Disclaimer: Even though I'm dying under a pile of revision, I still love Harry Potter. I also still don't own it.
Nobody Said It Was Easy
31st December 2032
"I swear to god, it isn't hard, all you do is flick your wand and say the right bloody thing!" Louis said frustratedly, as he turned around and gave one customer his shots then asked the girl next to him what she wanted.
"It's not that easy, these cocktails are weird!"
"There you are, miss." Louis gave the girl her drink before turning to Lily. "They're not weird at all! Look, what do they want?"
"Er, three Roxys and a Malfoy I think. Or was it two Roxys, a Rose and a Malfoy? Wait a second." She moved away from the bar, leaning to the side where a man was watching her impatiently. "Sorry sir, what did you order?"
"I swear, if you weren't a Potter I would have left by now." The man replied, and Louis groaned and nudged Lily out of the way.
"I'm so sorry, sir, what would you like to order? I'll give it to you on the house. Or, at least, Lily will pay."
"Two Roxys, two Malfoys and an Al please."
"Coming right up, sir." Louis replied, before making drinks quickly and presenting them to the man. "Happy new year, sir."
"Thanks."
Louis turned to Lily, who had been leaning against the bottles and watching him all the while.
"You owe me two galleons."
"How? We work for you-"
"And you get free drinks all year around whenever you want them. Seriously, don't start, you've been more useless than helpful tonight."
Lily looked down, pulling a face and mumbling. "I'm sorry, I'm just… I'm nervous."
"Why?"
"Excuse me." Someone called from behind him.
"One sec, Lils." Louis said, before turning to the customer at the bar. "What can I get you?"
"What are Potter shots?" She asked, and Louis reeled off the differences between Weasley, Potter and Malfoy shots before she ordered one of each and left again.
"So Lily, why so nervous?"
Lily had full on sat down now, on the chair Louis had put out for Al when he was helping out. She wasn't even pretending to help now, and Louis would mind if he didn't have other staff taking care of the punters.
"My boyfriend's coming tonight."
"Wait, your- your boyfriend? You have a boyfriend? Who is he?"
"You'll meet him tonight." Lily replied, shaking her head, "And I'm dreading it, and so's he-"
"Well yeah, we're a pretty scary lot."
"Exactly. I just don't want you all to scare him off."
"Wow, I feel like we're in Hogwarts again. You do realise that James, Fred, Al and I have grown up enough to recognise that you make your own choices? You can date whoever you like. Unless it's that Luke guy again, please don't say it's him, I'll kill him-"
"It's not Luke. I'm not stupid."
"I know." He reached out, and put his arms around her weakly. She just kind of laughed into his chest before a girl cleared her throat from the bar.
"Yes?"
"Sorry to interrupt the family moment, but you do realise that it's half ten?"
"So?" Louis asked dumbly, but smiling enough not to be rude.
"So, I'm done. And it's Hugo and Andy's turn!" Lily said the last part loudly, and a few of the girls near the bar squealed and crowded further forward.
"Yeah. You're right. I'll come with you to get them. Sam, you can watch the bar for five minutes can't you?" He asked his deputy manager, who nodded before replying.
"I can watch them but no one wants to be served by me!"
Louis laughed, before he and Lily struggled to push through the crowd towards the family room.
"I don't even get why there are so many girls; do they not get it? They're gay! Their tops can be as low as they like but Andy and Hugo will never look twice."
"No, but you will won't you?" Lily remarked, as she pushed the door open. "So the low tops aren't wasted at all."
"Low tops are never wasted." Al joined in the end of the conversation, and Louis couldn't help but laugh.
"Hugo, Andy, the girls are screaming; it's your shift." Lily sighed, collapsing onto the sofa next to Roxy.
"Eugh, my god, what are they going to be like when we start working?" Fred asked James, who rolled his eyes.
"A lot less impressed, probably." Anna replied, and Fred pulled a face at her as the girls laughed.
Hugo and Andy stood up and headed towards him, laughing about something or other.
"Ready boys?"
"For loads of girls to scream over me? Yeah, mate, gagging for it." Hugo replied sarcastically.
"Are you all okay in here?" Louis asked. "Any more drinks for anyone?"
