And with each mile
Dec. 6th, 2012 01:21 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
teamzaylorCHAPTER 29: STILLNESS
Rating: NC-12
Genre: Zaylor / Hancest
Pairing: Zac & Taylor
Credits & many Thanks to: Honor @beyondthethorns
About the story: Zac & Taylor's relationship broke up when they got caught kissing by the press and their career were over in a split of a second. To continue a normal life and to take a break from his brother, Taylor starts to study at a College in London but the long distance between them can't stop their feelings for each other.
You'll notice a change in this chapter, but it's just temporary. Don't worry you'll see what happened with Zac in the next chapter! ;-)
This chapter is a Flashback, it's quiet and innocent you'll get a view from their younger teenage days. I promise it is worth to read it. Enjoy ♥
I was fifteen years old the first time Zachary and I kissed.
It was the summer of 1998 and we had a two week period in Tulsa where there was nothing to do but lay around in our messy bedroom reading and eating bowl after bowl of Cookie Crisp. It was nice. Clocks ceased to exist. We went to bed when we were tired, we ate when we were hungry, and we played music when we felt like it- not when the curtain was scheduled to fall.
The weekend before we left for the Albertane Tour, our first real-full fledged concert tour, my dad decided we needed one final detox before going back to a life of fast food, fast highways, and even faster fans. I swear, every Hanson fan back in 1998 had to be the star of their middle school track team. Even the chubby ones. They were always one step behind us no matter how quickly we were whisked away and shoved into the backseat of a van. I wasn’t looking forward to going back to that kind of lifestyle. I was fifteen, a late starter and quite frankly, sprinting teenage girls with disposable cameras and bouncing boobs scared the fuck out of me.
My Uncle Mitch owns a bit ranch down in the southwest part of Oklahoma- by Lawton. He slaughters cattle for a living. Can you imagine? Get up, make coffee, slaughter cows, eat sautéed slaughtered cow, watch reality television, go to sleep. It just doesn’t seem right that that is someone’s job. It’s not one of those professions that you realize exists. When you hug Mitch you can actually smell a faint whiff of something inhuman and you have to ask yourself- is that supper? My dad made us pack our backs one Thursday afternoon that summer and then he drove the entire family to Uncle Mitch’s farm for the weekend. “We need to get back to basics before tour…” he had explained.
At the time, I didn’t realize it was because Mitch had skin cancer, and although he’s fine today, my dad didn’t know if he would be. Back then, Zac and I thought it was some sick plan to make our final weekend in Oklahoma complete hell. We were hell for my parents back then with our snobby attitudes and boundary testing, so we figured he was just giving us a taste of our own medicine, or something like that.
As soon as you get out of the car at Uncle Mitch’s house, you are a part of the ranch. It doesn’t matter if you show up in a Ferrari wearing Versache sunglasses- you automatically become the land around you. Your chatter becomes quiet stillness and your hands automatically feel dusty and rough.
At Uncle Mitch’s, you don’t speak in sentences. Single words get the point across.
The first night we were there Zachary and I we were sent to bed around ten at night. Dad said we were going to ride horses the next day, which neither of us were particularly excited about, and we should get some rest because Mitch’s family was usually up and noisy at 5:30 AM. We had just spent the past two weeks playing Sonic the Hedgehog until 2 o’clock in the morning so we couldn’t sleep. Not that we tried for very long…
We were sharing a pile of quilts on the guest room floor while Jessica and Avery got the full-sized bed. Isaac was on the living room couch basking in the glory of not only getting a soft spot to sleep without someone kicking him, but also getting a television and a remote all to himself.
“I can’t sleep,” Zachary said in the dark after what couldn’t be more than five minutes.
“Me neither.”
So, restless and bored, we wandered, bare-footed and in nothing but tapered sweatpants, out to Mitch’s fields and eventually found a barn to explore. I yanked the heavy, sliding door open and we slipped in to see nothing but more darkness.
“Scary,” I told him, using my one-word ranch talk.
“Don’t worry,” Zachary said and began walking towards the darkness.
“Zac,” I whimpered, looking around and seeing nothing. Nothing was scary because it was only a matter of time before nothing became something, and that something was an axe murderer or a ghostly figure.
He turned around and looked at me. I could see his eyes glittering in the dark. That was all I could see though. “Huh?”
“It sounds really stupid… but could you hold my hand?”
