Jet Black Heart (Ziall Horlik) AU

Chapter 18

Niall's POV

I got home around mid day once my slight hangover had been cured by Zayn cuddling me and kissing me up. He really just held me as he slept lightly and kissed me when he felt like it. Last night was probably the best night I had had in a while. I felt like I could relax and just really enjoy being with someone that I knew loved me even just a little bit.

I walked into my house and dropped my backpack at the door before slowly walking into the living room to see just Chris was sitting there on his laptop. My blood turned cold just being in the same room as him. I didn't want to let that get in the way of my good mood. But it still caused my hands to shake. I just walked past him quietly and went into the kitchen where I found my mum taking on her phone as she rushed around the kitchen.

She was in work clothes so I figured she was probably leaving to go show a house or something like that. I walked over and gave her a kiss on the cheek so she would acknowledge I was even in the same room as her. She smiled at me and gave me a few kisses on the cheek before leaving as she continued to talk on the phone. All I did was stand there and wait for the front door to close, knowing that left me alone with Chris.

"Hey, so I wanted to talk to you about universities and applying for a few." Chris told me as he walked into the kitchen to get a beer out of the refrigerator. All I did was follow him back into the living room and sit next to him on the couch. There was a space between us, but he closed the space as he moved closer to me with his laptop.

"Do you have any specific place you wanted to look at for school?" He asked me as he showed me a long list of schools that I knew were probably something we could afford to send me to. I looked over the list and shrugged because I never really thought of school. I actually only live in the moment nearly every day of my life because it always seems so much more important than the future.

"I want to study chemical science and stuff like that. I don't really want to do this right now, Chris." I mumbled to him quietly. He looked at me and nodded as he gently closed his laptop. I could see he was trying really hard to talk to me or have some communication with me, that made me feel guilty for being kind of rude to him.

"How's work going?" I asked him. He smiled at me and took a long drink of his beer before placing his hand on my knee. I flinched and froze, but somehow I remained calm enough to look him in the eyes.

"It's stressful at the moment, but I feel like all of that will get better soon. So for Christmas break I was thinking of heading on a short holiday to wherever Derby is playing. We hadn't done that yet and I know that it would be really amazing to see them play in person. Plus, it would be some guy time together before you go to school. Well if you're going, that is. What do you think?" Chris asked me. His fingers gripped my knee a little bit so I just nodded to answer him because I knew that would make him happy. He's really good to me sometimes. It would be rude if I just let him spoil me and didn't even try to be nice to him. He smiled that normal smile he always does before getting that look in his eyes.

That look left me laying down, trembling cold on the couch wishing I was someone else or just able to go to a secret hiding place. Maybe my tree house with just Zayn there with me.

Zayn's POV

I took a nap after Niall had left my house. He's always been able to handle his alcohol so much better than me. He was able to wake up sober with a dull headache while I'm here trying to deal with my head feeling like someone is hitting me with a hammer. Only when Niall was in my arms did my head stop hurting. All I wanted was peace and quiet for the day. Unfortunately, someone forgot to inform Louis Tomlinson of that because within the next ten minutes of me sleeping he came into my room and jumped on my bed.