“Books Before Boys”

When you fall into the Larry thread on Twitter 😅

The Boy in the Bookstore | l.s

In which a boy in a bookstore finds a broken boy and they fall in love and fix each other. - - ‘Tell me a story, L-lou.’ Harry asked, sleepy. 'What about, love?’ 'Anything. Make one up, if you like?’ 'Okay,’ said Louis, thinking for a second. He reached out his hand, and took Harry’s in his. 'It was a warm day in September, 2008. A shorter-than-average boy with brown hair and blue eyes had just got a new job at a store that sold books. His job was boring, but he loved meeting the new customers. He was only a few days into this job when a tall boy with curly hair and headphones walked in. This tall boy was shy and barely spoke, but he had a big heart and a lot of love to give. The boy with the curly hair slowly began to trust the other, and the boy in the bookstore began to fall for him. But he was afraid, he had never had a crush on another boy before. He didn’t know what people would think, and he was scared to be himself. But the younger boy, the one he had fallen for, had taught him to be brave. He had taught him to love again after getting constantly beaten down. The boy with curly hair didn’t have it easy, either. So they helped each other. They built each other back up. Now, little over a month later, the boy in the bookstore is holding the hands of the broken boy as he tries to sleep. It was them against the world…’ - - Contains mentions of domestic abusive, eating disorders and self harm. Read at your own risk. - - Hi! Welcome to my fic, I hope you enjoy reading. I started this as a project during when I was supposed to be in online lessons with school but I started to get hooked. My aim is to update as often as possible (this varies, I’m only human) and to write up to 60 or 70 chapters. I started to write this on July 14th 2020, and who knows when I’ll finish it. If you enjoy, please do vote/comment/share as it means a lot to me :)

And there is a door in the middle of it, a door he can walk through if he’s brave enough. He sits on his wall and he watches the walls fall for Harry and it can be his if only he’s brave enough to knock down his walls and walk through it. And he does;

Louis then looks into a mirror, and this is where we get the first mirrored scene in Lights up.

I see a few possibilities here; a) Louis and Harry have been called out by fans for mirroring each other before. Like a lot. It could be a Larry shout-out. 

b) They are singing to themselves. Louis is telling his younger self thank you for protecting me, for putting these walls up, but it’s bittersweet because he shouldn’t have had to. Harry is asking himself if he knows who he is, is he secure enough in who he is to risk changing everything by letting himself be seen for who he is? Does he want to be seen for who he is?

Further, Harry is in purple during this scene, which can mean mystery, creativity, wisdom, pride and dignity. It can also mean sexual frustration and a need to be seen as unique or unorthodox. To me, him looking in a mirror bathed in purple symbolises that he is asking himself if he knows who he is, he’s a mystery to us; is he trying to find a creative way to not be? Is he figuring out if his pride will let him be vulnerable with others, is he frustrated about not being able to be honest about his sexuality or relationship?

Louis on the other hand, is under a blue sky. Blue is connected to feelings of depth, to trust, faith, confidence and stability. Louis is telling himself that it’s gonna be okay, these walls you put up will come down and I am ready and confident that everything is going to be fine. I have faith, and I trust everyone around me to keep me safe. 

After walking through the door Louis finds himself on a stage surrounded by people dancing;

He looks sad, a little regretful maybe. He wishes he could dance with someone but he isn’t allowed to; not until the walls come down. I also find it interesting that Harry sayings ‘Kiss in the kitchen like it’s a dance floor’ in Lights up. Just another parallel. 

He also lays down on the stage, which is painted to look like a target and Louis is on the bulls-eye. I think this symbolises that if his walls come down and he’s honest, he could make himself a target. He’s worried about things going wrong. 

Another interesting point in this scene is when the couples, all of which are male/female, move away from each other while holding hands, making a space through which we see Louis. To me, this represents the needs to see beyond the hetero-normative narrative to see the real him. 

In Lights Up Harry is surrounded by both girls and boys, and we can clearly see their genders, that he is comfortable with both being close to him. It’s not hidden from us at all. He isn’t hiding, he doesn’t have to.

In Walls Louis is also surrounded by people, but they are masked and all wearing black. It’s difficult to tell their gender at all, they are hidden from us completely; he is hiding, he isn’t free. He also doesn’t look as happy or comfortable here, with people that are closed off from him and hidden from us.

Harry is also bathed in green light this entire scene, green is the colour of life, renewal and energy. It also has connotations of success, safety and environment. Could also represent the ‘Green Light’ to do something, permission and the ability to move forward. 