He chuckled at the comment and walked back over to me. At age thirteen, Zachary was so cool to me. He was becoming really witty and clever- developing his own style of confident sarcasm that I fawned over. I thought for sure he would mock my stupid request, but he didn’t. He just took my hand and we both wandered into the dark.
Zachary was never scared. That was a part of personality which I envied at him.
Or maybe he just played too many horror video games at night when he should go off to sleep.
“I hear sounds,” I whispered.
“The wind.”
“Hay rustling...”
“The cows,” he nodded at the open door where we could see the groups of cows standing together in the moonlight.
We found a loft and crawled up a ladder into it- I first and he climbed up after me- I gripped his wrist to yank him up. From the top of the barn, we looked down to see nothing spectacular except a bird’s eye view of darkness.
“You cold?” he asked, looking at our bare chests.
I nodded at the hay we were leaning against. “Itchy.”
He chuckled.
We sat there quietly for about five minutes, just looking out at the sliver of the farm we could see from the cracked open barn door and fidgeting as the straw agitated our backs. I don’t know what Zac was thinking about, but I was thinking of nothing but him.
It was about two months before that I had thought of him for the very first time- thought of him as more than just my brother. The thought had been plaguing me with fear and denial and shame, and more than anything I wanted to let it out. He was my younger brother, for Christ’s sake. Being pubescent is hard enough. You suddenly have to start using this powdery stick called deodorant and one morning you wake up with sticky covers. Your chin breaks out and you actually have to start studying to keep up in school and then one day you wake up and look over at your sleeping brother and you realize… fuck. He’s amazing.
Realizing you’re in love with your brother has to be one of the hardest thing a young guy can face. Most people will never experience in and so you just have to take my word for it- it’s terrifying. Despite my fear, I was a trooper. I went through about a month of shame where I tried to ignore how I felt about him, but my young age made it easy for me be honest with myself and eventually I sucked it up and acknowledged my feelings. Once I admitted it, I had a whole new set of concerns. I didn’t know what to make of it. I didn’t even know if I could believe my own feelings. I wondered, hoped, they weren’t real. I was delusional. Probably just in awe of my cool, precocious younger brother- probably just wanted to be just like him and I was mistaking that brotherly wonder for love.
I remember when the huge success hit us last year when we released our MmmBop Single Zachary used to say tell the reporters even though he was eleven but he already felt like fourteen. And he wasn't kidding. Zac were never shy with somebody and didn't have scruples to throw peanuts at journalists or waterballons on the heads of our fans from the rooftops of the concert venues. At Zachary's age I didn't have the courage to do something like that, even though sometimes I really wanted to.
Of course we both looked up to Isaac but somehow Zac's and my relationship have always been so much closer.
“What are you thinking about?” he finally said in that husky, tired voice. He dangled his feet from the edge of the loft.
I hesitated. “Stuff.”
“What stuff?”
There were long pauses in our conversations. When you’re sitting in a barn loft in the middle of nowhere- halfway naked in the middle of the night- there has to be. Long pauses are what the atmosphere calls for.
“A lot of stuff.”
Zachary sighed offended. “Fine, don’t tell me.”
After awhile I finally spoke up. “I was thinking about you.”
He glanced over at me and I could see him then because my eyes had adjusted, and I liked looking at him. I liked how Zachary looked. I liked the color of his hair, and the shape of his eyes, and the texture of his lips. I was slowly realizing I liked it all- a lot.
“What about me…?”
I eventually shrugged. I needed something generic. “That it’s a shame you can’t play soccer this year cause of tour.”
I don’t know where I came up with it. I just did. I had to because saying what I was really thinking was too bold even for an audacious adolescent.
“Oh,” he said flatly.
“Tay?” he said, a minute or two later.
“Hm?”
“Am I really special to you?”
It was a stupid question. I guess at our age, it seemed like a good thing to say. I guess I thought it was a normal thing to say at the time too, but looking back I see how obvious his question was.
“Why are you asking?” I frowned a little.
He shrugged. “I just am.”
I wasn't sure what to respond. The last thing I wanted was to scare him away.
“Of course you’re special to me Zac.”
“Do you love me?” he asked suddenly. “Because I mean, I know we fight sometimes, and things are so crazy with the band and traveling and I get on your nerves and … sometimes I just wonder if you still love me. Like a brother.”
Like a brother.
