Archive of Our Own

Niall is woken up by the familiar noise of his alarm. It’s piercing - the kind of loud beeping noise that permeates your brain; a smoke alarm, but somehow worse. Louis and Liam have been trying to get him to change it for years - but it’s the only thing he doesn’t sleep through - everything else too quiet to fully wake him. 

He groans, reaching a hand out from where he’s tangled in his duvet, and blindly trying to slam the button that turns it off; sighing in relief when it finally stops.

Lying in bed, he allows himself a few moments just to breathe in slowly. Then, he rolls out of bed - the duvet coming with him before he manages to successfully kick it off and jam his glasses on his face. It’s freezing in their flat - they really can’t afford the heating on - plus, Louis’ been on a weird, economically-friendly kick since the start of summer. Apparently, Lottie had done some research into global warming, and convinced him to change his ways. There’s now a post it note on their thermostat that reads, "Put on a jumper instead :)”.

He still can’t tell if the smiley is supposed to be passive aggressive or not.

Niall normally doesn’t mind the lack of functioning radiators that much; saving any kind of money is good by him. This month, though, it’s been so cold that the streets are frosted over with black ice. In all honesty, when Niall’s feet hit the wood of the floor in his room - he’s surprised to not find ice there, as well.

Fumbling about, he pulls a pair of socks out of his drawer, and then staggers his way to the kitchen. Liam is already sitting in there, mug of tea in his hand. He’s got papers scattered all around, and from the expression on his face - he didn’t go to sleep at all last night.

“Alright, Li?” Niall asks him - he walks over to where the teapot’s sitting beside Liam, taking off the lid and peering inside to see if there’s any left. There is - and Niall smiles, pouring it into a mug and glancing over to where Liam’s still sitting. He’s practically motionless, and looks as though he’s about to melt into the chair, purely out of sheer exhaustion.

“Yeah, fine. Just, got this thing to turn in, soon. I’m just doing one last read through. Been up all night doing it, mate. Not that I could have slept, anyway,” He sighs, blearily rubbing a hand over his face and then downing the rest of the tea in his hand. Niall feels tired just looking at him. “Lou brought some bloke back last night.”

Niall frowns, “I didn’t hear anything.”

“You’re lucky,” Liam says, darkly. There's a moment where the two of them just look at each other. Then Liam jumps; the panic clear on his face as he looks up at Niall. His face resembles the same kind of earth shattering fear as a child who has just been jerked out of a nightmare. “Shit, fuck, what time is it, Niall? Is this when you have a late lecture, or an early one? Have I missed the deadline for this essay?”

“What time’s your deadline?” Niall asks, slowly - praying for Liam’s sake, that it isn’t eight am.

“Nine.”

“Then you’re grand,” Niall grins, letting out a breath and slapping a comforting hand down on Liam’s shoulder. “It’s only quarter past eight now.”

Liam breathes out slowly, sinking back down into the chair. There was a time when Niall would have laughed at Liam’s unfounded panic, but he’s been there too many times to count, himself, and it’s never funny when you’re on the other end of it. So tired your head is too heavy for your neck - panic clawing in your throat, that horrible, raw kind of stress. Back in first year - he and Liam thought it would be funny to fuck with Louis - so they told him that he was an hour late to hand in his essay. 

Neither of them had thought it was funny when Louis had spent ten minutes breathing slowly in and out, curled in on himself. The next day, as revenge, he’d pissed on Liam’s comic books and cut the strings on Niall's guitar. Things that had caused more panic and stress than even Louis expected.

They’ve all learned better than to mess with each other, now.

“Here, you look like you deserve some food. Especially if you’ve had to listen to Louis shagging someone all night. If y’want, I’ll pick you up something on the way home from the lecture? I can get you some falafel. Might even be cheap, too - think El’s working today.”

“Shit,” Liam says, sinking forwards so that his head is resting on the table and breathing, slowly. “Thank god you have an early lecture. I think I just had a heart attack,” He places a hand on his chest and breathes deeply for a few more seconds, before he looks up at Niall and smiles. “Yes, food would be great, mate. I want falafels with, like, as much baba ganoush as you can justify, and hummus.”

“No bother,” Niall pats him on the back - in between his shoulder blades, again - and then ducks down to press a kiss to the top of his head. Smiling, he waves a hand at the computer, “G’wan. Submit your thing, then get some sleep. You know you’re rubbish without it, and you need to be awake to watch The Voice with us, later.”

“I hate that show,” Liam grumbles, but Niall just smiles.

“Only ‘cause you’re better than everyone else on it.”

Liam flushes, cheeks going pink, and he looks back down at his pile of papers. “M’alright,” He mutters. Niall laughs.

“You’re the best. Never lost a karaoke competition yet, have you?”

“Piss off, Niall,” Liam says, but he’s smiling. “Go to your lecture.”

“I’m not running late, yet. I can spare a couple of moments. Support you while you submit your work.” He leans down, looking over Liam's shoulder and squinting at the screen. 

“Stop nagging, I’m doing it now,” Liam says. He looks as though he’s still trying to be grumpy, but Niall knows him well enough to see the fondness underneath. The second that Liam clicks, ‘send’ on the email to his professor, he sinks back against the chair and laughs, shaking his head in clear disbelief. “Thank fuck,” He says.  

“Well done,” Niall tells him, slinging an arm over his shoulders in a sloppy hug. Then he catches sight of the clock on Liam’s laptop, and winces. “I actually do have to go now, though. I need to get a good seat, away from the prick in my lectures. I don’t know if Leigh’ll save me one, and I can’t cope with him looking at me all the time.”

Liam looks amused, eyebrows raising slightly. “Is this the guy that told you your taste in poets was shite?”

“Yes,” Niall hisses, scowling. “Fucking dickhead! Acting like I’m a cunt just because I don’t think that poetry should start and end with the Beat poets.”

“You love the Beat poets,” Liam says, snorting. “One of the first things that you told me was that if you were ever going to get a tattoo, it would be something from Howl. You have hipster glasses and want Ginsberg’s gay babies.”

“You’re not helping, Liam,” Niall says, shoving his glasses further up his nose, embarrassed. It’s rare that he regrets the things he says when he’s drunk, most of the time he thinks they're funny. His first conversation with Liam, however - is something that he wants pulled from everyone's minds. It was mortifying. 

“The point is; I can love the Beat Generation without thinking that it’s everything in poetry. This guy laughed at me for liking Yeats. He laughed, at Yeats! Who the fuck does he think he is?”

“Bro, you have got to get over your irrational hatred towards this guy,” Liam tells him, solemnly. Niall just rolls his eyes.

“It’s not irrational at all. It’s a perfectly well founded decision. I swear, this is the kind of guy that drinks PBR’s and thinks that Radiohead are the peak of all musical talent.”

Liam frowns at him. “You like Radiohead, too, Niall, and you definitely drank PBR’s when we were in America. Honestly, mate, I don’t know what you have against this guy, your taste is just as out there as his is, like. I dunno what you’re talking about, most of the time. I mean, mate. You’re doing an English literature course.”

“Fuck off, Liam,” Niall replies. “I’m leaving, now. Clearly you don’t appreciate me anyway.”

“I appreciate you lots!” Liam calls after Niall’s retreating back. “I appreciate you enough that you should reward me. Maybe through food, mate?”

“I’ll still buy you your fucking falafel,” Niall tells him, sticking his head back through the door and scowling. Liam grins, and gives him the double thumbs up.

“Thank you! Now piss off, or you’re going to have to deal with Louis and his new lad, too.”

“I’ll leave you with that one, Payne,” Niall calls back to him. “I had to do it last time.”

Liam groaning is the last thing he hears before he shuts the door to their apartment.

*

Initially, Niall had been a musician.

In the corner of his room, sitting there, is his old beat up acoustic. He got it when he was fifteen, as a birthday present from Greg. The wood was thin, and no matter how much he tried, he could never get it to stay in tune. He’d named her Marian, because he’d read The Once and Future King that year, and he’d had a massive crush on Maid Marian in it.

He loved that guitar - still does, really. Back then, he used to cart her about everywhere; strapped onto his back so if the situation called for it, he could whip her out, play a tune.  

He hasn’t played her in a while, so she’s probably wildly out of tune, but he can’t bring himself to pick her up anymore. Can’t bring himself to do it after everything went haywire, and his world fell apart a little.

Sometimes, he’ll look at the guitar in the corner - thinks about pulling her out, putting some of the words that he’s written to music. Sometimes, Liam will ask him to play a song on it - all careful eyebrows and twitching hands, and Niall will laugh it off - shove him away, pretend that it’s all fine.

It is fine, for the most part.

His English Literature and Creative Writing course isn’t exactly challenging; words have always come easy, to Niall. Still, it’s interesting, and loves working with words, studying the texts. Really, the only thing he would change are the people in his class.

Well, one person.

*

When he gets into the lecture room, Leigh grins - calling him over and shoving her bag off the seat she’s been saving for him. Niall smiles, chest loosening a little at the fact she did save him a seat. It’s not that he doesn’t get on, with Leigh - it’s just she’s a little absent minded, sometimes.

“Alright?” He asks, elbowing her. She grins.

“Yeah, pretty good. Still recovering slightly from the weekend, Jesy had us all out.”

“Drank more than you planned to?”

“Significantly,” Leigh says, shooting him a dark look. Niall laughs.

“You should know better than to take her on by now, Leigh. That woman is a force to be reckoned with.”

“Getting beat by women, Horan?” Someone says behind him, and Niall’s back straightens instantly. He turns, looks at the smirking face behind him and scowls.

“Being unnecessarily misogynistic, Malik?” He snaps back, and Zayn smiles. Cheek dimpling slightly in amusement; Niall finds himself endlessly infuriated by his existence.

“Hey, you know me. I love females,” Zayn says, and winks. It’s lame, way dorkier than someone who has a face like Zayn Malik’s should be allowed to be. Niall grinds his teeth together, and beside him, Leigh Anne rolls her eyes.

“You two are ridiculous,” She says. “You’d think that you’d be over this petty rivalry by now. You’re both good, get over it.”

“I’ll get over it when he gets over his hard on for Yeats,” Zayn says. Niall rolls his eyes.

“I never said he was a good person.”

“No, but you said he was a good poet.”

“Because he is! Plenty of people like Yeats, our professor likes Yeats. Ireland like Yeats! I don’t know why you have such an issue with him.”

“He’s a cliché.”

Niall looks at Zayn. Today, he’s wearing a distressed Rolling Stones tshirt with a black leather jacket, his hair is pulled into a ponytail, and his doc martens are in a shade of olive green. He even has a beard. Niall raises an eyebrow at him. Zayn shifts, as if he knows what Niall is thinking, and runs a hand through his hair. It catches on the bobble that’s tying his ponytail, and it slides a little looser, a strand of hair escaping and falling in front of his ear. He looks like he should be in a band, like the kind of guy you see in a film and roll your eyes at - because there’s no one in the real world built like them.

Niall grins, teeth sharp. “Sorry, Ginsberg. I didn’t realise that liking popular poets wasn’t allowed in the English courses.”

Zayn’s eyes narrow. “You can’t actually tell me you really hate the Beat Generation, Horan. I mean, you have to have at least some good in you. ‘Sides you’re no better than me for looking like a hipster. I mean, your beanie and skinny jeans combo are pretty bad, but the 1920’s glasses alone say it all, mate.”

“Are you mocking my poor vision?” Niall asks, eyes narrowing. “Do you want me to feel victimised? You know this university has an anti-bullying policy?”

“Calm yourself, Niall. The two of you are fucking idiots.” Leigh cuts in. She’s moved on from paying any kind of proper attention to them, instead - she’s produced a bottle of blood red nail polish from somewhere, and is going over the already immaculate coat on her nails, a bored expression on her face. “Niall loves Ginsberg.”

Zayn looks at him, eyes slightly wide - as if he’s surprised that Yeats isn’t Niall’s defining feature. “You do?” He asks, “I thought you had no taste at all.” Niall sighs, heavily, shooting Leigh an angry look before saying,

“No, I just have no taste for people who passed through universities with radiant cool eyes hallucinating Arkansas and Blake-light tragedy among the scholars of war.”

Zayn blinks, slowly; his eyelashes skimming against his cheek. Then he looks up at Niall and smiles - it’s the first one that’s looked genuine towards Niall since the first week of class. “I can’t believe this, like. You have the nerve to call me a cliché, mate, but you’re the one that knows lines from Howl off by heart.”

“All of part one, actually,” Niall says. Leigh snorts, and Niall glances at her before sheepishly saying, “Okay, all of it in general.”

Zayn’s eyes go wide. “Holy shit, mate.” He says, “That poem is really long. I mean, you must have some crazy fucking brain, like.”

“Niall’s a walking encyclopaedia of gay poets,” Leigh tells Zayn. “Actually, of poets in general. Go on, name one. Niall will be able to quote something.”

Niall flushes, and covers his face, embarrassed. When he does peek out through his fingers, well aware that his cheeks are bright red, it’s to Zayn looking at him, considering. “I would ask, like, but I reckon it’s not worth it. I mean, the professor will be here soon, yeah?”

Leigh shakes her head, her hair catching the movement, falling over her face slightly. “Don’t reckon he will,” She says. Zayn looks confused.

“Why not?”

“Because it’s twelve minutes after class is supposed to start, we’re a few of the only people here, and Professor Bond is never late. Bets it’s been cancelled, lads?”

