New Guy

Chapter 20

Zayn's POV: 

I know she's happy to see her friends and all but.. But I can already see how this is going to turn out. Her friends come over to visit her after years of not seeing each other and she ignores us for the whole time they're here.

I exchange a glance with Liam and I can tell he feels the same. I sigh and turn to leave, Liam doing the same. I quickly look back at Nicola and the boys, but instead of her looking happy, she looks confused. She's staring right back at me and I can see she doesn't understand.

I just shake my head and continue walking. I decide to text Niall and ask him to meet her here as I drove her and I'm leaving now. He quickly replies with an 'ok' and in about five minutes, he's here.

"Why are you guys looking so down?" Niall asks when he sees our expressions.

"Nicola's friends came over here from Australia after not seeing each other for three years and it's obvious that she's going to ignore every single one of us until the day they leave.." Liam explains.

"Oh," Niall answers, his face turning from happy to blank. He waves at her but she doesn't see him, too caught up with the band.

Ashton's POV: 

"You've grown up so much!" Mikey says to Nicola, messing her hair up. "When do you finish school?"

"Two weeks until I finally graduate!" She answers happily, really excited to finish.

Our baby really has grown up fast. I probably sound like some overly attached mother or something but I've been friends with her since we were only learning how to walk. Look at her now. Beautiful, strong, intelligent, confident.

~~~~

The girl trips. She falls.

I walk over to her and help her up.

"Hello," I say, wanting to be friends.

"Hewwo," She says back. She looks and sounds littler than me.

"My name is Ash."

"I'm N-Nicola. Want to be fwiends?"

"Yah!"

~~~~ 

I snap back into reality when Calum whacks my arm. "Ashton! Yes or no?"

"Sorry, what?"

"Stop zoning out, man! We need to get going so we need to plan some stuff! Are you up for lunch on Saturday?" Luke asks and I nod, pulling Nicola close to my side.

I'm really up for anything as long as I get to hang with my friends. Actually as long as I don't have to socialize with people I don't know who aren't fans.. I don't really like people.. I'm not a people person..

"I missed you guys so much, I'm so hyped that we finally get to hang out! Also you guys should be grateful, I've missed like a week of school in total in the past few weeks and I took half a day off today.." Nicola says, poking my tummy.

"We are grateful, baby, we are," I say and kiss her head. I kinda forgot that there are still fans watching and listening to everything we say and do and this action earns heaps of 'aw's. Okay..

Zayn's POV: 

My attention turns back to Ashton and Nicola as I'm pretty close to the front and can hear what they're saying. He called her 'baby'. That's our thing, though..