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Harry drags the zipper around the sides of his suitcase, moving the checked baggage tag out of the way. Holding back a yawn, he flops the top open. The slow, depressing task of unpacking. It's another undeniable sign that his two weeks in paradise has ended.

He’s exhausted from the long day of travel back to the UK, but if he doesn’t unpack now, the suitcase will still be full of dirty laundry and partially used hotel soaps a month from now. His carry-on is stuffed just as full next to the large suitcase. He unzips the front pocket to retrieve his phone. He’d turned it off for the flight and hadn’t bothered turning it back on once they’d landed. He has taken enough business trips in his day to know his way back from the airport blindfolded. He turns it on and drops it onto the mattress beside his suitcase after the screen lights up.

The holiday to Jamaica had been Gemma’s idea. After his divorce was finalized, Harry didn’t leave the house except for work. A month later, she’d had enough and booked them round-trip tickets and two weeks stay at an all-inclusive resort in Jamaica. The past fourteen days have been spent lounging on the beach, doing yoga, getting massages, and sipping poolside daiquiris as his sister encouraged him to start his new life as a single, gay man.

While he appreciated her enthusiasm and the sentiment of the trip, having his sister act as his wing-woman didn’t exactly draw in any potential dates. Despite that, it was nice to take a break from work and the dreary Manchester weather.

He pulls his toiletry bag out of his carry-on and heads to the dreary en-suite. He hates everything about this bathroom, the single narrow shower stall, dingy tile grout he can never scrub clean enough, and the one drawer in the vanity that doesn’t open. It’s a far cry from his giant bathtub and the deluxe shower head he’d installed in his old house.

As he puts away the rest of his toiletries, his phone chimes. A string of various dings and bells signal all the notifications coming through now that his phone is back on.

He shuts the mirrored door of the medicine cabinet. His tired reflection stares back at him. He’s not the youthful beauty he was when he’d met his wife. Ex-wife, now. His hair is shorter, styled to hide his receding hairline and dyed to conceal the patches of grey. He has wide rimmed bifocals and more lines around his eyes every year. The dark bags under his eyes reveal how exhausted he is. He’s long past his days of frequent business travel, no longer used to rushing through airports and catching connecting flights. The prospect of finding love as a newly-out middle-aged man is daunting.

He turns out the light, leaving his tired reflection behind as he return to the bedroom to finish unpacking. It’s strange, trying to put back pieces of his life into this room that they’ve never fit into. Everything reminds him how little this house feels like a home. The half-filled closet, the dresser without any knickknacks on top, the bare walls. Even the bedding he’d bought was a boring striped pattern.

He was never meant to stay at this rental house long term. But it’s been eight months since his wife asked for a separation, eight months since he signed the lease on the first available furnished rental unit he could afford. The rental has standard beige walls, beige carpet, beige everything. It is a beige purgatory where he’d planned to wait out the final judgement on his thirty-three years of marriage.

The ink on the divorce papers has been dry for six weeks now, and yet he hasn’t thought about buying a house of his own once.

He takes off his glasses and wipes his brow. Unpacking is more work than packing. Before moving on to his suitcase, he picks up his phone and sits on the edge of the bed.

The screen lights up with a couple of notifications, one text from his daughter checking on how his flight went, about a dozen junk emails from various stores, and a notification from his weather app about rain showers in the afternoon. Harry sighs. Welcome back to the UK.

Below that are two other notifications, a Facebook friend request and a new pending message. That’s odd; Harry is rarely on Facebook, hasn’t used it probably since his youngest insisted he needed the account. She’d helped him find family, neighbours, and some co-workers to send requests to. He taps the new friend request to open the app.

Louis Tomlinson. Even if the name hadn’t instantly knocked him back in time, the face in the profile picture sure would. Louis Tomlinson had been his first real crush. Even forty years later, despite the grey hair and the stubble on his cheeks, he’d recognize that face, those cheekbones, his blue eyes anywhere.

He clicks on the profile picture and it opens to Louis’ account. Almost everything is locked. There are two visible profile pictures, some happy birthday posts from the previous December, and his header image of a black curly haired dog laying in the grass. There’s no visible personal information, no relationship status, no hometown.

