Chapter Nine:
It had been three days since the incident at Zayn’s house and he still wasn’t back at school. I figured that maybe he would need a little time away especially since I now kind of knew what was going on at his house. I knew that he was upset for me not leaving when he had first told me too but some part of me remembered that sad look in his eyes. I could tell that he did want to get out of there and get some help but he was just too stubborn to do so. Once again the boys asked if I had wanted to hang out but I just wanted to see Zayn and hopefully get him to come over so we could talk a little bit. He really needed to talk to someone and even if it wasn’t about the purple and black marks all over his skin it was good to let some of his stress out.
I walked down the halls of our school and I could tell that I must’ve looked quite terrible. The students that normally didn’t even glance at me for a second were staring at me as I passed. When I looked in the mirror after I had woken up that morning I noticed the dark circles under my eyes from my lack of sleep. I hadn’t got much sleep after seeing Zayn like that and every time that I did manage to go to sleep the nightmares of him lying on the ground in a pool of blood would wake me up instantly. My mum even ran into my room one time because apparently I was screaming and thrashing around in my sleep. Once she got me awake I was drenched in sweat and my heart was beating so fast that I swear it was going to rip right through my chest. Since I couldn’t go back to sleep I grabbed the drawing that Zayn had left for me and stared at it for the rest of the night. Whenever I looked at it I felt like there was some hope that he would leave that terrible place and realize that I was there for him. I knew it wouldn’t happen anytime soon but it made me feel good at least.
I sighed before stepping into my math class and throwing myself into the chair in front of my desk. It was killing me that I hadn’t seen him and I didn’t know how much longer I could go without being with him. It sounded more ridiculous every time I said it to myself. I shouldn’t need to be with Zayn. He was just a sort of friend, right? But every single time I closed my eyes I could see his beautiful golden eyes and that gorgeous smirk that he always wore. I couldn’t help but smile at the thought of him. I heard a loud bang come from the desk next to me knocking me out of my little daydream.
I jumped and turned to see Mr. Higgins standing next to me laughing, “I got you good! You should’ve seen your face!”
I glared, “Why did you do that?! I almost peed myself!”
“You were staring off into space and I was trying to talk to you. I eventually just got sick of it and decided to see if I could snap you out of it.”
“Well you did. Thanks.” I rolled my eyes.
He chuckled, “What were you thinking about anyway?”
A blush crept onto my cheeks and he smiled, “It was Zayn wasn’t it?”
I slowly nodded, “Yes…I can’t stop thinking about him.”
“Why don’t you ask him to hang out or something. He could be daydreaming about you right now and you wouldn’t even know it.”
“I highly doubt that.”
He shrugged, “Hey you’ll never know unless you ask.”
I sighed, “I know. It’s just that I haven’t seen him in days. He hasn’t been to school or at the park or anything.”
“Well don’t worry about it too much, alright?” I nodded and the bell rang.
I really must have been daydreaming for a while. Probably 15 minutes at least. When the tardy bell rang a few minutes later I looked over at the desk next to mine and saw that once again Zayn wasn’t there. I sighed and put my head down hoping that he might be at the park after school. Mr. Higgins started teaching about something with numbers or whatever but I was too focused on Zayn that I didn’t even hear a word that he said. The door slammed and I looked up seeing Zayn walk in. The bruise on his face was gone as far as I could tell but I guessed that he was covering it up again. He didn’t look very good though. He looked even more tired than I was and I knew that I was completely drained. He looked at me but when we made eye contact he quickly looked away. He sat down at his desk and got his sketch book out. I tried to see what he was drawing but he obviously didn’t want me to see it so I didn’t push it.
Ask him to come over tonight Harry. I’m sure that mum and dad wouldn’t mind. Just go for it. At least he’ll know that you care about him.
I ripped a piece of paper out of my notebook and quickly scribbled down a note that read,
Zayn, come over after school. My parents are in love with you and I’m sure they would want to see you again.
I passed it over to him and he looked at it skeptically before taking it off of his desk and writing something back,
Sorry. Can’t. I have things to do.
