry breathes out slowly, trying not to cry. All he needs to do is change into his pajamas, shower, and go to sleep. There’s no crying needed for any of that. “I don’t know why he hasn’t come home yet. We’re supposed to talk to the doctor in two days. Which -- we all know what that means.”

She frowns at him. “We don’t know anything yet. Maybe they just want to keep an eye on him for a few days, that’s all. Or maybe the doctor was too busy.”

“They’re sitting on bad news and waiting to tell us,” Harry disagrees, gently taking his mum’s hands off his face. He squeezes her wrists. “Louis agrees with me, so don’t tell me I’m being pessimistic. It’s the only thing that makes sense. And they keep doing different tests on him. The poor kid can’t even watch Finding Nemo all the way through before someone’s poking their head in and asking to grab him for a moment.”

“We’ve had bad news before and it’s turned out better than we thought,” Anne says, and she’s not wrong, she isn’t. But she also has no idea what his test results are coming out to be, or how the tumor in Jack’s head looks. None of them do. Nothing can comfort him right now, not when they’re throwing platitudes into a black hole and hoping some will stick.

“I’m just going to go to bed so I can wake up and see my kid, okay?” Harry says, trying to smile for her. He kisses her cheek and squeezes her wrists again before leaving the kitchen and heading to their bedroom. He changes into more comfortable clothes before heading to Jack’s room and getting into his bed. It’s small, obviously, but Harry doesn’t care, not when it smells like his son and he has one of Jack’s toys to cuddle with.

Harry’s half-asleep and stroking the fur of Jack’s plush polar bear when the door swings open and Madison comes racing in. She jumps onto the bed and launches herself at Harry, and Harry wraps his arms around her and kisses her head. He wants to be left alone right now, but Madison hasn’t seen him in five bloody days and he misses her, too.

“Is Jax coming home?” she asks, giving him these wide eyes as she pulls on the collar of his shirt. Harry reaches up to smooth a hand over her straight dark hair -- the opposite of Jack’s short, curly, dirty blonde hair. Harry feels a sudden wave of nausea and he drops his hand.

“Soon, baby. Dad’s with him at the hospital for now.”

“Can I come, too?”

Harry bites down on his lip, hard. Will Madison even remember Jack when she’s older? It’ll depend, probably, on how long Jack can hang on for. Being robbed of growing up with your twin is brutal, and it puts a pit in his stomach. This is why Louis sent him home.

“I’ll talk to Dad about it, okay?”

Madison pouts, and Harry can’t take that right now, not when he spent the whole day at the hospital with Jack who cried into his chest over a headache that wouldn’t let him be.

They’re twins, it’s hard not to compare them. And one of his children is perfectly healthy and the other is in the hospital because he has fucking brain cancer. That doesn’t seem fair; Madison and Jack both deserve a long, healthy life. They deserve to grow up together, and they just won’t. Madison will grow and grow and grow, and Jack will deteriorate until he’s gone. Harry feels -- anger towards her, for some reason, even though he knows it's misplaced. He’s angry at what they’re losing, and it hurts to look at her and then at Jack. Jack is paler and thinner and not as energetic all the time, and Madison is running around and going to the neighbor’s for a playdate and full of energy. Harry loves them both equally, but he needs to spend as much time pouring all of his love into Jack while he still has the opportunity.

“Why don’t you go see what Grandma is doing, hmm?”

She sits back on her heels, looking sad. Like she knows Harry’s just trying to get rid of her. “She’s watching TV.”

“Oh. Well it’s late, yeah? You should be in bed by now.” He realizes it as he says it, but he figures that Anne not being strict on Madison’s bedtime is fair considering her brother is in the hospital. Again.

“Can I lay here with you?”

Harry swallows thickly and takes a deep breath. “No, love. You have your own room. But I’ll come lay with you in a little bit, okay? I just have to talk to Dad first.”

“Okay,” she agrees, immediately perking up. She goes to climb off the bed, but Harry’s heart lurches in his chest like it's trying to go after her.

“Wait,” he says. “Give Daddy a kiss.”

Madison does, grinning all the while, and Harry barely manages to keep the tears back as she goes. She shuts the door because she likes to show them that she’s tall enough to now, even if she has to stand on her toes, so Harry is at least offered privacy as he cries. He clings to Jack’s plush and buries his face into his space-themed pillowcase. Every bit of Harry is begging him to drive back up to the hospital, but he knows that will upset Louis so he forces himself to stay put.

Harry’s wiping his snot on the sleeve when his phone lights up from a call with Louis, and Harry sits up quickly, answering it in a heartbeat, automatically thinking the worst.

“What’s wrong?” he asks, breathless.

“What? Nothing. He’s still asleep. I’m just heading to the cafeteria and wanted to call you.”

“Oh,” he says, sinking back down into Jack’s bed. “Oh, good. Okay.”

There’s a small stretch of silence, and Harry knows Louis is debating whether or not to lecture him right now about always assuming the worst. Thankfully, he decides against it. “How’s Mads?”

“Good, I think. She wants to come with me to the hospital tomorrow.”

“Yeah, she can. I’d like to see her anyway.”

Harry frowns. “I don’t know if it’s a good idea, Lou. She’ll be moving a million times faster than Jack can. He won’t be able to keep up with her and I don’t want him getting upset.”

“Harry,” Louis says patiently. “Jack is fine. For right now, he is okay. He can keep up with her.”

“He needs to rest.”

“He needs to see his sister,” Louis disagrees.

Harry closes his eyes and presses a hand against his forehead. Louis’ right, and Harry knows the only reason why he doesn’t want Madison at the hospital is because she’ll be another moving part that he has to keep track of and stress over and he doesn’t need any more of that. That’s selfish. Keeping them apart is wrong.

“I’ll take her, sure. My mum can pick her up tomorrow night, then.”

“That sounds nice, love.” There’s some noise on his end of the line, and then a soft sigh. “I’m already sick of eating these sandwiches, I’ll tell you. Did your mum cook for you?”

“Yeah.” It’s not technically a lie.

“Good. Do you think you’ll be able to sleep well tonight?”

“I don’t know,” Harry admits. He’s exhausted as all hell, but his mind won’t stop running. “I promised Mads I’d sleep in her bed, so probably not, no.”

“Take her to our bed, it’s not any different.”

Harry nods. “Okay, yeah.”

“Look, I’ll let you go, alright? Go get some sleep, I just wanted to make sure you were okay.”

“I’m fine, Louis.”

“Go to sleep. I love you.”

Tears prick his eyes again. “I love you, too. And if Jack wakes, tell him I love him, okay? And that I’ll bring his polar bear to the hospital tomorrow.”

“Yeah, H. I will. Goodnight.”

“Night,” Harry croaks, and he hangs up the phone before Louis can worry anymore. He lays in bed for a few more minutes, trying to soak into the comfort being around his son’s things brings him, before getting up and heading to Madison’s room. He never showered, but he’ll do that in the morning.

Anne is reading Madison a story when Harry opens her door, and he smiles sadly at them. “Hey,” he says. “I’m heading to bed. Mads, love, come to my room when you’re ready for bed, okay?”

She nods sweetly, and Harry shuts the door again. He walks to his and Louis’ room and drags himself to bed, under the covers. He’s at home, in his big, nice, cozy bed while his son and husband are at the hospital. That’s not right, but he pushes that thought out of his head as he cuddles into Louis’ pillow and tucks the little polar bear he took from Jack’s room close to his chest. He’s sleep-deprived enough to convince himself that they’re right there with him.

-

At five minutes past six in the morning, he jolts up in bed, blindly reaching for his phone like it’s his lifeline. He’s barely awake as he fumbles in the dark, trying to click the right buttons. One new message from Louis -- if Jack was dead, there would be a lot more than that. He sags back in bed and takes a few steadying breaths. He feels hot all over and like he might be sick, a little bit, but after a few minutes, the nausea starts to go away.

Madison is still with him, stretched out in bed, completely oblivious to Harry’s hurried movements. He stares down at her and resists the urge to touch her; he should let her sleep. Carefully, he grabs his phone and heads to the bathroom. He’s still not fully awake yet, but after he goes to the bathroom and splashes some cold water on his face, he’s mostly awake.

He checks Louis’ message as he walks quietly down the stairs. I think we should think about taking them on a trip somewhere, the text reads. Disney land or something. Before they go to school? Harry doesn’t question why Louis texted him that at four in the morning, he just sends back an okay. He’s just walked into the kitchen and turned on the light when Louis calls him.

“You’re supposed to be sleeping,” Louis says, sounding tired himself. “It’s only six, love. Go back to bed.”

“I don’t want to. I’ll probably come back up to the hospital in an hour or so.”

“Babe. He’s still sound asleep.”

Harry leans against the kitchen counter, closing his eyes. “Maybe I just want to see you, ever think about that?”

“Yeah, right,” Louis says, letting out a quiet laugh. It goes quiet, so Harry pushes away from the counter and heads to the fridge. There’s a plate in the fridge marked with a sticky note that reads Harry’s name, and he takes it out. It’s fruit and cheese and a few slices of ham -- food that will be gentle on his stomach. He sits at the kitchen table, and Louis starts talking again.

“We both agree something bad is just around the corner,” he says quietly. “We talk to the doctor tomorrow; I want you to be as strong as possible for that. To get through the days after that, too.”

“How much sleep did you get last night, hmm?”

Louis sighs. “Okay, fair. I’ll let it alone. Just -- I love you, yeah?”

“I love you, too. Never going to stop.”

Harry honestly has no idea how their marriage will be impacted by Jack’s death. In his sickness, they’ve gotten closer, but having a sick kid is a lot different than having a dead one. He’s not planning on divorcing Louis, or anything. He loves Louis, and he really doesn’t think he could live without him. Louis’ right: Harry’s too pessimistic.

“What made you want to take our kids to Disneyland at four in the morning?” Harry asks before eating a piece of cheese. He wonders where Louis is right now; he wouldn’t be talking to him in Jack’s room. Maybe he’s outside, or in his car.

“Mickey Mouse was playing on the TV this morning. I don’t know. It would be fun, though.”

“Yeah, I agree. But, like. Can Jack even handle rides right now? He might get too nauseous.”

“Probably not on the ones meant for kids their age. I’ve never been, so I don’t know what it’s like. I’m just thinking.”

“It would be fun, yeah.”

Louis hums in agreement. “Make sure you eat before you come back to the hospital. And that Mads does, too.”

“Can we wait to see how Jack is doing before we let Maddie come? If he’s feeling poorly today -- ” he cuts himself off, surprised that Louis hadn’t first.

“Sure,” Louis relents. “You’re clearly worried about it, which I don’t really understand. He was talking just yesterday about how he misses her.”

It’d be too selfish to say that Harry wants to keep their bubble small, to say that he likes how Jack’s attention is solely on them, out loud, so he doesn’t. Instead, he says, “I don’t know. You’re right. I’ll just bring her when I come, and if Jack’s not up for it, my mum can come get her.”

“Yeah, okay.”

There’s noise in the doorway, and Harry glances over to see Cooper stretching out on the tile. He wags his tail and comes over to Harry, setting his head on Harry’s thigh. Harry pets him and kisses the top of his head. His heart aches, a bit, realizing that Cooper is probably wondering where Jack is. He’s a black and white border collie, and he loves Jack more than anything else on this planet. Dogs are intuitive, they know when someone’s sick, so it’s not exactly surprising.

Tears crash over him suddenly, and he fucking hates this, how sudden the agony washes over him. Something completely normal can be enough to tip him off and fall into a puddle of tears, and here he is, crying over the bloody dog with his husband on the phone. He hunches over and pets Cooper more firmly, trying to calm himself down. It’s impossible to, and a small sniffle escapes him. Immediately, Louis makes an unhappy noise.

“Hey. He’s okay. You saw him, like, ten hours ago. Completely fine.”

“He had a seizure, Louis,” Harry cries quietly.

(It was awful just like it always is. It’s only happened a few times, and it still hasn’t stopped being terrifying. This one wasn’t as bad as they can get, but it wasn’t a small one, either.)

“But he is fine for right now. Come on, lovely, don’t work yourself up. You’re breaking my heart.”

“I’m sorry,” he whispers, wiping his tears. “I’m sorry. Cooper just made me sad, I don’t know.” He keeps wiping the new tears that come, taking deep breaths, and swallowing through the heat in his throat. Louis shouldn’t have to deal with this right now.

“We got Cooper to keep everyone happier,” Louis says, laughing. “What, do I need to buy you another?”

A broken laugh pushes through him. “Maybe. A big one, though.”

“Noted, babe.”

Cooper lifts his head and looks behind him before Harry hears his mum. She enters the kitchen, smiles warmly at them, pets Cooper, and kisses the top of his head.

“Hey, my mum just woke up,” Harry tells Louis, ignoring how Anne tells him not to let him go on her account. “I’ll text you when I’m about to leave, okay?”

“Yeah, sure. Love you.”

“And text me about Jack, okay?”

“Of course.”

“Alright. Love you, too.”

Louis’ the one to hang up, and once Harry’s off the phone, he stands and hugs Anne. She hugs him back tightly, even though she looks a little surprised. He envies her, a bit. She managed to raise two kids just fine, didn’t lose either of them to anything. Harry’s only had his kids for four years and it’s already falling apart. But he pushes that down and hides his face against her shoulder, trying to feel small and safe and looked after. She’s good at making him feel like their world isn’t falling apart.

“I love you, baby,” she whispers, rubbing his back. “And I’ll be here for you and Louis, no matter what, okay?”

“Okay.”

“Here, come sit. We can talk, and you can eat the rest of your food.” She grabs the plate and his wrist, leading them to the living room. Cooper follows, and the three of them get settled on the couch. Anne’s got Cooper so well-trained that he doesn’t even pay Harry’s food any attention.

“Louis can handle a day at the hospital alone, you know,” Anne tells him, and Harry shakes his head almost immediately.

“I don’t want him to be alone. And I want to spend time with Jack, anyway.”

“Yeah, I figured you’d say that.” She squeezes his knee. “Maddie misses you two. She’s getting temperamental the longer you’re away.”

Harry sighs quietly. “I’m taking her with me to the hospital. Hopefully that will smooth it over.” He drops his head to her shoulder, soaking in the comfort. “You can come, too, if you want. You can come whenever you want.”

“I’ll come with you tomorrow, okay? So I can watch Jack while you and Louis talk to the doctor.”

Harry’s stomach rolls at that, and he shuts his eyes. He doesn’t even want to think about that. There are so many things she could tell them, and none of them are good. “Yeah,” he says barely above a whisper. “Yeah, okay.”

“It’s going to be okay, you know.”

“I don’t know. You don’t, either. They won’t show us any of his bloody test results, so how could any of us know what is going on?”

“We can always hope,” she says, moving to wrap an arm around his shoulders. He leans into her more. “Nothing was ever hurt with hope.”

“Nothing was ever helped, either.”

“Harry,” she says, sad.

Harry shrugs. “I have been hoping that we’d get to raise happy, healthy kids for years, and look where we are now.”

“Jack has held on longer than the doctors thought he would have been able to,” Anne reminds. “And he is happy. Very happy. The happiest little boy I’ve ever seen.”

Hot tears swoop right back up to his eyes, so he closes them. “I’m not going to even have the time to get to know him, Mum. He’s four, he’s not -- he won’t be able to grow into himself before he goes. I -- God, what will he be when he grows up? What -- what music would he like? What sport would Louis convince himself to go into? I’ll never get to fucking know, I’ll never get to know, Mum, and that’s -- I just want to know.” He sits up, covering his face with his hand. Anne sighs quietly and takes the plate from him, setting it on the table in front of them, before rubbing her hand down Harry’s back.

“Well,” she says patiently. “He’s very creative. He likes to paint and draw and color. Maybe he’d be an artist. Or -- he likes to talk. A lot.” A ragged laugh rips itself from Harry’s throat. “Maybe he’d be a TV show host. Or a news reporter. As for the music he’ll like. . . I don’t know. He sure likes those Lion King songs. Maybe that’ll stick. And Louis will force him into football, obviously. You didn’t have a boy for nothing.” She kisses his shoulder. “Please don’t act like he’s already gone. He’s just twenty minutes away at the hospital with Louis, probably dreaming of you. He could have a few more years, Harry, maybe even more, we don’t know yet.”

Harry’s quiet for a moment before he asks, “Do you think me and Louis could handle losing him?”

“God, love, what did I just say?” She scoots closer, rubs his back a bit more intently. “You can’t think like this, not right now.”

“I know,” he says miserably, wiping a hand over his face. He lets out a long sigh. “I just. . . I can’t ever turn my brain off. And Madison shouldn’t have to handle losing her brother and her parents divorcing, too.” He shakes his head. “Sorry. I’m supposed to just not think about it, I know.”

Anne moves her hand up to run her fingers through Harry’s hair, and it feels so nice Harry thinks he could fall asleep again if he were to lay down with his head in her lap. And it sounds so good that that’s what he does, and she smiles down at him.

“You know,” she says after a little while. “The only thing you and Louis do better than taking care of each other is parenting. The love you have for each other -- it might one day take different forms, but it’ll always be there. You’ll always have him.”

“Good,” he whispers, closing his eyes. It feels like one of those baseless promises that they feed the kids, but Harry finds comfort in it anyway.

-

Harry walks back into the hospital at 7:17 in the morning with a half-asleep child in his arms and that stuffed polar bear he slept with the night before clutched tightly in his hands. He makes his way to the room, and his heart nearly stops when he sees that the door is open and a back of a nurse. It’s not uncommon, nurses checking in, so he doesn’t know why it makes him panic so much. His fears are immediately soothed when he steps in the room to see Louis in bed with Jack, who’s awake in Louis’ lap, though he looks sleepy. He perks up when he sees Harry and Madison, and Madison squirms in his arms, so he sets her on the bed. She immediately makes her way up the bad, slotting herself onto the other side of Louis, right next to Jack. They grin at each other, and it’s like a punch to the gut.

“Thought you were going to tell me when he woke up,” Harry whispers, side-stepping the nurse to kiss the top of Louis’ head. He reaches over them to stroke his thumb over Jack’s cheek, and Jack reaches up to grab it, a toothy smile beaming up at him.

“I’ll leave you lot alone now,” the nurse says kindly, waving goodbye to Jack. He doesn’t seem to notice, too busy staring up at Harry. His attention falls to the polar bear in Harry’s hand and Harry hands it to him.

“It’s Pezzy,” Jack says faintly, petting the bear’s fur. Madison takes the stuffed rabbit off the side table, and Harry recognizes that Louis is talking to him but he can’t look away from how content Jack looks right now, halfway in his dad’s lap with his sister smooshing his rabbit’s face into the polar bear’s.

“Hey,” Louis says, touching his arm, and Harry forces himself to look away from the kids to look at Louis.

“Sorry. What were you saying?”

“He woke up, like, ten minutes after you got off the phone,” Louis explains. “He threw up, but he says he feels fine now.”

Worry gnaws on Harry’s heart, just like it does every second of every day. He looks back at Jack, who’s looking up at him with wide eyes. “You feel fine now, hmm?” Harry asks, running his hand over Jack’s head. He’s been off radiation for a little while now, so his hair is beginning to grow back. It’s short, still, the hairs just barely managing to curl.

“Yep,” Jack chirps. “All the sickies are gone now.”

That forces Harry down to the bed, having to sit. It’s devastating, the way Jack just doesn’t understand any of this. He hasn’t got a clue about anything, not really. “That’s good, baby,” Harry whispers, and Louis grabs his hand, giving him a soft look. Harry doesn’t know what it means, and he doesn’t try to decipher it, not when his heart is racing from how fucking sad he is.

“Jack, bud, scoot over,” Louis says. Jack does, and Louis does, too, taking Madison with him, and Harry squeezes into the empty space as soon as it’s been made for him. He leans into Louis’ side, fitting into the curve of him. He rubs Louis’ shoulder and presses a kiss there. Jack and Madison are making the rabbit and polar bear fight, for some reason, when Louis turns to him.

“You’ve got to try and not look so bloody heartbroken, baby,” Louis whispers, lips right over his ear so the kids don’t hear. Harry immediately schools his face, because Louis’ right. The kids are so much better off when Louis and Harry pretend like everything’s fine. He doesn’t mean to do anything that would prevent that.

Louis nods at him before momentarily leaning his head against Harry’s. “Alright, babes,” Louis says to the kids. “Dad’s really tired, and I think he’d like it very much if you went to sleep with him.”

“But I just got here,” Madison whines, and Louis taps her nose.

“And you’ll be here when you wake up. Come on, look, Dad’s already half-asleep.”

Jack giggles, and he’s the first to listen. He gets under the blankets and snuggles into the other side of Louis, hugging the bear to his chest, and Madison sighs, following suit. She stays turned towards Jack, so Harry sets a hand on her side, stroking his fingers along her waist gently. They all shouldn’t fit in this bed, but they do.

Jack is the first to fall asleep, Madison only a few minutes behind him. And like Harry’s body was waiting for a sign that it could take as permission, his face grows hot and tears pull themselves down his cheeks. He hides his face against Louis’ shoulder, but he knows anyway.

“I know, love,” Louis whispers as he pulls out his arm from underneath Harry so he can wrap it around him properly. Harry sinks further into him, trying not to let his cries gain noise. “One day at a time, okay?”

“I know,” Harry whispers miserably. “I know, I’m sorry.”

“Don’t apologize. I’m just as scared and as sad as you are, okay? Don’t apologize for it, just try to feel other things, too.”

Harry sniffles quietly. “He’s such a good kid, Lou.”

“The best,” Louis agrees. “Now, try to get some more sleep.”

“You have to, too.”

Louis squeezes his arm. “I will, babe. We both will.”

-

In the afternoon, they decide to take the kids out for a little walk. They might as well; Jack feels good and likes the outdoors, especially when he’s been in the hospital for a few days. Louis and Harry want to have a nice day, knowing damn well tomorrow isn’t going to be a good one at all.

They walk a step or two behind the kids, keeping a careful eye on them. They’re just walking around the premise of the hospital so there aren’t many cars, so Harry’s not too worried about it, but still.

“The nurse said Dr. Pratt will meet with us at eight tomorrow morning,” Louis tells him, voice low. He’s rubbing his thumb over Harry’s, their hands intertwined between them.

“Okay. Mum said she’ll come up tomorrow so she can watch the kids while we talk to her.”

Louis nods. “Think she can come pick up Maddie tonight? She won’t sleep here, I know she won’t, and I don’t want her keeping Jack awake.”

“Yeah, ‘course. I’ll text her when we get back inside.”

They both stare at Jack. He’s pointing ahead at a bird on the fence-line, showing it to his sister with a grin on his face. He’s always so happy. Such a good boy, he is. He always will be, no matter how short of a time that may be.

“We both know what’s probably coming tomorrow, right?” Louis asks, still keeping his voice low. Feeling a little breathless, Harry drops his gaze to the ground, to the kids’ shuffling feet.

“Yeah,” he whispers, choked.

“He did well in surgery the first time,” Louis says. “The doctors, you know, they’ll be in and out, it’ll be fine. Routine. And then we can start panicking after they tell how much of it they couldn’t get out this time, okay? But not a minute before.” He sounds like he’s trying to calm himself down about this just as much as he’s trying to soothe Harry.

“Yeah,” Harry repeats, just as strained. He’s about to say something else when Jack stops, turns around, and makes grabby hands towards them both.

“What, bub?” Louis asks. Instead of answering, Jack comes between them, pulling at their hands. They let go of each other easily, each grabbing one of Jack’s hands. And, before Madison can pout, Louis wiggles his hand out in front of him, extending it to her. She takes it happily. As Jack hums between them, bouncing a bit on every step, Harry wonders if he picked up on their tension and this is his way of soothing them both.

-

At three in the morning, Harry and Louis are sitting in Harry’s car, the heat blasting on their faces in an attempt to ignore the October’s chill. Neither of them could even think about sleeping, that’s why they’re here. It was Louis’ idea to go out to the car -- and after a confused look from Harry, he hit Harry on the arm and said he wasn’t trying to hook up with him in the backseat. They told the nurse at the front desk that they’d be back in a little while, and she said she’d call them if anything changes with Jack.

