Ronan: To the Moon and Back

Louis is pacing back and forth across the floor in Rae's room, anxiously biting at his fingernails. It's not that he's worried, Rae's a big girl, she's shown she can handle herself more than once. However, when Niall came knocking on her door, interrupting the little kisses Louis was placing all along her face just to make her giggle, and informed Rae that she was needed downstairs, the look on her face made Louis' stomach flip.

There's no doubt she's in the kitchen right now, probably forced to have a civil conservation with her father, possibly digging her fingers into the table so she doesn't maul at her raw chest. Or maybe she's gritting her teeth so hard her jaw begins to ache. Maybe she is trying not to throw the fruit bowl at her father's head. Maybe she's having a panic attack right now and Louis isn't down there to help and- alright, he is completely worried.

"You're going to ware a hole through the floor, ya know." Niall states from the circle chair he's nestled himself into after Rae had left.

In exchange for her, the other lads were sent up as well. Zayn informing Louis it was Rae who told them to wait in her room. Louis' been ignoring them all for the past fifteen minutes. He doesn't mean too, he just can't stop wondering what's going on downstairs. It's been quiet, no shouting or sounds of anything breaking; that has to be a good sign, right?

"So you told her you love her, finally?" Niall continues, ignoring Louis ignoring them. That makes him halt his steps.

"What?" Harry asks shocked, head snapping up from one Rae's portfolios he was looking at. "When did this happen?"

Sighing, Louis runs his hand through his hair once, before dragging it down his face. "Right before France."

"Right before..." Liam starts, "But we hardly had time to- oh! Oh." Realization dawns on his face.

"Literally." Louis tells them. "Right before we left. It just happened, I blurted it out and then jetted off to France. It wasn't exactly the way I planned it."

"She hasn't said it back." Zayn states quietly.

"Spotted." Louis snaps. "Bloody observant, you."

His attitude doesn't even faze Zayn. He doesn't even move from his spot on the bed, laying on his back with his head hanging off the foot of the bed. He just blinks slowly, like this whole exchange is boring him to sleep, but Louis knows. He's been eerily silent this whole time; not shifting, hardly even breathing it looked like. Louis knows it's because he was attuning his ears for anything suspicious noise from downstairs.

"Give it time, Lou." He suggests. "You don't have to worry if she feels the same or not. I know she does."

"That's not what I'm worried about." Louis sighs once again, defeated and plopping down next to Liam. "You didn't see her earlier. How angry she was, how hurt she is. She won't ever admit it, but I see it."

"I think that says it all, really." Harry speaks softly, gesturing to the mess still on the floor."Should I-?"

Louis cuts him off. "No. Trust me, she'd want to do it herself."

The only warning they get before the door opens is the last few stomping steps up the stairs, and Rae is suddenly there, hand gripping tightly to the handle. All five boys sit alert, breaths held anxiously until the fire in Rae's eyes softens a little. Louis can see her arms shaking, doesn't know if it's from anger or the aftereffects of an attack; he hopes it's the former. She blinks a few times, clearing the expression in her eyes, then smiles softly.

"You lads don't have to stay here, if you don't want." She says, a small tremble in her voice. "You've already done so much for me and mum."

"Rae, we don't mind." Harry insists genuinely.

"I know, but you should go, get a good nights rest on actual beds."

Zayn is the first to move. "That sounds good actually, right boys? A proper bed to sleep on. I'm bloody exhausted."

It's a clear lie, given that he hasn't really done anything for him to be exhausted. Rae shoots him a grateful smile, hand dropping from the door handle. Everyone else follows Zayn's lead, standing up and giving Rae long goodbye hugs. Zayn lingers the longest, holding tight to Rae and whispering something in her ear. She nods, squeezes his shoulder blades as he kisses her forehead and releases him. Louis' about to do the same, when Rae cuts him off, turns her back toward him and closes the door behind Zayn.

Confused, he opens his mouth to say something, but Rae spins around and Louis is abruptly pushed onto his back on the bed. All he sees is a blur of blue eyes before his mouth is attacked by Rae's. Initially the action takes him by surprise, laying frozen for a few moments before registering the urgency of the kiss. Rae's lips are insistence against his own, pressing hard enough that it feels like his bottom lip will cut against his teeth. Through his foggy, baffled brain, all he can do at the moment is place his hands on her waist, holding her gently as her hands clutch his shirt.

He loves her, he does, so very much, and he loves showing he does. He loves to hold her, kiss her; really loves to kiss her, but something doesn't seem right with this one. It's too desperate and Rae just came back from being forced into the kitchen with her mum and estranged father.

Louis blinks his eyes open, finally connecting his thoughts together. He pushes Rae back, just enough so he can sit up, one hand still at her side. Rae tilts her head in confusion, eyes bright with all kinds of emotions. Her lips are shinny and red, just a tad swollen and Louis has to tear his eyes away for a moment.

