Chapter Text
Harry doesn't really know why he's here. He ducks his head down, hiding his face in a mess of tangled, chocolate curls, and thinks that if he makes himself small enough then nobody will notice him and then he can leave and go back to his mum. All he knows is that his stomach hurts a lot—and that's probably because he hasn't eaten anything for the last two days except for a box of stale cereal he found in the pantry and some old crackers that were laying next to it—but he's scared because he doesn't know where he is and why he's here and why they're taking him away from his home.
The slender, tall lady—Mrs. Gold—Harry reminds himself, looks kindly down at him with soft eyes, but Harry doesn't return her smile. Mrs. Gold takes her eyes off of him and pounds her fist against the heavy wooden door in front of them, and Harry just stares, wide-eyed at the unfamiliar surroundings before burying his head back down against his shirt, wishing he could disappear.
A man with short, clipped brown hair close to his head, deep-set blue eyes, and thick eyebrows answers the door. His shoulders are broad and his chest is big and he reminds Harry a bit of a skyscraper with the way he's built, and Harry thinks about running away when the man's mouth pulls in a straight, thin line.
“Another one?” the man asks rather tiredly, shoulders slumping down in exhaustion, and Harry wants to leave. But then the man spots him and gives him a nice smile that makes the edges of his eyes crease up, and Harry thinks maybe the man isn't as mean as he seems to be.
Mrs. Gold looks apologetically at the man with the squinty eyes. “Sorry, Paul, we found him yesterday. According to the biopsy reports, his mum's been gone for the past three days—we found him holed up next to her body.”
“We're almost full,” the man with the squinty eyes—Paul, Harry thinks—replies, but he opens the door regardless and ushers Ms. Gold and Harry inside. “Near maximum capacity.”
“He won't take up much space,” Mrs. Gold replies, placing a thin, veiny hand on Paul's arm. “Paul, please, he's only six.”
Harry just clutches his duffel bag to his chest and shuffles behind t he unfamiliar Mrs. Gold he only met this morning and the man who's built like a building who has brown stubble in his chin. He thinks they might be talking about him, but he doesn't know why they brought him here. He just wants to be back home with his mum where she's just taking a really long nap. Maybe when she wakes up she can make him a grilled cheese sandwich so his tummy stops hurting so much.
“He's awfully small for a six-year-old,” Paul says cryptically, eyeing Harry. His eyes rest on the curls of hair, Harry's small, bowed shoulders, before landing on Harry's bright green eyes. “What's your name, buddy?”
Harry kicks the tiled floor with a scuffed sneaker, before he realizes Paul is talking to him. “Harry,” he manages in a small, shy voice, and the way Paul's smile breaks out on his own face makes Harry feel a bit more at ease.
“Hi Harry,” says Paul, leaning down to eye level with Harry. “You can call me Mr. Higgins, alright?”
“How come Mrs. Gold gets to call you Paul?” Harry asks, before flushing. Paul wants Harry to call him Mr. Higgins so he should just listen before he gets into any trouble.
Paul laughs at that, clapping a big hand on Harry's shoulder, and Harry flinches. Paul doesn't seem to notice as he continues on, “That's because Mrs. Gold is an adult. You can call me Paul when you're Mrs. Gold's age, how does that sound?”
Harry bites back his reply that he doesn't think that sounds fair at all, because he doesn't want to make Paul angry. Maybe if he's good then Paul will let him go back to his mum.
“Okay,” he manages uneasily, and Paul smiles at that.
“Good boy,” Paul—no, Mr. Higgins—says. “You're gonna stay here for awhile, is that alright buddy?”
Harry doesn't know what to say. He wants to scream and tell them to take him back to his mum, but that didn't work so well yesterday: to his terror, one of the policewoman had just burst into tears and everybody had cooed and fussed over him and had told him that everything would be okay, but nobody had taken him home. So he just nods bravely and tries not to cry.
Mrs. Gold clips a hand to his shoulder, and ruffles his curls. Harry doesn't like that—he doesn't like Mrs. Gold who took him away from home, but he permits it. “Good luck, Harry,” Mrs. Gold says, and with a click of her heels she exits the room.
Harry stares up at Mr. Higgins who is staring at him with a hard expression. “Harry, this is going to be your home for awhile, okay? There are lots of boys for you to play with and we have a lot of good food, alright?”
Harry wants to tell Mr. Higgins that he has a home and he just wants to go back to his house in Cheshire, but Mr. Higgins is being so nice to him he decides he might just listen to the man for awhile. If he wants to leave, maybe he can run away tonight.
