*Chelsea’s P.O.V.*

“So how did you meet them?” My mother started her interrogation simply but I knew it was going to get much worse. I explained to her how I had met them in a supermarket and Bridget had met them when she came home from America. I also informed her about Zayn and the rest of the boys and told her how I had met Zayn’s family and she was also keen to meet them like Trisha was when I had mentioned my family to her.

“Just to be a good mother and all, I hope you are using protection with these boys.” My eyes almost popped out of their socket.

“There’s no need for protection because we aren’t doing anything.” Bridget exclaimed and mum nodded not really believing what she was saying. It was true for me, though I couldn’t tell you about my twin with that whole Liam… situation.

“Well I better be meeting them soon either way.”

“You can when they get back. At the present time, however, I’m more interested in Sammy’s boyfriend.”

“I don’t have a boyfriend.” Mum turned to him with raised eyebrows and shot him a look. “Jacob is not my boyfriend.” Sam scoffed.

“Darling, friends don’t kiss like you two do all the time.” He turned bright red and I would’ve been teasing him about it when what mum said hit home with me. For Zayn and I being ‘just friends’ we shouldn’t be kissing like we do. I buried my face in my phone in the hopes to avoid any further talk similar to what had just come out of my mother’s mouth whilst praying to god I wasn’t blushing. My phone lit up with a notification and I smiled as I looked at the text from Zayn.

Z: Just landed beautiful, hope you’re enjoying your time with your family xx

“Guys, Chelsea is blushing.” Sam called out, trying to draw the attention my mother and sister were giving him over this ‘Jacob’ kid away from him and to me.

“Don’t be ridiculous, Chelsea hasn’t blushed in years.” My mum said but when I met her eyes they widened. “You really are blushing.” I groaned and buried my face in a nearby cushion.

“Break through, ladies and gentleman, Chelsea Parker is blushing.” Bridget laughed out. “I bet Zayn text her,” she paused for a second and I heard some ruffling. “Ha, I was right. He sent her kisses and called her beautiful.”

“Give that back right now.” I demanded as Bridget got up from the couch and ran away, me hot on her tail. Once my phone was safely back in my possession I collapsed back onto the couch.

“Remember the protection, my dear, at least for the next few years.” Mum said patting my knee. Sometime having a cool mum wasn’t all that fabulous.

“I’m going to see dad.” I decided, equally wanting to see my unwell father and wanting to get out of the presence of the crazy people I call my family.

“I’m coming too,” Sam and Bridget both called back and my mother nodded her head in a way of agreeing to come also. So much for my plan.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I really, really hate hospitals. They’re a place of new life and death but unless you’re in the maternity ward - it rarely means anything good. I know you have to go to hospital to get treatments to improve your health and keep you alive but inevitably, we are all dying and the white walls of this place just scream the word death at me. Ridiculous really, I just cannot seem to avoid that feeling when I walk through the doors of a hospital.

Mum and Sam were leading the way through the halls of the hospital, knowing the way around much more than Bridget and I did. As much as I hated to admit it, I avoided this place like the plague until it got to the point where I needed to see my sick father in person - not just hear his voice over the phone or seeing him on Skype - which happened to be every few weeks. Mum and Sam stopped outside of room 208, knocked lightly before turning the knob after getting some form of acknowledgement back.

Before I could follow after them into the room Bridget grabbed my arm, halting my actions. “Yes?” I asked her warily, observing the wry grin on her face.

“‘Friends don’t kiss like you two do all the time’,” she quoted our mother. “I saw you blushing and avoiding that conversation missy, what’s going on?” She asked with a smirk.

“Uh, um n-nothing. I don’t know what you mean.” That was really convincing Chelsea.

“Sure,” she looked at me with a raised eyebrow. “Maybe I’ll just have to ask Zayn. Wait, hold up - it’s one of the other boys isn’t it, that’s why you won’t tell me.”

“It’s Liam.” I deadpanned and she paled. “I’m kidding? No of course it’s not one of the other boys.”

“So it is Zayn, isn’t it?” She recovered from my previous statement and smirked. She had always been good at manipulating people, me especially. I shrugged not giving her an answer and turned away, entering dad’s room.

“Chelsea, you are actually here. You’re mother just told me that you and you’re sister were here. I didn’t believe her though, she likes to lie to me.” he joked, winking at my mother. I really admired how he could just continue to be humorous and have a positive attitude when something was trying to kill him from the inside. It’s days like today that hurt me the most. Seeing the people I love just hanging on to life but trying to live it to the fullest and here I am, ungratefully living the high life yet feeling down about myself and doing dumb things to myself anyway.

I’ve been recovering from my previous heartbreak, and my ‘self-hate’ was improving greatly, but I still had bad days. And then there were the really bad days. Zayn helps me majorly and he probably doesn’t even realise. I didn’t even realise until I had a conversation with mum earlier about how I seemed much happier. I realised in myself that he has caused a massive improvement within me, he’s like my saviour. The fact that one day I could loose him scares the hell out of me though, I would be too broken to cope with anything - it would be horrendous. I pray to god that that never happens, I never want to think about a life without him or the other boys, even Harry.

“She does, doesn’t she?” I smirked at my mother as I leaned down to give my father a hug, my mother rolling her eyes with a fond smile on her face.

“You still gotta love her.” He pretended to sigh like loving her took a lot out of him. His wit caused my mother to smack his upper arm but I guess he knew that was coming, as he was quick to steal her hand, placing a peck upon the top. I really do hope I can find a love like theirs one day. “Well don’t just stand there, please take a seat. You too Bridget, just move the stuff on that couch out of the way and you will have a perfectly comfortable seat. Well, as comfortable of a seat as hospital furniture gets.”

