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“Vas happenin’, minions?” Zayn semi-shouted into a small handheld video camera.
“For the last time, Z, we are not calling our fans minions,” Louis argued, messing with the contents of a black backpack.
“Don’t worry, minions. We aren’t going down without a fight.”
Louis rolled his eyes, leaning into view of the camera. “Tonight we’re having a little sleepover at the Payne house.”
...
They’d met around three years ago on a tour in London themed around Jack the Ripper. Somewhere in the middle, Louis had wandered off from the group, focused entirely on something Zayn hadn’t been able to see and not responding to his attempts to ask what he was doing. He’d honestly thought he might be crazy, but it manifested just enough concern for him to follow, effectively wasting the money spent to go on the tour in the first place. After about ten minutes of chasing him around alleyways Zayn hadn’t even realized existed, Louis finally stopped, looking annoyed at whatever he’d been chasing after.
“What the hell, mate?” Zayn asked, slightly out of breath from the exertion.
“Total dead end, can’t even hear anything they say,” he said glumly.
“Who?” The conversation was doing nothing to dissuade Zayn from his conclusion that Louis was certifiable. Neither was Louis’ slightly suspicious look towards him at the question. He seemed to be debating internally how to answer, before confirming Zayn’s suspicions.
“The ghosts.” He said it so matter-of-factly that the ridiculousness nearly went entirely over Zayn’s head. From there, they’d somehow ended up at a bar, where Louis explained that he’d been hoping to try and solve the entire mystery using his gifts as a medium. He almost thought he was going to, before being entirely thwarted by the fact he couldn’t actually hear anything a ghost might say to him. He’d tried lipreading, but the accuracy was next to zero. Zayn, of course, didn't believe any of it. Sure, he might've been convinced that a ghost had taken up residence on his couch, but a medium? He'd seen enough of those faking it on TV to believe in that nonsense.
In the end, it took Louis actually solving his couch ghost problem to earn Zayn's belief. And once that happened, it was only a matter of time and a few dates before their YouTube channel was born.
...
Contrary to popular belief, ghosts didn’t really wait to come out until night. If anything, most of them were already off to sleep before it got to be too late. Or they’d pretend to sleep at least, Louis wasn’t sure if they actually managed it with the whole “being dead” side of things. But spending the night opened up a much more compelling realm of clickbait for their videos, so in the case of the Payne house, he was really banking on the idea that the ghost in question (supposedly a young man named Liam) stayed up late as often as Louis did.
Stepping into the house itself, the hair on the back of Louis’ neck stood up. It wasn’t a reliable method of determining whether a ghost was around, far from it actually, but it definitely didn’t hurt the theory. He had taken the video camera from Zayn as the first person to cross the threshold, capturing a really nice atmospheric clip to help with the drama of the video. They’d nailed down a bit of a formula for them: first impressions of the haunted space, finding a ghost they could harass, some yes or no questions with a torch the ghost can turn on and off, some spirit box usage to try and get some actual words, a sleep timelapse, and lastly their final impressions.
Their lucky room that night turned out to be the kitchen, where the ghost was just getting up from a stool that had been sat by the counter. It stopped at the sight of the two men entering the room, though, a bit startled by their presence even though they hadn’t been the most quiet before. It must have been lost in its own little world. The ghost was taller than Louis, with a bit of a beard and dark eyes, but that was all the detail Louis let himself take in before diverting his attention.
“Seems as good a room as any to set up the torch, yeah?” he asked Zayn casually.
Zayn nodded, catching on immediately after having made so many videos before. He made quick work of getting it out of Louis’ backpack to be placed on the counter.
“If there’s a ghost here with us, turn the torch on,” Zayn said. Louis zoomed in on its place on the counter, trying not to look too much at the ghost itself. He didn’t want to give away that he could see it yet, it always felt more fun when he let them think that they’re able to mess with him and Zayn a bit. Sure enough, with an easy click of the button, the torch lit up. Louis faked a little gasp of surprise.
“If your name’s Liam, leave it on,” he called out to the room. It might’ve been more impressive to tell him to turn it off, but he needed to make sure the video had plenty of moments that could be ambiguous so people were able to draw their own conclusions about if a place was actually haunted. If it always looked 100% legit, he was sure they’d be accused of faking the encounters even more than they already were. Better to let people think it was a bit cheesy. They only messed around with the flashlight for another fifteen-ish minutes before everyone, including the ghost, Liam, seemed a bit sick of it.
Moving on to what might be Zayn’s least favorite part of the routine due to the resulting headache, Louis pulled their spirit box out of the backpack he’d brought in. The noise was obnoxious, but after years of not being able to hear a word any ghosts said, he embraced the device with open arms when he realized it could finally bridge that particular gap. He handed the camera back over to Zayn, who immediately pointed it in a completely different direction from the ghost to pretend to ooh and ah as if he could see it in front of him. Switching on the spirit box, Louis snorted to himself at the sight, before a bit of movement caught his attention.
Louis watched incredulously as Liam’s spectral hand reached out to stroke Zayn’s cheek in wonder. His lips just barely moved, with the spirit box picking up his voice a full second later. “Beautiful.”
“Oi!” Louis squawked. “That’s my boyfriend!”
The ghost jerked his hand back, looking a little sheepish and bewildered to make eye contact with Louis. Well, there went his attempts to hide his clairvoyance.
“How do you know he doesn’t mean you?” Zayn asked.
“Can see his hands all over you, can’t I?” Louis grumbled. Zayn pouted in mock sympathy, moving to put an arm over his shoulder before giving him a kiss on the cheek.
“Aww, babes,” he teased. “I’d much rather have your hands all over me.”
“Yeah?” Louis let a small smile tug at the corner of his mouth.
He nodded. “Even though they’re just as cold.” Louis gasped, poking Zayn’s side in retaliation. Glancing back over at Liam, he found him practically glued to the spot. His eyes were wide, giving them an almost puppy-like quality, and if ghosts could blush, he’d definitely be red as a tomato. Louis smirked triumphantly, having won the total non-contest for Zayn’s affections.
“Sorry,” the ghost’s voice came over the spirit box before he quickly turned to high-tail it out of the room. Apparently moving through walls was a conscious decision that had to be made, though, because he ran straight into the door, causing a loud banging noise. Zayn jumped, the camera in his hand snapping towards the sound. There was a brief moment of silence as Liam registered what had just happened to him before Louis burst out laughing at the scene he’d witnessed.
“What?” Zayn asked, turning the camera to capture Louis clutching his stomach with the force of his laughter.
“Your admirer just banged his face into the door,” he wheezed, causing his boyfriend to start giggling next to him. Louis was too distracted by his laughter to realize that Liam had come over to where they were before it was too late. The ghost knocked the video camera out of Zayn’s hands and to the ground in an attempt to break it.
Zayn yelped, trying to grab it, but to no avail. Liam had already kicked it clear across the room.
“Hey, prick, stop it!” Louis snapped. “That cost money, you know!” It was no use, Liam's form had physically darkened with the strength of his emotions, and there was really nothing to be done against that kind of force of nature.
"Shit, we aren't gonna be able to use this footage, are we?"