It’s been twenty minutes since they’ve sat down, and neither of them have said a word. Nothing feels appropriate right now.

“It could be nothing,” Harry mumbles after another five minutes pass. It’s pointless and untrue, so he’s not sure why it’s what he chooses to say.

Louis shakes his head. He’s staring out the front window, sitting in the driver’s seat even though this is Harry’s car. “We’d be home by now if it was nothing. It’s definitely something.” He sighs and shifts to get more comfortable, pulling one of his legs onto the seat and leaning against the door more. “Maddie asked me if Jack was sick again before Mum picked her up. You were in the bathroom with Jack. Do you think. . . I mean, we couldn’t have just told her that Jack was dying, right?”

“Of course not.”

“Right, I know,” Louis says. “I just feel so fucking guilty sometimes.”

Harry leans over so he can set his hand on Louis’ thigh, and Louis instantly sets his hand on top of his. “I know, me too, but we’re doing everything we can.”

“I’m just really fucking happy that I’m doing this with you,” Louis says, and fucking hell, he’s crying. Harry scoots over in the seat more, desperate to fill the space between them. He fumbles for Louis’ other hand and nearly crushes it with how hard he squeezes.

“I love you,” he says, because he’s not sure what else to say. “I love you so much, Louis.”

“I love you, too,” Louis cries out. He shakes his head, and his shoulders shake. “I couldn’t do this with anybody else. Nobody, I swear it. And your mum, God, there’s just,” he lets out a sharp cry. “If we have to do this, I’m so glad I have you to do it with.”

“Same, babe,” Harry whispers. He takes his hand off Louis’ thigh and slides it over the back of Louis’ neck, rubbing his thumb in circles on the skin there. “I’ll always be here, always.”

“You promise?”

“Of course,” Harry says easily. “I’m not going anywhere, same as you. We’re in this together.”

Louis sniffles and wipes his cheek on his shoulder. “Good,” he croaks out. “I promise, too.”

Harry leans over the console to set his chin on Louis’ shoulder. He keeps squeezing his hand and rubbing his neck, and Louis leans his head against Harry’s. After about a minute, Louis lets out a wet laugh.

“I can’t believe you thought I asked you out here so we have sex.”

Harry rolls his eyes, mumbling, “That’s why I was confused, alright. I thought you’d finally gone crazy on me.”

Louis lets out a shaky breath, and Harry kisses his cheek. He tries to ignore it, but there’s a voice in the back of his head asking, If today was a good day and it still ended in you both crying, how will you get through the bad ones? How will you get through tomorrow?

-

It’s fifteen minutes past eight the following morning when Dr. Pratt finally walks into her office, letting out a loud sigh and apologizing for the wait. She says something about paperwork as she sits down at her desk across from them, and Harry tries not to be impatient. Yes, this is his son’s life they’re about to discuss, but she sees countless patients and it’s okay if she’s a little late. He tries really, really hard to believe that, but when it takes her nearly five minutes to find Jack’s folder, it gets harder to be sympathetic. He would’ve snapped if it wasn’t for Louis’ hand crushing his under the table.

“Right,” Dr. Pratt says, opening the folder. She at least seems familiar with the paperwork. “It seems like Jack has had some tests done recently, right?”

“Loads,” Louis tells her. “And nobody would tell us how things looked until we talked to you.”

She nods slowly before looking up. Eye contact like this is never good, Harry’s come to learn. “I think the last time you were here, a few months ago, we discussed the idea of a possible second surgery. Is that correct?”

Harry and Louis nod.

“It seems like that’s what we’re going to discuss again today. Jack’s tumor has grown more than we expected it to since the last time you were here.”

“Then why did we stop the radiation?” Harry asks sharply. “You said that it was growing at a slow rate.”

“It was,” she says, a little unhelpful. “And we all agreed to stop radiation because it wasn’t in Jack’s best interest.”

Because it has been about a year now that the conversation shifted from what they could do to make him better to what they can do to maintain his quality of life before he goes, and pumping him full of radiation was not what kept their son happy.

“And if we want to hold off on the surgery. . .?” Louis asks quietly; the look on his face and the tone of his voice shows that he knows it’s pointless to ask, but he had to ask anyway. Harry watches Dr. Pratt’s face turn cold, like she’s keeping herself in check. He wonders how many parents she’s had to tell that their child was dying. Surely, they aren’t the only ones, no matter how much it seems like they are sometimes.

She doesn’t answer the question directly. “It’s what I would strongly recommend.”

“When?” Harry asks, and she looks back down at the paperwork.

“We were hoping to get him into surgery sometime next week. Wednesday morning or Thursday evening; it’s up to you.”

The decision seems huge, like one means death and the other means life. Harry shoots a desperate look to Louis, begging him to choose (and not be wrong), and Louis calmly looks at the doctor.

“What time Wednesday morning?”

“Ten.”

Good, that’s good. Not too early so Jack won’t be the surgeon’s first patient, but not too late so they’’ll be tired. Realistically, Harry knows that isn’t necessarily logical, but Louis is somehow on the same wavelength as him.

“Wednesday, then,” Louis says, nodding.

And then, a beat behind, “Yeah, Wednesday, please.”

“But you could have told us that days ago,” Louis tells her, irritated. Harry takes his other hand and runs his fingers over the inside of Louis’ wrist, not to calm him down -- he has a right to be annoyed -- but to show his support. “Our son has been in the hospital for days now, and the only reason why is because you took so long to come and tell us this. We could’ve taken him home the morning after he had the seizure.”

Dr. Pratt purses her lips. “I understand the frustration. You can take Jack home today, after he’s been medically cleared to go.”

“He’ll be fine?” Harry asks anxiously.

“There will be no higher risk of complications at home then there are here,” she says, once again avoiding the question entirely. “Now, do either of you have any questions?”

Louis looks even more annoyed now. “Yeah, I’d like to know the results of every test you lot have put him through these last few days. He’s four, you know, and he doesn’t particularly like being poked with needles and shoved into MRI’s. And of course that was necessary, but I would like to at least know what came of it.”

“Of course. I can have one of the nurses print off his reports.”

“I’m an event planner,” Louis snaps. “Harry has a degree in business. We aren’t going to know anything about anything in his reports. Can you please take ten minutes to go over it with us?”

“Of course,” she says, and Harry swears she holds back a sigh as she flips through his paperwork.

Harry leans back in the chair and concentrates on listening. When he starts getting lost, Louis is one step ahead of him and asks her to clarify something or slow down. This is their son they’re talking, his fucking brain; she can take the time to explain it to them.

Afterwards, when they’re walking hand-in-hand to the cafeteria, Harry doesn’t feel like he understands it any better, but he feels settled in knowing the small bits she did tell them. Louis pours them each a coffee and then they sit at a table. Harry lets out a heavy breath.

“Six days, then.”

Louis nods as he fiddles with the edge of the lid. “Yeah. At least we can bring him home for a bit.”

“Yeah.”

They’re both too far in their own heads right now, trying to process everything, which is incredibly difficult to do when Harry’s mind immediately blanks when he uses Jack and surgery in the same sentence.

“We’ve done it before,” Louis says. “He’s done it before. And the surgeons -- they do it every day. It’ll be fine.” Louis laughs hollowly and sets his hand on his forehead, closing his eyes. “God, I feel lightheaded.”

Harry gets up from the seat across Louis to sit next to him instead. He wraps a steadying arm around Louis’ middle, holding him close. “We’ll eat something before we go see him then, okay?” He presses a long kiss to Louis’ temple, and Louis slumps into his side.

“You’re not good at pretending like everything’s okay.”

“Sorry,” Harry whispers, leaning his head on top of Louis’. There’s no point in trying to do that, anyway. Nothing is okay, and nothing will be okay until they’re sitting at their son’s bedside after a very successful surgery next Wednesday.

He feels a little dizzy, too.

“Do you think he’ll be upset?” Harry asks in a low voice, knowing full well that the answer will be yes. What kid wouldn’t be absolutely terrified by surgery? What grown adult wouldn’t be? Harry and Louis will have to explain it to him somehow that won’t freak him out too much.

“We’ve done this before,” Louis repeats, taking a deep breath. “It’s fine. It’s,” weaker, “It’s what we have to do.”

On a regular basis, they feel utterly powerless and defeated, and this -- the inability to have a say in what happens to your son -- just adds to that. It’s impossible not to be sad, but feeling sad seems foolish when they can’t do anything to fix it.

-

Jack is delighted to be able to come home again. During the entire car ride, he’s talking about Cooper and playing with Madison and seeing the neighbor’s children and whatever else he babbles about, it’s hard to keep track of while Harry’s driving. Harry is bringing Jack home in his car, Louis has Madison, and Anne is driving alone.

Harry barely has the car in park before Jack is getting out of his car seat buckles, popping the child safety lock off, and hopping out of the car. He curses quietly, getting out of the car quickly after him. Jack runs straight for the front door, but still. Madison doesn’t do that; she just pouts and whines and kicks until Harry or Louis come undo the buckle for her.

“Jack, bud, don’t do that,” Harry says halfheartedly, but he isn’t mad and even if he was, he wouldn’t have been able to stay mad with how Jack looks up at him, the pom-pom on the top of his hat moving quickly, and raises his arms to be picked up like its an apology. Harry does, and while he’s getting Jack settled on his hip and finding the right key, Louis pulls behind him in the driveway. Harry distractedly watches him and Madison get out of the car when Jack plants a wet, hard kiss on Harry’s cheek, making him laugh loudly and look at him in surprise. He drags his finger down Jack’s nose, poking the end of it softly, and Jack giggles loudly.

“I love you, baby,” he whispers as he pokes Jack’s dimple, eliciting another giggle. “I love you so much.”

“Love you too, Daddy,” Jack says, and then he looks over Harry’s head. Louis is behind him now, Madison on his own hip, and he gives him a funny look.

“Forget how to open a door, Styles?”

Both of the kids laugh like it’s the funniest thing in the world, and Harry feels equal parts relieved and awful as he opens the door. Cooper comes running up to them, and Harry sets a squirming Jack down on his feet so he can pet Cooper, who immediately attacks him with kisses, his tail wagging. Louis sets Madison down, too, but she goes running in the direction of the stairs for whatever reason. There’s a grin on her face, so it’s probably nothing good.

“No running up the stairs!” Louis shouts, and there’s no response but they hear her successfully run up the stairs and to her room, so they know she’s fine. Louis sighs behind him and hooks his chin over Harry’s shoulder, watching Jack play with Cooper.

“Was my mum right behind you?” he asks, watching Jack try to play tug-of-war with Cooper. Cooper isn’t using all his strength as if he can sense Jack is in need of a victory.

Louis kisses the side of his neck as he side-steps him and heads to the kitchen. “Your mum said she was stopping at your sister’s on the way back.”

He follows Louis, running a hand over Jack’s head as he goes. Cooper follows them, anyway, so Jack comes with them, too.

“She didn’t tell me that,” Harry says, opening the fridge. There is still some lasagna leftover, so Harry pulls that out to reheat for Jack.

Louis’ digging in the cabinets for some tea. “Yeah, she did, babe. Right before we left.” He sighs, turning to Harry. “Did your mum suddenly take a liking to my tea and drink it all or what?”

Just like Harry forgets things when he’s stressed, his mum rearranges things. Harry has lived with her for enough of his life to know that. He sets the lasagna tray on the counter and opens the cabinets above the stove, and sure enough, she’s put it next to the spices, for whatever reason. He hands it to Louis, and Louis thanks him.

“Daddy, can I have some of that?” Jack asks, standing next to him and standing on his tip-toes to try and see what Harry’s making. Harry smiles down at him, his heart aching. He hates it so much; he can’t forget about the bad stuff even for a moment.

“Who do you think I’m getting it for, babe?”

Jack grins up at him, and just as Harry’s about to ask Louis to see if Madison wants some, too, she comes racing down the stairs and into the kitchen with a coloring book and her pack of markers.

“Do not run on the stairs,” Louis says sternly, turning around to look at her. “You could hurt yourself.”

“Oopsies,” Madison says as she climbs up into the chair. They have a proper dining room -- a gorgeous one, too -- but somehow, they always end up eating at the kitchen table instead. Jack moves from Harry’s side to sit next to her, clearly interested, and Louis shoots Harry a frustrated look. They don’t need another kid getting hurt. And Louis absolutely resented the idea of putting the kids’ bedrooms upstairs, but Harry said he felt more comfortable having their rooms next to his and Louis’. There are only two bedrooms downstairs, and they didn’t see the point in making the kids share when there are five bedrooms, so Louis agreed. And now they have to deal with Madison and Jack racing up and down them all the time.

“Make your tea, love,” Harry says quietly. Louis sighs and turns back around before grabbing the box and joining Harry by the stove.

“Do you want some?”

“No, thanks,” Harry says, just as Madison says she does. Harry tells her that she’s going to eat, and she pouts a bit before getting distracted by Jack ripping a page out of her coloring book. Thank God for four-year-old’s short attention span.

Once the food is reheated and Louis’ tea is done, Louis and Harry join the kids at the table. Madison eats on her own completely fine, rarely making any messes, but Jack -- well. They spoil him. They coddle him. Not that they’re harsher on Madison, because they aren’t, it’s just. . . It’s different, and somehow that difference almost always leads to Jack giggling at the mess he accidentally made on his shirt.

Harry reaches for Jack a fraction of a second later than Louis does, so he puts his arm back down as Louis scoops Jack up and settles him into his lap. “No messes, mister, you hear me?” Louis whispers to him, and Jack nods determinedly. Harry watches them for a few seconds, grossly jealous, before he gets his revenge by stealing Louis’ tea and drinking half of it.

“You’re such a shithead,” Louis says, sighing, stealing it back. “I would have made you some.”

“I didn’t want any.”

Louis sticks his tongue at him.

Madison is managing to color and eat at the same time, and Harry scoots closer to her now that Jack is occupied. She is not the second choice, not at all, but Harry is long past feeling guilty for scrambling to get time with Jack. She will have all of their attention eventually.

The idea leaves a chill in his chest. He never wanted to raise an only child. Of course, Jack’s death won’t erase him, of course not, but Madison is four, and she won’t be too much older when Jack inevitably dies. She will be all by herself, and Harry never wanted that. Having only one kid seems selfish in some ways, and it undermines his entire life plan, basically. He wanted to stay home and raise kids -- so many kids. Four or five, Harry and Louis always said, but as soon as Jack was diagnosed, the conversation paused. Or maybe it ended all together, Harry isn’t sure.

Two weeks after Jack’s diagnosis, Harry and Louis were due to meet their next potential child. They wouldn’t give her name, but they knew she was thirteen months old, newly in the system, and that she lived in Lancashire. Harry was the one to call the adoption agency to tell them that they weren’t going through with it anymore.

“What are you coloring?” Harry asks Madison softly, and he tries desperately not to imagine another child sitting next to her, a young girl, just under their age. It’s not like Jack’s condition would hurt any less if they had another kid to look after. . . or maybe it would, Harry doesn’t know. It doesn’t even matter.

“It’s a horse.”

Harry squints down at the book. “That’s a zebra, love.”

Madison shrugs. “Same thing.”

“I don’t think it is.”

“Yeah,” she says, a little nonsensically. She forks another bite into her mouth before flipping to a new page and pointing at a picture of a monkey. She rips it out before putting it in front of Harry and sliding the pack of markers so they’re in between them.

“Ooh, it’s a monkey,” Jack says, and Harry turns to him, nodding.

“Yeah, it is.”

“Daddy’s going to color it,” she says, maybe a little defensively. Harry squeezes her shoulder before picking up a marker and uncapping it. Markers somehow always get on the table, but crayons end up broken in half on the floor and into Cooper’s mouth and pencil shavings get everywhere when they use colored pencils, so markers it is.

“Can Coop have some?” Jack asks, and he’s already bending down to give him some food off his fork before Louis intercepts it.

“No, babe. Eat. This is your food, not his.”

Jack pouts. “But he’s hungry.”

“He’s not, but you can give him a biscuit once you’re done eating.”

“Okayy,” Jack says, and he sets the fork back down on his plate and tilts his head back against Louis’ shoulder. For a second, Harry goes back to coloring the tail of the monkey before he picks his head back up and watches Jack carefully. He doesn’t look like he’s in any pain, so that’s good, at least.

“Jack,” Harry says softly, reaching forward and setting his hand on Jack’s belly. “You feel okay, buddy?”

Louis looks down at him, frowning, and Jack squirms.

“Not hungry,” he says, and Harry’s gut churns.

“Okay. Are you just not in the mood, or do you feel funny?”

Louis drops a kiss to Jack’s head as he mumbles, “Belly hurts.” They exchange a look over their son’s head, and Louis shakes his head, rubbing Jack’s back gently.

“That’s okay,” Louis says quietly. “Do you want to color for a bit? Maybe watch some TV? Or are you sleepy?”

Jack squirms some more, a clear Jack-tell that he’s tired and doesn’t want to go to bed just yet. Louis picks up on it just as easily as Harry does.

“We can go watch TV in me and Dad’s bed, yeah? With Coop? Does that sound okay?’

Jack agrees, which is good. He’ll be asleep within seconds of being cuddled up with Louis and Cooper in a nice, proper bed. Louis picks him up and grabs his tea, and like she fears Harry’s going to run right along after them, Madison huffs.

“We’re coloring,” she says, her face close to a scowl. “You have to finish your monkey.”

“Of course I will,” Harry tells her. He won’t leave Madison, not when all Jack is going to do is sleep. But he does promise to be right back as he follows Louis and Cooper up the stairs. He just wants to make sure they’re settled and that it’s nothing more than a bit of nausea and exhaustion. Besides, Louis forgot his tea.

Louis sits them down in the middle of the bed, getting Jack comfortable under the covers and against the pillows. Harry sets the tea down on the beside and promises to make Louis more before he kisses Louis’, then Jack’s, then Cooper’s head.

“Text me, okay?” Harry whispers to Louis, and Louis nods.

“He’s fine, but I’ll let you know if anything changes.”

Harry’s about to step out of the room and return to Madison when Jack calls out for him in this sleepy, little voice. He halts and turns around, his heart melting slightly as he watches Jack rub at his eyes.

“Pezzy,” is all he says, and Harry tells him of course. The polar bear is on the main floor with Jack’s hospital bag, so Harry quickly goes and grabs it before bringing it to him. He swears Jack’s already half-asleep when Harry places the bear next to him under the covers, and he kisses Louis on the lips before quietly going back downstairs.

Madison looks a little surprised that he came back, which is. . .

“What do you want to do, Mads?” he asks as he sits down. “We can just color, if you like. Or we can do something else, it’s up to you.”

She thinks about it for a moment, and then she asks if they could watch a show while they color. Harry finds the tablet and powers it on, and as he scrolls through the kids’ selection, he finds himself avoiding Jack’s favorite shows and movies.

God, the scars Jack will leave him are something Harry can’t possibly brace himself for.

He turns on Ice Age, picks up a marker, and forces himself to focus on the present. And in the present, he has an adoring husband, a loving dog, and two kids who are doing alright.

-

At three in the morning, after an hour of coaxing Jack back to sleep since a headache had him whimpering into Louis’ chest, Harry and Louis are in the basement so they can talk without disturbing anyone. Except, neither of them really want to talk about the things they need to, they’re both achingly upset and stumbling after comfort and security, and they’re both too aware of the fact that there’s not a chance anybody will hear them if they have sex down here.

It makes Harry feel disgusting and like a terrible father, and it honestly shouldn’t. Harry and Louis don’t have a lot of time to have sex, not when Anne is living with them and there are two kids running around all the time. They’re fucking sad, alright? Harry doesn’t think it has to be a bad thing. At least, that’s what he tells himself, but he can’t bring himself to make the first move.

“I don’t want to talk about it,” Louis says. They’re sitting side by side on the couch, not touching and with their feet on the floor.

“I don’t either.”

Louis sighs. “We’ll tell him soon, but not tomorrow or anything, so we don’t have to talk about it tonight.”

“You’re the only one talking about it.”

Louis shakes his head before turning and kissing Harry, hard. When they do this, they aren’t exactly gentle or slow about it. Not in a bad way, just -- it’s easier to forget about important things when everything’s moving so fast in the moment. Louis pushes Harry down against the couch and climbs on top of him, and then he curses quietly.

“We are so fucking selfish,” he whispers, and he pulls away. Harry is quick to keep him close by setting his hands on Louis’ neck, preventing him from pulling back further.

“We’re not.”

“I have Jack’s snot on my shirt, Harry,” Louis snaps, and Harry shrugs. (It’s natural, how they go back and forth. Rarely do they have a meltdown simultaneously. One of them is always the calm one and the other is the one voicing the concerns they both have. It’s just how they operate.)

“Then take it off,” he says simply, and Louis momentarily looks devastated, and just when Harry thinks maybe they shouldn’t do this while Louis’ so upset, he swears again, yanks off his shirt, and leans down to kiss Harry again.

For eleven and a half minutes, the only two people in the world are them.

-

They end up having the talk they were supposed to have that night four hours later, at the kitchen table over coffee. They’re exhausted and probably should get some sleep before the kids wake up, but neither of them can sleep with this on their mind.

“So,” Louis says quietly. “We have to tell him, right?”

“Yeah, ‘course.”

“But how? Do we just do what we did last time?”

Last time, they told Jack that the doctors needed him to go to sleep so they could help his brain. That was literally it, and he was two so he didn’t question anything. He was scared about being put under anesthesia, but it only lasted a few minutes and then he was asleep. This time, it’s different. He’s older now and has a better understanding of the fact he’s sick.

“We can start there, maybe,” Harry says, nodding to himself as he says it. “And if he wants to know more, we can tell him.”

“I read that you shouldn’t lie. Like, if he asks if it’ll be painful, we should tell him the truth.”

Harry sucks on his teeth for a moment. He doesn’t agree with that, but at the same time, he has no way of really knowing what is best. He should trust Louis’ sources, probably. “I don’t think we should tell him that they’re cutting open his head, though.”

“No,” Louis agrees quietly, flinching slightly. “No, we shouldn’t. We should. . . I don’t know. Maybe we can tell him they’ll just, like, look at his head with machines. Like he’s used to.”

“Okay.”

Harry doesn’t know, either.

“Let’s just see what he asks,” Louis says. “And maybe your mum can be there, too? If she’s okay with it, I mean.”

Anne hasn’t done any of this before either. It’d probably be unfair to ask her to help with this. She’s the mum here, the oldest, and that might make her feel pressured to have all the right answers. But Harry feels a million times better just imagining her there with him, so he’ll ask her of that anyway. He has never denied being selfish.

“Yeah. She probably won’t mind. Should we tell him today, then?”

Louis shakes his head. “Tomorrow. I don’t want to tell him too soon.”

“Especially because he didn’t feel well this morning,” Harry agrees. Jack is inevitably going to be anxious about this whole thing, and Harry doesn’t want him to feel worse about it today because of this morning. He’s always a little sensitive after not feeling well. “Okay, yeah. Tomorrow.”

“And Madison? What do we tell her?”

“That Jack is going to go get help from the doctors and that he’ll be fine. We can’t worry her or she’ll worry him.”

Louis lets out a long, tired sigh before taking a sip of coffee. He scratches his face, at the unshaven stubble from being at the hospital the past week. He hates shaving a fraction less than he hates the feeling of facial hair. They’re both tired and vulnerable and sick to their stomachs with worry, and they haven’t even entered the hardest part yet. Getting Jack back onto his feet after the first surgery was the hardest period of their lives, and now they have to go through it again. Last time, there was less time to panic before it happened. Everything happened so fast.

“We should go back to sleep,” Louis mumbles, and like his brain is pleading him not to, he takes another long sip of coffee.

“Jack will wake up if we lay back down. Cooper, too.”

