Ronan: To the Moon and Back

It's been a quick three months of their break, having down time and spending it by traveling home, visiting old friends and just lazily lounging around their flats in nothing but their pants. Or in some cases, just plain naked. They sleep into the afternoon just because they can and because they truly still feel like they need it. An eight month long tour has bone deep exhaustion still over them, with jet lag screwing up their internal clocks. The boys spend time apart, hanging with other people, other friends, and once in a while sneaking around as to not be spotted by fans. All they want to do is be able to buy a jug of milk without being mobbed. Though in the end, they still gravitate towards each other, piling up on one of their couches in their flats playing videos and watching movies while throwing popcorn at each others faces.

It's not like Louis forgets to hop over to Manchester to visit his girlfriend, it's just that he's been busy not actually being busy and chalking it up to pure laziness. He'll catch the tube the next day, he doesn't want to fill up his gas tank, he's catching up on shows he never really watched, but figured this is a great time to start on Breaking Bad. He holds up in his room with his laptop and the show, while Harry cooks dinner and reminds Louis that he is indeed human and yes, he has to eat. So yeah, he actually does just kind of forget, save for the few phone calls because midterms are coming up and maybe he just "shouldn't be a bother and distract her"; her words, not his.

However, as much as he tries to deny it and make excuses of watching American TV shows, he's really spending his free time finding ways to be at the Hospice. It's all for the children, really, it is. He spends time with them, and if he just happens to look over his shoulder to see a girl with a camera attached to her face, then so be it. He leaves his jacket there by accident the first time, after one of their music days.

Rae is disappointingly absent that day, but they meet her mum, the second time for Louis, who explains her daughters lack of presence is due to a double shift at the diner she works at. If Louis spends a little extra time cheering up Ronan, pulling silly faces and pretending to get punched in the face by his toy dinosaur, just because his sister isn't there to do it for him, well then no one really has to know. Except they do. The other boys notice, when Louis has to double back two hours later, because he so desperately needs his jacket. He comes back to Niall's flat looking put out.

Harry notices Louis' left his jacket again, the second time in the week. When Rae does show up on a Friday, Zayn watches as Louis deliberately places his phone on the bed side table and conveniently forgets he's put it down by the time they get home. Niall sees Louis forget his football he brought in, because they wanted to play kick around right after. Liam keeps his eyes open and catches Louis swiping off his beanie while fixing his hair and "forgetting" he had it on. It falls off his head and into Raelyn's opened camera bag. She was, at the time, snapping photos of the nurses working hard and doing their jobs. She notices it before they leave, teasing Louis relentlessly about his ulterior motives of wanting to steal her bag again; he's really a thief and this Popstar thing is a cover up. He goes back for each item he leaves.

"Why don't you just leave your number with a "do you like me, check yes or no" note and stick into her forehead?" Zayn deadpans after the seventh time Louis forgets something and has to drive back.

Louis is suddenly, suspiciously clueless. "I haven't got a clue what you're on about, Malik."

Niall snorts into his food while Louis grabs his keys. "My arse."

"Maybe he could like, steal her camera again, saying "sorry, you just capture me so completely"." Harry inputs, miming taking a picture with his hands and winking.

Zayn literally slaps his palm over his face, Liam shakes his head in shame, Niall rolls his eyes and Louis. Well, Louis just flicks then all off.

"I have a girlfriend, thank you very much." Is Louis' horrible defense.

"Have you?" Zayn quips, rising his eyebrows. "Last I've heard of her was....I can't even remember."

Louis simply tells them all to do something rather crude to themselves, as loving as possible before he leaves. He still left his watch- and okay, it isn't really his- at the nurses station that he's got to pick up before visiting hours are over. Dammit to hell if his mates are right; though his love for them always over powers his apathetic hate for them, even if they are being insufferable twats. Still, they are correct, and Louis only feels a little guilty when he picks up his phone to call said girlfriend. She doesn't answer, in fact screens his call when it goes to voicemail after two rings. Eleanor's at Uni probably studying, or sleeping or partying and chatting up other blokes, who are probably chatting her up; hence the ignored call.

That thought doesn't sting as much as he thought it would and maybe it's time to take a step back and figure out when that happened. Reevaluated so to speak. It started long before he meet Raelyn though, so the other lads can bugger off. Maybe it was the distance thing; the traveling and different time zones. Maybe it was the way she came off at times as just simply using him to get free stuff. Whatever it was, he'd figure it out later because he just arrived to the hospital. There's a blue Volkswagen five spaces to his left when he parks, so he smiles to himself. All thoughts of the teasing and Eleanor temporally gone from his mind.

***

Louis was expecting to find Rae in Ronan's room, but the adorable, little boy is fast asleep, tucked under his blankets and snuggled against a Stitch stuffed animal. Instead, after inquiring about her whereabouts from nurse Jackie, he finds her in the viewing room of the PICU nursery wing. According to Jackie, Rae shouldn't even be in that wing, nor should Louis, but as long as Louis promised Jackie not to go into any actual rooms, he could look for her and bring her back.

Raelyn had dragged over one of the cushioned chairs, sitting and leaning against the window of the room that holds the tiniest babies Louis' ever seen. Her eyes are closed, lashes just grazing her cheekbones, long brown hair pulled up into a ponytail, the ends of it still reaching her mid back. He notices her right hand at her chest, slowly scratching at her exposed skin that her scoop neck shirt doesn't cover. Her left hand lays open, palm up on her thigh, as if she's offering something he can't see.

Slowly, so he doesn't startle her, he walks down the hall until he's right next to her. He studies her for several moments, notes how calculated her breaths are, how her eyelashes flutter against her skin. He waits a minute, knowing she can at least sense that someone's joined her, before he speaks.

