Wild (sequel to Deep) - Zarry AU

Splash

Nick pulled at his collar and adjusted the angle of the screen in front of him. He had just come off set for a new BBC show and was still wearing the dark, glittery, really uncomfortable suit that wardrobe thought fitted the show's late Saturday evening slot. It wasn't just discomfort that was making him fidgety. The jokes weren't working. Nick had never, in all the years he had known Harry Styles, had a conversation with Harry where he couldn't make him laugh. He was running out of options.

"You do realise this means our friendship is over, don't you?" Nick said.

Harry seemed to wake from a dream. "Wha'?" He stared at Nick. "Wha'd'you mean?"

"Well, if I can't even get you to raise a smile, Harold... it's all finished, isn't it? Ah mean, what else have I got? I don't have a body like ... erm... whatshername... so what are you gonna wanna hang around with me for?"

Harry frowned at Nick as if he had been asked a particularly difficult interview question.

"Ah ... oh.... were you tellin' a joke?" Harry's accent turned the word into "jerk".

"Duh. Yesss. " Nick rolled his eyes.

"Oh." Harry raised his eyebrows briefly and then carried on staring into something which seemed to be just above Nick's left shoulder. Nick turned and looked over his left shoulder. Nothing there, of course.

Nick tilted his head to one side. "Am I allowed to ask what's bothering you... or is that beyond the bounds of our traditionally-lightweight-banter-based interaction??"

"Ummm...." Harry said.

It was Nick's turn to stare. He took a deep breath and shifted in his seat.

"Ok. I get it..... Him." Nick's face flattened as he said it.

Harry frowned again and rubbed his forehead.

Nick closed his eyes for a good five seconds and opened them slowly, as if he didn't want to see something.

"What's going on, mate?"

Harry looked at the floor.

"Ah thought you didn't see him any more? Or talk to him?"

"Ah don't."

"So... what's..."

Harry nodded to himself, pinched his bottom lip between his thumb and first finger.

"There's a tape, Grimmy."

"What?"

Harry drew in breath sharply, sat up and looked around. "Jeezus..." he breathed. "I don't even want to say these words." Nick didn't move, seeming to barely breathe, as he waited for them.

"There's a tape," Harry repeated. Nick looked on, nonplussed. "It's of him and me, Grimmy.... In that hotel. We're..." He ran his hand through his hair. "...you know."

Nick was silent for a long time: mouth slack, eyes flicking back and forth across the landscape of the screen.

"Holy Sh..."

Harry stared out of the window.

"What the f.....A tape... What? Who's...like... who's got it?" Nick said, his mouth returning to an O shape at the end of the sentence.

"The Sun. Among others, no doubt."

"Oh my God Harry. But surely....? Isn't Si locking it-"

"- down? Yes. Hopefully."

"Even so." Grimmy's face was the stillest Harry had ever seen it. Like stone.

"Even so," Harry nodded.

Nick stared at Harry, his mouth still open slightly, the words processing. "How the fuck did they get that?"

Harry shrugged and pushed at his bottom lip with his fingers, like a small child. His frown grew deeper. Then he took a deep breath, nodded and said:

"Hidden camera? Or just CCTV. We were so fuckin wasted we didn't even think."

Nick rocked back, considered the wall of his dressing room, covered with autographed images of other ridiculously-besuited TV stars from decades past. He laughed in a small way. "Well.. you probably weren't capable of thinking .... After all, there wouldn't have been much blood going to your brains...." He folded in half and rolled back in the couch, his face a silent grimace of amusement. "I'm sorry, Harry, that was sick and uncalled for."

Harry threw a rolled up sweet wrapper at the screen, which actually made Nick flinch.

But at least Nick had made him laugh.