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Zayn loves sleep, he wants to elope with it in Southern France and serenade it every morning by the seaside. Part of his infatuation has to do with how sparse good sleep is on tour - they’re busy all the time, and when they finally get to the hotel the bed is only sometimes nice. Anyway, he never has enough time for his optimum amount of sleep, although that’s honestly just as much as he can possibly get. Hence, Zayn relies on naps. He likes it best when he can nap one of his boys, which has led him to develop a comprehensive band-habit-based nap strategy.
Now, all Liam needs to convince him to nap with Zayn is a little tiny bit of manipulation - it’s not even lying, most of the time. See, Liam likes to take care of people. He’s always reminding the other boys to eat, bringing them water bottles, hell, he carries sunscreen because Niall is always forgetting. If Liam sees that Zayn is getting all tired and droopy and grumpy he will want to do something about it. The thing is, Zayn knows that, and it’s not too hard for him to act absolutely exhausted when he’s merely tired. He just has to look a teeny bit pathetic. So, Zayn will yawn and lean on Liam while they’re waiting for the bus or whatever, and by the time they get on Liam will have gotten the point. While he’s there, Liam is really caring - he’ll pet Zayn’s hair and scritch his scalp and sometimes he takes off his hoodie to drape over Zayn - it’s just super nice. Zayn has to get him in the car or on the bus or the plane, though, because otherwise Liam remembers all the other things he thinks he absolutely needs to do. So, the trick for a nap with Liam is to ensnare him with patheticness when he’s trapped with no escape - in a nice, cuddly way.
It’s of general consensus within the band that Niall gives the best hugs - he squeezes tight and holds on just a little bit longer than is normally considered appropriate. Niall is small enough that, if he bends his head, Zayn can tuck him under his chin and it’s very cozy. Unfortunately, this does not exactly translate into him having the best napping skills ever. Niall will start out all nice and cuddled up next to Zayn, tucked under his arm and head on his shoulder. After a minute or two, Niall will be reminded of something he wanted to tell Zayn earlier and he’ll start the story whispering but then he’ll make himself laugh and end up giggling and squirming a little against Zayn’s side. And, okay, it’s sort of adorable the way he visibly remembers that Zayn, at least, is trying to sleep, and quiets down again. However, it is not the best for sleeping, especially because Niall will forget again just a little bit later and start twisting around to talk to Harry. Zayn can not always be putting his arm around him to pull him back and remind him that they are meant to be sleeping, come on Niall. There is a solution: Zayn lures Niall, normally by bringing him food, into somewhere with absolutely nothing interesting. His favorite are the green rooms they wait in before interviews, and the lounges at airports. Then he pulls Niall down to sit next to him, and once he’s at that point it’s easy to get Niall to cuddle with him, because he does that anyway. All he’s got to do is isolate Niall from distractions.
Louis doesn’t like to be seen as the kind of person who takes naps, because he thinks they’re for lazy people and children (and Zayn). He has a bit of a rant about it and everything. Zayn is determined, and he figures out through careful observation that Louis will fall asleep ‘on accident’ when he’s supposedly doing other things. When he’s got a movie going he’ll lay out on the couch and watch it while he gradually loses track of the plot and falls asleep. Louis will also put on headphones and pretend to be deeply absorbed in the music, closing his eyes so it won’t be obvious when he drops off. Zayn has learned to take advantage of this, and to tell the difference between when Louis is pretending to listen to music so he can sleep, and when he’s pretending to contemplate and interpret music to impress Harry. When it’s the first one, Zayn swoops in with his pillow and curls up next to Louis before he knows what’s happening. He thinks of it as helping Louis as well, because otherwise it’s a little bit too much like cuddling without consent. If anyone asks Louis can pretend to be holding still for Zayn, of course he wasn’t actually sleeping. The point is, Zayn knows he has to be on high alert to nap with Louis.
When Harry is sleepy, he’s almost always willing to nap. It’s a little bit hard to tell when he’s sleepy, since he pretty much always sounds like it, but Zayn knows him well. Harry is also really good to nap with, because the size difference is enough that he can curl around Zayn a little bit, but not so much that it’s awkward. For some reason, Harry seems to run a little bit warmer than any of the other boys and it’s nice, like having a breathing furnace. Zayn kind of likes to keep Harry-naps as a treat for himself, and he likes to arrange them to be as nice as possible - in a bed and everything. He waits until they are in a hotel that smells nice and doesn’t get noisy or bright from outside and has a bed that’s not too firm or too squishy. Then he texts Harry to come over to his room, sometimes they order hot chocolate from room service, and then they get right in bed. There’s not much of a run up, because they get nine hours to sleep at most, just sleeping. Zayn saves them for when he hasn’t had one with any of the others for a while. He’s not going to say that naps with Harry are his favorite, but they do take the least effort - just a text - so that’s nice.
So Zayn had gotten a bit of a reputation - always falling asleep, half the time on top of some member of his band. That’s not really giving him enough credit, he feels, because he’s actually quite stealth and deliberate about it.