𝐒𝐭𝐚𝐧𝐳𝐚 𝟐𝟓𝟖 [𝐄𝐧𝐠𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐡 𝐓𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐬𝐥𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧]

𝟏𝟕. 𝐋𝐨𝐮𝐢𝐬 𝐢𝐬 𝐧𝐨𝐭 𝐦𝐲 𝐛𝐨𝐲𝐟𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐝

That afternoon I had decided to go out for a walk, since by now the walls of my house were oppressing me.

Snow fell and covered all the surrounding landscape. It's amazing how this white substance manages to hide all the dirt and sadness and makes the bleakest places so clean, it makes them look like angelic places. It's like a baptism from heaven that comes to purify everything and every person, to take away the sins of humanity. The candid white that chases away all the black caused by the smog, the man's mistake. It made everything so beautiful and yet the sin was there, well hidden in a better guise. As far as I knew most of the time it was like this, the most ruthless killers are always the least suspect. Who goes to suspect the angelic sister when the victim has a boyfriend biker? Maybe the biker who scares everyone actually has a sweet and sensitive soul.

Louis was like that boy, he showed himself tough and grumpy to keep everyone away from him, when instead it was just a mask to not show his fears and weaknesses.

Louis... who knows how he was.

It had been a week since Josh had called me and Nick had answered for me. I called him back the following day and after a bit of banal talk about how he was doing, he told me the real reason for the call, which was Louis. I kinda suspected it, since Nick mentioned it causing me to have a heart attack.

Josh was worried about him, he hadn't returned his calls and texts since he left. He told me that once he had even called his house and his mother had answered, who told him that yes, Louis was at home, and this had partly relieved him, but that he never left his room. This was unusual because normally to avoid his family Louis spent all his time outside the house, not inside it. Then Josh added that in any case he usually spent almost all of the holidays complaining on the phone with him, but now he didn't even answer his texts. He told me he suspected he was mad at him for neglecting him a bit to be with Niall and asked if I could talk to him then, since we had bonded a lot.

l, embarrassed, not knowing what to invent, I told him I didn't have his phone number, which was true. He had never given it to me and I had never had the courage to ask him. Not that it helped me much anyway, I always saw him and he was in my room.

My excuse didn't last long though, as Josh graciously offered to give it to me.

It had been a week and I still hadn't used it. I wasn't sure what to say to him, how to start a conversation, but today was December 24th, Christmas Eve or perhaps better to say Louis' birthday. What better excuse than to call him to wish him a happy birthday?

I sat on a bench with my cell phone in my hand, undecided about what to do. I kept staring at the screen then took a deep breath and pressed that 'call' under the contact "Louis <3"

Tuu... Tuu...

I waited holding my breath, after a long time I would hear his voice again!

Tuu... Tuu...

What if he slammed the phone in my face?

Tuu... Tuu...

He didn't answer. Why wasn't he answering? Maybe I should have expected it since after all he didn't reply to Josh either, which was his best friend.

Tuu... Tuu...

What a fool I had been! Of course he wasn't going to answer me!

Tuu... Tuu...

I was about to press the red button when someone answered.

"Hello?" I froze at the sound of that voice, his voice. How much did I miss it?

"Oh...Ehm...Yes, hi Lou, I wanted to wish you a happy birthday!"

"Sorry, who are you?"

"Oh yeah, what a fool." I was thankful he couldn't see me, since I was turning very red. It was already embarrassing enough that I was stumbling over those few sentences.