Lethal (Harry Styles)

chapter 24

A throbbing pain emerged deep down in my skull and slowly crept along my bones until it hit the bottom of my stomach.

I just told Lisa I was fine but I sure as hell didn't feel good.

Not even once in my life have I felt this fearful. I have felt threatened before, yes. Zayn had his share in that memory but not once have I felt like my life was at stake.

This Liam guy was trouble, one look at him was enough to see the dangerous vibe that encased his body. That other bloke was just like him. Double trouble. What has Harry gotten himself into?

My subconscious felt the need to remind me that Harry may be a part in all of this. For all I knew, he could be in some kind of gang that dealt with drugs – or worse. His nice behavior could be fake, only held up to keep me out of his business.

I was torn between trying to really avoid him from now on and confronting him about it. For the time being, I would pretend nothing happened.

"Zoey? This is possibly the worst timing ever but I need to tell you something," Lisa spoke up, biting her lip in a nervous manner.

This couldn't mean anything good.

"Can't it wait?" I softly asked, too exhausted to fight whatever battle was about to come now.

"I don't think so. I don't wanna keep it from you and you really need to know," Lisa insisted, her voice softening a bit.

"Okay, go ahead." I hadn't it in me to fight her.

"About Zayn," Lisa started and I immediately groaned. This can't be happening right now.

Lisa paused and threw a worried glance my way. I nodded for her to continue.

"He moved back," Lisa dropped the bomb.

Only, it didn't explode. I figured as much when I saw him at the go-kart track.

"And he-he contacted me to see if there was any chance you would talk to him," Lisa cleared the air.

"Never," I answered. How dare he?

"I know. I told him as much. I can't really tell what he will do now but I knew you wouldn't want to talk to him. I just wanted to let you know, Z," she told me. I sighed in relief. I shouldn't even have doubted her.

Lisa stopped at a red light and I watched a granny cross the street with a walking frame. She looked so fragile with her thin legs that were barely able to hold her up anymore. She was walking at a slow pace and a teenage girl behind her looked at her with pitiful eyes. The girl's longer legs helped her cross the street within seconds but the granny was left behind, still on the street when the pedestrian's light was on red again.

Life was an erratic thing. You never knew what to expect. People spent their time making future plans, wasted even more time on the wrong people – and on school – and sometimes all it took was one heedless driver that didn't see the kid chasing a ball on the street to stop a person to waste any more time on all the wrong things.

That didn't mean we should stop wasting our time on wrong things. People made mistakes and things certainly went wrong all the time but we learned from mistakes. We had to.

"Zoey, whatever you're thinking of, stop it or else those crinkles won't go away," Lisa grumbled.

I threw her my sweetest smile. The way she shrank back told me it wasn't a sweet but scary smile.

"We're there," Lisa unnecessarily informed me while she parked in the mall's parking lot.

We aimlessly walked around the mall for what seemed like an eternity. My feet started to hurt, my headache got worse and I just wanted to sleep until my alarm clock woke me up to go back to college.