The bright blue “Accept” button looks so intense at the top of the nearly empty page. He hesitates at the thought of tapping the button, and reconnecting with Louis Tomlinson, of all people, after so many years. Why did he reach out now?

And then he remembers the other notification. He switches to the Messenger app. Louis’ profile picture and the first few words of his message are visible and the timestamp shows it was sent yesterday at 22:28. Heart pounding, he clicks on the message and reads.

Hello Harry, this may seem out of the blue, and even weirder if you don’t remember me. We hung out for a few weeks back in the summer of 82. A picture of you showed up on my Facebook tonight, I think because we have a few mutual friends on here. I know we haven’t spoken in forty years, but I thought I’d just shoot you a message. I hope you’re doing well. L

Louis wakes up with a headache and a twinge in his neck. He hates that he used to be able to pull all-nighters at a club without a problem but now a quiet night in with a bottle of wine means waking up with hangover.

He rolls over and grabs his phone, squinting at the too-bright screen. A low battery warning appears. Two percent. Groaning, he stretches to reach the cord on the bedside table and plugs it in so he can read through his notifications. Among the usual emails and news updates, there is a Messenger notification from Harry Styles.

He shoots upright, sheet falling around his bare hips sits up in bed. The night before comes rushing back to him as he focuses dry eyes on the tiny profile picture next to the unread message.

It had been a rare quiet night in with a bottle of red wine and his favourite reality housewives. A slower part of an episode led to scrolling through Facebook on his phone. That’s when he saw a picture that sent him back forty years. It was scary how capable this website was at finding connections between people he hadn’t talked to in decades. Because there on his timeline was a photo of Harry Styles.

In the photo, Harry stood with one arm around his sister, Gemma. They held colourful tropical drinks and smiled up at the camera, eyes squinted against the bright sunlight. Behind them, palm trees lined the white sandy beach to the horizon.

Harry’d been just sixteen when they’d met, but he still had the same wide green eyes, the same curly hair sticking out around his ears, the same deep dimples when he smiled. The only things Harry didn’t have back then were the glasses and his tattoos. The most striking of them was the butterfly on his abdomen, dark wings spanning his middle, drawing Louis’ eyes up to a smattering of chest hair and a pair of swallows.

Louis had gained his own collection of ink through the years, his own hair had gone completely grey, and he definitely had more wrinkles by his eyes than he did at eighteen. Despite all the time that had passed between them, Louis was still drawn to Harry.

The photo had been posted recently by Gemma. Louis read the caption:

Congratulations on surviving your divorce, here’s to the next chapter! 🍹

After seeing that picture of Harry, Louis couldn’t focus on his show. He drifted through memories of that summer forty years ago.

They’d met at a bonfire; it was the middle of August and summer was quickly coming to an end. Soon, he’d be off to university. He’d heard Harry first, a loud burst of laughter from across the field. Louis turned to the sound and saw the beautiful boy with curly hair arriving with a small group of friends.

The boy was a bit younger, with a cherubic face crowned with a curly mop of hair that fell over his eyes. Louis wanted to hear him laugh again; he wanted to be the one to make him laugh again.

He finally got his chance later that night when he spotted him sitting alone by the fire. Louis grabbed two new beers out of the cooler and headed over.

“Knock, knock.” Louis said.

The boy looked up, green eyes shining with flecks of gold in the firelight. He titled his head and hesitantly asked, “Who’s there?”

Louis smiled, excited that he’d caught his attention. “Nobel.”

He was quicker to respond this time. “Nobel, who?”

“Nobel… that’s why I knocked!” Louis burst out laughing. To his delight, so did the boy.

When their laughter subsided, he slid over and patted the log beside him. “I guess since you knocked so politely, I can let you in. I’m Harry.”

Louis gladly took the spot next to Harry. “Louis, nice to meet you. Would you like a beer?”

They spent the rest of the night trading jokes, trying to make each other laugh harder. It was the best night of the summer. For the two weeks that followed, Louis and Harry were inseparable, but summer came to an end, Louis left for university, and they lost contact.

