eternity. ♡ zarry ♡

10: float

Age 14

The summer after their middle school graduation, Harry felt the worst heartbreak in his fourteen years of living. It was something he could never forget, something that kept him clinging onto Zayn everyday after that.

He remembered floating in the pool, his head almost fully submerged in the water and the sun beating down on his chest.

He was thinking about everything, like how the sky was bluer today and how the sun seemed a little bigger, he especially couldn't stop thinking about the promise.

It was the first official promise he's ever made with anyone. Before, whenever he made a promise, he never poked out his pinkie and curled it around someone else's.

So Zayn was his first promise, the one promise he'd do anything to keep because it was just that important to him.

"You alive, Styles?" Niall yelled from the edge of the pool, causing a few people to glare at him.

"No," Harry yelled back.

He grinned when he heard Zayn's giggle, it was soft and quiet.

Then Zayn was laughing even louder and then he was yelling, "Stop, Niall! No! Don't you dare!" There was a loud splash and Zayn's yelling had stopped.

He could hear Niall's laugh after a couple of seconds, but then those seconds turned into minutes and Harry finally moved, interrupting the balance in his body so he was no longer floating. He looked around and Niall was pulling himself to sit on the edge of the pool but he wasn't smiling.

"He hasn't come up yet," Niall whispered.

"What'd you do?" Harry asked.

"Gave Zayn a bit of a splash. Who c-comes to a pool and doesn't get in?" Niall asked. He looked at Harry, panic clear in his blue eyes. "I-It was just a-a joke."

Tears welled up at the corner of Niall's eyes as he slipped off the edge and into the water. "Stop playing, Zayn. Come up."

There was something that flipped inside of Harry, like a switch turning every nerve in his body off and he suddenly couldn't feel a thing. He was frozen because Niall didn't know, but how could he possibly know?

Zayn couldn't swim.

Harry felt his heart increase in speed, it thumped and thumped until it felt like it was going to explode and burst through his chest. He felt like he might die, the thought of losing Zayn made his skin crawl and his eyes burn.

He's never swam so quickly, he swam down and down until he could feel Zayn's skin and the floor of the pool.

His chest hurt, his heart was pounding and on top of that, he was fully submerged in water.

But when he broke through the surface of the water with a limp Zayn in his arms, he forgot to breathe.

Was this it? Could this really be it?

When he laid Zayn on the concrete, he felt it then. The way his heart was beginning to split in two and he's never felt pain like that, or at least not this bad.

Harry's father passed away when he was barely old enough to comprehend what death actually was, so he was sure he didn't feel anything as bad as this.

He could remember the way his father kissed his forehead and held him against his chest, but he couldn't remember how happy his father made him or how much his father made him laugh.

But he could with Zayn, every memory they shared was flashing through his mind like he was dying and his life flashed before his eyes.

If Zayn died, he was sure he would too.

So when the life guard breathed into his mouth and pushed against his chest and Zayn didn't move or cough up the water he swallowed like they do in the movies, his heart cracked and fell into a million different pieces.

To this day, he can't remember what happened after that. He could only remember the empty feeling of floating in a dark vacuum and loneliness.

The next thing he vaguely remembered was waiting outside of Zayn's hospital door, he was told that Zayn should be fine but there was still a chance for anything to happen — brain damage, pneumonia, etc.

All that swirled in his mind was Zayn.

Zayn in print. Zayn in cursive. Zayn in bubble letters.

Zayn. Zayn. Zayn.

His body shook with that name.

When Zayn came out of the hospital room with his parents behind him, the first thing he did was stand in front of Harry and wipe his cheeks with his thumbs.

"Don't cry," he whispered. "It's okay, I'm okay, you're okay."

"I thought.." Harry sucked in a breath of air and his body trembled as he slowly hugged Zayn tight and desperate. He let out a strained sob. "I thought y-you were gone."

Zayn hugged him back as tightly as he could. "It's okay," was all Zayn could manage to say.

"You're m-my best friend, my Zayn. I can't l-lose you," Harry said softly.

There was a loud thump in Harry's heart, one that he was sure Zayn could feel with how tightly they were hugging each other.

"Please don't leave me. Please, please, please. I love you and I need you by my side forever. My best friend, my everything."

Something about those words stayed in Zayn's mind, like a boulder that'd never be moved and he felt it. So maybe Gemma was right, maybe wishing on all the stars in the sky that one New Years actually worked.

Harry pressed the tips of his fingers into Zayn's skin and hugged him even tighter, he didn't want to let go, he simply couldn't let go. Not now, not after what he felt and what he said.

It was cheesy, Harry knew that but he didn't care because he meant every word of it. So if Zayn pulled away and gave him a weird look, he wouldn't care because at least Zayn could see just a sliver of how much he meant to Harry.

But he didn't pull away, he just exhaled and said, "I love you, too."