Icarus | Z.M.

34 | Sprained

Victoria Tomlinson

Zayn and I arrived back home after a long four-hour car journey. It was long, it felt like it was dragging on for days since I hadn't managed to get a single second of sleep in the car. I couldn't stop thinking about my dad killing that girl. I didn't know her, I didn't know if she was innocent or not, but I still hated the idea of it.

I was fully aware of the fact that my dad killed people, I had seen him do it before. But it was always men, older men he worked with, men who betrayed him, tried to kill him or tried to go against him in any way. I wasn't aware of him ever killing a woman, yet alone a woman so young. The same age as me.

Zayn had managed to sleep the entire journey, he had headphones on and fell asleep after about ten minutes. I put his movie off for him, so he didn't miss anything. I knew he must have been exhausted. In the safe house he didn't sleep, we couldn't have had much sleep after the bar, he was the one driving everywhere, fighting everyone, he was the one who had his face beaten a few days ago, he needed the rest.

I hated that I felt guilty, he had told me he didn't like being asleep while someone else was awake. I knew he liked control and when he was asleep he wasn't in control of anything. I respected it as much as I could, not looking at him as he rested, I just watched out of the window. Every so often he would stir in his sleep or let out a soft grumble, that was the only time I would look over at him, checking he was sleeping fine.

I had woken him up, not touching him, not saying his name or trying to get his attention. I simply just got out of the car and shut the door harshly, making the car shake to the point Zayn had jerked himself awake. I didn't want him to wake up and feel awkward about the fact I had tried to wake him up, so it was the only thing I thought of.

When I arrived home, I was greeted with nobody, not my mother or my father or even Louis, but I guessed he was just out.  I didn't know why I had my hopes up, yes I had been involved in an attempted murder, but I didn't die, so they didn't have to care. I just went home, unpacked my things and went to bed.

The morning that followed, today, I was woken up annoyingly early by Zayn, who said my dad had requested I take extra self-defence classes with Harry in the gym, since I was so completely useless at fighting off anyone myself.

Which brought me to now, where I was in the gym, where I had been for the past two hours, training. Running, lifting weights, boxing with Harry. I felt like I was going to collapse, and my legs were going to give out any second, but I wasn't allowed to stop.

Zayn didn't usually stay for my gym sessions, he'd just drop me off and pick me up when I was finished. There wasn't really a reason for him to stay, he didn't train with us, and he just stood watch. He was observing from the corner, lingering.

"Victoria." Harry's harsh voice snapped me out of the day dream I quickly realised I had been stuck in. He was staring at me, his mouth in a flat line. He looked a little bit fed up with me. "Are you even listening?"

"Hmm? What?" I was a little confused, I swore he hadn't said anything to me in a good ten minutes. "No."

Harry let out a breath and rolled his eyes at me. "Maybe if you did pay attention we wouldn't have to do extra training."

"We're only doing extra training because of what happened in the safe house." I said back, I had given Harry a brief explanation of what had happened and why he had been told to give me more training each week. "It's only gonna be like once or twice then my dad will forget about it. I'm just tired."

"Be tired later." he muttered. "I said I want you to hit me. Twenty on the right and twenty on the left. Then I'll show you some more actual self-defence techniques."