Louis is bathed in red light in his scene, red is the colour of passion, love but it’s also the colour of danger and anger. To really mirror Lights Up, red is the opposite colour to green, it means stop, wait you can’t go further. 

At the end of this scene, Harry is smiling and he’s staying. He feels comfortable, he’s safe and he feels no need to remove himself. 

In retrospect, Louis ends this scene by smiling and leaving. He’s happy, but he’s ready to move on and leave the hiding behind. This is also the happiest we see Louis during this part of the Music Video, he’s accepted it and he’s leaving.

two ghosts x niall horan/louis tomlinson

[No re-reads this month]

New Reads:

1. Cheese Toasties (elsi_bee) - Harry is back to managing nights at Sandy’s Diner, his home away from home. A new customer with two kids in tow makes his nights a bit more interesting.

2. Have a Little Faith in Me (fallinglikethis) - Harry Styles remembers Louis Tomlinson fondly. They used to spend the summers bonding at Bible Camp, helping each other memorize bible verses for their weekly challenge against the boys in the other cabins, and chatting into the early hours of morning when they were supposed to be sleeping. They had been so close back then. Harry was heartbroken when Louis hadn’t been there last summer. He’d heard rumors, vague comments about how Louis had changed but he didn’t believe them. He couldn’t. Because the other boys, the ones from Louis’ home town, were saying that he’d started getting piercings and tattoos, that he’d come out as gay, and that he’d turned his back on God.

3. Holiday Greetings (and Gay Happy Meetings) (2tiedships2) - Niall’s dead care and a foot of snow conspire to force Louis into spending time with an alpha he hates… or does he?

4. Your Touch is the Only Thing I Feel (2tiedships2) - Louis refuses to settle for just any alpha despite intense touch deprivation. Fortunately Harry isn’t just any alpha.

5. Everything Suspended (louisandthealien) - Centered around the events of 9/11, Harry hears about the crash, Louis works in one of the towers.

6. You Really Got Me Now (allwaswell16) - Louis chaperones Fizzy’s school trip to Italy. Turns out Fizzy’s Italian teacher is surprisingly hot, Rome is surprisingly interesting, and Louis is surprisingly falling in love with more than just the city.

7. I Don’t Mean to Frustrate (lululawrence) - Louis is an omega pretending to be a beta, but what happens when Harry, his (pining) alpha best friend, learns his secret?

8. Forget Your Ex (rainbowskinnies) - When Harry’s boyfriend of two years leaves him for someone else, it’s fair to say he’s rather a bit upset, but his friends have a solution for him. Nick and Niall are hosting a start of term house party at their flat, having invited everyone they know from uni. Who knows, with a bit of luck Harry can find a rebound shag and finally forget his ex…

9. Raise a Glass to the Four of Us (2tiedships2) - Louis stared at his luggage. Well. Apparently not his luggage, because the clothing he was looking at currently was a: worth more than everything he currently posessed, b: not his size at all, and c: more suited for a fancy ass lawyer than a holiday in NYC with his best mates.

10. Fiction Romance - A punk Louis/uni Harry blind date AU where Harry likes older, sophisticated, mature men and can’t understand why Niall would set him up with Louis Tomlinson.

Rich Clarke, not sure who he is, might be an interviewer, posted 3 pictures of 1D and then a random unseen photo of himself with HL

Can’t remember who, but this picture got posted by someone who knows the boys.

Capital posted this Larry edit, originally it was Louis and Roman, he deleted it but then reposted it with a different caption then deleted it again, this is real because Sonnyjay who works at capital commented on another post asking what had happened to the one they deleted (Larry one)

The Xfactor had the nerve to post this 7 second clip of this Larry moment 😂

Does this need explaining...😂😂 same energy as “Louis Styles”

The BRIT awards responded to an ‘ObVioUSLy’ tweet with the following, like really, for those that don’t know, this was what Louis said loads of times when ‘denying’ Larry, they seem to be taking the piss out of the ‘denial’

I mean....(the iconic ‘Larry’ love bite interview)

This was posted on 1D’s Youtube account for the 10 year moments, the first one Louis was taking a video/picture of Harry, it was the same day as the subway picture where Louis has his arm around him, then the bottom one, is Louis filming Harry and calling him as he is waking up, the left side has been slept in and a phone is also charging on the same side (can’t see it in this photo because it is cropped but you can in others) and Louis is there with him so...connect the dots, also the bed is two singles put together “share a single bed” also it looks like a hotel room “if you like causing trouble up in hotel rooms”

Then Louis decides to follow Harry on Instagram (zayn also) but like.......huh?