if the kids are united - zayn/liam, harry/louis - 3/8
Title: If The Kids Are United [3/8]
Pairing: Zayn/Liam, Harry/Louis
Disclaimer: This is very definitely a work of fiction. Title taken from the song by Sham 69.
Warnings: racial slurs, homophobia, violence, possibly obscure references you may need to google
Word count: 14, 373 [total]
Summary: This Is England-inspired/80s!AU in which Liam is the skinhead with a secret and Zayn, the psychobilly pretty boy, is the epitome of everything he’s not supposed to desire. A dangerous love story unfolding on the bleak Northern streets of Thatcher’s England, where friends are family, ready with their fists, and tea and cigarettes are the life blood.
A/N: I... this might be really self indulgent? I just needed the ‘verse to exist, I admit it. There is also an accompanying mix here, if you’re interested in that sort of thing. Some of the songs relate directly, others just set the mood [a few are more modern, too].
The very next day two bricks come crashing spectacularly through Zayn’s living room window- barely missing his littlest sister as she sits combing the hair of her Barbie doll. Her scream is shrill, sudden hot tears bubbling over her chubby cheeks, and Zayn doesn’t think twice before scooping her up onto his hip and leaping to swing open the front door. He doesn’t catch them though, not even their backs- only hears the hollow echo of their boots thudding back through the entry. His little sister’s snot dampens the front of his Meteors t-shirt and her legs cling like a monkey; Zayn presses against the door jamb and rubs circles over her back. His wounds are still fresh enough to hurt as he scrunches his face up in frustration.
“Shit,” He exhales. “Sorry, I know, naughty word. But you going to be okay to sit on the sofa with some juice, Safsaf, while I sort it all out? Don’t go near the glass, lovie.”
He fixes her a cup of diluted cordial and strokes her tear-wet hair back from her eyes, kisses her forehead, before finding newspaper to wad up and stuff into the jagged holes in the pane. It’s a short-term solution, but the best he can come up with. Then the mess of the glass- he doesn’t have a clue where his mum keeps her dust pan and brush so he protects his hand with the sports pages and plucks it all up from the carpet. The bricks come last. They have paki [of course] and go home scratched into them with black felt tip pen but Zayn barely pays it any attention as he dumps them in the backyard.
“Wish I’d been sober enough to fucking break their legs,” He mutters to nobody at all, has to refrain from sending his fist hurtling towards the wall.
Instead, he sits with little sister in his lap and together they watch hours of crap on the telly. Cartoons become game shows and his little sister falls asleep. Small and snuffling. He squeezes her, despite the aching, and feels far more emotions than any teenage boy could really manage. It’s not fair is what he wants to think- but nothing is fair, so the argument’s a weak one. Everyone’s struggling and cold and hopeless. It’s not fair that Harry wont get to go to university; that Louis’ stepdad has never forgiven him for coming out; that a fucking brick nearly collided with sweet sleepy Saf.
Zayn’s mum cries when the rest of his family arrive home and when she scoops up Saf from Zayn’s lap, swaying with her, she murmurs over and over that Zayn is her brave boy. Zayn blushes under her praise and nudges his lips to her powdered cheek-
“Just a brother.” Is all he says.
“The best brother.” His Father insists from beside his wife, in a tone that tells his son not to argue, before slipping him a handful of coins, “Go find your friends and stay safe.”
Zayn almost feels like himself again once he’s checking the bus time table against his watch. Just a normal lad going to his mate’s place to share a few cans, some sweets thanks to his lovely Dad’s generosity. Cola cubes for Louis, those chocolate buttons with the hundreds and thousands for Harry... He even manages a cheery grin for the bus driver, a nod of thanks before he jogs up the stairs to the top deck.
It all drains from him when he pauses on the top stair and realises that Liam’s sat half way down the bus. All of the seats bare other than his. He’s staring out of the window at first, faint frown lines narrowing in towards the bridge of his nose, lips set in a line. He must hear Zayn breath though because his interest shifts over in seconds. His face remains passive but Zayn doesn’t miss the thick bob of his Adam’s apple.
“Hello Zayn,” He says, let’s the three syllables just hang between them on a thread Zayn can cut or catch.
Zayn takes a seat a few ahead of Liam and twists backwards in order to keep watching him. He feels prickly all over, far more sensitive to the cheap brown and orange fabric of the seats than he’d usually be.
“Liam, right? Can I help you? Were you hoping to actually break me nose this time?” Zayn narrows his eyes and steadies his voice by curling his fingers around the metal back of his bench.
“Oh God no- I’m... is your face okay? Is all of you okay?”
“Are you bein’ serious right now, mate? You put me in hospital!”
Liam’s frown lines deepen and there’s a fluttering twitch in his jaw- “That weren’t me. I was there but...”
