slow it down // zayn malik

chapter twenty-two // do i wanna know?

linley's pov

I can feel my heart pounding in every inch of my body as I walk beside none other than the Jonny Delark. I can't even keep track with how many times I've listened to his music on my ipod and fantasized about meeting him. 

And now he's here with me, talking and laughing and focusing on me. If I didn't know any better, I would say I'm stuck in another one of my fantasies.

But this is real life. 

"You're much smaller than I was anticipating," Jonny comments, pulling me from my thoughts. 

Laughter just bubbles out of my chest, my cheeks already stinging from all the smiling I've done the past few minutes. It's one of those smiles you can't fight against, yet you feel so stupid standing there smiling while he looks so goddamn cool without even trying. 

"I get that alot," I smile, "I think people don't realize how tall stages can be," I joke, causing him to laugh in return, shaking his wavy brown hair out of his face. 

 Ever-so-slightly, I take notice that he walks closer to me, causing our shoulders to brush every moment or so. It causes my head to get jumbled and my legs to tangle within one another. I feel like I was back in middle school again, getting all flustered over some boy. 

Laughter comes from behind us, causing me to glance over my shoulder discreetly. That bubbly feeling I had in my gut disappears as I watch as Zayn continues to make that Kenzi girl - the main singer of The Young and the Stupid - laugh as if it were his job. 

Unable to help myself since Jonny introduced her, I eye her up carefully. She's so pretty, but in that obvious way that makes life unfair. She fills out her floral summer dress in a way that I could never, with her tan, smooth-looking skin. 

Of course Zayn would go after a girl like her. Boys like him always do. 

Zayn catches my eyes and he wriggles his eyebrows suggestively, causing a large scowl to appear on my face. I don't know why I'm so goddamn frustrated with him. They'd be a beautiful couple; the most attractive couple I'd ever see. 

Part of me wants to be glad that Zayn has found somebody, that way he won't be irritating me constantly, but another part of me - the more selfish part of me - doesn't want some girl coming in here that knows nothing about him; that doesn't know him like I do. 

Perhaps my mind isn't so jumbled over my hormones and Jonny, but perhaps they're just jumbled and confused in general. 

"Here's our place for the remainder of the festival," Jonny's voice pulls me from my thoughts. 

Looking up, my eyes land on a large tent / cabin structure, identical to the others around it. I had been too consumed with my thoughts to realize we had entered the wealthy portion of the campgrounds, where the big stars usually stay. It cost more money than Sable and I have ever seen in our lifetimes to stay in a place like this. 

"Pretty rad, eh?" Jonny grins proudly as he leads the way to the tent.

I just smile and shake my head, still in a state of disbelief that he actually exists in real life and is wasting his breath on a girl like me.

He ducks carefully before disappearing behind the creme walls of his beautifully crafted tent that costs more than my entire life. I follow behind him closely, awkwardly trying to enter as Zayn drags behind me and complains when I tug too hard on the handcuffs. 

I shoot him an irritated glare as we enter the depths of the tent, causing him to roll his eyes in return. He's been acting strange ever since Jonny showed up.