"Nah, we're okay thanks mate." Alfie replied, smiling.
"And how're Rose and Scorpius handling the kids, Anna?"
Anna pulled a face, turning and looking up at Louis. "I don't know what you're talking about."
"Come on, you must have used that fireplace by now. It is mayhem over there? I mean, there are two of them, Rose is pregnant, and they've got four kids to keep an eye on. I bet Scorpius is going crazy."
"He did look a little hassled when I checked-"
"Ha, got you! I knew you wouldn't be able to resist." Louis smirked, and Anna folded her arms. "They'll be fine, just have fun tonight." As he said this, Fred and James laughed loudly at some joke one of them had made. "Like your husband is, apparently. I need you guys out and about soon, anyway; got to keep people buying drinks."
"You must make so much money off of us." Teddy pointed out. "Why don't we get paid for this service?"
Louis rolled his eyes. "How many times do I have to tell you all; you get free drinks all bloody year! It's one night; one hour shift on the bar and mingling around midnight; I'm not asking you to donate your wands or cut off your hair." Louis didn't tell them, but at that moment he had an idea of expanding the basement into a kind of Weasley/Potter museum… He mentally wrote that on his to do list.
"Sorry to interrupt, but Louis it's getting pretty mad out there." Sam poked his head around the door, and the sound of screams and music and laughter kind of whooshed into Louis' head.
"Full capacity yet?"
"Yep, as of about ten minutes ago."
"Perfect. Come on boys."
"Wait," Roxy said, jumping up. "If you're full then-"
"Don't worry, I'll make sure Jamie and his healer friends get in. How many are there?"
"About ten."
"No problem, Rox."
He made for the door again, before Fred yelled his name.
"Who's sold the most cocktails so far?"
"Er, probably Rose? I've sold quite a few Dominiques as well though."
Fred scowled, looking down at the cocktail in his hand and sipping it as Dom cheered. "I'm going to get out there and make people drink Freds soon."
"Good plan." Louis replied, nodding. "Maybe drink some water first though?"
By now, Louis could handle all different levels of drunk; happy, tipsy, drunk, absolutely hammered, smashed, paralytic… Water was always his first suggestion. And he needed Fred to at least be able to walk around when his shift came about.
"Right, boys follow me." Louis finally opened the door to the bar again, and was met by screaming. He pulled his wand out and pressed it to his throat. "Ladies and gentlemen, may I present to you for one hour, and one hour only; Andy Woodward and Hugo Weasley!"
The screams were really too loud now, and Louis groaned before walking towards the bar and getting the boys to follow him.
"Bloody hell." Hugo complained loudly. "It wasn't this bad last year."
"Last year, people didn't queue for six days. Only four."
The boys laughed. "I can't even think with this noise though." Andy groaned, putting his hand to his head.
"It's fine." Louis shrugged, before waving his wand. Instantly, the noise died down; only a couple of voices from those leaning on the bar could be heard.
"Wha-How?"
"Just a charm I made up this summer; it's kind of like muffilato but you can hear them if they touch the bar."
Hugo just shook his head. "Mate, you are too clever to work here."
"No, it's because I'm clever that this place works."
He always liked when people admired him; he was more proud of this place, the place he'd built from the ground up and made into everything he'd ever wanted, than anything else. And he loved whenever anyone else appreciated it.
"Right get on with working, you know the drill don't you?"
"Yep."
"Get on with it then!"
And so the three of them went back to work, serving screaming girls who would tell Hugo and Andy how much they wished they weren't gay. Hugo and Andy, being the amazing wingmen they were, would always point out that Louis was very much not gay; Louis really liked having these boys with him. They started selling less cocktails, but more shots and champagne; everyone began to prepare for the new year ahead by boosting their alcohol levels. And Louis' till levels.
When it got to about quarter past eleven, the boys finally got a break.
"Oh my god, I'm exhausted." Andy whined, sitting on the chair and whining. Almost instantly, Hugo stood behind him and began massaging his shoulders. "How do you do this every night? Just… how?"
"I love it." Louis shrugged. "Don't you kind of get a thrill from trying to test just how fast you can make drinks? And don't you think people are really funny when they try to make conversation with you as if they know you?"