“Follow me upstairs and I'll show you where you'll sleep,” Mr. Higgins tells him, and Harry doesn't have a choice but to agree. He wraps his hands around his duffel bag, but Mr. Higgins sees him struggling under the weight of it, so he takes it from Harry and slings it easily over his shoulder.
Harry follows Mr. Higgins up a wooden flight of stairs with a worn down banister, up to a small room with three beds. The room is painted a light blue and Harry likes the colour even though his favorite colour is orange. Mr. Higgins shows him where to put his bag and he takes out his few thin t-shirts and trousers and puts them into a dresser of drawers at the end of the narrow room.
“This is going to be your bed while you're here. The bathroom is down the hallway, and I'll get you your towel by tonight, alright? You'll be starting school here this coming Monday, and you can be a good lad and do your homework, can't you?”
Mr. Higgins goes on and on and Harry has a hard time paying attention to what he's saying, finds his eyes wandering to the posters of cartoon characters on the wall. Mr. Higgins tells him that he's expected to make his bed everyday and that he'll be assigned chores everyday to do as well.
“When you're finished doing your chores and your homework from school, you can go play outside in the backyard or in the attic or in the basement or the playroom, alright, Harry?”
Harry just nods and sits quietly down on the edge of his bed. Everything is so unfamiliar and he doesn't know where he is and that scares him because he doesn't know how he's going to get home. He's not even sure if the address he has stored in his brain actually his home address and his thoughts are so scattered, and he feels small and scared and lost.
Mr. Higgins places a hand gently on Harry's shoulders and Harry's green eyes meet Mr. Higgins' friendly grey eyes. Mr. Higgins sighs, a bit sadly, Harry thinks, and says, “Why don't you just go and meet the other boys? I'll introduce you to everyone at dinner, alright?”
Harry doesn't know what to do so he nods, and Mr. Higgins give shim a small smile and says, “Welcome home, Harry.”
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Harry really has to go to the bathroom, he realizes too, and he's thankful that Mr. Higgins told him where the restroom was because the last thing he'd want to do on his first day here is wet his pants. Especially since Mr. Higgins told him there's other boys here.
Harry runs to the bathroom and pees in an unfamiliar toilet and washes his hands in an unfamiliar sink. He's rubbing soap over his hands and trying to formulate a plan of how to escape in his mind when there's a voice.
“Are you new here?”
Harry looks up and along with his reflection in the mirror, there's a small boy wearing a striped blue and white shirt with tattered red shorts. The boy has a mess of cinnamon colored hair and bright blue eyes and he's missing his two front teeth. He looks nice, Harry decides.
Harry nods yes, and the boy bounds over next to Harry, uninvited.
“I'm Louis,” the boy chirps brightly and holds out a hand for Harry to shake.
Harry wipes his hands on his pants and then shakes Louis's hand hesitantly.
“Well?” Louis prods, a bit impatiently. When he speaks he spits slightly and there's a whistling sound from the gap in his teeth, and Harry thinks it's kind of funny but he doesn't laugh. “What's your name?”
“Harry,” Harry manages to reply, and Louis sighs in relief.
“Good, I was starting to think you were dumb like Zayn,” Louis continues conversationally as though he's a genius. And Harry thinks Louis might be a genius. Louis is awfully friendly and really outgoing and Harry finds it a bit unnerving. (Harry also has no idea who Zayn is).
“I live with Zayn and Liam just down the hall,” Louis goes on, pointing a finger to a room in the distance. “They're kind of weird but I like them.” Louis says this as though he's the most normal person here, and Harry just nods dumbly as he listens. “Zayn doesn't talk at all—but Mr. Higgins says that he can actually talk but we just have to be patient with him.” Louis's forehead furrows as though this is a very difficult concept to grasp, and Harry doesn't know Zayn, but there must be something wrong with him if he doesn't talk, just like Louis suggests. “Liam is nice but he cries a lot and wets the bed. Oops,” Louis looks at him apologetically, “I don't think I was supposed to tell you that, so don't say anything when you meet him, okay?”
Harry realizes he's supposed to answer and nods quickly, curls getting in his eyes.
“Thanks,” Louis blusters on, moving onto a different topic entirely. Harry's a bit surprised at how fast and how much Louis talks, but he doesn't mind it—he kind of likes the way Louis fills his mind with constant chatter. His last few days have just been full of an uncomfortable, loud silence with his mum not waking up from her nap, and it's nice to have someone talking to him.
Louis gestures for Harry to come with him, and he starts up the steps to a third floor. Harry stumbles after him eagerly, and listens to Louis's continuing blabber. “I've been here for almost a year now. It's okay, and I think you'll like it—but I don't plan on staying here forever. One day I'm gonna get out of here and be famous.” He grins brightly at Harry, and Harry can't help the smile that crawls over his face in reply.
