twelve- blithe
song for this chapter: “happy” by Pharrell Williams
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Zayn was walking around the house aimlessly, boredom kicking in. Iris had told him that there was no work to be done for the afternoon, and now he had no idea what to do with himself. He had attempted reading, but his body was craving physical activity, and being tranquil was a bit difficult.
Twenty one days. He couldn’t believe how much had happened during such a relatively short period of time, but all the excitement had given him a new joy in life that had been lacking before he got here.
Zayn was finally happy. During a night of sleeplessness and many epiphanies later, it finally dawned on him. The truth was so confronting that he had primarily denied it, because it seemed like the one thing that he had been sure of was collapsing.
He wasn’t in love with Perrie.
Zayn still loved her, of course. But he didn’t love her in the same way anymore, and this truth both thrilled and terrified him at the same time. It felt like he had turned a new chapter in his life, one filled with uncertainty.
He had spent the last couple of days thinking: he thought about everything that he possibly could, some of his major topics being Iris, his family, the boys, the media and Liam.
Zayn had decided that when he got back that Liam could live with him. They wouldn’t spend much time in Zayn’s apartment anyway, but it would be a place to call home for Liam. Now that he wasn’t getting married, Liam could stay as long as he so wished.
A gurgling sound filled the room in which Zayn was pacing in, making him pause for a second. He looked down at his stomach and patted it absentmindedly.
“I know, I know.” He muttered.
With boredom came hunger, and even though Zayn had eaten two hours ago, his stomach wouldn’t cease to growl at him. He sighed and gave in, heading towards the kitchen.
On the table were baskets of fruit and vegetables, picked by Zayn the previous day. He grabbed a bunch of green grapes and walked out the front of the house, sitting on the porch.
He once again fell into a state of contemplation, and as he put grapes into his mouth, he thought of what would happen when he got back.
They had a tour to finish, so they would probably give Zayn a couple of weeks to ‘recover’ or whatever, in which during his recovering period he would be in multiple interviews and hold many press conferences answering the same questions over and over again.
He wished that when he got back that he could not be in the spotlight, but it would inevitable. It would take him a while to get back into the fast paced rhythm of his life, especially after being here for so long.
Zayn knew the most asked question would be Zayn, where have you been? What could he tell them? They wouldn’t believe that he had stayed with some girl hidden in the middle of the English countryside. And he knew that if the officials caught a whiff that a girl had been living basically unregistered there would be an inquiry.
Iris would have no idea what to do.
Zayn grinned as he thought about how they first met, and could imagine some posh official knocking on the door, and then getting attacked by some medium sized girl with a log.
No, he would not tell anyone other than the boys, his mother and sisters of Iris. Management would get told some story in which he could probably make up on the spot. They didn’t need to know a thing.
“Zayn?”
“Out the front!” Zayn called back, smiling as he realised boredom was just about to be abolished.
He didn’t look up as he heard the front door open, and only looked at Iris when he felt that she had sat down beside him.
“Hey.” Zayn said, smiling widely at her.
“Hello.” She replied, smiling back. “How do the grapes taste?”
“Best grapes I’ve ever tasted.” Zayn assured her, and she nodded expectingly, like she had already known the answer.
“Got any work for me?” Zayn asked hopefully, making Iris raise an eyebrow at him.
“Are you actually wanting to do work?” She asked, looking surprised. “Are you really Zayn?”
Zayn laughed, noting that she was actually being serious. “Of course it’s me.”
“Then why do you want to do work?” She asked confusedly.
“No offence to you, but I’ve been bored out of my mind since lunch. I need to do something with a little heavy lifting.” Zayn explained, feeling the urge to move make his left foot tap impatiently.
Iris suddenly frowned and sighed. “Of course. I forgot to-”
She stopped suddenly, and very slowly a large, almost scary grin came onto her face. Zayn looked at her worriedly. “Forgot to what?” He asked timidly.
“To milk Lilac.” Iris said slowly, making Zayn feel more confused.
“Who the hell is Lilac?” Zayn blurted, turning red immediately after doing so.
