Chapter 28
Taylor entered the house to find only his mother and father in the living room, everyone else had been sent to bed. In fact, he got the feeling he was interrupting something as they seemed very surprised to see him standing there. "Taylor!" His mother said, "what are you doing home so early? Where's Isaac?"
He signed, "I-K-E is getting a ride back with L-E-E and her friends. I took M-A-R-C-Y home."
His father looked at him. "Did everything go alright? You two didn't fight did you?"
He shook his head. "No. It is hard to talk in the car and B-O-W-L-I-N-G—she is going to e-mail me at eleven." He looked at his watch and waved at his parents.
His mother got up and kissed him. "Did you have fun?" She asked looking up at him.
He smiled at her and nodded a 'yes'.
"I'm so glad, baby. Good night." He hugged her then turned and went up the stairs.
~~~~
When Marcy came into her house, her brothers were waiting for her. "Well?" Tim said to her as she hung her coat in the closet.
She turned and looked at them. "Well what?" She asked icily.
Greg walked over, stood very close to her and quietly asked, "Did he touch you?"
She gave him a blank stare, then leaned in and whispered, "Yeah, a couple of times." As her brother narrowed his eyes at her, she continued, "once, at the bowling alley when he helped me take my coat off and again in the car when I kissed him."
"Hmmm..." Tim said thoughtfully, "I guess he got kissed twice tonight then, 'cause Sherry Thompson called me tonight and said Kimmy laid one on him at the Golden Arches."
"I was there, so what?" She said.
"He was out with you and he kissed her! That's what!" Greg said heatedly.
"We weren't 'out'. Isaac asked me to go bowling with him and his friends and I went. You guys never ask me to hang with you and your friends, what am I supposed to do? Just sit in my room all the time?" She was getting angry and tired of their sudden preoccupation with Taylor Hanson. It had made her sick when news had leaked out that he had been abducted and hurt and her brothers and their friends had been delighted, saying he had finally "gotten what he deserved" and it was "about time somebody put the Hansons in their place." She looked at both of her brothers and said "I don't give a hairy rat's ass what you all think. He's been through some tough shit lately and I can see where he'd go off a little. I don't approve of his methods, but I can try and understand and cut him some slack."
She headed for the stairs but Greg stepped in front of her. "Just so you know Marcy, if he pulls any of his rich boy, better than everybody else crap..."
She cut him off mid-sentence, "What the hell are you talking about?! He never did anything to us. The only thing any of them have ever done was Zac's smart mouth comments and I have a feeling you guys probably started that. Stay out of my business." And she went up to her room and slammed the door.
~~~~
When Taylor got to his room, Zac was on the computer and Jessica was on his bed reading Teen People. He walked over and stood next to Zac. Momentarily, his brother looked up at him. "What?" He asked.
"Why are you on my computer?" He signed.
"Mine's locked up or something." He said dully, not taking his eyes off the screen and the game he was playing.
Taylor looked at his watch. It was ten 'til eleven. He put his hand in Zac's face. "Five minutes." He took off his shirt and threw it on Jessica's magazine. When she looked up, he used his thumb and pointed at the door.
"Are you throwing your little sister out?" She asked.
He nodded. She got up then leaned in close, "Ok Rosey, but you're taking me and my friends to the mall tomorrow and dance class at seven."
After she left he made a very rude gesture at the door. "God, I'd love to know what's going on!" Zac laughed. Taylor turned and gave him a look. "Alright, I'm leaving." As he walked past Taylor, he stopped and said, "You sure are home early," he smelled him. "And you don't smell weird. I guess it was pretty boring, huh?"
Taylor shook his head and pointed at the door. With Zac gone, he sat in front of the computer and signed on. At eleven, a familiar sound let him know he had a message and asked him if he wanted to accept it. He clicked 'yes' and for the next two and a half hours, he and Marcy Gutman "talked".
~~~~
The next day, Taylor surprised everyone by being in an extremely good mood. Even Diana informing him he would be watching the girls while she went Christmas shopping hadn't seemed to dampen his spirits. Avery had caught him dancing to some mindless song on the radio as he fixed his breakfast and he'd picked her up and dipped her before grabbing his blueberry PopTarts from the toaster and heading up to shower.
When he got out, Jessica was waiting for him in the hallway holding what she considered to be "normal" clothes. She didn't want her and her friends to be mobbed by crazy Hanson fans at the mall and she wasn't about to trust Taylor's judgement in that area. He agreed to wear the "B-O-R-I-N-G" outfit in exchange for her help bandaging his damaged arm. She had agreed and informed him as she worked that it was "gross" and that he needed to show their mother A.S.A.P.
Their trip to the Woodland Springs Mall was not as bad as Taylor had expected. Jessica, Avery, Megan and Michelle had insisted that he go blend in and they promised to meet him at 3:00 sharp at the fountain in the center of the mall. He had neglected to bring the stroller for Zoe, saying she was big enough to walk, ignoring Jessica and Avery's claims that he'd be sorry. Avery helped him hoist the baby up on his shoulders as she had become squirmy almost immediately and with only one good arm, that wouldn't bend thanks to Jessica's wrapping job, it was impossible for him to hold her on his hip as he usually would.
