Omnipresence ♾ Zarry

vii.

Time persists and persists and persists. January flies by in a flash, leaving as quickly as it came. The new year is ingrained in the structure of time and space. Harry celebrates his 32nd birthday with a lowkey dinner with some friends and family. Time just moves on, whether you want it to or not.

Harry finds a good rhythm for his life. It's all very mundane and most would say boring but learning how to live with grief is a chore, certainly. There are days when Harry wakes up and for a few fragile moments forgets the reality. He nearly fools himself into thinking the other side of his bed is still warm and Zayn is somewhere in the house still, in the bathroom or making breakfast downstairs. But the cruel truth doesn't let Harry dream for too long. Most days he's fine. He goes about his routines, he works, he even starts building up a semblance of a social life again. If he blocks out the pain in his heart, it's bearable.

His friends help a lot. When he doesn't want to do things alone, there's always someone willing to make that space in their schedule. Harry hasn't had the courage to talk to a therapist yet but he knows he has to at some point. For now, his friends bear the weight of the grief that spills out, of the pain tainting Harry's words. He would've truly gone insane if he didn't talk to anyone. It's not easy for him either, to talk about the baby or his own loneliness.

The little one turns out to be a girl. Not that it matters. Harry bares his soul mostly when it concerns her. He tries to be happy, he's looking forward to meeting her at last. Preparing for when she finally comes keeps his mind occupied too, even as he tries to ignore the absence of her other parent. If he overlooks that, it's quite fun. One of his friends is an interior designer and she's helping him turn the empty bedroom upstairs into a nursery. She wanted to do it all on her own as kind of a gift but Harry wants to have it turn out as he wants. Plus, he needs the distraction.

In March, Harry finds himself catching the first spring rays of sunshine in the park. He's sitting down on a bench with a book, Jolene sitting contently next to him in a harness. The leash is looped loosely around Harry's wrist as he reads. This has become his happy place in the past few weeks, ever since it got warmer. The fresh air and sunshine do wonders for one's mood and mindset.

The baby's regularly moving now, as she's coming in less than two months. It seems like ages away yet too soon at the same time. Harry treads the line between being excited and completely terrified. He has done a lot of reading in preparation for the arrival of his currently honeydew-sized baby, but not much shopping, apart from the nursery preparations. He's always liked his research so it's better to prepare that way, than with copious amounts of material things.

With the baby kicking up a storm, the ghosts have been relatively quiet since that pathetic Ouija board attempt. Still, books fall off of tables here and there but it's very random, without a clear motivation. It's better this way.

Harry stays in the park until the sun starts going down and the temperature drops. And Jolene starts chewing at the packaging of the treats Harry brings along on their walks to bribe her with. That is a rather clear sign that they need to go home.

He has dinner with Jolene usually, very pathetically so, but tonight he's meeting a few friends at a Spanish tapas place. Jolene gets her dinner and as Harry's leaving the house a couple of hours after arriving from the park, she's happily napping on the couch.

Harry's always been a social butterfly, always loved being around people, even if he liked to have his solitude sometimes. He is a writer after all and there are some things you simply cannot write in a crowded café. You need a clear mind for certain chapters, your mind can't be torn between multiple spots where to pay attention. But only after isolating himself in the house for weeks did he realize how miserable one gets spending so much time alone. It's not easy to socialize and laugh and be happy all the time. Sometimes Harry cancels plans and lies in his bed, haunted by memories. He needs that time alone to cope, to grieve, to try and flip his sadness into cheerful nostalgia. The process of it is extremely difficult but it is the only way to go forward.