A slight frown worked its way onto Zayn Malik’s face as Harry led him over to the old art closet in the quietest, least thought of area of the sixth form. Did Harry need art supplies? Maybe Harry was thinking about taking up art…either way, Zayn stood quietly, watching the taller boy’s movements. Harry let go of Zayn’s hand and opened the room door, but paused when he saw how Zayn was observing him in confusion.
“I, er, wanted us to have some privacy. I can never hear people talking when I’m in the cafeteria. Plus, you don’t like talking around other people, do you?” Harry started, and Zayn smiled widely. No one had ever wanted to hear him talk. Harry was so nice and caring, and made Zayn smile inside and out.
“No one understands me when I talk.” Zayn spoke quietly, before Harry led him into the art closet and shut the door behind them. It was long and narrow, with messy shelves covering the walls, art supplies and tools, even old sketchbooks scattered across them. The shelves were messily arranged, and looked as if it had barely been moved in years. The ceiling was low, and only just high enough for Harry to fit inside. There was a tiny window at the end of the room, which was the only source of light into the room. It wasn’t amazingly lit, even though the warm rays of the sun were shining inside, but Zayn could see Harry’s face, so that was the main thing he cared about.
Harry’s green eyes looked at him for a moment, before a small smile made its way onto his face, and he took Zayn’s hand once again and led him down to the window. Outside, you could see over the school fields, the younger year sport clubs taking place as young boys ran around the field track. Outside they were shouting and making noise, but in the art closet it was quiet and peaceful. Both boys had to climb over old easels and canvases, but Zayn smiled when he saw there was an old couple of couch pillows on the floor next to the window.
“I come in here sometimes to clear my head. The teachers never use it. I think the stoners use it more than the art faculty.” Harry spoke, as he pulled off his bag and dropped it by his feet. It dropped onto the floor and made the dust around it shoot up into the air, it showed up in the light from the window and Zayn’s fascinated brown eyes watched as the dust slowly settled down onto something else, until the next time it would be disturbed. The bright sunshine made the dust in the small room almost sparkle, and Zayn took it all into his mind, ready for a possible drawing. The names and colours on the labels of the brightly coloured paint bottles on all of the shelves all went down into his memory.
A warm hand then tugged at his own. Zayn turned around and realised that Harry was already sat down on one half of the couch pillow, looking up at him with a small smile.
“You can sit down, you know.” He chuckled a little, tugging Zayn’s hand once more. Zayn smiled, bringing himself from his own world. He pulled his bags from his shoulders and placed his bag down gently, arranging it so that it was stood against the wall upright. He caused another small cloud of dust, and simply giggled to himself as he watched it rise up into the rays of the sun before falling back down into the darkness of the room.
He finally sat down slowly on the old couch pillows. If he were on his own, he would have found them uncomfortable. The corduroy material that went around them was old, and he saw how if it wasn’t broken it was fraying, causing the pillow underneath to poke out. Years of dust and no attention meant that Zayn couldn’t tell what colour it was. It wasn’t like any of the colours in his pencil collection.
Another dust cloud swirled into the air, but this time Zayn didn’t look, he was too busy watching as Harry ruffled up his hair. His golden brown curls slipped through his fingers once more, his eyes concentrated in front of him as he ruffled up his hair, before he turned to Zayn with a small smile. Zayn smiled back, before realising that some dust from the room had landed on his glasses, and he pulled them off carefully. He lowered them down to his school jumper and cleaned them, before placing them back onto his face with a triumphant smile now that his vision was no longer blurred.
“Yeah…gets a bit dusty in here too. I can’t come in here some days when my asthma is bad.” Harry spoke with a small smile, before he leaned forward and started to rummage through his bag. Zayn watched as one of his blazer sleeves started to slowly fall down his forearm as Harry dug through his bag. His golden brown eyes saw all of the scraps of paper, or folded and scuffed up worksheets that poked out. Eventually Harry pulled out a small plastic box with his lunch inside, and a half eaten bag of Doritos. Harry placed the Doritos inbetween the two boys before he went to open his lunchbox, when a small sound echoed around the room, making Zayn jump a little.
“Shit…forgot.” Harry mumbled, bringing his phone out of his inside blazer pocket. His green eyes looked onto the screen and he was sucked into the world of his phone.
“You swore.” Zayn observed, in shock. How can such a nasty word fall out from something as perfect as the perfect pink lips that belonged to Harry Styles? Harry didn’t seem to hear, his thumbs too busy tapping away on his phone. Zayn watched in wonder as he saw how fast Harry could type. Zayn had never had a mobile phone, and had never really known anyone who did.
“Er,” Harry started, as his thumbs stopped typing, and he looked up at Zayn a little blankly, “You said something?”
“You swore.” Zayn spoke once again, pulling his knees up to his chest slowly and wrapping his hands around them, linking his hands together in the middle. Harry frowned a little and looked away for a minute as if in thought, before nodding.
“A lot of people around here swear…do you not?” Harry asked, before slipping his phone back into his pocket and looking at Zayn properly, giving him his full attention. Zayn quickly shook his head at the thought of him swearing. Harry’s small smile then turned into a cheeky grin, which Zayn found himself reciprocating.
“I bet you do…” Harry spoke, his voice playful as he looked over Zayn. His dimples were set in his cheeks as he reached into the Dorito bag next to him and pulled out a couple. Zayn quickly frowned and shook his head once again. Harry chuckled as he ate a few of the Doritos in his hand, before he passed a few to Zayn. Zayn took them slowly. He’d never eaten Doritos before, he had no idea what they tasted like. He didn’t really eat that much, he was too busy drawing and sketching to eat. He slowly placed it into his mouth and he chewed on the crisp, remaining quiet for a moment as he tasted its cool flavour before smiling.
