Under the Willow Tree (Zayn Malik Fan Fiction) *on hold*

Chapter 03: Holes

I wake up to the heavenly smell of toasty bananas lurking from down the stairs. I look to my left to find Carmen lying unconsciously in her bed, she hasn't yet taken off her makeup from the party last night. 

I check my phone, 5:34am. For some strange reason, I always seem to wake up early whenever I sleep anywhere other than my usual bed, I've been like this since I was a little girl.

I decide to pull myself out of bed. I walk downstairs to find Nana slicing mangos into a bowl of colourful fruit and a loaf of freshly made banana bread in the center of the small dining room table. "Did you make this?" I ask, running my fingers lifelessly through my tangled morning hair. I make my way to Nana and kiss her on the cheek. 

"Haha, yes. I know it's your favorite and I'm just so glad your back so I took the liberty of making you some banana bread to welcome you home." She was right, Darling is my home; my summer home. 

I cut myself a thick slice of the warm bread, ripped off a piece and let it melt on my tongue. 

"This is amazing!" 

She sets down the bowl of fruit in front of me. "Now eat up before Carmen gets a hold of these." she laughs and sits at the table with me.

"You know what would be nice?" she starts. "If you and Car went for an early row on the lake like when you did years ago."

"That sounds great!" says a voice from behind us. I turn to see Carmen in her plaid pyjama bottoms and a white T-shirt. 

"Good morning princess." I chuckle. 

* *  * *

"So how was Will last night?" I ask Carmen as we row our small canoe out to the middle of the lake. 

"He was super sweet and so funny! Natalia and Kyle, the couple that were basically swallowing each other on the sofa, made things a little awkward at times but it was alright. It was really cool hanging out with Will, Becky and the other two guys, Aaron and his younger brother Luca. Aaron was kind of a douche bag but I put up with him for the night because he's Will's best friend." she paused for a moment, "Megs, aren't you cold?" 

As she spoke, a small white cloud made it's way from between her lips, indeed it was a really cold morning.

"Not really," I lied. 

She shrugged and continued, "Will is 19 and he's lived in Darcy all his life. Apparently he knows you." I looked up at my friend in confusion, "Will knew me?" I echoed. 

"He told me that you two met one year in sail camp."

I took a moment to think back at the summer I took sailing lessons. I remember one day falling face first into the water so hard that when I surfaced, my face was bright red, stinging from the massive face plant. I remember everybody laughing except one little blond kid who never talked much. Usually he was shy and awkward, but this time he swam right up to me and asked if I was okay and helped me into my boat. I'm guessing that was Will because I don't remember him otherwise.

"Possibly," I say casually. If he knew me, why wouldn't he invite me to hang out with him? Or even say hi to me for that matter? I'm not going to dwell on it.

"Anyway, he was awesome and umph, so hot! You know, I think I really like this guy." Carmen made these giggly, inhuman noises then continued to row. She was always easily overwhelmed when it came to guys. I was the easy going one, I never made a scene in front of boys. I mean, they're only human, right?

"By the way, why'd you leave the party so early?" she asked. 

I shrug, "I got bored." She didn't take the subject any further. I was tempted to ask her about Zayn... If she'd completely lost interest in him because of Will, but I didn't bother. I don't want to make a big deal out of anything... We just got to Darling.

Ugh.

No matter how hard I try, I can't help but think of Zayn. His dark chocolaty quiff that stood still effortlessly above his flawlessly framed face. His deep brown eyes, that intense stare. It still gives me the shivers. I wonder where he had went last night, he just vanished into thin air.

All of a sudden our canoe makes a large thud noise and jerks as if we hit something... Hard.

"What was that?" Carmen gasped. We look around to see what we could have possibly hit but found nothing but water. We are in the middle of Darl's, there's nothing around us but calm, morning ripples. 

"Megan... Megan look!" she points to a puddle in the canoe.

"It's just water." I say.

"No no, look!" The puddle began to expand. "Megs, there's a  giant hole!" she said frantically.

"Row to the nearest ground." I say trying to stay calm as my friend began to panic. 

"Megan -"

"Shh! Just row!" 

After a few minutes of frantic rowing, getting us absolutely no where, my arms started to feel heavy. Our feet are completely under water. Carmen and I row and row but the canoe keeps getting slower and slower. 

"We're gonna have to swim." she says. Carmen looks over at me strangely as I smile. "What's so funny?" she asks.

"You know I love swimming, Car. Come on, this'll be a fun story to tell later. Lighten up!" I tease as I take my shirt off revealing my bright pink bikini. I hate wearing bikinis, especially in front of people. But hey, it's 6 am and nobody's awake yet except Miss Margaret on her rocking chair who wakes up at five every morning to watch the sunrise. She's the last person I worry about seeing me in a bikini.

"You're seriously just going to dive in?" Carmen hesitates looking down at the lake slowly engulfing our canoe. 

"Like old times!" I wink and dive into the crisp water. I surface and wipe the water from my eyes, "It's a great wake-up!" 

Carmen squeals as I playfully splash her with water. "Okay okay! I'll jump in! But what do we do with the canoe?" 

"We'll tow it! It'll float better without us in it, just leave your stuff, grab the rope on the side and swim towards land." 

Carmen grumbles as she puts her clothes in her knapsack that she leaves on the bench of the canoe. She dives into the water and shivers. 

"It's not that bad Car, we used to do this all the time." She and I grab hold of the rope attached to the front of the canoe and begin to swim towards the closest land, which happened to be the yard of a rather large house I hadn't noticed before. 

I feel the long, slimy, seaweed graze the tips of my toes causing me to shudder. I've always had an deathly fear of seaweed. Whenever I see it, I feel nauseous and irritated. Touching it makes me freak out though at the moment, I try to ignore it to reach the side of the lake faster. Knowing there's an abundance of seaweed under me is almost unbearable but I guess it won't kill me.

Carmen and I finally reach the yard of the large cabin and drag the canoe onto the lawn. 

"Check this out!" I point a fairly big hole on the bottom of the boat. 

"Shit." Carmen moans. 

"Oh, don't be such a sour puss." I punch her lightly on her shoulder. "We'll bring it back to the house and worst case scenario, we'll get a new one."

We begin to carry the canoe down Greenwood Drive which is nine blocks from Sunset Road, the street on which Nana lives. I just hope she isn't too upset about the hole we made...