***Louis Tomlinson***
Friday, July 6th, 2012 – North London, England

We were finally home. We had gotten in last night – Thursday – and Harry and I both fell into a deep sleep, the exhaustion finally catching up with us. It felt good to be home and in my house and my own bed, with my own amazingly wonderful boyfriend. I looked over at him, resting in my arms, shortly before lunch time on Friday, both of us having slept late. I was so thankful for him – at this point, he seemed to be the only thing in my life that was going well, and even that had some underlying problems. I was walking on eggshells around him – I was terrified to do anything that might upset him, because I knew how quickly he could get emotional and I didn’t want a repeat of our blowout fight. I just wanted to do everything in my power to keep the peace.

The more I tried to avoid thinking about the cab driver, the harder it got. I mean, I didn’t even know his name (I was sure it was printed in all of the news articles about the accident, but I wasn’t about to read any of those). I knew Harry made a good point when he suggested I reach out to the family, I just wasn’t sure I was ready yet – or if I ever would be. All I knew was that I wanted it to go away – the darkness of the whole situation was starting to completely take over, and I didn’t like feeling so low all the time.

I already missed being on tour. Sure, it was nice to be home, but there was a sadness that came along with the fact that it was over. I had gotten used to seeing my friends every day, and I missed being around them all the time. They helped distract me from reality, and that had never been necessary for me before. I was always able to handle whatever came my way, but it seemed that lately my success was being matched with heartache. Like things really were too good to be true, and so life just had to throw the worst possible things at me to make up for all the good.

There was the issue of my family. I had been in a coma for three days, which was very public knowledge all across the world. I hadn’t heard a single word from either of my parents or my sisters – all of the families of my band mates had reached out to me, somehow, whether through the guys or sending me cards and flowers. I didn’t bring my own family’s negligence up to the guys because they were already doing enough to take care of me, but it bothered me more than I thought it would. I knew I didn’t need my biological family – I had Harry, Liam, Niall, and Zayn, and their friendship was the most incredible thing I had ever experienced. But for my own flesh and blood to not even care whether I was alive or dead? That was really getting to me, on top of everything else.

Not wanting to wake Harry, I carefully climbed out of bed and went to the bathroom, where I pulled out one of my razor blades. I sat down on the edge of the bathtub and took it to my hip for the first time since April. I closed my eyes when I felt the sweet sting on my skin. It was comforting, and I knew that wasn’t good, but in that moment it was what I needed. I was so lost in the blissfulness of the pain that I didn’t hear Harry’s footsteps come to the door.

Notes

Aw, Lou!!!!