Keep the Car Running (Zarry AU)

Chapter 8

When Harry walks back to the living room, Zayn is sitting on the sofa, drinking a scotch as if nothing has happened. He stands up when he sees Harry, the ice shivering in his glass, and it’s so smooth – so elegant – that Harry says a little prayer that his feet don’t fail him and he spills across the floor.

‘Alright?’ Zayn asks when he stops in front of him, and that’s kind of smooth as well, like he couldn’t give a shit. It hurts more than it should, but then they’ve only been apart a few minutes so Harry’s heart shouldn’t be beating like that, either, too fast and too hard, as if he’s just got off a plane to find Zayn waiting for him in Arrivals. And it’s kind of pathetic – kind of cliché – how his nonchalance makes Harry want him more, but it does. It makes him want to reach for him, to fist his hands in his black hair and run his tongue along his bottom lip until Zayn opens his mouth. Given what they’ve just done – what Harry does most nights – it’s such a silly thing to miss, a kiss. Childish even. But it’s all Harry can think about as they stand there, looking at one another, and he wishes Zayn would just give him that tiny moment of softness. His thumb wasn’t enough.

But he doesn’t, just sips his scotch while Harry catches himself looking for some sign that he isn’t okay, either. A ring of sweat around his hairline. A cut on his bottom lip from where he had to bite down on it. But there’s nothing. There isn’t even a crease in his shirt and it makes Harry feel like shit as he licks the last of him from his mouth.

‘Do you need me to call you a cab?’ Zayn asks flatly.

‘Can I get you anything?’ Zayn asks flatly.

‘I'm alright.’

Harry looks towards the door. His neck is sore but he doesn’t realise he’s rubbing it until he looks back to see Zayn frowning and there it is at last: a flicker of concern. It only lasts a second before Zayn realises and the skin between his eyebrows smoothes, but Harry sees it.

He sees.

‘Okay,’ Zayn says with a shrug that doesn’t bother Harry as much as it would have a moment ago, but something in him still won’t settle.

‘Okay,’ he repeats, and that’s his cue to leave, he knows, so he doesn’t know why he doesn’t, why he stands there, looking at Zayn, like a dog waiting for a treat.

‘What?’ Zayn asks, sipping his scotch.

Harry shakes his head. ‘Nothing.’

‘Never been treated like this, huh?’

‘Like what?’ Harry tenses, lifting his eyelashes as if to say, Don’t you fucking dare.

But he does.

‘Like a prostitute.’

Zayn looks at him when he says it – right in the eye – and he may as well have thrown his drink in Harry’s face. He must see Harry’s jaw clench, because the corners of his mouth twitch as he shakes his glass so the ice rattles.

‘That’s what you are, isn’t it?’ He smiles and Harry doesn’t give him the pleasure of correcting him, just holds his gaze, his nerves tightening like piano strings. ‘And I’m the dumb fuck footballer who doesn’t know that he has a Helmut Newton in his living room.’

That hurts just as much somehow, as much as being called a whore, the thought that Zayn doesn’t think badly of what he does, but of who he is. It sends a surge of shame flooding through him and when he looks up at him, not sure if he should defend himself or plead for forgiveness, Zayn seems satisfied, licking his lips as Harry’s cheeks flare.

‘That’s how you make a living.’ He nods towards the sofa. ‘So you don’t get to come into my house and look down your nose at me, okay?’

Harry nods.