Chapter Sixteen

Zac

I remember once someone telling me that with change comes pain. Rather, change can be painful. I never doubted it and always believed that if I was ever faced with some big, painful change that I would get through it as best I could and that I would know that my family was there for me always.

The only thing is that I never really counted on finding out Taylor Hanson was not my biological brother and that one day he would move out of the house he lived in with us to be with his biological mother. For obvious reasons, this was something that never even occurred to me except for maybe when I was angry with him and had visions of being happy about something like this. But I never considered that one day it might actually be true.

And that it would hurt a lot.

And that no one in our family would be there for him or myself.

That is, when Taylor had come home, things had started out awkward and eventually the awkwardness became routine. We all sort of walked on eggshells around each other as much as possible, avoiding potential conflicts at all costs. It seemed strange, but I didn’t even dare to ask anybody about it because I was afraid that they would just stare at me blankly, unconvinced or unwilling to admit that anything was wrong. So I was sitting there, watching Taylor sort of flounder around, living with people who all but seemed to hate him (though I, for one, can say that that isn’t entirely true) and not know what to do about it.

I had hoped that when Parker came, everything and everyone would sort of ligthen up a little bit for his benefit. I hadn’t expected Annie to say anything about it the first night, so I wasn’t disappointed by that. But I hoped that everything would at least seem to be more okay between all of us now that we had to put on a show for someone and act like we were a normal family and nothing had happened.

Right from the moment Parker walked in the door I knew that that wasn’t what was going to happen. Everyone had stared at him like an alien from another planet and at Taylor like he had cloned himself and how dare he do such a thing without warning anyone he was going to do it. The awkwardness hadn’t been relieved and wasn’t going to be. It wasn’t even going to be replaced by a new awkwardness. That new awkwardness was just going to be piled on top of the old one and make for a really fine mess.

I’m slightly ashamed to say that it wasn’t until I saw Isaac and Taylor fighting at the kitchen sink, loud enough for Parker to have heard if he hadn’t been covering his free ear trying to hear what Gina was saying to him on the other end of the phone due to various other noises, it wasn’t until then that I decided to at least try my hardest to sweep away some of the eggshells that we were walking on. At least the ones between me and Taylor.

So that’s why I followed him to our room after the fight.

I found him sitting on his old bed (which was currently my bed). He wasn’t really doing anything but just sitting there, on the side, his hands propping him up and an angry look on his face. I wondered for a moment before entering the room if this was going to count as choosing sides between brothers, another hurtful thing I hadn’t even considered once upon a time.

“Hi,” I said, walking in and quietly shutting the door behind me.

He sighed. “Can’t a guy just get a little time to himself?”

“In this house?” I said. “How long has it been since you’ve lived here?”

He turned his face away and I momentarily regretted the words. But it was only for that moment. I knew that just because I was going to try and sweep away the eggshells didn’t mean I had to let go of my own anger and hurt that he had gone away. I just had to move it more into the background.

“Look, if you’re going to start in on me about the whole Annie thing...,” he started, but I swiftly interrupted him.

“I’m not,” I said simply.

He turned his face back toward me and seemed to search my face to see if I was lying to him or not. Apparently finding nothing that spoke of deceit, he went on.

“This is going to turn into one hell of a mess, isn’t it?” he said.

“I’d say that’s a bit of an understatement,” I said. “But we’re basically damned either way at this point, so there’s no use dwelling on it too much. Just go with the flow, I guess.”

“God, why did this all have to happen?” he asked, looking up toward the ceiling, almost as if he was talking to God. But I knew that he was just talking to the ceiling. “Isaac hates me...”

“Isaac doesn’t hate you,” I insisted immediately, unsure of that fact myself. “I think Isaac hates himself more than he hates you. He probably just thinks he hates you.”

“I can’t believe we actually brought Parker into this whole mess,” he said.

“Or did he bring us into it?” I asked, mostly talking to myself. “Anyway, how could we avoid it? Short of telling him over the phone and that wouldn’t really have helped anything.”

“But of course now we’re all just going to be walking around lying to him the whole time he’s here,” he said.

“Taylor, we were lying to him before he was here. The only difference now is the fact that he’s actually going to be in the room when we do it,” I pointed out.

He sighed and leaned over, resting his chin in his hand.

“Everyone is so angry with me,” he said. “And you know what the worst thing is?”

I honestly couldn’t imagine what was worse than having my entire family angry with me. It seemed like alienation in my own home was probably one of the worst things that could ever happen to me, especially being part of a family like ours. I’d much rather die a slow, painful, torturous death than have my whole family feeling betrayed because of me and having nothing that I could to remedy it, much like him.

“What’s that?” I asked.

“It’s just that I cannot blame any of you guys,” he said. Somehow, I expected to hear his voice shake with tears or something when he said that, but it was steady with something very much like calm acceptance of the inevitable. “No matter how hard I try, and believe me I have tried, I can’t find one single reason to blame you guys for being mad at me.”

The fact that he had tried to find reasons surprised me a little bit, but I kept myself from saying anything about it.

“Hm. Go figure,” I said. I didn’t mean it to sound like I thought that that was the way it should be, but I think he may have taken it that way. “But to be honest with you, I don’t think there’s really an excuse for hostility.”

“There are in some situations.”

“But not in our family,” I said. “Or if there is then that makes us the biggest bunch of hypocrites I’ve ever come across in my entire life.”

“I guess,” he said.

“Look, Taylor,” I said, sitting down on the bed beside him, “I won’t make any apologies for the way I’ve been acting lately only because that would entail apologizing for the way I feel and I’m not about to do that. You hurt us. You hurt me. Also, I don’t expect you to apologize for feeling the way you do on your side of the situation. So whatever you do, please don’t ever tell any of us that you’re sorry for feeling the way you feel about Annie and Lawrence and even Parker. And don’t let any of us apologize to you, either. I can’t speak for anyone else, but I am willing to try hard to put the different points of view on a hard situation aside for a while. Even if it only ends up being for Parker’s benefit.”

He nodded, seeming to understand what I was saying even though I don’t think I was entirely sure.

“Thanks for that at least.”

I nodded back, almost telling him that he was my brother and that’s what brothers were supposed to do, but decided against it. It didn’t seem like the right thing to say for more reasons than one.

We were silent for almost a full five minutes before a knock came on the door.

A little too serious for Zac or what?
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen