Mainstream

“Oh my gosh, turn it up! I love this song!” I yell, even though I’m already turning up the volume as I speak.

‘Sunday morning rain is falling
Steal some covers share some skin
Clouds are shrouding us in moments unforgettable
You twist to fit the mold that I am in
But things just get so crazy living life gets hard to do
And I would gladly hit the road get up and go if I knew
That someday it would lead me back to you
That someday it would lead me back to you

That may be all I need
In darkness she is all I see
Come and rest your bones with me
Driving slow on Sunday morning
And I never want to leave

Fingers trace your every outline
Paint a picture with my hands
Back and forth we sway like branches in a storm
Change the weather still together when it ends

That may be all I need
In darkness she is all I see
Come and rest your bones with me
Driving slow on Sunday morning
And I never want to leave

But things just get so crazy living life gets hard to do
Sunday morning rain is falling and I'm calling out to you
Singing someday it'll bring me back to you
Find a way to bring myself back home to you

May not know

That may be all I need
In darkness she is all I see
Come and rest your bones with me
Driving slow on Sunday morning’

“Well, at least I know you still have the voice,” Zayn laughs as he turns the radio volume down when commercials start to play.

I roll my eyes. “Zayn, you may not be my best friend anymore, but you don’t have to lie to me.”

“I’m not. You have a damn talent in your hands, Ellis.” I glare at his use of my last name. It’s been a few years, but he still knows how to get on all of my nerves. “Come on, Lina. Don’t be so stubborn. You have a great voice.”

I drop the look and shrug my shoulders. “Yeah, I guess.”

Zayn scoffs. “’I guess,’” he mimics me, shoving my shoulder lightly. I laugh. His impression of me is terrible, but as he makes the next turn I forget everything. “We’re here.”

He pulls into the packed parking lot, parking the car toward the back where there is still space. The giant wheel catches my sight first, followed by a number of rides and attractions. I can already hear the screams of thrill coming from young teens and small children with their parents. Just looking at this fair brings back so many of my memories with Zayn and a few of our other friends back when I lived in Bradford. Those were some good times in my life.

The second Zayn puts the car in park; I hop out of the car – like literally I’m hopping, and almost falling. Note to self: don’t hop out of vehicles. Anyway, Zayn is being way too slow, so I take him by the hand and start to drag him to the entrance.

“Oh my gosh, I wish Clara, Stevie, and Preston were here with us. It would be just like old times. We’d go through the tunnel of love, even though Preston and Clara were the only ones who actually even liked each other in that way, and I’d started yelling crap to them so bad that the security guy had threatened to kick me out.”

Zayn laughs, reminiscing over the moment with me. He pulls me back to his pace when we approach he ticket box, but when he pays, it is he who starts to drag me. We are quick to start with the more nauseating fair rides first, like the tilt-a-whirl and fireball. Between screams and waiting in lines, we catch up on each other’s lives. Zayn tells me more about their band, how it formed on X Factor, and what they have been up to since then. I tell Zayn about how the rest of high school went without him. I would’ve known about One Direction if I had stayed in Bradford, but the year Zayn auditioned, my family moved to Holmes Chapel, which is where I met Katy – and Zack, of course, but I didn’t want to tell him about that.

By the time the sun is below the horizon line and the bright lights of the attractions have turned on, we’re pretty much caught up on everything important. We’ve also almost gone on every ride in the park, so we decide to hit up the games. A game where you have to knock down old milk bottles with a baseball catches my eye. Zayn gladly pay for the both of us to play considering I forgot everything but my phone back at my house.

I throw my first of three balls, and I don’t even get remotely close to the bottles. It almost hit the booth operator, but he just laughs at my bad skills and tells me to take another shot at it.

“You know, Lina,” Zayn says, “you’re supposed to hit the bottles.” He throws his second one, and the two bottles that are still up get knocked down.

I huff. “You know, Lina, you’re supposed to hit the bottles,” I imitate under my breath. I throw another. The ball slightly nicks the top bottle on the side, but it doesn’t fall over. Before Zayn can say anything, I throw the last ball with my eyes shut in anger. I hear a shallow sound of metal contact and open my eyes just in time to see all three bottles to the floor.

“I think that’s a first! Maybe next time you’ll open your eyes,” Zayn teases as the game operator hands me a stuffed animal slightly bigger than the size of my head for getting it on my third shot. I smile and thank him.

Turning back to Zayn, I say, “I don’t know. I think there’s a sort of luck to me closing my eyes.” I hold out the small dog that looks like a sander has been taken to it. “For you.”

Zayn pulls his prize, a medium sized, light blue penguin with an adorable sailor hat and red bowtie, and swaps with me. “And for you.”

After walking around a little more, we decide to stop and get food. By the time we finish eating, I’m about ready to call it a night, but Zayn insist on one last ride – the Ferris wheel. I try to protest, but Zayn just pulls me along so I have no choice but to go with it.

The wait for the ride isn’t long, and most of the people waiting are young couples hoping to get stopped at the peak where you can get the best view of the fair. None who get stopped will see it though, because if there’s anything I know about the ferris wheel, it’s that all of the naïve couples who think they’re in love make out.

We are seated quickly, and I’m already starting to panic as they lower the bar over our laps. I grab onto the bar with one hand and tighten the grip on the penguin with my other arm.

“Are you okay, Lina?”

I shake my head carefully. “I may be a bit afraid of heights. Just a little,” I admit to him. The ride starts to spin, and I shut my eyes, breathing hard. My stomach turns as we reach the part of the circle that drops down.

I feel a warm hand rest on top of my clenching fist, and I peek over at Zayn a little bit. “Don’t be scared. Open both eyes. I’ve got you, Lina.”

I open both my eyes and try to shrink back into the seat. The view is beautiful and terrifying all at the same time, and each time we round the drop, my stomach turns more and I begin to regret not waiting a little longer after I had eaten to ride this ride. Unfortunately for me, when the ride comes to a pause, we aren’t getting off. In fact, we’re at the very top of the ride and at the highest place in the entire fairground. I peer over the edge, looking down upon people enjoying their time. The cart lurches forward slightly, and I take in a sharp breath and lean back into the seat.

“Hey, look at me,” Zayn says. I turn my head to him. “Just keep your eyes on me. You’ll be safe.” He takes my hand off of the bar and holds it in eyes, and I want to believe him. Oh, I want to believe him, because I look into his eyes and I can forget the world around us. But then he starts to scoot closer and he’s leaning in and my stomach turns for the seventeenth time tonight.

“W-what are you doing?” I put my hand out and put it on his chest to hold him back. He just smiles and keeps leaning in. I’m looking around and my panic about how high off the ground we are comes back and Zayn just keeps leaning in closer and my stomach is turning and then–

Bleecchh…

And then I puke. It’s short and abrupt, but I manage to get it out… all. over. Zayn. I hear him start to yell profanities, but the ride starts up again and the motion of the drop makes my stomach turn again and I’m soon upchucking over the side of the ride, most likely getting it on fellow passengers and people passing down below.

I don’t even have time to apologize to the ride operator when the bar gets lifted, as I run for the closest trashcan to finish. I can hear Zayn following closely behind, and I know it’s he who pulls back my hair as I grip the sides of the can.

When I finally stop chucking up all that’s left in me, we go sit down at the nearest table. Zayn gets up and walks away for a minute before coming back with water. He hands it over to me and I thank him before sipping slowly.

I set the bottle back down. “Look, Zayn, tonight was great and all – well, aside from just now really – but we… we’re just friends, okay? I’ve just never seen you in that way before, and tonight I was just happy to be catching up with an old best friend. I’m sorry about your clothes… and you shoes… and for everything.”

Zayn rubs one of his hands down the side of his face, sighing. “Don’t be sorry, Li. I should be the one that’s apologizing, especially since I still know of your fear of heights. Tonight was amazing, and I know that we’re just friends. I guess I’m still a little bit hung up over Perrie leaving me not too long ago that I thought moving onto you would help me forget about her. But she’s all I see, and for a second when we were up there I could’ve sworn you were her so I started to lean in.”

“Well, maybe you should contact her and tell her that you still have feelings for her. Even if she doesn’t, it’s better to try and get it off your chest.” He nods. “So we’re cool?”

“As cool as two people can be covered in vomit.” We both laugh. Amen to that.

~

“Wait, you’re scared of heights?” Louis asks. I nod my head shyly. It isn’t something I’m proud of, but everyone has his or her fears. He starts laughing. I groan. “I’m sorry. It’s just – you don’t seem like the kind of person who has a fear of heights.”