Iris shook her head, the slightly manic grin still on her face. “Not who, but what. Lilac is my cow.”
Zayn gaped at her for a moment, unable to form a sentence. He stuttered for a moment before managing to pull it together. “A cow?”
“You’ve been here for around three weeks and have not noticed that I have a cow?” Iris scoffed.
“Well, yeah,” Zayn said, ignoring her mocking. “But you want me of all people to milk a cow?”
“There is no need for trepidation, Lilac is a very quiescent.” Iris said, standing up, making Zayn do the same.
“Quiescent?” Zayn repeated lamely.
“Inactive. Kind of like you.” Iris jested, making her smile and Zayn frown.
“No fair, I’ve done stuff.” Zayn countered, but his lips were threatening to tug into a smile, despite how hard he was trying not to.
“But you were the one who told me two days ago that, quote, ‘I’m a lazy idiot who generally has done nothing physical in my life’ unquote.” Iris said smugly, and Zayn knew that she had won that battle.
“Fine, fine, you win.” Zayn sighed, making Iris beam in triumph.
“Now, let’s introduce you to Lilac.”
They walked back through the house to get to the back, and Zayn followed, though feeling thoroughly nervous and worried. The only experience that he had with animals was with ones that you could find in a pet store.
Zayn had seen Lilac before, but really hadn’t thought much of it. They both stayed out of each other’s way, a silently mutual agreement that was about to violated.
Iris opened the gate, and motioned for Zayn to go in first. He gulped and hesitated before going, careful not to step on the piles of cow leavings that seemed to be everywhere. He heard the gate shut with a click.
“We’re just going to slowly walk towards her, and then let her come up to you. She really is friendly.” Iris said.
Zayn spotted Lilac at the other end of the paddock, staring right at them. She slowly started making her way towards them, like it was the last thing in the world she felt like doing. Zayn understood.
“Why did you call her Lilac?” Zayn asked, barely dodging a pile of droppings.
“My father told me that the cow would be mine to take care of, and so I named her after my favourite colour.” Iris said, looking a bit embarrassed.
“Lilac’s your favourite colour?” Zayn asked incredulously.
“Yes. Why are you surprised?” Iris said, smiling slightly.
Zayn blushed, shrugging his broad shoulders. “I just never picked you as a lilac girl. Why is it your favourite colour?”
Iris looked up to the sky. “Because when the sun sets, there are so many colours in the sky, but the thing that always made my heart warm was seeing the clouds turn lilac.”
And once again she manages to surprise me Zayn thought, eyeing her with a thoughtful gaze. Everything she did was weird to him, but made more sense the more that he thought about them. It made him think about his way of viewing the world.
“Lilac, Lilac.” Iris cooed, and Zayn realised with a start that Lilac was mere metres away from him, making him stop in his tracks. Iris went up to her and started petting her head.
Lilac wasn’t the typical black and white cow usually shown on ads, but her coat was a dark brown, with no markings. Her big brown eyes looked innocent and lazy, and Zayn even thought she was cute.
“Zayn, come over and pat her.” Iris ordered.
He slowly walked towards the cow, and it’s head swung to face him, mooing. He paused, and then kept on walking, reaching the cow. He slowly raised a hand, and then ran it across the cow’s neck.
“See, that wasn’t too hard.” Iris said teasingly, smiling at him with her eyes glimmering.
“Ha, so funny.” Zayn said, but he was smiling too. He continued to pat Lilac, who had stopped paying attention to Iris and was nuzzling it’s nose into his hand, and he knew she was searching for food.
“Sorry Lilac, I don’t have anything for you.” He murmured, and she mooed again.
“She knows it’s time to be milked, I’ll go get the rope.” Iris said, smiling at the pair before walking towards the shed at the other end of the paddock.
“Look, I’ll try and be gentle, but no promises ok?” Zayn said to the cow, who flicked her tail.
“I think that you know that I haven’t done this before, so hopefully things will go smoothly.”
Zayn sighed as he realised he was talking to a cow like it was a human being, and decided that it didn’t matter who he was talking to.
