always in my heart

Chapter One: Do you know who I am?

ZAYN'S POV:

It's been three weeks.

Three weeks since I first met her. Three weeks since she fixed her emerald eyed gaze at me, as if she could see every inch of my soul and see into every crack of my mind. Three weeks since she tossed her ebony hair at me. Three weeks since I met, for the first time, Lauren Jauregui.

*Three weeks ago*

"Oy! Zayn, mate, where are you going? The show's starting in fifteen minutes!"

"Just a minute Liam, I need to run to the loo!" I rolled my eyes and shouted at Liam. "Besides, it's not like the show is going to start without us..."

"Fine but hurry, okay? We need to finish our song and then, meet the contestants."

"Yes Daddy!" I said in a boyish voice, grinning at him with an utterly foolish smile.

Liam grinned back, smacking me at the side of the head and pointing to the door.

"Alright, alright. Sheesh, take a chill pill mate..." I muttered under my breath while hurrying down the corridor to the loo.

"I heard that!"

Of course he did. Being Batman, he definitely had bat-like ears.

After finishing my business and whatnot, I finally emerged from the toilet, whistling while strolling out. Just then, I remembered that we had a performance to go to.

"Shit! It's 3 more minutes to stage! I'm going to be late!"

I cursed at myself, making a mad dash towards the dressing room, taking out my phone and texting Liam who was currently sending me LOADS OF MESSAGES asking me where I was.

Just when I was about to make a smart ass reply saying, "Where do you think, I'm on Earth", a certain female hurtled into me, both of us knocking the wind out of each other and dropping our phones on the ground.

"Ouch!"

"Nooooooooo! My phone!"

You can guess who was worried about their phone.

SPOILER ALERT: It was me. And just at that time, I had conveniently forgotten my smart ass reply. I know. Such intelligence being wasted is absolutely terrible.

"Watch where you're going..." I was just about to scold her for interrupting my grand gesture of "smart ass replies to Liam" when I decided to look up. Yes, I saw her.

She had the most emerald green eyes I had ever seen and the eyeliner around them only enhanced her beauty. Her voice had a raw edge to it, a bit husky but not too much. Ebony hair was cascading down in waves all the way to her waist and her red, moist lips were pursed together in a frown.

I quickly snapped out of my thoughts and gave my most charming smirk. "Zayn Malik at your service, how may I help you?"

Yes, Harry isn't the only one with skills. I got some of that boy's charm too. SURPRISE!

She placed her slender, pale hands on her waist and tiptoed a little higher so as to seem more intimidating. "Well, see here Mr Malik, there are in fact, two things you can do. Number one. You can, in fact, apologise to me. Number two. You can also pay more attention to where you are walking and not look like a bumbling idiot when walking."

To put it in the most simplest words, I was shocked. Why? Well, I was the King of Comebacks in the group and had NEVER been defeated before. Yeah, not even by the Tommo.

Okay maybe he did beat me once. Or twice. But that's not the point. NO ONE ever sasses me and that's final.

"Yeah, well then what were you doing running straight into me?" I challenged the beauty in front of me, staring her down.

She gasped, rebutting instantly. "Well excuse me but I, as a matter of fact, was just coming out of the room when a certain SOMEONE decided to crash into me and now, I'm going to be late!"

I blushed, but still said, "Well, I wasn't running that fast, was I..."

"You were running at the speed of light! What were you doing, chasing an ice cream truck?"

Well, desperate times called for desperate measures and I decided to pull out THE CARD. Oh yes, THE CARD.

"Do you know who I am?"

"Do you? Because clearly you don't seem to remember your own name and frankly, how am I supposed to know who you are if you yourself don't even know?"

Damn. That was a good comeback.

"I meant it literally. Any twenty mile radius within me is a No Sarcasm Zone."

"I'm not an idiot... You're..."