Niall blinks, looking around and taking in the diminished number of students for the first time. Then he fumbles his old, beat up iPhone out of his pocket and pulls up his emails. The first, unread one in his inbox is from his lecture professor, and Niall rolls his eyes. “No bet,” He says, showing her the email. “Fuck, I could have had a lie in.”

“Same,” Leigh sighs.

“Neruda,” Zayn says - without context. Leigh and Niall both look at him for a few moments, before Niall gets it. Then he laughs disbelievingly, shaking his head.

“That’s too easy,” He says. “I’d think you’d pick something more obscure. You know, give your hipster heart something to thrive off.”

Zayn glares at him, but it’s not as harsh as some of his looks in the past have been. Instead, there’s an amusement there, sitting under the surface. “I want Neruda,” He says, and Niall sighs.

“Fine. D’you want me to quote him in Spanish or in English?” He asks, partly because he can, and partly to see the way that Zayn laughs disbelievingly, twisting the chunky silver ring on his finger around in circles.

“Jesus Christ,” He says, “No wonder you’re beating me in this class. I have an unfair disadvantage, like. Your brain’s not human.”

Niall stiffens without meaning to. It’s been a while since someone has said something like that to him - but he’s heard it enough times. He hates it, people acting like just because he’s good at remembering chunks of text it makes him somehow less human. He especially hates the fact that out of all the snappish remarks Zayn has said to him, out of all the arguments and insults - a casual remark, clearly half done in jest - is what hurts him the most.

He’s about to say something about it when Leigh gets there first.

Her eyebrows are raised, and she looks unimpressed with Zayn for the first time since he’s walked in today. “Of course Niall’s brain is human. Maybe you’re not beating him in class because Niall’s just a better poet than you, Malik,” She snaps. It’s unusually harsh, for Leigh, and Zayn looks surprised for a moment, before finally replying.

“Fuck off,” He says. “It’s easy enough to be good when you can just channel any poet you want, innit?”

“So you’re saying that I don’t write anything original?” Niall asks, just to check. Leigh has closed her nail polish, and is now looking between the two of them, frown on her face.

Zayn raises his eyebrows, and there’s a challenge in his face - as though he knows what he’s saying is ridiculous, but he wants to get a rise out of Niall anyway. He probably does, Niall finds himself doing things that irrational all too frequently when Zayn is involved. “Yeah, mate. What if I am, like?”

Niall smiles at him, blandly. He’s torn between making the whole thing a proper argument, and shutting it down before it gets too out of hand - before they end up snapping things at each other that are genuinely cruel. Niall might dislike Zayn, and strongly at that, but he’s been verbally attacked in the past - and he’s not stupid enough to think that Zayn wouldn’t be good at it. He settles for saying, smile still on his face, “I think you’ll find, mate, that I can write the saddest lines tonight.”

Zayn freezes, looking at him for a few seconds. “Did you just recite Neruda?” He asks, and Niall laughs.

“You did ask if I could.”

“Piss off,” Zayn replies - but there’s hint of a smile playing in the edges of his face, as though he wants to smile about it, but isn’t letting himself. They sit there, all three of them, for a few moments of silence. Zayn is looking down at the floor, and Niall is looking resolutely at the wall over Zayn’s shoulder. He doesn’t need to see Leigh-Anne’s face to know that she’s glancing between the two of them amused.

Zayn finally stands, his chair screeching against the floor as he does so - the noise of it grating Niall’s back teeth. “Alright,” He says. “I’m going to go home and sleep. Try to get over your irrational thing against me, Niall.” There’s a bit of an edge to his tone, and Niall wants to snap his teeth at it - latch onto it and start the fight up again. He represses the urge, rolling his eyes at himself internally for being so childish when it comes to Zayn.

“I wasn’t the one that started this, mate. I’ll get over my thing against you, the day you get over your thing against me,” He tells him. Then he smiles, but it’s the fake kind of smile. At the last moment - the feeling that this whole thing went too well kicks in, and the urge to be childish overwhelms him.

He gives Zayn the finger.

Zayn just rolls his eyes, storming out of the almost empty lecture hall. The few people that are in there turn to look at Niall, twists to their mouths that have become all too familiar to Niall. Maybe he and Zayn have become predictable.

Leigh turns to Niall, looking unimpressed. “You two are so ridiculous,” She says. Niall smiles.

“I can’t hear you, Leigh, babe. Sorry.”

“Honestly. When are you going to admit that you’re only so mean to him because you want to fuck him?”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Niall says. “You heard him there now, he was a dick.”

“He was a dick,” She concedes. “But only briefly, really. And I’m talking about when two guys find each other attractive, so they pull at the proverbial ponytail of the other via literary references and unhealthy competition in class. Maybe he doesn’t know how not to be a dick, when it comes to you.”

Niall sighs, heavily, “Oh, fuck off. You know that’s not it, Leigh. He can be a decent person, we’ve both seen it. I mean, has he ever been anything other than fucking lovely to Pez?”

“No,” Leigh smiles. “I think Perrie just has that effect on people, though.”

“Yeah, but regardless, the point still stands, like. I mean, he might be fit, and all-”

“Maybe the fittest bloke I’ve ever seen,” Leigh cuts in, nodding. Niall glares.

“He’s fit, but I don’t want to shag him. Especially not after him being such a wanker to me, like, all the time. ‘Sides, I’m not trying to beat him in class. I do that naturally.”

Leigh doesn’t look convinced at all.

*

Back in the apartment - Liam is snoring, the familiar sound of it floating through their flat. He’s left his bedroom door open, so that when Niall walks down the hall he can see Liam spread out on his tiny single bed. His duvet was a birthday present from Louis, batman cover - and it’s only over his chest, his legs sticking out awkwardly on the mattress.

He reminds Niall of home, and Niall smiles at him, softly. Then he walks on, pushing into the kitchen. His plan is to put Liam’s falafel wrap in the fridge, and then do some work at the kitchen table. Missing lectures is fun, in theory - but Niall’s a third year now, he’s been trying to get his shit together. He doesn’t have time to mess about.

He’s already thinking in poems, words when he gets into the kitchen - but his flow is thrown off by the man who’s standing at their stove. It’s not Louis, and it’s obviously not Liam, and Niall watches him, surprised.

He’s tall, and has black hair, and he’s humming along to the radio as he prepares some kind of food; nothing but bright pink boxers and Niall’s, “Kiss me I’m Irish,” apron on his body. This must be the guy Liam said Louis had brought home. He seems to be trying to make an omelette, but, from the look of it - he’s not doing very well.

“Hello,” Niall says, walking fully into the kitchen and sitting down at the table.

The guy jumps, and turns around - before smiling widely at Niall. “Hey,” He says, holding out a hand. “I’m Nick. Nick Grimshaw? I’m the host of the local radio station, so you’ve probably not heard of me.”

His teeth are very white, and Niall looks at him for a split second, before taking the offered hand. He doesn’t know Nick - not from his show, at least. Louis knows him well, though - apparently he’s a regular at the café Louis works. Niall has heard a great many stories about Nick Grimshaw. He doesn’t think a single one of them has been positive.

“Sorry, mate, don’t know your show. I’ve heard of you, though,” He replies, then he smiles wryly. “Louis talks about you a lot.” Nick snorts.

“All incriminating, I imagine?”

“‘Fraid so. I thought Louis hated you, to be honest, mate.”

Nick, thankfully, just seems amused by this. He laughs, leaning against the kitchen counter. “Did you? The bastard. It’s okay, don’t worry about it. I hate him too.”

“Right,” Niall replies, rolling his eyes. He would be ruder about it - but he’ll wait until he knows Nick a little better. Which, judging from the fact that Nick is still just wearing his boxers cooking in the middle of Niall’s kitchen, won’t take very long. Niall has long since given up on trying to understand Louis’ relationships with people.

“I can make one for you too, if you want,” Nick says then, nodding his head towards the pan. The eggs look like rubber, the bottom of the thing is burned black - and they’re not the usual omelette shape. Niall feels slightly ill just looking at them.

“I’m alright, thanks. I actually just had a falafel wrap.”

“Ah,” Nick says, nodding. He looks down at the pan in front of him and frowns, “I think that was probably the wise choice, actually.”

Niall laughs, and pats Nick gingerly on the back. “Don’t worry about it, mate,” He says. “You’re still doing better than Louis could.”

Nick smiles, it’s so wide that his eyes crinkle. He slides the rubbery omelettes onto plates and says, “I’m going to tell him you said that.”

“Said what?” Louis asks, wandering into the kitchen. He’s wearing tracksuit bottoms that are sitting far too low on his hips, and they’d been rolled up several times at the bottom. They look ridiculous on him, like a child trying on their parent’s clothes. Niall would bet money that they belong to Nick.

“That you’re a fucking moron when it comes to cooking,” Niall tells him. “Also, Liam’s pissed off at you two for fucking too loud last night.”

Nick has the good grace to look slightly abashed, but Louis just rolls his eyes looking unperturbed. “Please, like he didn’t do that all the time when he was dating Sophia. He has no room to talk.”

“True,” Niall says, snorting. Louis looks at him then, and frowns.

“Don’t you have a lecture, right now? If you’re skipping you have to put five quid in the jar, Niall. You know the rules.”

“I’m not putting money in the jar for lecture skipping. Fuck off, it was cancelled, Lou. ‘Sides, there’s enough money in there from you to get us food for the next month. Next year, even.”

Louis gives him the finger, but doesn’t deny it; he skips lectures way more than he should for someone that wants to be a drama teacher, or, in fact, a teacher of any kind.

“I’m sorry, do you actually have a jar that you put money in if you’re skipping a lecture?” Nick looks endlessly amused. Mouth quirking up to the right as he leans against their kitchen counter. He looks, sort of, like he’s already made a home in their flat; Niall resigns himself to seeing Nick a lot more often.

Still, his question hits a little closer to home than Niall would like.

“It’s the last year of university,” Louis answers, before Niall has the chance to say anything. “I’ve been told that this one is actually important, you know. Life changing, almost. We can’t go keeping up our wild, first year bad habits.”

“Of course,” Nick says, nodding seriously. Niall feels somewhat like he’s being laughed at, and he glances at Nick, raising his eyebrows. Nick just smirks at him.

“You’ve got a proper face on you,” Louis says, looking at him curiously. “Did you have another run in with Zayn?”

Niall scowls, angrily and starts cracking the knuckles on his right hand. “He’s just. He’s so fucking infuriating, Louis.”

Louis nods at him, claps him on the shoulder, and then turns to Nick, who’s watching the scene play out with interest. “Niall wants to fuck him.”

Niall snorts, moving on to crack the knuckles on his other hand. “Alright, go off, mate. I don’t want to fuck him. I want to fuck him up.”

“I think he’s cool,” Louis shrugs. Niall glares.

“Sorry, did you two say Zayn?” Nick asks, leaning against their cupboards and crossing his arms. He looks properly interested, now. Louis nods.

“Yeah, Zayn Malik. Third year? He’s an English lit and creative writing student?”

“Shit,” Nick whistles, low, looking delighted. “I know him. I mean, I didn't think that there were that many Zayn's. But of course I know him. He’s Harry’s flatmate. You know, Harry Styles?”

“Harry Styles being your?” Louis asks, eyes narrowing. Niall almost laughs at how disgruntled Louis looks. Nick just shrugs.

“Harry being my mate. I’ve known him a while, our mums are friends. Zayn’s his best mate. The two of them are pretty inseparable.”

“Are you jealous?” Niall asks, and Nick flips him off.

“Nah, Harry always comes running back to me. I’m like his surrogate father, I think. It’s quite disturbing, actually. Anyway, I think Zayn’s alright. He’s always been nice enough to me, if a little quiet.”

Niall snorts at that, “Zayn’s never been quiet to me.”

Nick looks confused, “Are you sure?” He asks.

Niall stares, “Yeah. I’m definitely sure. Think I can tell when someone’s shouting at me from across a lecture hall about their latest poetry endeavour, thanks.”

“I guess that answers my next question,” Nick smirks. “Which was going to be, what do you have against him?”

Louis rolls his eyes, “They have ‘creative differences’, according to Niall,” He actually does the air quotes around creative differences, and Niall rolls his eyes at him. “Me and Liam have discovered that this means they’re both too hipster for each other.”

“I’m not a hipster,” Niall says. “I don’t even have anything against the concept of hipsters.”

“Good, because Nick is a massive one,” Louis says, grinning widely over at Nick. Nick doesn’t look impressed with him at all.

“I don’t have anything against the concept of hipsters,” Niall repeats, louder. “I just think that anyone who believes they’re better than someone else because of their taste in poetryis a knob. Especially if the aforementioned person you think is a knob is doing better than you in all of the classes.”

“Well, now aren’t you just acting like you’re better than him? Louis asks. Niall blinks.

“No! Well. I mean. Shut up.”

Louis looks at him expectantly.

“The point is, Lou. He’s a prick, alright? And I’m not a hipster.”

“Whatever you say, man,” Louis says, nudging him in the hip. Nick has stopped properly paying attention to the two of them, his focus instead on his phone. He’s scrolling, looking bored, and Louis hops up to sit on the counter beside him. He pulls one of the plates with an omelette towards him, and looks down at it, trepidation obvious on his face. “What is this?” He asks.

“Omelette,” Niall says, before Nick can open his mouth - still too preoccupied with his mobile. Louis’ eyes snap up to meet his.

