Took Me By Surprise [Zayn Malik] ✓

Chapter 27: Trouble With Management

A/N: yesterday (the 18th of March) it was my best friend's 17th birthday AND our story reached 10,000 reads! ^^ this NEEDS to be celebrated! <3

*Jenan*

   "Oh my God, like, seriously??!" Leesha asked and I could hear that she was close to freaking out. I was sitting in the secret room (the one with the awards, magazines..etc) holding a letter in my hand.
   "Do you think I'm kidding?" I asked, feeling a little bit annoyed. I had called her expecting some piece of advice instead of that enthusiasm I couldn't afford to feel.
   "No no, of course not." She replied. "But that's just.. ahhh!"
   "Leesha!" I scolded. "I need your help!"
   "Yeah, yeah, sorry. Read it again please."
   I sighed deeply, took the paper out of the envelope and started reading:
   "Dear Mr. Styles. You are fairly invited to the annual MTV Video Music Awards on Thursday, July  6, 2012, honoring the best music videos from the previous year. The awards will be broadcasted from the Staples Center arena at L.A. live in Downtown Los Angeles." I trailed off and Leesha sighed dreamily.
   "Are One Direction performing?" she asked.
   "Yes, the boys are performing." I stressed the boys cos it bugged me when Leesha called them One Direction. It sounded unfamiliar to me. As if they were strangers.
   "Continue!" she urged me eagerly.
   "There's nothing much more. Only the categories where 1D are nominated in, and that a company is hoped-for."
   "You should definitely go!!"
   "What?"
   "Why not??!" she sounded shattered.
   "I'm not even invited!" I exclaimed. This girl was crazy! I find an opened letter in Harry's room, get unsteady by the content, call her to satisfy her fangirl-needs and what does she do? Say I should go with them to that award show!
   "And you think that none of the five of them is going to ask you?" she asked sarcastically. "Believe me, you'll end up being asked by both of Zayn and Harry!"
   "Then," I replied "I'll reject their invitation politely."
   "Why?!"
   "Because.." I exhaled. "..This would mean I would go out with One Direction in public. It's like giving the world the nod to photograph me and gossip viciously about me! There will be a lot of cameras and One-Direction-fans and don't-know-whos!"
   "What's the matter with that?" she asked. "It's been now quite a while since you know that they are very famous celebrities, can't you expect how this affects you? The boys are your friends, and I don't think a little sacrifice would harm you."
   I sighed again and decided to drop the topic. For a while we spent talking about Egypt and how things were going. At the end of the phone call I jolted and asked: "Lee?"
   "Hm?"
Taking a deep breath, I stood up and walked towards the door. What I said next came out of my mouth almost in whispers: "Zayn acts strangely since he's come back from Bradford."
   "He was in Bradford??" she asked avidly.
   "Leesha, that's not the point!" I said impatiently and opened the door ajar, taking a sneak at the scene outside.
   "Yes, yes, pardon!" she quickly answered. "How strangely?"
   Zayn was in a deep conversation with Liam. Harry, Niall and Louis were nowhere in sight. "I don't know. He looks at me in a strange way and he just acts differently around me. I'm utterly confused."
   "Differently in an angry way?" she questioned.
   I shook my head and replied: "No. More.. cautious and wary."

**

   Talking to Leesha didn't help me. Her assumptions were either ridiculous, unrealistic or both. At the end she told me to simply ask him and –at first— I agreed. But now I just don't find the courage to do so. I don't know what it is, but a feeling inside of me told me that the answer won't be simple at all..
   "Anybody home?" Zayn's waving hands infront of my face pulled me out of my thoughts.
   "Huh?" I mumbled and blinked at him. He chuckled and his warm breath tickled my face and sent shivers down my spine. I examined his features; his messed-up hair, his jaw and chin, his eyebrows and even his mouth. And in the middle of them all, his warm eyes, looking at me with something I couldn't put my finger on.
   "You seemed to be deep in thought." He commented and ran with his hand through his hair. As he did so, my eyes fell on his tattooed arm. Then, he leaned forward to the cocktail table and grabbed his glass.
   "Yeah." I replied. "I thought about.. you."
   He stopped in his action and turned to me. A smirk lit up his face as he said: "I think I will never get used to the feeling I get each time a girl tells me I'm all she thinks about."
   I acted scandalised and threw a pillow at him. We both laughed but then it came to my mind that maybe really a lot of girls tell him he was all they thought about, and I stopped laughing. "Seriously?" I asked.
    He stopped laughing too and looked at me in confusion. "What? That girls tell me they think about me?"
   I nodded with a serious face, my heart jumping in fear. He was a highly coveted celebrity and Leesha had showed me the endless dimensions of the One Direction fandom. He meets pretty, awesome, wonderful girls every day..
   "Don't be silly." He grinned. "Of course I get to hear that from time to time but it's not the same when you say it to me." My heart fluttered and I started to feel dizzy, looking into his eyes. I began wondering about the strange feelings I started to get whenever I was around Zayn. The next thing which came to my mind was Harry's declaration of love and suddenly I felt the need to tell Zayn about it.
   "Zayn?"
   "Hm?"
   "Harry.. he told me he was in love with me." Direct and short. That's good.
   Zayn's face seemed to darken up a little before he replied: "I know."
   My eyes flew wide open and I crossed my legs, looking at him quizzical. He sighed, turned his eyes away from mine and replied: "Once he was drunk and confessed to us that he loves you. I actually didn't take him serious but obviously it wasn't just a side-effect of being trashed."
   "Why didn't you tell me??" my back straightened up and I looked at him accusingly. He turned to me again and asked: "Why should I?"
   "Because," I said. "You are very close to me and if you see that my best friend seems to be in love with me, then I think it's your thing to let me know!"
   I didn't know why the fact Zayn keeping it confidental bugged me. But I knew that he was about to get angry cos next he said: "I told you I thought he didn't mean it seriously!"
   "But still.."
   "No. You wouldn't have done it if it was coversely!"
   "I would have!" I lied, defending myself. "Because maybe you loved that person back, and telling you she has feelings for you could make you two get together!" how weak were my arguments!? And stupid!
  "Really?" he said, pissed off. "Then I'm sorry for standing in the way to a relationship between you and Harry!" he rose up, snatched his cigarettes and started walking away.
   "Don't be silly!" I yelled. Didn't he just say the same to me? "You know me and Harry could never get together, even if we had real feelings for each other, but he doesn't actually love me!"
   And then.. I don't know what it was. Zayn's back turned to me, him walking away, the argument with him, the thing with Harry, the feelings which came whenever I was with Zayn.. or maybe all of these things together got to my head and heart and I started crying. I didn't sob, only tear a lot.