Zac didn't get to talk to Ben again until his birthday the next Wednesday. Unfortunately Zac's week was busier than he thought it would be, but he made time to call Ben by skipping dinner. After work he stopped off at McDonald's and got himself some disgustingly appetizing food and called Ben while he ate it in his hotel room.
"Hello?"
"Hey baby," Zac said. "Happy Birthday."
"Oh, thank you, honey!" Ben said. "I really missed you today. We could have really used your help."
"My help?" Zac asked. "We? Who's we?"
"All of us," Ben said. "Jayden, Carter, Nix�oh, and Jess was here."
"What the hell was Jess doing there?" Zac asked.
"She was here with Nix," Ben said. "She and I talked. Sweet girl. It's nice to be in with at least one person in your family." Zac made a face as he took a bite of his burger. "Yeah, anyway, we could have used your help moving."
"Moving? You moved?" Zac asked.
"Yeah," Ben said.
"When were you going to tell me?!" Zac asked.
"Calm down, Zac!"
"Where did you move?"
"Across town. I'm still ten minutes away from you, but it's in the other direction. I just had to get out of that place with my Ma, you know? I looked into apartments and stuff and this morning I caught my mother before I left for school. She didn't say anything to me so just before I left I told her 'Hey, guess what, you forgot my birthday. I'm moving out.' She really didn't seem to care."
"Whoa, whoa," Zac said. "You're by yourself? You moved out?"
"Yeah!"
"Oh my God, Ben!" Zac said. "Can you afford this?"
"Of course I can! I have a job now," Ben said. Zac paused.
"Ben, you're a waiter."
"What, and you think I can't afford this apartment on a waiter's salary?"
"No!" Ben sighed.
"You're right, I can't by myself," Ben said. "I talked to my father. When I complained about my mother and said I wanted to move out, he offered to pay for my new apartment." It was the first time Ben had spoken of his father. "It's not much but it's just me here, you know? I don't need a lot. It's in a nice neighborhood, though."
"Well that's good."
"Who're you talking to, Ben?" Zac recognized Jess's voice.
"Your brother."
"Hi Zac!" Jess said into the phone. "How was your photo shoot?"
"Do you want to talk to him?" Ben asked.
"Sure," Jess said. The phone was switched over. "Hey, Zac, Mom mentioned you were doing an underwear ad. I don't want to see that."
"Well then don't look, okay?" Zac asked, smiling. He hadn't spoken to his sister since he left either. "And don't go to Times Square, because apparently I'm going to be on a billboard there."
"Really?" she asked. "A billboard in Times Square?"
"What?!" Ben asked. Jess laughed.
"Zac, your boyfriend's freaking out."
"I am not freaking out!"
"Zac's going to be half naked, fifty feet tall, and millions of people will see him every single day!"
"Shut up!" Ben yelled. "Give me the phone. Give it!" Zac overheard the struggle but was frozen. He'd never thought of that; he was going to be in his underwear for millions of people to see every day. He was uncomfortable with just a room of people being able to see him in his underwear, and now everybody who crosses Times Square, tourists and all, would see it. "Baby, make her shut up."
"She's not going to listen to me!" Zac said.
"Ugh, Jess, go find your boyfriend or something," Ben said.
"I was just with him!" Jess said. "We broke in your new bed." Zac's eyes widened, and although Zac knew she was joking he still shook his head and repressed his anger. "But I'll go find him again."
"She was joking, right?" Zac asked Ben.
"Oh, of course she was, honey! Don't be so 'older brother' on her. Now that Bronwyn and Jayden broke up we need a strong female to take her place."
"Yeah, but Ben, that's why we have you," Zac said.
"Funny," Ben muttered. "So, what are you doing now?"
"Right now I'm eating," Zac said. "Well, sort of. I'm scarfing down some McDonald's. I had to skip the sit-down dinner with my brothers because this is the only time I could spare all day and I wanted to call you and say happy birthday."
"Aww�you skipped dinner for me?"
"Not technically. I am eating."
"But you're eating crap fast food when you could be having a nice sit down dinner. Thank you."
"You're worth it," Zac said. "I wish I could be there."
"Yeah, I wish you were here too. But it's okay. I'll see you for Thanksgiving, right?"
"Yeah," Zac said. "I'll be home for a couple of days before we have to come back here, then I'll be back for two weeks at Christmas."
"Oh, great!" That was definitely good to hear. There was no complaining, no fight, just a simple, genuine 'Great!' out of Ben's mouth. "Well I'll be looking forward to that."
"Yeah, me too," Zac said. The door opened and Sheila walked in.
"We gotta go, Zac."
"What? I thought I had, like, ten minutes!" Zac said. She shrugged.
"It's a tight schedule. Let's go." Zac sighed.
"I'll be out in a sec," Zac said. She left. "Baby, I gotta go. Say hi to everybody for me and punch Nix in the face for messing with my little sister."
"I'll say hi but I won't punch anybody. Nix is much stronger than me," Ben said. "I love you."
"I love you too. Bye." Zac hung up the phone and got up. He stuffed a few more fries in his mouth and walked out of the room. Sheila was waiting for him and they left together, resuming Zac's hectic schedule.
It was about halfway through November that Zac's underwear ad started showing up in magazines, as well as on the billboard in Times Square. A few days before Thanksgiving Zac was invited to do an interview for TRL in New York. He agreed to it before he realized that they only asked him to come on the show. He almost wanted to back out of it, realizing it was his first television interview without his brothers, but by that time he was already committed to it.