Louis shrugs. “We can sleep on the couch, then.”

“Okay.”

They finish their coffees and put the mugs in the sink before heading to the living room. Louis lays down first, so Harry gets to be the little spoon. Louis holds him tight, needing to be needed, and Harry tucks his face against his chest. There’s a blanket on the back of the couch that they use, and being covered makes Harry feel less exposed, less vulnerable. But the minute he feels comforted by Louis, he always thinks, God, I couldn’t take it if we aren’t together forever. Every single time; it makes him feel guilty, almost like he’s planning on their downfall. He’s not, he’s just terrified. He couldn’t do this all over again with someone else, and he wouldn’t want to.

“Sleep,” Louis whispers, like he knows Harry’s mind is spinning. Harry presses closer to him.

-

With both the kids home, Harry gets to fall into his role of being the stay-at-home dad again. He cooks breakfast and lunch and helps his mum with dinner, he does bath time, he plays with them all day and tucks them into bed at night. Sometimes it feels like he has no other purpose than taking care of these kids, which usually doesn’t bother him until that purpose is taken away. With Jack at the hospital and his brain too scrambled to care about anything else, Harry couldn’t distract himself or find a way to feel good about himself in any way. His main source of feeling productive and needed and like he’s good at something lies with these kids -- and Harry doesn’t know what he’d do if that was taken away.

“You’re so good with them,” Anne tells Harry at noon. Louis’ on the phone with his boss upstairs, and Harry is splayed out on the living room rug with the kids, a tub of legos spilled out in front of them. Jack’s building a flower shop, Madison a bridge, and Harry a boat. Cooper is supervising from the couch.

Harry smiles. “It’s almost like I’m their father or something.”

“I know, I know. Some people aren’t such naturals in parenting, though. You and Louis figured it out quite quickly on your own.”

“You’ve been here with us for half of their lives,” Harry reminds. “We weren’t on our own.”

“Take the compliment,” Anne says sternly, and Harry rolls his eyes fondly before thanking her. He really does love them. They’re his best friends, pretty much. He’ll never get sick of the feeling of being loved by them.

Louis comes out into the living room a few minutes later, and he gets down on the floor with the rest of them, slotting himself in between Madison and Harry since there’s no room between Harry and Jack. Jack has been in a good mood since he woke up, which was nine in the morning. His sleep schedule has gotten messed up from the hospital, and he jumped on top of Harry and Louis, who were still sleeping on the couch. Louis got a kick to the groin and Harry got an elbow to the nose, but still, it was a warm morning welcome.

Harry’s staring at Jack’s flower shop that has the wonkiest foundation he has ever seen when Louis leans into him and snaps his boat in half. The kids laugh, Anne shakes her head with a smile, and Harry groans.

“That’s not very nice, Dad,” he says, scooping up the pieces that fell off during the attack. He clips one back on, and Louis reaches over to cause more destruction. Harry slaps his hand away. “I’ve been working on this bloody boat for nearly a half hour.” He looks to Jack and stage-whispers, “You see how mean he is to me?”

Louis jabs his fingers into Harry’s side, and the kids laugh some more.

They work on their lego creation for an hour longer until Harry gets up to start lunch. Louis follows him into the kitchen like he usually does. He doesn’t help cook -- really, he just gets in the way -- but it’s nice to have the company.

“What did your boss say?” Harry asks as he pulls out a pan from the cabinet. He’s tired, so he’s just going to make some grilled cheese sandwiches. Nothing too fancy.

Louis makes an unhappy noise as he leans against the fridge. “He was fine with me wanting to take another week off, but when I said it might be longer than that depending on how Jack does, he got a little pissy.”

“I need the butter,” Harry says, so Louis moves. As Harry grabs what he needs from the fridge, he says, “What did you say to that?”

“I said that I won’t leave my sick kid at home to help a bunch of stupid rich people plan stupid events that nobody wants to go to.”

Harry squints at him. “I’m one of those stupid rich people, and I think, by extension, that means you are, too.”

Louis has never gotten used to having money. He works five days a week and worries about the kids’ university funds and bills, even though none of that is a problem. The kids have more money to their names already than Louis probably even realizes. Harry’s grandparents are the founders of some nation-wide paper company and his parents invested in the right stocks. Money isn’t a worry for them, but Louis didn’t grow up like Harry did and some habits are hard to shake.

“You’re rich, but not a stupid rich person, there’s a difference,” Louis says, waving him off. He leans back against the fridge once Harry shuts it again. “He said to call him again in two weeks, so I guess that’s what I’ll do.”

Harry nods as he flicks on the burner. “Me and Mum can handle it by ourselves, you know. I mean, I know you want to be there, but he’ll be okay with us.”

“I know that, but yeah, I still want to be there. At least until he’s for sure doing alright.”

“Okay, yeah. Have you told your mum yet? About -- you know.”

Louis shakes his head. “If I tell my mum, all my siblings find out, too, and I don’t want a million people texting me about it. I’ll tell her soon, though.”

“She might want to be there. At the hospital. She hasn’t seen the kids in a while.”

“She saw them in August,” Louis says with a sigh. “I don’t know. I think her being there will just stress me out more.”

“Okay, but she should still know.”

Louis halfheartedly kicks at Harry’s shin. “I’ll call her after we tell him.”

And Louis looks stressed about it, so Harry leaves it be with an okay. He thinks Louis’ mum being there for him will help, but if Louis doesn’t want that, then so be it. It’s okay. Harry isn’t going to tell Louis how to do this when he doesn’t have a clue how to do it himself.

-

The following afternoon, they stick Madison in the family room with a movie playing in the background while she finger-paints, call Cooper in Jack’s room, and they all sit down with Jack to talk about it. They do what they talked about: start off by telling him a vague version of the truth and handle it from there. Jack doesn’t ask very many questions, but he’s very clearly nervous about it. His arms are wrapped around Cooper’s neck, his fingers fiddling with his name tag, the entire time they talk to him. One of the questions he does ask, though, is if he did anything wrong, which completely confuses them all and they spend a handful of minutes reassuring him over and over again that this isn’t happening because of anything he did or didn’t do. The other question he asks is if Madison will have to have it done, too, and he gets teary-eyed when they tell him no.

Afterwards, when they’re all staring at him with watery eyes and an aching chest, Louis asks him if he wants to do anything fun, and Jack asks with a strained voice if they can go to the dog park. It’s raining and the kids will do everything in their power to find every muddy puddle in a fifty-mile radius, but immediately, they agree.

“Can you get him all bundled up?” Louis asks Harry, motioning to Jack. “I’ll get Cooper ready and Anne will handle Maddie.”

Harry nods. His eyes are burning and itchy, his nose is running, and his throat is scratchy. Louis looks like he feels the same. “Yeah, ‘course.”

Jack sniffles at him and, without having to be asked, lets go of Cooper to stretch his arms out towards Harry. A wounded noise tears itself from Harry’s throat as he picks him up and settles him on his hip. Jack sets his cheek on Harry’s shoulder, his fingers gnawing at his shirt, and Harry kisses his head repeatedly until Anne, Louis and Cooper leave, the door shutting behind them.

“We’ve got to get you dressed, baby,” Harry whispers, but Jack shakes his head and whimpers out a no, and Harry will not push him right now. So, he rocks him back and forth on his hip for a few minutes, texting Louis with one hand to tell him that they’ll be a while.

“It’s okay to be upset, lovey,” Harry tells him as he rubs his back. His heart is breaking into a million little pieces, only being held together by the knowledge that Jack needs him right now. “But me and Dad -- we love you to bits, okay? We’ll always take care of you. You’re our baby, and we won’t let anything happen to you.”

Each time he tells a lie like that, a lie that Louis and Harry somehow know everything and all will be forever okay, a part of himself disappears. When he’s gone, Harry won’t ever be able to forget all the lies he told him. They’ll haunt him about a million more times than they do already.

“I know it’s scary, Jack, but you’ve done it before, remember? It wasn’t all that bad, was it?”

Jack shakes his head, tiny hands still clutching onto Harry. He probably remembers it vaguely, but not enough to remember that no, actually, it was pretty awful.

“And when you come home,” he whispers, “me and Dad and Cooper and Maddie and Grandma will all be here to take care of you. You’ll be like a king, everyone waiting on you. You know, like the stories?”

Jack nods. It doesn’t make him smile like Harry was hoping for, though.

So, Harry kisses his head and whispers, “And, when you’re better, we can get another dog, yeah? Like Cooper?”

Jack sits up straighter, his eyes wide with desire, and he reaches out to touch Harry’s cheek. “Yeah?” he asks, meek, and Harry kisses his hand.

“Yeah, baby. You can even pick it out.”

“Promise?”

Harry squeezes his hip. “I promise you, darling.”

-

At the dog park, Jack vehemently refuses to be put down for even a second. He’s usually running around trying to say hi to all of the dogs or pretending like he’s the one walking Cooper, but today, he stays planted on Louis’ hip the entire time. Louis attempts to put him down for just a quick second, and Jack immediately bursts into tears and clings to him with every ounce he has in him. It’s fine, really. He still looks like he’s having a good time, and he points at nearly every dog that walks by and asks their names, and they make up goofy names that make him giggle. Madison feels a little underappreciated, so Harry focuses on making her feel included. He holds her hand the entire time, which she seems to like.

Once the kids are worn out and their shoes have clung to every bit of mud possible, they get back in the car and head to an ice cream shop. Jack refuses to be put in his car seat just like he did on the way here, so Harry holds him tightly in the back seat. Madison fusses, saying it’s unfair, but Harry asks her maybe a little too desperately to stop.

Harry and his mum get vanilla ice cream while everyone else gets chocolate, and they eat outside at a table with an umbrella so they’re kept out of the rain. Cooper lays the table, and Jack quietly talks to him, making faces at him and waving. He’s back in Louis’ lap, and Madison’s just about had enough with it and demanded to sit in Harry’s lap, too, which he obliged easily. Like usual, she makes less of a mess than Jack does, although she still gets ice cream on her cheeks and hands, too.

As Louis wipes his cheek for the millionth time, Jack asks, “Will there be ice cream on Wen-day?” and Harry’s gut drops, shooting a panicked look to Louis as he sets a hand on Maddie’s head. They haven’t told her yet, and now is not the time to have this conversation.

“Yes,” Louis says, and he tries to change the topic, but Madison is quicker than him and asks what’s happening on Wednesday.

“Jack has another doctor’s appointment,” Louis says quickly, and then he asks what movie the kids want to watch when they get home, intentionally starting an argument between them. Anne gently touches Harry’s shoulder, then Louis’, and nods at them reassuringly. They’re doing the best they can.

After Madison wins the argument and the decided movie is Pooh’s Heffalump, she’s content and Jack is a little moody, but he doesn’t complain too much. He looks too tired to.

Louis’ talking to Anne about -- something, Harry realizes that he doesn’t even know what the conversation is -- when Madison’s sticky fingers start to poke at Harry’s hand. Harry glances down and, unsurprisingly, she’s tracing the tattoos of their names Harry has on his right hand. It’s below his thumb, and their names are written vertically to follow the edge of his hand, Jack’s on top and Madison’s on the bottom in neat cursive writing. Louis has the same on his hand. The kids don’t really understand tattoos, but they think they’re cool anyway and somehow realize that it means something special. He watches her concentrate on poking every letter of each of their names -- and Harry mentally keeps track what letter she’s on -- and once she’s done, she reaches up to touch the cloth covering the inside of Harry’s right bicep, about two inches below where Louis’ name is.

“Daddy,” she says, looking at him intently, and Harry has no idea what’s going on in her tiny little head, but he nods and kisses her temple.

“Yeah, Daddy’s right there.”

And suddenly, he feels like he’s about a millisecond away from crying. It’s always so fucking abrupt. He takes a deep breath, sets his chin on Madison’s head, and looks up, trying to stop the tears from coming. It takes a few minutes, Madison’s sticky, prodding fingers and Jack’s hushed whispers to Cooper making it hard to calm down, but when he feels like he won’t cry again, he looks back down, to Louis, and Louis’ already looking at him. Wordlessly, Louis touches the spot on his bicep where Harry’s name is, and Harry nods, understanding everything that means, and he’s choked up all over again.

-

On Tuesday night, Harry and Louis can’t even think about sleeping, so they slip outside to the back. Since decorating is in Louis’ job description, the entire house looks exactly the way both of them want it to, but the backyard is something else. The patio is fully furnished with dark wood, grey bricks, comfortable furniture and a porch swing that Harry loves but has a heart attack every time the kids sit on it. There are fairy lights, too, that are strung around the roof. They’re bright enough so they can see each other in the dark, but soft enough that the light isn’t harsh.

They’re huddled into each other on the armchair since space is the last thing either of them want right now. Louis’ sat on his lap, and the blanket that’s wrapped around them keeps out the cold. Cooper was out with them, but they sent himself inside once it was obvious he was too cold.

“This is still my favorite part of the house,” Louis says randomly. They’ve been crying for a while, so it’s no surprise that his voice comes out shot. “Out of everything I’ve done with your money -- ”

“Our money.”

“I didn’t earn any of that.”

“Neither did I,” Harry reminds, and Louis snorts.

“Yeah, I guess. But out of everything we’ve done with this house, I think this is the best.”

Harry nods, agreeing. They keep talking about things that don’t matter; it’s a way to distract themselves, maybe, but it’s hard to stay distracted when one of them randomly starts crying every few minutes. It’s going to be a hard night followed by much more difficult ones, but they’ll get through it.

“It feels like ages since I met you,” Louis says. He rubs his nose before putting his arm back underneath the blanket.

“It’s been, like, thirteen years. It has been ages.”

Louis sighs. “I feel older than thirty-one is what I mean. Like, uni and everything feels like a lifetime ago.”

“It feels longer than four years since we’ve had the kids,” Harry agrees. “Feels like I’ve spent my whole life with them somehow. I guess in a way that’s true. . . Nothing before them matters much anymore.”

They met when Harry was sixteen and Louis was eighteen at a football game. Harry went to an all-boys’ prep school, but their footy team sucked so Harry always ditched theirs and went to his mate’s school’s games instead. Louis played on the team, and he was the fittest of the bunch, but Harry didn’t entertain the idea much. Back then, boys were an idea to him, like being in a relationship with one was something that would never happen to him. And his mate, Liam, told him that it probably wasn’t a good idea.

“Tomlinson isn’t gay,” he said, “and even if he was, he wouldn’t get together with a private school kid.”

It was after that same game that Harry was in line at the concession stand and Louis came up and tapped him on the shoulder. Harry turned, surprised. Louis was out of his uniform and in normal clothes, and he looked determined.

“You don’t go here,” he said.

Harry blinked at him. “Uh, no.”

“Where do you go?”

“A private school, like, an hour from here,” he admitted, because even though he thought Louis was proper fit, he wasn’t going to waste his time on someone who wouldn’t like him solely based on where he goes to school.

But Liam was wrong, and Louis wasn’t a waste of time.

“But you come to all the games,” Louis said. “Surely you have some sense, then.”

Harry grinned. “Just a little.”

From there, he stopped going to the game’s because Liam didn’t want to go alone and started going to the games because Louis was playing. It happened so suddenly, they started to date, and neither of them knew what they were doing for the longest time. The sex didn’t stop being awkward and uncertain until university. Harry still refuses to admit he only went to university because he was scared of losing relatability to Louis, but it doesn’t matter because he had fun at school.

They got engaged when Harry was twenty-one, and everyone in both families adamantly disagreed with it. They all said being together for five years meant nothing when they were still so young, but Harry and Louis were certain they knew what they were doing. They still had a lot of growing up to do, sure, but they were both certain they wanted to do that growing up together. And maybe their immaturity was highlighted the night they got married, but whatever. It worked out alright.

Harry invited Louis to his dad’s side of the family’s Easter party, and the topic of their engagement became the topic of discussion over dinner. Harry’s paternal grandparents weren’t particularly kind to Louis, to say the least, accused him of being a gold digger no matter how many times Harry said that wasn’t true. Harry’s parents were protective over Louis, too, but his grandparents just wouldn’t stop talking. So Harry made them stop.

He grabbed Louis’ hand, stood up, and said they were leaving. When his grandmother asked where they were going, Harry looked her straight in the eye and said, “To go get married. Thanks for dinner.”

He didn’t realize he was completely serious until he was driving and Louis looked at him and said, “We didn’t have to leave. They were just being protective of you, and I’m not, like, offended. I couldn’t care less, honestly.”

“Yeah, well, I do. I don’t need to be protected from you.”

“And your solution to them being mad that we’re engaged is to marry me?”

He shrugged and said, “I don’t know, if you’re up for it.”

“You’re bloody insane,” Louis said, laughing, and he hit Harry in the shoulder when Harry didn’t laugh, too. “You’re not serious.”

“I don’t have to be. We can wait.”

Louis hit him again. “You want a big, fancy wedding that will take, like, a year to plan. Don’t abandon that just because you want to prove a point.”

“I do want to prove a point,” Harry agreed calmly. “But not to them, to you. I love you, and I want to be married to you, and I don’t think it has to be more complicated than that.”

“But the wedding,” Louis reminded, and Harry shrugged.

“We can still have a proper wedding later on. I don’t know, I always thought having your kids in your wedding would be sort of nice.” He glanced at Louis and realized he looked completely overwhelmed, so he hit pause. “I’m just thinking out loud. We don’t have to get married. We can go home and just let everyone think we did. It’s up to you.”

Louis was quiet for about a minute before he turned to him and said, “Not tonight. We’re not getting married on a holiday, that’s dumb. But if you’re still up for it in the morning. . .”

And Harry was, so they went down to the courthouse in tuxes they bought that morning, and they then realized that you have to wait twenty-eight days after filling out the paperwork to get married. So they did, and then they got married in the courthouse in the beginning of May. Neither of them regret it at all, and Harry still feels a little smug whenever he comes back home for a holiday with Louis and his grandparents have to pretend like they’ve always supported them.

They had a proper wedding when the kids were barely two, about four months before Jack’s diagnosis. Louis planned it, Harry paid for it, and Harry is guiltily relieved that the day was untouched by the stress of Jack’s sickness. It will forever be Harry’s second favorite day, the first being the day their surrogate had the twins. It was still somewhat of a shock, having two babies. The early scans missed Madison for months, and then suddenly at one of the appointments, Louis’ mum looked at the ultrasound and informed the doctor who they were paying very, very good money for that there were two babies. And without a doubt, Harry and Louis agreed to keep both of them.

Louis’ right: all of that feels like ages ago.

They talk for another twenty-five minutes, and then the door slides open. They turn to see Anne standing there, Jack half-asleep on her chest. “Someone wants to see you,” she says, just as Jack reaches his hand out towards them. Immediately, they stand, and Louis gets to Jack first, so Harry shuts the door behind them.

“It’s only four,” Harry says kind of pointlessly. They’re supposed to leave at seven-thirty so they can get there at eight, when they’re supposed to. Jack can’t be awake this early.

Louis is stroking his fingers over Jack’s arm, staring down at him intently. “We can get him back to sleep,” he says, and Jack squirms and protests, but he does look exhausted still. Louis takes him to their room, and Harry follows. He stops on the way to the room to grab the stuffed rabbit and polar bear from Jack’s room, and he hands them to Jack once they’re all settled in bed.

“Not tired,” Jack mumbles against Harry’s chest, though his eyes slip shut. Louis kisses the back of his head and rubs his back, and within minutes, he’s back asleep. Louis and Harry are careful not to move around too much, but they do turn on the TV at a low volume because neither of them is going to even attempt to convince their minds to let them sleep.

Jack wakes up again at six, which is a mostly acceptable time. He seems proper awake this time, too, so they don’t coax him back to sleep.

“I’m hungry,” he says, and Harry and Louis frown.

“You can’t eat before the procedure, babes, I’m sorry. But we can take Cooper out for a walk.”

It’s a shit compromise, but Jack gets distracted anyway. He loves Cooper more than almost anything, which becomes helpful when they need to distract him or make him happy, like now.

Jack is quiet on the walk. They ask if he’s nervous, and he won’t admit to it. He holds both of their hands and just walks -- there’s no commentary about the passing cars or squirrels or his sister. He’s quiet. He’s scared.

When they’re getting him ready to leave, Jack gets teary-eyed. Harry’s buttoning up his coat when he notices, and he immediately pulls him in for a hug, desperate to ease his nerves.

“You’ve done it before, baby,” he reminds. “When you were so much littler, too. You’re big now, you’re so big, baby. You got this. There’s nothing to be scared of.”

“Is Maddie coming?” he asks, hiccupping, and Harry shakes his head.

“No, love. She’s sleeping. But she’ll be there when you wake up, okay?”

“Promise?”

“I promise, baby. So will me and Dad and Grandma. We’ll be right there for you.”

Jack sniffles. “The whole time?”

“Every minute, love.”

Harry’s heart has broken two-hundred times over by the time they get to the hospital. As soon as they walk in, Jack gets into game-mode. He hides his nerves, he doesn’t want to be carried, and he’s a bit more talkative. Either they’ve soothed him enough for him to feel prepared, or he’s realized that he’s been to the hospital tens of times before and it isn’t all that scary. Whatever it is, Harry couldn’t be more relieved to see him wave at the receptionist.

“We’re here to check-in,” Louis says. Harry can tell how hard he’s holding Jack’s hand, but Jack doesn’t seem to mind.

“Okay,” the receptionist says. “What’s the name of the patient?”

“Jack. Jack Styles.”

“Okay, great. If I could just have you sign here, and then once you’re done, you can go to floor six, room eleven. I’ll page someone to let them know you’re here.”

“Okay,” Louis says, but he doesn’t make a move from the pen. He looks lost, a little bit, so Harry grabs the pen and signs them in instead. Jack seems like the least nervous right now, so Harry grabs Louis’ hand on the way to the elevator. His palms are clammy and shaky, same as Harry’s.

“Press the sixth button, bub,” Harry tells Jack, and Jack nearly clicks floor five. Harry’s quick to move his hand to the right button, and he tugs him back as the door closes.

-

The morning went by achingly slow, but the next two hours fly by.

Jack gets examined, and then they take him for tests. Every person who sees Jack is in the fakest best mood possible, and it’s good, because as the time gets closer, Jack gets quieter. Harry and Louis, too. It’s impossible to fake happiness at this point, and the nurses doing it for them is a big relief.

By the time they have Jack walking down a long hallway with a hospital gown on, it’s far too soon. It’s far too fucking soon, this is all happening too fast. Harry and Louis are allowed ten minutes to sit with him in the last room before he’s taken into surgery. They’re the ten most daunting minutes of their lives.

“It shouldn’t take too long, baby,” Louis says, voice trembling. He smooths over a wrinkle in Jack’s blanket. “And when you wake up, you can finally eat. What do you want, hmm?”

Jack’s answer is immediate. “Chicken nuggets.”

Louis laughs. “Alright, I think we can do that.”

“Daddy said we can get another dog,” Jack says. “Like Cooper. When I get better.”

Harry nods. “Yeah, ‘course. I told you, babe, you can pick it out, too. And name it, if you want.”

Jack’s eyes light up. He looks down at Harry’s hand, at the way Harry’s playing with his fingers, just like Louis’ doing with his other hand. “Snoopy if it’s a boy,” Jack says thoughtfully. After a few more seconds, he says, “And Hallie for a girl. Like in Maddie’s show.”

Harry must be a bad dad, because he doesn’t know a Hallie in one of Madison’s shows. He’s not entirely focused on that, though. He’s more focused on the fact that Jack is about the sweetest kid in this entire world and he doesn’t deserve to have his brain poked around at. In just under ten minutes. God.

“Those are good names,” he says, nodding. Louis agrees.

They have seven minutes left. The next four are spent with Jack rambling about what the dog he wants will look like. The final three are quiet -- a nurse comes in to check something, and Jack senses that it’s time. And then Louis and Harry are being asked to leave, and it takes everything inside of them to hold off on crying.

