Roses | ziam.

Solace

There was something stirring inside him, something that made him feel like laughing and crying all at the same time.

Liam traced a finger around the rim of the bowl, the tread of his finger jerky and uncertain. Liam had wanted to throw it away without a second glance, but there had been something holding him back. He knew that the soup was different, knew it the second he flipped the lid open. Oh no, Zayn hadn't just bought it from the usual shops, the lad had actually made it himself, judging by the richer aroma and the deluge of herbs and mushrooms.

It was strange how Liam was reluctant you'll drink it slowly, carefully, cherishing every mouthful because this is the last time that anyone would ever do something so touching for you, Liam, you made it this way, it was you- to drink the soup.

Every whiff of soup sent his resistance fraying at the ends, and Liam glowered darkly, slamming the lid down on the bowl. He opened a drawer and took out Zayn's tie that he had rescued that day during the photo shoot. Brown eyes landed sadly on the spot where Liam had just occupied minutes before. He didn't know why he still kept it, it was absolutely silly, it had been so preposterously… absurd…

This was the tie that Zayn had worn to Louis' wedding.

"-you're gorgeous. And tomorrow I'll be sober but you'll still be gorgeous."

That was all he needed, that single trigger, that lone memory that unlocked an overloaded dam of feelings within Liam, every moment, every minute of those two months, drawing him back to places, emotions that he couldn't forget no matter how much he tried to, and there they were, that slideshow of happiness dancing around his skull-

"-let me take care of you, please?"

because it's always so warm, so lovely whenever someone says 'I'll take care of you' instead of simply 'take care'-

A spasm of longing rippled through Liam's insides, he was crippling himself with his indifference, and he knew that if he let this end, it would simply bleed away into the inky, black, cheerless night that he drowned himself in. Panic was suddenly increasing, beating its frenzied tempo on his thudding heart, this sharp, indefinable rhythm that sent everything clicking into place.

Liam let out a deranged snarl and snatched up the proposal that was drenched in ink. The brunette pawed furiously at the proposal, his control all frazzled into confetti. He had spent hours on it, perfecting it, but now, it was ruined, it was destroyed utterly and completely just by a single careless mistake, a single careless slip of the tongue, and he had no way to redo it, no other option left but to rip it apart into pieces-

With that, the brunette grasped both corners of the parchment roughly and tore it into jagged shreds and harsh scraps, his face twisted into a frightful expression of anger and abandon.

every time we talk-

The mutilated fragments of the proposal fluttered forlornly to the floor and Liam clamped the back of his hand to his mouth, muffling a sob of dismay. Yes, the proposal was demolished, but this thing with Zayn, yes, it was bruised, it was damaged, but no, it wasn't dead yet, it wasn't the end yet, unless you let him go-

every time we laugh-

The life that he had forced upon himself was grey, cold and antiseptic, this stumbling block to communication debilitating him, he didn't want to keep his feelings jailed and under lock and key anymore, and there were these emotions trampolining all over the place, this full constellation of regret, melancholy, distress, apprehension and agitation swirling, raging, thundering through him like an out-of-control maelstrom. Liam could count the number of times that he had ever felt like this on one hand, and yes, he didn't know what it meant, he didn't know what any of it meant, but it had to mean something, something-