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Twelve days. It’s not long, really. Not quite a fortnight. A little over a third of a month. It’s less than four percent of a year. In the grand scheme of things, twelve days is not a very long time. It’s really not a long time when it’s all you have to make the most important decision of your life, as Niall is learning.It’s nearly time. Every second on the clock over Niall’s bed seems to tick by at double-speed, the clicking of the gears digging claws into Niall’s brain that render him unable to think of anything other than the way they’ve been disappearing since midnight mass. The way they’re whizzing by, as if Niall hasn’t found himself with a fork in the road in front of him and a bomb set to a timer at his back.On the morning of the thirteenth, he’d given Niall a choice. Stay, or run away. It’s simple enough, in theory. In reality, though, it’s much more complicated. Niall has devoted himself to something. He’s pledged his life and body and soul to the service of his mission. Everything he is, is bound in black and white, starched and compressed and uniform. His life is laid out in tidy columns, and he finds that satisfying and comforting. He’s lived his entire life by that rule. Black and white and clean and neat.And then he met Harry. Harry, who is a hurricane in human form- Blowing through Niall’s life without a care as to the utter destruction he wreaks. Harry, who lives his life not in black and white, but an explosion of colors that Niall hadn’t known existed before. Smears of red and spatters of blue and swirls of yellow follow Harry around in the air, as drawn to him as Niall has been since the moment they met.And it wasn’t some magical moment, either. It’s not some cute, romantic story that Niall would want to tell over and over again. It’s not a love story for the ages, but it’s theirs.Niall had found Harry in front of the building one morning, snoring with half of his face in a puddle of vomit, the reek of it nearly making Niall wretch when he stepped closer to investigate. But, because Niall is who he is, he’d shaken Harry awake by the shoulder and taken him inside to clean up. It hadn’t taken long to read the signs, to tell that the way Harry itched at his arms and his pupils were blown wide weren’t due to sickness or alcohol.He’d left once he was clean and stopped shaking, never speaking to Niall in the time he was there. Not a single word of thanks or goodbye. But he’d brushed his fingers over the back of Niall’s hand in what Niall would eventually come to recognize as a promise to return.Because Harry did return, though, ironically, it wasn’t for another twelve days after their first encounter. And Niall found him in the exact same state, in the exact same place. But, when Niall woke him up this time, he smiled. His lips parted, and, even through glazed eyes, it looked like he was looking at the only thing he wanted to see. Not that that had stopped him from departing again, without a single word spoken.It had taken four times of them repeating the cycle before Harry had said anything, and, when he did, Niall nearly jumped out of his skin, all from a single word.“Why?”Three letters that encompassed a question Niall had never, in his black and white and neat and clean life, been able to answer. Not really.So Niall had shrugged and pointed to his neck, allowing it to suffice as a response. And that had been all it took for Harry to walk out, leaving Niall with the same question that Harry had posed to him.And it was the first word on his lips the next time he found Harry.His response had made Niall’s heart throb. He wanted to forget. He wanted to be someone else. He wanted to die, for the chance to be reborn as someone new. Each time Niall found Harry, the question was asked on both sides. And each time, Harry’s response changed, while Niall’s remained the same. The results never changed. Harry always walked away once Niall pointed out his duty.One morning, Niall had had enough. He’d had enough of finding Harry on the ground, only half existing in this world, which desperately needed the color and light he brought to it. He’d cleaned Harry up, once again, but when Harry turned to leave, Niall grabbed him by the wrist and led him to the bathroom. He’d forced Harry to look in the mirror, and asked that question again.“Why?”Harry hadn’t been able to say anything in response. Instead, he peeled off his shirt without making Niall turn around like he normally did. Reds and blues and yellows followed Harry around, yes, but they were also littered across his body. Imprinted and stained and beaten into his skin, along with purples and greens and greys that made Niall’s fists clench at his sides and his stomach try to escape through his throat.His father had left them there, as Niall slowly learned between bouts of Harry’s withdrawal, tracing over each of them with his eyes. Harry had a smart mouth. Harry forgot to buy the beer. Harry liked boys. Harry existed. Each had a name and a reason and a story attached to it with a little tag, etched into Harry’s soul. Each sin, real and perceived, was engraved into Harry’s bones and his eyes, and Niall finally understood why he kept them clouded. He wanted those sins to be hidden from anyone who dared to look past the dark cloak of leather that he shrouded himself with.But those sins didn’t deter Niall. He spent his life mired in sin, and he knew Harry’s demons posed far more of a threat to himself than to Niall.So he’d taken Harry by the hand and led him back to his room. He’d held Harry through the worst of things, and spent three days wondering just how strong Harry must be to survive the way his demons were threatening to tear him to pieces. They almost succeeded, more than once. He left Niall’s sheets damp with sweat and things shattered on Niall’s walls. He stained over Niall’s skin with ugly words and uglier tears. He left a ring of purple on each of Niall’s arms from where his hands had gripped at him harshly to throw him out of the way, and a gash on Niall’s lip that had drawn glances he did not welcome. He left a library’s worth of stories inked onto Niall’s walls and heart, slurred and delirious as they spilled from his lips.And then he’d just left.He’d left one morning, slipping out of Niall’s