It might have been crazy to reach out to Harry after so long. Did he even remember Louis? He holds his breath and opens the message from Harry.

Hi Louis, wow has it really been that long since that summer? Time seems to go by faster and faster every year. How are you?

Over the next few days, their sporadic messages begin to stretch into long nightly conversations. A week into it, Louis is surprised but delighted when Harry asks for his phone number. It’s much easier to send texts than to keep up with Facebook messages. With Harry’s number now stored in his phone, their nightly conversations spill over into all hours of the day.

A month after exchanging numbers, Louis finds that their conversations take up every spare moment he has. He’s gone from barely remembering to charge his phone, to never leaving the room without it.

The change is so noticeable even his sister comments on it when they’re out for lunch one Saturday. Lottie asks, “Why didn’t you tell me you were seeing someone?”

“What?” Louis looks up from his phone, confused by the question.

“Oh, come on, don’t play dumb with me. You’ve checked your phone three times since the waiter took our order. Who are you texting?”

Louis thinks quick and tries to formulate a believable excuse. “It’s just work.”

Lottie stares him down with an unimpressed look. “On a Saturday?”

“Something urgent came up Friday aftern–”

“I call bullshit. You never smile at work emails like that.”

She spends the rest of the meal trying to pry information out of Louis about the mystery person he’s texting, and he relents shortly after the waiter delivers their food. As he finally tells her about reconnecting with Harry, Louis realises that Harry is the first person he talks to in the morning, and the last person he talks to at night. And he wouldn’t change a thing about it. Except… he would rather talk to Harry in person.

Though they’ve shared plenty about their lives through texts, they haven’t met up. They haven’t even spoken on the phone yet. Louis knows that Harry lives near him in Manchester, has three grown children, and recently went through a divorce. But he doesn’t know what Harry sounds like. He wonders if Harry’s voice has changed much since he was sixteen, if it’s deepened with age, and if he still has the same laugh.

On his next night in while binging reality shows, with two glasses of wine encouraging him, Louis type out a text asking Harry out. Unfortunately, he knows Harry is busy and not able to check his phone all evening. The “Delivered” mark stares back at him until he falls asleep.

Harry arrives three minutes early. It’s a good amount of time to scope out the Italian restaurant and try to settle his nerves before Louis arrives. He hopes Louis is on time. It’s his first date since the divorce, first since he’d met his ex-wife. It’s also his first date with a man. Harry isn’t sure how he will handle it if Louis is running late, or, heaven forbid, doesn’t show up at all.

He almost combs his shaky fingers through his hair, but remembers at the last second the immense amount of fussing and hair spray it took to make sure it looked good before he left the house. It’s growing a bit long, curling on the sides around his ears. Spending that much time on his hair, he’d noticed just how much grey is starting to show through his roots. He needs to remember to schedule another appointment with his barber next week.

He tugs at the hem of the floral jumper he’d paired with dusky rose corduroy trousers, wondering what Louis might think of his more feminine style. He’s still getting used to it himself. He’s always loved bright colours and loud patterns but throughout his marriage, he’d kept the bold accents subtle, limited to his ties and socks. He never dared experiment with florals or shades of pink. His new wardrobe had been one of the first big changes after the separation. He found solace and enjoyment in expressing himself through new clothes now that his wife wasn’t shopping for him.

He checks his phone for the time, or a message from Louis. It’s just one minute past six.

“Harry? Hi.”

Harry looks up from his phone at the greeting. Louis is in front of him in nice black trousers and a fitted red polo that makes his biceps look incredible and shows off the tattoos scattered across his arms. He hasn’t shaved in a day or two, with a bit of scruff coating his sharp jawline. The golden hour sun highlights his equally sharp cheekbones and his silver hair.

Louis offers a reserved smile a quirk of his brow. Shit, Harry was so stunned by his beauty that he forgot to greet him back. His silent stare has probably turned awkward. “Oops,” Harry fumbles to slip his phone back into his pocket and greets Louis with a nervous wave. “Hi.”

“Ready to go inside?”

“Yes, let’s.”

