[✓] 𝐒𝐔𝐍𝐅𝐋𝐎𝐖𝐄𝐑, 𝚑𝚎𝚛𝚛𝚘𝚗

forty-four ☆ i'll never take it off

DECEMBER
of twenty-nineteen

narrator's pov.

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elenacarmen happy holidays from the herron house ❤️💚
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-

after exchanging gifts with the family, zach and elena headed up to zach's room to give each other their gifts.

"i want you to open mine first," elena declared, passing zach a medium-sized red and green gift bag.

zach grinned, and revealed what was inside. there was a star map titled the night we connected. he analyzed the alignment of the stars, and looked at the date at the bottom.

october 5th, 2019... the night of homecoming.

"elena, these were the stars from homecoming night?" zach asked, smiling as he made eye contact with the dark-haired girl.

elena nodded, "i'd say that was a pretty special night, and you don't ever see the same pattern of stars twice."

"i love it," zach remarked, "thank you so much, ellie."

he passed her his gift bag, and elena began to unravel her present, "what's this?"

elena pulled out a book, and began to flip through the pages. her jaw dropped when she saw pictures of herself, "zach, is this a scrapbook?"

he nodded, "it's a combination of some of my photography, pictures of you, some pictures with friends, stuff like that."

"this is so beautiful," elena gushed, analyzing all the pictures.

"some of them i had to steal from your instagram," zach laughed, "i realized that we don't have many pictures together, but you know what they say... you have the least amount of pictures with your closest friends."

elena flipped to the second-to-last page, and was immediately confused, "huh?"

"that's mirror adhesive," zach explained, "so that every time you open up the book, you can see who you are that day, and how much you could have changed."

the dark-haired girl angled the scrapbook to face her and zach, and they both smiled into the mirror. she flipped the page over, and noticed a poem on the final page.

-

all things lovely come and go,
except for the flower that stands in the wind.
so beautiful, yet so fragile,
and alluring, and delicate.
so bright and carelessly, the sunflower stands.
it feels so familiar, yet also so far.

and with such an untamed beauty,
i sit and reflect on how it reminds me of
my beloved, elena quinn carmen.

-

"zach, did you write this?" elena asked, earning a nod from zach, "this is so good! i can't believe you wrote this for me."

"i just thought a beautiful girl deserved something as beautiful as her," zach replied, playing with his fingers, "there's one more gift."

elena blushed at zach's compliment, and grabbed her final present. it was a tiny box, and when she opened it, there was a necklace. specifically, there was a sunflower locket.

"open it," zach declared.

she opened the locket, and z + e was engraved on the metal. zach stated, "i thought it would be cute to put our first initials. you know, z plus e is zach and elena. it was either that or—"

elena cut him off by embracing him. zach grinned, and hugged her back.

"this seriously means the world to me," elena mentioned, "help me put it on?"

zach nodded, and he unclasped the necklace. the chain was loosely wrapped around elena's neck, and zach re-clasped it for security.

"i'll never take it off," elena remarked, smiling as she stared down at the necklace, "the day it comes off is the day i die."

"well, i guess you'll be wearing that for a long time," zach laughed.

elena exhaled, and smiled, "seriously, thank you so much, zach. i've never had such a meaningful christmas present in my life. you make me feel so loved."

...

a / n :

just a short zalena filler before we head
to the next few chapters. warning:
major drama. also, the sunflower
necklace is important, so keep that
in mind for future chapters!