Zayn Malik
4 years later
"Be careful, El." I told Ella as she followed me up the stairs, she was running everywhere lately and it seemed like she forgot what the word 'walking' meant.
It was cute to see her running around though, her little curls would bounce and her tiny feet would make a very cute sound on the wooden floor.
We were alone at home today because Amber was going to have a girls' night out with her friends and I didn't mind staying on babysitter duty. I actually preferred it, spending time with Ella was the highlight of my day.
My job was taking a lot of my time lately, but I managed to work from home most of the time so I could stay around her.
Music production was something I was always interested in... I loved singing and composing, this used to be a guilty pleasure kind of job to me and I was very lucky to be able to do something I loved.
The hardest part was ignoring the overflow of memories involving Harry.
Sometimes I'd cry out of nowhere because some song would remind me of him, and Amber didn't even ask anymore because she knew the reason why.
But it also made me happy... and Ella liked it when I wrote songs for her, even though she was still too young to properly understand it. She was smart though, she always had a witty comeback ready and I just knew her teenage years were going to be a challenge.
Amber had her fun with it, she said Ella was like me and that's why she was going to be a little troublemaker and heartbreaker.
I just wanted her to be safe.
That's why we moved practically across the country and changed our last names, picked the most random small town we could... we decided to finally start over and the years passed so fucking quickly.
Today marked four years that Harry and Cleo died.
And it was the first time I dared to go through the boxes full of their stuff that I had brought along with me, but I couldn't bring myself to open them through all these years.
I just knew I had to bring at least something of theirs with me... I couldn't let them be erased forever, even though I forced myself to not think about this because it hurt too much.
The memories were fresh... I broke into Cleo's apartment and just packed their things as if they would come back one day and ask me where they were. I was in denial at first... I was so fucking pissed off because they lied to me about where they were.
I tried looking for them and I found nothing. And I just knew they did it on purpose because they knew I'd be weak and break my promise. I hated and loved them for this, but the pain was stronger than every other emotion.
The boxes were just sitting there in the corner of my old office along with some other boxes of Ella's old toys, since I didn't use this room anymore.
I stayed mostly downstairs and this was kind of a storage room now... and I had no idea why I felt the urge to open those boxes today.
Four years seemed like enough time to allow myself to think of them again. I missed them way too much.
Amber knew this was a topic I refused to talk about, I went through some pretty rough weeks, months actually. Maybe she was scared I'd fall apart again, but I would never do this with Ella.
Maybe that's why I took the opportunity that she was with me tonight, she was my anchor and the only reason I made it out alive. I honestly had no idea what would've happened if I was alone.
