Catch and Release

Part 1

"Harry," Zayn called, "time for your dinner." Sure enough, Zayn then heard the patter of Harry trotting over to his food bowl in the kitchen. "There's a good lad" Zayn cooed.

Harry happily munched on his fish and chicken kibble, tail swaying in the air. "Up for a movie night?" At that Harry stops eating and looks up at Zayn. Zayn takes this response as a yes. He picks up his feline companion and walks into the living room. There Zayn settles on the couch with Harry curled on his lap, and Mean Girls playing on the television. Harry was a two year old rag doll making him the perfect lap cat, even though his long dark fur often got in Zayn's mouth.

Once the movie was halfway through, and Harry was sound asleep, Zayn carefully placed Harry on the other end of the couch and went into the pet den. The pet den contained all of Zayn's pets. Harry was actually his fiancé's cat, but what's her's is his (or something along the lines of that). His fiance, Perrie, was actually in a very successful and popular girlband. However this also meant that Zayn had more than enough time to himself in their house. That's probably where the strong attachment Zayn has for all of his pets (including Harry) came from. The den held all the pets Zayn had previous to dating Perrie. Zayn had a flop-eared bunny with dark blonde fur named Niall, a long sand-coloured snake named Liam, and his best friend the parakeet Louis. Louis was Zayn's first pet, and he always felt a sense of pride when Louis would say "good friend" to Zayn. Sure, Louis may not know what the words mean, but Zayn's certain that Louis thinks of him as a friend. He was, of course, the one who always fed the bird. Zayn carefully shuts the door behind him, making sure Harry wouldn't get in, and went into the closet to fetch Louis' bird seed.

"Hey, Lou." Zayn poored the seeds into the pale blue dish known to be Louis' that sat on the window sill. Louis didn't exactly have a cage, Zayn didn't care for that idea, instead Louis stayed in the pet den for the magority of the time (except for when Zayn locked Harry in his room for an hour so Louis could fly around the house). The colourful bird landed on Zayn's shoulder nudging his head with his own.

"Good friend," Louis squaked, "good friend." This made Zayn smile his usual proud grin as he pet the feathers on the top of Louis' head with his finger.

"I'll be right back," Zayn spoke, "time for Liam's supper. I wouldn't want him to eat Niall!"

Okay, Zayn knew that would never happen, but he liked to talk to his animal friends. Not that he'd ever admit it out loud. Liam and Niall were actually somewhat friends much to Zayn's amusment. At first he was skeptic of putting Niall's large cage right next to Liam's terranium, but he was prooven wrong when he witnessed the two getting as close as they could with the two glass and metal barriars in the way. Liam didn't even do his tongue thing that he usually did when he was about to devour the mice that Zayn fed him. Sometimes Zayn would take both Niall out of his cage and Liam out of his terrarium, and place them in the middle of the den. Louis would sometimes join with them as they sat in a circle checking each other out. And while Zayn only sat there to make sure they wouldn't end up killing each other, his presence never seemed to be needed. It was nice, so that while Zayn was gone, they still had each other. Where in the wild they'd consider one and other as prey and predator, here they were just different species that got along. Except for Harry. Zayn was certain that introducing Harry the cat, and Louis the bird, would not end well.

Zayn shook himself from his thoughts and walked over to the door carefully opening it and closing it behind him, making sure Harry wouldn't get in. He walked down the hall and went down to the basement steps to the chest-freezer kept there. The thought of keeping dead, frozen mice in the same freezer he and Perrie kept their food in made Zayn cringe.

Zayn held the dead mice in the plastic measuring cup as far from him as he could. Whenever he had friends or family over, (which was practically never) they'd always tease Zayn about how squeamish he was about the mice. He loves Liam and all his pets to pieces, and he shows this through carrying dead, smelly mice to Liam's terrarium.

He swiftly opens the door to the den with the hand unoccupied with small deceased rodents, and dumps them in with Liam. Zayn then quickly gives Niall a scoop of his rabbit feed, and makes his way out shutting the door behind him. On his way to his room, Zayn scoops Harry up and falls asleep with Harry curled at the foot of his bed.

Later in the night as Zayn continued to sleep, Harry left the bedroom and walked around the house. It was then he noticed the door that was usually shut tightly, was left ajar.

Harry head-but the door open to reveal a room with other creatures. A brightly coloured bird sitting in the corner spiked his interest. Harry silently went under the wooden desk by the door, and got low to the ground. His tail swished from excitement, as his eyes got wider. Harry then took off, leaping into the air, and snatching up Louis the bird. Liam hissed from the other side of the room in protest.