EAT » [ziam]

fourteen

[I gotta stay high all the time, to keep you off my mind]

~**~

“Dammit! Who the hell ate my yogurt!” shouted Mr. Malik while slamming the refrigerator door shut.

Trisha walks over to him—her heels clacking against the kitchen floor—and rubs soothing circles around her husband back. “It’s okay honey, I’ll just run to the market later this afternoon and buy you some new ones.”

Zayn was stuffing his backpack full of school supplies in a time-crunch because he slept in later than usual and was going to miss the bus if he didn’t haul ass. He throws the straps around his shoulders ready to leave when his father walks up to him pointing a finger at Zayn like he was caught with a hand in the cookie jar.

 “I bet it was you!” Yaser was now face-to-face with Zayn. “I shouldn’t expect any less from a fat fuck like yourself,” he spat, his tone more venomous than a cobra.

Zayn was just a choked up mess because his father had never gotten in his face like this before and it was honestly terrifying. God forbid he hit Zayn in the face, Jawaad would stay true to his word and beat the living crap out of Yaser, but Zayn couldn’t say the same for his mother who would pretend to play ‘peacekeeper’.

“Yaser, please! It’s no big deal whether he ate them or not!” pleaded Trisha while trying to calm down her significant other and ply him away from his son.

What his own oblivious parents hadn’t realized was that the last thing their son ate was those lettuce leaves at dinner Tuesday night. That was over two days ago—as it was now Friday morning—and Zayn was anything but guilty for eating his ridiculous dad’s yogurts.

“Daddy,” says Safaa, Zayn’s little sister, to get her father’s attention. Yaser turns around and looks at his daughter eating cinnamon toast for breakfast who has a saddened face. “I... I ate your yogurts. It wasn’t Zaynie,” she mumbles with a regretful presence.

Yaser clenches his fists and speed-walks around the room looking for something while starting a rant. “Do you seriously wanna end up looking like Zayn when he was your age?! Safaa, you’re only seven and shouldn’t be eating out of control! Look at your breakfast! Sugary cinnamon toast! That has diabetes written all over it!” Yaser’s face was as red as could be with fury as he picked up his suitcase for work. “Fine, continue getting fat. See if I care.” He ends in exasperation before slamming the door shut and heading to his car to drive off to work.

Zayn was praying to Allah for the prick you call his father to get in a car wreck or something. He hated his family and his life and must have done something terrible in another life to deserve this. Safaa starts bursting into tears with her face landing in her hands, her skin becoming moist from all the tears. That was the first time her father had ever blown up on her like that as he was usually doing it to Zayn.

“Oh, sweetie,” coos Trisha while hugging her daughter. Once again she just stood back and let her husband terrorize their children, but this didn’t surprise Zayn at all. Hell, it was second nature by now.

“Why… why was daddy being so mean, mum?” the little girl asks in a choke between crying and audible words.

“I’m leaving, I guess,” mutters Zayn, “See you guys later.”

He walks out and instantly loves the fresh feeling of having the crisp air enter his lungs and breathe life into him. It was so refreshing to get out of his house that was rather much like a prison if anything. Zayn couldn’t help but smile even though his day started off rocky because he had a date with Liam tonight. He had no clue what was in store for him, and Zayn never really had any experience with dates before. It was a first for him. The closest thing in his life to a date was during his freshman year when Jawaad invited him to a party thrown by a kid from Jawaad’s school. Zayn knew no one besides his cousin there and he didn’t want to drag Jawaad down so he tried to venture out on his own. A few senior boys from the soccer team had started talking to him and Zayn actually thought they were a nice group of guys. Turns out they actually were planning to gang-bang him in a locked room but failed when Zayn ran out of the room crying to Jawaad as soon as they started dropping their pants. It was a crazy experience and Zayn really hoped nothing like it would ever happen to him again.