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Liam cuts her hair herself, alone in a hotel room bathroom a few hours after a show. It’s a snap decision—one minute she’s looking in the mirror at the light brown waves that tumble halfway down her back, and the next minute she’s digging through her bag for the scissors she carries with her in case she feels like turning a pair of jeans into cutoffs or a t-shirt into a crop top.
She doesn’t entirely realize what she’s doing until she’s got a hunk of silky hair in her hand and she can hear someone knocking on the door.
“Holy shit,” Zayn says when Liam lets her into the room, pushing her glasses back up onto her nose. “What’s all this?”
Liam shrugs, trying not to think about the fact that half of her hair sits just below her shoulders and the other half reaches nearly to her waist. It’s a little embarrassing, especially considering that Zayn’s thick dark locks are twisted into a perfect side braid. “Fancied a change. Think it might have been a mistake, though.”
Zayn grins, reaching out to run her fingers through the cut strands of hair. “Nah, you’ll look wicked with short hair.”
“You think?” Liam asks, heading uncertainly back into the bathroom and dropping the handful of hair into the trash. With her luck, a fan will go through the hotel’s trash, find the cut hair, and auction it off on eBay.
Being famous is weird sometimes.
“I do think,” Zayn tells her, reaching for the scissors herself. “Here, let me even it out for you.”
For a few minutes it’s quiet, just the sound of Zayn quietly humming some Rihanna tune and the shnick of the scissors and the soft whoosh of Liam’s hair falling to the floor. Liam aggressively doesn’t look at herself in the mirror, certain that this is a huge mistake and knowing there’s not much she can do about it now.
“Okay, it’s even,” Zayn announces, stroking Liam’s now-shoulder-length hair but not putting the scissors down. “Unless you wanted it shorter?”
Liam frowns, considering. She hadn’t actually thought about what she wanted her hair to look like. She’d just wanted a change, something to distinguish her from the girl who’d held Dani’s hand and adopted a dog with her and fallen asleep with her fingers tangling in her long hair. “What do you think?”
“I think,” Zayn says seriously, “that it’s your fucking hair, and that my opinion isn’t actually important. But I also think it’d look sick if you went really short.”
Fuck it, Liam thinks. If she’s going to be a new Liam Payne with a new haircut, she might as well go all-out. “Do whatever, I guess.”
“Perfect,” Zayn teases, tossing her braid over her shoulder. “One buzz cut, coming right up.”
“Zayn!” Liam shrieks, whirling to face her bandmate.
“Joking!” Zayn says immediately, throwing up her hands and backing away. “Totally joking, one hundred per cent. I couldn’t do that with scissors even if I wanted to.”
“Good,” Liam huffs, settling down and turning back around. “Because I was going to say I trust you completely, but if that’s what you had in mind I’m feeling less sure.”
“You can trust me, Liam,” Zayn says, and it’s surprisingly earnest. “Like, with anything. Not just your hair. You can always trust me.”
Liam can feel the heat rising to her cheeks. “I know.”
“Good,” Zayn whispers, leaning in to brush a quick, teasing kiss across Liam’s cheek. Liam has to fight not to raise her hand to touch the skin Zayn’s lips had danced over seconds before. “Now hold still, or I really will fuck up your hair.”
Liam holds still.
*
“Okay, I actually really like this,” Liam says a half hour later, reaching up to toy with the ends of her hair. It just barely brushes her chin, and it’s sort of obvious that it was cut in a hotel bathroom by someone with no training and using craft scissors, but all things considered, it truly does look good.
“Lou will probably need to clean it up,” Zayn suggests, leaning in to rest her chin on Liam’s shoulder as they look in the mirror. Liam can feel the press of Zayn’s breasts against her back, the tickle of her breath along the side of her neck, and she’s struck with the urge to turn and catch Zayn’s mouth with her own. “Looks a bit raggedy. I’m not exactly a professional.”
Liam pats Zayn’s cheek, a poor substitute for what she actually wants right now. “It looks great. I love it. Thanks for, like, saving me from winding up bald.”
Zayn giggles, pulling away from Liam. “No problem. But you’d look great no matter what you did with your hair, babe.”
“Do me a favor and repeat that again in the morning when Paul is looking at me like he wants to scream because he’s going to have to have a conversation with management about the fact that I made a major change to my ‘image’ without permission,” Liam jokes, running her hand through her newly-short hair one more time before flicking the light switch off and leaving the bathroom. She’s suddenly sort of exhausted, and even though the hotel bed looks like every other one of the hundreds of hotel beds she’s slept in, she wants nothing more than to crawl into it and fall asleep.
But she also really, really wants Zayn to stay.
“Will do,” Zayn laughs, reaching out to tousle Liam’s hair herself. The height difference between the two of them is just enough to make her stand up on her toes to do it, and the wave of affection that hits Liam in response is paralyzing. “I should probably let you get some sleep.”
She’s already almost to the door when Liam blurts, “Zayn, wait.”
Zayn pauses with her hand on the doorknob, and Liam pats the bed beside her, doing her best to keep the desperation out of her voice. “Stay a while, yeah? It’s been ages since we’ve had a cuddle.”
Just a cuddle. A friendly cuddle, because they’re best friends, and this is a thing that they do.
“Yeah, of course.”
Zayn doesn’t hesitate for a moment, just comes back across the room and hops onto the bed, snuggling up close to Liam, her sharp chin digging into Liam’s shoulder. “What’s up?”
“What isn’t?” Liam is trying for humor, but it comes out small and sad, and she curls closer to Zayn like it’ll make her stronger. “I didn’t realize breaking up with Dani would suck this much.”
In response, Zayn sighs softly.
“Like, what if the reason we broke up is me?” Liam continues. “I know I did the breaking up, but what if there’s more I could have done? I was a shitty girlfriend, honestly.”
“You’re a fucking great girlfriend,” Zayn says fiercely, sitting up abruptly and looking Liam in the eye. “Don’t put yourself down like that, Liam. Dani was lucky to have you, and you’ll find someone else, and she’ll be lucky too.”
She says it like a prayer, like poetry, and Liam inhales sharply, because this doesn’t feel quite like just a friendly reassurance.
“Will she?” Liam asks hoarsely.
“Yeah, definitely,” Zayn whispers back, and Liam can’t help herself, she’s hooking a hand around the back of Zayn’s neck and pulling her into a kiss, her lips parting, the end of Zayn’s braid tickling her arm. For a few seconds, Zayn is kissing her back and it’s heaven, and then, suddenly, it’s over.
“We shouldn’t, babe, not yet,” Zayn says, and Liam’s heart sinks, only . . .
“Not yet?”
“I want to,” Zayn confesses. “So much. But you’re still hurting over Dani and I just . . . I don’t want to push you.”
Liam pouts, but she can’t sustain the expression for long. “But soon?”
Laughing, Zayn leans down to press a gentle kiss to Liam’s forehead. “Yeah, babe. Soon.”