~Papa, papa, paparazzi~

I came to the studio the next morning during lunch to meet up with Zayn and Pixie. But a peculiar sight greeted me at the front door of the building. There was a small crowd gathered at the entrance, most of them with cameras. I figured some huge artist was dropping by so I walked past them casually. I saw Niall as I was walking up and rished to get to him. As soon as I greeted him, I heard someone shout "There they are!" before flashes of light come attacking me in the face. I was shocked and totally offguard. But Niall grabbed my arm and ushered me to the door quickly.

"What was that?" I panted.

"I'm sure you know what paparazzis are, don't you?" he asked.

"Of course I know they're paps, I meant, what are they suddenly interested in taking pictures of you? There's usually none here"

"You're so oblivious sometimes..they're taking pictures of us. Because of that picture that's going around about us..they need a follow-up, you know" he shrugged it off casually.

"I thought you blew it off already? And how can you be so calm about this? They're talking about your personal life you know!" I exclaimed.

He laughed at my remark. "This is normal. It happens to all of us all the time. You just gotta laugh it off, I guess."

"Hmm, you might be used to this, with all your girlfriends and what nots. But I on the other hand, am not. It's not even true, we're not even close to being a couple."

He chuckled, but the smile quickly faded. "For the record, I haven't had a girlfriend for years now." He paused before saying softly,"And yeah..we're just..friends.." Then he looked away.

The way he said his last sentence seemed odd to me, like he was actually upset that we were just friends. "You're so weird Niall. Anyways, I'm sure the right girl will appear soon. And whoever she is, she's a very lucky girl. You're a fine lad, the nicest guy I've ever met who's sure to make her happy." I beamed.

He immediately blushed at my compliment, which made me smile. He's cute when he gets shy, which is a rare occasion. He practically jumps at everything he hears, all news is good news to him. That's the great thing about him. He's so carefree, so joyous to be with, like a child. I continued admiring him, then I looped my arm around his and walked beside him up to the recording studio where the rest of the members were at.

When we stepped into the studio, everyone immediately stopped whatever they're doing to stare at us. Niall quickly loosen our arms and did an awkward cough as he walked towards the other members. Pixie, surprise surprise, quickly rushed towards me and pulled me to a corner.

"So the rumors are true then? You guys are together? Which is great you know, I love it!" she blabbered on.

"No! We're not together! We're just friends, I have no feelings towards him at all!"I defended myself.

"Ohkay..I believe you..no need to freak out on me! Anyways, did you see how Zayn looks when you entered with Niall just now? Total disgust on his face, so funny! He totally has a crush on you girl. No surprise there, with all the compliments he talks about to the press, people would think you guys were the couple." she blabbered on yet again.

"You've got to stop matchmaking me with all these guys, Pixie! You're making me look like a slut here" I laughed. "But wait, Zayn talks about me to the press?"

"Yeah, you don't know that? You're famous with the fans Lila! They all love you. Well, most of them. You can't stop the jealous haters. But yeah back to Zayn, yeah, I mean there's a lot of pictures in the web of you guys hanging out so obviously, some interviewers like to ask about it. The fans find it sweet that you two are so close and stuff. You should totally make a Twitter account, you'll have so many followers! Look, even I have 1D fans following me." she showed me her twitter page. "Some of them will interact with you, you just have to be nice to them."

I laughed at the idea of having fans. It's just surreal. I'd never thought that being a friend of a member of boyband might make me famous. Well, almost famous.

That night, at my house, I walked up to Zayn from behind, and whispered into his ears. "Sooo, I heard you have lots of nice things to say about me to the press..hehehe"

He looked up and chuckled nervously.

"Don't worry about it. I checked it out, I liked it. I especially like how you say and I qoute 'she's the best girl I've ever known, and that my next girlfriend better be careful cos she should measure up to her'. Hahaha! That's a good one!"

"Stop it, you're making me regret saying all those nice things about you. And I thought you don't check gossip sites!"

"Well, Pixie's got me hooked. And I even have my own twitter account now! How 'bout that huh?" I wriggled my eyebrows at him and then giggled.

"Are you serious? Well, this is gonna be fun. I bet I can make people follow you in an instant."

So we sat there, both meddling with our twitter. We mentioned each other and joked around publicly. In half an hour, after Zayn tweeted for everyone to follow me, I had 2,000 followers already. Some were already talking to me, and were asking funny and weird questions. Zayn and I had a blast laughing at their questions. Then a question was asked: Are you dating Niall or Zayn? I showed it to Zayn, and he gave a fake laugh. I placed my phone down, and sat nearer to Zayn.

"Hey Zayn? How would you feel if I were dating Niall?" When he didn't answer, I continued. "I mean, you've never seen me with a guy other than you before, have you?"

He stared at me for a few seconds before he finally spoke. "I'd be jealous."

And with just those three words, I felt a tingle in my spine. I was blushing, and I couldn't stop it. I tried moving away from his eyes, but he kept staring at me as he continued,"I don't want anybody hurting you, and the only person that I trust that won't ever hurt you...is me."

I teared when he said that, and moved to kiss him on the cheek. When my lips were off his cheek, our faces were just inches away from each other. I could feel his breath on me. I looked into his beautiful brown eyes, and admired his thick eyelashes. I studied his face, then my eyes fell to his lips. His looked so soft, and for a moment, I wanted to kiss him then. I looked back to his eyes, and realised he was looking at my lips too. Subconsciously, we moved in nearer to each other, so close I felt our nose touching. We were breathing heavily on each other. I've never felt this way about him before. He was moving his lips towards mine when suddenly, I heard the doorbell.

I shut my eyes, feeling kind of pissed off that our moment was interrupted. I opened them again to see Zayn, wiping his face with his hands, trying to get a hold of himself. I straightened myself up, and awkwardly went to the door. All feelings of anger vanished as soon as I saw Pixie at the door, with smeared mascara and eyeliner on her face. She had been crying, and she was shivering. I quickly brought her in.

"Oh god, what happened Pixie?" Zayn asked worriedly.

In between tears, she managed to get some words out. " Me..Joe..broke..me.." Then she just burst into more tears.

Zayn and I exchanged glances but we didn't know what to do as well. Pixie and Joe had been together for 3 years, and it was a shock why Joe would suddenly break up with her. All we could do was hug her, and mutter some comforting words. We fell asleep together that night, all cuddling one another with Pixie in the middle. When I woke up the next morning, I realised that Zayn and I were holding hands and a smile appeared on my face.

A/N:

Merry Christmas to my fellow readers! Hope you're not bored with my story just yet..and enjoy your holidays! :D