“Did you make this, Nialler lad?”

“Nope,” Niall says, popping the p, and trying not to laugh as the flicker of hope that was in Louis’ eyes dies. “That one’s all on your lad. I came in and he was slaving away at the stove, for you, Lou.”

“It’s true,” Nick says, nodding. Niall can see the smirk that he’s desperately trying to hide.  

Louis pokes it. The omelette slides around the plate with a squelching noise, and he looks up at Niall - pleading look in his eyes. “D’you wanna go halfers?”

“I’m alright, thanks,” Niall tells him. “I stopped by Falafel earlier. I’ve got a wrap for me and Li.”

Were Niall a better person, he might have felt slightly guiltier at the look of complete desperation on Louis’ face. There’s a brief moment where Niall considers offering to split the omelette - but then he catches sight of the smug look on Nick’s face and decides that this is a mating ritual he wants no part in.

“You have to eat it, Louis,” Nick says. “I made that special.”

“Yeah,” Niall snorts, before he can stop himself. “You made it special, alright.”

Nick looks over at Niall, and then smiles slowly - every single one of his teeth appearing in one of the most predatory grins Niall has seen in a while.

Niall has a moment to regret everything he’s ever said, and then Nick starts talking. “And to think,” He says, still smiling, “That you apparently have an issue with Zayn - when it’s his party that you agreed to go to with me on Friday. Funny that, isn’t it?” He widens his eyes, ever the picture of innocence. Niall stares.

“I never agreed to go to any par-” He says at the same time Louis talks over him with,

“Party on Friday?” Louis asks, eyes wide. He looks to Niall, expression clearly giving away that he knows Niall never agreed to anything of the sort. Of course he didn’t; Niall avoids parties like the plague. He hasn’t been out in months and months, just doesn’t do it anymore. It doesn’t matter to Louis, though. Now that he’s finally got a solid excuse to drag Niall with him, he’s going to take it.

“Sick,” He says. “We’re definitely all going.”

Niall stares at Nick. There’s no point even trying to argue with Louis when it comes to something like this; Louis loves any excuse to avoid his course load - and parties prove one of the best excuses. “You’re evil, mate,” He tells Nick. Nick just smiles, and gives a little wave.

Niall decides right then and there that Nick and Louis are probably going to last for a lot longer than either of them realise.

*

Friday, for once, comes too quickly for Niall.

Before - Niall never had to deal with Zayn in the context of real people. Zayn was absent, in all the way that counts, from Niall’s life. He only existed in the lecture hall, Niall hadn’t ever seen him outside of class. Arguing with Zayn was a break from the norm. Now, though - now he’s being forced into willingly entering Zayn’s space. Now he has to acknowledge Zayn as more than a punching bag for his literary preferences.

It makes him falter, in class. Quiet and awkward - he can’t think of anything to say when the new poem gets brought up; The Hollow Men, by T.S Elliot. Niall has a bundle of notes on it, somewhere - and his dad had always been an Elliot fan, but this - this deviation from routine, it’s messing him up.

It makes Zayn falter, too - somewhere in the middle of his spiel about Eliot’s use of free verse being like the wind that’s mentioned in the poem. He’s looking at Niall, like he’s waiting for Niall to jump in and correct him, or shout over him, but Niall has nothing to say.

Professor Bond looks over at him too, eyebrows raised slightly; he looks considering, which is never a good thing - because their professor is one of the shrewdest people Niall has ever met. It’s clear he knows something is up; Zayn and Niall’s discussions within the class have become somewhat legendary. Leigh says that the only reason half the people in their class kept the lecture on after first year was so they could watch Niall and Zayn go at it over poetry references.

Now, though, Niall feels uncomfortable arguing with someone that’s going to be having him in his home. Even if Zayn didn’t invite him, he’s still going to be there, in Zayn’s space. It sets everything off balance.

When Friday comes, Niall locks himself in the bathroom.

“You’re coming,” Louis yells through the door. He pounds on it for good measure, and Niall winces at each sound of Louis’ palm on the wood. He doesn’t move, though - just pulls his knees tighter into his chest and doesn’t move from where he’s sitting in the bathtub.

“M’not!” He calls out, “Go on without me. You’re only going because you want to shag Nick.”

“Irrelevant! I’ve already shagged him. Anyway, Li’s coming too, so that excuse doesn’t even make sense! C’mon, why are you being so arsey? You used to flourish in parties, Niall! Remember first year?”

He hears Liam’s warning, “Lou!” At the same time Niall sucks a harsh breath in. That was a low blow, even for Louis.  

“You dick, you know that I hate you bringing that up,” Niall grits back at him from between his teeth. He clenches his hands into fists at the thought of how he got on in first year; at the thought of the amount of parties he had to get carried home from for being such a mess. It wasn’t a good time for any of them, him, Liam and Louis combined. “Anyway, none of those were parties in the enemy's house!” Niall calls out, running his hands through his hair, anxious.

“Stop being so fucking dramatic, you wanker,” Louis says, but there’s a note of guilt to his voice that Niall is secretly satisfied to hear. Good; let Louis be guilty.

There’s silence for a while, and Niall thinks that he might have gotten away with refusing to go, when Louis says. “You told Nick you were going”

“You know very well I didn’t, Lou. Stop trying to be sly, it doesn’t work for you.”

“Everything works for me,” Louis says. He’s hammering on the door again, and Niall eyes it, warily. The wood is cheap - and with the amount of his weight that Louis must be putting on it, he wouldn’t be surprised if it splintered open soon.

It still doesn’t make Niall still move out of the bathtub.

It occurs to him how childish he’s being - but he really doesn’t want to see Zayn outside of the lecture hall. He likes the fact that the two of them only really exist, in there. He likes having something to focus all his anger on, and the arguments help him get good marks on his essays. He hasn’t even passed Zayn on campus, before; bar the one time the two of them awkwardly ended up walking into the classroom at the same time. Niall likes it like that.

“Fuck you, then,” Louis says, and Niall hears the sound of him storming away. He lets out a deep breath, and is about to get out of the tub and go hide in his room, instead, when someone else knocks on the door.

“C’mon, Niall,” Liam says, quietly. “You can’t leave me to be the third wheel between Louis and Nick. Have you seen the two of them together? The only things they ever do are fight and fuck. I know you haven’t been to a decent party in ages, Niall. It might be good, yeah?”

“I’m sure there’ll be some hot girls there that you can hook up with, or something,” Niall mumbles back, wondering if Liam can even hear him. “You don’t need me there, like.”

“I’ll always need you, Nialler,” Liam says, so painfully honest that it makes Niall’s stomach tighten up. Fuck Liam for being like he is. “Anyway,” Liam continues, “You know I’m not looking for anything right now, bro. I’m having a break after Sophia. C’mon, I want you there.”

Niall sighs, and doesn’t say anything - hopeful that if he leaves it, Liam will just get frustrated like Louis and storm off too. Then Niall can put it all behind him; go back into class and argue with Zayn and talk to Leigh, and everything will fall comfortably back into routine.

He likes routine; it leaves little room for him to fall into his old habits.

“Please?” Liam asks, gently. He sounds so sincere that Niall shuts his eyes for a moment, before pushing himself to stand.

“Fine,” He says, swinging open the bathroom door.

He pretends not to see Louis’ enthusiastic fist pump when he does.

*

Zayn and Harry’s shared flat is on the first floor of a converted Victorian house. It looks posh, and is definitely a hell of a lot nicer than Niall, Liam and Louis’ house. All three of them pause for a moment outside - the sound of people talking and heavy bass music is coming from a cracked open window somewhere; the whole place seems to be thrumming with barely contained energy.

Niall looks at it, and feels wildly sick for a moment. He thinks about bowing out, about going home, and the other two turn to look at him. Clearly, his distress is easy to see - because Louis frowns deeply, and Liam takes a step towards him.

“Thanks for coming, Niall,” Liam says, slinging an arm over Niall’s shoulders and leaning his weight into him, carefully. Niall leans back, and breathes in the familiar scent of Liam’s cologne - some form of Lacoste that his dad buys him every year, for his birthday. It’s predictable - like most of Liam’s actions - and Niall takes comfort in that. He likes knowing that things don’t change, with Liam.

He sighs, knowing that he’s committed, now. He has to stay.

“Yeah, yeah,” Niall says, knocking back against Liam’s body. Liam takes his weight easily, not even moving in his place.

“You don’t have to, though, if you really don’t want to,” Liam says, and he’s looking at Niall sincerely - because Liam understands Niall better than most people do, and he knows. Niall takes a deep breath in, then out, and says.

“No, no, it’s fine. We’re here now, aren’t we, Payno? C’mon.”

Louis grins at the two of them, and starts making his way up the side steps to the higher apartment. He’s practically bouncing on his feet, and the sight of it makes something strange shift in Niall’s chest, makes him remember how long it’s been since he’s seen Louis like this - buzzing, before a party.

It makes him realise how long it’s been since he’s been out at all.

He’s about to say something, anything - make a joke out of the whole situation, when the door is swings open, revealing a guy with hair down to his shoulders and a shirt that’s hanging open. The music is pounding behind him, loud - but not unbearable, and it sounds good; like someone who actually has some taste has chosen it.

“Hey,” He says, holding out a hand. Louis shakes it, and the bloke smiles - dimple cutting deep into his cheek. “M’Harry. This is my place, and I don’t know you, so I’m guessing that you’re Nick’s friends.”

Niall snorts, “He’s Nick’s friend,” He points at Louis. “I’m just here for the beer.”

“You’re here to keep me company,” Liam corrects, sliding his arm around Niall’s shoulders and pulling him tight against him. Niall laughs, going obligingly. Harry looks between the two of them, eyebrows raised.

“Are they together?” He whispers to Louis. Except, it’s not really a whisper - his voice carries right over to where Liam and Niall are standing, and Liam drops his arm from Niall’s shoulder like it’s burning him.

“You’re adorable,” Niall says, laughing.

“I’m straight!” Liam tells Harry, sounding distressed. Louis snorts.

“Does that answer your question, Harold?” He asks. Harry shakes his head, smiling.

“I guess so, c’mon. It’s all just kicking off,” He holds open the wooden door to the flat, the music getting even louder as they step inside. It’s Drake, and Niall smiles, almost absentmindedly at the familiar sounds of HYFR blasting down the corridor. It fades out and, a few seconds later, Justin Beiber’s Sorry starts playing.

Louis flashes him a grin - he knows how much Niall likes Justin Beiber. Though, the half an hour that Niall spent refreshing the ticketmaster page frantically trying to buy tickets for the two of them before they sold out is something they both deny happened.

Harry’s nose wrinkles. “Sorry for the music,” He says. “My flatmate, Zayn, he picks it all. It’s his condition for these parties.”

Niall stiffens.

“He not a party person, then?” Louis asks, casting a sideways glance at Niall and smirking. Niall gives him the finger.

Harry smiles again, “Nah. Not really. It’s a shame, but he loves me enough to put up with it.”

“Niall’s not really a party person either,” Liam says, glancing at Niall quickly. “We practically had to drag him out.”

“Oh?” Harry looks at him, curiously. “Thought you were Irish? Aren’t you supposed to, like, drink a lot and then fight people?”  

“We’re a complicated nation,” Niall says, indignant. “There are more facets to my personality than the fact I’m Irish.”

“Yeah,” Louis says. “Besides, we said he wasn’t a party person, not that he wasn’t a drinker.”

Niall is definitely going to kill Louis by the time that this party is over. Harry just laughs, though, head flinging back - hair flying everywhere. He’s kind of remarkable to look at, like a piece of half finished art that came to life in the process; he’s the sort of person that Niall could write poems about.

“Well,” Harry grins, wild-eyed. “We definitely have drink for you, then. C’mon.”

Of course Zayn Malik shares his flat with a perfectly lovely bloke with long hair and painted pink nails. Niall hates Zayn. He hates him.

Four beers later, and Niall is trying to figure out if Liam and Louis will be disappointed in him if he skips out this early.

The party isn’t crazy, not by any means. There’s only around thirty people crammed into the flat all together, and the living room wall is knocked into the kitchen, creating a big enough room that it doesn’t really feel cramped at all.

He can remember back when he would have loved this sort of thing. Back, in the beginning of university, when he was even more messed up than he is now - he used to spend all his time in various different parties - drinking excessively and stumbling home at all hours of the night.

Now, he’s mainly over that, parties don’t really do it for him anymore. He’s spent most of the night hiding out in the corner. Earlier - he’d had a brief conversation with a pretty girl, she’d been Irish too, and had bright red hair and spent a while talking to him about County Westmeath. She’d been nice, and Niall had debated flirting with her a little, asking her out - but she’d walked away when she’d spotted her boyfriend in the crowd, effectively putting an end to that line of thought.

Now, he’s just sitting alone, moodily tearing at the label on his bottle of beer. He thinks about going over and speaking to Liam, but he’s been chatting with someone since the second that they arrived, some tiny, pretty girl that Niall’s pretty sure is good friends with Leigh.

He can see Liam now; he’s leaning against the breakfast bar that sections off the kitchen area of the room to the general living room area. The girl is standing in front of him, and they’re laughing. Niall thinks about going over, involving himself in the conversation - reminding Liam that he exists - but he decides to leave it. Liam hasn’t spoken to anyone female since him and Sophia called it a day, so Niall figures it can only be a good thing.