That’s a bunch of bullshit. He just doesn’t want to come over. I’m not letting him go that easily,
Come on. You don’t have to stay for long. I just want to hang out a little.
A moment later a piece of paper hit me in the head and I glared at him before picking it up,
No.
Two can play at that game sir,
Pleeeeaaasssseeeeee!!!!!!!!!!! I’ll make you dinner and you don’t even have to talk if you don’t want to!
I saw him look over the paper and roll his eyes. The bell rang and I slammed my fist on the desk. I got out of my seat quickly to make sure that he wouldn’t leave without saying anything to me.
He sighed, “Move Styles.”
I shook my head, “Not until you agree to come over. I haven’t seen you in a while and I just want to hang out.”
“I’m going to be late for my next class.”
“Oh please. I know you don’t give a fuck about that. Just…Please Zayn…” I gave him the best pouty look that I could and he groaned.
“Fine. But I’m not staying long.”
“Yes! Thank you!” I stepped out of his way and he hastily left the class. I grabbed my backpack and was walking out the door when someone grabbed my arm.
I looked up and saw Mr. Higgins standing there with a smile on his face, “Very nicely played Mr. Styles.”
I smiled, “I know right? I’ll see you Monday and I will tell you how it goes.”
“Alright. Have a good weekend.”
I waved, “Thanks! You too!”
I ran off to my locker praying that the rest of the day would go by faster than it normally does.
The drive to my house was pretty quiet. Zayn was sitting in the passenger seat staring out of the window listening to the radio. I was kind of disappointed because he wasn’t singing and I really just missed that. He had the voice of an angel and if he really wanted to he could probably be famous for it. When I pulled into my driveway I saw that he was still staring off into space so I tapped his shoulder.
“Zayn, we’re here.”
He didn’t look at me at all. He just got out of the car and made his way over to the front door. I shrugged it off thinking that he was probably still feeling a bit tense from Tuesday. I wasn’t going to push him to talk because I knew that he would tell me what he wanted to when he was ready. We walked through the door and walked up the stairs to my bedroom. He sat on my bed and looked down at his hands.
“You want to play video games or something?”
He shook his head.
“Alright.” We both sat in the silence for a long while before he spoke up.
“You hung it up?”
“What?” I glanced over to where he was looking and smiled, “Yea. I love it. Right when I found it I had to put it up. It deserves to be where people can see it.”
He turned to me, “You really think that?”
I nodded, “Of course. I think it completes my room, don’t you?”
And there was that smirk that I was dying to see, “Yea.”
I walked over and sat on the bed beside him, “I know you don’t want to talk about his but I just want you to know that I’m not going to tell anyone about what I saw on Tuesday. I mean, I really want to tell someone but I don’t want to ruin anything that we may have.”
He opened his mouth a few times to speak but nothing came out. I thought that he was going to just drop the subject until he slowly shook his head, “I just wish it never happened.”
I put my hand on his knee, “If you want me to just forget everything that I saw then-“
He cut me off, “That’s not what I mean.”
“What do you mean then?” He started wringing his hands and I knew that all of this was a touchy subject. In all honesty I didn’t even think he would speak one word about it but if he wanted to talk then I was going to be there to listen.
“My dad wasn’t always a terrible person Harry…” He looked into my eyes and I could see a sparkle in his, “We used to have such a wonderful time together. He took me to the park to play almost every single day and we used to stay there for hours. I remember the time that I was scared to go on the big slide because I was scared to go up so high.” He smiled at the memory, “He told me that if I truly wanted to go down the slide then I could. He said that I shouldn’t let anything get in my way of doing what I really wanted to do. So I went down that big slide and it felt great. He told me that I could do anything I wanted and I believed him. He was my hero. But everything changed one night.” The smile was now gone and his eyes suddenly got much darker. He didn’t speak, he just closed his eyes and shook his head over and over. “I’m sorry. I can’t talk about this.”
“It’s ok. I know that this is probably hard for you to talk about.”
He nodded but didn’t say anything.
“Can I ask you something?”
He answered after some hesitation, “Sure.”
“Why do you live there if you just get beat all of the time?”
