how to love // z. m.

Chapter Forty-Six

Chapter Forty-Six

By now, I had my heels off and carrying them by their straps on my index finger and middle finger on my right hand, exhausted as I was thanks to that huge show known as the VMA's.

It's exhausting, watching that show. All you want to do there is dance and scream the lyrics to songs when the performers are, well, performing.

But, One Direction won every award they were nominated for, which was amazing. I felt really proud of them. And when they went to accept the award, Niall and Addison kissed. The audience (let me remind you, was full of mostly fellow celebrities) went crazy over that.

Now, nearly six hours later (there'd been an after party and then we went to dinner with some other stars whose names I can't pronounce), Zayn and I were walking back to my hotel room. Right now, we were about to cross the lobby.

And he just mentioned what I'd been waiting for him to mention all night long.

"So... What was that phone call on the way to the VMA's about?"

"In the limo?" I bit my lip, turning my eyes' focus on the floor in front of me.

"Yeah," I heard Zayn say.

"It was David..." I sighed. "He..." I shrugged, looking up at his curious, yet worried, eyes. "He didn't react to the whole coming-to-L.A.-with-you thing how I'd expected him to..."

"...That bad, huh?" he said quietly, his deep voice low.

"Worse, probably..." I said, but forced myself to give a little smile. " It'll all work out somehow. He's just jealous. When he sits down and realizes that I do not like you, 'in that way', he's going to be a lot better boyfriend."

It felt weird saying that. My conscience was yelling at me, I knew it. But I just ignored it, making myself keep my focus completely on real-life.

"Yeah..." he mumbled, looking away. He had his hands stuffed in his pockets and his eyes were squinted.

By now, we were in the middle of the lobby (it's a big hotel... Perks of being a celebrity's 'plus one'.), and it felt like the whole building was empty, it was so silent. Addison and the rest of the girls and the guys all went back to the after party after we all finished eating, but Zayn and I had agreed that we were pretty tired and just wanted to relax.

Addison had raised her eyebrows and whispered to me, "Mr. British Sex God", but I made sure she knew that nothing was going to happen between us.

Not that she bothered to listen, of course.

Suddenly, I saw petals. Lots and lots of blood red rose petals, scattered on the floor of the hotel. My eyebrows furrowed as I followed them with my eyes, seeing them lead to a door that had a little sign next to it, showing a staircase picture on it.

"Is that..." Zayn said, noticing the petals, too.

"Yeah..." I grinned. "A guy did this for a girl... Possibly a girlfriend... Like a movie moment... Oh my God..."

Zayn smiled and bit his lip, looking over at me. "And I suppose you're going to want to crash that moment?"

"Well..." I grinned, then started laughing. "Yeah. I do."

Zayn nodded, his smile a lot bigger and more... well, real. "Then let's go." He grabbed my hand and started walking toward the staircase.

"Seriously?" I asked, surprised that he was so willing to do this. "Well, this isn't like you at all."

"I've had a change of heart..." He clutched his heart, looked over at me dramatically, his lips in a pouty smile.

I laughed and nodded. "Okay. Lead the way."

We both followed the rose petals to the door. Zayn opened it and we both dashed in and up the stairs, following the petals that sprinkled on there, too. Eventually, though, we had to stop running and just keep walking up the stairs because it seemed like the petals would never come to an end.

"What, is it on the roof?" I groaned, my feet killing me. First, thanks to the heels I'd worn all night but were now in my hands, and now the staircase. Can't a girl get a break?

"Guess so," Zayn said. "I mean, that is a really romantic place, especially in a big city like Los Angeles at night."

"Seems like you really know you're stuff when it comes to this, huh?" I giggled, steadying myself with the bar provided by the stairs.

Zayn shrugged, smirking. "You could say that."

I smiled, and finally reached the top of the stairs. "Okay, moment of truth." I looked at Zayn as I grabbed the handle of the door in front of me. "I hope they don't hate us after this."

"Eh, they won't," Zayn grinned as I pulled on the door, opening it slowly.

Cool, fresh air hit my face as I peered outside. I saw the silhouette of a tall, muscular man near the edge of the roof, but a pole was in the way so I couldn't see if there was a girl next to him. Even if there weren't, then maybe she hasn't come up yet, and we shouldn't probably hide.

Yeah.

I quickly began --- as silently as possible --- trudging through the rose petals, which were extremely soft against my bare feet, Zayn following close behind, but someone called my name.

"Toni?"

I froze and looked over to the guy, who was now turned to face me. David.

"David...?" I said timidly, looking from him, to Zayn, whose face showed no emotion, and then back to David. I started to tiptoe closer to him, until I was now on the edge of the roof, as well.

"Toni, I know you probably hate me now---"

"I don't---"

"No," he said, grabbing my hands. "Don't speak. Not yet." He took a deep breath, looking into my eyes. "I love you, you know that? I guess I just have really bad jealousy problems, and I'll work on that. I really will. I'm actually gonna see if I can hang out with Zayn and the other guys in One Direction to become friends with him, so that I don't ever feel jealous again. I really want to get you to feel for me the way you did before any of these fights ever happened. I also---"

While I was listening to him talk, a smile was creeping onto my face. But now it was just too much. I shut him up by grabbing the front of his shirt and pulling his lips to mine, kissing him. He immediately kissed back, cupping my face with his large hands, smiling into the kiss.

He then pulled away for just a second, just long enough to get out two words that made my heart stop.

"Marry me."