Acting Royal #Wattys2017

Chapter 41

ZAYN

Zayn sat in the waiting room of the hospital and the atmosphere was tense. Amir and his mother sat next to each other, even Rana was sitting closer to them than to him. He'd fucked up. He could see that now so clearly. He'd removed himself from this family basically allowing Amir in, and now he had lied to them all, and that just pushed them even further away. He felt like an outsider in his own family and he longed for Jenny right now. He longed to have a family with her, one that he wouldn't mess up.

The doctor finally came through and everyone stood up.

"And? Zayn stepped forward anxiously.

"His condition is stable at the moment, but we still don't know what's causing this, we could run more tests, but-"

"No." Amir held his hand up and shook his head firmly. Zayn eyed him curiously. "He doesn't want any more tests, he's tired of them."

Zayn nodded, "It's true. He told me that too."

"Yes, he said that to me too rather loudly as one of the nurses tried to draw blood." The doctor smiled slightly, he'd been the royal physician for as long as Zayn could remember, in fact, he'd delivered Zayn and Rana. The doctor turned to Zayn.

"He's asking to speak to you." Zayn glanced over at Amir for a second and could see he looked very put out by this. But Zayn ignored him and followed the doctor into his father's private room. The inside looked more like a luxury hotel, than an actual hospital room. When he arrived, his father looked a million times better and was even sitting up in bed.

Zayn approached the bed cautiously and pulled up a chair. "You wanted to see me." It sounded so formal. But he and his father were always formal with each other... and even in a situation like this. What had happened to them? When had their relationship gone so wrong?

"I'm running out of time." His father said.

"I'll do it." Zayn said firmly trying to sound sure of himself. "I'll marry her, I'll be king. I'll do it."

His father looked away from him as if he was struggling to look at his own son. Zayn felt like a small boy all over again, desperate to please his dad. Desperate for his approval and for him to pat him on the back and say, "I'm proud of you son." But he didn't.

"You've embarrassed us all by bringing that girl here."

"I know." Zayn said. "I'm sorry."

"We'll say she left you, we'll wait a few months, then we'll announce your engagement and the marriage will happen quickly after that. Nothing like a big expensive wedding to help people forget inconvenient things."

Zayn nodded. "Sure."

"I'll tell her father." The king turned and looked at Zayn. "Why you just couldn't do this earlier. I don't understand. Why it took all the lies and deceit to get us to this point, I don't know."

"I'm sorry father."

"Don't say sorry to me, just do the right thing now. Do the right thing for this family and for your people."

Zayn stood up. "I'll leave you to rest."

He walked out and something was building inside him, he could feel it. He didn't know what it was, but it was building and threatened to rip out of him and do something he feared he wouldn't have any control over. He burst into the waiting room, everyone looked at him and he couldn't bare to be there. He ran down the corridor and pushed a door open which lead into the emergency stairwell. He ran down it as fast as he could, it felt like the walls were caving in on him and his life was collapsing around him.

He reached the bottom of the stairs and fell onto the floor. He sat cross-legged on the cold, hard cement floor trying to catch his breath. This was it, the point of no return. He would be marrying someone he didn't love- in fact, he didn't much like her even. Then he would become king... unless Amir tried to kill him first.

He put his head back against the wall and pulled his knees up, and stayed there while he pulled himself together. He needed to be strong now, he needed to reclaim his place in the family. He stood up and straightened himself as he saw Rafiq walking down the stairs towards him.

"I know, I know." Zayn said. "I need to pull myself together, I need to be strong, put on a brave face, blah, blah, blah..."

Rafiq nodded.

"I'm coming," Zayn said. "Just give me a few minutes."Rafiq left and Zayn took a few deep breaths. How the hell was he going to do this when his whole heart was somewhere else entirely? How the hell was he ever going to get over her and be okay again? His chest hurt, his head hurt, his face fucking hurt, everything hurt because he knew the answer to that question and it was never.

He was never going to get over her. He would now just have to learn how to live without her.