Neon Red [Order The eBook] [Zayn]

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(DISCLAIMER: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author's imagination or used in a fictitious manner. It's important to remember this is all totally fabricated, embellished, and exaggerated for entertainment purposes.)

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And be forever with my poison arms around you

No one's gonna fool around with us

No one's gonna fool around with us

So glad to meet you, Angeles

Elliott Smith | Angeles

Days after the news broke on March 25th that I'd left One Direction, Shahid got into another Twitter spat  with Louis and leaked "I Won't Mind." I went ballistic, calling him and cursing him out. Demanding that he take the track down because Pez would know it wasn't written for her. Later when the track was removed from SoundCloud, we made up the excuse that it was a rejected 1D demo, which Louis called out as a lie almost immediately. I couldn't help but think of how jarring it must've been for Haz to see it leaked, knowing it had been recorded for his ears alone. We hadn't spoken in over week, and I knew he was upset for how things had played out, but it honestly and sincerely couldn't be helped.

Apart from that, things were looking up for my mental. I headed back to Bradford for a stretch, just hanging about with old mates and all my younger cousins. Walking around those familiar roads unbothered by the press, hidden in my dad's old sheepskin coat and reveling in normality. Overcome with felicity. That old homebound high I used to get towards the end of tour, except now it didn't wear off because I could stay in Bradford as long as I wanted, unconcerned with dates and meetings and media obligations in the days ahead.

When I headed back to London, things became bleak again. Pez and I had given it a go for a while longer, but when I thanked the lads——all of whom weren't speaking to me because I'd abandoned them without a single word of goodbye——in my Asian Awards acceptance speech in April, she flipped her lid and said I'd embarrassed her yet again. That she and her mum and a few friends had been watching and rooting for me all night, and that she just felt humiliated and belittled that I hadn't mentioned her onstage. I told her I'd been offering an olive branch to the boys in hopes of making things right after how I'd left it, and that I'd totally forgotten about everyone else in the process. It was an honest mistake. 

After that, we couldn't stop screaming at each other. Eventually we quit sleeping together and I knew it was over. An escape to LA had been in the making for a while now, because I longed to escape the relentless British paparazzi, as well as the deeply disturbed fans who had surrounded my home day and night since March 25th. Ringing my fucking doorbell in the wee hours and singing 1D songs throughout the day, hoping I'd comeback. Even the neighbors had begun to complain. This place was hell. Time for a change of pace, and LA seem like the perfect solution. The weather was more promising than what the UK was offering, and Simon had also helped negotiate a three-year record deal with RCA for me, which I needed to be briefed on and discuss further negotiations before signing. He'd also assigned me a legal team since I was on my own with no one on my payroll at the minute. So with that in mind, I decided it was time to take back control of my future. To start making music for myself and leave a mark on this industry far more consequential than my footprint from 1D.