Zayn Malik's Long Lost Sister (Unedited)

53. So Ridiculous That Its Stupid

We had stayed at the table for quite some time. Actually, almost two hours.

We discussed the day of me being given to Emily and Jason. It was the first time Zayn heard their names. Patricia had done well to keep the names of my parents out of his head.

I was surprised that all of this didn't upset me the way it would have if I were here with anyone else besides Zayn. I'm sure it was because of the feeling of being secure that had me overcome this emotional spot.

I'm sure if Zayn wasn't so cheerful and trying, I would've slipped into another funk like the ones I've been in since finding out about my birth mother.

By now, Zayn was driving really slow through his street that seemed almost never ending. He explained that he just wanted to take in his old neighborhood. He even showed me his neighbors house where he and Patricia would always visit while she was pregnant with me, toward the ending of the pregnancy when Yaser wasn't around. He told me about this particular neighbor when we sat in the park. And from what Zayn had input just a few seconds ago, they still live there sixteen years later with an their old styled car the husband always took care of, parked out front.

When we came up to his old home, he stopped completely and we stepped out of the car.

The place was taken and we could hear a family inside, but we stood out there and leaned against his car anyway. I bit my lip and I couldn't help but see something familiar about this house. Not just this house, but this neighborhood. Even the park seemed scarcely familiar.

"I think..." I began, not sure how to word my thoughts. "I don't know, I think I remember something. Something here."

My hands moved as I talked, referring to the place around us. I turned my head to look for anything that could catch my attention and my feet began to move more down the street. I shoved my hands in my white shorts pockets and peered around as I walked.

Nothing really caught my eye, but the way each house was built was oddly familiar. Maybe I've been to this place a lot when I was still living in Bradford with my parents. I didn't hear Zayn trying to catch up to me, but he stayed quiet as I curiously looked around. And that's when I saw it.

This had to be it.

This neighborhood was familiar because it was my old neighborhood. We stood in front of a few steps leading up to a door that wasn't the same as I remembered. It was colored red but I remembered ours as light brown. The window frames weren't the same color either, they were pure white now. But what I recognized was something the owners didn't change.

The colorful stain glass of an angel holding a bundle of blankets that was supposed to be a baby. I remembered it because my dad and I made it together when I was about five. The baby represented me, my father had told me. Because they called me a gift from above.

I began to miss my parents.

Not the parents that I've lived with in Florida, but the parents I used to live with here in Bradford, merely nine houses down from Zayn's old home. I remembered doing so much with them, creating things and memories that were fuzzy to me now.

"Marley?" Zayn asks, looking for reassurance.

"It looks like we weren't very far from each other while my parents and I still lived in England." I sigh.

"This was your house?" Zayn asks, disbelieving. He turned his head back down the road at his old home. "You were this fucking close? Do you think mum knew?"

"I don't know." I answer. I haven't turned my eyes away from the house since I recognize it. I couldn't look away, this was just too weird. This is my old house and it just felt too strange for it to be real, and it would still feel that way even if it wasn't in this location. "What do we do now?"

"Whatever you want." Zayn says.

"I wanna.... Can we just stay here for a bit longer?" I ask, finally looking his way. "I'm not ready to leave yet."

"Of course."

I crossed my arms and continued to stare up at the house I once called mine, which felt like it happened in a totally different lifetime. In a parallel universe where my parents weren't tyrants and I was little happy Marley.

"Excuse me, can I help you?" I hear a man ask from behind my brother and I.

We turn and find the face of an older and attractive man. He stood in a pair of slightly torn faded demon jeans and a white shirt that seemed a bit too tight for his build, holding a sack of groceries. His hair was a dark brown and short cropped, a bit shorter than Yaser's. This seemed to be an ordinary man.

But his eyes were beautiful.

"I'm sorry," My brother begins. "We're just admiring the stain glass, its beautiful."

"Oh," The mans face settles into a friendlier mask. He smiles softly. "It's been there since I moved here."

"W-when did you move here?" I ask quickly but quietly.

"I've been here maybe nine years." He answers with a nod of his head. "Long time." He chuckled, moving up the stairs. "I know the owner of the house and I got a knocker of a deal on it. But uhm, continue admiring. I've gotta get inside, I have frozens."

"Okay-" Zayn began, but I cut him off.

"Did you know the owners before you?" I quickly ask just as the man is about to twist the key in his lock.

"Yeah, I did." He answers.

"Do you remember the names of them?"

"It was the Richards family." He says with a nod before disappearing into the house.

* * *

"He knew my parents." I tell Zayn once we sat down again at the table in the park. I like to call it my 'giving table'. Too soon?

"Did you recognize him at all?" Zayn asks me.

I shook my head. "No. His face isn't familiar."

Zayn cleared his throat and leaned forward, watching my face for any sign as he sat across from me. "His eyes were nice." He said pointedly.

"Yeah, I noticed them, too." I said, my eyebrows coming together slightly. "Please don't say what I think you're about to say. It's too big of a coincidence."

"But you have to admit-"

"No, I will not. And you aren't allowed to say that to me. Many people have nice eyes."

"But-"

"No."

"Marley, he-"

"No, Zayn."

"Why don't we-?"

"Zayn, I'll kick you in the balls. Stop it."

"We could ask mum-"

"Hell no! That isn't happening." I confirm. "I'd rather not know at all than ask for her help in this. I'm not even looking for him."

"And by 'him', you mean-?"

"Don't say it." I sigh, covering my hands with my face, my elbows propped up on my giving table.

"Your biological father." Zayn teased, chuckling. "I know it's a serious thing, but you're making a big deal about it which makes it fucking hilarious."

I laugh along with him this time, shaking my head.

This can't be, it's too big of a coincidence for it to be real. It's so ridiculous that its stupid and I don't know how I should feel about this, but laughing it off at the moment seems like a pretty good idea.