all our younger years (l.s.)

3: 4 weeks until the end

"Why do you have a book about Buddhism?"

Louis' room was, decidedly, an absolute pigsty.

It was...usually like this. Most of the time. All of the time. But it wasn't the kind of messy that was clothes flung to the floor, trash littering the rug, drawers hanging open; it was a sort of organized chaos? His clothes were in a makeshift pile next to his bed, the trash was all on his nightstand, his three pairs of shoes (newer sneakers, older sneakers, and spikes) were stacked on top of each other next to his wardrobe which was on the verge of collapse due to the sheer amount of shit that he'd stuffed into it. His bed was, of course, unmade. Harry wasn't really sure what he'd expected; he hadn't been to Louis' house in a while (a while being three days).

Louis shrugged. "Not sure. Just ended up in here."

And that was how things usually occurred in this household.

There was always a faint thrumming in Louis' house. The girls distantly chattering, the washing machine rattling, the tap running, the air conditioning humming. It would've been annoying if it wasn't so oddly comforting.

He refused to let himself ponder what everything would be like when it was empty.

He also refused to acknowledge the obvious tension, instead awkwardly bringing up the lack of sun in today's weather.

"It would be nice if it rained though," Louis replied, flopping down on his bed and ignoring the pained and weathered creak it emitted out. It wasn't quite as old as it seemed; it was just exhausted from the same two boys doing the exact same jumping action on it all the time for the past several years.

"Why?" Harry mimicked him, and they were lying comfortably side by side staring at the ceiling.

"Nice change."

"Change," Harry echoed.

"Yeah. Sick of the damn sun."

Instinctively, without even thinking, Harry rested a hand on the other boy's arm and sat up. Louis yawned.

"Tell me about Buddhism," he requested.

Louis blinked up at him.

"I told you-"

"You're a shit liar, Lou." Harry pressed, grinning. "Why were you reading a book on Buddhism?"

Louis stared at him for a long moment before sighing all too dramatically and slapping a hand over his chest. "You never believe anything I say," he sighed, feigning hurt and resentment.

"Tell me."

"Ugh. I've only read, like, two pages, yeah? But there's the whole 'one with everything' thing, oh! And I read about the afterlife. If you can call it an afterlife. You know Nirvana?"

"The band." Harry laid back on the bed and smashed at a handful of invisible drums, humming a song off key. He couldn't remember what it was called but he was certain it was by Nirvana.

"Yeah, but it was a Buddhism thing first," Louis explained, nodding as if he was the Buddha himself. "Like reincarnation, basically? Instead of going to heaven or hell or whatever-" Harry ignored the fact that Louis had been going to church since he was a toddler and didn't seem to be displaying his years of Sunday school education now, "-you go into your next life. And you keep on living until you've, like, fulfilled...whatever, you only stop once you're a whole person. Truly happy."

Harry hummed and ignored the wheels beginning to turn within his brain.

"Then you go to Nirvana which is, to quote, 'a blissful state of nothingness'."