“Course I do.”
“Really?”
He sighed and picked up a piece of straw which he put into his mouth like a cowboy. Then he tossed the straw over the edge of the loft and watched it fall to the ground.
And because I was inhibited and didn’t know better, I boldly said. “Like you have no idea…”
He frowned. “Maybe I do.”
I shooked my head. “Trust me, you have no idea.”
“Then tell me. What do I have no idea about, Taylor?”
He began to impatiently fumble with one of the straws again. I smelled the hay in his hand.
“I said what do I have no idea about, Taylor.”
“I heard you…” I winced and tossed a handful of the hay over the loft. We both watched it lazily flutter to the ground like falling snow.
He sat there staring at me- waiting for me to say something- anything. I felt his eyes and looked up and said, “What are you waiting for me to say? What are you expecting to hear?”
I killed the eye contact. It hurt too much. I was too scared that maybe he felt the same way, and even scarier, maybe he didn’t. I was scared that Zac didn’t love me, definitely, but my teenage age gave me a sense of hope, I think.
I had always felt so much love between Zachary and I. He’s always been my comfort, the person that lifted me up and kept me grounded all at once. Zachary was the person that made me laugh the hardest, and cry the loudest, and smile the widest. I wasn’t sure he loved me like I loved him, but I sensed it more than he sensed it from me. He felt our love, but his young age made him disregard it even more than I did. He had convinced himself he was imagining it and his feelings would sicken me. I know this because he told me it a few weeks later.
“I just want to hear… the truth. What do I have no idea about, Taylor?”
I shrugged thoughtlessly.
“Stop saying things and then not owning up to them.”
I sighed and shifted in the hay, leaning off the edge a lot more. “I can’t say what I want to say. It’s strange. It’s creepy. It will scare you.”
He stared at me so I knew he was getting it.
“Try me…” he said. “Just try me. Maybe you’re wrong.”
“I can’t.”
“Taylor! Try me. I think maybe you’re wrong.” He was getting mad.
I looked up at him and with sincere, worried eyes I began to ask, “Do you ever think about me…”
But he cut me off. “Yes,” he said, before I could chicken out and change the sentence.
I swallowed.
“Do you ever feel closer to me than you should…?” I asked, my voice so quiet it was almost a whisper.
“Yes.”
I frowned at him, almost disbelieving our conversation. I knew how he was feeling. I was a feeling it too. We were both so caught in trying to say something we just couldn’t say- but hoping our expressions and half-way completed sentence might make the other say it.
“Turn around,” came my throaty command. “Look away from me.” I just couldn't look at him anymore. I felt guilty for not being able to hide my feelings for him anymore like I should as his older brother.
He gave me a questioning look and turned that my back was to him. I pulled my knees up to my chest to try and stay warm. Maybe to try and stay brave.
“Are you listening to me?”
“Yes.”
My voice was practically cracking in fear and I pressed my hands together, hoping it would stop the shivering.
“I’m going to say some things to you- things I already wanted to say during the spring. If you want me to stop talking and I am scaring you and you hate me for what I say, then just shake your head no. If you do, I’ll stop talking. And then we’ll never talk about this night again,” I instructed, gaining confidence with each sentence. “If you don’t shake your head, then when I’m done talking I’ll wait for you to say something in response.”
He nodded. I was sitting there wondering what he thought or what he was going to say. I was convinced he was going to shake his head.
I cleared my throat and then sighed gently. “Zachary… I don’t know how to say this. It scares me and I don’t know what to do, but for some reason I feel like maybe I’m not crazy for feeling this way. Maybe you do too… but I’m terrified you don’t.”
“Just say it.”
“Please, don’t talk. Until I’m done, and if you do shake your head, I don’t want to speak to you for the rest of the night. Or the rest of this trip. Okay?”
He nodded.
I started again. “When I look at you, I feel really good. You make me really happy… and you’re my favorite person to be around. And… and… sometimes…”
Say it, say it, say it, I was chanting in my ear. I was so close. I was so freaking close I was scared I would lose my nerves and going to change my mind about him before I even got the words out and all would be lost.
“Sometimes… I want to kiss you.”
I paused and must have just been sitting there staring at him. He refused to move. I was scared that any motion on his part would look like a head shake. When I didn’t say anything more, he said so quietly I almost couldn't hear him. “Then kiss me.”
