Smoke & Mirrors • Zarry

38. Let me be mad

Two years later.

"Get in the car," Harry spoke sternly, opening the passenger side door of their new black Range Rover, the one that Harry insisted Zayn had to purchase again because it brought back memories from their past, memories that he wanted to hold onto.

"I'm not going," Zayn returned, shaking his head with his arms folded tight across his chest.

"There's no fucking point, Harry. They don't care. They never cared."

"Maybe not, but you have to try," said Harry, motioning for him to climb in.

"You know damn well my family isn't going to come to our wedding," Zayn grumbled as he reluctantly hopped into the front seat and slammed the door.

In the last two years Zayn's parents had spoken to him only on holidays, which Harry was never invited to, and they never once asked Zayn about his relationship with Harry either. It was almost as if they pretended it didn't exist, even though the world knew that it did and there was evidence of it everywhere.

And Zayn had to begrudgingly deal with it every time against his will, if only so that he could see them and still have some sort of relationship with them, even if it was strained. And Zayn tried so hard to accept them, to accept their faith and their points of view but it was slowly ripping him apart as time wore on that they weren't giving him the same courtesy.

"They're not going to speak to you, you know. We'll be lucky if they even let us in the fucking door," Zayn went on as Harry drove off onto the street, making their way to Manchester, England.

"Just breathe, babe. I know it's been hard and I'm fully aware that this probably isn't going to go the way we want it to. Maybe they'll throw us out, who knows, but if we don't attempt to make them understand then they never will. This is a battle we have to try and fight or else we'll always be stuck and running from the bullets," Harry explained as he leaned over and rubbed Zayn's thigh comfortingly.

But Zayn wasn't interested in listening to Harry's logic and words of wisdom because Zayn was too busy fiending, drumming his fingers along the side of his passenger door with the window down and the anxiety traveling through his veins. Although Zayn had quit smoking cigarettes six months ago, which was one of the hardest things for him to eliminate from his life, he was desperately feeling the urge to light one up to relieve some of his stress and it was overbearingly annoying him as he sat there, just trying to breathe.

"Here," Harry said, as if he knew, and pulled a pack of Marlboro golds out from his jacket pocket and handed them over to Zayn along with a green lighter. "Yeah I know, I'm enabling you. What a shitty fiancé I am."

"Never shitty," Zayn spoke, graciously accepting the pack and pulling one out to light up. "You always know what I need. You're the best, really. I don't know what the fuck I would do without you, Harry."

On the drive there Zayn chain smoked more than ever before and vowed to stop again once this was over, but he felt the nerves twisting and turning so badly inside his stomach and they were helping just a little, and Harry sang along to every tune that drifted through the car speakers as they sped down the freeway, animatedly shouting out the lyrics while trying to get Zayn to laugh or smile and it worked every so often.

But Zayn still couldn't stop thinking about this inevitable conversation that he was going to have. The only thing Zayn ever hoped for was that his family would just finally accept him for who he was. It was the only thing that was really left to resolve in his life, the only remaining storm cloud in his otherwise blue sky. And although he had plenty of other people who supported him, who had his back, all he really wanted was to hear his parents tell him that they loved him no matter what, to hear them say that they accepted him, to let Harry come to family holidays and to make them feel included. Zayn just wanted that more than anything.