Before the surgery, the words, “See you in a little bit, okay? I love you, baby, so much,” followed by a kiss to the forehead is Harry’s goodbye. “We’ll be waiting just outside, love. Every minute, you hear me? We love you, sweetheart,” is Louis’.

They leave, then, after Jack gets a tight hug from both of them. Walking down the hallway seems even longer than the first time did, and they don’t look at each other, or talk to each other, or do anything but squeeze each other’s hands as tight as they can.

And then the waiting starts, as well as the tears.

-

They’re given a pager, just like they were the last time, which will let them know if they’re needed or if there’s an update on the surgery. It makes it so they’re able to go out to the car without feeling anxious that they’ll miss something. They sit in the car and cry, because doing it in the waiting room was too embarrassing. They just need to get it out now, and then they can sit and wait without drawing so much attention to themselves. Maybe it’s wrong to even be thinking about anyone else right now, he doesn’t know. All he knows is that his son is in surgery right now, and he doesn’t need to feel judged for crying about it.

“Maddie’s awake,” Louis croaks out at half past ten. Harry looks at him for the first time in nearly a half hour, and his skin is as red and damp as Harry’s. He’s biting on his bottom lip and blinking rapidly, probably trying to put a stop to the tears. Harry wipes at his own eyes, feeling caught, somehow.

He clears his throat to say, “Okay.” He hasn’t checked his own phone since they got here, so he pulls it out. Almost immediately, though, all the texts from friends and family wishing them the best is overwhelming, and he swipes it all away. The only texts he reads are from his mum, his sister, and Liam. Those are the only people whose support doesn’t feel violating.

“He seemed okay,” Harry says, except he doesn’t realize it was him who said it until Louis nods. He feels so lost, so scrambled. He’s not going to be able to catch his breath until Jack is out of surgery and in his sight.

“Yeah. Wasn’t as scared as I thought he’d be. He’s a strong kid.”

Louis should know by now that there’s almost nothing that irritates him more than hearing that. It’s right up there with people telling him that God won’t take Jack until it’s his time -- well, what the fuck does he do if he doesn’t believe in God? What then? And even if he did, how is he supposed to be comforted by the fact that someone put Jack in their lives only for him to be ripped away in one of the worst ways possible?

“He’s four. He shouldn’t have to be strong.” Harry says. It’s as polite as he can manage, and even then, it comes out cold. He doesn’t mean to be that way towards Louis, ever but especially now, so he reaches over to grab his hand. He can’t tell which of theirs are trembling worse. “You know what I mean.”

“Yeah, and you know what I mean.”

He squeezes Harry’s hand tight, and it’s not as reassuring as it normally is. A strained sigh falls from his lips as he leans over to set his forehead on Louis’ chair. He wants to be held but doesn’t have the courage to ask for it, not when they’re both going through the same thing. Louis places his empty hand on the back of his neck, and it’s close enough.

“Who’s Hallie?” Harry asks.

“What?”

“Hallie. Jack said she was from one of Maddie’s shows, but I don’t know who he’s talking about.”

“Oh,” Louis mumbles. He starts to move his fingers against Harry’s neck, and it makes him close his eyes. They feel swollen and sticky already, and it’s not even been an hour. “The hippo from that one doctor show. Doc McStuffins.”

God, he’s going to cry again. At least he can feel it coming on rather than it attacking him abruptly.

“Oh, right. She -- Louis, shit. They love each other so much.”

“Yeah, they do. Best friends, them.”

Harry sobs quietly. Crying takes so much energy, energy that he doesn’t have right now. “She can’t lose him. She can’t -- we know the risks here, we know he’s on borrowed time, but she doesn’t. She can’t lose her brother.”

“Hey,” Louis says softly. “She’s not going to.”

“Maybe not today,” Harry cries. “Not today or tomorrow or next month, even, but it’s going to happen, it’s going to, and we -- ”

“Don’t get yourself worked up about what if’s when what is actually happening is already bad enough,” Louis says sternly, and he squeezes Harry’s hand tightly but the hand on the back of his neck remains light.

“But they were supposed to have each other forever, they were -- that’s what you’re bloody promised with having a twin, and -- ”

“Babe, stop it. We’ve gone through this so many times before, and we can’t do it again. Not today. We don’t deserve that, come on.”

He doesn’t say it meanly, he’s pleading for it, so Harry shuts up. Louis was right: adding to their pain right now is pointless, and that wasn’t his intention. Right now, there is enough going on. Planned brain surgery usually goes well, they go in and out and do what they need to do, and Harry needs to remember that. Jack’s done this before, and he’ll do it today, and he’ll do it again if he has to. These next few weeks will be hard, but not impossible. Louis has said that to him so many times by now that it’s finally starting to stick.

“Look at me,” Louis says, voice gentle, so Harry slowly picks his head up to look at him. His eyes feel so heavy, weighed down by exhaustion and tears. Louis presses a kiss to his forehead, and Harry leans into it. “I love you,” he says, and even though he’s said it probably a million times at this point, it soothes Harry long enough that he stops crying again.

-

Ten minutes after they return to the waiting room to sit, it’s Harry’s turn to comfort Louis.

The waiting room is mostly bare, thankfully. There’s only one other family here; there are six of them, and by the sounds of it, their brother was taken into emergency surgery and hasn’t woken up yet, even though he was supposed to by now. Two of them -- the sisters, Harry’s pretty sure -- are crying. By the time Harry pulls his eyes away, realizing he was eavesdropping, Louis is crying next to him, too. Silent, steady tears stream his cheeks, and Harry nudges his knee with his own.

“Do you want me to get anything for you?” he asks, because sometimes when he can’t find the right words, he can find the right things to do. Louis shakes his head at first and wipes his cheeks, but then he nods.

“Coffee, please. And not the shit kind, find me some real coffee.”

“Okay,” Harry says, standing up a little too eagerly. He just wants to help Louis the way Louis helps him. “I think they have a Costa outlet downstairs. Do you want your regular?”

“Yeah, please.”

Harry bends down to kiss his head and hands him the pager. He’ll be closer if anything happens, so he should be the one to have it right now. Louis squeezes his shoulder as he stands up, and Harry makes it only a few steps forward before he eyes the family again. They all look tired and stressed and maybe in need of a little human kindness, but there’s still a chance they’ll get upset by him asking. He decides to ask anyway, and when he walks closer, they fall silent and look at him expectantly.

Addressing the mother, Harry says, “I’m going downstairs to get coffee. I was just wondering if anybody wanted anything.”

There’s a brief second where they exchange looks with each other, and Harry hopes that this isn’t inappropriate.

“Dimitris, go with this man,” the mum demands, and a young man stands. He’s twenty at the most, and he eyes Harry tiredly. “Thank you, sir,” she says, nodding at Harry, and he nods back.

“It’s not a problem.”

“Here, Dimitris, take my card,” she says, grabbing for her purse, and Harry puts his hand out, waving her off.

“No, no, it’s okay. I offered, don’t worry about it.”

She argues with him a little bit on it, but she lets it go once Harry says, “I just want to do something nice for someone. And if you’re here, I think you deserve something nice, even if it’s only coffee.”

So, Harry and Dimitris walk down the hallway together towards the elevator. He feels bad that he was the one volunteered to go, but maybe it’s good to walk around a bit. Harry knows he needs it himself; sitting and waiting is the worst part.

It’s after Harry pushes the elevator button that Dimitris speaks.

“What’s your name?”

“Harry. And you’re Dimitris?”

“Yeah. We’re here for my brother.” He crosses his arms over his chest and looks down. Harry would comfort him if he knew what to say. “Who are you here for, if you don’t mind me asking?”

Harry looks down, too. This shouldn’t be awkward, should it? They’re talking about deeply personal things, sure, but that doesn’t mean Harry has to feel so ashamed, almost. “My son. He’s having a brain tumor removal surgery.”

“Oh, shit,” Dimitris says, looking up. His eyes are wide. “I’m sorry, mate. That’s awful.”

“He’ll be okay. So will your brother.”

Dimitris frowns. “You don’t know that.”

“No, I don’t. But it’s at least nice to try and stay positive. For me, anyway. Even though it’s really hard to be.”

“It just isn’t supposed to be like this, you know?” Dimitris says. He wipes his cheek on his shoulder even though he hasn’t started crying yet. Maybe the surgery was completely out of left field and his brother wasn’t sick long-term like Jack has been. Harry tried hiding his tears in the beginning, too. Before he realized it was a waste of energy. Dimitris sniffles. “My brother -- he’s twenty-one. He was walking his girlfriend home last night and got hit by some drunk driver doing one-hundred and twenty kilometers per hour in a residential area. His girlfriend died, and he might, too. And your son. . . We’re supposed to die old, you know? We’re supposed to have a beginning, middle and end. It isn’t fair.”

The elevator opens, and neither of them move at first. When someone else walks in, Harry starts walking forward, Dimitris following behind him. He finds the Costa outlet easily, and there’s a line that they slow to tail, and Dimitris continues.

“My brother has barely begun the middle part of his life yet. There’s no way it ends here. And your son, how old is he?”

Harry smiles sadly. He’d be crying by now, probably, if it wasn’t for the fact that his brain is in comfort-Louis mode. He can’t be selfish right now. “Four,” he says. “He’ll be five in August.”

Dimitris shakes his head, and he genuinely looks angry. “Shit’s fucked up, man.”

“Yeah,” Harry says quietly. “Yeah, I know.”

Harry buys black coffee for himself, a caramel latte for Louis, and Dimitris orders six vanilla cold brews. He feels bad about letting Harry pay, but Harry couldn’t care less. He and Louis have been together for ages, and Louis still hasn’t managed to rub off any of his responsible-spending skills onto Harry.

They’re quiet on the way back up to their floor, but once the elevator opens and they’re walking down the hallways towards their loved ones, Dimitris turns to him and says, “You’re right. My brother and your son -- they’re both going to be fine. They’ll walk out of here with cool scars to impress the ladies with, yeah?”

Harry snorts, unable to even imagine Jack or Madison ever being in a relationship. He refuses to become an overprotective parent, so he’s going to have to figure out how to stomach the idea of someone messing with his kids’ heart. The idea makes his blood boil, and they still have a long way to go before dating is even a thing.

Jack won’t ever get to have a serious relationship, but Harry finds himself imagining proms and dates and flowers anyway.

“Yeah,” Harry agrees, smiling gently. “Yeah, they will.”

When he returns to Louis, he notices Louis’ moved the chairs so that they’re facing each other and can sit with each other easier. (And there’s a sign literally right above them that asks them not to move the furniture, so maybe it’s okay that Harry’s still wastes money because Louis still breaks simple rules.) He sits down and hands Louis his coffee, leaning their shoulders together and sliding his shoe to line up with Louis’. Louis sets his head on Harry’s shoulder and sighs quietly.

“That was nice of you,” he says. “She really appreciated it, you could tell. Called you an angel.”

Harry leans his head against Louis’ as he says, “I love you, Louis.”

Louis presses his shoe against Harry’s firmer. “I love you, too.”

-

Anne calls at noon, and Harry talks to her a little while. He tells her no, there’s been no updates and yes, it’ll be another hour or two before they hear anything and no, he doesn’t need her to come up to the hospital just yet. She’s as nervous as he is, Harry can hear it in her voice, and he hopes Maddison hasn’t fed off of everyone’s nervous energy.

“Oh, she’s fine,” Anne tells him when he voices his concerns. “We’re out back with Cooper playing fetch. Although I think she’s looking for bugs now. You used to do that as a kid, too.”

“Has she asked about anything?”

“Of course she has, love. She’s a curious one. But all I’ve told her is that Jack will most likely be awake tonight, and that you’ll let us know once he’s ready to see everyone.”

Harry nods to himself. “Yeah, okay. Good. And she doesn’t seem worried?”

“I told you, she’s fine. How’s Louis?”

“Louis is fine,” Louis mumbles beside him. He’s laying with his legs over Harry’s lap, and he’s been mindlessly scrolling through his phone for the past half hour. Harry’s been listening to music to distract himself, and he offered to listen to a podcast with Louis, but Louis kicked at him and said podcasts are for old people.

“Louis’ fine,” Harry echoes. “We’re both doing alright, really. I mean, this morning we were a bit of a wreck, but we’re pushing through it.

“So is your boy in that surgery room, my love.”

Harry nods, swallowing thickly. “Yeah, I hope so.”

-

An hour later, Harry and Louis watch Dimitris’ family get called into the consultation room. Once they return, they’re smiling and hugging each other and saying, Thank God, thank God, oh, thank God, he’s alright, and Harry’s own shoulders sag in relief.

Dimitris’ brother is okay. Harry catches himself praying that it’s a good news type of a day, and that grace will be brought onto his son next.

-

It’s 1:03 when Surgeon Jones walks into the waiting room.

Louis’ the first to notice her, and he bolts up to his feet. Harry follows quickly after him before even realizing that Dr. Jones is there, and when he sees her, he swears under his breath as they hurry over to her. She smiles warmly at them, and Harry isn’t naive enough to think that means anything.

“Are you Jack’s parents?” she asks, and Louis nods and tells her yes. “Okay, if it’s alright with you, I’d like to speak with you in the consultation room.”

“‘Course,” Harry says. They follow closely behind her, and she takes them to a small room with nothing but two chairs and a painting of a ship on the wall. The last time they did this, Harry would have bet his life on assuming that being asked to come into a separate room was a sure sign that they were receiving bad news. He had already convinced himself Jack was gone when the last surgeon told them he was doing fine, and he desperately tries not to do that to himself again. Louis sits in the chair, and Harry stands beside it, his hand on Louis’ shoulder.

“Is he okay?” Louis asks just when Harry is about to ask the same thing. She’s taking too long to get to the fucking point.

She’s smiling again. “Jack is out of surgery and is currently in a recovery room. The surgery went as planned, and he’s expected to make a full recovery.”

All the blood rushes to Harry’s head, his throat feels tight, his legs feel weak, and he can’t hear properly for a few seconds -- and he was just told good news. He doesn’t even want to imagine what it would look like if they were told bad news. He swallows and blinks hard, trying to steady himself, and Louis’ hand comes up to grab his, their intertwined hands sitting on top of Louis’ shoulder. The surgeon’s smile looks a lot less daunting now, and Harry clears his throat.

“Thank you,” he says hoarsely. “For, like. Taking care of him.”

She nods at him. “Of course, that’s my job. So, just so we’re all on the same page, we were only able to remove about thirty-five to forty percent of the tumor, but that’s still good news. He’ll most likely be in less discomfort than he was before.”

That’s better than nothing, and Harry will take it and pocket this as a win.

“And the anesthesia?” Louis asks. “That’ll take, like, an hour to wear off, right? And then he’ll be awake?”

“It varies, but yes, an hour is what we expect.”

Harry lets out a deep breath of relief. An hour, and then he gets to spend time with his son, no matter how much borrowed time they’ve already had.

As Harry and Louis follow Dr. Jones to Jack’s room, hand-in-hand, Harry feels himself warming up to the idea that maybe. . . maybe it’s okay to start thinking of a future. Actually, properly think about it. Disneyland and pre-school and field trips; maybe they can still have that Jack. It’s been so long of Harry thinking that was naive to think about, bracing himself for the worst, but his kid has gotten through brain surgery twice now and he’s getting through the days fairly gracefully. Maybe it’s time that he takes a long, deep breath and accepts that not everything is going to fall apart so soon.

Dr. Jones excuses herself once she shows them the right room, and he’s thankful for it. Yes, she just did a great deal for their son, but he wants some time alone right now. Louis’ the one that opens the door, and seeing Jack -- actually seeing that he’s okay, not just hearing about it -- makes Harry get that faint feeling all over again.

-

Madison and Anne get to the hospital two hours later, despite the fact that Harry had explained that even though Jack woke up for a few minutes, he quickly fell back asleep. It means the anesthesia has worn off mostly, but he’s still exhausted, and Harry doesn’t want more people moving around in his room. Anne promises to keep Madison occupied elsewhere, though.

“Go talk to her,” Louis tells him once Anne texts that they’re here. Harry frowns, and Louis shakes his head at him. “He’ll be right here when you get back. I’ll stay with him, okay? Go talk to Maddie, tell her everything’s fine, and update Mum on everything.”

Harry takes a long look at Jack, who is still very much asleep and will remain asleep during the duration Harry is gone. Logically, he understands that, but sitting next to him is doing wonders for Harry’s nerves. He doesn’t want to leave him. And he wouldn’t have if it wasn’t for Madison; she needs to be taken care of, too, even if that looks differently than how Jack needs taken care of. He kisses Louis chastely before standing up. He has to resist the urge to kiss Jack, so he doesn’t wake him, and leaves.

He finds Madison and his mother at the cafeteria. Anne’s paying for something in the vending machine while Madison holds her hand, and he watches them for a few seconds, watches Anne tell Madison to grab the bag of chips out of the bottom and hold them tight. They turn around, and like she knew somehow, Madison’s eyes immediately find him, and she bursts into a smile.

“Hiya, baby bee,” he says, grinning as she basically throws herself at him so he’ll pick her up. He does, and she plants a kiss to his cheek.

“Is Jack done with his visit?” she asks. She’s crushing the bag of chips with how she’s holding it, so he gently takes it from her and hands them to his mum when she’s close enough. Harry adjusts his hold on her as he leans in to kiss his mum’s cheek, and again, Madison kisses his cheek.

“Jack’s sleeping right now,” he tells her. “He might sleep all day, but that’s alright, right?”

Madison nods.

They sit at a table nearby. Madison demands to stay in Harry’s lap, and he doesn’t have the energy to argue so he lets her. She eats her chips and plays on Harry’s phone while Anne and Harry talk about the surgery in vague terms; Madison isn’t paying attention, but still. He doesn’t want to scare her.

“If Jack doesn’t wake before tonight, I’ll take this one back home so Cooper isn’t by himself all night,” Anne says. “And if he does, I’ll have Gemma pick him up and take him to her flat.”

“I want to see Aunty Gem,” Madison says distractedly, and then she shoves the phone in Harry’s face and asks him to help her with her game. He doesn’t even know what it is or when it was downloaded onto his phone or by who, but he does the level and hands it back to her.

“I’m just glad Cooper isn’t a super high-energy dog,” Harry says. He’s watching Madison play her game over her shoulder, and she’s awful at it, but he ignores that. “He knows to calm down around Jack. One less thing we have to worry about, you know?”

Anne nods. “Yeah, for sure.”

They talk for a few more minutes before Madison starts to squirm in his lap and asks to go outside for a walk. It’s cold out, but Anne doesn’t seem to mind, so Harry doesn’t tell her no. She gets upset when she realizes that Harry isn’t coming with them, but Harry tells her that he can’t leave Louis alone or he’ll get lost, and it gets him off the hook.

He’s one-hundred percent convinced that Jack will be up and talking by the time he gets back, but he isn’t. Louis is still where he left him, too, except now he’s reading one of the books Harry packed in the hospital bag.

“You know,” Louis says quietly as Harry sits back down beside him. “Your taste in literature shows how pompous you still are.”

“Why, ‘cause it doesn’t have pictures?” Harry asks, snorting.

Louis scowls at him. “No, because it’s boring.”

He must actually think so, because he reads twenty-five pages of the book before he falls asleep, his head leaned against Harry’s shoulder and his mouth agape. Harry takes the book from him and reads it himself. He nearly falls asleep, too, only being kept awake by Anne’s frequent texts. He texts Liam a bit as well, looking for some distractions, and it serves him well. He’s texting Liam back about his girlfriend’s dog’s bad habit of peeing in the house (aka, Liam’s attempt at taking his mind off things), when Jack lets out a sleepy little sound. Harry glances at him, and sure enough, blue eyes are staring back at him.

Harry sits up quickly, scooting his chair up closer to the bed. “Hey,” he says softly, and he shoves at Louis’ shoulder to wake him. “Hey, baby. Told you we’d be here.”

It only takes a second or two for Louis to be right next to him, whispering his own sweet words to their son. They’re stuck between trying to take it easy on him while also wanting him to say something, but all they get is slow blinking and sleepy yawns and a small noise of content when Louis rubs his arm. He pulls the stuffed polar bear that Louis set near him to his chest, and within about two minutes of him being awake, he’s asleep again.

“It feels like when they were newborns,” Louis whispers, pulling his arm away from Jack. He sits against the chair and sighs. “All you wanted to do was talk to them and they were asleep, like, ninety percent of the day.”

Harry smiles at that. Really, compared to his sister and Louis’ experience with children, Jack was a fussy baby. He cried far more than Madison did. Puked on them more, too. For the most part, though, Harry never really minded getting up in the middle of the night to go comfort them. He’d hand Madison off to Louis so she could settle down without her brother disturbing her, and then he’d take Jack to the living room and calm him down until he fell back asleep. Harry has spent his whole life wanting to be a father, and even though the sleep-deprivation got a little intense at times, he found himself being glad that Jack was crying for them. For him. Because all he wanted in life was to be the person that his children came to when they needed help, for anything. Even if it was just to be held for a few minutes before going back to sleep, only to do it again an hour later.

“We have the best kids in the entire world, Louis,” Harry says, voice hushed. He sets his head on Louis’ and wraps his arms around him.

Louis nods. “We really do.”

-

Madison and Anne manage to catch an hour of time with Jack, in between one nap and the next. They thought that they’d have to keep reminding Madison to keep her energy levels low, but she seems to grasp onto Jack’s relaxed demeanor and understands that he’s injured. She seems a little spooked by his quietness and the bandage on his head, but once she realizes that Jack is still Jack, just a little tired, she seems to let go of that fear. Jack’s too exhausted to do anything other than watch a movie with her, but she doesn’t seem to mind that, either.

Harry and Louis take turns in who gets to sit with Jack on the bed. Madison demands to be on whoever’s lap it is at the time. They don’t want to crowd Jack’s space too much, but Jack is visibly relaxed with one of them next to him, an arm wrapped around him.

“When will we get another dog, Daddy?” Jack asks quietly, peering at Harry. He’s sat in the bed with Louis right now, while Harry and Anne are on the chairs.

Harry smiles gently at him. “As soon as you feel better, baby.”

“I already feel better. Can we get one today?”

“No, darling,” Harry says, laughing. “Not today. Maybe next month, alright? Until then, you can snuggle with Cooper a whole bunch, okay?”

“Okay,” Jack agrees, and he sets his head on Louis’ shoulder again. “I love Cooper,” he says, and Harry and Louis both look at each other, recognizing how tired he is. Wordlessly, Harry stands to grab Madison off Louis’ lap so it’s more comfortable on the bed. She’s getting tired, too, so she doesn’t complain.

“We know you do, bub,” Louis says. “He loves you, too.”

Jack falls asleep on Louis’ shoulder, and as soon as he’s out, Anne and Madison say goodbye. Harry kisses them both goodbye while Louis sends air kisses, not wanting to disturb Jack. And then it’s just the three of them again.

“You should sleep, babe,” Louis says quietly.

It’s been far too long since Harry slept, and it’s starting to weigh on him heavily. “Yeah,” he says, leaning back against the chair. “I know.”

“I’ll wake you if he gets up again,” Louis promises, already knowing that’s what Harry’s going to ask. Harry nods and thanks him. He gets the chairs set up so he can stretch out a little, and he lays the blanket that they brought from home over himself. For the first time since Jack had that seizure a few weeks ago, Harry closes his eyes and doesn’t feel like he’s drowning in worry.

-

His body knows something is wrong before he does.

He lurches upright, his hands flying out to steady himself on the arm rests to push himself up. He’s on his feet before he can even process anything around him, everything surrounding him white noise to his ear and his vision blurry from having woken up so suddenly. For a moment -- one last moment of peace -- he thinks he woke up from a nightmare. And then everything catches up to him all at once, and he’s trying to push past Louis, who’s keeping him back, as people in uniform swarm his son’s bed, and there’s a loud beeping noise.

“Harry, Harry,” Louis keeps saying, his hands on Harry’s body, keeping him back. Harry’s still so disoriented, and he has no chance at calming down until he figures out what is happening.