Both boys shook their heads. "Nope, I just want to go to bed." Hugo whined, leaning forward on his boyfriend and sighing.
"Please stop being so adorable. Please. It almost makes me wish I wasn't single."
Both boys gasped in mock horror.
"Almost!" Louis repeated. "Not really."
"Hey, Louis?" Sam leaned on the bar from the other side, and Louis looked up and smiled. "Apparently there's a group of people upstairs who say they should be let in? It looks like Wrenshaw's one of them?"
"Oh, right, yeah, I'll sort it." Louis headed out of the bar, before turning to Hugo.
"You two okay on your own for a couple of minutes?"
"No!" Hugo whined again, and Louis just laughed before pushing through the crowd again towards the door.
Outside it was cold, and loud, and Louis thought for a minute that he was an absolute genius for putting a window through the wall and having another bar serving the queue. "Wow, the party's buzzing out here." He smiled, and looked down the queue to see they were still lined up around the corner, but there was a kind of street-party feel to the whole thing.
One of the bouncers, Jeff, laughed, "It's madness. I reckon you've made about 600 galleons just in this street."
"Sounds good." Louis smiled, shaking Jeff's hand as he did so. "Anything I can you guys?"
"You can send your cousins up with hot chocolate again?" Leo replied, and the other bouncers agreed.
"Please stop perving over my damn cousins."
"Why? That's why everyone else is here! Lily please!"
Louis just shook his head. "Anyway, where's Jamie?"
"Here." A voice said from behind him, and he turned to see a group of intelligent-looking people behind the barrier on the other side of the door.
"Hey, Jamie. How many of there are you?"
"Nine? There were meant to be twelve but a few had to stay on shift for longer."
"Oh that's a shame. Well, give Jeff here their names and when they get here they can go straight down. And you guys can feel free; Roxy's in the back, Jamie."
"Thanks mate, you're the best."
"Don't say that he'll get an even bigger ego!" Jeff complained.
"Ha ha, very funny. Who pays your wages again?" Louis teased, before turning back to the door. "I'll see you all in there."
He walked back inside, to see Hugo and Andy looking rushed off their feet.
Louis walked into the bar area, and Hugo ran up to him.
"Why is everyone suddenly getting drinks? Is there a drought? What's going on?"
Louis shrugged. "It's nearly half past, so everyone's stocking up before midnight. Because then they have to go half an hour without anything but champagne."
"Right, okay."
Hugo turned around again, and Louis stood and watched just how good the two boys were at the bar, before thinking that maybe he should help them too.
"If you see any of Jamie's friends, give them a drink on the house okay?"
"How will we know who they are?"
"They're healers; they'll be knackered." Andy told Hugo, who pulled a face back at his boyfriend before turning back to another customer.
Louis served another few people, before he saw Hugo serving someone he recognised out of the corner of his eye.
Hugo was putting the guy's drink together when Louis swooped in.
"That'll be seven sickles please." He told Jake, while Hugo looked at him confusedly.
"Wait, I though you said-?" Hugo began.
"Seven sickles." Louis repeated, and Jake nodded and pulled his wallet out.
"Are you alright, mate?" Jake asked Hugo quietly over Louis shoulder while Louis counted the money.
"Yeah, I'm fine thanks, how are you?"
"Can't complain." Jake shrugged. "How's business, Louis?"
"Much better with these seven sickles, thanks." Louis replied shortly, before turning to the till and putting the money away.
He vaguely heard Hugo apologising, before he turned and was faced with the ginger man.
"What's your problem?" Hugo asked, and Louis shrugged.
"I don't like that guy."
"Don't like… Louis he was your best friend for six years!"
"Yeah, but you know what? He was crap at it." Louis replied, and Hugo sighed before sitting down.
"Hello, we're dying here!" Andy yelled over his shoulder.
"Yeah, one sec." Hugo replied, catching Louis' arm after he'd turned to go and help. "Louis…"
"I've got a busy bar to look after, Hugh-"
"Yeah, and I have a cousin to look after. What happened?"
