Wild (sequel to Deep) - Zarry AU

True

I threw the small, squishy ball into the air and caught it.

"Seriously, Riss... why don you jus leave this with me and I'll get back to you when I finish with editing it?" Val scooted the mouse around as he scanned the screen of his desktop. He'd bought a flashy new one since getting promoted at work and seemed to like playing with it just to impress me. He was still living with his parents, though. The one fact didn't quite make up for the other.

"Hmmm?" I had a mouthful of gum.

"Yes... I mean, that'd save you hangin around here playin' with my dog's toys."

"unhrghhh!" I dropped the ball I had been throwing and catching for about ten minutes. "That's ... your dog's?" I wiped my hand down my leggings. "I thought it was a stress ball!"

"Well..." Val was channelling his inner sass now... "I think this story of yours might need a lot of work, so you're gonna be here a while! Might... not be worth.... staying..."

I slumped down onto Val's bed. He had taken down the posters of the boys save for a small picture of Zayn with green hair and he no longer slept under a 1D bedspread. Trying to be sophisticated, like we all were.

"Ok... but just get to the main bit... I want to see what you think."

It was probably a bit of a risk asking Val to beta my fanfic. I was a bit out of practice so I knew he would have a lot to say. And not only was he fussy about the plot and whether he thought the boys would actually do this or that, but his English was maybe also not always perfect so he didn't get it when I used idiom and slang... still, he was my best hope at this point.

I lay back on the bed and listened to the clock ticking.   I think I must have started to fall asleep.

I heard what sounded like a grunt.  I opened my eyes.

"Ehh?" Val said.

I sat up and squinted at Val through the afternoon light which was now slanting through the window. 

"What the...?" I mumbled.

"Riss..." he was saying, "this scene.... Seriously?"

"Which... ?" I got off the bed and leaned over his shoulder to look at the screen. "What...you mean the sex scene?"

"Yeah... the like....scene in the hotel."

"What about it?" I yawned and rubbed my eye.

"Riss.. it's a scene in a hotel room during a power cut!  Which starts with Harry kneeling in front of Zayn to ... you know... then standing up and pushing Zayn's jacket off ... his shoulders... then they kiss... then they turn... la di da...." He stopped, turned and looked up at me. "What the actual fuck, girl?"

I stared at Val.  Ok, I might have been pouting slightly.

"You just wrote the whole bloody sex tape!!"

*

I shrugged, looked out of the window. Now who was the small child, being told off?

Val carried on staring at me.

"You can't do this!!"

I looked back at him.

"Why not?"

"Because.... because... it's real!"

"So?"

"You're violating their .... " he searched for the word... "privacy!!"

"No one's gonna know it's real."

"That's not the point!"

"Well.... " I searched for arguments. "It would have been much worse if the actual tape had been published!"

"That's not the point either!" He looked at me as if I had actually murdered his dog instead of just borrowing its toy.

"Riss." He crossed his arms. He looked and sounded like my old maths teacher now. The one I hated because he was so condescending. "I almost unfriended you when you tried to sell that tape. You know that, don't you?"

"But it never happened, Val! The tape got buried!! And no one will ever know this is based on something real!"

Val grew silent and then serious. "The boys will know. Zarry will know."

"What??  Get real!  Zarry are never gonna read my fanfiction!!!"

Standoff.  We stared at each other for a good minute.

Finally Val spoke.  "How do you know? And if they do, they will know you saw the tape! And that you were probably the one trying to sell it!"

I turned to the door and picked up my bag.

"You're crazy, Val!! They are never, ever going to read it!"