He hasn’t seen Louis since they got here - but he hasn’t seen Nick, either. Niall really doesn’t want to know anything about that.

Really, most of his sour mood is just because of Zayn Malik, anyway. The whole party, Zayn’s been curled up on a beanbag in the corner of the room - laptop on his knee. He’s pretty much directly opposite where Niall’s planted himself - a mistake, on Niall’s part - and he’s been talking to almost as few people as Niall.

It’s obvious that he’s controlling the music - and it’s grating on Niall that he’s liked every single song so far. It’s mainly been RnB, with some rap and hip hop thrown in - but there’s been poppier songs, too, and slower ones. At one point, Bad Religion by Frank Ocean had started playing, but Harry had put a stop to that quickly.

“C’mon, Zayn, I love you, but this is a party, yeah? No one needs to be listening to this at a party. Frank Ocean just doesn’t have the right vibe.”

“What would you rather?” Zayn had asked, wry. “High School Musical?”

“Don’t diss it!” Another blonde girl - one who Niall didn’t recognise - had yelled, “That soundtrack was fucking great, Zayn. I’d dance to that.”

Zayn had sighed, heavily, and started playingLet’s Dance to Joy Division by the Wombats. It wasn’t exactly High School Musical, but the girl had grinned anyway, winking at him and slinking away to dance.

Niall looks over at Zayn, now. His hair is down today - shoved to the one side of his face, the shaved side shown clearly. He’s wearing a loose fitting t-shirt, plain, and grey tracksuit bottoms. The whole outfit gives the impression that he just woke up, or that he’d rather be anywhere but at this party.

Niall stares at him some more, sighs, and then pushes himself to standing - walking over to where Zayn is.

Zayn looks up at him, and his eyes widen, clearly surprised that Niall has approached him. “Y’alright? You got a song request, or summat? My music too hipster for you?” He asks, rolling his eyes. He has to raise his voice slightly louder than normal to be heard over the speakers and the general noise of the party, and he looks tired and defensive.

“Nah,” Niall says, shrugging. “I’ve liked all the music that you’ve played so far.” Then he sits down on the floor beside Zayn’s beanbag. Zayn’s eyes get even wider. “I was just wondering why you’ve been hiding in the corner the whole time. D’you hate parties, or something?” He nods at the computer in Zayn’s lap, and Zayn smiles slightly, shrugging.

“Nah, I hate parties with shite music though,” He smiles at Niall, hesitantly - as though he’s not sure if Niall’s going to start an argument with him again or not. When Niall doesn’t say anything, he continues. “And, like, I never know many people at these thing - they’re all Harry’s mates really, like.”

“Don’t you chat to them?”

Zayn shrugs again, “Yeah, like, if they talk to me. Believe it or not, you’re the only person that doesn’t seem to like me,” He smirks, and Niall offers him a lazy salute. He doesn’t like Zayn, not really - but he’ll take it over trying to start a conversation with someone he doesn’t know. Sure, earlier he was speaking to someone - but she’d initiated the whole thing. Niall’s long since forgotten how to do that - too long spent cutting himself off from people, trying to get them to forget the person he was first year of uni. “It’s kinda hard, though. To start a conversation with Harry’s mates. They’re all art students, or whatever, though. Photography and stuff, like. I don’t really get it,” Zayn continues.  

“Wow,” Niall says, laughing. Zayn looks at him. “I mean, it’s just funny that you’ve got a roommate even more pretentious than you. Surely you could just quote some Kerouac at them? Plath, even?”

Zayn glares at him, but it’s without his usual harshness, instead, he looks almost amused. “Harry’s lovely,” He says. “It’s not his fault that he thinks the world starts and ends with what filter he uses on Instagram.”

“Is that not you, Zayn? I’ve seen your Instagram. It’s all in black and white.”

Zayn laughs, clicking something on his laptop; the soft sounds of FKA Twigs starts to play throughout the apartment, and Niall smiles, tapping his fingers to the beat absentmindedly.

“Yeah, alright,” Zayn says, looking at Niall. “How’re you gonna explain the fact you were creeping on me though, Horan? You got a secret obsession with me, or summat?”

Niall elbows his leg, lightly - Zayn’s at a slightly elevated level due to his bean bag chair. Zayn looks down at him, eyebrows raised in a question. Niall sticks his tongue out, “Like you haven’t looked at mine before.”

Zayn smiles - a proper one - his whole face crinkling up, lines appearing beside his eyes. “You’re really into golf,” He says, smile still on his face. And, well - that’s answer enough.

“I used to play it whenever I was home, with my da’, like. He’s always been into it, and there was a golf course a few minutes’ walk away. Not right beside us, like, but close enough.”

“Used to?” Zayn asks. There’s nothing loaded in it, he’s clearly not trying to get a rise out of Niall; Niall’s seen him when he is. It doesn’t stop Niall’s throat from cramming up, though, or his hands clenching on his jeans.

“Yeah,” He snaps, brusquer than he intends to be. “I don’t really go home that much anymore. Not that it’s any of your business.”

Zayn holds his hands up, clearly placating. “Woah, bro. I didn’t mean to, like, freak you out. If I was really going to do that I’d bring up how I did better than you in class this week.”

Niall looks up at him through the veil of his eyelashes. Zayn’s hands are still up, but he’s smirking slightly. When Niall turns to look at him fully, he grins, tilting his head to the side and putting his hands back on his lap. Niall feels the tension in his body deflate. “You’re a dick,” He says. Zayn’s grin doesn’t fade.

“It’s not my fault that you had nothing to argue about with me, this week. Clearly I’ve finally cracked it, like. I’m just too good for you.”

“That wasn’t it at all.”

“Oh yeah?” Zayn taps his fingers on his laptop, still smiling. “I dunno, like. I think you were blown away by my amazing explanation to the lack of rhyme schemes within The Hollow Men. As wind in dry grass, mate, I’m a fucking genius.”

“Please,” Niall snorts. “Saying that it’s like the wind of the first part is basic, man. Anyone who’s done a couple of seconds of Googling could come up with something like that.”

“Alright, like. What do you think, then? Seeing as you wouldn’t say anything in class.”

“I don’t think that there is a meaning to the lack of rhyme. Like, it’s hollow, innit? The whole poem is about Elliot feeling incomplete, about how everyone around him is hollow. So, like, the lack of thought isthe thought, you know? It’s not supposed to mean much, because he’s talking about this hollow wasteland. He’s talking about being a hollow man, so, you know. It all cancels out.”

Zayn looks at him for a few seconds, silently. Then he laughs. “You pulled that out your arse,” He says. Niall gives him the finger, laughing as well.

“Yeah, yeah, alright. That doesn’t mean it’s not good.”

“Bond would love it,” Zayn nods. Niall smiles.

“Bond loves anything I do. I told him on the first day that my favourite poet was myself, and since then he’s been convinced that I’m some kind of secret genius, or something. I was just really nervous.”

“You said that you were your own favourite poet?” Zayn asks.

“Well, yeah. Like I said, I was nervous. I don’t know, first day of lectures, and all. I just end up sounding like a cocky little shite, when I’m nervous.”

“I just hide,” Zayn is looking at him now - FKA Twigs still playing. He’s smiling, slightly, and there’s a softness in his profile that hasn’t been directed at Niall for as long as Niall has known him. The noise of the other people sort of fades out, and it’s just Niall and Zayn, crouched in a corner.

“D’you wanna hide from this?” Niall says, jerking his head in the general direction of ‘everything else’. Zayn blinks, slowly.

“What?”

“I just, like,” Niall’s stumbling over his words, and he hates that. He doesn’t really know what he’s doing; only that he’s been looking for an excuse to get out of here for ages, now, and talking to Zayn isn’t as horrible as he used to think it was. “I just mean, d’you wanna get out of here? Only, I’m kinda done with the whole party scene.”

Zayn looks around, slowly; everyone is still drinking, and talking amongst each other. The general thrum of activity is still there, and nobody is paying any attention to the two of them; it would be easy enough to slip out.

“Sure,” Zayn says, eventually. He’s looking at Niall, slightly guarded - as if Niall’s going to take it all back and start arguing with him again. Niall doesn’t give him the opportunity to overthink things too much. Instead, he pushes the lid of Zayn’s laptop closed and then stands, holding out a hand to help haul Zayn up. Zayn takes it, staggering only slightly with the force of Niall’s grasp.

“Alright, then,” Zayn says, straightening himself out and running a hand through his hair. “Let’s see what you’ve got.”

*

It’s cold outside, and Niall shivers, hunching further into his hoodie. He hadn’t considered that he’d be wandering around at quarter to midnight when he’d left the house, and all he’s got on is a ratty old thing that he’s had since secondary school.

Zayn looks at him and smirks; he’s properly dressed for the weather, jumper and leather jacket on - the hood of his jumper pulled up over his head, gloves on his hands. Niall narrows his eyes and tries to remember that he and Zayn have been getting on well tonight - being bitter over the cold won’t do either of them any good.

“Come on,” Zayn says, watching Niall shiver for a little longer, and then starting off walking. Niall has to jog a little to keep up with him - but when he glares, Zayn just smiles. “Sorry, just. There’s a McDonalds down the road. They’ll still be open, like. If you’re cold.”

“What, Malik? Not gonna offer me your jacket?” Niall knocks his shoulder against Zayn’s, and Zayn staggers slightly, laughing.

“I would, but I’ve been told that it reeks, like. I’ve had this thing for far too long - smells of a lot of nights out.”

“Pleasant,” Niall says. They’re on a thin road, and when Zayn turns the corner, Niall can see the yellow light of the McDonald’s sign in the distance.

“I’m nothing but, bro. You just didn’t believe me until today,” Zayn looks at him.

He’s lit up only by the orange light of the streetlamps, and the faint glow of the shops at the end of the road. His hands are in the pockets of his jacket, and he’s smiling, slightly - like he knows how attractive he is, here, in the middle of the street - shadows cutting the shape of his cheekbones even more prominently. “How come you didn’t like me until today?” He asks, then.

Niall is so fucked.

“You insulted my taste, mate. Say what you will about Yeats as a person, but he’s a fucking good example of Irish poetry. Easter 1916 is a classic!”

“I don’t care, like. It’s like listening to Chris Brown’s music after you found out that he beat up Rihanna, innit? S’just not nice.”

“Yeats never beat anyone up! He was a pacifist.”

“I love the fact you actually know that,” Zayn says.

Niall glares at him. “It was the reason for conflict in most of his poems, dick. He loved Maud Gonne, but hated that she was involved in all the fighting. It’s context, isn’t it?”

Zayn rolls his eyes, but Niall watches him out of the corner of his eyes, and he can see the twitching of a smile. “Anyway, I don’t mean. Like, it’s not the same situation, but it’s the same idea, innit? He asked Maud Gonne to marry him four times. Four, mate! Like, get the hint after the first time, innit? Anyway, when she turned him down, he asked out her daughter.”

Niall wrinkles his nose. “Yeah, but -”

“Twice, bro. He asked out the daughter twice. Like, was he incapable of understanding the word, ‘no’. That’s just weird to me, man. Like, it totally changes how I see his poetry, you know? Especially when you’re reading summat like No Second Troy - and all you’re thinking is about how this woman turned him down all the time, and he’s still writing poetry about how she, ‘filled my days with misery’. That’s not even the worst one, is it? I mean, in Among School Children he’s looking at little girls, saying that they drive his heart wild ‘cause they remind him of Maud. S’fucking weird, bro.”

“I think you’re reading too much into it.”

“It’s poetry, mate, you’re supposed to read too much into it.”  

As they’ve been talking - they’ve reached the door to McDonalds. Zayn holds it open for Niall, tilting his head as Niall walks through.

“Fair point,” Niall says, glancing at Zayn. Zayn looks all too smug, and Niall rolls his eyes. “Alright,” He says, wandering slowly up to the counter. “Seeing as you’ve declared war against the most famous Irish poet of all time, who do you like?”

“What, from Ireland?”

“I meant in general, but sure. From Ireland.”

“Kavanagh.”

Niall stares, “Kavanagh?”

“Yeah,” Zayn shrugs. “I like his whole message, y’know? Irish poets, open your eyes. I think he’s clever, like. I mean, I dunno. It’s just, his poetry’s sweet, innit? He’s not, like, trying to be something else. It’s all just, there, yeah? I wanna be like that, one day. Everything just, there. My mind, like, opened up,” He looks across at Niall, and Niall feels like someone’s punched the breath right out of his throat. In this moment, with Zayn Malik looking at him like he could explain every secret behind poetry if he only had the time. They look at each other for a charged second, before Zayn looks away, strange expression on his face. He coughs. “Plus, Heaney’s like, everyone’s next favourite Irish poet, yeah? After Yeats, I mean. Only, like, Heaney got everything from Kavanagh.”

“Original’s always better?”” Niall asks, Zayn grins.

“Of course. How else would I be a proper hipster, Horan? Anyway, is Yeats your favourite? Irish poet, like?”

Niall shrugs. “I like ‘em all, really. I like them for different reasons, though.”

They’ve hit the counter, now - and Niall hasn’t missed the way the tired looking girl behind the till is eyeing up Zayn with barely contained interest. Niall doesn’t blame her; even in the harsh fluorescent lighting, Zayn still manages to look as though he’s fresh off a photography shoot for some top brand fashion designer.