“What’s -- Louis, what’s going on, what happened, what -- ”

“I don’t know,” Louis tells him, and he starts to say something else, but then they’re rushing Jack out of the room and Harry staggers after them. He faintly hears Louis tell him not to look, to stay back, but Harry doesn’t -- can’t -- listen. Harry follows the people swarming his son, talking in rushed voices and moving frantically, and Louis follows him.

“What are you doing to him?” is ripped from Harry’s throat, voice wrecked and desperate. “What’s happening, what’s -- ”

He must be getting too close to the doctors, because a nurse, one who isn’t fucking stealing their son from them without a word, approaches him.

“You two need to stay here,” he says, “the doctors -- ”

“Just where are they taking him?” Harry asks. They turn down a hallway and Harry can’t see what’s happening anymore, and he stumbles forward again, this time into the nurse who won’t let him past, he won’t let him see his son, what’s happening, Jesus Christ, what is happening?

“We have no idea what’s going on,” Louis explains with a trembling voice, and the arms around Harry’s waist pulling him away from the nurse must belong to him. “What’s -- someone needs to tell us what’s happening.”

“I can try to figure that out for you if you stay here, okay?”

Harry feels his body give, and he would have definitely fallen to the ground if it wasn’t for Louis’ arms keeping him upright. “That’s our son,” he says, breathless, and Louis says something that sounds vaguely like it’s in agreement but Harry can’t make it out.

God, he’s going to throw up. His body is hot and his throat feels full and -- God, where are they taking him, they can’t just take him, what the hell is going on?

“Stay here,” the nurse tells him, and Harry tries to protest, he whimpers and struggles with as much strength that he has, which is strangely little considering how full of adrenaline he feels right now. Louis keeps him back, and then the nurse is walking away. Harry jerks forward, and Louis must think he’s trying to go after him but he’s not, he’s not, and he yanks himself free from Louis’ arms to stumble towards the garbage he doesn’t even remember seeing. He throws up, and it’s awful, and his head feels like it’s spinning, and Louis’ on him again, gentle hands steering him to nearby seats. Louis can’t comfort him right now, though, not when their son is gone and potentially dying, not when Louis’ sobbing, not when the world feels like it’s repainted itself to match every single one of Harry’s nightmares.

As his body slows down, slowly catching up more and more, his mind speeds up. He can’t stay on one thought at a time, it’s all just coming together to create panic, and he needs that nurse to come back and tell what is going on.

“What happened?” Harry asks hoarsely, turning to Louis, who’s crying into his hands. It’s always been a knee-jerk reaction to comfort Louis, but right now he can’t even figure out what that would look like.

Louis sniffles and pulls his hands away. His skin is flushed and wet, his eyes bloodshot and tired. His hands are shaking, and then Harry remembers how, and he grabs them with his own, turning towards him, their knees knocking into each other.

“His monitor started making noise,” Louis croaks out, and he doesn’t look at Harry. “And I called for a nurse, and then -- I don’t know, it all happened so fast. I was asleep, too.”

“You didn’t hear them say anything?”

Louis shakes his head tiredly. “Just something about his blood pressure, I don’t know.”

Maybe this is all a misunderstanding. Maybe Jack’s blood pressure dropped or shot up, and they’re doing whatever it is they do to fix that sort of stuff. Maybe everything’s going to be fine still.

Harry wishes he could convince himself that, even for a moment, but he can’t.

“I’m gonna go find that bloody nurse,” Harry mumbles as he stands. He lets go of Louis’ hands briefly, but Louis doesn’t let him. He, too, stands, and they follow the direction the nurse went.

He’s stepping out of a room just as Harry and Louis turn the corner. He locks eyes with them, and there’s guilt on his face and hesitance in his posture as he walks towards them.

“I don’t know all the details,” he tells them, and he would sound believable if it wasn’t for the way his eyes can’t stay on either of them. “A senior clinician will be out in -- ”

Dr. Pratt is the next to step out of the room, and Harry tugs Louis along as he walks towards her. She’ll give them a straight answer, no bullshit. Her expression is a lot less telling than the nurse’s was, and Harry thinks that might mean that he’s still alive. Harry can take things being bad if it means that his son is at least still alive, he can, he can do that. And then she asks them to sit down, and Harry’s whole body heats up, his mind blacks out.

“Just say it,” Louis demands. “Just tell us what the hell is going on. He was fine, and now he’s -- ” his voice catches, and then he stops talking. Dr. Pratt takes a deep breath before she talks.

“Jack suffered a stroke,” she says. “And I’m deeply sorry to tell you that he didn’t make it. We did everything we could, but he died. Again, I’m so sorry for your loss.”

He had always wondered how this moment would go. How it would happen, how it would feel. Harry always wanted Jack to die during his sleep, without any pain, but not like this. Not in a hospital, not via a stroke, not hours after they were told he had a successful surgery. The tumor was supposed to be the cause of it, not a goddamn surgery that Harry and Louis signed him up for. And how it feels. . . Harry can’t think for the first few moments. Everything is deafeningly quiet, and the floor feels like it has dropped beneath his feet. His body is boiling hot, but when Louis lets go of his hand, he’s achingly cold, too. Everything’s too much, everything is happening too fast, it’s -- God, no. No. This can’t be happening.

Bile races up his throat once he realizes that their son is lying dead on a table in a room only a few feet away, and he doesn’t know where a trash can is this time and he doesn’t even care. He throws up near a wall just a few feet away from Louis and Dr. Pratt. Sitting there, crouched -- he can’t bring himself to get back up, so he lowers himself to the floor, leans against the wall. His hands are trembling worse than they ever have before.

A breath gets caught in his chest, and then he’s sobbing. Heavy, thick cries push through him in waves, crashing into without pause, and it hurts, everything hurts, and he shouldn’t have been asleep, and this is all too much. This is -- he drops his forehead to his knee, curling in on himself more, and it hurts even worse sitting this way, but he doesn’t move. He can’t.

He has no idea how long it is until Louis drops into the chair beside Harry. God, Louis. Still shaking with sobs, Harry reaches out to touch Louis, to put his wavering hand on his arm, but Louis pulls away.

“Don’t touch me,” he says, sounding wounded and panicked, and Harry does the exact opposite of what he asked. He stands; the energy needed to do that coming solely from his love for Louis, and he tries to wrap his arms around Louis’ neck for a hug, but Louis pushes him off again. So, Harry sinks back to the floor in a crouch, and he wraps his arms around his leg instead, setting his forehead on Louis’ knee now. Louis doesn’t push him away this time.

-

It’s two o’clock in the morning, seventy-two minutes after they find out Jack is gone, and they’re sitting in his hospital room. They never brought the bed back, so Harry and Louis sit in the chairs, side by side, and they barely speak. Louis holds onto Jack’s jacket and cries, and Harry pets the fur of the stuffed polar bear in an attempt to soothe himself, the same way Jack had done countless times. His nose and eyes burn, his skin is sticky and damp, and there's a headache raging in his head. He feels nauseous again, like his body is scrambling to scrape enough up to puke again.

The silence is suffocating, but when Louis finally speaks, Harry would rather the quiet.

“You need to call your mum,” he says, voice scratchy and toneless. Harry’s eyes well up at the idea of telling anyone what happened. He’s still trying to process it, and he’s not ready to explain it to anybody else just yet.

“I can’t,” he says, sniffling.

“Call her,” Louis says, harsher than Harry likes. “I want to go home, and I can’t -- I don’t want Madison there yet. We can’t tell her yet.”

“But -- ”

“Call her,” Louis repeats. “I can’t fucking be here anymore.”

Harry’s crying heavily again by the time he has the phone pressed to his ear. He hiccups quietly, and Louis sets his hand on his shoulder. He’s crying, too, Harry can hear it, and he doesn’t want to see it anymore.

“Harry,” is all his mum says before he loses it. He wasn’t ready to do this, not yet, and now his mum is asking him over and over again what’s wrong. He’s crying so hard that he’s choking on it, and so is Louis, and Harry isn’t ready to open up this wound further for everyone else to see, but he doesn’t have a choice anymore.

He's nearly hyperventilating when he chokes out, “He’s gone, Mum,” and somehow, everything feels worse once the words are out. It’s like something in his chest has shattered, and it feels impossible to get through it.

“Oh, sweetheart. Oh -- let me call Gemma and have her come watch Maddie so I can come be there, okay?”

“Louis wants to come home,” he stutters out, shaking his head. “He wants -- but she can’t know, not -- not yet, she can’t -- Mum, she can’t know.”

“Then I’ll take her to Gemma’s now. We can figure this out, baby.”

“But what will you say? She can’t know something’s wrong.”

“I’ll figure it out, don’t you worry about it. I’ll send Liam to come and take you home. Me and Mads will be gone before you get here, okay? But if you need me, if you want my help in anything, I can come right back home.”

This is all progressing faster than Harry would like it to, so he doesn’t even know what to say or think. “I don’t even know,” he gets out, because he doesn’t. He doesn’t know anything anymore.

“You don’t have to have anything figured out right now.”

She hangs up about a minute later, promising to get everything settled for them. He holds the phone tightly in his hands, nearly as tight as Louis’ hold on his shoulder. Harry leans towards him, blindly reaching, and Louis meets him halfway, pulling him close. That helps, at least. The closeness between them. It’s what he needs right now. Harry cries into his chest, and Louis cries into his shoulder, and it’s far too quick before his phone is lighting up with a call from Liam. Thankfully, Louis answers it. Maybe he realized rushing Harry into talking about this wasn’t a good decision.

“Yeah. . . No. No. We can just meet you in the parking lot. . . Yes, it’s fine. I don’t care. . . That’s a dumb question. We’ll see you in a minute, alright?” Louis hangs up the phone and hands it back to Harry before standing, and Harry can’t bring himself to do the same. He watches Louis: he looks lost, for a second, and then he slowly starts to collect Jack’s things and put them in the bag. Harry feels guilty for not doing anything, but he can’t. He just can’t.

Louis pauses from where he’s crouched by the bag. He stays still for a few seconds before he says, voice low, “How the hell are we going to do this?”

Harry swallows and wipes his cheeks with his sleeves. His skin is starting to feel raw from doing that so much. “I don’t know,” he admits roughly. But then guilt takes back over him -- and why does he feel so fucking guilty? -- and he adds, “Together.”

“But we’re not together,” Louis says. “One of us is gone now.”

And then Harry is back to crying, and Louis kisses his forehead before heading to the bathroom. Harry can’t do this; already, he’s decided there’s no way he can get through this. It just doesn’t seem possible.

When he hears the toilet flush, he forces himself to stand. He grabs the bag off the ground, puts the stuffed bear in it so he doesn’t get lost, and puts the bag on his shoulder. He’s not ready to go home, but he’s not ready to deny Louis of what he needs, either.

They leave the room, and it has no right to hurt so bad. But that’s where they spent their last moments together, and now they just have to leave like that doesn’t matter. Nurses will come in with a new bed and a new patient and clean up the last traces of their son. Just like those surgeons did an hour ago when they washed his blood off them.

Harry grabs Louis’ hand firmly, not liking that he didn’t grab his first.

The cold night air feels brutal, and Louis presses closer to him as they walk to Liam’s car. It’s parked in the front and Liam’s standing outside it, so they find it quite quickly.

“Hey,” Liam says gently to the both of them. Louis nods, wiping at his eyes, before grabbing the bag from Harry and getting into the backseat. Harry tries to be as brave as Louis right now, but it doesn’t work and he doesn’t fight the urge to be coddled by Liam. Liam holds him and rubs his back and whispers to him a million words that don’t make anything better. There’s so many things Harry wants to say right now, but he can’t, they’re all stuck in his throat, so he just cries some more.

“If you need anything, mate, just let me know,” Liam tells him, and Harry nods into his shoulder. His whole face aches from crying so much at this point. For something they knew was coming, he was completely unprepared.

“I don’t like leaving him here,” Harry says, and it sounds less like words and more of a whimper. Liam shushes him.

“We can worry about funeral arrangements tomorrow, okay? He’s okay here. They’ll take care of him.”

“But they didn’t,” Harry protests weakly. “We didn’t.”

Liam’s assurance that that isn’t true doesn’t mean anything, and he doesn’t like Louis being alone in the car right now, so Harry pulls away and heads around to the passenger’s seat. Louis reaches out to brush his fingers over the back of his neck, and Harry turns and offers his hand out, which Louis accepts.

There’s a car seat in the backseat next to Louis, because Liam still has two kids at home. It leaves a hole in Harry’s stomach, and he tries not to think about it. (It’s impossible not to.)

-

Cooper excitedly greats them at the door, and it’s a punch to the gut that leaves Harry breathless. He’d cry, but he’s pretty sure he physically can’t anymore. Instead, he sinks to the floor to pet him, silently apologizing for not being able to bring Jack home to him. Louis lingers by the doorway, and Harry thinks that means he doesn’t want to be far from him, so Harry doesn’t spend long with Cooper before standing back up. They stare out into the living room, a place that suddenly feels foreign.

His feet will never run across the rug again, Cooper won’t ever get to race after him, Jack’s toys will never be splayed out on the ground again, they’ll have to play games without him, they’ll have to do everything without him, he’s gone, he’s gone, he’s --

“I thought he was going to be okay,” Louis whispers. His voice, or maybe it’s the words, make Harry flinch, and he swallows thickly.

“Me too.”

“It wasn’t supposed to happen this soon.”

“I know.”

Cooper licks at his hand, and Harry slides it over Cooper’s head. None of this fair, not for anyone but certainly not for Jack. He was four, he barely had a life, he was too young and too special to have to be referred to as was now. And Harry shouldn’t have been sleeping, he shouldn’t have been; he let his guard down, and he paid the price for it. Maybe if he had been awake, he would have noticed something was wrong sooner, maybe if they had chosen the afternoon surgery instead, maybe if Harry hadn’t told him everything was going to be okay.

Louis is the first to step forward. The first step is hesitant, and so is the next, but after a moment he pushes through it and walks towards the stairs, the hospital bag held tightly to his stomach. Harry should follow after him, he really should, but he can’t. He just can’t.

Cooper licks at his hand again, and Harry lowers himself back to the floor.

I promised him another dog, Harry thinks as he tries and fails to pour all his focus onto Cooper. He pets his back, his head, his cheeks, his ears, and he’s pretty sure it’s just making him sadder because this is Jack’s dog and it always has been, but Jack’s gone and Jack loved Cooper and he’d want him to be bloody pet, so Harry is going to do that for him. He has to -- God, he feels nauseous. Cooper licks his face, and Harry pulls away, at first, and then he stops caring and lets Cooper lick over his cheeks.

“I’m sorry,” he cries, petting Cooper’s neck firmly. “I’m so fucking sorry.”

And he doesn’t know who he’s apologizing to or for what, but he does it anyway. Surely, he has something to apologize for if this is happening tonight. Why tonight? Why two weeks before Jack’s favorite holiday? He was going to dress up as the cowardly lion and Madison was going to be Dorothy because they wouldn’t let her convince them that she wouldn’t get green face paint everywhere to be the witch. They were going to Gemma’s house for the Halloween party, and Jack was beyond excited about it because he loved to dress up and that would also mean he got to see her dogs. And now he’s just gone, and now they’re supposed to simply accept that, and Harry doesn’t know what to fucking do.

His phone vibrates in his pocket, and he wants to ignore it. He doesn’t want to talk to anyone right now, and he’s suddenly so angry, and Louis is upstairs, by himself, and Harry’s letting him be alone because he’s so lost and he doesn’t know how to do this. But it’s his sister, and Madison is at her house right now, and Harry assumes the worst -- Madison must’ve figured it out, or maybe she’s just being fussy, or maybe she’s fucking gone, too.

Or maybe he does want to talk to someone and he won’t let himself admit it, because his husband is upstairs by himself and Harry doesn’t plan on getting off the floor anytime soon.

“What?” he asks when he answers the phone. Gemma doesn’t say anything right away, and Harry drops his head to rest on Cooper’s neck. Cooper’s a good dog, so he lays down in front of Harry, his head against his knee, and Harry follows him down to set his head on his back instead. “Is Madison okay?”

“Yes,” Gemma says, her voice shaky. She sniffles. “Yes, she’s fine, she’s asleep, but -- Haz. I’m so, so sorry.”

“What did Mum tell her? I don’t want her to know yet.”

“We said that I was baking cookies and my kids were too young to help. I don’t know, she bought it. She was just happy she got to be up late, even though she crashed on the couch as soon as she got here.”

Gemma’s kids are one, three and four, born four months after the twins, and they’re happy and healthy, and her family is together, they’re complete, while Harry’s has a giant fucking hole in it now.

“I’m here for you to talk to,” she says softly. “Louis, too. I understand if you’re not ready to talk to anyone yet, but I wanted to let you know that, the moment you are, I’m here.”

Harry is a second away from yelling at her, so he doesn’t know how that turns into him crying, “I don’t like him being there. At the hospital. I don’t want him there.”

“Okay, that’s okay. Have you and Louis discussed where you want his funeral to be held?”

Harry grips onto Cooper’s collar as he snaps, “No, because we weren’t planning on losing him so fucking suddenly. We weren’t -- it wasn’t supposed to happen right now, God forbid we didn’t discuss his bloody funeral arrangements yet.”

He startles when a hand touches his shoulder. It’s Louis, and he silently crouches down behind Harry, reaching past him to pet Cooper, too. Harry closes his eyes and sets his head back down on Cooper’s back. It’s too hard to see how devastated Louis looks.

“Me and your mum talked about it once,” Louis whispers to him. “Just the one time. She said there was this nice place in North London.” His voice is wrecked, doesn’t even sound like his own. His hand moves to stroke Harry’s hair, but Harry moves away from it. Louis needs to be comforted, too, he can’t be so fucking selfish. He sits up again, this time moving to scoot next to Louis and set his head on his shoulder, his hand on his thigh.

“Louis says to ask Mum,” Harry says. He’s exhausted, suddenly, which makes him feel even more guilty and selfish than he already does. “There’s one in North London, I guess. Just -- I don’t care. I really don’t. I just want him out of that bloody hospital.”

“Okay,” Gemma says. “I’ll talk to her now. We’ll get it sorted, Harry.”

“I don’t want him there,” Harry finds himself repeating, because he really, really doesn’t. He can’t stand the idea of that.

“He doesn’t have to be there if you don’t want him to be. I can probably get him moved tomorrow, alright? Tomorrow morning if I make a fuss, even. I’ll get it sorted, I promise.”

A baby wails faintly in the background, and Gemma curses quietly. There’s a distant voice telling her not to worry about it, that he’ll get it. Gemma’s husband, probably. Scott.

“You can go,” Harry says, and he clears his throat. “I have to -- I don’t know. There’s stuff we probably should do. I don’t know, but you can go.”

“I don’t have to.”

“It’s fine,” Harry tells her, a little hotly. “You call me as soon as you can get him somewhere, okay?”

“Yes, of course.”

Harry hangs up a few seconds later. He sits there, staring at Cooper, and he finds himself terrified to look at Louis. And he hates that, he hates that so much, so he turns to look at him, at his wet eyes and red nose and quivering lip. He leans forward to kiss him, and it feels wrong and disgusting but also necessary. He pulls back, and Louis sets his forehead against Harry’s.

“We told him it’d be okay,” Louis whispers, and Harry closes his eyes.

“We had to.”

“But we lied.”

Harry swallows, hard. “We didn’t mean to. It wasn’t supposed to be a lie.”

Cooper lets out a low whine, and they pull away from each other to look at him. Cooper’s smart, always has been, and he can read them. Their emotions. He must know something’s wrong, too. Louis pets his head.

“I’ll let him out for the night,” Louis says, standing up. Cooper stands, too, and Harry doesn’t. He can’t. But Louis looks down at him tiredly and says, “You can’t stay on the floor forever, come on.”

Harry probably could, but he doesn’t want to be a burden, so he slowly pulls himself up off the ground. Louis nods at him before taking Cooper outside, and Harry stays put until they come back. They stare at each other from across the room, both of them unsure of where they go from here.

“I think I’m just going to go lay down,” Louis tells him. His cheeks are puffy from crying so much and wiping at them a lot, like he does now. “We can -- tomorrow. I can’t do anything more tonight.”

Harry nods and mumbles out, “Okay,” before he follows Louis up the stairs, the stairs Louis didn’t want the kids going up and down so they wouldn’t get hurt and one of them got hurt anyway. Louis goes to the bathroom, so Harry follows. He feels so lost, and he’s sure Louis does, too, but he’s doing a better job at pushing through it, and Harry wants someone to blindly follow. As Harry pees, Louis brushes his teeth. And then they switch places, and Harry feels so sick that he gags as soon as he puts the toothbrush in his mouth, so he abandons that and instead swishes some water around his mouth. It doesn’t matter if his teeth are clean or not. Louis bumps into him gently so he has room to wash his hands -- Harry never did get around to having someone install an extra sink in here -- and Harry watches him, every part of him hurting in ways he didn’t think were possible. It’s everywhere, a deep, tight sadness that’s inescapable.

As Louis dries his hands, Harry asks, “Can I,” he licks his lips nervously, “Can I sleep in his bed?”

Louis glances at him. “Why wouldn’t you be able to?”

“I don’t know. If you -- if you don’t want me to mess anything up, I won’t go in there. I don’t have to, if you want to -- to leave things where he put them.”

His hands are shaking again, and his eyes are getting wet all over again, and his chest hurts so badly that he thinks something might be wrong. Louis stares at him for a minute, maybe more, before he shakes his head.

“He liked it when we slept in bed with him,” he says, and his chest is heaving, too. “You can -- go ahead, it’s okay.”

“Will you come with me?” Harry asks. His bottom lip quivers, so he sinks his teeth into it as he watches Louis hesitate.

“I don’t know. I don’t know if I’m ready for that.”

Harry nods. When he blinks, tears come rushing from his eyes, but he wipes them away. “Okay,” he says. “I love you.”

“I love you, too,” Louis whispers, and they reach for each other at the same time. They touch each other gently and desperately, and Harry doesn’t want to let go but he also doesn’t want to be awake right now, he just wants to sleep, he just wants to go to sleep. Tomorrow they’ll handle the harder things, like funeral arrangements and Madison and how the fuck they’re going to get through this, but tonight -- Harry’s at his limit.

They separate in the hallway, Harry going one way and Louis going another.

When Harry gets to Jack’s room, he closes his eyes and makes his way to the bed with them tightly shut. He doesn’t want to see anything, see all of his son’s things that he’ll never get to touch again. All he wants is his bed, which he finds when his knees bump into it. He climbs into it, and even with his eyes shut, he can see every different rabbit on the duvet. It’s a light blue blanket with bunnies dressed in all sorts of outfits, because Jack liked the one with the red bowtie. Madison’s are covered in stars, but Jack wanted the bunnies.

For a second, he thinks he’ll actually be able to fall asleep. He sets his head on the pillow, pulls the blanket over his shoulder, and thinks he can do it. And then Cooper comes into the room and hops into bed with him, and he sets his head on the pillow beside Harry, and Harry sobs all over again.

It’s not even been a minute before Louis is climbing behind him in bed, too, curling his body around Harry’s. He’s crying, too, and everything hurts, and Harry just needs to fall asleep so he can stop thinking. So he can stop hurting.

“I miss him already,” Louis sobs out, and Harry lets out a choked sound. He does, too, so much, so much, and he’ll never get to stop missing him, never. He’ll always be gone, always be missed. Harry can’t accept that, but he doesn’t have a choice. This is their life now.

-

At eight-fifteen, Gemma calls him.

Harry’s phone is still in his back pocket; he never changed his clothes and he never took it out. So, when it vibrates with a call, it wakes them both up. Harry jolts up to grab it, his mind immediately back into panic-mode (although, really, he already got the worst news he could ever receive, so maybe he should give up on worrying so much).

“Hello?”