He turned slowly to face me and my eyes were wide and dilated. I watched him wet his lips and take an unsteady breath of air. It was like slow motion. He started moving in towards and the moment just extended- making me more and more scared and excited by the second.
His lip did eventually bump against mine. The kiss was awkward and clumsy, but it was perfect. He pulled away immediately and looked at my eyes- searching them for some kind of emotion. And because I didn’t know exactly what I was feeling, I closed my eyes and pressed my lips to his in response.
The kiss was nothing much. It was really just two little pecks in the stillness of my uncle’s southwestern Oklahoma barn. But that kiss triggered the biggest change in my life. As we stared at each other in the loft and then finally climbed down silently, holding hands and wordlessly walking back to our spot on the guest room floor, we were changing our fate. Nothing would ever be the same.
That night Zachary and I laid next to each other on the floor staring at each other in the night. I guess to most people it would be awkward. We weren’t smiling or frowning. The only sounds were the occasional shifting of blankets and our steady breathing, but it wasn’t suffocating. In fact, it was a soothing silence and falling asleep was bittersweet.
When I woke up in the morning, Zac was gone. I found him in the kitchen doing a couple impressions with Isaac. When he saw me, his laughter stopped and he wandered outside to follow my uncle around the farm. He spent the next week doing everything he could to avoid me. When he had no choice but to acknowledge me, his acknowledgement came in quick nods and disinterested grunts.
It was the most horrible week of my life. Everything I had been so thankful for that night in the barn was suddenly my biggest regret. I was terrified that I had ruined Zac and my relationship for good and I would never, ever get my brother back.
I got my brother back, as I’m sure you can figure out. In fact, I got more than just a brother… I got a lover. I got him back for two and a half years until one day he packed a bag while we were having one of our shouting matches in our bedroom. He got in the car and disappeared off to his new life in Los Angeles.
Him vanishing in the night stung like hell each and every time.
Rating: NC-12
Genre: Zaylor / Hancest
Pairing: Zac & Taylor
Credits & many Thanks to: Honor @beyondthethorns
About the story: Zac & Taylor's relationship broke up when they got caught kissing by the press and their career were over in a split of a second. To continue a normal life and to take a break from his brother, Taylor starts to study at a College in London but the long distance between them can't stop their feelings for each other.
You'll notice a change in this chapter, but it's just temporary. Don't worry you'll see what happened with Zac in the next chapter! ;-)
This chapter is a Flashback, it's quiet and innocent you'll get a view from their younger teenage days. I promise it is worth to read it. Enjoy ♥
I was fifteen years old the first time Zachary and I kissed.
It was the summer of 1998 and we had a two week period in Tulsa where there was nothing to do but lay around in our messy bedroom reading and eating bowl after bowl of Cookie Crisp. It was nice. Clocks ceased to exist. We went to bed when we were tired, we ate when we were hungry, and we played music when we felt like it- not when the curtain was scheduled to fall.
The weekend before we left for the Albertane Tour, our first real-full fledged concert tour, my dad decided we needed one final detox before going back to a life of fast food, fast highways, and even faster fans. I swear, every Hanson fan back in 1998 had to be the star of their middle school track team. Even the chubby ones. They were always one step behind us no matter how quickly we were whisked away and shoved into the backseat of a van. I wasn’t looking forward to going back to that kind of lifestyle. I was fifteen, a late starter and quite frankly, sprinting teenage girls with disposable cameras and bouncing boobs scared the fuck out of me.
My Uncle Mitch owns a bit ranch down in the southwest part of Oklahoma- by Lawton. He slaughters cattle for a living. Can you imagine? Get up, make coffee, slaughter cows, eat sautéed slaughtered cow, watch reality television, go to sleep. It just doesn’t seem right that that is someone’s job. It’s not one of those professions that you realize exists. When you hug Mitch you can actually smell a faint whiff of something inhuman and you have to ask yourself- is that supper? My dad made us pack our backs one Thursday afternoon that summer and then he drove the entire family to Uncle Mitch’s farm for the weekend. “We need to get back to basics before tour…” he had explained.
At the time, I didn’t realize it was because Mitch had skin cancer, and although he’s fine today, my dad didn’t know if he would be. Back then, Zac and I thought it was some sick plan to make our final weekend in Oklahoma complete hell. We were hell for my parents back then with our snobby attitudes and boundary testing, so we figured he was just giving us a taste of our own medicine, or something like that.