“What can I get you?” She asks, smiling. Niall looks at the way she’s leaning over the counter - and the way that she tucks a loose strand of hair behind her ear and shakes his head. It’s obvious that she’s flirting. He’s about to loudly proclaim that he can leave, if Zayn wants - when Zayn looks over at Niall.

“What’cha want, babe?” He asks, and Niall starts at the pet name and the way Zayn’s tilting his whole body towards him - all of his attention intent on Niall. Niall looks at him for a second, annoyed at the flush he can feel rising in his cheeks. Zayn sees it too, from the look of delight on his face, and Niall tears his eyes away, looking up at the board and mumbling,

“Just a coffee.”

Zayn looks back to the waitress, smiling at her and saying, “Two coffees, ta,” And handing her a crumpled fiver. “Sure you don’t want anything else, love?”

He looks back to Niall, and this time, Niall can’t hold back his eye roll. “Love, is it now? No thanks, petal, I’m alright.”

“You sure, darling?” Zayn smirks. Niall rolls his eyes.

“I’m positive, honey.”

“That’s a shame, pumpkin.”

“Not really, marshmallow. Y’need to save all your money.”

“That’s true, like. I just don’t want you going hungry, vanilla bean.”

Niall snorts at this, shaking his head, “Alright, you win this time,” He says. At this, Zayn does a fist pump that’s so lame Niall properly laughs, flinging his head back and knocking his hip against Zayn’s.

The girl behind the till looks thoroughly put out at the two of them. She watches their whole exchange, shaking her head and muttering, “I’ll just go and make your coffees, then,” Before scuttling away from the two of them.

Zayn watches her go and then hangs his head a little. He looks amused. “Sorry about that, like. I never know what to when girls start flirting with me.”

“You could flirt back?” Niall asks, leaning against the counter they’re standing at. Zayn laughs.

“Why would I do that?” He says, Niall blinks, slowly.

“‘Cause it could be fun? Or, you could make a good friend out of it?”

“They always seem to think I want to shag them, though.”

Niall waggles his eyebrows, “That was the fun part of it all.”

Zayn stops laughing. Instead, his eyebrows furrow together and he frowns; it makes him look slightly like he’s constipated, and Niall knows that he shouldn’t be finding so much satisfaction in Zayn Malik finally looking less than perfect - but it’s nice to see him look more human. So far, Zayn has turned up for lectures at eight in the morning, and still looked a thousand times better than everyone else in the hall.

It was infuriating.

Zayn is still looking at Niall, strange expression on his face. “Why would it be fun?” He asks, and Niall blinks, thrown off.

“I don’t know, man,” He adjusts his glasses awkwardly and shrugs. “Because it’s sex? Like, it’s supposed to be fun. Never got the people that make it a big deal, to be honest. I mean, at the end of the day it’s just two people with some weird body parts.”

“That wasn’t what I was talking about, mate,” Zayn says, leaning back in his chair. “I meant, y’know, because they’re girls.” He takes a long drink of his coffee after saying this, as if he’s hoping that the paper cup will cover his face. Niall stares.

“You’re not into girls?” He asks. Zayn coughs, and shifts in place.

“Er, no,” He says. He starts looking around the McDonald’s - eyes purposefully not landing on Niall. “Thought you knew that,” He mutters. Niall stares.

“No, I had no clue, to be honest.” Zayn looks floored, and Niall coughs, smiling hesitantly, “It’s not an issue, if that’s what you think?” He asks, leaning forwards. Zayn looks surprised.

“Nah, like. I mean, I know you can be a dick, but I don’t think you’re that much of a dick. C’mon, though. You’re always teasing me for liking the Beat Generation. Thought you were being obvious.”

“Obvious, no. Oblivious, clearly,” Niall laughs - taking another drink of his coffee and kicking out at Zayn’s feet, gently. It’s weird - there were times before when Niall would have killed to get the opportunity to kick Zayn. Now, he’s doing it jokingly, the same casual attitude that he applies to ribbing Louis about Nick, or Liam about anything.

Zayn seems relaxed too - his shoulders relaxing from where they’d tightened up, his back curving into the shape

“Yeah, think you’d be more observant. For a writer, like.”

“Excuse you,” Niall laughs. “I can write the shit out of any situation.”

“Was that a reference to something?” Zayn asks, head tipping to the side curiously. “The phrasing of it sounds really familiar, like.” Niall flushes.

“Maybe?” He says. “Sometimes I pick things up without even realising it. The point still stands, though. I could write the shit out of anything.”

Zayn smiles, slowly. The corners of his mouth twitch up and spread out - and Niall is reminded of the way sunflowers bend to face the sun. “Go on then,” He says, and Niall blinks - forcing his eyes away from the shape of Zayn’s lips, telling himself that the fact Zayn needs to use lip balm isn’t important.

“What?”

“Write me something.”

Niall flicks his eyes around again - looking for something to fixate on that isn’t the quiet, intense look in Zayn’s eyes. There’s nothing much; it’s still a McDonald’s late at night. The tables are scattered with the remains of food from previous customers, and the girl behind the counter looks tired and annoyed. There’s nothing very romantic, here. Nothing that makes him want to wax lyrical. Nothing except the boy in front of him - and the way he’s watching Niall intently.

Zayn smirks. “If it’s too hard for you, you can admit defeat, you know. I won’t hold it against you,” his mouth twists a little. “For long.”

“You’re a prick,” He says, shaking his head. “I never said I wasn’t going to do it, did I? I’m just looking for some inspiration.”

“See. This is what Yeats does to you, looking around desperately trying to find something you deem romantic enough to write a poem about. You needa be more like Kavanagh, innit? Irish poet, open your eyes.”

“Fuck you,” Niall says, shaking his head. Zayn looks amused, waggling his eyebrows at Niall.

“Sure,” He replies. “Didn’t think that you’d be up for it, to be honest.”

Niall looks at him, eyebrows raised. “Who says I am? I was just joking, mate. This is all a ruse to make you think that I like you, then m’gonna turn around and start screaming at you.”

“I’m wounded. Who do you think I am, Carrie?” He laughs, drumming his fingers on the table idly. It’s something that would have annoyed Niall endlessly before now, but tonight he lets it go. “Please don’t dump pig’s blood on me. I don’t eat pork.”

“Cow’s blood?” Niall asks, without skipping a beat. Zayn shakes his head, but Niall can see his smile in the split second he looks away, in how he drums his fingers against the table in front of them.

“No blood at all, please. Come on, you still haven’t written me a poem.”

Niall’s brows furrow, before he grabs one of the napkins on the desk and pulls a pen out of his pocket, scrawling a few messy lines down in his terrible handwriting;

There once was a boy named Zayn,
He annoyed me again and again.
He was so fucking dumb,
And no goddamned fun -
I wish he could stay in his lane.

He brandishes it at Zayn, grinning. Zayn takes it from him, and reads it over, once, and then twice. Niall watches the corner of his mouth twitch, and the way he glances at Niall from above the napkin, smirking.

“Limerick? Sticking with your Irish roots, huh?”

“I’m from Mullingar, not Limerick,” Niall replies.

“Close enough.”

“It’s not that close.”

“Oh yeah?”

“It’s the same distance from Bradford to Northampton.”

“Like I said, close enough,” Zayn smiles. Niall sticks out his tongue at him and then kicks his feet out - hitting Zayn in the shin, lightly.  Zayn kicks back, and Niall traps his foot between his legs without thinking about it, laughing at the affronted look that crosses over Zayn’s face. “Oi,” Zayn says, smiling. When he looks down, his eyelashes touch his cheek. “I’ll need that.”

“Oh yeah?” Niall asks, grinning. Zayn looks at him for a few moments, his eyes narrowed. Niall laughs, tightening his hold on Zayn’s foot - when Zayn kicks out his free leg, landing his foot into Niall’s shin - hard. “Ow! Fucker!” Niall exclaims,

The woman behind the counter looks over at their table when Niall shouts. Niall feels bad for her; the only other people in the restaurant are an old man, huddled over with his head on the table and two drunk girls. The girl’s heels are lying on the floor beside their feet, and one of them is sleepily calling a taxi.

“What time is it?” Niall asks, looking at the girls - they look like they’ve come out of a club, skirts short and make up smearing.

“Um,” Zayn pulls his phone out of his pocket and squinting at the screen. “S’ten past one,” He says, then he glances up at Niall. “You gotta curfew?”

“I turn into a frog at two am,” Niall replies, drumming his fingers on the table. Zayn grins, looking amused.  

“What if I kiss you?” He asks. Niall starts, staring at Zayn with wide eyes.

“What?”

Zayn doesn’t seem bothered, shrugging easily - his signature smirk back on his face. “S’what they always do in the stories, innit? You kiss the frog and they turn into a handsome prince.”

Niall splutters for a bit. “Are you calling me a prince?”

Zayn’s shoulders rise and fall. He’s smiling, and Niall isn’t sure what to say anymore. It’s ten past one in the morning, and Niall was up early enough that he’s far too tired to be having this conversation. Zayn is sitting there - across the less than pristine McDonald’s table, staring smugly at him. He looks relaxed, but there’s a tightness around his eyes that makes Niall think he might not be entirely kidding. The thought of Zayn Malik actually wanting to kiss Niall leaves him feeling strange - like he’s running on hard concrete in bad shoes, the pavement slamming through his bones and into his shins.

He thinks it’s a bad feeling, but Zayn lays his hands flat on the table, and Niall stares down at them. His fingers are thin, and his skin intricately inked - and Niall looks  at the tattoo on the back of his hand - tracing the lines of it. It’s a beautiful tattoo.

Niall holds his breath, counts to five, and then looks up. “I’m not kissing you in McDonald’s,” He says. Zayn blinks at him, silently for a few minutes.

“But you’d kiss me somewhere else?”

Niall raises his eyebrows, brushing off the implications with a joke, “Woah, Zayn. Someone’s eager. You should save the somewhere else for after the first date, at least.”

“So this is a date, now?”

“Yeah,” Niall nods, smiling at the way Zayn blinks at him in surprise. “It’s January eighth.”

Zayn groans, leaning forwards and dropping his head onto the table. “You’re really funny, Niall. Real witty, like.”

Niall opens his mouth to respond, but gets distracted by the buzzing of his phone in his jacket pocket. Frowning, he pulls it out and blinks at the screen. Louis’ name is lighting up, and Niall winces. “Sorry,” He says to Zayn, “The mother is concerned.”

“Your mum’s up at one am?”

“Nah,” Niall laughs. “S’my mate Louis. Louis Tomlinson?” Zayn looks blank, and Niall shrugs. “He’s been shagging Harry’s mate Nick. Y’alright?” He asks then, accepting the call.

“Niall! Where the fuck did you go?” Louis’ voice crackles out through the tinny speakers of Niall’s phone. Niall sighs.

“I left a while back, wasn’t doing much there, anyway,” Niall tells him, running a hand over the hair on the back of his head. He doesn’t want to tell Louis where he is right now. He’s hoping that hearing his voice will be enough to calm Louis down from his terrifying mother-hen tendencies, but clearly Louis didn’t get the memo.

“Yeah, I know you left, fucker. I meant where are you, though? Liam went back home and he says you’re not there.”

Niall shuts his eyes and pinches the bridge of his node. He has a terrible feeling that Louis will never left him live this down. “Uh, yeah. That’s ‘cause I didn’t go back to the flat. I’m, um. I’m in McDonald’s at the minute.”

There are a few beats of silence, before Louis says, “What?”

“Yeah. I was having kind of a shite time, so I asked Zayn if he-”

“You asked Zayn? Sorry, isn’t this the Zayn that you supposedly hate? The Zayn who’s annoying? The Zayn who you’ve been telling Leigh that you definitely, absolutely, don’t want to shag at all?”

“You’re a fucking dick.”

Louis’ grin is audible in his voice, in spite of the dodgy phone connection. “I’m just checking, Niall, you know. Maybe it was another Zayn, or something. Always good to be sure.”

“You’re so smug.”

“I am, I’m very smug, lad. It is possible that I have never been smugger. But, I’m also relieved that you’re not passed out drunk in a ditch somewhere. I’ll let you go back to your boy, now -”

“Fuck you. Smugger isn’t even a word,” Niall cuts in.  

“- And go tell Liam that you’re alive. You know how he frets, Nialler. I think he was near ready to start walking the streets calling for you.” Louis’ joking, but Niall can hear the vein of concern running underneath it all. Niall sighs, wondering if he’ll ever be able to live down first year. Wonders if he’ll ever be able to convince his friends that he’s over it, past that.

“Thanks, Lou. Give Li my love, yeah?”

“Will do,” Louis chirps. “Have fun with your boy!”

“Piss off, dick. I’ll see you at home,” Niall says, hanging up the phone and shaking his head at it - though he’s fond when he does so, far too used to Louis to be offended anymore. He looks up to where Zayn’s now standing a few feet away from him, leaning against the door.

“You wanna go?” Zayn asks. He’s slumped, hands in his pockets - and there’s a cigarette Niall doesn’t remember seeing before tucked behind his ear.

Niall looks at the table, where their two - now empty - cups are sitting on the table. There’s nothing keeping them here, and Zayn still technically isn’t a friend - but Niall doesn’t want to go back to the apartment. Not when he knows that the second he gets in the door Louis and Liam will be on him, ready to take the piss and ask questions - respectively.

“I mean, I’m alright with leaving.”

