One Collision ✔

Chapter Seven - It's Broken

Chapter Seven – It's Broken

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When it's broken, you say there's nothing to fix.

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Liam walked into the lounge of the recording studio, and he instantly knew something was off. It wasn’t that the recording studio was too quiet, in fact it was the opposite, the studio was ringing with laughter. But it wasn’t familiar laughter, it was female laughter.

Peering around the corner, Liam’s eyes were accosted with a sight he didn’t expect to see when he woke up that morning. There, playing foosball, were Zayn and Victoria while Niall looked on and cheered for whoever was winning at the time Conveniently, the Irishman also substituted as referee and scorekeeper.

When she looked up to see who came in, Liam saw a flash of fear pass through Victoria’s eyes, and she immediately lowered her eyes back to the game. Liam’s fists clenched, and he demanded, “What’s going on here?”

Niall didn’t even acknowledge him, because he was so angry that Liam had changed into someone virtually unrecognizable. Zayn, however, managed a weak but genuine smile and motioned to the foosball table.

“Wanna play?” He offered generously. “If you join, Niall can too, and we can make it two on two.”

Liam shoved the offer aside and shook his head, “No. I don’t feel like playing.” Victoria nodded and went back to the game, scoring a point against a distracted Zayn. Doing a little victory dance, she poked her tongue out at him.

“I’m creaming you, Bradford!” She said happily, completely forgetting Liam was there. Zayn returned his attention to the game.

“I’m just getting a late start, Vic!” He said, copying Victoria unintentionally, and dismissing the fact that Liam was there, too. “Just watch out!”

Then the game was back on, and a wide smile was on all of the faces involved, meaning that Liam was only scowling. Louis and Harry came in talking animatedly and freezing in their tracks when they saw the three foosball players. Zayn, Niall, and Victoria were totally and completely oblivious to the stares of their fellow band mates until Victoria hit 25 points and won.

“I told you! I am queen of the foosball table!” She said jumping around and grinning. Taking Niall’s hands, they swung around dancing, shouting, “Foosball queen! Foosball queen!”

Zayn pouted a little, crossing his arms, and Victoria noticed. Detaching from Niall, she went over and hugged him, “Aw, now don’t pout!” She said, giving him a kiss on the cheek. “I warned you. I can’t be beaten.”

The three of them snapped back to attention when they heard the crumbling of a Pepsi can. Liam looked down to his hand to see the Pepsi can he had been sipping from reduced to a poor, wrinkled version of its previous form.

At once, Victoria took in the amusement on Harry’s face, the shock on Louis’, and the clear anger on Liam’s. But she was so used to anger on Liam’s face that she didn’t think it rare. What she did find surprising was the soda trickling down Liam’s hand to the marble floor that he didn’t seem to be paying any attention to.

Sighing, she stepped away from Zayn and Niall, “I’ll go get some napkins.”

“We have assistants for that.” Louis inserted snarkily, and he immediately regretted it. The look that Victoria gave him made him positively shrink. There was so much disgust in her eyes that no other part of her face seemed to matter as much as her thoroughly disapproving eyes.