the pants book ≫ ziam & larry

iv

once upon a time, niall horan felt mildly fit. what a wonderful five minutes that had been.

since dr. lamstone had deemed him as "scrawny" and "about twenty pounds and twelve ounces underweight" last week during his yearly physical, niall has been on a mission to reinvent himself and gain killer abs that will make girls cry by the end of the summer. also, maybe a new physicion. dr. lamstone is sort of an asshole.

which is how niall finds himself journying a near death experience. it's six thirty in the god dammed morning, and he's running laps around a neighborhood that reminds him of a homicide documentary on netflix.

and because the universe is on a limited edition quest to destroy niall's life, of course one of his best friends just has to be team captain and nationalist on the track team at manchester university, meaning she literally outshines him in everything even remotely related to athleticism, and essentially makes him out to be much weaker than the actuality. between her, lovestruck malik, and harry-abnormally-comfortable-around-your-parents-styles, niall decides he is mildly screwed in the best friend department.

jade thirwall has been considered family since freshman year in high school when she and niall both got lost on their way to algebra 1. a few months down the road zayn adds into the mix when he and niall are seated at the same table in detention for being tardy, ironically on the same day. (zayn calls it fate, niall calls it a terrible public school discipline system). and then they both brought this lanky doof with curly hair from their english class to the lunch table one day and introduced him to jade, and the four have been inseprable ever since.

niall tells himself its normal to feel heart burn and potential death after fifthteen minutes of steady pacing. he wills his body to continue jogging, and is mildly pissed when it breaks down and collapses on the sidewalk five seconds later. niall slaps his legs in an attempt to gain the feeling back in them before she sees. a few yards away, jade notices niall is no longer trailing behind her. she skids her pink nikes against the assfault to a stop and reverses in the opposite direction back to niall.

"come on, buddy," she encourages him as she reaches his aching body, and ah. yeah. buddy. he almost cries.

but instead, niall grabs her left hand extended out to him and lifts himself up. leaning up against jade, she's so cute and adora-

"are you good for another mile?" she asks him, and right. running. life fucking sucks.

niall came to terms with himself long ago that he's kind of like really in love with jade, has been since he took her to his cousin's wedding three years ago, danced with her when bob marely came on, and realized she's more than someone he cheats off of in chemistry when ms. clarke can't see. on a scale of one to ten, niall is averaging an eleven on how bad he's been friend zoned.

niall doesn't even mind that his twelve year old prepubescent man child body will most likely be around for a long while too, because he never expected it to change at all, anyway- he just used dr. lamstone's medical report as an excuse to get jade to run with him, meaning they will be alone and he can finally tell her how he feels without zayn or harry around incase he scares her off and rejects him. he tries not to think of that much.

he just doesn't know why he chose this particular excuse- the last time he did something even remotely benificial for his body was when his mum signed him up for diving lessons in the sixth grade. the residing pain in niall's abdomin tells him the healthy lifestyle is something he can deal without. he'd rather stick to his crisps.

"uhm," niall wracks his brain for something to say that will make him sound cool, and eventually "my legs hurt," comes out instead. he and zayn should write a book on how to murder you're chances with people you're in love with in a single conversation. great. fantastic. fuck.