“Not with going home though, innit?” Zayn asks. Niall wonders if he’s naturally perceptive, or if he’s just predictable.

“Something like that.”

“C’mon, this area’s great. Not only do we have a McDonald’s, but we also have a play park. We can sit on the swing set at night.”

“That’s very young adult literature.”

Zayn grins, and it’s crooked - only the right corner of his mouth tipping up. “C’mon,” He says. “Don’t bail out on me now, like. S’gonna be real poetic.”

Niall looks at him. Follows the line of his jaw, his neck. Niall stares at him, and thinks about their earlier conversations - about Zayn’s but you’d kiss me somewhere else. Sometimes, there are moments that feel fixed in time - like every other part of your life was careening towards this path. Niall’s only felt it once before, that one night, back in first year - where he woke up in the hospital with his dad standing over him -

Zayn Malik has always been kind of inevitable. From the very first class, when he’d looked down at the table and said his favourite poet was Ginsberg, and Niall had snorted so loud every head in the lecture theatre had whirled around and stared at him.

“Alright,” Niall says, “Let’s go.”

*

Niall gets home at five am, that night. He and Zayn had walked to the park arguing over films, and books - and anything really. Niall found that the tentative truce between him and Zayn didn’t put him any closer to agreeing with anything that Zayn said.

Zayn thought that The Godfather was too slow, claiming that if any other film had taken thirty minutes to move past the first scene, “A fucking wedding scene, like,” Then it wouldn’t have sold a single ticket.

“It’s context building!” Niall had cried, shoving him in the shoulder. “I can’t believe this. First he doesn’t like Yeats, then he tells me that he thinks The Godfather shouldn’t have sold any tickets. I should just walk home now. My initial assumption about you was right, Malik.” Zayn laughed.

“You know what builds context pretty goddamn quickly? How to Train Your Dragon. You know what else? The action starts happening in under thirty minutes. He finds the dragon pretty quickly, like.”

“I can’t believe that you just compared How to Train Your Dragon to The Godfather.” Niall had snapped back, but Zayn hadn’t said anything back. Instead, he just looped a careful arm around Niall’s shoulders and grinned; Niall had been helpless not to smile back.

The whole thing had been nice. More than, really. There’s something peaceful about sitting on a set of swings at three in the morning, the two of them kicking their feet into the ground and laughing at each other. It was like being a kid, again; the house they’d had in Mullingar had been tiny - barely big enough for Niall, never mind Niall and Greg - but it’s back garden had opened right onto the back of a playground.

It had been a shite park, really. Nothing really more than a single swing and a rusty slide. Everything else had been chewed up or tore apart by older kids in the neighbourhood, but Niall had loved it endlessly. Sometimes, at night, Greg would drag him out the back gate of their garden; he’d help him jump the fence to the park, and then he’d push Niall on the swing, telling him that it was a rocket - blasting off to Mars.

Looking back on it, Niall is positive that Bobby had known what was going on, positive that it probably wasn’t even that late at night. It had felt like a childish rebellion, though - like having fun, being free. The whole thing had been an adventure, Niall’s first trip to outer space.

With Zayn, it had felt like that too. Niall had kicked on the tarmac - brought the swings up to the peak of their height, then shut his eyes and allowed himself to indulge in the feeling of flying. Allowed himself to indulge in something he hadn’t let himself have in far too long.

At four thirty, Niall had called a taxi to get home. Zayn had waited on the street with him, the two of them standing so close beside each other that the back of their hands had touched. The whole thing had been so childish; back in fourth year Niall had taken a girl on a date - at the end of the night neither of them had looked at each other, but they’d ended up swinging their joined hands between them, faces bright red with things that they weren’t going to say. Things like; this night has been really nice. And, I meant it when I said I’d kiss you, I think.  

When the taxi had pulled up - a Ford Focus, with an exhausted looking man behind the driver's seat - Zayn had said, “Give me your arm.”

Niall had looked at him, brows furrowed, before Zayn rolled his eyes, reaching out and grabbing Niall by the wrist. He’d rolled Niall’s sleeve up to his arm, and - with a sharpie he produced from somewhere - carefully wrote his number onto Niall’s arm.

“I won’t be able to read that,” Niall said. “Your handwriting is terrible. Looks worse than a doctor’s, mate.”

Zayn just smiled. “Yeah, yeah. I’m an artist.”

The taxi driver was starting to look more and more impatient, so Niall grinned, slapped Zayn on the shoulder in lieu of a proper farewell, and hopped in the car.

When Niall got home, the sun had been starting to rise - thin shreds of light peeking out through the clouds. Niall had thought about going to bed - but he wasn’t in the mood. Instead, he boiled the kettle and poured himself some tea. Then he slumped into their saggy, defeated sofa in their tiny living room.

The sofa had been Louis’ mum’s, and he’d carted it into their flat when she was getting a new one. Liam and Niall had been the ones to actually get it in the door; there’d been a lot of fighting, and a lot of dismantling of various things. At one point, Liam had taken a chunk out of the hallway’s plaster after he accidentally caught the leg of the sofa off it.

Niall is definite that they’re not going to get their deposit back.

Curled up on the sofa, blanket Louis’ gran knitted wrapped around him, Niall falls asleep reading Chuck Palahniuk's Survivor.

*

Niall is woken up with his glasses still on and Louis sitting on his stomach. He’s shifting about, ass pressed uncomfortably onto Niall’s bladder, and Niall bucks - trying to shift him with little success. He’s still bleary, far too little sleep in his system to cope properly with what’s happening.

“Get off,” Niall says. Louis doesn’t move. “I will piss on you, Louis.” Niall warns him, and there are a few suspended moments of silence - Niall glaring up at Louis - mainly up at Louis’ nostril, for all the view he’s getting. Just as Niall is starting to worry that he really will have to piss on their sofa, just to prove a point, Louis finally stands up. Niall gets off the sofa instantly, and staggers off to the bathroom as fast as he can.

He takes his time He pisses, then he spends a long time washing his hands and his face, brushing his teeth and trying to wake his body up. It doesn’t work, really - his head still feels stuffed with cotton wool, and he keeps getting distracted by the number written on his arm. Zayn’s carefully printed digits, mocking him.  

When he comes out, Louis is there - holding a mug of tea in his hands and staring at Niall - specifically the number on Niall’s arm. His eyebrows are raised.

“Alright,” He says, “Fucking talk.”

“Where’s Liam?” Niall asks. Louis glares at him.

“What? You’d rather talk to Liam about this stuff than me?”

Niall raises his eyebrows. “Is that supposed to be a trick question? Yes, a thousand times over. Liam is nice. Way nicer than you.”

“I can be nice! Lottie called me when her boyfriend dumped her!”

“Lottie called you so that you’d yell abuse down the line for twenty minutes about what an arsehole he was. Supportive, yes, you’re very. Nice? Not at all.”

“Fuck off, Horan. I made you tea!” On this, he thrusts the mug in his hands towards Niall. “Look how loving and kind I am.”

Niall takes the offered tea, smiling. “Yeah, alright.” He says. “You’re lovely and kind, Tommo. Best mate in the world.”

Louis smiles.

“I still want to know where Liam is, though.”

Louis’ smile falls, and flaps a hand about, brushing Niall of with a roll of his yes. “He’s out buy food, I think. Apparently we’re out of everything but cereal. Now, come on. Tell Tommo everything about your night with the hottest man alive.”

“Weird,” Niall says. “I don’t remember meeting Justin Bieber last night.”

“I’m going to pretend that you didn’t just say that,” Louis stares at him for a few moments. Niall shifts uncomfortably from one foot to the other, taking an awkward sip of tea. “Come on, Niall. It’s been ages since you did anything exciting. I want to know everything, yeah?”

Louis’ voice has gone soft, like he’s talking to a spooked animal, and Niall sighs, slumps against the doorframe of their bathroom, overly large mug cradled in his hands. It’s Liam’s mug, he thinks, because on it is some reference to a TV show that he never watched - it says Troy and Abed in the Morning on it - and it’s five times bigger than the amount of tea Niall would normally have in one sitting.

“So really, what this is about, is that you and Liam want to know if I’m being a real boy again.” Niall says. “You want to know if I’m over,” Niall doesn’t know what to say, here, so he gestures vaguely instead, hoping he gets his point across. Louis narrows his eyes.

“No, me and Liam want to know if you’ve stopped being a complete shut in and really fucking unhappy. C’mon, lad. Stop looking at me like that.”

“What do you want me to tell you?” Niall sighs, leaning even further into the door, letting his neck slide down so much that his shoulder is pressing into his ear. Louis watches him for a few moments, silently appraising.

There are times - more frequently than Niall would like to admit - where Louis reminds Niall of his mam. All bustling hands, too-milky cups of tea and piercing looks. Niall’s mam has always been one of the few people that could get him to sit completely still. Louis has that quality to him, too.

“I just want you to be happy, Nialler.” Louis says, quietly. Niall smiles, and takes a drink of his tea.

“It was a nice night,” He shrugs, avoiding eye contact with Louis. “Zayn’s still a hipster prick, but it was nice, alright? We got coffee, and then we went to the park.”

“At one in the morning.” Louis says. It’s not a question.

Niall grins. “Yeah. Sure, you’re always slagging me off for doing things that are too cliché. Coffee and the park isn’t cliché if it’s one in the morning.”

“Coffee and the park is always cliché, if it’s a date.” Louis says; then. “Was it a date?” He says it carefully - but his eyes are focused back on the number. Niall wishes he wasn’t holding the mug, wishes he could put his hand over it and hide it. He feels remarkably protective over this, this thing with Zayn.

Zayn, who Niall spent months on months arguing with, snapping at, talking shit about - but who still left a party at his own house to talk to Niall for hours on end. Zayn, who has terrible taste in movies, but incredible taste in books. Zayn, whose eyes crinkle up when he smiles, who likes good music and has thin wrists and -

“I’m going back to bed,” Niall tells Louis, pushing past him, gently. “Didn’t get much sleep last night.”

“I’ll bet you didn’t,” Louis snorts. Niall gives him the finger and pushes open the door to his bedroom.

*

He doesn’t sleep when he gets into his bedroom. Instead, he stares at the numbers on his arm for so long his vision starts to blur - and then he pulls out his phone.

Niall:   Hey. It’s Niall here. Last night was gd!

He looks at the little green speech bubble of text for an embarrassing amount of time, as though if he stares at it for longer it will somehow force Zayn to reply to him sooner. All it really serves to do is make him feel stressed and uncomfortable about his own text. He doesn’t know what he’s expecting from Zayn, anymore. An insult perhaps - or a slew of smiley faces. There is a moment where he considers what he’ll do in lectures if Zayn swerves him, if Niall gets a reply that says sorry mate, wrong number.

When Niall wakes up his phone is on his stomach and he has three new texts. They read, in order;

Zayn:   yeah it was good!

Zayn:   do you want to do it again sometime?

Zayn:   I’m reading Siken and all i can think about is how much youre judging me from across the city

Niall laughs, pressing his fist to his mouth and biting down on his middle fingers knuckle. He remembers reading Siken, back when everything had gone wrong, and Liam had used to have to coax him out of the compartment like he was a rescue dog still trying to learn that people can be kind, sometimes. He sends a new text to Zayn.

Niall:   You’re right, I am judging you. On a scale of 1-10, you reach 42 for the gayness levels.

He looks at it for a while, and then, quickly, before he can chicken out,

Niall:   If we’re talking about Siken, though - then Boot Theory is my favourite

There’s another five minutes before Zayn replies again, and when he does - it seem to be in succession. Clearly, Zayn has no qualms about multi-texting, which is good, because Niall is typically pretty bad for it himself.

Niall had been reading - trying to read - Anne of Green Gables. He likes the books - even though every time Louis sees him reading them he makes some kind of wisecrack. Normally, Niall’s pretty involved when he’s reading - but this time, when he feels his phone vibrate, he has to force himself to finish the chapter that he’s on - as though he’s playing hard to get with himself. Then, he jumps for the phone.

Zayn:   aha shit and you once insulted me for liking ‘overhyped emo stuff’

Zayn:   im sorry that was mean

Zayn:   i was serious about you wanting to hang out again though? unless u dont want to

Zayn:   harry is laughing at me about this from the kitchen

Niall feels like a teenage girl - like he’s fifteen scribbling Zayn’s name into an over-decorated diary.  It’s so ridiculous - to go from sniping at Zayn, from refusing to see him outside of the lecture hall, refusing to acknowledge him as anything more than a hindrance - someone to hurl stupid insults at when he was having a shit day. To go from that, to this - to grinning at the screen of his phone, getting excited about a potential meeting.

Niall:   Sure I want to. Who else would I yell at for not liking the classic films.

Zayn:   i dont need classics when films like deadpool came out this year

Niall:   I still can’t believe you like comics so much. You don’t present yourself as the closet nerd you actually are. False advertising.

Niall:   Are you free Tuesday? After the lecture.

Niall really doesn’t return back to his book after that. Instead, he lies on his stomach - arms holding him up with his phone in between them. He scrolls through Instagram, trying to pretend that he’s actively interested in something other than whether or not he gets a reply to a text.

Zayn:   ill be there []

Zayn:   the class wont believe that we’re getting along aha !!!  

Niall locks his phone and puts it under his pillow so he doesn’t say anything embarrassing, but he’s smiling so wide at this point that his cheeks are aching. Then, after a few moments of lying there - looking down at the creases n his bedsheets and smiling to himself, he picks up his book and starts to read again.