Louis shook his head, and debated whether to say anything. Because he didn't want to whine; he didn't want to show how insecure he was when it came to Jake Thomas. But he also wanted Hugo to leave him alone before the whole bar descended into chaos.
"Look, the guy just let me down one too many times. For as long as I've known him he always chose girls over guys; he wasn't ever there if I really needed him and it's just… I know it was a long time ago but I warned him about Lily and did he listen? No. He completely ditched me for the sake of looking after her; you were there, he told us we were the worst cousins ever and that we didn't care, and it turned out that we were right all along. And you know what? Lily apologised for all the crap she put us through but Jake never did."
"I get it." Hugo nodded. "I do. But-"
"Besides, who needs best friends when I have family like you?"
"Stop, you'll make me blush!" Hugo joked, and Louis was pleased that he seemed to be dropping the discussion.
"Okay, really adorable family moment over; I'm dying!" Andy yelled, and the two boys laughed and went back to work.
Louis hated that he was a little distracted now; he glanced over to Jake and his friends one too many times and spilt a drink for the first time since he'd opened the bar. He started to wonder why Jake was even here when the two guys hadn't got along since Hogwarts. A horrible, pointlessly hopeful part of him started to think that maybe he was there because he wanted to apologise; wanted things to be okay again. Louis hated not getting on with people, especially people who had once meant a lot to him.
"Right, last orders guys, then let's bring in 2033 with a bang!" Louis announced, and while it meant that there was a final rush for drinks, at half eleven he stopped serving and finally caught a break. He turned around to see Andy and Hugo sat on the floor, looking exhausted.
"Thanks guys. You can come work for me any time you like."
"Thanks? I think." Hugo pulled a face, and pulled himself and Andrew up.
"Right, can you go everyone out of the back room and I'll set up for later."
"They're going to be hammered by now." Hugo groaned, heading to the door.
Louis just laughed, heading towards a platform he'd set up in the corner. Minutes later his family joined him, those who had been in the room for the last hour having drunk considerably more now.
"Right, where's this boyfriend, Lils?" James announced loudly, and even though there was a little bit of a crowd gathering around them it was clear they didn't care; it felt like the Gryffindor common room all over again.
"Er, he's somewhere in here. He arrived with Jamie."
"Did he?" Jamie asked, and Lily nodded.
"Wait, so he's a healer? Great, just what we needed; someone else who's smarter than me in this family." Al complained.
"Well, I must say I don't think much of his on-time… ness." Fred announced, before downing the drink in his hand.
"I don't think you've ever grown up." Roxy told him sarcastically.
"Of course I have, I'm a Dad now. That means I have to be grown up all the time and it's boring!" Anna's eyes narrowed, and Fred quickly backtracked. "Not that I don't love my children deeply and adore the family I have… I love being a Dad. Yeah, I love the nappies and bottles and never sleeping-"
"Yeah, okay Fred, you're off the hook."
"Yay!" He cheered, and Louis just raised his eyebrows before James spoke again.
"No, seriously Lily where is this guy? He's not very punctual-"
"That's the word I was looking for!" Fred laughed.
"Right, just give me a second." Lily asked, before walking away from them and into the crowd.
"You know what? I reckon we already know this guy." Dom said, and they nodded in agreement.
"Well I definitely do. Apparently I work with him." Jamie laughed. "Who knew?"
"Who do you reckon it is?"
"I don't know; five of them are girls. And I've met two of their girlfriends so that just leaves-"
Hugo coughed loudly and dramatically, distracting Jamie so that they never heard who it was.
"Wait a second, you know who it is don't you?" Andy asked his boyfriend. "Come on, I can tell when you're lying."
"Who is it, Hugo?"
"And how do you know before we do?" Al asked.
Hugo just looked down at his feet. "Look, you're all going to find out in like two minutes-"
"So you may aswell tell us." Fred pointed out.
"I, er…" Then Louis was confused, because Hugo turned to him apologetically. "She's really happy, you know-"
"Oh my GO-!"
"We really should have seen this coming!"
"Is that meant to surprise me?" Al demanded, and Louis finally turned around to see Lily walking towards him holding hands with-
"Louis she's really happy." Hugo repeated, and Louis just shook his head.