Iris coming back was a grateful intervention from his weird thoughts, even though her coming back meant that it was time to milk Lilac.
She carefully looped the leash around Lilac’s neck, Zayn observing how lovingly gentle she was with the animal. His chest warmed to see her like this, and he knew that when he got back home it would be memories like these that he would think back on.
He followed them to the shed, and watched as Lilac compliantly went into the stall. Iris set up the small stool, and then placed the bucket underneath Lilac’s udder. Zayn swallowed.
“I’ll show you how to do it, and then you can do the rest. I will be standing by, so don’t worry.” Iris said, taking a seat on the stool.
She didn’t tell him how to do it, but rather just showed him. Zayn tried not to look as hopelessly lost as he felt, and it seemed that Iris could tell.
“Sit, let me see how you do it.” Iris said encouragingly, and he just couldn’t say no to the eager look on her face.
Zayn carefully sat down, feeling he was going to break the old and weathered stool, but found that it held. He carefully put his hands on the cow’s teats, wincing as he did. He copied Iris’ motions, and let out a gasp as milk came out.
“Iris!” Zayn said gleefully. He could sense her smiling.
“Yes Zayn?”
“I actually did it!” He said, feeling proud as he watched the pail starting to fill.
“I knew you could do it.” Iris said, sounding just as proud as Zayn felt, which made his smile grow.
“You’re a good cow, aren’t you Lilac?” Zayn cooed, feeling elated at his new found skill.
Zayn thought that the real reason why he was so happy wasn’t really because he could milk a cow, but because he could do it by himself. When he was on tour, everything was done or organised by someone else: his hair, his choice of clothes, where he was going, where he was staying, what he was going to say, etcetera. He felt a freedom that he hadn’t felt for a long time.
After Lilac was finished, Zayn helped Iris pour the milk into glass bottles, which were placed in a cool corner of the shed. Zayn gave Lilac a good pet before Iris and him started walking towards the gate of the paddock.
“Thanks for that, Iris.” Zayn said, smiling sheepishly. “I’ll admit that was a lot more fun than I first thought.”
Iris waved a dismissive hand, perhaps a gesture she learnt from Zayn. “It was no problem.”
Zayn opened his mouth to say something, but found that a yelp came out instead. His feet flew out from underneath him, and he landed on something rather soft.
Iris stared at him in shock for a moment, before she burst out laughing, clutching her stomach as the loud laughs tumbled out of her mouth. Zayn gaped.
Her laugh wasn’t exactly the prettiest laugh in the world, but even so it was just so happy and Zayn adored it. He would do many things to see her laugh.
She snorted, and Zayn began to laugh too, causing both of them to start crying from the hysteria they were experiencing. At some point Zayn realised he was sitting in a pile of cow poo.
“Iris-” He said chokingly, his laughs increasing as Iris snorted again.
“Yes?” She said between fits of laughter, tears of happiness streaming down her cheeks.
“I’m sitting in a pile of poo, aren’t I?” Zayn stuttered, his stomach aching from all the laughing.
She nodded, and tried to calm herself down, walking away from him, her slowly fading laughter echoing in the paddock. Zayn took in deep breaths, staring up at the sky.
Iris was beaming when she came back, and let out a little giggle when she looked at Zayn. “Come on, we should probably go get you cleaned up.”
Iris helped Zayn up, and grimaced slightly at the smell. He looked at Iris and gave her a large smile, and she returned it, making his heart flutter.
“God Zayn, you really do smell.”
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asdfghjkl guys can't deal
dedication goes to @harrehstyels for her fabulous comment on the last chapter, thanks for the kind comment :)
have a good day- AND GUYS HARRY IS 20 WHAT THE ACTUAL HELL. NO. WHAT.
and if anyone was wondering, my username, roulade means "a musical embellishment consisting of a rapid succession of tones sung to a single syllable" idk, I thought it sounded pretty haha
but it can also mean "a slice of meat rolled around a filling of mince meat and cooked" sigh I can't win. But I prefer to go with the first meaning, so yeah x
Sara xx