"Raelyn." He begins, panting a little, heart racing.

Rae frowns, shakes her head and moves in. Louis allows her to kiss him again, more gentle this time, her lips moving on his. He counts in his head, and mentally slaps himself to get a grip. He cups her jaw in his hands, pushing her away once more. She's panting, trying to catch her breath that's ghosting over his own mouth.

"Please." She whispers, eyes suddenly desperate; begging.

Louis sighs. Swiping his thumbs along her cheekbones. "Rae, what's wrong?"

Rae frowns once more, bringing a hand up to clutch around his wrist. "Nothing's wrong. Can't I just kiss you to kiss you?"

"Of course, love." Louis smiles sweetly. He leans in to place a tender kiss on the corner of her mouth, then says, "But something's bothering you."

She groans in frustration, pulling herself back far enough that Louis' hands fall from her face. She sits at the corner of her bed, her back to Louis. "You're too attentive for your own good."

"Just to you." Is his answer. "What happened?" Louis tries to reach out for her, fingers just grazing her neck before Rae shoots up from the bed.

She starts pacing, arms crossed tightly over chest. Her eyes seem to have darken a little, brooding over the thoughts in her head. So, Louis just sits patiently until she's ready to talk. Twice Rae stops, turns to Louis, opens her mouth, but thinks better of it and continues her pacing. Louis begins counting the number of photos she has on the wall, gets to thirty-five before Rae finally speaks.

"I try not to be a bad person," She says, snapping Louis' attention back to her. "I do everything I can for other people, I try to be nice, try to be good."

"You are good, Raelyn. You're an incredible person." Louis tells her genuinely.

Rae smiles softly, and continues, the smile slipping from her face. "It's not bad that I don't want him here, is it? Does it makes me a horrible person because I don't think he deserves to be here? He doesn't deserve to be anywhere near here! He doesn't deserve to be at the funeral. I don't want him there! I'm so fucking angry, Louis. He has no right to be in this house!"

Louis has to tread carefully. One wrong word and Rae could go off again, and granted, there isn't much in her room for her to just destroy without having a horrible break down afterwards. He can't think of anything else to say, and he knows the words on his tongue won't be welcomed with a cup of tea.

"Raelyn...he's still your-"

"Don't you dare finish that sentence, Louis." Rae cuts him off, pointing a menacing finger at him.

"Rae, try thinking of it from your mother's point of view maybe? I mean, she did call to tell him." Louis shrugs, but that seems to anger her more. Louis is shit at treading carefully.

"You know," Rae starts, her voice bordering on a dangerously saccharine tone. "Out of all people, I thought maybe you'd understand."

Automatically Louis' thoughts jump to just time spent with Raelyn. Having getting to know her as a person, as this incredibly, beautiful strong woman. He knows her inside and out by now, and the way she's looking at him knowingly, makes his brain make the connection. She's talking about his own biological father leaving when he was just a baby. About his step-dad, his sisters father, a father to him for many years, leaving.

It hits a nerve buried inside him. His stomach churns lightly, but Rae isn't bringing it up to rub it in his face, no. She brought it up because she doesn't know how to feel about her own father. This is something they both have in common; deeply rooted and only resurfaced when forced, like right now.

Louis understands now. He reaches out for Rae's hand and he thinks it a small victory when she lets him. He pulls her on the bed next to him, tightening his hold around her fingers. "I'm sorry, you're right."

"No." Raelyn shakes her head frantically. "Don't let me say horrible things to you because I'm angry. It doesn't work like that. I'm sorry. You're just so easy for me to lash out on, and you just let me. Don't let me."

"It's because I love you. Because I know you need too, and if I'm the only one you're able to do it with, then that's okay. I honestly don't mind. I love you." He says it again, so she can believe it, so she can fully comprehend that Louis is willing to be her metaphorical punching bag if she needs him to.

"Yeah, you...yeah." A strange look comes over Rae's face. "I'm tired." She says suddenly, pushing at Louis' chest so he's laying down on his back again.

He watches as she shifts around, gets comfortable and ends with her head on his chest, snuggling up close to him. Louis pulls her as close as he can, until he can feel her breath on his collarbones, feel her heart beating against this ribs. He curls his arm around her shoulders, and watches as she traces his tattoos with her fingertips. Her touch leaves tiny goose pimples in their wake that make him shiver lightly. In return, he plays with her hair, scratching his blunt nails along her head.

"Why are you always so good to me?" Rae whispers, tangling her fingers with his own.

Louis kisses her temple, soft and tender, and whispers his answer in her ear. He knows she know by now, the answer to the question. What the answer will always be to that question.

