zero • njh

• three •

After leaving Mrs. Garrisons class, I am held back by Harry who is grabbing me by the shoulder, making me stop from getting the hell out of that room.
  "Hey, Maia! Wait." I turn around and his soft voice is making my heart skip a beat. "Huh?" I look at him confused and captivated at the same time, my glance locked to his lips. He runs his hands through his thick locks as he speaks.
   "I just wanted to thank you, you know. For taking the blame and stuff. That was really nice. I don't think anyone else would've done that, you saved me from a whole lotta bullshit there." My cheeks start to heat up and I nod slowly, because he sounds genuinely thankful.
   "Yea, sure, it's fine. I don't have any plans anyway... I-I mean for Friday, and the weekend in general." Harry chuckles making my knees go weak immediately and feeling a little less like a fool for talking like a waterfall.

"Why don't you come to Louis' party after the game?" He suggests with a wide smile that shows off his dimples, "I'll take you with me as my plus one." 
  I don't really know how to respond to that. "Uhh I don't know if I'll have time like I have to ask my dad and stuff, he probably won't let me go without Zayn." The words pour out of my mouth again, but I snap out of it as Harry scoffs my arm laughing.
   "Sorry, that sometimes happens." 'I explain, only for his smile to grow a little wider. 
   "No worries, I know that." He looks at me with a huge grin on his face. "You can bring Zayn along if you want, I think he's invited anyways."
"Okay, I'll ask him later." I say smiling and he nods.

  "Cool, I'd love to see you there, babe." He gives me another smirk before leaving. I put my hand over my mouth to remind myself that I'm at school and squeaking in the middle of the hallway would be the death of the supposedly invisible girl, who seemed to be not so invisible anymore.

Harry Styles just asked me if I wanted to come to a party and called me babe! 

I swear, I wasn't the type of girl to go nuts over guys with thick British accents, but Harry is walking on a whole other level here. After a few seconds of standing there, squeezing my eyes shut and trying to find my chill again, I turn around to continue to walk to my locker to get my books for the next class. My heart doesn't stop pounding against my ribcage for a while, but it feels good in a way. 
   "Hey Maia." someone says next to me and I turn my head towards Julia leaning against the lockers. "Hey Julia." I say and try to smile as friendly as I can, but feel like I've lost that ability over time. 
    "Harry told me that you took the blame for him." She says, explaining why she would come talk to me. "That was pretty nice of you." 
    "Uh, yeah. I guess it was?" I mumble, clearly failing being bold, shoving the books for my next class into my bag. Chuckling, Julia nudges my shoulder in the most cautious way, probably second guessing if it would be awkward.
    "Anyway, I know you weren't serious about the shopping thing, but if you want, we could totally do that sometime." 
My eyes light up as I look at her surprised and my lips curl up into a shy smile. I nod, appreciating the nice gesture and sound more excited than planned.. "Sure, I didn't think you'd want to." 
    "Why not? I'll text you later, k?" 
Again, I nod and Julia pats my arm gently, before turning around and leaving.  

✽    ✽

Later that day Zayn and I are sitting in his car on the Nips parking lot again, eating burgers and fries. The sun is already setting, which makes the clouds look like floating pink and orange candyfloss. And what makes this whole evening better is the fact, that none of the soccer jocks is currently here. The whole day felt like a dream, thinking about Harry and Julia, two really popular and pretty human beings, that were actually being nice for once.
Though, I'm not really that eager to show up to Louis's, because I feel like I'm just going to fuck everything up again with a small mistake. Also, him calling me babe isn't making this whole thing any easier.