Deep (Zarry AU)

Clouds

2013

How often did Harry sit there thinking: fucking Nick – right again? Too bloody often, Harry thought. This time, it was something Nick had said to Harry just after Harry had told him about That Night - during one of their drunken conversations entitled Zayn Malik: His Mind and Motivations:

"You seem to be forgetting one rather important thing, Hazza."

"What?"

"Well unless my reading of the Daily Mail is completely wrong, he still has a girlfriend."

"What, you mean Perrie?"

"Yeah Perry, Kerry. Terry. Whatever."

"Well, I don't think Zayn's exactly committed to anyone, is he? I mean he hasn't been behaving like he is."

Nick had looked across the street. They were sitting at a pavement table outside a late-night café in Soho, taking a monumental risk that only their snapbacks were lessening, their conversation almost drowned out by the thumping beats from the gay bar around the corner. Nick had leaned forward, put his elbows on the table and bitten at his thumbnail. Then he'd said:

"Yeah, but that's the thing, young Hazza. It's amazing how something like this can lead to someone in his position making some grande geste – some big display of heterosexuality. Cos they're running scared of all the stuff that's actually got their engine revving."

And now here Harry was, a few months later, sitting on his bed watching a youtube video; an overexcited female presenter speculating about rings and venues and how her bandmates must be buzzing. And Nick had been right again.

It was still a rumour of course, and Harry fully expected Zayn to deny it; after all, Niall had said he'd taken at least one girl back to his room after the second Las Vegas show. Of course it was always possible that those girls were just going back to Zayn's room for a chat.... Just as it was always possible that Harry would still think he was in love with a girl after she'd let him do her in the way he liked best.... Possible - just not likely.

But then Zayn had sat them all down – the whole band - around a pub table a few days before the This Is Us premiere and told them; a smile playing over his lips like getting hitched was all he'd ever wanted. Niall had high-fived him and Louis clapped him on the back, although Harry knew what Louis secretly thought. Harry couldn't help himself though. He had just sat there, silent, watching; rubbing his fingers back and forth across the table's rough surface. He later noticed that a splinter had embedded itself in the tip of his thumb.

*

"Seriously? Why?"

"Why not?"

"Well, you're too fucking young for a start."

Zayn and Harry were on their own in the dressing room. Zayn turned away, kicking at a shoe that Louis had left on the floor when he'd run out to retrieve his phone from the car. Harry figured they probably had five minutes before Louis returned.

"Ah love her."

"Ok." Harry stared at the ground, his arms folded across his chest so his unbuttoned shirt felt closed.

"What about the others though, Zayn? Giving all that up now are we?"

Zayn didn't hesitate. "They didn't mean anything."

He stared at Harry. Harry stared back.

"You were the one that said –"

Harry turned away, looking out of the small window that gave over a solitary patch of trees.

"What, Zayn? What did I say?"

"That it wasn't good for the band," Zayn whispered.

"And you believed me?"

When Harry turned back he noticed that Zayn's hands were shaking.

"It's all in the past now, anyway."

"What's all in the past, Zee?" Louis sauntered back in, tucking his phone into the pocket of his black bomber jacket. "Oh yeah, your freedom!" he grinned and butted Zayn with his shoulder affectionately.

Harry stood frowning at the ground. He swept his hair out of his eyes and left the room.