"Yeah, I'm sure she is. He'd do anything for her, wouldn't he?" He replied. "Anyway, if you'll excuse me I have a bar to run." He told his family, before turning and pushing past Jake and Lily to get back through the crowd.
"Louis!" Lily called after him, and he forced himself to ignore it because he was just so irrationally angry that he didn't trust himself not to cause a scene.
"Right." Louis walked towards Sam, who was chatting with some of the other bar staff. "We need to get our act together, guys. You all know the drill; until then keep collecting glasses, guys, make sure everything's clean... What time is it?"
"Are you alright?" Sam asked.
Louis ignored him, and carried on. "If people ask to order drinks, they can't until half twelve. Try and remind them that Fred, James, Roxy and Dom are serving so they'll hang around."
"We can take care of it if you want to be with your family?" Sam suggested, and even though Louis knew he was trying to be nice he shook his head.
"I'd rather not." He replied, following Sam's eyeline to where his family had sat down now and were chatting and laughing; Jake was hanging out with them like he'd never been away. "I'd rather just make sure I make as much money as I can tonight, then go home."
He spent the next quarter of an hour getting ready; collecting empty glasses and checking everyone was okay. He went upstairs and checked on the street party, and debated staying there because it was just as much fun as in the bar but cooler and he didn't have to avoid anyone, before eventually sitting down for couple of seconds next to the bar and looking around proudly, avoiding looking at his family.
He was used to it, by now, but for some reason he jumped almost out of his skin when someone sat on the barstool next to him.
"Hi." The girl said, and Louis forced himself to look at her and smile.
"Er, hi. I'm Louis-"
"Please, I know who you are. I'm Jennifer."
"Jennifer what?"
She just tilted her head, her long brown hair cascading over one shoulder as she did. "Is that really important?"
He shook his head, realising that he'd actually asked for someone's surname. He never really asked before. "No, I guess it isn't." He looked back into the glass of water and didn't really know what else to say.
"Well, look, here's the thing. It's nearly midnight, and I've got no one to kiss. But you're Louis Weasley, so you're perfect for the job." He smirked, leaning towards him.
For some reason unknown to him, he leant back away from her.
"Er, any other night I would literally jump at the chance to kiss you. But I just... Not tonight." She looked at him with raised eyebrows, and he realised his reputation was fading hard and fast. "Because I… er, look I'm a free agent and I plan to bring in the New Year that way."
He stood up, to walk away, but she stood up too and smirked. "I don't see anyone else in your family planning on bringing in the New Year as a free agent."
"My family are boring. But come back tomorrow night and I might just prove that I'm definitely not." He winked, before heading back to Sam who was counting the boxes in front of him.
"All ready to go?"
"Ready as we'll ever be." Sam shrugged. "But before that are you sure you're alright?"
"Sam, mate, when am I ever not okay?"
He signalled to the DJ, who stopped the music abruptly. Once everyone stopped cheering, Louis stood up on the bar, but still didn't say a word.
Then they started cheering his surname, and he laughed and stuck his tongue out at his family, clearly lip reading Dom calling him an attention seeker.
"Hey guys! Are you ready to welcome the New Year?"
Everyone cheered again, and when Louis joked that he couldn't hear them they cheered louder.
"Right, well if everyone'll take a glass of champagne that my staff are handing out, and just give me and my assistant here-"
Sam grumbled as he stood next to him.
"Just give us a second and we'll all be ready to party!"
He took his wand away from his throat, and turned to Sam.
"You ready?"
"If this goes wrong-"
"It won't! I had aurors to teach me."
"Scorpius taught you once. And the bar was empty. This bar's full; if it goes wrong-"
"Shh." Louis told Sam. "Right. 3… 2… 1…"
Louis and Sam both twisted their wands at the same time, towards the roof of the building. Before their eyes, as if expanding from the middle, the roof appeared to disappear, displaying the night sky above.
Louis couldn't help but turn and high five Sam when the roof was completely gone and the crowd's cheers just floated up into the sky instead of echoing around.
He tilted his head, and realised if he looked closely he could see the clock on the front of Gringotts; he had two minutes before midnight and he was so ready for it.
