Fool's Gold » ziam

« Prologue »

zayn smiled at niall who happened to be enjoying a bottle with his nan as zayn walked in the door from work. "abi!" niall squealed, crawling out of his nan's lap and toddling over to his father. zayn smiled and scooped him up.

"hey there, blondie." zayn smiled and kissed niall on the nose gently. "how were you for nan?" zayn asked, trying to coax a few more words out of his toddler, who didn't like to speak for some reason. trisha just smiled.

"he was fantastic." she said and zayn nodded.

"that's what i like to hear." he kissed niall's fat little cheek again and tipped him back a bit before bringing the little boy back up giggling.

"abi! you see." niall whined, squirming out of his father's arms. he grabbed his hand and tugged him towards the kitchen to show him all the colouring pages him and nan had done. "see! see!" he squeals. zayn smiled.

"getting to be quite the little artist, huh?" he chuckled and glanced at the drawings they'd done. "can abi hang them up in our room?" zayn asked the toddler and niall just nodded as he climbed up in a chair and popped his dummy in his mouth.

"zayn he still needs his bath. can you give it to him? please?" trisha said as she walked in to help clean up from the mess she and niall had made earlier.

"of course i can give it to him, mum. he's my son." zayn frowned a little and glanced at his mother, picking up and settling niall on his hip. "i was actually looking at flats today, that's why i left so early." zayn said quietly.

"zayn darling, we've talked about this... i thought you were going to wait until niall's older." she said and zayn shook his head.

"i don't want my son raised by my parents, mum. he's already got one father who bailed on him, and i'm not going to do the same." zayn said, as niall was completely distracted by some object on zayn's keychain.

"you aren't bailing on him for just leaving him here whilst you're at work love..."

"mum... i don't do a lot with him because i'm working and i realise that. i realise i haven't put him to bed in a long time, and i realise i haven't made him dinner in a while. i realise that i need to step up and be a father. not back down and run like he did."

"you have to work in order to keep him cared for and to keep your rent paid." trisha wasn't opposed to the idea of her son moving out and taking care of niall on his own, she just didn't want him to have any major setbacks.

"i've got it handled mum. i work from home online, three hours a day, five days a week, and then i go in on saturday mornings for four hours." zayn explained and smiled at niall who was giggling and playing with his keys. zayn was a teaching assistant. he went in on saturdays to do grading and work like that.

"i'm supporting you if you think you can do it love... i just want you to be careful, okay?"

"okay mum. now i'm gunna go give him a bath quickly."

~*~

by the end of the month, zayn and niall were moved into a little two bedroom flat on the opposite side of bradford. niall had never had his own room before and he got whiny when abi said he had to sleep in his room for the first week they were there.

zayn had spent a lot of time in decorating the flat. he could paint over the surface of the walls if he were to ever move and cover up the pastel superheroes he'd painted for niall. he just loved comics so much, he wanted his son to share that love with him as well. "abi misses getting to spend time with you." zayn smiled as he sat down his only son in the floor or his little bedroom. niall giggling at the characters spread around his room. in pastel pinks, yellows, blues, and greens.

"spi-dur!" niall giggled pointing to the pastel pink, pastel blue, and light grey rendition of spider-man as he sucked on his dummy and waited for abi to get out the stuff so they could paint with their fingers.

"mhm, spider-man babe." zayn chuckled and spread newspapers on the floor. then he laid down on his tummy and niall sat in front of him and he watched niall paint his picture with his fingers. "what're you painting prince?" zayn asked after niall was silent for quite a bit. he was just painting and sucking his dummy.

"abi!" he giggled softly. "me," he said pointing out two very plump, yellow, blobs. one blob had another dark blob on top that niall said was abi's hairs.

"it's beautiful, i can hang it up in the kitchen yeah?" zayn smiled at niall, pushing up his glasses and niall nodded as he giggled. "let's let that dry and go get in the bath, then we'll make dinner and dessert yeah?" zayn smiled and scooped niall up.

~*~

zayn had bathed niall and gotten him fed pasta for dinner. after niall was asleep, zayn stepped out on the terrace off his bedroom to smoke quickly. when he saw the dark haired boy who fathered his child on the terrace next door he froze. he was talking and smiling with another bloke and it all seemed rather strange to him. when his eye caught the dark eyed boy's, he'd blinked a few times, put out his cigarette, and went back inside. he locked all his doors and his windows.

he sunk down and sat in front of the counter in the kitchen, knees pulled to his chest, hands tugging at his hair as tears fell down his cheeks. he wiped his eyes and decided, never again. never again would he let that boy get to him like that. never again.

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A/N: [1,015 words]

I didn't rewrite anything from this chapter because I thought this was a good way to start off the story and changing anymore would be kinda eh (later chapters will be changed/fixed).

-Celina Azad