Monday rolled around and Louis was a little anxious to see Luke. They hadn't spoke since Louis' night with Ashton and he knew Luke would not be impressed with his confession.

Rolling up the bottoms of his trousers, Louis hummed to himself, feeling like his outfit was now complete and up to his standards. He gave himself a once over in the mirror, making sure his light pink jeans and white frilly top were all in place before making his way to the living room.

"Megan?" He shouted, not knowing where the girl currently was.

"What is it now?" Megan walked into the living room, her hair in a messy bun and still dressed in her pyjamas. Louis looked at her with a roll of his eyes.

"Make sure you go shopping. We are out of milk." Louis tugged on his last shoe, picking up his bag as he walked past the sofa. He placed a kiss to her cheek, giggling to himself as his lip gloss left a mark. "And that's food. Not clothes."

Megan raised her hand and waved him off. "I know dumbass, now get outta here before you're late. Luke's been outside for the past ten minutes."

"Wait, how d'you know that?" Louis raised an eyebrow.

"You could here that boys music from a mile away. Now scoot, I wanna be alone." Megan gripped ahold of Louis' shoulders, spinning him around. She pushed on him slightly, making him move towards the apartment door.

Louis smiled, opening the door before turning around. "I love how much you love me."

"Yeah, yeah." And the door was shut. Megan sighed, shrugged her shoulders, then made her way to the kitchen to note down what she had to get whilst shopping.

-

"It's about time." Luke shouted towards Louis as he showed up closer to his car.

"Sorry. I couldn't find the right top." Luke rolled his eyes, opening his car door before sitting down inside. Louis following the other side.

"You take too long dude."

Louis gasped, placing his hand on his heart and looking to Luke with a hurt expression. "What have I said about that word? I am not one of your 'dude's Luke."

Luke laughed, starting the car, "just winding you up, Lou."

Louis pulled on his seatbelt, placing his bag at the bottom of his feet. He laughed to himself. "Better be." He mock-warned.

Then, they were off. Luke pulled out of the apartments parking lot, his music blaring out of the small car speakers. And Megan was right, his music was way too loud.

-

"So I heard about you and Ashton." It was now lunch time, also the first time Louis had seen Luke since the morning. He was thankful they were running late earlier, simply because he did not want to have this conversation then. Louis looked up, an innocent expression on his face.

"Yeah? What about me and Ashton?" He played dumb, hoping that Luke would just let it drop.

"Just that you ruined his dreams. Y'know, crushing his hopes of dating my best friend." Luke popped a chip into his mouth. "I thought this was your way of getting over Harry?"

Louis whined, placing his face in his hands. "I know." He sighed. "It just didn't feel right. It felt like I was leading him on. And the fact that there was a picture of Harry's cute little face on his desk did not help."

Luke lent forward, placing a hand on Louis' shoulder from the opposite side of the table. "I know babe. Things are hard. Love's complicated." Louis looked up, confused with his friends speech. "But you've just got to let Harry go. Either that or get with him. It's either one or the other and knowing you, the latter would never happen."

Louis' mouth dropped and he hit his friends chest. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"You've got no balls." Luke chuckled, holding his hands in front of his face as Louis stood up and began hitting the boy. "Just not the face!" He got out, in between laughs.

Louis chuckled to himself, before sitting back down on his seat. "This is why I tend to avoid you out of school. All you ever do is take the piss out of me or bug me. I have no time for either."

The lunch hour went on like that. Luke teased Louis when Harry walked by and Louis blushed when Harry overheard. He had to admit, it was worth the embarrassment when he heard the low chuckle admit from Harry's throat. He gushed about it for the whole journey to band practice, annoying Luke as much as he possibly could.

When they arrived at Luke's, the two went straight to his bedroom, knowing that they had time to spare before any of the other boys would arrive. Luke's mum Liz, made sure the boys knew of her presence.

No matter how many times Luke told her he was not into Louis, she would never believe him. "I sometimes think that she really wants us to be together." Louis laughed as he sat down on the bed.

"Honestly, I just think she wants to see more of you. She's constantly telling me to get you to come over. I swear, she talks about you more than she does me, and I'm her own son." Luke lifts up his legs, resting them on his desk table from where he was sat in his desk chair.

"I love your mum." Louis announced, suddenly feeling the emptiness inside of his from the loss of his own mother.

"Have you tried..?" Louis knew what Luke was going to ask.

"No. And I don't want to hear from her any way. For all I care she could be half way across the world. I'm not going to even give her the satisfaction." Luke nodded.

"What about Jade? Don't you wanna talk to her?" Louis sighed.

"'Course I do. It's just been so long. I don't have a number and I have no idea where she is living." He sighed. "When the time is right, I'll find her. But right now, I need to focus on school and get my life sorted." He slapped his hands down onto his knees, as if agreeing with himself.

