Keeping up with ZIAM (The Contract Sequel)

Guilt is the theif of life

After catching up over coffee, Zayn left the New Zealanders household and stopped by Starbucks on the way home. He didn't want to be rude and not get everyone something. When he arrived he was welcomed by Niall who had his laptop open as he watched tv in the second living room by the kitchen.

He asked what took him so long and Zayn covered it up by saying he wanted to explore the valley, so he went to a Starbucks further away than the one he did yesterday. He hoped Harry hadn't mentioned anything about Kj and judging from Niall's lack of bringing him up, he knew he didn't. He knew that right away Niall would have said something about it.

Zayn moved to the kitchen and asked if Liam and Ezra were still sleeping to which he responded with a thumbs up as he got on a zoom call with one of his other clients. He gave him a "sorry," type of tense smile hoping he didn't interrupt too bad.

He made his way up letting Niall have downstairs to himself as he peaked into Ezra's room. He saw him laying down peacefully cuddled up to Loki who perked up his ears, but remained still. Zayn backed out shutting the door softly as the puppy drifted off back into sleep.

When he reached his door he heard Liam's louder than usual snores. It must have been the alcohol. His snores were pretty silent usually unless he was super tired, so the volume was new. He opened it and instantly felt shameful of himself as his eyes landed on Liam's puppy dog face while he slept.

No nothing of the sort happened over coffee. He may have stolen some glances at the man's toned body, plump lips, perfect teeth, and still dyed red hair even though that role was long over with. He felt shameful of that. The feeling of possibly fancying someone other than his own husband. The man he's loved, known, and wanted... Ever. His session tomorrow definitely would be interesting.

The whole day was fairly relaxing to everyone. Well, everyone except Zayn. He still couldn't believe he went to KJ's house for coffee. In all the movies and shows he's watched growing up, "Catching up over coffee," meant the adults either wanted to rekindle something from the past, aimlessly try to flirt away, or even have sex. Since none of that happened he felt at ease a bit, but it still worried him that something drew him to say yes so easily.

Later on in the afternoon Harry stopped by as well as Freddie who was dropped of by Louis. He had an Oppenheim group meeting at the office so he didn't want to leave the boy home by himself just yet. Back in London he may have left him at the flat alone, but he wasn't familiar with his neighborhood just yet and they were just down the street.

Harry suggested they go do something fun in the city but Liam disagreed. The next day they would be going out to dinner so that was "enough public interaction" for Ezra to handle he stated. Harry frowned because he wanted them all to go to Santa Monica Pier, to an Aquarium, or even just go to the Hollywood sign. Something a little cheesy and touristy to maybe get everyone's mind off things.

Most of the day consisted of swimming in the pool for the two younger boys, Niall on zoom meetings with his brother Greg, Liam being in the office dealing with things at the London agency, and Harry bugging Zayn about all the things he truly didn't feel like speaking about. He knew he shouldn't have told Harry about his morning, but it just slipped up.

"What if you had been seen leaving his house?"

"Did anything else happen other than coffee drinking."

"Why did you even go over in the first place." We're some of the many questions Harry had asked him. He was busy unpacking things since the moving guys were there and moving in box's from the shipping container that had just docked.