As soon as you get out of the car at Uncle Mitch’s house, you are a part of the ranch. It doesn’t matter if you show up in a Ferrari wearing Versache sunglasses- you automatically become the land around you. Your chatter becomes quiet stillness and your hands automatically feel dusty and rough.
At Uncle Mitch’s, you don’t speak in sentences. Single words get the point across.
The first night we were there Zachary and I we were sent to bed around ten at night. Dad said we were going to ride horses the next day, which neither of us were particularly excited about, and we should get some rest because Mitch’s family was usually up and noisy at 5:30 AM. We had just spent the past two weeks playing Sonic the Hedgehog until 2 o’clock in the morning so we couldn’t sleep. Not that we tried for very long…
We were sharing a pile of quilts on the guest room floor while Jessica and Avery got the full-sized bed. Isaac was on the living room couch basking in the glory of not only getting a soft spot to sleep without someone kicking him, but also getting a television and a remote all to himself.
“I can’t sleep,” Zachary said in the dark after what couldn’t be more than five minutes.
“Me neither.”
So, restless and bored, we wandered, bare-footed and in nothing but tapered sweatpants, out to Mitch’s fields and eventually found a barn to explore. I yanked the heavy, sliding door open and we slipped in to see nothing but more darkness.
“Scary,” I told him, using my one-word ranch talk.
“Don’t worry,” Zachary said and began walking towards the darkness.
“Zac,” I whimpered, looking around and seeing nothing. Nothing was scary because it was only a matter of time before nothing became something, and that something was an axe murderer or a ghostly figure.
He turned around and looked at me. I could see his eyes glittering in the dark. That was all I could see though. “Huh?”
“It sounds really stupid… but could you hold my hand?”
He chuckled at the comment and walked back over to me. At age thirteen, Zachary was so cool to me. He was becoming really witty and clever- developing his own style of confident sarcasm that I fawned over. I thought for sure he would mock my stupid request, but he didn’t. He just took my hand and we both wandered into the dark.
Zachary was never scared. That was a part of personality which I envied at him.
Or maybe he just played too many horror video games at night when he should go off to sleep.
“I hear sounds,” I whispered.
“The wind.”
“Hay rustling...”
“The cows,” he nodded at the open door where we could see the groups of cows standing together in the moonlight.
We found a loft and crawled up a ladder into it- I first and he climbed up after me- I gripped his wrist to yank him up. From the top of the barn, we looked down to see nothing spectacular except a bird’s eye view of darkness.
“You cold?” he asked, looking at our bare chests.
I nodded at the hay we were leaning against. “Itchy.”
He chuckled.
We sat there quietly for about five minutes, just looking out at the sliver of the farm we could see from the cracked open barn door and fidgeting as the straw agitated our backs. I don’t know what Zac was thinking about, but I was thinking of nothing but him.
It was about two months before that I had thought of him for the very first time- thought of him as more than just my brother. The thought had been plaguing me with fear and denial and shame, and more than anything I wanted to let it out. He was my younger brother, for Christ’s sake. Being pubescent is hard enough. You suddenly have to start using this powdery stick called deodorant and one morning you wake up with sticky covers. Your chin breaks out and you actually have to start studying to keep up in school and then one day you wake up and look over at your sleeping brother and you realize… fuck. He’s amazing.
Realizing you’re in love with your brother has to be one of the hardest thing a young guy can face. Most people will never experience in and so you just have to take my word for it- it’s terrifying. Despite my fear, I was a trooper. I went through about a month of shame where I tried to ignore how I felt about him, but my young age made it easy for me be honest with myself and eventually I sucked it up and acknowledged my feelings. Once I admitted it, I had a whole new set of concerns. I didn’t know what to make of it. I didn’t even know if I could believe my own feelings. I wondered, hoped, they weren’t real. I was delusional. Probably just in awe of my cool, precocious younger brother- probably just wanted to be just like him and I was mistaking that brotherly wonder for love.
I remember when the huge success hit us last year when we released our MmmBop Single Zachary used to say tell the reporters even though he was eleven but he already felt like fourteen. And he wasn't kidding. Zac were never shy with somebody and didn't have scruples to throw peanuts at journalists or waterballons on the heads of our fans from the rooftops of the concert venues. At Zachary's age I didn't have the courage to do something like that, even though sometimes I really wanted to.
