The Best Thing

“Where we headed?” Harry asks as we drive down the road in Liam’s car as he drove. It was a big enough sized vehicle to fit all seven of us. I look out the window as we drove, bright shining lights coming into view. We were getting closer to wherever we were headed.

“To a night club, Haz, where else did you think we were going?” Liam asks with a small hint of humor in his voice.

The curly haired lad just shrugs his shoulders as my cousin turns his attention back to the road in front of us. As Liam drove to the night club we were going to, I talked with a few of the other lads and Sophia who were asking me random questions. Zayn was up in the passenger seat beside Liam who was driving. I couldn’t help but still be so curious about how quiet he’s been since I got here. Maybe, just maybe, since we’re going out, I could ask him simply as I can. I didn’t want to cause any waves of friction between us; the least I could do is get to know him first off before anything else.

“Are we almost there, Liam?” Niall pipes up loudly over the slightly turned up music that played from the stereo, a song by Kings of Leon.

“Just a few more minutes, Niall,” Liam says as he continues to drive. I turn to look out the window as we come closer to the city lights coming into view. A good ten minutes later, the car soon slows to a stop and we are in front of a bustling night club, people standing around everywhere. A few minutes later, we are all piling out of the vehicle to wait for the others to get out. Once we were all out, we make our way across the street toward the busy night club.

I was walking alongside Sophia who was holding hands with Liam. As I look over toward the two, I can’t help but smile. They were adorable. Niall and Harry were way ahead of us moving toward the front of the line and Louis and Zayn were a bit behind us. Once we make it to the front of the line, we are let right in. Hmm, I could get used to this.. I think to myself as we walk past the burly man with the red rope.

“C’mon Roe, don’t hold the line up,” Liam yells toward me and pulls me from my thoughts as I stand there near the entrance of the club, looking around the place. It was packed full of people who were drinking and having a good time and some on the dance floor as some song played over the music system loudly. I look over at him as he grabs my arm.

“Sorry, was just looking around at everything,” I feel my cheeks heat up a bit in the dim club. I soon look up to find we were in the exclusive VIP section of the club that was a bit closed off from the rest of the club. There was a booth that Sophia and the other lads piled into along with Liam, who was beside his girl, leaving me standing there a bit awkwardly beside Zayn who I noticed kept looking at me every so often. The other lads were in the booth, trying to catch someone so they could get some drinks.

“I’m going to go to the bar!” I call out to them and begin to walk away from the VIP section so I could grab myself a drink.

I get an “okay” back from the rest of them along with Liam. I smile a bit before I turn and head to the bar. As I continue on my way to the bar, I finally get through the massive throngs of people standing around with drinks. I make it to the bar and take a seat in one of the empty bar stools. Once I sit down on the rickety bar stool, I begin to flag down a bartender so I could order a drink. I really wanted a cosmopolitan right now because I saw someone back there with one and it really sounded good to me.

A few minutes go by as I try to flag a bartender so I could get my cosmopolitan but no one comes. Well, this place was busy. I let out a huff of annoyance and rest my elbow on the counter and rest my chin in the palm of my hand as I sit there. My mind begins to drift off to how awkward it was earlier, when I went to go take a shower and I walked into Zayn’s room instead to see him shirtless. What the hell is wrong with me?

I am soon pulled from my thoughts when I feel a light tap on my shoulder. Slowly I turn to my left to find Zayn with a slightly amused look on his face, small hint of a smile.

“What are you doing here?” I speak my thoughts and mentally slapping myself for making this even more awkward.

“Getting a drink, why else would I be here?” he retorts and holds up his forefinger toward a girl behind the bar who was looking our way, more at him, a small smile on her face. A dark haired girl begins to make her way toward where Zayn and I sat.

“What can I get you, handsome?” she asks looking at him, a smile on her face, batting her lashes. I had to fight the urge to laugh at how stupid this looked, her trying to flirt. She wasn’t even that pretty.

“Best beer you got, top shelf,” Zayn tells the girl before she turns to me to take my drink order.

“What would you like, love? You two are adorable by the way,” she smiles at the two of us and waits for me to tell her what I wanted. I tell her I wanted my cosmopolitan and she nods before telling us she’ll have them right out for us.

“What was that about?” I ask as I look at Zayn who was staring at me, a slight smile on his lips.

“She uh, I guess she thought we were…together?” he points out as a question. I slowly nod my head at his reply.

“But we don’t even–“ I get cut off as the bartender sets our drinks down and tells us how much our drinks came to. I give her a small smile and pull out my wallet so I could pay her for my Cosmo but I’m interrupted by Zayn pulling out some money and paying the girl and telling her to keep the change. I take a sip of my drink. It was good, been a while since I last had one. She thanks him and trots off, swinging her hips back and forth trying to gain his attention. As I look over at him, I noticed his eyes weren’t on her; they were looking right at me.

“You um, you didn’t have to pay for mine, here–“ I begin to rummage through my clutch for some money. As I start to hand it to him, he pushes it away with his hand and takes a sip of his beer after a slight chuckle leaves his lips.

“It’s no problem, love, really, been a while since I could buy a pretty bird like yourself a drink,” he tells me as he sets his bottle down on the countertop.

“I’m sorry for um, walking in on you uh – shirtless… earlier, been a while since I last was at Li’s place, forgot where things were, I guess,” I mumble as I reach for my drink.

“It’s fine,” he mumbles and looks down at the marble countertop. Things were silent between us for a few minutes before he one of us spoke up.

“Why’d you choose to come here? To Wolverhampton?” he asks as he looks at me.

“I uh, I basically just wanted a new start and picked here because I missed Liam and haven’t seen him and his parents for years, I’ve always liked it,” I tell him with a small smile.

“That’s cool I guess,” he says.

“Speakin’ of Liam, heard a bunch of things ‘bout you,” he tells me and takes another swig of his beer.

He sets the beer down on the bar as he fixes his eyes on me again. His brown eyes shined under the dim lights of the club as he continued to look at me. I couldn’t help but get lost in his eyes. I realize what I was doing just a few minutes later. Whoa, Monroe, slow down there… I think to myself and pull myself from the crazy thoughts in my head.

“Like what?” I ask and laugh a bit.

“Just a bunch o’ different stuff, some quite funny stuff that happened to you when you were younger,” he replies and smiles a bit.

“Oh god, really?” I ask and hide my face with my hands, feeling a bit embarrassed. I begin to wonder what he was referring to but can’t quite place which story it was. There was way too many to count.

“Don’t be embarrassed love, stuff like that happens to all of us,” he smiles as he brings the beer up to his lips and takes another sip. “I’ve had embarrassing stuff like that happen to me b’fore, plenty ‘o times when I was a kid,” he finishes and takes another sip of his beer before setting it back on the bar.

“And by the way, you look nice,” he mumbles with a smile and finishes off his beer.

“Thanks. I uh, take it when you drink; makes you spill the truth,” I give a lame attempt to a joke and grab my drink and swirl it around in the glass. It was almost gone.

“Well it’s only the truth,” he replies with a smile as he pays the nearest bartender for another beer.

I laugh a bit as I reach for my drink and take another small sip. As the night goes on, Zayn and I sit there and have some more drinks and continue to talk and get to know each other. It was actually quite nice that we surprisingly hit it off. I thought I wouldn't have gotten the chance to get to talk to him tonight but I guess plans change and people, too. Tonight turned out better than I thought it would.