“Yeah. You were. With Andy. You also ‘appened to be there when he was yelling paki at me, eh? Probably launched one of them bricks through me window, too. Do us a favour lad and leave me alone.”
“Bricks?” Liam pales, “I know nowt about bricks, swear on my Mum. I’m not that kinda guy, mate.”
Despite logic, Zayn finds himself wanting to believe the other boy’s protest. He just knows honesty and it’s what keeps him from turning his back on Liam.
“Look. You can say no, but wanna come for a cup of tea or somethin?” Liam rubs at his neck, stretches, sighs.
“I need to pick up some fags first.”
“Yeah, yeah, sure. And then The Caf?”
The Caf is a favourite haunt of the town’s teenage population [and it’s builders, and OAPs] though it’s nothing much. Just a counter, six sets of booths and yellowing paper that’s peeling at the corners. Still, it’s the most inviting doorway on it’s row of the high street; always warmly well lit, smelling like home cooked meals and cheap instant coffee. They order two plates of egg and chips when they arrive and then slide into their seats with their eyes skittering this way and that. Zayn guesses that Liam doesn’t want to be spotted fraternizing with the enemy and he feels much the same. There are a crowd of skinheads in one corner but Zayn recognises them as a harmless bunch and Liam he doesn’t seem to recognise them at all.
Zayn tips the salt shaker, spilling granules out onto the grubby table cloth and then drawing patterns in the pool of them. He’s waiting for Liam to speak first, expecting the boy to launch into some sort of explanation or apology. He doesn’t, and the lull between them makes Zayn antsy. He lights up and looks up, his expression not particularly kind-
“If you’re not like them, Liam- like Andy and that- why are your mates with ‘em? He’s a fuckin’ dickhead. It’s not like you can’t ‘ave noticed.”
“I didn’t know anyone else at first- like, he found me? On one of me first days here. And once you’re in... you know, you’re sort of in.”
“What’s that, once you been selected for the National Front you get shot for desertin’?”
Zayn expects Liam to splutter- he doesn’t expect Liam to bow his head and cup his hands around his face. Hiding. Liam is broad, Zayn can’t help but notice- shoulders wide beneath the check of his shirt, solid wrists, thick fingers. He keeps hearing Harry’s husky voice in the back of his head, however, reminding him that the boy’s eyes are not what his biceps would suggest. It’s mostly awkward because Zayn’s in the habit of hugging people who seem to come over all sad [or at least lovingly cuffing them over the back of the head].
“Look- the other night, I think you were out of it. Out of it even before we got to fightin’, so I wont blame you for forgetting. But near the end, I was holding you up. Your eyes kept rolling and your mates were all bleedin’. That little pretty one, half of his face were red, it were the fuckin worst. And yeah, I ended up laying you on the floor...”
Zayn sucks at his cigarette until it’s near enough just drooping ash between his fingers. Those anonymous arms, when his breathing had stung.
“Then you watched for the ambulance, yeah?”
“Aye. I’ve been worrying since. I ain’t seen Andy, or Gazza and Smith. Didn’t feel right. I’m not like that Zayn, I know I’ve said it but am not. I just like Two Tone.”
Their food arrives and the waitress slides them a side of buttered bread, too. Their fried eggs have neon yellow yolks, ready for bursting and the chips are thick, cut the same way Zayn does them for the girls’ tea. He stubs out his cigarette and sucks on his bottom lip, skating the prongs of his fork over his yolk so that it spills over.
“Do you like The Specials, yeah?” He asks, to distract himself, and Liam actually beams.
“Yeah, mate.”
“Wanna listen to A Message To You Rudy then, don’t ya?” Zayn smirks and he definitely feels pleased when Liam chokes on a chip-
“Oi, you cheeky arse! Besides, did you not notice Elvis’ been dead since the seventies?”
“Hush up and eat up, lad,” Zayn scowls, but the corners of his mouth are rather uncooperative- they want to curve into his cheeks, mirror Liam’s.
They get to eating in a companionable, half-smiling silence. It’s as though the two boys who entered the cafe are not going to be the ones leaving it. Their fingers even brush when they both reach across for the bottle of brown sauce; Zayn has to close his eyes for a split second, grab a round of bread instead.
“You’re still a dick for yelling at me in the underpass and shit you know,” He ends up saying- mouth full of quickly slapped together chip butty- “You’re not a dickhead for ‘elping me last night, but you’re not proper off the hook.”
Liam lays his cutlery politely across his emptied plate and weighs up Zayn’s words.
“Can I fix it at all, Zayn? Pint? I’ll pay?” He suggests and then adds, “Pay for some songs on the jukebox, too?”
“Alright,” Zayn sighs after swallowing. He pats his pocket to check for his cigarettes and slides from his seat, “You drive a hard bargain, Liam. The Swan do ya?”
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