*

Louis and Liam spend the lead up to Tuesday hovering over Niall’s shoulder. For Louis, it’s mainly jokes -snide comments that don’t land too hard, because Louis, for all his wicked grins and, “Lads nights out,” is fiercely careful when it comes to Niall’s emotions. Sometimes, it’s so easy to see that Louis grew up with his mum as his best friend - all gentle touches and careful closeness.

Liam is the same, at the base of it - but he’s sweeter about it too. He asks questions about Tuesday, puts his head in his palm as he listens to Niall speak. Tentatively, awkwardly, Niall tells him about the Friday night he spent with Zayn, and Liam doesn’t say anything - but every line of his eyes say, I told you so.

Niall thinks he should probably be more embarrassed about the whole thing. He’s spent years - literal years - telling everyone that his anger at Zayn wasn’t some poorly misconstrued way of hiding that he thinks Zayn is attractive. Clearly, that’s all been shot to hell, now.

He still wants to be careful with it all, though. Still wants to take things slowly. The last time he went out on anything that could be considered a date - a proper date - was back in first year. Before. Before. It had been with a girl called Catrin, and she’d been Scottish, and tiny, and Niall had thought she was beautiful.

He’d stopped calling when everything went to shit - and by the time he’d got himself sorted out again, she had a new boyfriend. He sees her, sometimes, around the university. She smiles at him every time.

In class, on Tuesday - Leigh calls him over again. She’s saved him a seat, as per usual - because no matter how on-time Niall thinks he is, Leigh will still be there before him. He smiles, ambling over to her and slumping down.

“I have it on good authority that you owe me money,” Leigh says, and she’s smiling. It makes her eyes light up, and she tucks a strand of hair behind her ear. She’s left it curly, today - and it’s bunching out around her head in an afro. Niall can see Stewart, four rows back tracking the movement of her hand, and he laughs to himself. Sometimes it’s hard knowing people as attractive as Leigh-Anne.

“What do you mean?” He asks, and she snorts.

“C’mon, Louis’ told us all about your date with Zayn Malik. And to think, a couple of weeks ago and you were telling me you don’t want to shag him.”

Niall opens his mouth to respond, but at that point - Professor Bond coughs, his universal signal for getting everyone in the lecture theatre to shut the fuck up. This week, Bond tells them that they’re mainly going to be discussing Anne Carson, and The Glass Essay.

Niall grins when he hears this. He has a strange soft spot for Carson. He’s read The Glass Essay before - way back when, before university, back in Ireland. He’d finished it all in one go and then staggered downstairs to where Greg and his dad were sitting in the kitchen, shouting about a football match Niall had plans to watch on record. The two of them had looked up at him, expectantly, and he’d said, “I fear I am turning into Emily Bronte.” Hi dad had just looked confused, but Greg had snorted and called him a, “Feckin’ eejit.” Told him to get his head out of the books, and sit down and watch the game with the two of them.

Niall smiles, remembering it now, and thinks about Carson, and how grief is a long process. Bond is talking, quiet voice spreading out over the lecture halls, then he says,

“So, let’s open it to the class. What do you think that Carson was trying to say?”

Zayn’s hand shoots up - of course it does. He says, “It’s a love poem, yeah. It’s not a love poem to, like, the guy that she mentions - Law. He’s not the point, the point is Emily Bronte. The point is Wuthering Heights. The point is all that weird, raw emotion that you feel when you’ve just had your heart broken.”

“Yeah,” Niall says, before he can think to stop himself. Zayn’s eyes swoop over to his, catching, and Niall holds the contact, before looking back to Bond. “I think, it’s like. It’s about how she feel awful, and alone, and this guy up and left her - but at the same time she’s got all this literature. She’s got Bronte, who never really left her house, but who still wrote one of the best books out there, yeah? It’s a love poem to literature. And it doesn’t matter that it’s dark, or grim, or, y’know, it pains me to record this, because, like - it’s a parallel. She’s not alone, because Bronte did it first - she’s able to live on, through that.”

Zayn snaps his fingers at him, does a finger gun. It’s lame and embarrassing and Niall laughs at it. Bond looks between the two of them, face carefully expressionless, before he says. “Well. It’s about fucking time.”

The rest of the class laugh at that.

*

Zayn meets him outside the lecture theatre. He’s wearing black skinny jeans, held together at one part by gaffer tape. He’s got a maroon jumper on, and a red beanie, Niall things, somewhat irritably - that on anyone else the combination of maroon and red would clash horribly. On Zayn, it just looks like a deliberately clever deviation from the norm. His hands are awkwardly shoved into his pockets, shoulders rounded, and his head is tipped down a little. Niall readjusts his glasses three times in quick succession, and then says,

“Hey.”

Zayn smiles, one hand coming out of his pocket to curve in the air in a small wave. His mouth tips up towards the right, and his eyes seem to soften when Niall comes nearer. Niall wonders what this moment would look like to someone on the outside - two guys, facing each other in a corridor - he wonders if there’s some kind of poetic way of describing the distance between them. Then he wonders when he got so fucking cheesy.

“Hey,” Zayn says. He rocks forwards onto his toes once, and then back again. “I was thinking we could go get lunch? There’s a nice falafel place that’s pretty close.”

Niall stops dead in the street, and Zayn spins around, looking back at him, curiously. “What?” He asks. “Do you not like falafel? We can go somewhere else, if you want.”

“No, I love falafels. I was just wondering how I’ve never seen you in there. I go there all the time.”

At this, Zayn looks a little sheepish, his eyes drop to the pavement - and Niall’s almost positive that he’s gone a little pink; the flush settling in his cheeks in a way that only serves to make him look more attractive. “I uh, I have seen you in there,” He mumbles. Niall chokes.

“Sorry, no you haven’t.”

“No, I have,” Zayn looks back up at Niall, catching eye contact with him quickly - before dropping his eyes back to the pavement. “I was behind you in the line, and you were with some guy, laughing. I dunno, I didn’t wanna say anything, like. Didn’t think it was the time for a fight.”

“What guy?” Niall asks, tilting his head to the side in curiosity. To his delight, Zayn looks even more embarrassed at this, shuffling his feet. There are people walking around them, and they’re stopped awkwardly in the middle of the pavement - but neither of them seems inclined to move.

“I dunno. He was at the party, on Friday? All muscles. Pretty fit, like. I didn’t want to, I dunno, interrupt the two of you, or anything.”

Niall is laughing, slightly - but he’s trying to hide it from Zayn. “Were you jealous, Malik?”

“No,” Zayn scowls, but the way that he keeps readjusting his beanie tells Niall otherwise.

“You were!” Niall crows. He hasn’t been this happy in a while, and, when Zayn starts walking away from him - head down determinedly, Niall trots after him. “From your description,” He says, “You’re talking about Liam. S’alright, Malik, I can see why you would be jealous of him.”

Zayn’s scowl deepens further, and he shifts his shoulders away from Niall. “See, this is why I didn’t tell you.”

“Liam’s my flatmate. He’s tragically straight. I dunno how he ended up living with me and Lou but I can’t let him go now. He makes tea in the mornings.”

Zayn’s rapid pace slows a little, and he looks over to where Niall is still walking quickly to keep up with him. “You’re not, like, I dunno, shagging some really fit jock bloke on the side?”

Niall cracks up, head falling backwards and ribs curving in. Zayn looks grumpy, and embarrassed, but there’s a softness folding in at the corner of his eyes as well - like he’s aware of how ridiculous he sounds. “Jesus H christ,” Niall says. “Fit jock bloke. I’m never telling Liam you said that. He’d be way too pleased. No, Malik. I can honestly tell you that I am not, and never will be, shagging Liam Payne. If he was going to have a gay experiment it would definitely be with Louis. Or maybe Christian Bale. He’s a big batman fan.”

“Christian Bale is no Heath Ledger,” Zayn replies. Niall smiles, a little, softly.

“Well, I’m glad you like them tragic.” He says. He tries to ignore Zayn’s slow look, instead - he awkwardly leans down, tangling his fingers with Zayn’s. When he looks back, Zayn has a pleased little smile on his face, and he keeps glancing down at their intertwined hands.

*

It becomes something of a routine. Any time the two of them have a lecture together - they go for lunch afterwards. Or they go somewhere else. Sometimes, it’s not even after a lecture - it’s when Niall’s spent all day in the library, in the back, trying to focus on the words in front of him but instead having his head spin off in ten different directions. Or when Harry forces Zayn out of the house because he’s turning their whole flat into a dark room, and Zayn will turn up at Niall’s apartment, sheepish smile on his face, bag of Thai takeaway in his hands.

Three months pass, simultaneously slow - like honey, pooling gently off a spoon, and so fast that Niall swears sometimes he can hear the sounds of clocks - exaggeratedly sped up, like a montage sequence in a movie. Every time he leaves the apartment to go somewhere with Zayn, Louis and Liam will stand there, swooning at each other - sighing like a badly written heroine in a TV show.

Niall flips them off - but even he can admit that it’s starting to get ridiculous, the fact Zayn seems to be shaking with the constant need to go places - take him places. He pulls Niall into second hand bookshops, leans against him in the classics section, thumbing over Bronte, and John Irving. Then he’ll pull him into Waterstones - read lines from the latest, post-apocalyptic young adult novel, the main female in a high pitched, breathless voice - the main male in a rough voice, as though Zayn had burned through three extra packs of cigarettes that day.

They go for walks in the park, wait for children to be done on the swings, and then beeline straight for them. Zayn will lie in the grass and smoke, and Niall will sit beside him, talk to the kids who walk past - or the people walking their dogs, trying to ignore the way Zayn will have one hand on his ankle at all times. It grounds him, keeps him tethered to the earth on days when he feels like he’s going to fly away.

He doesn’t understand why though. Doesn’t get why Zayn insists on doing things. Niall would be perfectly happy sitting in his tiny bedroom, with its colour coded CDs and books, sitting on his bed with a laptop between them, watching comedy shows like It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, watching Zayn laugh with a hand pressed to his face - like he’s not sure that it’s allowed.

“I don’t want you to get bored,” Zayn says, one day, after Niall finally asks him. Up until this point, he had been in the middle of tearing up packs of sugar and dumping them all into the very end dregs of his coffee, causing everything to melt together into a vile looking pile of sludge brown mush. He does this every time he finishes a hot drink when they’re out - and Niall looks at him, half fond; torn between getting him to stop and passing him additional packets.

“Bored of what?” Niall asks. Only half of his attention is really focused on Zayn’s words, the rest of it is watching the delicate way Zayn’s fingers bend as he rips yet another paper packet open.

“Bored of me. I’m, um. I’m not very interesting. I guess, like, I like poets so much because it’s like, I don’t know. They take away from how boring I am.”

Niall stares at Zayn, wordlessly. Trying to think of something to say. Zayn seems to take his silence as a need to continue, because he screws up his eyes and says.

“I just, like. I don’t know. I keep taking you to new places because I want you to think that I’m like, cool, and exciting or something. I don’t want you to start insulting me again.”

That does it. Niall leans forwards across the table and grabs Zayn’s wrists, pulling his hands down so that they’re resting on the table. Then, he twists their fingers together, squeezing Zayn tight. “Zayn,” He says. Zayn looks up to meet him, looking like he wants to bolt. “Zayn, loud, blinding cafés are the last thing you need.”

Zayn freezes, and he stares at Niall. “Did you, did you just quote Rimbaud at me?”

Now it’s Niall’s turn to blush, and he looks down, away from Zayn. “Maybe.”

“You fucking sap,” Zayn’s smiling - the wide one, where it lights up his whole face, the corners of his eyes crinkling and his cheeks splitting. They’re in some new wave, indie kind of coffee shop - everything in shades of purple and blue, with large, arching wooden windows all along the front of the café. Zayn looks lovely in the daylight, and Niall’s whole stomach feels tight when he looks at him.

“Sap is champagne,” Niall tells him, half to see if it will make Zayn’s smile wider, and half to see if Zayn will finish the sentence for him.

“It’s definitely gone straight to your head, like,” Zayn says - but he’s still smiling so wide that Niall thinks if he only looked close enough he could find a galaxy in the shape of his open mouth.

They haven’t kissed yet. Not beyond awkward pecks on the cheek that always leave Niall bright red and Zayn scuttling backwards, as though he thinks Niall will react badly to him. Niall knows that it’s his fault they’ve been going at a glacial pace. He won't let it go past their hands being tangled together, or the kisses on the cheek. The one time Zayn had tried to kiss him - properly, on the mouth, that is - Niall had ended up panicking at the last moment, turning his face away so that Zayn's lips skimmed sloppily over Niall's cheek. 

-

“You’re a ninety-five year old woman, Nialler,” Louis had told him, when Niall had finally admitted the state of his relationship with Zayn. “No, in fact, that’s not true. You’re worse than a ninety-five year old woman, because I read somewhere that old ladies are desperate for sex -”

“You didn’t read it, Lou, it was in Scrubs, and it was gross,” Liam said. Louis flapped his hand about in a dismissal.

“Not the point, the point is that Niall has taken a vow of celibacy when the most attractive guy in the world is offering himself up on a silver platter.”

“You used to find me attractive,” Liam grumbles. Louis ruffles his hair and bursts out laughing.

“And you’re adorable,” He says. “And also into shagging women.”