"Weasleys bar, can you hear me?" He announced, and the crowd screamed. "Diagon Alley; can you hear me?" The cheers from out on the street resonated back into the bar. "Oi, Potters, can you hear me?" He yelled to his family, and James, Al, Louisa and Lily yelled back surprisingly loudly for just four people before the crowd returned to chanting surnames.
"I'd just like to say, 2032 has been amazing! But bring on '33!"
It seemed to him that the crowd would chant anything they said, because now they repeated 33 for a whole minute before Louis yelled, "Right, are you ready? 30, 29, 28…"
And so the whole bar counted down to midnight, and Louis stood and waited before setting off the fireworks Fred had given him. The bigger ones whizzed out of the bar and exploded in the sky in huge Weasley logos, 2023 numbers and stars. The smaller ones whizzed past people, circling them as they cheered and celebrated the new year.
Louis, now all his jobs were done, glanced up and looked across at his family, who celebrated together by hugging and kissing, while some couples intertwined. Louis couldn't help but stare at Jake and Lily for a little too long.
"I'm going to get a drink, I think I'm allowed one now." Louis told Sam, before jumping down to behind the bar and making his favourite drink calmly. Then he looked up again to see his family dancing away, Jake laughing with Jamie and Fred as they did so. Slightly less calmly, Louis poured three shots of firewhiskey and downed them in quick succession.
When he decided it was probably time to reopen the bar, he headed over his family to collect his final recruits. "Oi, Roxy, you ready?"
"Ready as we'll ever be." She replied walking towards him, dragging James and Fred with Dom following behind.
He felt the need to remind them all what to do, and while the girls remembered the boys seemed content enough to just climb on the bar and yell at people to buy their cocktails. After quarter of an hour of trying to make them do anything useful, he gave up and trusted that a combination of ex-head girl, beautiful blonde girl and trained bar staff would prevent anarchy from breaking out. Mainly because the firewhiskey had started to kick in and he really needed to sit down.
Taking a glance to where everyone else was, he snuck away to the back room and sat down on the sofa with a glass of water.
The music was still banging loudly through the door, and as the laughter on the other side got louder with the chants of "Fred" and "James" he started to realise that it was a bit weird that he wasn't out there with them having fun. It wasn't that he wasn't in the mood, or that he had too much work to be getting on with, but he just… He was too stubborn. He refused to go out to where Jake was partying with his family. That just wasn't fair.
It also wasn't fair that they'd ruined his new year though. He'd been looking forward to it for months; all his planning and organising seemed to have gone to waste. Well, not to waste; everyone else was having fun, but he'd been looking forward to finally letting himself chill out; now he just had something else to worry about.
He stayed there for a little while, generally feeling sorry for himself, before even he got fed up with himself. He got kind of angry, really, because he was not the type to let anyone ruin his fun. And Jake Thomas was no exception.
Standing up, he stormed (although he preferred to think of it as walked with purpose) towards the door and went to open it but someone else beat him to it.
Then he came face to face with the guy he'd decided had ruined his night.
"Oh, hey Louis! You've been busy tonight, haven't you?" Lily asked, smiling.
"Why's he going in here? Family only, you know that."
"Louis, don't be like that." Her face fell.
"Mate, I'm not here to pick a fight-" Jake began.
"No, neither am I." Louis replied, his gaze locked on Jake's, ignoring Lily. "But I'm not your mate. And this is my bar. And this back room is only for Weasleys, or Potters."
"Or Malfoys or Wrenshaws or Woodwards-" Lily replied.
"Or people I trust." Louis concluded, still glaring at Jake. "You're not one of them. So you're not allowed in there."
"And what if I married him? Then what, Louis; if he's a Potter can he go in there?"
"That's ridiculous; why would you-?"
"Because I love him."
Then he forced himself to look at her, and she looked so sincere that for a second he stopped being quite as angry.
"Then I'd have to think about it, but I don't think I'd let either of you in here at all." He turned to Jake and narrowed his eyes. "Because I don't like him, and clearly you're too stupid to make sensible decisions and I don't want someone like that in my bar."
"Oh for god's sake, Jake just ignore him-" Lily began, grabbing his arm and pulling him further towards the door.