***

They've been lying on her bed for a while, both relaxed, both tired, Rae fighting to keep her eyes open this whole time. The alluring sound of Louis' heartbeat has been lulling her into a state of calm, but now her mind has been wide awake with thoughts, whirling around like a tornado. Her heart has been racing frantically and her stomach is fluttering as if she was on a rollercoaster dropping again and again.

Louis' words keep replaying in her mind, and she's slowly been working up the nerve to return those same words. There shouldn't be anything hard about it; she has no reason to be scared or nervous. Even though she had admitted her feelings to Ronan- a sharp stab of pain shoots briefly through her chest when she remembers that- it still took her while to actually admit it to herself. So, Rae focuses on Louis' slow breathing instead of her own. It's been silent for so long that when she finally decides to speak, she feels Louis startle.

"I love you." Rae confesses softly, as if speaking at normal volume would break the bubble they're in. Her heart is hammering against her chest.

Louis' fingers have been gently gliding up and down her arm, from her shoulder to her elbow. It's been a comforting rhythm for her. She doesn't pick her head up from Louis' chest when his fingers halt; doesn't move when she hears the soft hitch of his breath, or when his chest shudders with a shaky exhale. She feels him shift, like he's trying to get her to do the same, but she won't. She stays right where she's been for the past hour. Head on his chest, left ear directly over his heart; heard it pick up abruptly in pace when she said those words.

"Raelyn." Louis finally speaks; it sounds a little sad. She hears him sighs wistfully. "Rae...are you sure you mean..." Louis trails off with his carefully selective tone and words, and that makes her move. She sits up, removing herself from his warmth and comfort and glares at him.

"Of course I mean it." Rae defends vehemently, frowning down at Louis who seems frozen this time. "Why would I ever, ever say that if I didn't mean one ounce of it?"

Louis, seeming to fully comprehend what he really said, sits up as well. "Rae, that's not what- I just-"

He huffs out a frustrated breath and Rae knows it sure as hell isn't directed at her. She watches as Louis shoves a hand in his hair, and waits for him to explain. She's trying to hold off on rubbing her healing chest; she didn't expect this to be his response.

"I just meant-" Louis tries again, eyes looking a little defeated, "you just lost your brother, love. People some times say things from extreme grief."

"I know who I just lost, thank you very much!" Rae bites back harshly. Louis only blinks. "Do you've any idea who I wanted to turn to afterwards? Any idea at all how close I was to driving to your flat, only to remember you were in bloody France!? It was you I wanted to run to. You I wanted to be with because I have no idea how to even fucking handle any of this and I just needed you there and you weren't and I understand that- no!"

Rae yanks her hand away from Louis' grip, away from the bandages on her chest. Subconsciously, she guesses, she was trying to scratch at her skin again, and Louis reacted by attempting to pull it away. Instead, she shoves both hands under her thighs and continues.

"It was you, and it's always been you, Louis. Always. I can't even remember how I dealt with anything before I met you. And it's taken a while, a really long time for me to realize I've fallen in love with you. Took me time to admit it to meself and here I am, telling you, after you told me before you left. You just let it slip out like it was that simple, like it was so easy for you. Now I'm telling you I love you and you say I don't mean it? Are you fucking mental?"

"Very much so." Louis says, nodding slowly with wide eyes.

Rae closes her own eyes for a moment and sighs. When she reopens them, she tries to show, to convey as much sincerity as she can. For Louis to fully believe her. That's she's saying it, not because she's emotional and needy, but because she is truly, absolutely head over heels in love.

"I love you, Louis. I need you because I don't know what to do anymore. How do I...how do I handle my father being here? He wants to come to the funeral and I just can't. I don't want him to, and that makes me a horrible person, or maybe it doesn't, I don't know. But how do I handle that? My mum, how am I suppose to be strong enough for her? How am I suppose to just accept Ronan's gone? How..I miss him..I miss him so much."

The room suddenly feels so hot, like someone just cranked up the heat inside a sauna sitting in the middle of an active volcano. Rae can't breath properly, can't remember how. Her chest is spasing intensely, it has to be her worse one yet. It's so, so painful, and yet she can't seem to shove her hand through her chest to stop whatever has its vice grip on her. She can't hear anything but the rushing of blood in her ears, can't see her room or the blue of Louis' eyes anymore. All she knows is that she can no longer do this.

Blurry imagines dancing around in her vision, fading the corners into black, and all she hears are muffled noises coming from somewhere distant. She feels sick to her stomach, but she can't catch her breath to calm it, doesn't seem to find any air in the volcano. All she feels is heat and more heat and something tugging harshly at something she thinks is possibly connected to her body.

