Louis' fire alarm goes off at 8:05 the next morning.
It's their personal one- not the one connected to the outside that can summon the Harry Styles Fan Club Division of the city fire department, but the shitty battery-powered one shaped like a frog that Zayn had gotten installed after the first time Louis tried to thaw a frozen TV dinner and accidentally set the microwave on fire - and Louis falls out of bed in an attempt to snag the worn phonebook sitting on the dresser for just this very purpose.
He waves the book under the alarm in the hallway to clear the air, steadfastly ignoring the fact that he has to stand on his tip toes to reach. It takes a good three minutes of idle wafting back and forth before he realizes that the alarm itself ceased beeping two minutes ago.
Stopping the momentum of the book seems like it would take too much effort, so he moves it about for another thirty seconds before lowering his arm to his side and letting his gummy eyes slide closed again.
"Well," says a low voice, and Louis' eyes snap open even as he ricochets away from the wall, arms flailing out wildly. "Took you long enough."
Louis hits himself in the face with the phonebook and smacks into the wall, clocking his elbow against the light switch. The light flicks on with a low buzz to reveal Harry leaning against the wall of the hallway, dressed in a suit and sequined bowler, holding a riding crop in one hand and a plastic grocery bag in the other.
"Good morning, Louis," says Harry. He appears to be wearing eyeliner. And mascara. And possibly lipstick. "You're not dressed, but then again, I prepared for that."
Louis rubs his eyes with a fist and blinks up at him. There's blush caked onto his cheeks, and Louis is beyond done with this already. "Couldn't you have just have woken me up some normal way? Like, say...knocking on the fucking door?"
Harry looks unperturbed. He tosses the grocery sack at Louis, who fumbles but manages to catch it, letting the phonebook thump to the carpet by his feet. "I did knock. You didn't wake up. I was forced to resort to other means. Now, get dressed. I'll tell you the rules while you put your suit on."
Louis rolls his eyes. "Could you keep it down? If you wake someone up before nine I'll have to do dishes for a month."
Harry looks behind him, studying the wood as intently as if he's never seen a door before. "I saw Zayn asleep on the couch when I broke in. Who are we staying quiet for?"
"When you- never mind. Pisces is sleeping in Zayn's bedroom for the time being."
Harry frowns. "Your new roommate is a Zodiac sign?"
"Aren't we all?" says Louis, because it's early in the morning and he's allowed to be cryptic.
"Don't be cryptic."
Or maybe he's not. "She's Niall's girlfriend. It's a long story."
"Niall is dating a Zodiac sign?"
Louis, because he really isn't awake enough to explain anything right now, let alone the fact that he forgets Pisces' real name every single time he asks for it, pulls open the bag and peers inside. There does indeed appear to be a charcoal gray suit inside, as well as... "Are these braces, Harry?"
"How very British of you," says Harry, in his husky Cheshire accent. "Here in the States, we call them suspenders."
Louis rolls his eyes and pulls them out of the bag. They're sparkly and blue, and they match Harry's bowler exactly. "It is much too early in the morning for such crimes against fashion."
Harry tosses the crop from hand to hand. "Get dressed, Louis. We're already behind schedule."
"Get..." Louis blinks at him. "Like, right here?"
"Yes, right here, it's nothing I haven't seen before," says Harry impatiently, and then starts to pace as Louis lethargically pulls his soft cotton sleep shirt over his head, rooting around in the grocery bag for an undershirt. "Okay, rule number one."
Louis sighs from underneath where he's tangled in silk. "Why do there have to be rules? Why can't we just go to Taco Bell and split a burrito? Why does everything you do have to be so weird?"
"Rule number one," Harry continues loudly, stepping forward to guide Louis' left arm toward the correct hole in the fabric. "Rule number one is: no asking questions."
"Jesus Christ," mutters Louis, halfway into a pair of pencil-leg pants.
"Rule number two," says Harry, pushing his thumb into his bottom lip, "is that you obey anything I say."
Louis stops halfway through buttoning the blazer across his middle. "I'm not giving it up that easily, fire boy."
"Or at least consider my suggestion as a viable option," Harry amends, and then continues. "Rule number three: when I tell you to run-" He thumps his crop against the wall for emphasis. "-you run."
Louis slowly pulls out a white rose from the bottom of the bag. "Harry, have you ever actually been on a date before? Like, do you know what the word date means?"
Harry just smiles mysteriously and then taps Louis' bum twice with his riding crop before striding down the hallway, flicking on lights on his way. "Get some shoes on, Tommo, and if you wear espadrilles I will beat you with this crop. Meet me outside. We must be on our way."
He pauses by the door and looks back over his shoulder at Louis, who's standing in the hallway, holding a white rose and looking lost. "By the way, are you allergic to horses?"
Louis blinks owlishly down the hallway. "...no?"
"Good," says Harry, and then he's gone, the deadbolt clattering uselessly behind him.
Louis exhales loudly and kicks the forgotten phonebook against the opposite wall.
There's a horse-drawn carriage parked outside his apartment building.
"There's a horse-drawn carriage parked outside my apartment building," says Louis blankly.
"Yes," agrees Harry, who is, at the moment, perched on the front of the carriage, the reins of the two horses gathered in one veiny fist. "Your observational skills are impeccable, Louis. This is Beyoncé, and that's Fido. They're going to be your engines today. Care to hop in?"
One of the horses- Fido, he thinks- snorts loudly, and Louis flinches back a little. The blinders clapped over the sides of their heads means they probably can't see him, but those giant flaring nostrils are most certainly capable of picking up a whiff of vanilla body lotion and fear. "Is it too late for Taco Bell?" he tries weakly.
Harry grins and tips his bowler.
"So," says Harry. "I'm sorry to say that this isn't exactly going to be a normal date."
Louis grabs onto the side of the carriage as they lurch over a pothole. "You don't say."
"In fact," Harry continues, "it's more of a dangerous spy mission than a date."
