stars shine brightest in room 93 (halren/halsren/lausey?)

v

tune: falling out of love-aqualung

Yet again coming home feels like heaven. Especially late at night when I'm just so ready to sit down, have a nice glass of wine―or any kind of liquor in general―and go to sleep.

God, my bed sounds so good right now.

The only downside of coming home so late is that Lana is always asleep so that leaves me alone with Zayn. I mean, I don't mind being with Zayn, he's great and I'm around him all the time but that's always when there's the distraction of Lana running around and screaming and making me smile.

Lana is the perfect diminish-er of bad thoughts. She overshadows all of my demons so well. So, when she's not there to distract me from all of my bothersome thoughts concerning to how I've been feeling about Zayn lately, they come out to play. Especially when it's me and him together. Alone.

I know how it used to feel being alone with him before and I know how it feels now. It's different and depressing and scary because it feels like such a big part of my life is changing so dramatically. I don't even know exactly what went wrong or when, but it's something and I can feel it.

It's nothing that he's doing or saying. I guess it's just me who's changing and I don't know what to do about it. I don't want to think about it. I have enough problems already.

"You've been out for a while now love," Zayn points as I walk into the door. "You left right before dinner too. You hungry; parched?"

"No, I'm fine. I'm not really in the mood to eat. I'm just really tired." I inform him, setting my purse down and unbuttoning my shirt a bit. I walk towards the kitchen.

"Thought you weren't hungry, bird." Zayn laughs, rolling his eyes when he sees what I'm actually doing.

"Not hungry, babe, but stressed as hell." I quirk, pouring myself a bit of tequila.

"Needed something a little bit stronger than your usual, Lo?" Zayn asks, walking over and grabbing himself a glass. I slap his hand and point to the fridge signaling for him to go get a beer instead.

"Sharing is caring," He whines but proceeds to get himself a Corona anyway.

"When you work as much as I do, sharing booze becomes a thing of the past," I shoot, humming at the taste of the strong liquor. "And to answer your question, with all this extra shit I'm doing, wine has nothing on this 40 proof."

"Careful love, drinking kills," Zayn warns lifting his corona in the air for gesture.

"Look who's talking." I reply, clinking my glass with his beer.

He laughs gently before looking down and then back up. He stares at me for a little while before smiling again, a small boyish grin on his lips.

"What?" I question, bringing my glass to my lips once again.

"I just love you," He responds and my stomach drops.

I blink a few times and sigh before biting my lip. "I...I love you too."

"Yeah," He laughs awkwardly lifting his bottle once again. "Well, I'm going to bed. Join me if you wish."

With that he turns around and walks off, leaving me alone with my one true confidant, alcohol.

I sigh again, this time into my cup, the strong stench of sugar and hard liquor invading my senses.

When did I get to the point where it became hard to tell my own husband I love him? It's a gray area but I know it's been this way for a while. We don't even have sex anymore. And it's so fucking sad.

I spend more time at work than I do with him. Or at home in general really. And when I am home I'm always either doing paperwork or tending to Lana. So, there's never really any Zayn and Lauren time. And when there is I dread it. I fucking dread it.

Zayn and I got married almost 6 years ago, and I sometimes think maybe we should've waited until we were older―more mature. I mean, we were barely legals.

After Lana was born, things became a bit more distant and stressful. There was no more bubble baths and long, slow kisses. There were baby monitors and late night crying with no sleep. I had just started working and maternal leave just made me wrack up more and more work that I had to catch up on when I went back.

This caused more distance, and everything just started going downhill. Lana got diagnosed, I was working non-stop and Zayn got laid off by the construction company.

It was never dramatic. There was no yelling, no anger. There was just an invisible border between us.

And I do love him. I really do. It's just maybe not in the way it used to be. It's not burning or passionate. He just feels like a really good friend now.

His place in my universe has sort of shifted. He's still there, just in a different spot. He used to be central. He was there and he was probably the most important thing to me in my universe. He was an essential. He was everything. And like Lana has now, he had his own solar system. All the little things he would do, the way that he was made up his planets and moons. And his smile was the sun and all the love I had in me revolved around that smile.

Now he floats elsewhere. He is in my family solar system. My mind and heart have put him there. I'll never stop loving him. But I did stop loving him the way I used to. As long as he's still in my heart, I'm sure we can make it through.

I walk out of the kitchen and towards Lana's room. Opening the door a bit I peek inside to see if she's sleeping alright. All the stuff with Nicole and the REM monsters sort of spooked me. I have never talked about or dealt with something like that before. I mean, Chris had a pretty severe case of insomnia but, we never talked about that.

"Mami?" Lana speaks suddenly and I jump a little before calming down and walking into the room.

"You can't sleep baby?" I question, sitting at the edge of her princess canopy.

She shakes her head and I hum in response, stroking her wavy brown hair.

"You want Mami to sleep with you in your bed tonight?" I offer, hugging her tiny body against my chest.

She nods again before tugging on my dress shirt, reminding me that I'm still wearing my work clothes. She successfully guides me down into a lying position and cuddles further into my chest nuzzling my neck.

When Zayn wakes up I know he'll be sad. And I know he's probably waiting for me to come to bed right now.

And as much as it breaks my heart I can't be in there right now. I don't want to feel the tension and the weird sense of discomfort.

I'd be lying if I said I didn't wish I was in love with him. Because in all honesty, I really wish I was.

I wish for it so desperately.

A/N: Zorbas Pizza is still hilarious AF.

-trigger-warning is out.