bed like a shadow and disappearing like one too.Niall didn’t see him again for weeks. He’d bitten his nails to nubs, always finding something to bring the boy back to his mind, until Niall found him again one morning, in the same spot as always.But Harry wasn’t snoring, and he wasn’t shaking, and he wasn’t in a puddle of his own vomit. He was just sitting there, with clear eyes.They didn’t speak at first, Niall just taking a seat next to him on the ground, until Harry’s fingers had tentatively slipped into Niall’s, and Niall’s had tentatively curled around them in return. And Harry hadn’t needed to clean himself up, but that hadn’t stopped him from following Niall inside, or Niall from waiting for him at the door. And Niall knew it was a sin of his own, but that didn’t stop him from pressing his lips against Harry’s when the other man had pressed his against Niall’s against the wall in the back, under the watchful eyes of the man that Niall had devoted his existence to.It never went farther than that. Niall wouldn’t allow it to. He’d stopped looking to find Harry in the mornings, and he’d stopped leaving the door open at night. He withdrew until Harry decided to come looking for him, for a change. And, like Niall had with Harry before, Harry refused to allow Niall’s demons to claim him. He refused to let the claws of sin tear Niall open and spill him all over the floor.From then on, Harry became a permanent fixture, not a transient one. The stone walls and floors of Niall’s building had become a part of him, but so had grey-green eyes and freshly cropped strands of chocolate brown. The fingers that slipped in between Niall’s at night became as familiar as the well-worn pages of the book he lived his life by.And it’s not to say that Harry spent every moment with Niall, because he didn’t. He’d disappear sometimes, for days even, but he found ways of letting Niall know that he was okay. He’d always brush his fingers over the back of Niall’s hand, and Niall learned that that was a promise Harry wouldn’t break, even though it had no words. He’d always come back, and though he had his vices, his escapes, none of them were the ones that left him shivering in Niall’s bed anymore.Sometimes he’d come back with his head hung low and tears in his eyes, apologizing for breaking a faith between them that Niall had never let himself form. His breath would smell of alcohol or sweat from another body, and though it made Niall ache, he forgave Harry, because he couldn’t give Harry what he was so desperately seeking from anyone who would give it to him. He couldn’t give over his body with his heart, because it was already promised to another. They both were, but Niall had no choice when it came to his heart.So he’d take Harry back to his bed and curl up to the boy’s back murmuring words of salvation to cover up the sound of Harry’s thousand whispered apologies into the hands holding him.Other times, he’d come back and refuse to let Niall touch him anywhere. Niall knew those times were much worse. Those were the times when another sin had been pressed between the pages of Harry’s skin. Those were the times that left him withdrawn and silent, following Niall around because he needed comfort, but refusing it at every turn.And one night he disappeared, and Niall didn’t see him for three days before he’d shown up and given Niall the ultimatum that has him staring at the ceiling now, listening to the ticks of the seconds fly by. Stay, or go. Devotion, or love. Black and white and clean and neat, or a storm of colors that stain across his existence forever.It’s almost time. It’s almost been twelve whole days, and Niall knows that Harry won’t wait for an answer. That Niall not showing up will be an answer in and of itself. But Niall can’t not give Harry the answer. He can’t not say goodbye. He can’t not watch when Harry leaves with his heart, because he’s not giving it back, and Niall doesn’t want it back. It belongs with Harry, even if Niall doesn’t.So, when he hears the squeal of tires that signals Harry’s arrival in the middle of the night so he can make his departure, Niall’s bare feet hit the ground and carry him out of his room without hesitation. They pad through the sacred halls of this place that’s been his home his entire life, between the pews and out through the old oaken doors that will have to reopen in a few minutes for people to begin filing in for the morning’s Christmas services to celebrate the false birth date of their Lord and Savior. They step forward, unflinching, into the snow and ice on the ground between him and the car that Harry is leaning against with a question written all over his face. The question both of them have for the other.“Why?”“Because I love you.” Harry whispers, wrapping his arms around Niall’s back and pulling him in close to protect him from the chill. “But I can’t stay. They’re releasing him from the hospital today, and- And he’ll kill me, Niall. He’s almost done it before, and that was before I ever hit him back. I can’t stay. So- Please- Please say you’ll run away with me.”“The church is the only world I’ve ever known, Harry.” Niall says quietly, curling his fingers into the loose fabric of the ratty, torn shirt Harry wears underneath his leather jacket.“Then let me show you the world you don’t know.” Harry murmurs, brushing his nose against Niall’s. “Let’s find new pieces and places together. Let’s find our own world, away from all of this.”“It scares me.” Niall admits breathlessly. “You scare me.”“And you scare me.” Harry returns. “Because I should have left as soon as I put him in the hospital, but I couldn’t. Not without giving you a chance to decide to come with me. These things you believe in- I don’t. But I believe in you, and I believe in us, and I want you to believe in me the way you believe in Him.”“I do.” Niall says, finally looking up into Harry’s eyes and knowing what decision he’s going to make after twelve days of adamant denial. His hands slip away from Harry’s shirt, and those grey-green eyes well up with panic for a moment until they find Niall pulling the starched, white collar from around his throat and dropping it to mingle with the same whiteness in the snow. The snow can have the whiteness, because Niall chooses color.He chooses Harry.“Why?”“Because I love you.”