Louis holds the door for Harry. As they head toward the Maitre’D, his hand rests on Harry’s lower back. The heat of his palm ignites a flame inside Harry.

The woman at the front greets them with a polite smile, “Good evening, sirs.” Her eyes lower to where Louis’ hand is holding Harry. Suddenly that little flame blazes into a white-hot beacon that everyone would notice. Where he’d wanted to lean into the touch just seconds before, it now feels like his palm is searing into him. Harry stiffens. She asks, “Reservation?”

Louis’ hand drops from his back and he brings his elbow up to his cover his mouth while clearing his throat. “Yes, should be under Tomlinson.”

“Great, right this way.”

The wine is good, the pasta is delicious, and the conversation is amazing. Louis hasn’t felt this much promise on a first date in years. They’ve covered a lot more ground in one night than they could have typing out texts, talking about everything from how their days went, to their families, to random places they hoped to travel someday.

They’d even broached topics that seemed too big to fit in their phone screens. Louis learned that Harry had been married to his ex-wife for more than three decades. Then, their three kids, a boy and two girls, grew up and moved out. Without footie practice, dance recitals, science fairs, and choir concerts packing their schedules, the flaws in their marriage came to the forefront. It only took a few sessions of marriage counselling for Harry to build up the courage to come out to his wife. Their separation and subsequent divorce had quickly followed.

Similarly, Louis shared that he’d been with his partner for sixteen years until he’d passed away in 2005. It was hard to open himself up to relationships for years after. Though his friends have tried to set him up on the occasional date, he hasn't had much luck.

By the time the waiter dropped off the check, they’d circled back around to lighter topics, like the music they listen to.

“Oasis, love them. The best gig I’ve ever been to was seeing them play at Maine Road in ‘96.”

“Wow, I bet that was unforgettable.”

“Do you like concerts?”

“I love going to shows now. Unfortunately, my wife didn’t like them, so I didn’t get to go to any for the longest time. Luckily, my daughter loves music as much as I do and when she was a teenager she convinced me to take her and some friends. The first show we went to together was The Script in 2008.”

“No way! I was at that concert.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, a friend had a pair of tickets but they broke up with their boyfriend a week before the show, so they asked if I wanted to go. That was a good show.”

“It was, I had a great time, even though I was just a dad in the audience.”

“I’m sure your daughter appreciated that you were willing to take her and her friends. You seem like a great parent.”

“I hope so,” Harry says.

The waiter interrupts their conversation to bring back Louis’ credit card. As they leave the restaurant, Louis’ hand naturally falls to the small of Harry’s back again. Instead of tensing as he’d done earlier in the night, Harry seems to lean into Louis’ touch, allowing Louis to guide him around the crowded tables and back out to the street.

Outside the restaurant, Harry turns and Louis’ hand drops to his side. “I had a great time tonight, Louis.”

“I did too,” Louis says, biting back a frown as disappointment tugs at him. He doesn't want their night to end and hopes Harry feels the same. He didn’t immediately dash away once they finished their meal; that’s a promising sign, at least.

Under the warm glow of the street lamp, Harry looks beautiful. Slivers of tattoos peak out from the deep neckline for his floral jumper, which Louis recognizes from the photo on Facebook as the wingtips of the pair of swallows. Harry stands with his toes turned in and he fidgets with the rings on his fingers. He looks just as nervous as Louis feels.

He can’t hide behind the text on his screen this time, but he’s got a good feeling about inviting Harry back to his. Louis takes a deep breath, and asks, “I live just down the road, do you want to come back for a drink?”

“I’d love to.”

Louis unlocks his door and shows Harry inside. “Make himself at home. Would you like some wine? I have a bottle of red.”

“Yes, please.” Harry heads into the living room, taking a seat on the couch while he waits for Louis. By himself for the first time all night, doubt creeps into his thoughts as he thinks about where the night is headed.

Everything with Louis is going well. He’d been wary at first, in the early days since that Facebook message, thinking how strange it was to reconnect with someone that knew him when he was just a young kid. But over the past month, he’s come to really care about Louis in a deeper way, wanting to know more about him, wanting to share every thought with him. Tonight had only solidified what he’d suspected from how often he looked forward to his messages. As his daughters would say when they were teens, he like-likes Louis.

