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Zarry - break the night with colour

He slowly trailed the tip of the brush through the thick paint, mixing blue and yellow into a light green colour before looking up at the white canvas positioned in front of him. Holding the brush up, he hesitated for a moment before figuring out how to start and lightly moving the tip of the thick brush over the white surface.

The first stroke of the brush was always the hardest, but once he started painting, the rest came automatically as he felt the familiar calm and serenity wash over him and lost himself in his art.

Painting was the only thing he did these days, having given up music almost entirely. Professionally, anyway. He did still write songs, still played the guitar occasionally and sang to himself, but he was no longer part of the industry, unlike the rest of his former band mates.

Niall was still a successful musician. He'd moved back to Ireland after the end of One Direction and had pursued his musical career over there, playing in small clubs there and in the UK. Liam still sang as well, but after a few years, he'd started writing and producing music as well, and was mostly busy doing that these days. His charm and great sense of humour had earned Louis his own radio show. He hosted television shows occasionally but he was on the radio every day and while he still sang sometimes, he mostly talked about music nowadays.

And then, of course, there was Harry.

Harry who had always had the potential to go very far in life, even more than the rest of them, and who'd always been everyone's favourite, even when they'd still been a band, had launched his solo career after the breakup and was still successful worldwide and currently on the covers of every magazine.

Harry was who Zayn missed the most, when he allowed himself to think about his friends, and he made sure to keep up with Harry's life as much as possible. In order to not miss anything, he would have to spend all day and night online, since news or crazy rumours about the other man came out almost minutely; Zayn preferred to check some blogs about once or twice a week, which gave him a pretty good idea about the events in Harry's life.

They had all drifted apart a little in the past few years, which was what Zayn regretted most about the end of One Direction. Sure, he still missed performing sometimes; the rush he'd felt every time he'd gone on stage or interacted with fans, but more than that, he missed spending all his time with the other boys. He'd always hoped they would all stay friends forever – and they still were – but they all had their own lives now and it wasn't possible for them to see each other more than a few times a year. They did meet up every once in a while for dinner; to discuss what was going on in their lives, to talk about the good old days. But it wasn't the same since they weren't together 24/7 anymore. Zayn often found himself remembering those times nostalgically.

Focusing back on the painting he was working on, he smiled a little and shook his head. Again. He always ended up painting the same thing lately, and had a large number of very similar paintings of him.

He'd been working on this one for several hours when his doorbell rang. Blinking curiously, Zayn put aside his brush and glanced at the large clock on the wall thoughtfully, wondering who could visit him at this time. Not that the time was particularly odd – it was early evening now, which was still a perfectly acceptable time for a visit.

The fact that someone was ringing his doorbell at all was what was odd.

Not many people knew where he lived. Even after One Direction had ended, paparazzi still paid them a lot of attention, always wanting to see what they got up to, waiting for them to do something stupid that they could get a snapshot of. And just like when they'd been on a break during the peak of their careers, Zayn liked to stay away from places where the press could easily find him. When they'd decided to end One Direction, he'd bought a house in a small village not too far away from Manchester, where people left him alone.