Suddenly her blurry chaotic world is being tipped forward and down and it's like a gateway in her chest has opened up, and she can breathe a little easier. She tries focusing on the same thing that was pulling her before, can feel it on a different spot she thinks is her back. It's stroking up and down along her spine and right, she has a spine. She realises it's a hand touching her, so she focuses solely on that. Next she concentrates on the muffled noises, feels almost like she's under water, and tries to figure out what it's saying.

"Eight..nine...C'mon love."

It's a voice, right next to her ear, breaking through the murky water in her head.

"Just breathe."

Breaking through the dark clouds of smoke billowing from the volcano.

"Ten. Raelyn, focus on my voice."

Louis. It's Louis. She knows now. She'd know that voice anywhere. He sounds stressed, worried. He sounds scared. Rae finally realizes she's having a panic attack, a rather severe one at that going by the urgency in Louis' tone.

"You're alright, darling. I've got you." He's saying, still rubbing her back. "Just breath for me, Rae. Through your nose, exhale through your mouth. Breathe."

Rae tires, she does, inhaling short little breaths. She's beginning to come back to herself, understands what's going on and she automatically reaches out for something, for someone. For Louis. However, her hand is enclosed by another that feels much to calloused to be Louis'. He's still counting by her ear, so Rae squeezes the hand in hers, both of hers she notes in her foggy brain, since two are squeezing back.

Rae matches her breaths with Louis' counts and finally, after a few more coaxing and gentle encouragements from Louis, Rae can finally breathe properly. Her vision clears as she slowly straightens up, eyes immediately locking on Louis'. The blue of his eyes don't look so blue anymore, instead anxiously tinted grey. His eyes are searching hers, probably to make sure her attack is over and she won't stop breathing again. His brow is furrowed so deep, Rae is abruptly concerned that he'll develop premature wrinkles. She suddenly feels guilty.

"Sor-sorry. I'm so sorry." Rae apologises sheepishly.

Louis is automatically shaking his head. "S'not your fault, Rae. You're okay. Can you breath alright?"

"But it is. I-"

"No, it's not." Louis interrupts gently, placing the hand not holding hers to her face, tenderly cupping her cheek. He strokes his thumb beneath her eye once. "I was the one who brought it up."

Rae is just beginning to disagree when she's cut off by a familiar inhaler between her and Louis. She breaks eye contact with Louis, and sees Harry with the inhaler in his hand, smiling apprehensively; Rae thinks he just keeps it around now as some sort of inside joke. Zayn's next to him, holding out a cigarette, ironic and unashamed, but a concerned looked in his eyes, and Niall next to holding Pepper, who's worriedly pawing at Rae's knee.

Which leaves Liam kneeling on her left, her hand clasped in his. He isn't looking at her though, rather, he's giving disapproving looks to Zayn, but his silent presence is comforting. When he looks back at Rae, he raises his eyebrows and subtly shakes his head. His expression is unexpectedly hilarious to her, and suddenly Rae is laughing so hard, she collapses into him.

She laughs so hard, she has to gasp to get take in breaths of air, and it makes Louis maneuver her into an upright position again. She's sure shes going to give him an ulcer on of these days. She didn't know it was so funny. Maybe it's because she hasn't laughed for days, or maybe she realises how much they all love her and like an idiot, she's only truly noticing it now. It feels good to laugh, liberating in a way.

"I thought you all left." Rae says, calming herself down.

Niall shifts, an apprehensive look on his usually bright face, looks as if he doesn't want to ruin her strange mood. "Your mum-" He starts, clears his throat and continues, "was kicking your father out when we were leaving."

Oh. Rae sombers quickly. "Oh."

"So we just decided to help her out a little." Liam pipes up, squeezing Rae's hand. "Made her some food, and just cleaned up some."

"Thank you." Rae sighs in relief. "Honestly, thank you boys for everything. You really should go home though." When Rae looks at her digital clock, it's nearing midnight. "It's late and the...um...funeral is Saturday."

There's a pause in the room and Rae drops her eyes to play with Louis' fingers. When she decides to speak again, her voice is nothing but a whisper. "You'll come right? All of you?"

"Of course." Zayn answers fiercely. "She's right, lads. It's getting late, we should go."

By the time they all say their goodbyes, give strong hugs to Rae and kisses on her cheeks, the room is silent again. Rae has a sleeping Pepper in her lap, and knows Louis is lingering by the door. She gently strokes the cats fur a few more times before finally addressing Louis by looking at him.

"You know I'm going to ask you to stay, right?" It's more of a statement, than a question.

"Was just making sure." Louis replies, moving to sit next to her.

Rae rolls her eyes. "I'm in love with an idiot." She says fondly.

At that, Louis gently cups her face in his hands, leans in and kisses her breathless. She'd much prefer this form of breathlessness over anything else, and when they lay back together, Louis pulling her close to his side, she falls asleep quicker than she has the last few days.

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Notes