“First Dorito?” Harry asked with a smile, before he shoved another small handful into his mouth once again. Zayn smiled and nodded, which made Harry smile too.
“Nice?” Zayn nodded once again at Harry’s words, and Harry chuckled and looked down at his lunchbox. His large hands opened it up once again, a look of concentration on his face as he did so, before revealing two freshly made wraps in his lunchbox. There was a small post-it note next to them, bright yellow with black handwriting, and Zayn’s eyes quickly looked over the message before smiling.
“My Mum…she likes to leave me little post it notes when she makes my lunch.” Harry chuckled as his own green eyes read over the small post it note, before his large hand folded it in half and placed it into his top pocket. Zayn nodded a little, before watching as Harry’s large hands picked up one of the small wraps in his hand, his chocolate brown eyes observing each piece of lettuce or chicken that stuck out of it before it went into Harry’s brown eyes, never to be seen again. He watched as Harry got half way through the wrap, before he must have noticed Zayn’s eyes watching him.
“Where’s your lunch?” Harry asked, looking at Zayn with confused green eyes. Zayn simply shrugged and smiled a little, shaking his head as he remained sat with his knees by his chest.
“You don’t have any?” Harry asked, a slight frown now on his face. Zayn once again shook his head with a smile. Harry was quiet as his green eyes pierced deeply into Zayn’s, and Zayn bit onto his lip, pulling his legs even closer to his chest. Why was Harry looking at him like that? It was almost like the way the boys had looked at him in the class earlier…but why?
Harry must have sensed how suddenly Zayn’s body tensed, and his eyes seemed anxious and uneasy. Then he realised he had been staring at the olive skinned boy for a long moment, and quickly shook his head, pulling himself out of it and mentally scolding himself for it.
“What do you do when you get hungry?” Harry asked, but tried to make his voice softer and lighter, to try and appeal to the boy.
“I draw.” Zayn burst out loudly, with a wide smile. A smile spread on Harry’s face too, which only made Zayn smile wider. Zayn looked down at the drawing book that had been tucked inbetween his lap and smiled a little, comforted that it was close to him. His lunchtimes were always spent drawing, maybe sometimes reading, but he very rarely had books to read. Plus, when he read, all he ever wanted to do was draw the characters, or the situations they were in.
“Yeah, well you draw well. Really, really well.” Harry replied, thinking of the drawing of him that was now pinned up on his bedroom wall, with a load of other little memoirs, like postcards from his family, train tickets or random Polaroid photos of him and Louis’ trips to the Reading and Leeds festival. Zayn immediately beamed a smile know he knew that Harry had liked his drawing.
There was a silence between the bag, and Zayn smiled as he listened to the sound of Harry eating his lunch. The two wraps disappeared quickly, and soon enough Harry was clicking the lunchbox lid back onto the small box, and stuffing it back into his schoolbag. Zayn couldn’t help but chuckle at how Harry barely put any care into placing the box back into his bag. Harry heard him chuckle and looked up with a small smile, before he grabbed the Dorito bag from inbetween them and opened it up, taking a few out for himself and shoving them into his mouth, before he shook the bag in Zayn’s direction with a kind smile.
“Come on, I’m trying to convert you to Doritos here!” Harry chuckled, shaking the bag once more, and Zayn chuckled too as he dipped his hand into the bag and took out a few more Doritos, before slowly nibbling away at them. Harry watched him with sparkling green eyes before he let out a short laugh. Zayn turned to see why Harry was smiling and laughing so much.
“You know the best way to eat Doritos?” Harry chuckled, and Zayn shook his head and shrugged, wondering what the heck Harry was going to come out with. A cheeky smile spread across Harry’s face.
“Either, with my Mum’s homemade dip and a hilarious movie…or, with a cheeky little swear word.” Harry spoke, but Zayn’s smile faded and he frowned a little, wondering what Harry was talking about. Why did Harry talk about swearing so much? Did he not know how bad it was to swear? Harry laughed at Zayn’s obvious confusion, before Zayn suddenly felt a finger poke into his side. He shot up with a slight yelp.
“Go on, just say shit.” Harry laughed, and Zayn frowned and shook his head once more.
“Say it! Just a quick little swear word, go on, say damn!” Harry continued, poking into Zayn’s side over and over. Zayn kept wriggling and squirming at Harry’s touch, Harry’s large hands tickling him, and it was becoming increasingly harder to stay quiet when all he wanted to do was laugh his head off. Harry kept bugging him over and over to say a swear word, and Zayn was protesting and laughing so much that he was now leaning on Harry’s sides, begging him to stop as he kept being tickled. The dust was now floating around the room like before due to the two boys’ wrestling, the small room being lit up with the two boys’ laughs.
“Just one…for me!” Harry spoke, stopping his tickling and bringing the younger boy into a tight hug, pressing his cheek against Zayn’s. Zayn could feel how protectively the tall boy was holding him, and the brown curls that were tickling his forehead, only making him giggle more, but more softly this time. Harry’s arms were wrapped around Zayn’s small torso, and Zayn could feel Harry’s steady heartbeat through his chest. Zayn’s chocolate eyes looked up and met the perfect emerald ones that were inches away from his.
“Damn.” Zayn whispered, before he bit onto his lip so no more terrible curses would slip from them. Harry smiled widely down at Zayn.
“Why did you whisper?” Harry asked softly with a slight chuckle, and Zayn shrugged a little, blushing under the emerald gaze he found himself under. Harry chuckled once again and quickly tickled the boy in his arms once again, which made Zayn wriggle once more, so he was practically lying on Harry’s lap.
“Thank you for listening to me.” Zayn mumbled, a blush on his cheeks still, and Harry simply smiled down at him and cuddled into him more, before their perfect bubble was burst by the shrill school bell.