"What are you doing?" Louis questions quietly.

"Praying." Rae murmurs.

He's taken aback by her answer, just because he wasn't expecting it, and turns his eyes on the babies behind the glass. Most of them are newborns, encased in incubators, with their parents reaching through the small arm holes to comfort their child. There's one mother sitting in a rocking chair, cradling her baby against her chest, muttering silently and crying. Her baby is wrapped in a soft pink blanket, squirming around every once in a while, and she is tiny. So, incredible tiny and fragile, and Louis wonders why she isn't in an incubator of her own, when it hits him. That sweet tiny, little baby probably won't make it through the night.

Louis' throat suddenly dries out, tightens with emotion as his heart drops when he realises it. There's a sharp prickling at the corners of his eyes, trying to fight back his tears. He now understands the reasons for Raelyn's prayers. What he can't understand, is why has she been sitting there for what seems like a good amount of time. Louis knows she can't cry, she's claimed that herself, so why would she sit in front of something that would undoubtedly make anyone else break down in tears-oh. Louis gets it, his mind clicks together, and he's so stupid for not noticing it earlier. She's trying to make herself cry. Trying to force out the tears that just won't come, however, Raelyn's hand has yet to stop scaring up her skin.

Louis bends slightly and gently takes her assaulting hand away from her chest. He can feel her trembling, like all the pent up emotion is vibrating behind the cement walls she's built up, imprisoned for years. Walls he is just now beginning to see.

"Raelyn." Louis' voice is soft, his tone sad.

Rae inhales deeply, opens her eyes only to turn multicolored blues on him and smiles. It doesn't reach her eyes. "Hi."

"Hi, yourself." He smiles back, "what are you doing here?"

"Told you, I'm praying for them."

Louis shakes his head. "That's not all you're doing now, is it?" He gives her a knowing look.

Raelyn looks stunned. Looks at Louis for what feels like a good five minutes before she blinks. "How- I...do you really know what I'm doing?"

She doesn't say it in another other way than simple curiosity. She honestly wants to know how he figured out her secret. Figured out how to crack that mask she wears so well when other people can even make a stretch.

"I think," He begins slowly, considering his thought. "That you are trying to force yourself to cry, so you find things that are heartbreaking, until this happens." Louis gestures to her chest, bright red and welting up from her nails.

"It stings." Raelyn states quietly, her fingers twitch in his hand.

"So why do you do it, Rae?"

"Because how's it fair for everyone else to cry, when I'm over here, not shedding a single one? It makes me look like some heartless monster because I can't shed one bloody tear. We're in a Children's Hospice for Christ sake, and all I can do is...nothing. I just wish I could trade places with them so they wouldn't have to cry. So I at least can do something about it." Raelyn's response shines in her eyes, bright with an emotion she can't physically carry out, yet broken in a raging storm. Louis squeezes her hand once, and pulls her in for a hug.

"Rae, you are doing something, and you have been for what, three years? Don't pass yourself off, love. You are incredible." He tells her in her ear, and maybe this moment is a little too heavy for a new friendship. Though to Louis, their friendship doesn't feel new at all, not with how they got on so well, bantered and teased and confessed all within two months of it.

Rae shakes her head in denial, but Louis cuts her off before she can say anything. "Let's get you some tea, yeah?"

They break apart, Louis dropping her hand once they're both standing. He takes three steps towards the doors, when he sees Rae hesitating. Louis takes back, grabs her hand again and tugs gently. Rae blinks twice, then follows behind Louis, walking away from the window and the tiny, fragile newborns. It's silent as they make their way down the lift towards the cafeteria. It's broken when Louis offers to buy her dinner that she's probably missed, and Raelyn speaks up. Insisting they take her car this time and promising Louis can have his chance at snooping around. He complies and enjoys himself immensely as he shuffles through her car once they're inside.

Louis searches around excitedly. Finds empty film canisters scattered in varies places, but mainly in the glove compartment. Store bought and burnt CDs in the middle console, along with napkins, pens and one stain remover pen. Her car is relatively clean and smells a little like coffee beans, though there isn't a car freshmen to be seen. However, Louis perks up when he spots a simple black binder on her back seat, which turns out to be a portfolio of her photos. They're beautiful, and amazing, each one he flips through. Rae explains them when he asks.

"Where'd you shoot this?" "How'd you get that angle?" "Who's this couple?" "Who's this guy, he looks like a wannabe hipster." Louis asks, and points to each new picture.

"Scotland on a road trip with my friend." "I climbed a tree and hung upside down. Nearly broke my neck but it was worth it." "That's my cousin Vinny, you tit."

Louis apologizes, meaning no harm to her cousin, which seems to be a sore subject with the way Rae's eyes tighten along with her hands on the steering wheel. Her jaw is clenched and she seems to be struggling with keeping a hand in the wheel instead of at her chest. So, he compliments the picture, because it is beautiful, black and white and a little faded. He'll save his questions about him for another day though.

They arrive at casual pizza pallor, with Louis paying only because he distracts Raelyn by pointing out how pretty the water fountain outside is. They keep their conversation light, poking fun at each other, and unknowingly learning more about one another. Rae drops Louis back off at the hospice for his car. Before she leaves, she gives him a hug, and is about to drive off when she rolls down her window.

"Oh, Louis?" Rae calls, holding something out that's dangling from her fingers. "Next time you leave a watch here that you claim you lost and is yours, even though I know you don't wear watches...just ask me to hangout. I don't bite and I think Liam would appreciate it if you didn't steal his wrist watch. Have a good night."

With that, she tosses the watch to Louis, laughing while she drives away. Louis' phone rings in his pocket, but all he hears in his ears are the echoes of Raelyn's laugh.

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Notes