Harry’s mouth goes dry. Now that he’s admitted it to himself, he doesn’t know what to do. He hasn’t kissed anyone but his wife in thirty-five years. What if he’s horrible at it and scares Louis away?

Louis brings two glasses of red wine and sits beside him. Harry doesn’t really need more. He has a pleasant buzz from the two small glasses he had with dinner, but takes a sip.

Louis sets his wine glass down on the coffee table and turns to Harry. “I am so glad we finally got to meet in person.”

Harry nods along, still feeling like his mouth is stuffed with cotton despite the wine. He takes another sip. He holds it nervously twirling the stem in his hand, staring at the way the red liquid spins in the bottom of the glass.

“I’d really like to kiss you, Harry.”

Harry’s eyes snap up to meet Louis’ and his hand stills. Despite all his doubts, he would really like that, too. His voice is barely above a whisper as he nods. “Okay.”

Louis leans in. Harry melts into the soft press of Louis’ lips, responding to the gentle touch with a breathy gasp.

When they part, a smile tugs at the corners of Louis' mouth, deepening the crow’s feet around his eyes. He grabs the wine glass from Harry and places it on the table next to his.

This time when Louis leans in, Harry meets him half way. Any hesitation from their first kiss is gone as Louis’ tongue coaxes his lips to part. Everything about kissing Louis is new. New and different. Different than kissing his wife. Harry tries to shake the comparisons from his mind. Louis shifts them to lie on the couch as their kisses deepen. Hands wander over clothes, then under shirts.

Louis’ hand brushes over Harry’s clothed cock. A jolt of pleasure surges through his veins, but it hits like ice water. Harry’s eyes fly open as he realizes he’s hard. Suddenly, he’s not ready for what comes next.

Louis pulls back, confusion knitting his brow.

Harry covers his face with his hands, embarrassment staining his cheeks. “Sorry, sorry.”

“What’s wrong?” Louis scoots back a few inches on the couch, giving Harry space. Harry both appreciates it, and hates that he’s ruined the moment for Louis.

“It’s stupid.” He shakes his head, unable to meet Louis’ eye.

“It’s okay, whatever it is, I promise.” Louis assures him. “Do you want to talk about it?”

Harry pauses for a moment, considering how to explain the jumbled mess of his thoughts. There’s no order, no sense to the intense wave of emotions that crashed into him, but Louis looks so earnest, so patient. He lets his biggest concern spill out first.

“I’ve never slept with a man.” Harry holds his breath, pursing his lips to keep any other deep fears from tumbling out to fill the silence.

Louis grabs his hand gently, holding his palm in his, “That’s okay. We don’t have to do anything if you’re not ready.”

“But what if I’m not ready for a long time? What if I am never ready? It’s been years since I’ve slept with anyone. Hell, it’s been decades since I’ve dated anyone.”

“That’s okay, love.”

Harry begins to shake his head, ready to argue that Louis shouldn’t have to wait years for him to catch up when he’s been out for decades. Louis gives his hand one gentle squeeze. “Wait here, please.”

Louis springs off the couch, and heads down a hallway out of Harry’s sight. His eyes begin to wander around the living room, catching the row of picture frames lining the mantle above the wood-burning fireplace. He’s tempted to cross the room to get a better picture of the people in Louis’ life that are important enough to be displayed, but before he gets off the couch, Louis is back. He’s carrying a very old shoe box, with moth-eaten cardboard that looks like it could turn to dust in a light breeze.

Louis sits on the couch next to Harry, pushes their wine glasses out of the way, and sets the box on the coffee table.

Before he opens the box, he turns to Harry. His knee presses against Harry’s thigh but neither of them move away. Harry meets his eyes; the deep blue irises shine as he begins to talk.

“Going out with you tonight has been better than I ever imagined. And, I’m hopeful that it won’t end here. I want to keep seeing you. I want to get to know you, at whatever pace you need.”