I nodded, following my fathers instructions, my actions halting as I observed what I needed to move. I picked up one of the books of glossy paper and turned to look at my parents suspiciously. “What is this?” I asked looking back at the magazine detailing information about Piper, the boys, and myself, and also mentioning Luna and a few others. There were multiple other magazines lining the couch with similar stories open on them.

“Well I need to know what’s going on in my daughter’s life one way or another.” He smirked but I could tell the fact he had to read gossip magazines to hear about me upset him, obviously wanting to know straight from me. A wave of guilt hit me and I turned back to clear the other magazines of the couch and onto one of the many tables scattered around the room.

“It’s really not that fascinating, they’re just people. I was going to tell you about them today anyway, you just have a head start on me.”

“Well go on then, I’m all ears.”

“So you know who One Direction are right? Do you know the members?” I asked making sure I knew what level of information I was dealing with. Dad nodded his head and pulled a face as if it were the most obvious thing in the world to know. It’s not like he was a teenage girl or anything. I had to check. “I met them at a super market and I may have insulted Harry.” I pulled a fake guilty face and dad laughed, mumbling something along the lines of ’well, nothing has changed then’. I gave him a fake warning look before continuing. “’m not sure why I did it but there’s something about the bloke that ticks me off, I like him as a person but he just does things that trigger this sassy reaction from me. He and Piper are dating now.”

“That girl was always obsessed with him.” My mother commented with a headshake, she never really understood the whole ‘fan girl’ thing.

“Zayn and I managed to exchange contact details and since then we’ve all gotten to know each other. Niall and Luna are really close friends now, he helped her through her break up with Jack. Louis and Liam tend to goof around with the others most of the time but would you believe me if I told you that Liam was dating Macy Rodheriro? It’s such a small world.”

“I don’t like her, she’s a horrible girlfriend to Liam.” There was obviously still something going on between Liam and her after their… night together, and the reaction she gave me earlier when I joked about hooking up with him. I decided to get all the details from my twin later when there wasn’t an audience.

“I think that feelings mutual with everyone else, including Liam. Zayn and I are pretty close-”

“Pretty close?” Bridget scoffed. “That’s an understatement. They love each other but neither of them are willing to admit it because they’re scared. Both their most previous ex’s cheated on them so they’re holding back for now.” Bridget told the other three, acting like I wasn’t sitting beside her or anything.

“Yeah right, that’s completely untrue, we’re just best friends. Can we not talk about that, it’s awkward and I would rather not think about Zayn in that way.”

“Alright Chelsea, but make sure you bring the man that won your heart to meet me, I need to approve him before you can tell him how you really feel.”

“I’ll see if I can bring the boys to meet you guys but there aren’t any feelings that need to be shared because we don’t love each other. How’s your treatment been going, have you been improving at all?” I asked, drawing the topic away from my love life and finding out information that was more important to me.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“We’ve just been sleeping since we got here mostly, and eating. It’s not like we’ve been doing anything strenuous. I don’t think we have anything important until tomorrow, and if we do Liam will tell me because I not really aware what’s happening this trip, I wasn’t listening.” I could here the chuckle in his voice for his inattentiveness. “I think they’re giving us the day of to ‘explore our surroundings’ or something, it’s not like we’ve never been here before. Harry’ll be out with all of his closest friends, I swear he picks up friends wherever he goes.”

I laughed at that. “Not with me,” I joked and Zayn agreed.

“He’ll come around. Have you been to see you’re dad yet? How’s he going?”

I sighed, feeling a little down about my father. “He’s in high spirits but he’s getting worse faster than he is getting better. It’s like a 60/40 fight between death and life right now and I just wish that there was something that would help him improve just that 10% to give him an even better quality of life, so he can get out and explore the world before the sickness takes him away from it. I can’t bear the thought of him not being here but there’s nothing I can do and that kills me. They want to meet you – my family you know – you and the boys. I was telling them about you all.”

“Nothing bad I hope…” I left him hanging causing him to groan.

“I’m joking, I didn’t tell them anything bad, I just left them to make their own assumptions. Dad has a whole heap of magazines with us in it.” Zayn groaned again.

“I hope he realises they write a whole load of bullshit in them, I don’t want him getting any bad ideas about me or you.” I assured him that dad understood that they were just gossip feeds and most of the information in them wasn’t true and I would keep him updated on the things that were actually going on. “We’ll have to organise for me to meet them when I get back, I’m sure the boys will come too, I could even see if we could do it during the time my family is in town. Are you okay with everything that’s happening though?”

“As okay as I can be. The whole situation has me thinking more about my reactions to bad things that happen in my life and I feel like an idiot for the way I’ve handled them. I feel sick to the stomach about it all more than anything, well I think I feel sick from the whole situation with my father. I need to sleep on it, maybe I’ll feel better tomorrow and I’ll be able to face it all then.” I really had been feeling a bit off all day but I had placed it on the information that I had found out at the hospital, I really hope it is that and I’m not just being ignorant. I’ve got too much going on to be sick at the moment.

“Go and sleep then baby, I hope you feel better tomorrow. You’re much stronger than you think, I know you can get through this all. You have to and you will. I’ll see you soon, night Chels, have a good sleep.”

“Thanks Zayn, I’ll talk to you soon, night.” I hung up my phone placing it on my bedside table with a lazy smile gracing my face. I switched of my bedside light and got comfortable under my blankets.

“I can finally sleep now your finished talking to your boyfriend.” Bridget grumbled but she didn’t sound too mad about it as she placed her phone on her beside table also.

“Shut up and sleep.” I retorted and received a chuckle. “Night sis.”

“Night Chels, sweet dreams of Zayn.” I could hear the smirk in her voice and I wanted to smack her but I was way to comfortable for that shit, letting my dreams take me away.

Notes

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