Your Creation • Zarry

52. Pillowtalk

January 29, 2016

After quite the long year, One Direction was finally over. To the world we were on "hiatus," which was to soften the blow for the fans, but I knew deep down that I was probably never going to go back, which lead me to a new chapter of my life, one that was just as confusing as it was exciting.

As much as I still loved Liam, Niall and Louis, I really needed some major space from them. We had become quite a mess by the end of it all, especially Liam, and I didn't want to be there anymore. Liam was drinking far too much and had spiraled out of control, Louis and I were always fighting because he didn't want the hiatus and poor Niall was constantly stuck in the middle of everything.

Before it all ended, we put out our final album. I wrote a few songs about how I was feeling at the time, especially "If I Could Fly" and "Olivia," and I hoped that when Zayn heard what I had to say that he would come back to me.

But he didn't.

So I decided to say fuck it. I just wanted something new, but to be honest, I had no idea what the hell I was doing.

However, I had developed a pretty tight-knit group of friends over the last year, who were really helping me through all of the hurdles I was trying to jump, especially Jeff Azoff, who was going to become my new manager.

Jeff was more than a friend to me, he was like a dad or an older brother, and he was quite smart and knew everybody. He knew what he was doing and he promised that he was going to take care of everything for me. I trusted him and I had already been setting this up and networking with Jeff and his team for years, in fact, just waiting for the opportunity to go solo and I was looking forward to the stuff we had lined up.

I had some plans to act in a film later this year called Dunkirk, by the great Christopher Nolan, and I was starting to work on some new material for my first solo album. So, in terms of my professional life things were really looking up, but in terms of my personal life...well, I was sleeping with Kendall Jenner.

I didn't even know what we were. I guess we were dating, but we weren't calling each other boyfriend or girlfriend. Back when I had my first "date" with her in November of 2013, we had become friends - pretty good friends, actually. She was kind of cool, she didn't really care about much and she never wanted anything serious. I had hung out with her on and off over the last few years, which was something Zayn didn't particularly enjoy, but no matter how many times I told him that I didn't have any romantic interest in her or anyone else I hung out with, he never fully believed me. No matter how many times I assured him that he was all I cared about, he always questioned it.

In fact, all he ever did was doubt me.

When I learned that Zayn broke off the engagement with Perrie last summer, I waited for him to call me. I spent every day waiting to see if he would come around, and when I learned months later that he was dating Gigi, I was angry. I was angry and jealous. Really, really jealous. She was one of the most beautiful women I had ever seen and he chose to just move on with someone else instead of contacting me or trying to work things out. I was convinced that he wanted nothing to do with me anymore and it hurt.

But I didn't want to hurt.

Maybe going back to Kendall and taking our friendship to the next level was the safer choice, because I knew that she kind of fancied me already, even though she never really said it, plus she already knew me and she was hot. Was that enough?

But to make matters weird, she was friends with Gigi as well as my ex Taylor, who had written some songs about me on her last album and some of those songs had made me look like a total dickhead, but I guess it wasn't enough to detour Kendall from giving me a chance.