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Zayn didn’t like Liam Payne. Not one fucking bit. He knew the whole school was in love with him—something about everyone falling for the token bad boy. But this wasn’t a fucking rom com and Liam Payne was an asshole. He was cocky and pompous. He thought mouthing off was an effective way to get attention and smoking cigarettes was cool—it wasn’t, Zayn would know, since he also smoked but wasn’t worshiped by the entire student body.
Zayn just didn’t understand the appeal. He was pretty sure Liam hadn’t taken anything seriously in his life, never mind be expected to hold a decent conversation. He thought kid like Liam stopped being cool in high school—at least there they were only popular because they were ‘interesting,’ but Liam wasn’t. He was a dime a dozen at Zayn’s high school, a type he had hoped he could get away with once he got to college. He had done so well in the beginning, so one could only imagine his disappointment when he got trapped in a fucking elevator with the dude. An elevator. What the fuck.
And the icing on the cake? Zayn thought he had done a pretty good job of keeping on the down low in his college career, but apparently he was wrong because Liam Payne? Yeah, he knew who the fuck Zayn was. He made that abundantly clear when he started up a conversation after the elevator shut down and addressed Zayn by name and started talking about his interests. Never mind the fact that they were trapped in a death shute, Liam wanted to know if Zayn had ‘seen the new Marvel movie yet’ because it looked ‘sick.’ Again, what the fuck?
“’M not really in the mood for a chat about Marvel right now, Liam,” he snapped. They were trapped in an elevator, didn’t Liam realize that? The thing had come to a complete stop. It was no longer going up and down. They could not get out and had no way of being able to get out without help and they had already done that and had gotten a curt ‘We’re sending someone now. The elevator should be running again in roughly half an hour. Please remain calm’ like Zayn could keep his cool when trapped in a metal death box with the one man he hated. Did Liam not realize that?
“Then what do you want to talk about?”
Zayn spun to face Liam, his expression no doubt displaying his pure disbelief because what? Didn’t Liam realize he didn’t want to talk about anything besides how to get out of here?
“I don’t want to talk about anything! I want the elevator to start moving again.”
Liam sighed next to him, leaning against the wall and crossing his arms over his stupidly big chest. That was another issue Zayn had with Liam. What the fuck even were his muscles? The were big and dumb and delicious. Zayn hated them, even though he kind of wanted to lick Liam from head to toe. It was awful.
“The elevator doesn’t run on silence, Zayn. If we play the quiet game it won’t decide it’s bored and magically start working again.”
Zayn turned his head to glare at Liam. “Sarcasm and shitty jokes are the last thing I want to deal with right now, Liam. How ‘bout you just keep your comments to yourself.”
Liam rolled his eyes. Zayn thought he did that a lot. “The last thing I want to deal with is your bad attitude and sense of entitlement, but I guess we don’t always get what we want.”
Zayn let his crossed arms drop to his side, indignation taking over. “I am not entitled!”
Liam raised an eyebrow. “Oh really? So you don’t go around ignoring anyone who isn’t one of your little friends because you’re better than them? Or sneer at people who don’t perform well in class? God forbid the rest of us struggle a little bit in school.”
Okay, what the fuck? Zayn didn’t think any of those things. Never once had he looked down on anyone because they struggled in school, and he definitely didn’t think he was better than anyone. What the fuck?
“Fuck you, I don’t think any of that. Maybe if you pulled your head out of your ass and paid attention to anyone but yourself you’d realize that. If maybe for once you gave a shit in general.”
Liam pushed himself away from the wall, advancing toward Zayn. “No, fuck you. I do give a shit, but I’m not a fucking genius like you, Zayn. Just because I don’t get high marks doesn’t mean I don’t fucking care. Did you ever think about that? That maybe I’m just fucking drowning in work I don’t understand? That I wasn’t born with a natural ability to just understand stuff like you can?” Liam had practically boxed Zayn in at this point, his large frame seeming to dwarf Zayn and he should be scared, maybe even offended, but mostly he was angry and weirdly turned on. Seriously, fuck Liam Payne.
“Please Liam, I’ve seen you. You walk around with your superfans trailing you, getting by on your looks and reputation. I’ve seen you in action.”
Liam’s eyes were still filled with fire, an anger Zayn had never seen this close, but there was something else lingering in their depth—something Zayn didn’t know Liam well enough to place. As soon as Zayn noticed it, Liam was backing away from him just as quickly as he’d advanced.
“Okay, Zayn,” Liam said, but his voice trembled. He just sounded tired. “Whatever you say.” Liam walked back to the opposite wall, falling heavily against it before scrubbing a hand down his face and thunking his head against the wall behind him. Guilt slowly started curling it’s way around Zayn’s stomach and he couldn’t place why. He was speaking the truth. It wasn’t like he was accusing Liam of those things based purely on observation; he had heard countless stories about Liam from so many people. They couldn’t all be lying, right? Then again, Liam had said some pretty interesting things about Zayn. Was that just Liam’s opinion, or had he been hearing the same kinds of stories Zayn had. Regardless, he was terribly confused.
