London Calling

Jen smiled brightly as she felt Niall’s hand find its way around hers and intertwined their fingers. She can’t say she was overly enthused about being at the award show, she would have rather been writing, but Niall was making it worth the boring parts. She squeezed his hand lightly. He leaned closer to her ear and whispered, “Thank you for coming with me.”

She looked into his blue eyes, “I’m glad I came. I didn’t want you to have to fend for yourself with no one else.”

“For that,” he said as he brought her hand to his lips and kissed her knuckles, “I am eternally grateful. Are you going to be okay for the performance with the girls or do you want to come back stage with us?”

“I’ll be fine here, don’t worry about me. Just go up there and have fun and I’ll cheer you guys on from here.”

Niall nodded and stood up though he bent down again and kissed her cheek. She told him to break a leg and with that he left. She waited with the rest of the girls at the table for the boys to take the stage. They all looked content and excited for their respective boyfriends to take the stage except Perrie. She had been relatively quiet that night. She wasn’t even speaking to Zayn. She would reply to a question she was asked but she didn’t participate in any other conversation. It worried her that she and Zayn had been in a fight. She hadn’t seen Zayn all day since she was getting ready with the girls, but he didn’t seem the least bit worried about Perrie. Perrie and Harry’s date Cara had gotten ready together after Perrie finished her band business.

She shook her thoughts from her mind as the boys were announced and they took the stage. It was the first time that Jen had ever heard all the boys sing together and now she could definitely tell what all the rage was about, they were perfect together. They meshed with each other just right on the stage and she couldn’t even describe how amazing their voices were together. Her eyes were glued to the group. Okay, mostly Zayn. He sounded even better than her memory would let her imagine when he wasn’t around.

He was dressed in black jeans and a black leather jacket over a black T-shirt. Her favorite parts of his outfit were the red sleeve on his jacket and his small hoop earrings. He looked so passionate as he sung his parts of the song and he looked totally in his element. He didn’t look like he did when he was working on his art. Instead he had the same intense look in his eyes, but underneath that she could tell he was having the time of his life. He sung for a living and drew for fun, but she could tell which one made him the happiest. Zayn loved his job even if he had to deal with the paps occasionally; she knew that he thought it was worth it. She felt her heart soar at the small smile on his face and as they made their way down the cat walk and closer to the girls’ table. During the bridge of the song Niall was right in front of her. He had on black jeans and black leather jacket with a red collar. On his feet were white and black Nikes and he pointed to his shoes? That’s when she saw what he was getting at and rolled her eyes as a small smile graced her lips. His shoes were laced with the same color blue as her dress; he had gotten his wish to match her.

Zayn came over and pushed Niall out of the way and knelt on one knee and leaned forward right in front of her. He moved his microphone from his mouth and lipped the words ‘be mine’ to her. Her eyes widened as she looked around and saw that no one had seen it, not even Perrie who was staring out into space, not even in the direction of the stage. She immediately got up and walked briskly to the nearest bathroom to commence her freak out.

What the hell was he thinking! He had a girlfriend for goodness sake! She didn’t know what on earth had gotten into him. If he expected her to be okay with him seeing Perrie while they were together, he had another thing coming. She would not be the other woman for anyone and the fact that he had thought she would be okay with that was insulting. No, she wasn’t going to be dramatic and run away from the scene. She was too angry for that. She planned on dancing the night away with Niall at the after party and drinking way too much alcohol and having the time of her life. She deserved it after not partying since the incident. She finally realized that she couldn’t trust anyone and she had better get used to it or she was just going to get hurt. She would no longer be anyone’s doormat; she would live her own life and do what she needed to do in order to make herself happy.

*****

To say that Zayn was worried was a gross understatement. He was losing his mind with worry. He hadn’t seen Jen in days. He hadn’t gotten a chance to talk to her at the awards after party because he and Perrie had ditched the party. Understandably since Zayn had dumped her before the award show, she didn’t feel much like partying or even going to the awards but she had agreed to be Zayn’s date and even though he broke up with her, she wasn’t ready for people to find out about the breakup until she and Zayn figured out how to handle the press. Zayn had promised that they would say the breakup was mutual so he could save Perrie some embarrassment. Zayn wasn’t an asshole; he wanted to make sure that Perrie was okay so he escorted her home.

