There’s no day or time or moment that Zayn can think of as to when it started. All he knows is that Liam had been there for him from the very beginning. Soft smiles, soft eyes, soft whispers, just soft and gentle. Bit by bit, piece by piece, he had stolen Zayn’s heart until it was all his. Maybe Zayn had consented to it all, because (i) he didn’t have a choice since (ii) Liam Payne was (is) the most irresistible human being on this planet and (iii) he wanted to. He wanted to be Liam’s, he wanted to have Liam, he wanted all of Liam, he knew Liam was his the moment their lips had accidentally (not really) touched. But it was hard. Unfortunately, and fortunately, they weren’t just normal boys who started dating and nobody gave a fuck about them because they are such losers, acting like married people at the age of 20. But they were in a band, they were almost-celebrities. And their record label and management kind of owned/controlled them. They had been sat down, and talked to, and made to sign contracts. They weren’t supposed to do whatever the hell they wanted, they were supposed to be role models, they were supposed to try to be better than other celebrities, each one of them were supposed to do everything and anything for the band’s sake. There is just one thing Zayn still remembers from the two hour long meeting they had had, and that one thing is their manager asking them if they were not straight. Zayn remembers uneasily looking over at his friends to find Niall and Louis shaking their heads. Harry said a nonchalant, “Nah!” and Liam just shook his head slightly so Zayn did too. The manager proceeded on to say how that was simply great, since 97% of their fan base comprised of teenage girls who looked up to them, wanted them, drooled over them. And they had to be the perfect boys for them. Great looks, good manners, sense of humor, no relationships in the band, no hookups with random boys, just no, and then some other stuff Zayn doesn’t remember.
It would be fair to say that Zayn had taken the order seriously; he had given up on ever being a somebody more to Liam than just a band mate and friend, pushed out all thoughts of clasping his hand around Liam’s, fingers threading together. It could never happen, he had thought. His uncanny predictions however, didn’t come true. Instead, his resolve of not thinking about Liam in ways that were unacceptable didn’t last very long. It didn’t even have the potential to really, since Liam was just always there, and always so friendly, and always so touchy, and always so inviting, and fuck. Zayn couldn’t have stayed away even if some supernatural force had tried to possess him and make him do so. There was no escape, just Liam, picking at the lock on his cage, destroying the walls he had tried to put up around him.
And then they were playing “Hide and Clap” one fine day, and Zayn was supposed to be taking the turn with a blindfold on, walking with his hands outstretched, trying to catch the boys. When there was a clap right behind his ear, he turned around to catch the person who did it, before he knew what was happening; his nose was bumping against another, his lips were brushing against softer ones, a tongue was licking at the bottom one, and then a small “sorry” whispered into the air, followed by hurried footsteps fading away. He stood there for a long couple of seconds, trying to figure out what had just happened. His lips tingling, his blood warmer than before. He did not need a forensics team to figure out who the boy was. He knew Liam’s smell by heart. (and he lusted after it, like a dog after meat, no fucks given.)
Zayn hadn’t brought it up; he had tried to push it away. He was good at running away from things that made him anxious or nervous. And his running away came in the form of staying quiet, shut up, and only going out to smoke. Smoking just cleared his head, made it easier for him to pay attention to things that mattered more than his infatuation with Liam. Yeah. That is what he was going to call it because it was better if he didn’t think of it as something else.
What he hadn’t been expecting was for Liam to bring it up. So when Liam did, one night while they were sitting in their shared hotel room watching some boring sitcom, it knocked the breath out of Zayn.
“Why didn’t you ask me about it?” Liam had said, just when the girl on TV opened a letter from her long lost love.
Zayn had frozen. It had been a month since the accident and yet he knew exactly what Liam meant. So he gulped, and stated, “It was you.”
Maybe that was confirmation, a question, or a perfect answer to Liam’s question, he didn’t know.
“That is exactly why you should have said something,” Liam threw him off by the response.
Zayn just looked at him, with his mouth open, trying to say something, not succeeding. Liam didn’t attempt to talk, stared right back, Zayn wondered where this sudden confidence in him came from. Then he said, “Okay. Why?”
Liam raised his eyebrows, “That’s all? That is all you are going to ask?”
“No,” Zayn said, “There’s more. But, first tell me why you did it?”
“You say ‘it’ like I did a bad thing,” Liam said.
Zayn wanted to claw his hair out, why was Liam playing with his emotions like this. But he stood his ground and said, “Liam, will you answer me?”
“I did it because I wanted to.”
Zayn had not been expecting that.
“I did it because I thought you wouldn’t mind.”
Zayn hadn’t.
“I did it because I thought you’d do ‘it’ back.”
Zayn couldn’t breathe.
“But you didn’t.”
Zayn’s mouth was dry, when he finally spoke, “I was shocked. I wasn’t even sure who it was.” He knew the last sentence was a lie.
Liam knew too, he rolled his eyes, “Yeah, right. You didn’t know who it was. I believe that.”
“You apologized, like you had made a mistake. What was I supposed to say?” Zayn wanted to punch the wall, or Liam’s face for putting him in such an uneasy position.
“I apologized because you didn’t fucking respond,” Liam said through gritted teeth. Liam rarely swore, but when he did, everybody knew he meant business.
“You could have given me a second to catch on,” Zayn muttered back.
“If I had, would you have responded?”
Zayn didn’t know what to say, the answer clear on his face.
Liam asked again, “If I do ‘it’ again, will you respond?”
Zayn tried to breathe. As Liam leaned in, he waited and shut his eyes the moment Liam’s soft palm came in contact with his left cheek. Then Liam’s nose slid against his, Liam’s impatient, nervous, minty breath on his lips. Followed by the soft press of Liam’s lips against his. Zayn immediately returned the pressure, answering all questions that needed to be answered.
After it was said and done, and Liam was lying comfortably with his head on Zayn’s thigh looking up at him, Zayn’s hand in his hair like always, but in a different better kind of way this time, did Zayn bring the most important matter up, “How are we supposed to tell the management about this?”
Liam just grinned, whatever had happened to the responsible, fatherly side of him, Zayn had no idea, “We won’t tell, simple.”
Zayn was okay with that, very okay indeed, “What about the boys? How do you think they will take it? Louis will throw a fit, I am telling you.”
“Then we won’t tell them either,” Liam had said, smiling his brightest smile at Zayn.
“What? But-“
“It is best not to, for the time being.”
“I don’t think that's a very good idea.”
“You have a better one?”
“No.”
“Yeah.”
“Harry and Louis will kill us when they find out,” Zayn said.
Liam put his hand up to touch Zayn’s cheek lightly, “Listen, we will handle it together when the time comes okay? We will see, we will. Now, tell me, where would you like to go to on our first date?”
And that was the end of it.