Louis stuck his arm out in front of them and smirked. "Look, I don't want to cause any trouble by asking you to leave." He said smarmily, "So if you could just follow my rules-"
"Louis will you just grow up? You're not 16 anymore, you don't have to be so bloody insecure about whether your best friend likes someone else more than you." Louis opened his mouth to retort but couldn't. "You don't need to prove you're a man by yelling at people or pulling girls. I'm proud to say that I'm not the same person I was in school; so's Jake and Hugo, and Roxy and James and Fred… But you've not changed one bit!"
Louis raised his eyebrows, feeling a little like he'd been punched in the stomach by words.
"Reality hurts, doesn't it?" Lily smirked, and Louis realised that everyone in his family could be just as evil as each other.
"No." Louis replied, straightening up. Because he refused to let them beat him. "I just think you have a pretty warped sense of reality. Maybe you caught it off this guy." He gestured to Jake, who had kind of shrunk into the doorframe and seemed to just be watching. "Because both of you think you're dishing out 'reality' when you tell me I'm not grown up or that I don't care about my family," he narrowed his eyes at Jake. "But really, it just shows how little the two of you know me."
With that, he turned around, beginning to head back into the party.
"You have a side of the bed." Jake's voice carried over the music, and Louis didn't turn around but stopped, mostly out of shock. "Every girl you ever sleep with, you'll always end up asleep on the right hand side. And you deliberately did badly in your OWLS because you thought it made you seem cooler, but when you realised it was going to screw your NEWTs you used to secretly get up two hours before everyone else so that you could work. You planned opening this bar when you were 14, but you wouldn't tell anyone because you thought it was stupid. And I bet you're so, so proud of what you've done and that you succeeded, but sometimes you hate that you never told your family it was what you wanted all along, because somehow them thinking you thought of it when you were 19 cheapens it a little. You love your family more than you could ever love any girl, and even though you'll never admit it I know that you hated leaving Lily to fend for herself even if you thought it was the right thing to do, which is why I said all those things I said to you because I wanted you to change your mind." Louis still didn't turn around, but carried on listening like he was addicted. "When you finished school you said you burnt all your uniform because you were glad you left, but you secretly kept your tie. When Al got injured you couldn't visit because it upset you too much but you came in to ask the doctors how he was doing every day, sometimes twice. You're probably still secretly trying to teach yourself the rules of Quidditch." Louis hated that he laughed a little at that, so forced himself to turn around but still not walk towards them. "Never say I don't know you." Jake shrugged, and Louis was about to speak before Jake carried on, walking towards him a little. "You tell people you're mad at me because you think I care more about girls than you, but really it's because you think I'm choosing Lily over you all over again and you're jealous. You're annoyed I didn't try to find you the same way I found her. But I didn't try to be your friend again because I thought you wouldn't want me to, and because you have better friends than me; one's who didn't let you down the way I did. And I know I can't undo that easily, who knows, maybe I never will. But I am, and always will be, in love with your cousin and that's not changing. And I'm with her now, and I'm telling you that you just have to accept it, even though I know you, and I know you hate being told what to do."
Louis looked at Jake, who had now linked his hands with Lily and was looking back at him and completely meeting his gaze.
Louis wanted to stay angry, he really did. But somehow, it was difficult. Maybe it's because he realised that he did feel sixteen again, but he wasn't and he needed to stop acting it. Maybe because he was surprised by how much Jake still knew about him. Maybe it was because Lily looked happy, and Louis would rather he was happy with Jake than with certain other people…
"I need a drink." He stated. "Do either of you want one? Because you can just go right up to the bar and ask. Or tell me and I'll get someone to bring them to you, if you want to go in there."
He decided to be the bigger person. Really, it made a change.
Lily just smiled really widely. "We'll come and get one with you, if you'd like?"
Louis groaned. "Sure, but he's paying." He gestured to Jake, who smiled at him nervously.
"What? I'm family." Lily pouted.
Louis shrugged as they reached the bar and he yelled his order to Roxy, remembering Lily and Jake's orders from earlier in the night and asking for those too. "My bar, my rules." He told Lily.
He loved that he could say that.