“Hi,” Gemma says. “I know it’s early, and I’m sorry if you were sleeping. The funeral home Mum was talking about opened at eight, though, and I called them first thing. They’re already on their way to pick up -- to pick him up from the hospital.”

She won’t even say his name.

“Give me their number so I can call to make sure he gets there okay,” he says, like it matters at this point, like he’ll ever be okay again.

“Yes, of course. They said it will take about a half hour, and that you have to, like, call the hospital to give them permission to release him. They might make you come down in person to sign some things, they might not, the people said it just depends on the hospital’s policy.”

Louis’ already grabbing for his phone and getting out of bed. Cooper picks his head up, but Harry puts a hand on him, silently asking him to stay.

“Okay,” Harry says. “Thanks. I’ll, um. I don’t know.”

“Mum will do the whole thing if you want her to,” Gemma says softly. “She’s already looking into all sorts of options. If you don’t want to do it yourselves, which is totally okay, just tell Mum what you want. Like, what kind of service.”

It seems cruel to even have to think about all of this right now. His kid just died and now they have to figure out what to do with the body. Literally. That’s so fucked up. But planning a funeral for their son when he was still alive is even more fucked up. What would they have done, picked out what fucking flowers they wanted when Jack was in the other room playing with his sister? Is that what they were supposed to do?

“I’ll have to talk to Louis, I don’t -- I don’t know.”

“That’s fine. Take your time.”

Harry closes his eyes and starts to bite on his thumbnail. “Is Maddie awake?”

“Yeah. The baby woke her up. She’s out with Charlie in the backyard right now.”

“You have to watch them,” Harry says, meaner than he intends, but the last thing he needs is Madison getting hurt, too.

“Scott and Mum are out with them. I’m watching Morgan and Pete inside. We have everything covered here, try not to worry about it, okay?”

Harry lets out a deep breath. “Yeah, fine. Just text me that number, okay? I need to know he got there alright.”

“Yeah, of course. I’ll text it to you right now. Love you, Haz.”

He hangs up after mumbling that he loves her, too, and then he sits in bed. Jack’s things are everywhere, they’re everywhere, and it all hurts. It all hurts so much. And he has a whole day ahead of him of more pain, and he doesn’t want to deal with all of this. He wants to sleep all day or get wasted, one of the two.

Louis comes back into the room a few minutes later. “I called them and gave them permission to release them to the funeral home. I had to sign some stuff, like, virtually. But it’s taken care of.”

“Okay. Thanks.”

They stare at each other, and it’s unfamiliar. They don’t know how to talk to each other right now. Anybody, really, but anybody includes each other, and that’s not normal. Harry doesn’t have a clue on what to say or feel or even think.

“I’m gonna let Cooper out, I guess,” Harry mumbles, pulling himself out of bed. Cooper follows him, and Harry goes outside to let him use the bathroom. As he does, Harry sits on the swing, trying to keep his mind free of any memories of Jack out in the backyard. He just wants to forget it all while remembering every tiny little detail, and he thinks he should be able to have both.

Every part of him aches. His face is swollen and sticky, his eyes dry, his nose burning. His throat feels like he’s been screaming for hours, and his chest is still cracking, and his head is still hurting. Inside and out, everything hurts.

He sits outside with Cooper longer than he means to. After about a half hour, he calls the funeral home, and they confirm that Jack has been brought there. They ask more about what he wants, and Harry tells him that he’s not ready to think about that yet, and they’re understanding. They should be. Once he’s off the phone, he sits there thinking for nearly twenty minutes that he should go back inside. That’s all he lets himself think: I should really go back inside. I should.

He probably would have been out there for hours if it wasn’t for Louis sliding open the door and telling him that it’s too cold outside. When Harry doesn’t respond right away, Louis sighs and tells him to at least wear a coat.

“No,” he says quietly, and he stands up. “I’ll come in, sorry.” Because Louis’ right, he’s freezing, and it feels sort of nice. It’s a distraction, kind of, a physical ache that he understands, and then he just feels fucking guilty because he made Louis worry about him when they shouldn’t need to deal with that right now.

“I called the people,” Harry says, and his voice is still hoarse. He sits at the kitchen table and tries not to think about sitting here and eating with Jack. Or coloring or playing with clay or legos -- he doesn’t think about it. Louis sits across from him, and Harry realizes he should probably continue. “They, um. He got there alright, I guess. They said to call them back when we have our. . . wishes figured out.”

Louis leans back into his seat and looks down at the table. “I don’t want it to be an open-casket,” he says firmly, like if Harry were to disagree, there would be issues. So Harry doesn’t, he just bites down on his lip and nods. It would probably be too confusing for Madison, anyway.

“I think I’d like a traditional service,” Harry says, and he doesn’t know why he’s scared, like Louis is about to snap at him or something. He feels so vulnerable right now, so exposed, to the point that he doesn’t even want Louis to see. “Like, um. I know we aren’t religious, but I think -- I don’t know.”

“Say what you want,” Louis says sharply, and then he briefly closes his eyes. “This is for us, alright? We need to do whatever -- whatever we need to do that will make us cope with this. If you think some stupid preacher talking about God is what you need, then fine. If I don’t like something, I’ll tell you.”

“I just can’t even picture it,” Harry admits quietly. He feel so dumb, for no reason. Louis won’t judge him, and he’s feeling the exact same thing Harry is. If Harry already feels alone. . .

“The funeral? Me neither. Sort of feel like saying we won’t have one, but.”

“But we’d regret it,” Harry finishes, nodding. Because he feels the same way: not a single part of him wants to go to and have a funeral, to dress up in a suit and find a dress for Madison, to stand and listen to people cry around him. None of that sounds like something he wants, but it’s something he needs. Something they all need.

“We should’ve had this figured out before,” Louis says, shaking his head. And that digs something up in Harry; it’s like he can physically feel the pain explode in his stomach and travel up his throat.

“I thought he was going to be okay,” he sobs, and he covers his face with his hands, still feeling incredibly vulnerable. “I thought -- I told myself it was okay to start believing that he’d be fine, and then he died the same night, I -- I did this, it feels like I did this, I jinxed it, I must’ve, because he was fine, and then wasn’t, and then -- ”

“Do not start that,” Louis says, and his voice is sharp again, and it’s just not right, none of this feels right, it’s all wrong, like there’s a right way to do this and they’re already fucking it up and it’s not even been ten hours yet.

“Harry,” Louis says sternly. “He had a stroke. It was a complication from the surgery. His health was in no way related to what any of us were thinking. Don’t start blaming yourself, and I mean it, because you won’t be able to stop.”

“Well, I’m sorry that I’m not doing this right,” Harry snaps, throwing his hands out. “I’m sorry that I’m handling this wrong, apparently, because you already seem two steps ahead of me, and you keep -- ” but he doesn’t want to yell, he really doesn’t, so he goes back to crying into his hands and focusing on the hurt.

Louis doesn’t do anything. He doesn’t yell back or apologize or comfort him or leave. He just sits there, watching Harry cry, and Harry is too scared to move his hands from his face. His biggest fear after Jack dying is losing Louis because of it, and every tiny thing that makes him feel like that might come true makes loud, ear-piercing alarms go off in his head, because he can’t lose Louis and he can’t do any of this without him and he already feels so far away, somehow.

When he hears Louis sniffle, it’s about the best thing in the world, somehow. He takes his hands from his face and sees that Louis’ crying, too, and that’s probably why he didn’t say anything, and Harry feels a bit better but so much worse because their son just died and he already caused a fight.

“I’m sorry,” he gets out, wiping at his face harder than necessary. “I can’t -- I don’t know how to do this.”

“By not blaming yourself for a fucking stroke,” Louis says, voice croaky, and he wipes his face, too. He shakes his head, swallows, and balls his hands into fists. “We’ll have a religious funeral service, I don’t care. And then we’ll bury him. . .” he looks lost.

“My family all gets buried in the same place,” he tells him. “They have for generations. Remember that cemetery, the funeral you came with me for when my great grandmother died?”

Louis just nods.

“We can do it there,” Harry says, but he’s scared again, because that’s a very permanent decision and he doesn’t want to mess it up. “Or -- or not, I don’t know. It can be anywhere.”

“There’s fine. I don’t -- fine, yeah. If it’s a family thing, it makes sense.”

“But it doesn’t have to be a thing for our family,” Harry stresses, and Louis shakes his head.

“That means your mum is going to be buried there, so you’ll want to be buried there, so no, yes, I want Jack there, too.”

Harry wipes at his nose. “Okay. And a -- do we want a memorial service? If we wanted to, we could do it at my mum’s house, probably. I don’t -- have you even told your mum yet, Louis?”

It dawns on him suddenly that no, Louis hasn’t. Louis’ eyes dart away, and Harry frowns.

“You don’t have to,” he says quickly. “Not until you’re ready, just -- you need her. For these sorts of things, you always talk to her. I think you should call her.”

“Your mum’s house,” Louis says. “The one in Knightsbridge or Kensington?”

Harry blinks, debating if he should push him or not. He decides not to. “I think she keeps up with the one in Chelsea the most. Like, I think she went there last week to tidy things up. She’d probably prefer it done there. But it doesn’t matter.”

“Chelsea’s fine,” Louis says, nodding. “And -- I heard Gemma earlier. Your mum -- she’d be fine with doing everything else?”

Harry nods. “Yeah. If we don’t want to, she will.”

“Okay,” Louis says, standing. He pushes his chair in before going to a cupboard and opening it. “You should call her now,” he says, pulling out an expensive bottle of whiskey. “So we can get that going and won’t have to talk to anyone else today.”

Harry does as he’s told, partly because Louis told him to and partly because he wants to be so inebriated that his brain doesn’t remember enough words to string together thoughts with. It’s boldly irresponsible and unhealthy, but it’s also one of the only nights they’ll be able to grieve in this form, because Madison is bound to start getting suspicious here shortly.

He talks to his mum briefly, explaining to her what they’ve decided, and when she asks for the hundredth time if he is doing okay, Harry sighs. “No. Of course not. But me and Louis are going to get drunk, I think, and I think that’ll make me feel a bit better.”

“It won’t,” Anne says sadly, and Harry shrugs.

“It has to.”

He tells her he has to go, because Louis’ finally managed to open the bottle and take out glasses. It’s so stupid, drinking like this, but Harry doesn’t even care. He doesn’t care.

-

Drinking was supposed to make things quieter, and it worked, to an extent. He got plenty drunk with Louis right behind him, so drunk that Harry lost pieces of the night. After Louis started slurring on and on about Madison, about how this is all going to traumatize her, the night started to disappear. Harry doesn’t remember who cut them off when, but surely one of them decided enough was enough, because the glasses are in the sink and the whiskey is back in the cabinet and they woke up in bed. In their bed; Harry distinctly remembers being too scared to throw up in Jack’s room.

Sure, getting drunk at nine in the morning and sleeping the rest of the day away made him feel a little bit better in the moment, but now it’s four o’clock the next morning and he’s standing in the kitchen after vomiting for what felt like forever, and everything feels so much worse.

This sadness, the hole in his heart, the pressure in his chest -- it’s never going to go away. And he almost doesn’t want it to, because that’s Jack, that’s his son clinging to him, begging to be remembered, and Harry can’t take it, but he doesn’t want to lose it, either. Gemma wouldn’t even say his name on the phone, and that’s -- Harry can’t ever let him be forgotten.

As he grips the countertop, he debates going back to bed. Being conscious right now is too goddamn demanding, and if he can sleep, then he should sleep. Before he goes, he grabs one of the glasses out of the sink, fills it back up with more whiskey, and throws it back as if he wasn’t thinking two minutes ago that he was never going to do that again.

He drags himself back upstairs, the stairs Jack will never scale with them watching him nervously again, and when he gets to the top step, he hears Louis talking. To Cooper, he thinks, until he gets to the doorway and Louis’ on the phone. With his mum, probably, so Harry gives him a short nod before turning back around, not wanting to disrupt his privacy. Harry feels like every part of him has been invaded, every cell of his body being peeled back to be gawked at, so if he were Louis, he’d want privacy, and that’s what he gives him.

He goes to the second bathroom upstairs, the one the kids use, and sits on the ledge of the bath with the sink’s water running so he can’t hear Louis talk. He’s still drunk, he realizes, so he lowers himself to the ground in an attempt to avoid losing his balance and smashing his head against something.

Jack was not a fan of bath time. Neither was Madison, honestly. But Jack didn’t like it because he liked staying dirty, and Madison hates it because she hates her hair being brushed, and now Harry has to talk about his children in different tenses. On the back of the door, the kids’ robes are hung up, these soft, funny-looking things that have animals on the hoods, Madison’s a frog and Jack’s a puppy, and Jack is never going to wear it ever again. It was his favorite part of bath time, the only part he liked, and now it’s going to forever remain unused. Probably won’t even be touched again.

After five or so minutes, he gets himself off the ground because he’s so tired of thinking and Louis is probably done. It only takes a minute to explain what happened. And Harry’s right; Louis’ lying in bed, crying loudly, the phone abandoned on the table. Harry crawls back into bed, his breath tasting like vomit and whiskey, and he pulls Louis into his arms and lets him cry. He doesn’t say anything because nothing needs to be said, and he falls asleep a few minutes after Louis does.

It’s a restless sleep, one of those sleeps where he keeps waking up just as he’s fallen asleep, a constant battle. Once he finally does push his way into sleep for good, he has dreams of Jack and Madison that would have been considered good if it weren’t for the fact that he’s now gone. Nothing is ever going to be considered good again.

When he wakes up for good at eight, it’s to a noisy creek on the steps. Harry jolts up, thinking it’s one of the kids getting up in the middle of the night. And then his eyes get wet because he technically only has one kid now, and then they leak because he checks the clock and realizes it’s been a whole day of Jack being dead now. Then, he turns and realizes Louis is gone, so Harry wipes his cheeks, stands up, and follows the noise.

His mum is in the hallway, and as soon as he sees her, it hits him like a blow and he’s crying again because he’s never going to be able to stop. She comes to him and hugs him tight, she pets his hair, she squeezes his shoulders, she does everything she normally does that makes him feel better, and it doesn’t work, none of it works, because she can’t fix this. Nobody can.

“You need to eat,” she says, after we’ll get through this and you still have Louis and Madison and I’ll always be here for you. His stomach rolls at the idea of food, and she shushes his whine. “It’ll make you feel less sick, come on, baby. Louis’ eating his toast, and you can do the same.”

She guides him down the stairs and to the kitchen like he wouldn’t be able to make it there himself, which is probably a fair assessment. At the table, Louis’ eating his piece of toast just like she said, and there’s another plate beside him that’s supposed to be for Harry. It’s just a piece of jam and toast with a cup of tea, but it feels like the world’s biggest chore right about now. He sits down, anyway, knowing that he needs to eat something. He didn’t eat anything yesterday, and neither did Louis. And then they got wasted. That wasn’t particularly smart.

Anne sits down, too, with a cup of coffee in front of her, and it’s almost as clear as it is on Louis that she’s been crying. Jack was part of her daily life, too, her family, her grandson. Harry didn’t even think about how anyone else was dealing with this. Surely, word has gotten around by now. That’s why Harry hasn’t checked his phone, and he assumes Louis hasn’t much, either.

He should say something to Louis, at least a good morning, but nothing seems appropriate. Instead, he wordlessly grabs for Louis’ hand. It’s sticky with jam, and his skin is cold. He squeezes Harry’s hand without looking up.

After Harry and Louis have both finished their toast, there’s a few minutes of silence before Anne goes to the fridge and fixes them a plate of ham and cheese and crackers. Either she was waiting to see if they’d get sick, or she’s nervous and doesn’t know what to do with herself. The toast has already relieved some of Harry’s stomach cramps, though, so he grabs for a cracker.

“Like I told Louis earlier,” Anne starts as she sits back down. She rests her hand on his shoulder. “I can be here as much or as little as you want me to be. If you just need someone to check on you and fix you meals, I can do that, or I can stay here permanently like I was before. It’s up to you two.”

“The plan was that you’d move out when Jack was gone,” Harry says, and as he says it, he regrets it. Because he can’t even remember what it looks like to wake up in the morning and be a parent, and Louis probably feels the same way. His mum can help, and he wants her to.

“Plans change,” Anne says softly. Harry nods once before looking to Louis, who’s still looking down at the table. Harry squeezes his hand.

“I wouldn’t mind it,” he says.

“It’d be good for Madison, too,” Louis agrees. “To not have so many things changing at once.”

“How is she?” Harry asks quietly, a little guilty for that not being the first thing he asked. Their daughter is still here, and they’ve sent her away. It doesn’t make much sense, but it’s -- Harry can’t take that right now. At all.

Anne moves her hand to rest on Harry’s bicep, and she squeezes. “She’s doing fine. Doesn’t like the baby much, though.”

“But she doesn’t know anything, right?” Harry asks, making sure, and Anne nods.

“Not a thing.”

A silence falls over them, then, and it’s not a comfortable one. Nothing will ever feel comfortable again, probably. How could it, when their main source of comfort, the kids, has been severed in two? But the silence is unnecessary; there’s so many things they should ask about. The funeral, first of all. He has no clue where she is in the planning of it, if she’s started at all. And he should ask her if she’s okay, because they asked her to be here for them these last few years and she has been, she’s given up so much for them, and Harry can’t even ask her if she’s doing alright. He feels so much, it makes sense why he has so little to say.

Louis breaks the silence seven minutes later -- Harry’s staring at the clock, begging it to go faster. He’s finished his tea and gone after Harry’s, which is fine because he didn’t really want it anyway. “Has she asked about him?” is what he says, and Harry wishes he hadn’t, because he can’t take hearing the answer.

Anne’s response is hesitant. “Of course. She wants to -- to visit him. I’ve told her that he’s very sleepy and needs quiet time, but she’s. . . It’s alright, if you need more time.”

“We can’t let her figure it out on her own,” Louis says, shaking his head. He lets go of Harry’s hand, and it hurts far more than it should. He watches Louis wrap his hands around the mug, and it feels like betrayal. To combat it, to quiet the pain, Harry nudges his foot against Louis’, and Louis hooks his ankle over Harry’s.

“She’s smart,” Louis continues. “If we wait too long, we risk her realizing that something’s wrong.”

“We have a little while before that happens,” Anne tells them, and she sounds so sure, so certain, that Harry’s nerves are settled by her words. But then Louis’ shaking his head again and they flare right back up.

“When have we ever sent her away like this? Absolutely never. She’s not stupid, she’ll figure it out. And I think it’ll go a lot smoother if she’s not already scared before we tell her.”

“How do we even do that?” Harry asks sharply, because he wanted to spend a few minutes comforted by his mum’s words. He just needs a few minutes of believing that everything’s going to be fine.

“I don’t know,” Louis says, matching his tone. “But just because we don’t know how to do it, that doesn’t mean we don’t have to.”

“Alright, alright,” Anne intervenes, voice soft. She rubs her hand over Harry’s arm, and he crumples, a bit, hunching over in on himself. “Louis’ right, we do have to do this, but we don’t have to do it today. Tomorrow might be best, but we can talk about this. About how we go about doing this. None of us have had to do this before, and there’s no wrong way to do it, alright?”

Harry lifts his head to make eye contact with Louis, and they share a small nod. Harry doesn’t know what it means, but it seems like it’s something important.

“She understands death,” Anne continues, “so we don’t have to deal with that obstacle. I talked them through it when the neighbor’s cat died, remember? And she handled it well. She understood.”

But the neighbor’s cat is a lot different than her twin brother. They all know that, so he doesn’t say it out loud.

“We can tell her that he got very sick, and the doctors tried their best, but it didn’t work and it was painless,” Louis says, and he sounds distant, like he isn’t really here. “I think we’ve got to make it sound as least scary as we can.”

“She’ll just want to be held,” Harry whispers, nodding. “We can do that. We know how to do that.”

They decide that they’ll do it tomorrow morning. That, at nine o’clock when the kids usually wake up, Anne will take her home and they’ll tell her then. Tomorrow seems so far very away, so it’s less suffocating. Today is their day to mourn, to figure this out the best they can before they have to explain it to someone else and teach them the way to grieve. They have to show her that everything’s going to be okay, and to do that, they have to believe it themselves.

-

Tonight, they sit outside. In the dark, the string of lights turned off, and with Cooper by their feet. He knows something’s wrong, just like Harry thought he would. Their sadness is wearing off on Cooper, and he hopes to God the same thing doesn’t happen with Madison. They have to be strong for someone else in their weakest moment, and that’s. . .

Anne went home an hour after breakfast, but not before making them dinner and telling them that her home in Chelsea is being prepared for the memorial service and that she’ll be sending them information as she gets it. She had asked them to call Madison to say goodnight, if they could manage it, but neither of them even considered it.

Harry and Louis don’t speak or hold hands or hook their ankles together. They don’t cuddle into each other or run their fingers through the other’s hair. They don’t cry, because silent tears don’t count, not when they’ve both heard how loud it can get. They just sit, nothing attaching them aside from the blanket draped over both their laps and the trauma they’ve now officially endured. Harry stares into the background, the black emptiness, and Louis keeps his eyes closed.

For two hours, they just sit there. For two hours, they fail each other, because surely, there’s something they could have been said. No matter if it was hard or wrong or awkward, they could have said something. And they didn’t, they didn’t say a thing for two whole hours, even though the silence and lack of distraction was worse than anything they ever could have said to each other. And when they decide to go inside, to go to bed, that decision isn’t spoken aloud. Louis just stands up and leaves, although he holds the door open for Harry. That’s it.

They get ready for bed, Harry manages to brush his teeth tonight, and then they head to Jack’s room. Again, the decision is made without conversation. Harry’s the little spoon tonight, and Louis’ arms are strong around him, protective. They cuddle into each other, and Harry cuddles into Cooper, and he doesn’t realize how much the silence was bothering him until Louis speaks and it elicits a reaction so strong that it’s physical. His heart stutters and his chest tightens and he squeezes his eyes shut, almost like it hurts.

“He was such a good boy,” Louis says, and Harry nods, sniffing quietly.

“He was. And he deserved so much more than he got.”

Tears pool his eyes, and he doesn’t even process it anymore because of how normal it’s already becoming.

“I just wish he didn’t die in a fucking hospital,” Harry says, and it doesn’t sound like him, it doesn’t sound like anything. But it does feel good, talking about this. Acknowledging it instead of drowning it silence. Because that won’t work, it won’t ever work; ignoring it isn’t an option. Harry wishes it was, but it isn’t.

Louis presses closer, his arms becoming tighter. “I keep thinking, like. At least we have Madison. And it sounds so -- so wrong, like she’s just there to lessen the hurt or something. Or that it makes it any better, because it doesn’t. It’s making me feel so fucking guilty.”

So Louis is feeling guilt, too. It’s not just Harry.

“I know,” he whispers. “Me too. But I think, like. I think it’s normal to think that. To remind ourselves of what we still have.”

“It feels like we have nothing. Like there’s nothing left at all.”

“Like there’s no point,” Harry adds. “Like we lost our purpose. Because we did, he was -- he was. . . he was everything, Louis.”

Not in the sense that he was the only thing, but he was everything. He was what Harry thought about all day, stressed over, cried over, he’s what kept Harry motivated and in a good mood. And now that’s just gone, that tether has been split, so of course they feel lost. There’s nothing left to hold onto anymore.

“I know,” Louis whispers, his breath warm against the back of Harry’s neck. “I know.”

-

Madison is excited to see them. She trips over her too-big slippers she must’ve nicked from Gemma as she stumbles over to them, arms extended, wanting to be picked up. For a horrible moment, Harry and Louis just stare at her, uncertain. Louis is the one to step forward and meets her halfway, picking her up and hugging her tight.

“Charlie and Morgan said hi,” she tells them, smiling bright. “They aren’t as big as me, Daddy. I was the biggest. Pete’s just a baby. He stinks.”

Harry swears he’s going to pass out, and it must be obvious, because Anne comes to stand next to him and wraps her arm around his waist. “You need to eat,” she says sternly, voice low, and Harry nods, licking his lips nervously. They didn’t touch their dinner last night.