Of course we both looked up to Isaac but somehow Zac's and my relationship have always been so much closer.
“What are you thinking about?” he finally said in that husky, tired voice. He dangled his feet from the edge of the loft.
I hesitated. “Stuff.”
“What stuff?”
There were long pauses in our conversations. When you’re sitting in a barn loft in the middle of nowhere- halfway naked in the middle of the night- there has to be. Long pauses are what the atmosphere calls for.
“A lot of stuff.”
Zachary sighed offended. “Fine, don’t tell me.”
After awhile I finally spoke up. “I was thinking about you.”
He glanced over at me and I could see him then because my eyes had adjusted, and I liked looking at him. I liked how Zachary looked. I liked the color of his hair, and the shape of his eyes, and the texture of his lips. I was slowly realizing I liked it all- a lot.
“What about me…?”
I eventually shrugged. I needed something generic. “That it’s a shame you can’t play soccer this year cause of tour.”
I don’t know where I came up with it. I just did. I had to because saying what I was really thinking was too bold even for an audacious adolescent.
“Oh,” he said flatly.
“Tay?” he said, a minute or two later.
“Hm?”
“Am I really special to you?”
It was a stupid question. I guess at our age, it seemed like a good thing to say. I guess I thought it was a normal thing to say at the time too, but looking back I see how obvious his question was.
“Why are you asking?” I frowned a little.
He shrugged. “I just am.”
I wasn't sure what to respond. The last thing I wanted was to scare him away.
“Of course you’re special to me Zac.”
“Do you love me?” he asked suddenly. “Because I mean, I know we fight sometimes, and things are so crazy with the band and traveling and I get on your nerves and … sometimes I just wonder if you still love me. Like a brother.”
Like a brother.
“Course I do.”
“Really?”
He sighed and picked up a piece of straw which he put into his mouth like a cowboy. Then he tossed the straw over the edge of the loft and watched it fall to the ground.
And because I was inhibited and didn’t know better, I boldly said. “Like you have no idea…”
He frowned. “Maybe I do.”
I shooked my head. “Trust me, you have no idea.”
“Then tell me. What do I have no idea about, Taylor?”
He began to impatiently fumble with one of the straws again. I smelled the hay in his hand.
“I said what do I have no idea about, Taylor.”
“I heard you…” I winced and tossed a handful of the hay over the loft. We both watched it lazily flutter to the ground like falling snow.
He sat there staring at me- waiting for me to say something- anything. I felt his eyes and looked up and said, “What are you waiting for me to say? What are you expecting to hear?”
I killed the eye contact. It hurt too much. I was too scared that maybe he felt the same way, and even scarier, maybe he didn’t. I was scared that Zac didn’t love me, definitely, but my teenage age gave me a sense of hope, I think.
I had always felt so much love between Zachary and I. He’s always been my comfort, the person that lifted me up and kept me grounded all at once. Zachary was the person that made me laugh the hardest, and cry the loudest, and smile the widest. I wasn’t sure he loved me like I loved him, but I sensed it more than he sensed it from me. He felt our love, but his young age made him disregard it even more than I did. He had convinced himself he was imagining it and his feelings would sicken me. I know this because he told me it a few weeks later.
“I just want to hear… the truth. What do I have no idea about, Taylor?”
I shrugged thoughtlessly.
“Stop saying things and then not owning up to them.”
I sighed and shifted in the hay, leaning off the edge a lot more. “I can’t say what I want to say. It’s strange. It’s creepy. It will scare you.”
He stared at me so I knew he was getting it.
“Try me…” he said. “Just try me. Maybe you’re wrong.”
“I can’t.”
“Taylor! Try me. I think maybe you’re wrong.” He was getting mad.
I looked up at him and with sincere, worried eyes I began to ask, “Do you ever think about me…”
But he cut me off. “Yes,” he said, before I could chicken out and change the sentence.
I swallowed.
“Do you ever feel closer to me than you should…?” I asked, my voice so quiet it was almost a whisper.
“Yes.”
I frowned at him, almost disbelieving our conversation. I knew how he was feeling. I was a feeling it too. We were both so caught in trying to say something we just couldn’t say- but hoping our expressions and half-way completed sentence might make the other say it.
“Turn around,” came my throaty command. “Look away from me.” I just couldn't look at him anymore. I felt guilty for not being able to hide my feelings for him anymore like I should as his older brother.
