little do you know // niall horan au

chapter 5; scarecrow

Harlow was simply...too much for Mona to handle sometimes. Mona's reasoning? The outfit Harlow picked out for herself to wear for Fright Fest.

"Bruh," Mona groaned, internally wincing because she had no doubt started saying it when Zayn began throwing the word around as a joke and now it was somehow embedded into her vocabulary. "It's cold outside."

Harlow shrugged, pulling on leggings as if that would shield her skin from the cold. "So what? I'm not gonna let a little wind stop me from looking cute." She snapped her fingers for emphasis, grinning at Mona through the reflection in the mirror, and all Mona could do was give her a look, raising her brows and pursing her lips, all while shaking her head.

"You're impossible," Mona tutted, rising and making her way to Harlow's closet to snag one of her NYU hoodies. "It's cold outside and when you start to cry about it I'm just gonna laugh at you."

"Aww," Harlow cooed, checking her hair once more in the mirror before turning around to face Mona. "I expect nothing less from you." Before Mona could come up with another response though, Harlow's ringtone was blaring from somewhere beneath her unmade bedsheets. She rolled her eyes, because leave it to Harlow to leave her phone buried under a pile of sheets and pillows. She managed to grab it before the call rang out, answering with a breathless "hello?" even though she had nothing to be breathless about. "Time to go!" she exclaimed after wrapping up the call, squealing a bit as she slipped the phone into her tiny purse. She tugged on Mona's wrist until she was rising to her feet. "Aren't you excited!"

Mona couldn't lie, she was actually looking forward to it, so much so that she couldn't even suppress the bright grin that had crept along her features at the sight of Harlow's excitement. "Obviously," she got out through her giggles, allowing Harlow to pull her out of the room and through the apartment to go outside. Harlow babbled delightfully all the way down the elevator and through the lot in the back. None out of the six of them owned a car—Harry used to have one but his mom convinced him that it would be cheaper to simply use public transportation when he used to incessantly complain about how little pocket money he seemed to end up with—but Louis did. Their group was rather large though so Zayn convinced his cousin to lend another one to them for the day. Once they headed out into the lot, Mona and Harlow joined their usual group, which included Louis and—much to Mona's lowkey discontent—Cleo.

Cleo and Niall were already standing together, giggling away at something Louis said, and Mona tried to tamp down the urge to groan out loud when Cleo doubled over in her fit of chuckles, her head leaning forward to rest on Niall's shoulder. She hated herself for the way her blood boiled when Niall's hand went around to rest on the small of her back, loathed the way she couldn't help but think that Cleo probably looked better with Niall than she ever did.

Zayn nudged her shoulder, snapping her out of her thoughts, and when she glanced over at him, he was raising his brow at her, the ghost of a smirk passing over his features. "Ready to go?" he asked, though Mona knew that was not at all what he'd rather be talking about. But, in his typical Zayn way, which Mona greatly appreciated, he gave her an out and she snatched at it, nodding her head as he gestured towards his cousin's car.

"I call shotgun," Mona got out rather amicably despite the fact that—no matter how much she denied it—the sight of Niall and Cleo made her heart fall to her stomach and caused the rise of her blood pressure. Zayn scoffed under his breath a bit, shaking his head before unlocking the car, and Mona knew he was slightly disappointed in her because he hated it when she tamped down her feelings like that.

Mona heaved a breath of relief when she settled in the front seat but her moment of ease was soon disrupted by Niall and Cleo climbing into the back, both of them laughing obnoxiously loud. "Hey, Mo," Niall got out breathlessly, nudging Cleo with his elbow as if that would help her giggles subside.