“Liam?” The other man looked up at his name, connecting his gaze with Zayn’s. “I’m sorry. For, um, presuming, I guess?”
Liam cracked a smile, a little warmth shining through his otherwise rough exterior. “Yeah, uh, me, too. I should’ve known better.” Zayn couldn’t help but smile back.
“So…what do you wanna talk about?” Zayn asked.
Liam let out a guffaw, his eyes crinkling up in a way Zayn absolutely adored. When he finally settled down, Zayn noticed the slight mischief lined in his face.
“You could tell me an embarrassing story. Ooooh, I know. Tell me how you lost your virginity, Zayn.” He followed this with suggestive eyebrow waggles, and Zayn was back to square one because a. his eyebrows and their movements should not be that attractive and b. how dare Liam cheapen this moment with a joke. They were making progress.
Zayn stared at him for a moment, waiting for Liam to say ‘just kidding!’ When Liam just continued to stare at him, Zayn let out a very inelegant snort.
“I am not telling you how I lost my virginity, nope. That is the last thing that is happening.” When Zayn looked back up, Liam was sticking his bottom lip out in an exaggerated—and hot, fuck you very much Liam Payne—pout that Zayn wanted to punch off his stupid face.
“Awww, boo. You’re boring.” A devilish grin replaced the pout as a wicked gleam started to shine in Liam’s eyes. “I’ll tell you how I lost mine if you tell me how you lost yours. C’mon, Z, I bet you’re curious.”
“We are not talking about our sex lives, Liam. What’s wrong with you? Are you mental?” Zayn decidedly ignored the thrill that went through him at Liam calling him ‘Z’. Liam was messing him up so bad.
Liam let out a loud laugh and Zayn fell a little in love with it—again, fuck you Liam Payne. Liam definitely didn’t laugh enough, and Zayn ached to fix that.
What the fuck, Zayn thought. Being trapped in an enclosed space was really starting to affect him.
Almost as soon as he had the thought, though, the elevator dinged, the numbers glowing back to life and the telltale whirring of the box echoing through the space. When he looked back up at Liam ready to celebrate their freedom, Liam was already looking back with an incredibly soft look on his face. It momentarily threw Zayn off kilter—why was Liam looking at him like that? More importantly, when had almost half an hour passed?
With a start, Zayn realized it was in part because of Liam. If the man hadn’t been keeping up a constant stream of conversation and ridiculous questions, Zayn would probably be a mess of nerves right now.
When the elevator doors finally opened up, Zayn practically flung himself through them, ready to forget the whole thing ever happened. Well, kinda. He would definitely be remembering the way Liam looked towering over him later. Liam, however, had other ideas.
“Hey, um, Zayn? I was, um…I was kind of wondering if maybe…could we…,” Liam trailed off, shifting nervously in front of Zayn. Zayn heard a muttered fuck before Liam looked back up, the most nervous Zayn had ever seen him. The man normally oozed confidence, but now he was standing in front of Zayn looking as if he was ready to run for the hills. It only made Zayn more curious as to just what Liam was wondering. “You want to go to the movies with me?”
And okay, Zayn definitely wasn’t thinking that. Did Liam just ask him to the movies? Because if he had it sounded and awful lot like he was asking Zayn on a date. The more Zayn thought about it, the more that made perfect sense. Liam knew who he was. Liam started a conversation with him as soon as the elevator stopped—and wasn’t that suspicious, almost like Liam knew it was going to stop—and his first question was whether Zayn had seen the new Marvel movie. Liam was nervous, for Christ’s sake. He was asking Zayn on a date.
“Liam Payne, are you asking me out on a date?” Zayn watched as a blush rose high on Liam’s cheeks, and he couldn’t help the pure giddiness that rushed through him. Liam Payne, resident bad ass, was fumbling and blushing his was through asking Zayn, of all people, on a date. It was incredible.
“Um, I…yes?”
Zayn fought back a laugh, overcome with a sudden urge to push Liam up against the nearest surface and kiss the fuck out of him. Okay, so maybe Zayn didn’t hate Liam quite as much as he might have led everyone to believe.
“I’ll go out with you,” Zayn began. A smile started spreading across Liam’s lips, hope filling his eyes. Zayn held up a hand between them, halting anything Liam might say. “On one condition.”
Liam’s smile dimmed a little, but he nodded for Zayn to continue.
“You have to tell me how you lost your virginity, Liam ‘badass’ Payne.” He emphasized badass with finger quotes and all. Liam giggled in front of him, fucking giggled, and Zayn knew he was so, so fucked.
“Yeah, okay,” he agreed. As soon as the words left Liam’s mouth, Zayn launched himself at the man, pinning him up against the wall next to the elevator and kissing the mouth that had been driving him mad.
And when Liam eventually confesses he paid one of the facility managers to stop the elevator so he could ask him out, Zayn teased the fuck out of Liam. He absolutely did not let that go. In fact, he told everyone.
But for now, now the only thought Zayn had—aside from how fucking good of a kisser Liam Payne was—was how maybe life did turn out like a rom com sometimes.