All the Leaves are Brown (Zarry AU)

Chapter 10

They meet at a pub near Manchester Piccadilly, one of those chains Zayn despises that sell WKD in every colour and do two meals for a fiver. His local, the Crown and Sceptre (or the Hat and the Stick as he and Ant call it), might be a shithole, but at least it has some character. He’d much rather endure the scuffed floorboards and mismatched chairs that feel like they’re going to give way when you sit on them than this place which probably looks exactly the same as the Wetherspoons in Leeds and Cardiff and Dublin. Plus it’s huge, a veritable airport hanger that makes him yearn for the Hat and the Stick with its empty Hendrick's Gin bottles they reuse as soap dispensers in the toilets and its jukebox that has every Joni Mitchell album but no Coldplay. But when he eventually finds Harry tucked into a corner, idly fussing over his mess of curls as he reads the menu, there’s a backpack at his feet so Zayn knows they won’t be there long.

He grins, his little face lighting up like the Blackpool illuminations when he looks up to see Zayn standing there in a leather jacket and a Bondi Ink tank that he definitely, absolutely did not change into after Harry texted him.

‘You came,’ he says, his dimples so deep Zayn could stick a finger in them.

As soon as he considers it, he has to sit down because God help him, this kid is adorable – sleepy puppy falling off a sofa adorable – and Zayn is fucking done for because despite his efforts to refer to him as a kid and the voice in his head that’s saying, He’s seventeen over and over, his heart bounces like a rubber ball against his ribs.

Fuck my life, he thinks as he sinks into the leather chair opposite Harry, and he’s glad there’s a table between them because they’re going to shag, aren’t they? Zayn’s been there less than a minute and he’s already looking around for the disabled toilet.

But instead he says, ‘I was promised chips.’

‘You can have whatever you like,’ Harry says with a smirk that somehow manages to be utterly obscene yet not sleazy in the slightest, which Zayn didn’t think possible. But then that’s Harry, he’s learning, he walks that line well, the one between knowing too much and not having a clue and Zayn’ll be fucked if it isn’t what’s had him thinking about him all day. What’s got him to this shitty Wetherspoons at eight o’clock on a Sunday night when he’s hungover and bone tired after only four hours sleep.

But then Harry’s smirk softens into a smile and suddenly Zayn isn’t tired at all. He’s never felt more awake, in fact, his blood hot and his heart pumping. And that’s down to Harry, he knows, to just being next to him, because he has this energy, Zayn can feel it. He’s sure that if he touched him now, he would be humming because Harry is nothing but energy, energy and light. Not just behind his eyes, that slight glint that makes it difficult to look away sometimes, but under his skin. It’s as if Zayn can see the youth burning through his clothes, and he just wants a little bit of it.

Just a bit.

‘Who’s Ant?’ Harry asks and Zayn stops shrugging off his jacket.

‘Ant?’

‘Yeah, Ant.’

‘How do you know about Ant?’

‘Doniya said that you’ve been living together for a year.’

Harry suddenly looks very serious and Zayn’s stomach turns to water just like it did that morning when he walked into the kitchen to find his sister in her pyjamas. He shouldn’t, he knows, but it’s Zayn’s turn to smirk. ‘Yeah we have.’

‘So you’re living together?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Just the two of you?’

Harry presses his lips together and it’s cruel, Zayn knows, but so is the fact that he’s taking off his leather jacket to reveal his sleeve of tattoos which has Harry’s gaze dipping away from him for the first time since he got there.

‘Yeah,’ Zayn says and Harry looks up at him again.

‘Are you together?’

Zayn can’t help but smile then because it’s just what he wants: to not fuck around. He hates dating, hates the stupid games that you’re supposed to play when you like someone. Don’t reply to texts straight away. Don’t make a date for a Saturday night after Wednesday. Don’t say I love you first. Zayn prefers a more direct approach, especially as it usually results in him getting his dick sucked.

‘No,’ he says but Harry doesn’t look convinced.

‘Have you ever been together?’

Zayn shakes his head.

‘Are you seeing anyone?’ Zayn shakes his head again and Harry smiles. ‘Good,’ he says, fishing a £20 note out of the pocket of his jeans. ‘Time to get me liquored up.’