He quickly stood up so he was glaring down at me, “What the hell are you talking about?!”
“Zayn, please calm down. I didn’t mean to offend you I just really want to know why you just take it and you can so easily just walk right out the door.”
I saw the rage building up in his eyes and I mentally slapped myself for even bringing any of this up.
“Look Styles! I don’t know what the fuck you think you know but my father doesn’t beat me! He may be a drunk and I may have some problems with him but he doesn’t fucking hit me! Got it? Just stay out of my damn business!”
He turned to walk out of my room but I quickly stood up and grabbed his arm before he could leave. He tried to push me off but I had a pretty good grip on him. I made him look at me and I quietly said, “I’m sorry Zayn. I really am. Please don’t leave. It was stupid of me to assume something like that but I’ve just been so worried about you lately. I just want to be able to understand.”
Even though I apologized I could still tell that he was quite pissed off at me. “Why should I stay? Give me one good reason.”
I definitely had more than one good reason that he should stay and it was hard for me to pick one that would actually keep him from leaving. “Because I care about you.”
He scoffed, “That’s the biggest load of bullshit I have ever heard. You don’t care about me.”
“Yes I do Zayn. In my eyes we’re friends. You may not think that we are but I truly do care about you and I want you to realize that.”
He stared at me for a little while then shook his head, “Fine. I’ll stay.” He slowly walked back to my bed to sit down and I was relieved to see that he had calmed down a bit.
We sat in silence for a while both of us not knowing what to talk about but then I got an idea. “Have you finished anymore stuff for your portfolio?”
He didn’t really show it but I could tell from the look in his eyes that he was excited about it. “Yea. A little bit. They’re not really that good though. I did them those days that I was home from school.” He sauntered over to where his backpack was and grabbed the folder that was leaning against it. He sat on the floor and leaned against my bed before taking his art out from his folder. I made my way onto the floor beside him and he handed me a few of his pictures.
After a few moments of looking through all of them I was still completely taken aback by his talent. “Zayn, these are beautiful. There’s no way anyone is going to deny you.”
He chuckled, “I doubt that. I’m gonna go to the bathroom really quick.”
I nodded and continued to look through the paintings and sketches. When I had looked through all of them again I went to put them back into the folder and noticed a few more that he hadn’t shown me. I carefully pulled them out and my eyes grew wide when I saw them. There were about 7 pictures that were all so amazing and breathtaking but the one thing that really got me was that they were all of me. I heard the bathroom door open down the hall and I quickly shoved the pictures back where they came from.
Zayn walked in and raised his eyebrow, “Why do you look so guilty?”
I shook my head and let out a nervous laugh, “G-guilty? Ha. I-I’m not gui-guilty!”
He gave me another look and then just shook his head, “You’re weird.”
“Yup! That’s me! Weird!”
“Ok Styles now you’re creeping me out. Stop it.”
I nodded, “Sorry. I’m uh, gonna go get something to drink. Do you want anything?”
“Sure.”
I ran out of my bedroom and down the stairs before making my way into the kitchen and grabbing a glass to fill with water. I drank all of it down in one big gulp and took a deep breath.
Should I ask him about those pictures? No! Don’t ask! He’ll know that you were going through his stuff and then he’ll never trust you! But what if he likes me? Oh my god! There’s no way he likes me! He doesn’t even treat me like a friend! He’s good at hiding things though. I don’t know what to do. How about I just don’t say anything until he shows me? Yea. That’ll work. Ok Harry. Relax.
“What’s taking so long?” I jumped and Zayn laughed, “Didn’t mean to scare you. I thought you might’ve got lost or something. You’ve been down here for like ten minutes.”
“Oh sorry. Just was daydreaming I guess.”
“Whatever you say Styles. What time is dinner?”
“My mum should be on her way home soon.”
He nodded, “Cool. I’ll be playing video games in your room.”
Before I could reply he was already walking away and I just couldn’t help but stare at him as he did. I was wondering if he liked me but really I should be wondering if I liked him. Right now I had a feeling that I was starting to fall a little harder than I had planned.