Young & Beautiful

“Well. She actually wanted me to name him ‘Barney.’ But I didn’t like it, so I named him
‘Cleopatrick.’ But it was because of her I named him. You know?”
“So you named the bird.”
“Correct, Louis Tomlinson.”
And Louis decides that he hates the way Harry says his name, all slow, rumbling, and flowing like
a thunderstorm. Or crushed velvet. It’s not appealing at all, not in the slightest. It's
fucking...irksome. It's an irksome sound.
“So. Tell me. Why on earth did you buy the poor damn thing in the first place?” Louis then asks,
cutting off Liam who was beginning to inquire about the whereabouts of the loo. Too bad.
Harry, also failing to acknowledge Liam (who’s now full-on pouting to Zayn), merely says,
setting his cold, green eyes back on Louis, “I liked him. It’s my new thing. Do you like birds?”
“I do not like birds. They shit everywhere, they fly at your head, they’re not very cute, and I don’t
trust their eyes. They’re very penetrating.”
At that, Harry’s lips twitch, almost as if to laugh, before smoothing back out to the wide,
unnerving grin. “Best stay away from Cleopatrick, then. His eyes are extra penetrating,” he says
with a slow blink of his own eyes. Of course he manages to make it creepy.
Louis narrows his eyes at the words, already feeling his muscles tense in agitation. “I assure you
that I'll have no problem staying away from Cleopatrick, especially if he’s going to be attached to
you all day. Now, darling, I’m going to find some champagne and pretend like I’m having a good
time.” With that, Louis begins to stalk off.
“I suggest the fountain. Glasses are over there,” Harry calls, gesturing to a table with a tower of
sparkling and freshly polished champagne glasses, waiting to be filled.
And yep, that confirms it—it’s a fountain of fucking champagne. How does that even happen?
“Of fucking course,” Louis sing-songs in reply, not looking back.
He’s sad to have left Liam and Zayn—the only two people at this party that he’s even close to
knowing—but he needs, absolutely needs, to be away from Harry Styles before he kills him and
his little bird, too.
So he waltzes towards the tower of champagne glasses, steals the one at the very top, and drinks
his irritation away.
**
It’s been a few hours and a few glasses later, and Louis has had many successful conversations
with the guests.
Well. Maybe not exactly successful.
The last guy he talked to kept banging on about his father’s yachts.
“We’ve gone through so many, I can’t even count. My brothers have crashed over a dozen. It’s no
bother, of course, since my father’s the head of the company. We get them all the time—we’ve no
room for them anymore.”