He gave me a questioning look and turned that my back was to him. I pulled my knees up to my chest to try and stay warm. Maybe to try and stay brave.
“Are you listening to me?”
“Yes.”
My voice was practically cracking in fear and I pressed my hands together, hoping it would stop the shivering.
“I’m going to say some things to you- things I already wanted to say during the spring. If you want me to stop talking and I am scaring you and you hate me for what I say, then just shake your head no. If you do, I’ll stop talking. And then we’ll never talk about this night again,” I instructed, gaining confidence with each sentence. “If you don’t shake your head, then when I’m done talking I’ll wait for you to say something in response.”
He nodded. I was sitting there wondering what he thought or what he was going to say. I was convinced he was going to shake his head.
I cleared my throat and then sighed gently. “Zachary… I don’t know how to say this. It scares me and I don’t know what to do, but for some reason I feel like maybe I’m not crazy for feeling this way. Maybe you do too… but I’m terrified you don’t.”
“Just say it.”
“Please, don’t talk. Until I’m done, and if you do shake your head, I don’t want to speak to you for the rest of the night. Or the rest of this trip. Okay?”
He nodded.
I started again. “When I look at you, I feel really good. You make me really happy… and you’re my favorite person to be around. And… and… sometimes…”
Say it, say it, say it, I was chanting in my ear. I was so close. I was so freaking close I was scared I would lose my nerves and going to change my mind about him before I even got the words out and all would be lost.
“Sometimes… I want to kiss you.”
I paused and must have just been sitting there staring at him. He refused to move. I was scared that any motion on his part would look like a head shake. When I didn’t say anything more, he said so quietly I almost couldn't hear him. “Then kiss me.”
He turned slowly to face me and my eyes were wide and dilated. I watched him wet his lips and take an unsteady breath of air. It was like slow motion. He started moving in towards and the moment just extended- making me more and more scared and excited by the second.
His lip did eventually bump against mine. The kiss was awkward and clumsy, but it was perfect. He pulled away immediately and looked at my eyes- searching them for some kind of emotion. And because I didn’t know exactly what I was feeling, I closed my eyes and pressed my lips to his in response.
The kiss was nothing much. It was really just two little pecks in the stillness of my uncle’s southwestern Oklahoma barn. But that kiss triggered the biggest change in my life. As we stared at each other in the loft and then finally climbed down silently, holding hands and wordlessly walking back to our spot on the guest room floor, we were changing our fate. Nothing would ever be the same.
That night Zachary and I laid next to each other on the floor staring at each other in the night. I guess to most people it would be awkward. We weren’t smiling or frowning. The only sounds were the occasional shifting of blankets and our steady breathing, but it wasn’t suffocating. In fact, it was a soothing silence and falling asleep was bittersweet.
When I woke up in the morning, Zac was gone. I found him in the kitchen doing a couple impressions with Isaac. When he saw me, his laughter stopped and he wandered outside to follow my uncle around the farm. He spent the next week doing everything he could to avoid me. When he had no choice but to acknowledge me, his acknowledgement came in quick nods and disinterested grunts.
It was the most horrible week of my life. Everything I had been so thankful for that night in the barn was suddenly my biggest regret. I was terrified that I had ruined Zac and my relationship for good and I would never, ever get my brother back.
I got my brother back, as I’m sure you can figure out. In fact, I got more than just a brother… I got a lover. I got him back for two and a half years until one day he packed a bag while we were having one of our shouting matches in our bedroom. He got in the car and disappeared off to his new life in Los Angeles.
Him vanishing in the night stung like hell each and every time.
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Date: 2012-12-06 03:11 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-12-06 03:24 am (UTC)But I need to know what happened to Zac. I hope he didn't leave Taylor this time. I know you promised we'll find out on the next chapter, so update soon!!!!
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Date: 2012-12-06 07:16 am (UTC)Anyway, I hope Zac didn't leave Taylor again, he went all the way from Tulsa to London not to do that, right? More soon...!
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Date: 2012-12-06 12:30 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-12-06 05:19 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-12-06 10:42 pm (UTC)Thanks again for your reading, I know it's not our story but our revised edition and the hard job to find matching cover banners makes us feel proud to see how much you like it... ♥
I just updated the next Chapter, I'm curious what you will think about the changes. :)