“Cool,” Harry responds, and Louis's eyes light up like Harry's just told him that it's Christmas everyday.
“We're going to get along just fine, Harry,” Louis tells him, “you wanna be friends?”
Harry doesn't think he's ever had a friend before, but he's read about them in books and seen them in movies and stuff, and yeah, that sounds pretty cool.
“Sure,” Harry says, and his heart lulls in his chest and he thinks that maybe this new home won't be so bad after all.
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Mr. Higgins was really nice throughout the whole questioning process but Harry thinks he might be stupid because he didn't know how to respond to a lot of the questions Mr. Higgins was asking.
So he's awfully relieved when Mr. Higgins leads him into the dining room. There's a long table covered with platters of mashed potatoes and baked chicken and broccoli, and Harry's stomach grumbles. He's really, really hungry. The table is lined by two long benches and clutterd with children with all the boys are sardined in next to each other. Harry knows there's a lot of boys but he can't count past ten so he's not sure how many of them there are. He looks around, not sure where he's supposed to sit and feeling awfully uncomfortable, when there's a cry of a familiar voice.
“Niall, move, Harry, Harry, Harry over here!” comes a call, and Harry's eyes flash up to look at Louis who is teetering on the edge of his seat. Harry watches as Louis pushes a boy with pale skin, a shock of white blonde hair, and bright blue eyes out of the way to make room. Louis slaps the bench with his palm, waving Harry over.
“Louis, you can't just push me!” protests the blonde boy, a dusty pink painting his cheeks, but he doesn't seem too mad as Harry clambers in eagerly between him and Louis.
“Harry, this is Niall,” Louis beams, as though he didn't just shove Niall out of the way. Niall looks at Harry with a crooked smile—he's missing a bunch of teeth, but the way his smile lights up it nearly splits his face in half. Niall's really small—even smaller than Harry, and Harry's a bit surprised because he's never met anyone smaller than him.
Niall's voice is kind of funny-sounding with an accent Harry doesn't recognize, but he doesn't say anything about it. Louis, on the other hand, is not as tactful.
“Harry, isn't his voice funny?” Louis sniggers, blue eyes bright and with an oblivious insensitivity Harry almost admires.
“I'm Irish!” shrills Niall in an incredibly loud voice, and Harry thinks the blonde might break his eardrums. Harry claps his hands over his ears as Niall continues, “My voice is just funny to you because you're English!”
“He's right, you know, Louis. You shouldn't make fun of him,” comes a quiet voice, and Harry looks across the table to see a boy with a puddle of brown hair and soft brown eyes.
“Oh shove off, Liam, I'm just kidding,” Louis says indignantly, folding his hands protectively over his chest. “Niall, you know I'm just teasing, right?”
“Yeah, it's alright,” Niall admits begrudgingly. He scoops some mashed potatoes onto Harry's plate and then onto his own plate. Harry nods in thanks, and Niall pushes the potatoes down the table towards Louis.
“This is Harry,” Louis bursts to Liam, as though Harry's a pet that Louis discovered and recently bestowed a name upon. Louis slings an arm over Harry's shoulder even though they've barely met, but Harry doesn't mind.
“Hi Harry, I'm Liam,” Liam says again, even though Harry already knows who he is. He searches his mind to see why that name's familiar, and ah, Liam's the bedwetter. Harry studies him—Liam doesn't look like he'd wet his bed. He looks older than Harry, a bit more solid, with a friendly face and very mature and composed for a kid.
“Zayn, do you want some chicken?” comes Niall's loud voice, and Harry glances over to look at the other kid on Niall's side. There's a boy with delicate eyelashes as long as a girl's and tanned skin and bright brown eyes that look a bit scared. His hair is jet black and his lips are full, and Harry remembers Louis telling him Zayn doesn't talk.
True to Louis's word, Zayn doesn't answer, and Niall sighs but graciously gives him a drumstick anyway. Zayn offers Niall a hesitant smile, and starts eating without a word. Harry studies him with as much attention as a six-year-old can muster; Zayn's movements are quick and jumpy—he flinches a lot, and Harry thinks he might be nice too. He wonders what Zayn's voice sounds like.
Louis squalls for his attention, nudging him in the side with a grin. “How's your first day, Harry?”
Harry looks uncertainly at him, eyes traveling from one boy to another—Liam, Zayn, Niall, before landing on Louis. He smiles hesitantly, and judging from the way Louis's blue eyes soften, Louis understands.