in the hills • zayn malik

five- fascinating

five- fascinating

song for this chapter: 'old pine' by Ben Howard

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“That was a very unintelligent thing to do.” Iris said coldly, watching Zayn as he huddled in front of the fire, his hazel eyes half-closed.

Zayn turned to face her, and admired her slightly in the warm glow of the fire. He was able to grasp that she was wearing her hair down for the first time since they had met, and it greatly improved her: even though she was glaring at him with a force that could stop a murderer in their tracks, her hair outlined her slightly rounded face and accentuated her slightly big nose, which fit perfectly, despite its perhaps not so perfect appearance.

“It won’t happen again.” Zayn muttered, turning his face back to the fire, the features of her face still drifting in front of his eyes.

“You are lucky that I hadn’t gone to bed, that I was out the front of the house, and you were also lucky that I have rather keen hearing-” She spoke slowly, and with control, and it annoyed Zayn slightly that if it were anyone else they would be saying these things to show how worried they were.

“I get it, ok?” He snapped, standing up, leaving the coarse blanket on the floor. Iris looked at him weirdly, and Zayn thought for a moment that she might cry. But she just nodded and walked over to him, bending down gracefully to pick up the abandoned blanket on the floor. He watched her for a moment, and felt his anger dissipate as quickly as it had come.

“I need to go to bed.” She said quietly, bunching up the blanket in her hands, and he was painfully reminded of Perrie, just before she left, before she changed his life.

He struggled to find words to say to her, because his angry side was telling him to leave the room and go and sleep, but that side that had warned him not to run away was telling him to say sorry, to not be a jerk and let his emotions control him.

Iris walked out of the room, her arm brushing slightly against his, and he felt guilt well up in him. He bit his lip and turned away, knowing that it would have to wait until morning. The fire was close to its end, but Zayn found himself staring at the dying flames, figuring that must be his heart right now, close to the edge of doom.

His back ached from standing and from the walk that could have so easily have been one of his last. He sighed and walked back to his room, seeing that his little make-shift bed had been made, not a single crease to be seen. He wished he could splash some cold water on his face, but he didn’t want to disturb Iris, especially after he had been such a jerk.

He stripped his clothes off, leaving him only in his underwear. His skin was covered in a layer of sweat, and his hair was not even close to looking good, but he realised that at this moment and time it wasn’t exactly the thing to be thinking about. He slid underneath the blankets and began to dream.

Zayn dreamt of Perrie. It wasn’t a good or bad dream, but a painful mixture of both: he remembered the moments when they seemed inseparable and he couldn’t get enough of her; he remembered when they could just stare into each other’s eyes, their fingers playfully intertwining; he remembered when he felt her skin against his, her lips against his, and everything would be alright, because nobody had ever made him feel like things could be ok, even when they weren’t.

But his dream reminded him of the times when cold silences were all that they shared whilst they lay in bed; he remembered the time when there was that goddamn video of him with another girl, and how she yelled, how she cried; he remembered when she wouldn’t answer his calls and made up excuses not to go out with him; he remembered when he felt like he didn’t know what to do to fix this tension that had suddenly sprung up between them.