The boys had reported that Jen had gotten home safe and sound and that they hadn’t noticed anything different in her attitude. She had been just as bright and cheery though the boys did say that she had drunk her fair share of alcohol. She hadn’t made an idiot of herself, but Zayn knew that she wasn’t a big drinker and that was a big hint to him that she was anything but okay. She was most likely mad at him though he couldn’t for the life of him figure out why. The boys had assured him that she had liked him just as much as he liked her and they didn’t understand why she wasn’t answering one of the many calls, voicemails, and texts he had sent her.

The only bright side to come out of Zayn’s spontaneous proposal to Jen for a relationship was that he and Niall’s tension had dissipated. Once they had gotten off the stage, Niall had hugged Zayn and told him that he had hoped to force Zayn’s hand in order to give him the balls that he needed to get Zayn to make a move. Zayn had known deep down that Niall would never hurt him like that unless he really loved the girl and he hadn’t known Jen enough to be that sure about her. Niall was just trying to help his friend in the only way he thought would work. Yes, it made him look like a jerk to Zayn for a while, but in the end they both thought it was worth it.

So with all of his loose ends tied, Zayn was in his living room pacing while Niall watched him try to rip out his hair in front of him. He didn’t know what to do. He wanted to drive to her apartment building and bang his fist on her door until she opened the door and spoke to him. He thought that was a little dramatic. Jen was a thinker. She thought through all of her decisions and weighed the consequences when she had to make an important choice. Zayn figured that choosing to trust a man with her heart after all she had been through would be an important decision for her and he was trying to give her space so he wasn’t nagging her too much.

But he was bloody freaking out! He just wanted to know what was going through her mind. He wanted her to know how serious he was about this. Asking her in the middle of their performance may have been a spur of the moment thing, but he was totally serious about wanting to be in a relationship with her. He didn’t care that she would be back in Chicago months later; he would do everything in his power to see her as much as he could. He wouldn’t let their relationship fail if it made the final months of Jen’s stay because there was distance between them. They were touchy feely sure, but they did a great deal of talking and he was sure that would help them through the distance. He knew they could make it if they just tried. But that would require them to speak to each other again.

He was just pacing a hole into his apartment floor until he got the courage to show up at her apartment and demand an answer or kiss her so soundly that she would have to agree. He didn’t know what he should do. His mind wasn’t giving him the solid answer that he needed so he decided to follow his heart and what it wanted to do and that sure as hell wasn’t sitting around waiting for her. He had to make his move now he simply couldn’t wait any longer to make her his.

He walked into her apartment building and rode the elevator up to her floor. He knocked on her door and waited for her to answer. When she opened the door his eyes widened at what he saw. She was standing there in just a T-shirt that just covered her bum. Her eyes were bloodshot and glassy. Her face was flushed and she had a bottle of beer in her hand and a cigarette sticking out between the fingers holding the glass bottle. “Yes sir? How may I help you?” she asked brightly.

“Uh,” he stuttered still trying to grasp what he was seeing. She was ten sheets to the wind with no hope of recovering tonight. He sighed and let himself into the apartment while gently pushing her out of the way. “Love, can you please explain to me why you are drunk at five in the afternoon?”

“Because I am upset,” she stated in a matter of fact tone. She put the cigarette to her lips and took a drag. “I want to dance,” she said a moment later and clicked a button on her remote. Music came blasting through her stereo. He winced when he recognized the song as Wings by Little Mix. She turned to him with the fakest smile that had ever adorned a face and told him, “It’s your girlfriend Zayn! Let’s sing!” She proceeded to start shaking her head making her wavy hair from side to side as she started moving her hips to the music. Soon her shouting filled the apartment, “Mama told me not to waste my life, she said spread your wings my little butterfly.