-

Niall shakes his head thinking about it now, trying to brush away the thought. When he refocuses, Zayn is across from him, still smiling. He’s watching Niall, now - all of his attention focused like Niall is the most interesting thing in the cafe. It makes Niall flush, feeling awkward and over exposed.

“Do you get bothered by it?”

Zayn looks confused. “Bothered by what? You quoting Rimbaud?”

“No, not that. I mean. You like Rimbaud.”

“I know I do,” Zayn laughs. “I don’t like it when you talk around a question, though.”

Niall pulls his hand away and gives Zayn the finger. With his other hand, he rubs it through his hair, holding it over his face and sighing. When he pulls it away, Zayn is looking at him, concerned. “Y’alright?” He asks. Niall nods.

“Yeah. I mean, no. I mean - ugh.”

“Take your time.”

“I mean; do you get bothered by the fact I won’t kiss you?”

Zayn looks surprised, as if he didn’t expect them to be having this conversation at any point in the future. “I dunno, like. Are you ever going to, or is this your way of saying that, like, I should give up now?”

“No!” Niall says - and it comes out more desperate than he means too, like Zayn giving up would be the worst possible thing Niall could imagine. It makes Zayn laugh, sink further into his seat - like something Niall said made him relax, boneless.

“So you want me to kiss you?” He asks. “‘Coz, I mean, I know you were, like, hinting at it - that first time, in McDonalds. I just, I guess I never know with you, Horan.” There’s a tiny smile at the corner of his mouth, the barest twitching of lips. Niall looks at it, and sighs, heavily.

“It’s not that, it’s just. I don’t know. I guess I need to tell you some stuff.”

“You don’t have, like, a tentacle instead of a penis do you?” Zayn asks. Niall chokes on his breath in, not sure if he’s dying or laughing.

“No,” he says, still coughing. “No, it’s not that.”

“That’s nice to know. I mean, I reckon I could make it work, it would just be weird, yeah? Like, would there be suction? Would you stick to me?”

“Are you debating the merits of a tentacle, right now? Is there something you want to tell me? Do you have some sort of feelings for octopuses that should be addressed?”

“Thought it was octopi?”

“No, it’s a grammar thing. They have a different origin - cacti, sure. Octopi, no. The correct phrasing is octopuses and -” Niall trails off when he catches sight of Zayn’s smirk. “You definitely already knew that, and we’re talking about your thing for tentacles.”

“One feeling too falsely disdained, for thee to disdain it,” Zayn says, grinning. Niall shakes his head, trying to ignore the fact that Zayn sometimes makes him feel as though he’s on a bungee - emotions and stomach flip-flopping through so many different stages at once that the rest of him can’t keep up.

“Percy Bysshe Shelley? That’s more obscure than usual.”

“I’m surprised you picked up on it.”

“Any friend of Lord Byron is a friend of mine,” Niall says, smiling, and Zayn laughs - his whole head tipped back. Niall follows the line of his neck, letting his gaze rest in the crevice of his Adam’s apple, the way that shadows fall across his skin. Niall thinks about how it would look if he were to bite down on it, what a bruise would look like - tucked, safe in the hollow of the space under Zayn’s jaw.

He resolves to tell Zayn the truth the next time that they go out.

*

The next time, they’re not out - not really. Instead, they’re lying on Zayn’s tiny bed together. It’s a double, but it’s so compact that it might as well not be. Their shoulders are pressed together, the warmth of Zayn’s body heating all of Niall’s skin, even through their layers of clothes.

“I have something to tell you,” Niall says. Zayn’s playing music - James, on a vinyl - his fingers are tapping along softly to the beat. And he hums in recognition.

“Alright,” He says. “Whenever you’re ready. Just a note, though, if you start reciting Kerouac or something I may spontaneously combust on the bed.”

“What about Vonnegut?” Niall asks, shooting a look to Zayn’s bookcase, where there’s a whole shelf filled with his works. Zayn laughs, and runs a hand through his hair, pushing it back so that it splays across the duvet beneath him.

“You’re killing me at even the implication.”

Niall laughs, but pushes himself to sitting - resting his head against the wall behind the headboard. “No, as much as I’d like to do that. This is serious.”

Zayn sits up too. Slower than Niall, and when he’s upright, he curls his knees up, looking at Niall seriously. His eyes are hooded, and he tucks his chin onto his knee, right arm curled across his shins. “Okay,” He says. He looks small, and defensive, sitting there. Niall lets out a breath, looking up to the ceiling.

“I, um, I. In first year, of university, I was a mess.” He glances over to Zayn, and Zayn’s still sitting there, looking at him with serious, open eyes - listening like everything that Niall has to say is important to him. Niall takes a deep, shuddery breath in, and keeps going. “My dad, and my mam. They’ve, um, they’ve not been together in years - since I was a kid, like. Um, I was never that close to my mam, really. I love her, like - but, me and Greg, uh, we always used to live with Dad.”

Zayn’s hand snakes out - and he touches Niall’s bare ankle, gently, as if he doesn’t know if the touch is okay. Niall stops, and smiles at him, letting the muscles in his body relax slightly, trying to tell Zayn in all the ways he doesn’t know how that it’s more than okay. Zayn smiles back, soft - so Niall thinks he’s going okay.

“Anyway, um, she lived in a different house. Not too far out, like - ‘bout a, thirty, forty minute drive? But, eh, Greg was always closer to her than me. So, yeah, he used to make the drive a lot. No big deal.”

Zayn’s hand tightens incrementally on Niall’s ankle, and Niall wonders if he knows where this is going. What’s about to happen.

“So, um. When I came here, England, for uni - whatever. Greg was still living in Ireland, with dad, because he helped out, and he liked, I don’t know, staying at home. He never wanted to leave, like, and dad would have -” Here, Niall chokes up a bit. Resolutely, he keeps his eyes fixed on the ceiling. Focusing himself on the warmth of Zayn’s hand - the dip in the mattress where he knows that Zayn is sitting. It helps. After a few moments, he continues. “Dad would have kept us forever, if he could have. So, anyway. I’m in university - and one day I get this -” Niall chokes off again, he breathes, trying to keep going. “I get - “

Zayn lets go of his ankle, slowly, he crawls up the mattress, until he’s sitting beside Niall. Their hips are pressed so tight to each other, and Zayn’s right arm comes up, wrapping itself over Niall’s shoulders.

“I’m listening,” Zayn says, quietly. His head is tipped towards Niall’s, his forehead resting against Niall’s temple. He smells familiar - like cigarettes and the cologne he always uses. That flowery laundry detergent that Harry always buys. Niall shuts his eyes, lets his weight sink against him.

“I get this phone call, that Greg - um. It was a drunk driver, like, coming from the other direction. And, well he swerved, ended up in the other lane. And well. They’re on the phone to me, saying that it was one of those death on impact thing, so he didn’t suffer. All I’m thinking is this isn’t happening.”

Zayn sucks in a breath, leans impossibly closer. Niall remembers chemistry classes - learning about osmosis, and the shifting of molecules to combine two things together. He wonders how much tighter he’d have to press to do that with him and Zayn. “I’m sorry,” Zayn says. “I’m, like. Shit, Niall. I’m so sorry.”

Niall remembers when it had first happened - and Liam had said, “I’m sorry, Niall.” He remembers how he’d snapped, said.

“I’m sorry too, sorry you’re such an overbearing cunt,” And tried to hit Liam. He remembers the way Liam had grabbed his fist, pulled him into a hug, told him that it would get better. He remembers Louis appearing with a bottle of vodka, saying.

“For Greg, yeah?”

Then he remembers the decline. “I, like, initially I blamed my dad, ‘cause Greg was driving to my dad’s house. Then, I don’t know, I blamed my mam, ‘cause he was driving from her house. Then, for a long time, I mean, then I blamed myself, because I wasn’t - I - I wasn’t there. So it was on me, right?”

“No,” Zayn says. His other hand, the hand that’s not wrapped around Niall’s shoulders, is pressing into Niall’s stomach. Niall remembers reading about how you’re supposed to do that with babies - bundle them up in blankets, so that they feel secure. It’s some sort of replication of the womb; Niall thinks that he should maybe ignore the Oedipean implications that lie there.

“I thought it was,” He says, trying to shrug. “Doesn’t matter, basically, I went off the rails, started drinking all the time - fucking anyone that would lie down with me, skipping class, ignoring my mam and dad when they called. I, um, I don’t know how many times I passed out on a pavement, or woke up and didn’t remember how I got there. Before, I mean, before the phone call - I was gonna do music. But, um, Greg bought me my first guitar, and I couldn’t touch it anymore. I still, um. I still can’t, really.”

Zayn doesn’t say anything - just breathes, waiting for Niall to continue.

“The point is, just. First year, I was a mess. I reckon it’s why I started, uh, started fighting with you in the first place. I think, I think I just wanted someone to treat me how I was feeling. But, like, I don’t know what I would have done without Liam and Louis. I owe them more than they even know.”

“Is that why you wanted to leave the party? The first night we hung out, like?”

“Yeah,” Niall laughs - though there’s not much humour in it. His cheeks are wet from telling the story - and he knows, in an absent kind of way, that he was crying. “I just, I don’t know. I don’t fully trust myself yet.”

“Back, um, in first year, like? I thought about fucking with you. Or, I mean. Fucking you. ‘Cause, I knew, I mean, I reckon I would have been able to do it.”

Niall chokes, not sure where Zayn’s going with this. “Probably, yeah.” He admits. He feels, rather than sees Zayn’s smile - the way the skin on his forehead shifts, the minute fluttering in the air.

“Yeah. I mean. You just made me so angry, you know? I was fucking furious at you, like, all the time. And, I don’t know. I thought about taking you home and fucking you, and then, like, walking out the next day.”

Niall thinks that he might start crying again. He’s not sure. He winces at the way his voice wavers when he says, “That’s kinda fucked up.”

“Yeah, I know.” Zayn replies. “I didn’t do it, yeah? ‘Cause, like, Harry would have killed me for being such a dick, and, I mean, I’ve seen Liam and Louis, I reckon they could hurt me.”

Niall chokes on a laugh, feeling weird and raw - inside out and shaken. Like someone dragged rough nails down the softest parts of him. “I think they could, yeah. They seem to like you alright at the minute though, Malik.”

Zayn laughs - more an exhalation of air than anything else. “I’m charming. Just took you a while, yeah? Anyway, the point is - I mean. I couldn’t have gone through with it, I reckon, even if I had tried. You’re too. I dunno, like. You’re too fucking bright, Niall. I reckon the second that I touched you I was kinda ruined.”

“Fuck you, Zayn,” Niall says. He might be crying again.

Zayn is silent, for a few seconds. Then he says, “My love reveals objects.”

Niall’s insides feel like they’re being tangled - like there are butterflies wreaking havoc in the hollow of his bones. He knows this poem. Knows where Zayn is going with this. He can’t believe it, though - his brain snagging, like a bitten nail, catching on the sleeve of a jacket. He sucks a shaky breath in, says, “Zayn-”

“Silken butterflies concealed in his fingers,” Zayn continues. His hand moves, sliding from Niall’s stomach to grasp at Niall’s hand, their fingers clasped together, like the pins of a zip. “His words splash me with stars,”

With each word, Niall feels like he’s falling more apart. He shuts his eyes, tries just to focus on the rhythm of Zayn’s breathing.

“Night shines like lightning under the fingers of my love,” Zayn goes on. His thumb is moving softly over Niall’s hand, an absent move in its simplicity - but Niall feels like every single thought in his brain is zeroed in on that point of contact. “My love invents worlds where jewelled glittering serpents live. Worlds where music is the word,”

Here, Zayn presses a kiss - soft, and sweet, onto the bone of Niall’s cheek. It’s so gentle that Niall could almost swear he imagined it. “Worlds where houses with open eyes contemplate the dawn.” Zayn laughs again, soft, and gentle. He lets go of Niall’s hand, and touches his face - reverent in his attention. Niall’s eyes shakily fall shut.

“My love is a mad sunflower that forgets fragments of the sun in silence,” Zayn whispers. He feels close, impossibly close - each word out of his mouth so near that Niall can feel it against his eyelashes.

Niall kisses him. Soft, and warm - contained in the circle of Zayn’s arms, Niall presses his mouth forwards and kisses Zayn. It feels like clean bedsheets, like mornings when you don’t have to get out of bed, like the first drink of a perfect cup of tea.

Niall kisses him, and doesn’t think that he’ll ever be able to stop.

*

It’s another few months, before Niall wakes up one morning - Zayn still fast asleep next to him. They’re in Niall’s room, though there are a pack of Zayn’s cigarettes on the bedside cabinet beside him, and some of Zayn’s shirts in the drawer - and a spare toothbrush that’s not spare anymore.

Niall watches Zayn, takes in the slow in-and-out of his breath, the way that his back is sloped away from Niall, tattoos splayed out in stark contrast with the white of Niall’s sheets.

Slowly, carefully, so he doesn’t wake him - Niall slides out of bed, crossing the room to where his guitar, Marian, is sitting. He picks her up.

Zayn wakes up when Niall is stumbling his way through Love Will Keep Us Alive. The chords are kind of sloppy, and he probably could have tuned Marian for longer before he started to play. It doesn’t matter, though - because the look on Zayn’s face would keep Niall playing forever. Terrible, out of breath singing voice and slightly out of tune chords and all.