All had gone well until 2:55. As Zoe and he gazed at the fountain while waiting for the girls to show up, he felt something warm on his neck and then down his back. Too late, he remembered Diana's instructions to take Zoe to the potty often as they had used the last of the Pull Ups and there would be no more bought. At 3:10, Zoe's discomfort was as great as his own and he decided to return to Gadzooks and pray Lee was back from her break where she'd been earlier when he had stopped in. He was overjoyed when he saw her behind the counter showing a customer a Cat in the Hat watch. Zoe's whining and saying, "Tay put down!" grabbed her attention immediately.
Her face brightened at the sight of him. "Hey, what's up gorgeous?" She said. He turned and pointed to the large wet spot. "Yuck!!" She said, "Is that what I think it is?"
He nodded and asked her for paper. He wrote, Can you call and get someone to page Jessica Avery to go to Gadzooks by the fountain? No last name please. Zoe was now crying loudly and Lee could tell Taylor was about to lose it.
"Sure thing." She said kindly. "Let me get her down from there."
He bent down and she took the baby down from her six foot perch. Taylor was relieved. His shoulders were aching and he was afraid he'd hurt or drop her if he got her down one handed. He stooped down to his baby sister, signed and said, "Clothes off?" as clearly as he could, but she was too upset to understand.
Lee made the phone call and momentarily, they heard the page over the mall's intercom system. Lee went to the clearance rack and pulled the smallest babydoll style t-shirt she could find. As Taylor pulled the wet clothes off her, Lee placed them in a plastic shopping bag. The t-shirt, which said 'girls rule' fit like a long dress and in no time she was a dry and happy baby, unlike her big brother.
Being as it was Christmas, every employee of the store was on the schedule for that day and Taylor's distress sent all the girls into maternal overdrive. There were other customers in the store, but no less than three salesgirls were clamoring either to hold or play with Zoe, or to comfort her good looking companion. The shirt Jessica had carefully chosen for it's blandness was soon replaced by a blue silk one that offset Taylor's eyes to perfection. It wasn't often the girls got to dress a rock star and so, quite a debate had gone on until the perfect shirt had presented itself. Though there was nothing wrong with the pants he was wearing, they wouldn't stand for that beautiful shirt to be worn over those "yukky old jeans" and so they gave him a choice of a pair of very expensive black suede ones and a velvet, navy blue pair. He looked at Lee.
"Mmmmm, damn... Do you and Isaac wear the same size?" She asked him.
He nodded and said, "We can. He usually likes his more..." He thought for a moment and wrote for her, baggy.
"Well, by all means, go for the black ones. Or, better yet, both." And she put a wicked grin on her face and winked at him. He smiled and went into the dressing room. When he came out and dropped the wet shirt and jeans in the bag, sighs were heard coming from the lips of the girls in the store, customers and sales clerks alike.
As Jessica made her way to the counter, she noticed a gathering in the back of the store and, for a moment, she panicked. "Lee!" She exclaimed, when she saw the familiar face of her brother's girlfriend. "Where's Tay?! Is he ok?!"
"Hey Jess, just a little accident, Zoe didn't make it to the potty in time."
Jessica looked at her for a moment, trying to figure out how that would cause a crowd to form, then she saw Taylor's blonde head smack dab in the center and she understood. Taylor was a chick magnet anyway, but slap a bandage on his arm and give him a cute baby and the attraction meter went off the scale. She watched as he made his way up front.
When he saw her, he began to sign furiously. "Where were you!!?" He asked, but before she could answer, he signed again. "Zoe wet on me!!"
"I'm sorry Tay," she giggled, "we lost track of time." Now she saw his pants. "Good God! How many cows gave their lives for those!? We'll never make it out of here alive!"
He glared at her. "Where's Avie?!" He asked.
The crowd of admirers had dispersed, but they were still being watched by people just interested in the exchange. Lee was always amazed by their signing, but Taylor seemed to have gotten a certain style now, a grace or something that made it even more beautiful to her. A look of relief passed over his face when she answered. "She's at the fountain with Meg and Michelle."
He sighed, then turned to Lee who was holding Zoe. "How much?" He asked her.
"What? Oh, I guess you have to pay, don't you?" She laughed and handed Zoe over to Jessica. She looked at Taylor. "Are you sure we can't find you some more? I think they were enjoying that way too much." And she grinned at the three girls who were all still watching him, though they pretended not to. As she rung up the sale, Lee leaned over the counter and quietly said to him, "You know, you really should reconsider that whole Calvin Klein thing. Maybe that's why God made you so pretty."
She hadn't said it to tease or antagonize him, and, though he had never understood people's preoccupation with his looks, in a way, he could see the logic in what she'd said. His mother always said, "When God closes a door, he opens a window." Perhaps that would be his window.
~~~~
When they'd gotten home, he'd
e-mailed Marcy and asked her to "meet" him online later that evening.
At ten o'clock sharp, he heard the sound that told him she was there waiting
to talk to him. And, she would be there every night that week.
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