Mindless (malik au)

preface

Eliza walked in a hurry, trying her best not to spill her smoothie all over herself in the midst of buzzing college students. There was some game--Football? Basketball?-- Eliza didn't know, nor did she care for that matter. She was just focused on reaching her dorm in peace since not only was it ten o'clock at night, quite possibly the worst time to be out alone on campus, but she was also worried she would miss the new episode of Grey's Anatomy.

As she was walking towards her building she felt quick-paced wind. It was one of those breezes that remind you it's summer, the kind that flows through your entire body. As Eliza's hair slipped off her shoulder and flew with the wind, she looked up to push the frame resting on her nose higher. When she saw Zayn she was surprised there wasn't music playing in the background, because he was leaning against a brick wall, people all around him, half smile hanging on his lips, eyes choosing Eliza's in all the chaos. They locked eyes for a split second that meant more than hundreds of years.

Eliza didn't know his name. But she memorized the way his lashes rested against his cheek when he looked down, the way his fingers held his cigarette, the way he raised his eyebrow ever so slightly when they locked eyes. It couldn't have just been her who felt it; he had to have felt it, his friends had to have felt it, the entire campus had to have felt what Eliza felt in that one moment; that rush in her chest and twist in her stomach.

Eliza didn't see Zayn for the next seven days. All she could think about was black hair and unreal hazel eyes. Maybe he was creation of her mind, a hallucination even. Whatever he was, she didn't mind.