"Right." Luke smiled sympathetically towards the boy, to get a smile in return. "Well, you can always ask my mum to adopt you. I'm sure she'd say yes in a heart beat." Louis laughed, leaning back until his back hit the bed. He placed his hands on his chest and let out a long breath, a smile still on his face. "Don't get too comfortable," Luke warned, sliding his legs off of the desk and standing from the chair. "The guys will be here soon and we need to start on that music thing."

Louis laughed, propping himself up on his elbows, allowing him to watch Luke from his lying down position. "You mean the thing that I've nearly finished?"

"Precisely that." Luke grinned at his best friend, making him look all innocent and adorable.

"Will you stop that face please." Louis groaned, falling back against the bed once again. Luke chuckled, walking over to Louis' bag, pulling out the book he know Louis did his work in.

"Maybe, if we get it done, we can do our own little performance for the band. I'm sure Ashton would love that." Louis huffed rolling over onto his stomach, leaning forward and snatching his book from Luke's hands.

"We both know he most likely hates me. Plus, you know I don't like my voice, so you'll be the one doing all of the practical stuff. I'm just the behind-the-scene person." Luke joined Louis on the bed, laying on his stomach also.

"You have an amazing voice. It's unique, unlike any other. I love it. And Ashton doesn't hate you. In fact, he still likes you very much. We've talked. He said so himself." Louis found himself smiling. "But anyway, the song." Luke nudged Louis. "Let's get on with it."

They had managed to finish the song by the time Michael, Calum an Ashton showed up. And by they- it was mainly Louis. Luke helped with one or two words. But let's face it, Louis knew that he would be the one to do most of the work. He had known that as soon as he was announced to be Luke's partner.

"So you wanted to show us a song?" Calum asked, taking a seat on the old couch, sitting right next to Michael.

Luke nodded quickly. "It's for a music project, Louis wrote it. We need your honest opinion, okay?" The members nodded their heads.

"Okay get on with it then." Michael leaned over Calum, placing his guitar on the floor so that it was resting against the sofa arm. Ashton stood from his drum set, taking Louis' place on the sofa, the other side of Michael.

Luke had managed to persuade Louis to join him to sing the song. Louis would defiantly be lying if he said he wasn't terrified. He- who had no actual musical knowledge apart from the stuff they learn in class- was about the preform in front of a band who were amazing at what they did. All of which had great voices too. That did not help his confidence.

Louis took a seat on the stool which was sat next to Luke. He looked over to his friend. Luke gave him a short nod before strumming his guitar strings. Louis let out a shaky breath before looking to Ashton. Ashton sent him a warm smile and Louis' lip-stick covered lips repeated his kind gesture.

"Ohh, there he goes again. Every morning it's the same. You walk on by my house, I wanna call out your name. I wanna tell you how beautiful you are from where I'm standin', you got me thinking what we could be, 'cause," Louis looked down, afraid to keep eye contact with the brown eyes boy for too long.

Luke came in with his verse, his voice sounding a lot louder than Louis', "I keep craving, craving. You don't know it but it's true, can't get my mouth to say the words they wanna say to you. This is typical of love. Can't wait anymore; won't wait I need to tell you how I feel when I see us together forever, in my dreams."

The song carried on, Ashton couldn't stop watching the shy boy who sat beside his band member. He knew Louis felt uncomfortable, not with his stare, by the situation in a whole. But he couldn't stop himself from watching. His voice was mesmerising. The song was beautiful and he paid as much attention to the lyrics as he could.

Luke looked to Louis as his partner began singing along with him. He noticed that Louis wasn't looking up at anyone and he can't help but feel bad all of a sudden. It was obvious that Louis didn't want to sing in front of the others. But the boy needs to learn that he has a talent, one he shouldn't be afraid of presenting to people.

"Maybe this will be the night that we kissed, for the first time. Or is that just me and my, imagination? I keep craving, craving. You don't know it but it's true; can't get my mouth to say the words I wanna say to you." Louis finished, sheepishly looking up when he heard nothing. He looked to Luke first, who was grinning at the boy. His eyes then traveled to the sofa I front of them. He locked eyes with Calum first, who's surprised face began to smile as he stood clapping; applauding both performers. Michael followed Calum's actions, making 'woo'ing noises as he did so.

He then looked to Ashton, hoping that he also had something positive to give. And of course he did. Ashton shot Louis a dimpled smile, standing from the sofa and opening his arms, inviting Louis in for a hug.

Louis bit at his bottom lips, standing from the stool and rushing over to his friend. His eyes closed as Ashton's strong arm wrapped around his petite body. Ashton bent his head forward, tucking his face into Louis' hair, whispering praise. "You were amazing." Louis smiled into Ashton's chest. "How come you've never told me you can sing, aye?" Ashton gripped Louis' shoulders, pulling him back a little so that he could look down to the boy.

Louis giggled cutely, "guess it just never came up in conversation."