Madison talks on and on with Louis and Harry commenting tensely in the right spots, and it only takes about four minutes for her to ask about Jack.

“Aunt Gemma said she’s going to make pumpkin cookies for the party,” she says. “And she said me and Jack can help. Will Jack be home? For the party?”

Louis’ hold on her gives, far more than Harry’s comfortable with. He’s about to step forward to help her to her feet before Louis tightens his hold again. Louis looks to him, petrified, and Harry takes a deep breath.

“We have to talk about that, Mads,” Harry tells her, as softly as he can while feeling so tense.

Madison frowns. “About the party?”

“No, not about the party, baby. We have to talk about -- about your brother. About Jack.”

Initially, she’s confused. She doesn’t understand it. She’s just confused; confused about why they’re so serious, why she has to sit down, why they look so sad. She doesn’t start to get upset until Harry repeats Louis’ words from yesterday: there was an accident, the doctors tried their best, but it didn’t work, and he’s dead. Harry’s the one to say it, because right now, he feels almost as protective of Louis as he does Madison, and he can’t force him to say that. He can’t do that to him, so he said it himself, and now he has his daughter’s bright blue eyes that look identical to her brother’s staring at him, horrified.

It’s a complete mess from there. A painful, heartbreaking mess. She cries, God, does she cry, and she does the only thing she knows how, which is to cling to them and let herself be held. She ends up in Louis’ lap, but Harry’s right behind him, hugging her from behind as Louis hugs her from the front. They hold her and they talk to her and they make promises they shouldn’t just like they did with Jack. It goes on for forever, her crying, her tiny hands clutching onto Louis with everything she has. Harry needs her to be okay, he just needs her to be okay, that’s all he needs, that’s it.

“You still have us, alright?” Harry tells her, his voice croaky from how hard he’s holding back a sob. “Me and Dad aren’t going anywhere, we’ll always be right here. And we love you so much, baby, so much.”

Once it’s quiet, after Madison’s laying against Louis’ chest, breathing heavily but no longer crying, her fingers kneading Louis’ skin, Harry glances at the clock. It’s been forty-seven minutes since she got home, forty-three since they changed her life forever. He wonders if she’ll remember this moment until the day she dies, or if she’ll block it out forever to protect herself. Harry knows he won’t get that option, that this moment will be burned into his brain for the rest of his life.

-

It should feel like the hardest part is over, probably. At the very least, there should be some relief, but there isn’t. All Harry feels is nauseating, unbearable pain in every crevice of his body. It’s too much on its own, but paired with Madison’s clear heartache -- he can’t take it. It’s suffocating. So, after a miserable attempt at a normal breakfast that ends with Madison throwing her empty, plastic cup at Louis and storming away, shoving past Harry, he sits in the basement by himself. Going outside is too obvious of a cop-out, so he settles for sinking into the beanbag downstairs, near a pile of board games. He tells himself that it isn’t unfair on Louis because Anne is here now, and she’s the one that went after Madison, anyway.

He keeps thinking about how happy Jack would have been, getting another dog. That’s all he wanted, really. Another dog. He wasn’t asking for much, and yet he still got nothing. He got ripped away. Now would be a good time to believe in Heaven, because picturing Jack somewhere safe, somewhere in which he’s still alive in some ways, would alleviate some of the pain, but he just can’t. It’s not how his brain operates, no matter how hard he closes his eyes and tries to picture it. He’d lied to himself long enough, anyway. Maybe now will be the time he can finally stop hiding from the truths.

Before, he thought he had grieved Jack several times over. Now, he hates himself for thinking that, because he had no idea how it would actually feel. It’s like there’s an actual part of him missing, like his insides have been hollowed out, like his body is suffering withdrawals. It’s so painful, it’s so painful, and he doesn’t want to be alone in this pain, which is odd considering he keeps isolating himself. Or maybe he was just sort of hoping Louis would follow him downstairs.

It doesn’t matter what he hoped for. It never has.

On top of the stack of board games is an old Gucci shoebox that the kids painted and decorated. There are a lot of beads and a lot of glue-marks where beads have fallen off. On the top is each of their handprints, Jack’s in orange paint and Madison’s in green. It was decorated the day that Jack and Madison declared they needed their own board game box for their own game, which was their version of charades. Harry helped them write down whatever scenarios or characters that they thought were funny onto index cards, and he’s pretty sure they were working on some sort of system that involved dice. It had just been the three of them down here; Anne was out in the garden and Louis was at work. It was just Harry and his kids, all huddled together and covered in paint and giggling over things that didn’t even make sense. And because they’re kids and it was what kids do, after that day, they abandoned that game and made up a new one, and they never got around to playing the old one, and now they’ll never get the chance to.

There are so many things Harry would do differently, which just fucking sucks because he thought he was doing everything right, then. He knew that Jack was on borrowed time, that it could be any day in a number of different ways, so he took them out for ice cream when he asked and turned on the movies he wanted and let him stay up later than he should’ve. Now, though. Harry wishes they got a second dog. A third and a fourth and a fifth. He wishes they had gone to Disneyland, to Paris, to California. Jack loved the beach, and they only went a handful of times. He should’ve taught Jack as many life skills as he could have, because even if Jack didn’t need them at the time, Harry needed those memories. He needs those memories now.

Anne comes downstairs about a half hour later, and he wishes she would leave him alone as much as he wishes she would come hold him. She sits next to him on the couch, pulling her legs up next to Harry’s, and lets out a long, deep sigh.

“She’ll be okay,” she says, and Harry closes his eyes.

“You can’t possibly know that.”

“No, I do. Because she’s four, Harry. She’s four. She’ll be okay, because kids don’t know there is an option to not be okay. Most of them, anyway. She’ll be devastated for a while, of course, but the only things she needs to get through that are her dads.”

“I should’ve gotten him another dog, Mum.”

“Oh, Harry. It’s -- ”

“No,” he interrupts, opening his eyes to look at her. “He loved dogs. Cooper was all he’d ever think about, and we just didn’t get him another one. Why? We had the money, the space, the time to look after another one. . . It would’ve made his whole fucking day. His whole fucking life, Mum, and I just didn’t get him another one, and when I finally promised I would, he fucking died.”

She frowns at him. It’s a pitying one, and he can’t tell if he hates it or not. “He loved Cooper. That was enough for him.”

Harry shakes his head. He doesn’t want to be told he was enough; he wants someone to be angry with him. “There was this guy,” Harry tells her. “At the hospital. His name was Dimitris. And his brother, he was twenty, he got hit by a car. Hit by a car that was going a hundred and twenty kilometers an hour, and his surgery was going screwy, and he lived. He got to live, after all that. While Jack, who was only fucking four, had a perfectly fine, planned surgery, and then he fucking died. How is that fair? How is that -- I told that man that they’d both make it out alive, and I fully thought I was lying to him, that his brother was going to die, and he didn’t, but my son did. My son.”

“He was somebody else’s son, too, baby,” Anne tries to explain softly, but Harry doesn’t want to hear it. He doesn’t want to hear that at all.

“I don’t care. It’s not fair.”

“Nobody is saying it is, love. I understand -- ”

“You don’t understand anything, me and Gemma are fucking fine, we’ve -- ”

Anne interrupts him. “I was going to say that I understand that you’re angry, and that’s okay. It’s okay to be angry, it’s okay to think it’s unfair. And it’s okay to want to be alone, but it’s okay to want to be around people, too. Whatever you’re feeling, Harry. . . It’s all okay. There’s no straight path to grieving.”

“I wish there was,” Harry says, frowning. It’d be so much easier, he thinks, if someone said, okay, this is how you’re going to feel today, and this is what you’re going to do. He doesn’t know what to do with himself.

“Well,” Anne says carefully. “I can tell you that Louis doesn’t want to be alone right now.”

Harry closes his eyes again. This is all so much, and he keeps thinking that, but then it somehow gets even heavier. “I snapped at him yesterday. Isn’t that awful?”

“He snapped at you, too. He told me. It’s okay. You’re hurting and you’re angry and your whole life just got up-ended. You’re going to snap sometimes, and that’s okay, so long as you two work on it.”

“I don’t want to lose him. I’m scared if -- if we do this wrong, if we don’t get this right, then I’ve lost him, too.”

“He is right upstairs,” she tells him, reaching over to squeeze his ankle. “Go up and make him some tea, and then sit with him. You haven’t lost him, and you won’t. It’s far too soon to think that, baby. You both are just hurting right now, and you’re scared, I get that, but he’s right upstairs.”

He’s so tired.

“And Madison?” he asks. “Is she alright?”

“I’m going to watch a movie with her when I get back upstairs,” Anne tells him, nodding. “She is upset, but she’s okay. Just a little sensitive at the moment.”

He stands, then, and so does she. They walk up the stairs together, his mum’s hand on his back, and when they reach the top, he grabs her hand. “I don’t want you to go,” he says, eyes wide. “I want you to stay. We need you to stay.”

She strokes her fingers over his cheek. “I’m glad, sweetheart. I wasn’t planning on going anywhere.”

Anne goes upstairs, Harry makes tea, and his head still feels so full that it hurts, but he’s been given a clear instruction and it helps. Making tea; he’s done that countless times by now, especially to lighten Louis’ mood, and it helps interrupt the stream of Jack Jack Jack racing through his head.

When the tea is done, he pours it in Louis’ favorite mug and grabs a package of these fancy biscuits that his mum buys that Harry has always hated but Louis loves. He knows how to take care of Louis; there’s no way to forget that after all these years. Maybe if he concentrates on comforting Louis, he can find comfort in that himself.

Louis’ at the end of the couch, curled up with his elbow resting on the armrest and a couch pillow cuddled against his stomach. He’s staring at nothing, and when Harry enters the living room, he looks up at him. His expression is mostly blank, if only a hint of gentleness there.

“I made you tea,” Harry says, shuffling on his feet for a second before coming over to Louis. Louis draws his feet closer to him as if to make room for Harry, like there isn’t already plenty of space. He sits beside him, handing him the tea and package of biscuits. Louis takes them, mumbling out a thanks that sounds genuine.

“Madison’s going to be okay,” Louis tells him, voice low, as he grabs a biscuit from the plastic. “She’s. . . We have to help her through it, obviously, but I think she’ll be alright.”

“And us?” Harry asks tentatively.

Louis snaps the biscuit in half and shrugs. “I think. . . I think we have to help each other through it, too. We can’t go at this alone. And it’s hard to think that we’ll ever be okay, but I think eventually it’ll get less hard. That’s what your mum said, anyway. I don’t know.”

Harry doesn’t know, either. He lays down beside Louis, tucking his body against his and resting his head against his hip. He doesn’t know, and neither does Louis, and neither does anyone else. That’s one of the many things Harry’s just going to have to accept, he’s pretty sure.

-

That night, instead of sleeping in Jack’s cramped twin-sized bed, they sleep in Madison’s. Louis and Harry sleep on opposite sides of her with Cooper at their feet. It only takes ten minutes of crying for her to be pulled to sleep, and once she’s under, Louis and Harry stare at each other without saying anything. This time, there’s an excuse for their silence.

-

Grief is an ugly thing.

It’s not just the worst sadness he’s ever experienced, it’s anger and despondence and sleeping all day. The day after they tell Madison, Harry wakes up in the middle of the night and heads to Jack’s room, and he sleeps until three in the afternoon, only being woken by his mum knocking on the door. It’s being paranoid, for some reason, because Harry can’t stop thinking that he’s doing this wrong and that everyone else is handling it better than him and that Louis’ going to get mad and leave him. Anne keeps telling him that’s just because he lost Jack, and he’s scared to lose Louis, too, like that helps anything. It’s also blaming himself for everything, for Madison’s tantrums and Jack’s death and Louis’ sorrow. There must be something he can do that he’s not, or something he could have done that he didn’t. The guilt Harry is dragging around is suffocating, it’s unavoidable, and it hurts.

Grief for Louis is waking up early and spending hours outside with Cooper. It’s making himself tea that he doesn’t drink, the empty mugs like a trail that Anne or Harry clean up after. It’s breaking his hands trying to make Madison happy, pouring all his energy into her, and looking defeated when it doesn’t work. And either Harry’s being paranoid again, or part of Louis’ grief is slowly pulling away from Harry, because by the end of the first week, Harry swears Louis has pulled away from Harry’s touch more than he’s pulled closer.

For Anne, it’s pretending like nothing has changed. It’s molding herself to fit whatever shape someone needs from her at the time. It’s crying in the kitchen, or in the bathroom, or in the backyard when she thinks nobody is looking.

And for Madison. . . it’s a lot more complicated. It’s her not saying what she needs and being mad when no one can figure it out, or throwing tantrums over small things, or hitting them when they try to comfort her sometimes. She wants them to leave her alone while also needing them right there beside her. Madison’s grieving process can be summed up in one word, really: confused. She’s so bloody confused. She’s feeling so many things she’s never felt before, never watched anyone else feel, and they’re all so big and scary that she doesn’t know how to handle them. She doesn’t know how to cope. And it’s getting worse, he swears it’s getting worse, like Madison is slowly realizing Jack really isn’t coming home.

It hides itself in different shapes, but no matter what form it takes, it’s ugly. It’s relentless and sickening and cruel. And on the morning of the funeral, eight days after Jack’s death, they’re all choking on it worse than ever before, maybe even worse than that first night. Because today is the day they’re supposed to say goodbye, it’s the day for closure, and Harry still swears it’s all been a misunderstanding. If he doesn’t get this right today, he might regret it for the rest of his life.

It’s seven forty-five when he wakes, and Louis isn’t next to him. He must be outside, then, and usually Harry lets him be, but this morning, he pulls on a coat and slides on some slippers. On his way to the backyard, he passes his mum who’s sitting at the kitchen table, and he presses a quick kiss to her cheek on his way out.

He pushes open the back door, flinches from the cold air, and when he looks up, he realizes that it’s snowing. He stares out at the snowflakes rushing down, idly noting that he’ll have to drive because Louis refuses to drive in the snow if he can help it. It’s the day he has to say goodbye to his baby, and it’s snowing for this first time this fall. He swallows, tears welling up in his eyes and pricking his throat. Cooper nosing at his hand is completely ignored by his brain, far too overwhelmed, but when Louis speaks, he registers that.

“It probably won’t stick,” he says. “It’s not cold enough yet.”

Harry nods as he takes a deep breath. He pets Cooper’s head briefly before moving to sit next to Louis on the swing. The motion from him sitting makes him momentarily dizzy, and he carefully lifts his legs up so it doesn’t move too much.

“This would’ve made his day,” Louis whispers, and Harry nearly cries when Louis reaches over to grab his hand. His fingers are freezing, but Harry doesn’t even think about complaining. “He would’ve felt like shit still, probably. Exhausted, sleeping half the day, having headaches. . . But him waking up to this -- he would’ve forgotten about all of that.”

“Probably would have demanded to go for a walk,” Harry agrees. He stares down at their clasped hands, at their tattoos. At least Jack is permanent in that way, he thinks.

“You know,” Louis starts. “I was thinking, like. I wish we’d done the memorial service at the place you grew up. Mayfair, I mean. I don’t even think I’ve been to her house in Chelsea.”

Immediately, Harry says, “We can move it. It won’t be a problem, Louis, if that’s -- we can just move it. My mum, she can pay to have people move the things.”

“Doesn’t it sound nice, though?”

“It does,” Harry agrees, reaching up to touch Louis’ cheek. “It’s been ages since we took the kids there; Madison will like it. We can move it, nobody will care.”

“Does your mum even still own it? I thought she only had the three houses here.”

Harry shakes his head. “She does. It’s my dad’s. He wanted us to stay there while I grew up because he felt bad for leaving. But yeah, he still owns it.”

“If it’s not a problem. . .”

“It’s not. I’ll go tell Mum. She won’t care.”

“Not right now,” Louis says, tugging Harry closer by his wrist. Harry scoots closer, his hand dropping to Louis’ shoulder. “Just sit with me, for a bit.”

“Okay,” Harry whispers, and he tucks himself into Louis’ side. The movement of the swing makes Harry nauseous again, but it goes away as quickly as it came. If only the tears burning Harry’s eyes could do the same.

-

Suits are ironed, ties are straightened, shoes are thrown before being securely strapped to Madison’s feet. It feels wrong; whenever Harry is getting dressed up like this, he’s usually going somewhere fun, somewhere exciting. Today is the exact opposite of that, and so it feels wrong to put effort into looking nice. Today’s about Jack, and Jack never cared if Harry’s shirt was wrinkled or not, be here he is, smoothing it out in the mirror. He wonders if it makes him selfish, narcissistic. Louis’ doing the same in the bathroom mirror, though. One last look in the mirror before they have to leave.

Both of them step away from the mirrors, Louis emerging from the bathroom swiftly, when a loud shout is heard from downstairs. Madison’s been a right mess today. If it was under different circumstances, he’d say she’s being a brat, but she’s mourning and grief is an ugly thing. Louis grabs his coat off the door and heads down the stairs, Harry following closely after him.

“I don’t want to go,” they hear Madison shout. From the kitchen, they find. Anne is sitting down with her, clearly trying to talk her through this for the millionth time. Madison doesn’t get this, doesn’t understand why she has to go for Jack if Jack isn’t going to be there. Harry and Louis discussed making arrangements so she wouldn’t have to come, but they ultimately decided they wanted her there. They want her to have a chance to say goodbye.

“Baby bee,” Harry mumbles, coming closer to her. He crouches down in front of her seat, his hands on her knees. Her face is bright red, her eyes wet. He kisses her knee as Louis comes to stand behind him. “I know you’re upset, alright? We’re all sad, too. But it’s important that we go.”

“It’s stupid,” she huffs, and her foot jerks out like she thought about kicking him.

“Maybe,” Louis says behind him. “But everyone will be there, baby. Uncle Liam and Aunt Gem and all my sisters, too. All your cousins, baby, don’t you want to see them?”

“No,” she says miserably.

Harry frowns. “We’d really like it if you came, love. It’s important to us. We’d feel a lot better if you were there. And I know it’ll be weird, okay? It’s going to be weird. But it’s -- it’s okay to be sad. It’s always okay to be sad. Every day, it’s okay, but today especially.”

“And we’re going to all sorts of places,” Louis tells her. “First a church, and then a -- and then somewhere outside. We’ll get to be out in the snow for a bit. And then we’re going to a big, big house in Mayfield. It’s where Daddy grew up.” He digs his fingers into Harry’s shoulder. “Don’t you want to see where he was, what he was up to, at your age? Doesn’t that sound fun?”

She squirms. “I don’t know.”

It dawns on Harry, then, that this isn’t just her being upset because of Jack. She has quite literally never gone anywhere like this without Jack by her side in her entire life. When Jack was too sick to go to family gatherings, Madison simply didn’t go either. Jack did the same with her, too. They were a united front, and maybe Madison developed a dependency on him. Maybe the idea of being alone around a lot of people scares her.

“You can stay with me and Dad the entire time, you hear me?” Harry says firmly, and he reaches up to smooth down a stray hair. She leans into the touch. “You’ll sit by us, you’ll ride with us, you’ll be right next to us the entire time, baby. The whole time. You can sit in our laps and hold our hands as much as you’d like. We’d like that, too, okay?”

“The whole time?” she asks, doubtful.

Louis answers immediately. “Every second.”

They had a conversation like this with Jack less than two weeks ago, and the memory of it is slamming its fists against Harry’s brain, begging to be paid attention to, but Harry can’t right now. He can’t focus on that, or else he’ll cry, and Madison needs them right now.

She stretches her arms out towards him, as if to test it, and Harry scoops her up. God, he misses carrying Jack, misses cuddling him close. That’s something Harry would give anything for to have again, just another cuddle with his son.

“We have to put our coats on first, though, okay?” Harry tells her, and his voice wobbles. It must be noticeable because Louis puts a steadying hand on his lower back.

It hurts, everything hurts, and he hopes to God that getting some closure today can make it just a little more bearable.

-

Closure is a made up thing, he decides. He makes this decision while his mother is at the podium, speaking about Jack to all their friends and family. His hand is firmly on Madison’s shoulder, Louis’ on the opposite, and he can’t really hear anything aside from faint talking. It sounds like it’s been drowned under miles of water. He’s dizzy, too, and he’d think he was falling if it weren’t for his hold on Madison.

This type of pain, this deep of a wound -- there’s no way to find closure in that. It’ll always, always be there, bleeding and festering. Maybe things will make it better, but there will be a lot of things to make it worse, and that’s just not something that’s going to change. Gaining closure is essentially saying he’s moved on, that a chapter of his life has been closed, but fuck that. Jack wasn’t just a chapter of his life, he was Harry’s entire world, and that can’t be closed off. He’s always going to feel this pain.

“And his laugh was infectious,” Anne’s voice rings out. He can barely make out the words, but he knows what she’s saying because he read over her eulogy on the way here. He didn’t end up driving, since Anne said as politely as she could that he’d get them all killed driving in his condition. She drove, and Louis sat in the back with Madison, and Harry read the eulogy. He didn’t cry; it felt like he couldn’t. He hasn’t cried yet since they got here, either. Louis has, and so has everyone else around them, but Harry can’t.

Coming in, they managed to slip away from the majority of pitying stares and touches. They spoke with Louis’ family for a little while before finding their seats, and the way Lottie clutched to her son as they spoke about Jack won’t leave Harry’s mind. Most of their friend’s kids are too little to be brought to something like this, aside from Niall’s and a few others. And for some reason, Harry thought it would be obvious that they didn’t want a bunch of kids running around here. Lottie brought her kids, though, her two boys, and Gemma bought her kids as well so Madison wouldn’t be left out. He’s not mad about those who have decided to bring their kids, just -- if they’re here, fine, but don’t clutch them so tightly in front of him like Harry’s going to whisk them away or explode at the sight of them.

“And I think we could all take something away from how he never stopped smiling. . .”

Beside the empty seat that Anne occupied before, Scott is standing there, baby Pete in his arms. Gemma’s standing beside him, for some reason. Harry would much rather turn to see his sister staring back at him, her warm eyes, not Scott’s nervous ones. Louis’ mum is standing next to Louis, her hand on his shoulder much like their hands on Madison’s. His other hand aches to be secured over Jack’s shoulder, too, keeping him close.

Harry swears he doesn’t even hear the end of the speech or process that the service is moving on until a hand touches his back, and his mum is back standing next to him. He stares at her, confused, and she rubs his back soothingly.

After more muddled talking, Harry can suddenly feel the atmosphere shift. He glances around, trying to gauge what’s changed. He can’t concentrate on anything right now, and he doesn’t exactly know what’s happening, but Anne and Jay start to gently push Harry and Louis forward. Louis looks just as lost as he does.

“You don’t have to say anything out loud, if you don’t want to,” Jay says. “Just go up there, okay? Just for a second?”

Oh, Harry thinks numbly. They’re supposed to go up to the casket now. And say what, Harry doesn’t know. He just thinks this is all a bit morbid, everyone staring at them as they approach the shut casket, Madison between them looking nervous. But when he realizes that Madison needs him, a switch kicks on and he feels a little more present. He crouches down beside her, Louis mirroring his moments in sync, and they tell her that she can say goodbye, that she can touch the glossy, dark wood, or she can not do anything at all. She doesn’t get it, doesn’t understand it, and she’s still hiccupping loudly as she reaches over to set her hand flat against the polished wood.

Harry turns his head for a moment, certain he’s going to throw up, but the feeling passes.

Louis places his hand next to Madison’s, so Harry does the same, and that’s when the tears finally kick in. Because this -- this whole day so far -- hasn’t been about Jack, it’s been about them, but now -- now he’s connected with Jack in some way. Now, this feels like it’s about Jack, and it hurts.

Madison turns to Louis when she wants to be picked up, probably uncomfortable by Harry’s tears, and the three of them stand up on shaking legs before heading back to the front pew. Madison’s cries are hardly muffled by Louis’ shirt while Harry’s are silent, his sniffles weak. He feels so weak.