Don't let what they say keep you up at night and they can't detain you 'cause wings are made to fly. And we don't let nobody bring us down no matter what you say it won't hurt me.
Don't matter if I fall from the sky, these wings are made to fly!” She ran her hands through her hair and held them above her head making her black lace panties visible to him. Zayn would have appreciated the view had it not been for the fact that she was completely trashed. She then skipped over to him and wrapped her arms around his neck, beer and cigarette still in hand. She sent him another fake grin as Perrie’s voice filled the apartment, “Aren’t you so proud Zayn, huh? You have a beautiful girlfriend with a beautiful voice. I think you should just stop while you’re a head.” She pushed away from him and said with a definitive hint of anger.

Zayn’s brows furrowed together and utter confusion. She had totally lost him. She wasn’t making any sense. Wasn’t it abundantly clear to her that he didn’t want Perrie? He had asked her out finally and she thinks that he would be better off with his ex? It just didn’t make any sense. He didn’t want to argue with her or get into a screaming match with her. She had to know how he felt so he tried to talk some sense into her in a calm, collected voice in order to diffuse the tense situation, “What are you talking about Jen? I dumped Perrie for you. I want to be with you, not her. She and I aren’t you and I, can’t you see that?”

Jen stopped dancing and looked at him like he had grown a second head. “What did you just say?”

Zayn stuttered and then repeated almost as if he was asking her a question, “Uh, I want to be with you?”

She walked up to him and roughly punched him on the arm, “Not that idiot, why didn’t you tell me you broke up with her!”

“I didn’t think I would need to if I asked you out!” he exclaimed flailing his arms around to emphasize his point. “What kind of man did you take me to be?” he asked slightly offended that she obviously took him for a dirtball.

“Okay one, you said be mine, you could have been asking me to be your valentine in advanced for next year! Who the hell asks someone to be theirs? Honestly Zayn I hope you have some better moves than that up your sleeve because that gave me no direction at all. I need a blunt approach because let’s face it, I’m a little slow. Secondly, how the hell was I supposed to know you broke up with her! You should’ve told me, Jen, I broke up with Perrie and I want to sweep you off your feet or some shit! Be mine doesn’t do it for me. Thirdly, I obviously thought you were a fucking asshole and I am drunk because if you’re an asshole then there is no hope for humanity. I pegged you for the nicest person in my whole bloody world and I thought that you were just trying to get in my pants when you asked me out! ” She exclaimed while poking him the chest to make her points really hit home. Her eyes were still glassy and bloodshot, but Zayn could see her brain working again and logic present in her features. She was still slurring, but it wasn’t as bad as it had been a few minutes ago.

When she saw Zayn’s little grin that had overtaken his face she had to stop herself from smiling in return. His smile was her weakness, but she was determined to withstand it for the moment. “What!” she yelled agitated as he continued to stay silent and just look at her with the same grin.

He chuckled and replied, “Been in London for too long love? I distinctly heard the word bloody come out of your mouth.”

“Out of my entire rant, the only word you received was bloody?” she huffed while crossing her arms in front of her and pouting.

He laughed again and pulled her into him by the hips. He looked down into her brown eyes and with a charming smile he said, “Jen, I broke up with Perrie and I want to sweep you off your feet.”

She grinned up at him and replied, “Okay, but our first date isn’t going to be tonight because I am drunk off my ass and I kind of want to continue that trend for the rest of the night. Do me a favor?” She asked as she batted her eyelashes at him dramatically.

“What would that be?” he asked.

“Come back tomorrow and remind me that I said yes to go out with you. Oh, and bring some painkillers when you come.”

He shook his head and let out a surprised laugh, “Will do. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Bye love!” she mocked him with a kiss on the cheek and a push in the direction of the door. When he shut the door behind him, the stereo started blasting again and he shook his head. He made a mental note to get her drunk again because she was scatter brained and hilarious.

With a big smile on his face he made his way back to his car. He couldn’t be happier in that moment; he had the girl of his dreams to plan a date for.