Fifteen Minutes (Zarry AU)

Chapter 7

‘This is what I get for being spontaneous,’ Harry says, sighing dramatically when he sees Zayn ambling down the corridor towards him. Zayn’s rooting through his backpack and stops just as he’s about to trip over Harry’s legs.

‘What are you doing here?’ he asks, looking down at him with a frown.

‘I told you.’ Harry holds his arm out. ‘Being spontaneous.’

Zayn takes his hand and helps him up. ‘Spontaneity only works if you call first.’

‘I did call,’ he huffs, bending down to pick up the pizza box at his feet. ‘I’ve been calling all day. You should answer your phone. It’s very annoying.’

He makes a show of rolling his eyes and Zayn takes the bait. ‘You never answer your phone!’ he snaps, finding his door keys in his backpack and pointing them at him.

‘So you know how annoying it is, then?’

Zayn gives him a look as he opens the door that tells Harry he’s about to get punched in the face, so he waits until Zayn has put down his skateboard and is halfway across the loft before he follows him in.

‘I brought pizza.’ Harry holds up the box.

‘Good. I’m starving,’ Zayn tells him, toeing off his DMs.

‘But I ate it.’

Zayn rolls his eyes. ‘Only you would bring someone pizza then eat it, Harry.’

‘Excuse you.’ He thumbs over his shoulder at the door. ‘I was waiting out there for almost an hour. I got hungry. Where’ve you been anyway?’

Zayn ignores him as he bangs around the kitchen, grabbing a glass from one the cupboards then striding over to the fridge and pulling a bottle of vodka out of the freezer compartment. ‘Breaking up with Ben,’ he says at last, unscrewing the lid.

‘Shut up!’ Harry says, eyes wide as he drops the empty pizza box on the dining table. He doesn’t mean to sound like a fourteen-year old girl, but O M Fing G.

‘I wish I had shut up,’ Zayn mutters, half-filling the glass then knocking it back.

Harry watches his Adam’s apple rise and fall in his throat as he does and usually he would be rapt, but he’s distracted by how rough he looks. He’s never seen Zayn look anything other than perfect, even in the morning when he’s hungover and can’t open his eyes, he could still be in a Chanel ad, but he looks wrung out, like the woman who works in the café on the corner who always looks like she hasn’t slept for a week. And he looks thinner, which is impossible given Harry only saw him yesterday, but Harry’s sure that his cheeks are sharper and his jeans are hanging a little lower on his hips than usual.

‘What happened to your face?’ Zayn asks with a frown.

‘Chloe punched me.’

He holds up the empty glass and shakes his head. ‘I don’t want to know.’

That’s what Harry wants to talk to him about, but when Zayn doesn’t laugh and roll his eyes like he usually does, he feels the hairs on his arms bristle. Zayn puts the empty glass on the counter and there’s something about the way he does it, about the way he looks away and refills the glass with a disgusted sigh that makes the air tighten.

Something’s wrong and Harry doesn’t think, just walks over to him, but as soon as he does, Zayn walks to the cupboard to get another glass. Harry tells himself he’s being paranoid, but there’s something instinctive about it, as if the two actions are connected, like the way Zayn squeezed his shoulder that time in the bar. So Harry follows him and sure enough, Zayn walks to the other side of the kitchen.