“Well, I do, so shut it, Tomlinson.”

I don’t even know why he’s over. I was sitting on my kitchen floor with a big soupspoon, eating what was left in the tub of ice cream that I had originally bought for Katy, when he invited himself in. So he got himself a glass of water and sat down next to me. We’ve been talking about the other night’s horrifying event since then. And that’s not even why I’m sitting on the floor, hugging a tub of ice cream.

“So what happened after you got off the ride?”

I tell him about the two of us sitting down and what we had talked about, how we both understand that we are nothing more than friends – best friends if you may.

“Well then why do you look like you’ve been sobbing and why are you hugging a tub of ice cream? I thought you only did that when you were trying to get over someone.”

I sigh and take another spoonful of rocky road. I don’t even like this flavor, but I ran out of mint chip so I’m stuck with it. Louis nudges me a little and raises his eyebrow. “Hit play on my phone stand,” I mumble, gesturing to the charging station for my home phone. Louis gets up and walks over to the stand, hitting play like I told him to.

‘No new messages. All messages quite back. Beep.’

One of about eight messages starts to play. All are from the same person.

‘Beep.’

“Who is this?” Louis asks as the next message starts to play.

“My ex,” I grumble. I dip my spoon into the tub only to find that there is no more ice cream left. The message goes on about Zack wanting to get back with me after all this time when I was pretty much almost completely done with him. How can he be saying these things now? My body shakes with anger as the sobs come back. I throw the empty ice cream tub across the floor. The spoon clangs on the tiled floor after it.

Louis stops the messages from playing and rushes to my side. As soon as I feel his arms start to wrap around me, I throw my arms around his waist and push my face into his chest. He starts to stroke my hair as I start to spill my complaints on how unfair life is being at the moment with the Zack situation. I cried over him for a year having still loved him, and I wanted to tell him that but he had moved on. A few weeks ago, I was finally getting it through my head that he isn’t coming back, but here he is leaving a trillion messages on all of my phones telling me that he still loves me. I just wanted to let him go. I was almost completely done with him.

“Lina, sweetheart, he doesn’t deserve your tears. If he still loved you he would’ve called a long time ago,” Louis whispers when my tear ducts have dried up and can no longer produce any more water.

“Then why now, Lou?”

“You’ve been in the medias a lot lately after being seen hanging out with all of us. He’s probably just calling you up because you have a name out there now. We’ve all had out share of people who only try to be seen with us because we’re famous, and by the sounds of how much of an asshole he was to you, he’s just another spotlight seeker.”

“So he doesn’t really love me?” I frown. A small part of me still hopes that he does, but with what Louis is saying I just can’t see it.

“I hate to say this, but I don’t think he does.” Louis puts his lips to my forehead. The gesture gives me comfort. I know that he is being genuine with his words, but for some reason it still hurts. It kind of makes me wonder if anyone loves me… “Of course someone loves you.”

“What?” I pull back. Wait, did I say that out loud?

Louis chuckles a little. “Yeah, you did.”

“Oh…” I drop my gaze out of embarrassment.

Louis puts lifts my chin up so that I’m looking at him. “Hey, chin up, twin Payne. I mean it, someone loves you…”

“Yeah right. If Zack doesn’t love me then–”

My eyes go wide as cold lips meet mine. The coldness of the touch soothes me though, and I start to kiss back. I’m not kissing back for too long before he pulls away though, resting his forehead against mine. “I love you, Lina Payne. Even if no one else loves you, I do.”

Notes

Well that escalated quickly…

Who isn't annoyed that there is a whole song that fills in space at the beginning?
What is your biggest fear? (Don't you dare say oblivion.)
Are Zayn and Perrie going to get back together?
Will Zack keep nothing Lina?
Who do you ship together with Lina? with Katy?

The song that fills space is Sunday Morning by Maroon 5. And it is the Saturday the 20th where I live so no you can't yell at me for not updating on time. It just took me a while because it's been a while since I've written and I've had basically no motivation to write anything. iceskatez doesn't have wifi or a laptop at the moment and wasn't able to edit more than I already have so it there are typos, I hope you can all forgive me.

So um… please give us some feedback. What kind of mainstream plots, ideas, etc. do you hope to see get parodied in this story? Let us know in the comments below as well as what you think is going to happen next. x

Next Chapter Release: September 27

~A

posted 09.21.14