Keep the Car Running (Zarry AU)

Chapter 5

Harry should have left half an hour ago, but Chris ordered another bottle of champagne and Harry didn’t stop him so there he is, trying to focus on Chris’ unnecessarily loud story about having a threesome with two girls from a band Harry has neither heard of nor cares about. He’s trying not to stare at Zayn but then Chris goes into detail about fingering one of them – with hand gestures and everything – and Harry’s gaze strays back to Zayn. He has to stop, because that’s the first rule: they pay for you, they get you. All of you. And even though Chris hasn’t paid, if he notices Harry checking Zayn out and tells Charlotte she’ll skin him like grape. So Harry makes himself look at Chris, at his round blue eyes and button nose as he all but stands on the sofa they’re sitting on and shouts, I’M STRAIGHT. LISTEN TO HOW STRAIGHT I AM, EVERYONE.

Zayn Malik’s straight, Harry thinks as Chris makes a point of winking at the waitress when she passes, revoltingly, hopelessly straight and Harry loves it. It’s making his heart beat a little faster as he watches how unfazed Zayn is, sipping his champagne as the girls he’s with paw at him. He has nothing to prove, no stories to tell, like Chris, no wink for the waitress or smug smile for everyone else when one of the girls draws him into a deep kiss. It’s like a red rag to a bull and Harry wants to charge over there and pull her off him, to climb into Zayn’s lap and lick his way into his mouth while his hands mess up Zayn’s perfect hair and perfect suit. He’s so immaculate – all in black apart from a diamond stud in his left ear – that Harry wants to leave creases in his shirt and teeth marks on his neck. Fucking brand him right there and then before taking him in his mouth and sucking him until he’s sweating and shaking in his Prada shoes.

‘So then she came again. I didn’t even have to touch her.’ Chris laughs and Harry wants to reach for the bottle of champagne and down it in one because this isn’t fair. He wants to be over there with Zayn, but he’s stuck with pretty but dim Chris and it isn’t fair. But it is what it is, so Harry just smiles sweetly, but when Zayn turns to kiss the girl on the other side of him, his nerves tense suddenly. He’s trying not to stare, but he must be because when they pull apart, Zayn looks at him as if he knows. Harry would normally look away, tease him a little, but he tries to take in as much of him in as he can before Zayn looks away again, his wide eyelashes, the sharp line of his jaw, the not so sharp curl of his mouth. The top button of his black shirt is open to expose an inverted triangle of skin that Harry wants to press his tongue to until he tastes salt and when he thinks about it, his heart does that thing again where it feels like it’s been kicked.

‘I’m going for a piss,’ Chris says, with a wink that is as subtle as it is unwelcome.

Harry smiles again, pretending not to see how he has to cover his hard on with his hand as he swaggers towards the bathroom. As soon as he’s gone, Harry looks at Zayn again, but he’s gone and it takes him a second to realise that it’s because he’s walking towards him. Harry holds his breath and when Zayn passes his table, he doesn’t think before he’s on his feet, following him to the bar, his legs suddenly a little weaker.

‘I’m Nathan,’ he spits out as soon as he catches up with him, not even waiting to catch his breath. It’s been a long time since he felt that – since a guy made him nervous – and he doesn’t know what he thinks is going to happen, but he likes it.

Likes how it feels in his bones.

Zayn presses his palms to the bar and turns to look at him from under his eyelashes and it makes the collar of his shirt stick to the back of his neck because it’s like being undressed, button by button. He licks his lips and it makes Harry lick his lips as well because all he can think about is kissing him. Kissing and kissing and kissing him. Kissing him like those girls just did, until Zayn’s jaw clenches and his eyelids shiver shut.

‘I know,’ Zayn says at last. ‘I think we have a friend in common.’

Harry’s heart does that thing again.