A hand grasps Harry’s shoulder tightly, and Harry doesn’t react at first, thinking it’s Anne. Her hands are by her side, though, so Harry turns slightly. It’s Liam, and he nods at Harry when they lock eyes. Harry reaches up to grab his hand, holding it tightly, the other hand going to rest on Louis’ forearm.

A little while later, people start shuffling out. Anne and Jay act as guards for the two of them as they accept people’s condolences on behalf of them. Harry wonders who’s going to stick around for the burial, and then the memorial service. He hopes the crowd is halved by then; he doesn’t want to deal with people who are only here to be polite. He’s pretty sure he saw Des’ neighbor’s kid here, a man Harry spoke to occasionally as a kid.

When it’s just the five of them, Anne turns to them. “Do you want a moment alone?” she asks, and she touches Harry’s arm so softly.

“We can take Madison to the car,” Jay adds.

Harry doesn’t even have time to think properly before Louis is saying yes, they want a few minutes alone. He hands Madison off to his mum, and Harry squeezes her ankle as she goes. They tell them to take their time before leaving, and then it’s just Harry and Louis. Even the priest has left by now, slipping away into the shadows.

“I don’t know if I can do it,” Louis whispers, sounding ashamed. He hangs his head, and Harry doesn’t know what he’s talking about, but he crowds against Louis anyway, pulling him close and telling him that he can, he can do it. “Watching them do -- that,” Louis continues, voice choked. He tucks his face against Harry’s jacket, his fingers wrinkling the fabric at the bottom. “Bury him, put him under, under the cold, hard ground, I can’t -- I can’t do that, Harry, I can’t.”

“You can,” Harry says firmly, hoping it’ll give Louis the strength. Because Harry couldn’t do it alone, and they promised Madison they’d be there every step of the way. “He’s -- it’s going to be fine. We’ll get to see that he’s safe, right? And protected. We won’t have to worry that something is off, because we’ll get to see it.” He drops a kiss to Louis’ head, holding him closer. “And if you don’t want to look, then you don’t have to. We can be just like this, okay, but I,” his voice wavers. “I need you to be there with me, Louis.”

Louis nods into his chest.

Before they leave the church, hand-in-hand, they say another silent goodbye. On top of the casket, they line their hands up and just rest them there, and they hope that says everything in itself. Words have failed them too many times in their lives; maybe this will be enough.

-

After what feels like a million hours later, because time is playing tricks on Harry today, dragging itself out to rub in the pain, Harry is leaned against the kitchen counter of his childhood home. It’s quiet in the kitchen, since he’s by himself. He needed a second of peace. People are mingling out there like this isn’t the worst day of Harry’s life, and it’s making him sick.

He’s been gone for a half hour before Louis comes and finds him. Or, maybe he wasn’t looking for him, because he opens the first set of cabinets without looking at Harry.

“There’s none here,” Harry says quietly. “I looked. He must’ve moved everything to his new house so his wine cooler could look fancier.”

Louis sighs, dropping his arms to his side. He turns to Harry slowly, and he looks beat. “Nobody out there seems to realize that I’m not in the mood to chat.”

“That’s why I left. Liam started talking to Zayn about some office meeting they have, and I couldn’t take it anymore. Where’s Mads?”

“With Scott and Gemma. Antagonizing Pete. She’s fine.”

“Too tired to care about any of this anymore, you mean.”

Louis nods as he crosses the kitchen to stand next to Harry. He sets his elbows on the counter, leaning against it, so their bodies are facing opposite directions. “I’m glad we did it here,” Louis says. “It’s. . . not nice, being back here, but it’s familiar. It’s good to know that Jack had been here before, even if it was only once or twice.”

One day, reminiscing about him is bound to get a little easier. Now, Harry’s already nearly choking on tears again.

“He liked the pool,” Harry says, remembering how Jack attempted to make a beeline straight in it when he’d only been swimming, like, twice before that. Cooper was right on his heels, and Harry’s still confident he would’ve protected him if Louis hadn’t gotten to him first, but it scared the shit out of him anyway. And then they got him in proper swimming trunks and floaties, and Harry had a hand on him the entire time as Jack swam around, little limbs flailing about. Madison sat with Louis at the edge of the pool, too scared to go in.

The pool is covered now, all closed off for winter, and it feels spiteful.

“I want to go home,” Louis whispers. “Can’t cry around all these people without getting a few stares. And half these people -- I mean, I know we became a little closed off after he got sick, a little busy, but Lottie’s friend from primary school came. Like this is a bloody -- ”

He doesn’t finish that sentence, because Jay comes walking in with an exhausted Madison weighing down her arms. Harry steps forward to take her, and Jay hands her off easily.

“She was asking for you,” she says, sticking close by to run her fingers through Madison’s hair. “She’s grown so much since I saw her last. What a beautiful girl. Looks more like May more and more every day, I swear.”

Harry and Louis shoot each other a look at the same time, a desperate, nervous glance that reads, Please tell me you remembered to invite her. Because May was the best surrogate they could have ever asked for, she was so kind and understanding, the mother of their two children, and they just didn’t think she’d want to come to this. They didn’t even think of her at all. And yes, it’s true that she didn’t want to have much contact with the kids unless the kids wanted to meet her -- all she asked was for a Christmas card every year -- but Harry and Louis made the decision to reach out to her to tell her that Jack was sick anyway.

It was a long time ago, maybe two months after Jack was first diagnosed. May had been very apologetic, and in the end, she chose not to visit. It’s not like they had expected her to, or wanted anything from her. They just thought she should know, but they fully respected her decision. She calls infrequently, maybe every five months or so, to ask how he’s doing, and she sounds like she genuinely wants to know, so it was a really, really shithead move not to think to invite her. Or tell her that the person she birthed into this world four years ago is now dead.

“Are we terrible people for not inviting her?” Louis whispers, looking horrified, and Harry quickly shakes his head. That’s -- no. He can’t take any more guilt.

“She lives in Wales, anyway, she wouldn’t have wanted to come. She wouldn’t have, she -- there’s no way.”

Harry and Louis had taken a month-long vacation to Wales during May’s last month of pregnancy so they wouldn’t have to miss it. She had asked that they weren’t in the room during the birth, though she invited them in as soon as Jack was born and let them stay through Madison’s birth. It had been the most overwhelming experience of Harry’s life at the time, and now that’s been replaced by much more depressing days.

“I don’t think she would have wanted to be invited,” Jay says calmly. “But maybe, when you’re ready, one of you should give her a call.”

God, that’s going to be painful. Harry almost thinks they should spare her the news, but it’d be so awful if she called in a few months to check-in, only to find out that he’s been dead for months. It’s one more thing on Harry’s mind, one more thing weighing down his heart, and it’s the last thing he can take before he decides he wants to go home.

Louis must be on the same page, because he says, “I want to go home. We can just go home, right? It’s -- and Maddie’s tired, and I’m. . .”

Jack’s headstone is sleek black with his name engraved in capital letters, and there’s a dog that was etched into the stone with Cooper as a reference at the bottom of it. It’s not done yet, but Harry and Louis recently got a picture of the almost-finished result, and he thinks about it suddenly. The image sticks in his mind as Jay explains that yes, they can go, and that she’ll fetch Anne while they slip out the back.

“And our coats,” Harry says faintly, weakly, as he squeezes Madison tight. She’s sound asleep on his shoulder, her hands loosely holding onto his shirt. As Jay leaves, nodding, Louis turns to him.

“We should call May tomorrow. I think. . . She deserves to know.”

All Harry can do is nod before burying his face in his daughter’s neck, the urge to protect her and hide her away from everyone the strongest it's ever been.

-

The day after the funeral, Harry wakes up at eight in the morning. And then he falls back asleep, tucking his face against Louis’ ribcage as they lay in Jack’s bed. The next time he wakes, it’s one, Louis gone, and he can hear Madison singing downstairs. The sound is about the best thing ever, and he holds it close to his heart. He thinks about getting up for all of two seconds before he’s pulled back under. Then, he wakes up at two, and the same thing happens: he opens his eyes, sees the digital clock on Jack’s shelf, next to his Woody statue, thinks he should get up, and then immediately passes out again. Then again at three-thirty. At five, he wakes to Louis sitting next to him in bed, running his fingers against Harry’s neck. Again, it wakes him slightly, and he debates getting up, but he feels powerless against the exhaustion weighing him down. He reaches towards Louis, hand falling onto his thigh, as his eyes slip shut again.

“Can’t sleep all day, baby.”

Harry’s never been so tired, so he’s pretty sure he could.

“Come on, H. Madison’s getting worried.”

That makes Harry properly wake up. He still feels like garbage, but now he has some semblance of motivation. “I feel like shit,” he says, voice scratchy with sleep. His head is pounding and his face aches like it’s swollen, and he’s gotten used to that enough to know it’s from crying so much the day before.

“‘Cause we’ve been eating like shit for days. Come on, Mum will make you something to eat.”

Harry rolls onto his stomach and cracks his eyes open. “What time did you wake up?”

“Nine, I think. I, um. I called May.”

Harry sits up on his elbows, shocked and angered and with nausea sloshing around in his stomach. That’s not at all what he wanted to wake up to, what the fuck. What the actual fuck. “What?” he asks. “I thought -- I thought we would do that together.”

“I know, I’m sorry.”

“You knew that I wanted to be there, but you went ahead and did it anyway? I mean, Louis. I thought -- what did she say?”

Louis sighs. “That she was sad for us. That she had been praying for him every night. I don’t know, she didn’t say much. She was shocked, for the most part.”

Harry rubs a hand over his face, trying to push this aside. Louis shouldn’t have called her on his own, but it’s. . . it’s not fine, but it’s not something that Harry has the energy to argue over. He doesn’t have any more fight in him.

“Did you tell her where the cemetery was?” Harry asks quietly, staring down at the bed.

“Yeah. She said she’d visit, if she was ever in town.”

Harry nods before getting out of bed. He has to use the bathroom, and he also just wants to be alone for a minute. Louis doesn’t protest, which sort of makes Harry angrier, but whatever. He has to let that go; this is not the time to get worked up over small things.

Everyone’s sitting in the living room, and Harry makes it a point to sit next to Louis, grabbing his hand. He doesn’t want to cause any tension between them, because as emotionally fragile as they both are right now, the tiniest pressure could make them snap.

“C’mere, Mads,” Harry says tiredly, patting his lap. Madison abandons her Legos to come and crawl onto Harry’s lap. She seems less upset today, more herself. Harry knows it won’t be that easy, that the grief will hide itself in other ways when it comes to her, but for now, it comforts him.

-

The next week goes by so slow that Harry genuinely fears he’s losing his mind. Every minute he’s awake, he’s exhausted and his heart hurts and Jack weighs heavy on his head. All of his senses feel overstimulated, the smallest thing feeling like the biggest. Conversations are getting harder and harder to maintain, bed times are becoming earlier and earlier, and his mum’s words are starting to impact him less. You can only be told so many times that things will get better before you stop believing it.

Louis is coping in his own way. He’s taken over breakfasts and lunches, he’s doing the dishes more than he ever has, he’s taking Cooper out on these hour-long walks. And that’s all good and well, and Harry does not want to demand that Louis cope the same way he does, but it’s entirely too much when everyone else is being productive and loud around him when he just feels. . . stuck. If it wasn’t for Anne taking care of him, Harry would be well on his way to wasting away by now.

He doesn’t even know it’s Halloween, a day behind in his head, until he walks into the kitchen at eleven in the afternoon and Madison’s wearing a shirt with a pumpkin on it. Jack had an identical one, he thinks, as Madison pops up from her seat and shouts happy Halloween.

“Thanks, baby,” he mumbles, too tired to fake excitement. He does, however, come over and give her a hug to make up for it. He pokes her tummy, and she giggles as she squirms away. “You my little pumpkin today, hmm?”

She pouts up at him. “Noo.”

“No? Why?”

Madison simultaneously gets him through the day and makes his day a million times more difficult. She keeps him moving, occupied, distracted, but she also is an ever-present reminder that Jack is no longer here.

“I’m a bee,” she says, kind of sadly, and Harry pokes her nose.

“That’s right. My baby bee, you’re right.”

He doesn’t know where that nickname started, it just sort of happened, and she’s clung to it ever since. It was a nickname that Jack didn’t have, and that made her feel special. It still does, judging by her bright smile.

Louis’ making lunch, says he’s just in time, and Anne is sifting through a magazine at the table. When Harry sits down in the chair between Madison and Anne, his mum looks up at him, frowning.

“You look tired, love.”

Harry waves her off, and as if to remind him, his eyes grow heavier. “Might take a nap later, but I’m fine.”

“Before the party?” Madison asks, her eyes wide. Harry stares at her, confused, his eyes slowly finding Louis’. The Halloween party is no longer on the agenda. It was taken off the agenda the minute Jack died; maybe even before then. He didn’t even give it a second thought, and now here she is, staring at him like he’s broken a promise.

“Did you still want to go to that, baby?” Louis asks carefully, turning around to look at her. “It’s okay if you don’t.”

Madison’s eyes welling with tears is enough for them all to realize that yes, she very much still wants to go to that. And if she does, that’s fine; they can get it sorted out, someone else can come pick her up and drop her off. Harry has no problem with that.

“I can take you, darling,” Anne says, smiling softly at her. “It’ll -- ”

“I want Dads to come,” she interrupts, big blue eyes darting between the three of them, angry. And Harry loves her, loves her to pieces, but he will not be going to a Halloween party. Absolutely not, not a week after his son’s funeral. It’s just not happening. And it looks like Louis is on the same page as him.

“Baby,” he says slowly. “Grandma can just take you, can’t she? It’ll be no different, love, you’ll just be playing with the other kids.”

But it’s the wrong answer. It must be, because Madison bolts from her chair and runs upstairs, and the door slams shut behind her. Cooper lifts his head off the ground, confused, before getting up and going after her.

Harry and Louis stare at each other.

“I’m not going,” Harry says, and there’s an edge to his voice. He recognizes it, how hostile he sounds, so he tries to fix it. “Louis, babe, I can’t go to that. And if you can’t, either, that’s fine. She’ll get over it.”

“Will she?”

“If Mum takes her, yes,” Harry tells him. “She’ll forget that we didn’t come within the first five minutes.”

Louis looks conflicted, and Anne shakes her head. “Let me talk to her,” she says, standing up. “There’s no reason that I can’t just take her.”

Once she’s gone, Harry sits back in his chair and Louis turns towards the stove again. He flicks the burner on and something sizzles. Harry stares at his back, at his shoulders flexing and his muscles moving. They don’t say anything, even though they should. Even when they hear Madison shouting upstairs. It’s not until Anne comes back with a flushed face and a frown that they speak.

“I can walk her in,” Louis offers, sighing. “If I get her settled, she won’t mind if I leave.”

Harry can’t even imagine doing that. Going inside his sister’s home, around all those people, all those kids. Absolutely not. That’s his worst nightmare right now. But if Louis can do it, and he’s willing, then Harry isn’t going to disagree.

“Are you sure?” Anne asks, and Louis shrugs. He’s tense, though, Harry can see it in his posture, in how pinched he’s carrying his shoulders.

“It’ll be five minutes. And then I can come back home and get drunk with Haz. If you don’t mind staying with her, that is.”

“Of course I don’t,” Anne says. “But you shouldn’t be drinking. It’s not healthy.”

“It’s what we did every Halloween before we had kids,” Harry tells her, sort of feeling numb all the sudden. It’s like how he felt at the funeral; everything’s starting to feel less real, less tangible. “Ordered pizza and got drunk.”

“You still have a kid,” she says, and Harry hardens her gaze at her.

“I know that,” Harry says harshly. “But she’s not going to be here tonight, is she? That’s all I was saying.”

Anne nods. “I know that, love.”

“Then don’t make me feel like a bad father for wanting to get drunk on my dead kid’s favorite holiday,” Harry says, scoffing. Not even a second later, Louis responds.

“Stop deflecting,” he says shortly. “That’s not what she was saying and you know it.”

“Don’t -- are you kidding?” Harry asks, shaking his head at Louis. It’s like all of his emotions were wrapped in a tight ball, and Anne somehow pulled at the right spot for it to unravel. “I’m still pissed at you, you know. For calling May without me. What the fuck was that, by the way? As if you didn’t know that would hurt me.”

Louis sighs, flicks off the burner again, and turns to him. “I’m not arguing with you,” he says flatly. He turns to Anne, completely dismissing Harry’s words. “I’ll go talk to her. Finish the potatoes, will you?”

And no, that’s -- no. Louis doesn’t get to tell him when they’re arguing or not, first of all. Not when Harry has a good reason to be upset. And second of all, they’re making him feel inadequate, selfish. No matter their intentions, that’s how they’re making him feel. At least Anne has the decency to talk about it with him.

“We’re all upset, all a little on edge,” she tells him. Her tone is soft. Caring. Nothing like Louis’. “Anger is a part of this, we all understand that. But we can’t be mean to each other, not right now.”

“I wasn’t trying to be.”

“I know you weren’t. Louis knows that, too. And he wasn’t trying to be mean, either. We all just have to be a little more understanding of each other right now.”

He doesn’t respond, doesn’t have anything to say, so she turns to tend to the potatoes. Maybe he was a little unreasonably pissy, anyway. There’s no point in arguing, and he should’ve kept his mouth shut like he had planned on while he was upstairs.

Louis comes back to the kitchen about fifteen minutes later. There are the tell-tale signs that he’s been crying: puffy cheeks, flushed skin, tired eyes. And Madison isn’t with him, so Harry thinks he’ll have to break. That, because Madison’s happiness is more important than their own, they’ll have to cave and go to the stupid party and be robbed the ability to be sad in private.

And he’d be willing to go, he would’ve done it for her, but Louis says, “She agreed to going with Anne so long as I walk her in,” he says with a short sigh as he leans against the door frame. He’s tired eyes fall on Harry. “But she refuses to wear her Dorothy costume. Says it’s not, like, right unless she does it with Jack. That her outfit doesn’t make sense.”

That’s a problem they can actually fix.

“We can find something,” Harry says, standing. “Downstairs, I mean. That one year she changed costumes, like, four times.”

Harry and Louis head down to the basement together. There’s a little side room that’s filled with crap; boxes and bulky appliances and the kids’ old toys. The first few years they had this house, Louis refused to have a messy storage closet when they had a big house. Everything has a place, he’d say. After their baby shower, that motto went out the window and now he fully embraces the storage room, even in all its clutter.

Harry’s flicks on the light, and one of the first things he sees is a witch hat poking out from a box. He grabs it and tosses it out towards the main area of the basement so they have a pile. Madison is going to be picky.

As Harry’s crouching down in front of a box, Louis says, “It doesn’t feel like it’s been two weeks already. Some days, it feels like just yesterday he was with us, and others, it feels like it’s been months.”

Harry tightens his hold on the edge of the box. “I can’t talk about this right now.” He shoots a guilty look to Louis, who looks far too understanding.

“Yeah, I get that.”

He grabs a box of his own and opens it. It’s kitchen stuff, judging by the way it jingles. He sets it to the side and grabs another.

“Jesus,” Louis mumbles. “Forgot how many fucking shoes we bought for them when they were little.”

And maybe the plan to get another kid isn’t off the table, because they’ve been holding onto all the kids’ old stuff when they could have been giving it away. Everyone’s having babies, but they’ve kept all this stuff. And it makes Harry feel incredibly disgusting to even think about that right now. He didn’t mean to; it just popped in his head.

But then Louis says, “Maybe whenever Lottie gets pregnant again, if it’s a girl, we can give her some of Mads’ old things,” and it all but breaks Harry’s heart. Maybe it wasn’t just a passing thought. It doesn’t matter, anyway; he doesn’t even want to think about adopting another kid any time soon, no matter what his lost brain is thinking.

Harry finds an old cowboy hat his dad used to wear while riding horses and tosses it behind Louis and onto the pile. Louis does the same with an old pair of ballerina shoes they could probably make work somehow. Madison refused to indulge Harry even a little bit in going to dance classes. She wouldn’t even go to one. And Jack said he wouldn’t go if Madison didn’t, so Harry gave up.

Harry and Louis spend nearly an hour digging through old boxes before Anne and Madison come downstairs. Madison’s wearing her frog bathrobe, and there’s a pink tongue drawn on her face with what looks to be make-up, along with two small black circles on her cheeks that don’t really make sense.

“I’m a frog,” Madison says, raising her arms triumphantly, completely ignoring the small mound of potential costumes behind her.

Harry and Louis nod slowly.

“Yeah,” Harry says.

“That, you are,” Louis agrees.

“She just needs green shoes,” Anne tells them. Louis re-locates that box of shoes, digs through it, and comes up empty handed.

Harry stands, his limbs protesting slightly. “Jack had a pair of turtle slippers,” he says hesitantly. “If I find them for you, is that -- I mean, would you want to wear them?”

Madison’s eyes go wide as she leans back against Anne’s leg. “Could I?” she asks, quiet.

“Jack never minded sharing,” Louis reminds her. He walks out of the storage room and Harry follows, flicking the light off. They all ignore the pile of things on the floor as they head back upstairs, and Harry wonders if that robe has made it to the wash in the last two weeks or so.

-

That night, Harry and Louis end up in opposite ends of the house, one of them massively wasted and the other wishing he was. Harry’s almost offended at how shocked his mother is that Louis’ the one slumped on the couch when she gets home.

They start the night at the same place: the dining table. Harry doesn’t really know why, but the kitchen table feels off limits tonight. Anne picked them up a pizza before she and Louis left to take Madison to the party, and they each pick at their food quietly for a miserable half hour. Louis’ the one to leave first, saying he’s going to grab a bottle of vodka. Harry doesn’t follow. Instead, he abandons his food, grabs the three family albums that are tucked in the living room’s cabinet, and heads downstairs to be by himself.

Well, he’s not by himself. Cooper keeps him company.

It takes him two and a half hours to get through all the pictures. He spends time studying each and every one of them, taking himself back to that memory, back to that smile or park or house. He wants to remember everything, every bit of Jack’s life. He’s terrified of forgetting parts, so he spends as much time as he needs to remember them.

It hurts, of course. Each picture of him feels like it’ll be the last punch before he breaks. But the pain. . . it’s becoming the only thing that keeps his brain full anymore. If he forces him to stop thinking about Jack, then there’s nothing else to fill that space.

Once he’s finished looking through the books, he lowers himself from the couch to the floor to sit with Cooper. Cooper licks him and loves on him and it helps, it does. Harry’s sobbing quietly and each nerve ending feels like it’s been set on fire, but Cooper helps. Somehow, it helps. And then, hardly ten minutes later, he hears Louis start to drunkenly make his way down the steps.

Harry makes it to the bottom of the steps to glare at Louis, who has only made it to step number two. “Get back up there,” he says sternly, heading up the stairs himself. He grabs Louis’ forearm tightly and doesn’t let go until they’re away from the stairs. “Don’t do stairs when you’re drunk, you idiot.”

“Not drunk,” Louis slurs, and Harry huffs. He steers Louis to the kitchen chair before getting him a glass of water. He doesn’t let him be until he’s drank all of it, and when he has, Harry helps him to the couch. The pizza box and vodka are on the coffee table, and while Harry takes them to the kitchen and puts everything away, Louis falls asleep on the couch.

For a second, Harry is furious. It almost immediately fizzles out, though. Harry had every intention of getting just as drunk as Louis before all the sudden he decided the idea of alcohol sounded terrible. So, instead of being angry, he fixes the pillow under Louis’ head, covers him with a blanket, and sits by his feet, waiting for his mum and Madison to come home.

Harry’s not at all surprised that Anne brings Madison home asleep. He is a little bummed, though. He wanted to hear about the party, about the happy memories she made tonight in the midst of all the sad ones.

“We can sit and chat after I put her to bed,” Anne tells him softly, but Harry shakes his head.

“It’s alright. I’m knackered myself. Thanks for taking her, though.”

Anne smiles at him sadly. “Of course, baby.”

-