With that, Louis turns back to the box and lifts the lid. He carefully sorts through the stacks of letters and photos, keychains and little trinkets inside as if the dusty contents are catalogued in a meaningful order. He pulls out a small Polaroid, but holds it so Harry can’t see the photo. He twists his ring around his finger to stop himself from reaching for it. He’s never been patient when something’s piqued his curiosity.

“A month ago, Facebook suggested that I might know Gemma because of a mutual friend and showed me the recent picture she’d posted of you both on vacation. It might have been a fluke, or maybe it was something closer to fate, that I saw that picture. Whatever it was, I’m glad I sent you a friend request that night.”

“I’m glad you did, too.” Harry says. His heart races as he tries to anticipate where Louis is going with this conversation.

Finally, Louis flips over the photo and hands it to Harry. The orange glow of a bonfire lights up two people sat close together on a log. Harry gasps as he recognizes a familiar curly head of hair tipped back in a full-body laugh. A hand covers his mouth as he takes a closer look, noticing a young Louis next to him, with bright eyes and a fond smile watching the young Harry.

“Where did you get this?” Harry’s voice wavers. He didn’t know that a piece of that night still existed outside of his memory.

“A friend of mine was obsessed with taking Polaroids that summer. Do you remember that night? It was– ”

“–The night we met. Of course, I remember. You told me the stupidest knock knock jokes.” Harry nudges his elbow into his side. His nose scrunches up as he adds, “But they all made me laugh.”

Louis smile widens and he looks so fondly at Harry. “Forty years ago, we didn’t get a chance to be together. There were a lot of obstacles in the way and the world wasn’t ready for us back then.” Louis nods at the boys in the picture. “We’ve got this rare second chance and I think, this time, we could become something great.”

Harry brings his hand to Louis’ cheek and pulls him close, against his lips he whispers, “I think so, too.”

Louis and Harry sit together on their couch, flipping through the photo album filled with Polaroid pictures of them. They’re back home now after spending a week at a Jamaican resort to celebrate one year together. Harry holds a small stack of new photos from the trip, ready to be slotted into the next open pockets.

Louis had been endeared when Harry had shown up to their second date carrying a vintage Polaroid camera, determined to capture moments of their new relationship on the instant film just as the night they’d met had been. Now, there are nearly a hundred moments filling over half the album from their first year together.

Louis can’t wait to fill album after album with Harry.

Their first Polaroid is still his favourite, but the most recent one is a close second. In it, Harry and Louis stand on the beach with the ocean behind them. Harry’s face is scrunched up fondly as Louis presses a loud smacking kiss to his cheek. Harry’s hand rests on Louis’ chest, with a new silver band on his ring finger.

Harry turns another page of the album. There are only two photos on this page. Harry begins to slide the new photos into the remaining pockets.

“Wait,” Louis says when Harry gets to the final photo. Harry pauses, looking up at him. “I’ve got an idea for how we should announce our engagement. Can you take out this and the first one?”

They haven’t taken the first picture out since Harry had added it to the very first slot of this album. It is a much better place to keep the photo than in the dusty old shoebox in the back of Louis’ spare closet anyway.

Harry shrugs, flips to the front of the book, and hands the photos to Louis. He arranges them side by side, 1982 and 2022. Tenderness swells in Louis’ heart seeing the two moments next to each other. Time has yellowed the boarder and faded the first picture, but to Louis, it’s never looked better.

Louis pulls out his phone and takes a picture of the two Polaroids. Harry leans over his shoulder, watching as he opens the Facebook app to create a new post. Louis types out a new caption for the photo.

Excited to get this second chance with you because we’re getting better with time.

“Your captions get sappier every time.” Harry laughs.

Louis pouts dramatically. “Hey, I thought this one was good. It's definitely better than the knock knock joke I could have written instead.”

“It is good, I just like teasing you.” Harry leans in for a kiss.

Louis turns his face to the side, letting Harry’s lips fall to the side of his mouth. “Hold on a sec. Just need to post this.”

With Harry kissing the side of his neck, just below his ear, Louis hurriedly checks over the caption once more for typos and then clicks “Post”. He doesn’t even wait for the first likes to come in as he closes the app and turns off his phone. The likes and comments will be there later. For now, he’s got his fiancé all to himself.