It was the first time he actually cared about what he was wearing when he went somewhere. This was television, and the last time he'd been on television other people told him what to wear. Unfortunately this wasn't like that and he was freaking out. When he and Sheila were searching through his clothes for what he was going to wear, he said, "I have nothing to wear!" and for the first time he actually felt gay.
"Calm down," Sheila said, picking a stray hair off of Zac's white T-shirt. It was the simplest outfit he had but it looked amazing on him; he had on a pair of the new line of CK jeans with a fitted white T-shirt (from Calvin Klein as well). The only thing that made it stand out was the necklace around Zac's neck that Ben had given him for his birthday. It was a cross on a chain to remind Zac of his roots, as much as Zac hated his parents for being such strict Christians, but also had Zac and Ben's names written on the back, very small so a person would have to look for it to notice it. Zac thought it was the best gift he'd ever gotten, mostly because of the meaning behind it. He loved how a cross, the symbol of everything Christians stood for, could be combined with the "sin" of two men who were in love with each other.
"I'm just a little uncomfortable without my brothers," Zac said, scratching his arm.
"It's okay. You look amazing," Sheila said. Zac thanked her. She lowered her voice. "Now in the unlikely event that anybody asks where you got your necklace, where did it come from?"
"My friend got it for me for my birthday," Zac said. "Just my friend."
"And if it continues on like that," Sheila said, "it will set up the question 'Not your girlfriend?' in which you can truthfully say 'No.' " Zac nodded. "Great." The door opened and a worker with a microphone came inside.
"You're on after the commercial," she said. She handed the microphone to Zac. "Follow me." Sheila gave him a thumbs-up and let him leave. Although Carson Daly no longer hosted TRL, as of late, Zac was pleased to hear that Carson was back at MTV this week and was doing the show today. He didn't like the way the show had changed since he and his brothers guest hosted it years before, but any publicity was good publicity and he was here to have fun.
"All right, our next guest has been here a number of times and with his brothers he was the first to guest host our very own TRL a few years ago. Lately you can see him in every single magazine in the country as the new poster boy Calvin Klein. Please welcome Zac Hanson!" Zac was pushed into the room, surprised at the loud screams of the studio audience. The studio audience was one of the new things Zac didn't like about TRL as of late, but he learned to deal with it.
He walked in and shook Carson's hand. "Hey man," Zac said into the microphone.
"Hey, welcome to the show," Carson said.
"Thanks for having me." Zac stood on the other side of the television that was hanging in the middle of the room. He faced Carson, his back to the glass walls that was the TRL studio. "It's kind of weird being in here alone."
"It's even weirder from this angle," Carson said, gesturing behind Zac. Zac turned around and across the street was his underwear billboard.
"Oh my God, it's me!" Zac said. "Hi me!" He waved at himself. "Man, that picture turned out great. I look damn sexy."
"It's very�bare," Carson said. Zac turned back to him.
"You think?"
"So what were you thinking with that?" Carson asked. "I mean, you just turned eighteen, you've been doing a lot of ads, did you think 'Hey, now I'm legal, I might as well take all of my clothes off?' " Zac laughed.
"No, not quite. When I heard about that I had just finished an interview for a magazine where the woman asked me if I would ever do something like that. I found it ironic, so I just said 'Fine, I'll do it' and then I did it."
"Speaking of which we have the cover of that magazine," Carson said. The television in between Carson and Zac showed the cover of the YM issue Zac was featured in. "I mean, look at you. You're not little Zac Hanson anymore. You've definitely grown up. Do we have that other photo?" Next to the YM photo showed a goofy twelve-year-old Zac, with the gapped teeth, long blonde hair and body of a child. "I mean, look at the difference."
"Yeah, well, it happens," Zac said. "I hit puberty and suddenly I didn't look like a little kid anymore."
"That is definitely true," Carson said. "So you've been doing a lot of work for Calvin Klein lately." Zac nodded. "Are you their new spokesperson or something? Every time I see an ad for Calvin Klein lately it's been you selling it."
"No, not really," Zac said, shaking his head. "I mean they ask and I just kind of do it. I'm not an official anything."
"How'd that come about? Did Calvin just call and say 'Hey, do you want to do an ad?' " Carson asked. Zac shrugged.
"Sort of," Zac said. "Apparently he saw my last TV appearance, and this was back in June, and thought I'd be good to sell some jeans. My publicist asked and, after a little coercing, I agreed to it."
"So when you were first asked, you didn't want to do it?"
"No," Zac said. "Actually, I still need convincing to do anything without my brothers. We always did everything together and now, all of a sudden, it's just me. I don't like all the attention."
"Now some of the ads you've done has caused a bit of controversy," Carson said, ignoring Zac's open invitation to ask about his brothers. Zac was a little disappointed when Carson turned back to just him. "The commercial you did with the model Corrina can only be aired on certain networks after a certain time because viewers thought it was too racy. What are your feelings on that?"
"You know I never thought it was too racy. That idea didn't even cross my mind."
"I could see why; you're rolling around the beach with a half naked beautiful woman," Carson said. Zac laughed.
"Yeah, well I didn't think it was bad. I actually thought it was pretty decent. You know, I was seventeen at the time and it wasn't like you could see anything, but it might put ideas into little kids' minds," Zac said, and snorted. He sounded like his mother. "So I didn't have a problem with the restrictions on it. It's still playing."
"And it's still playing a lot," Carson said. "You can't turn on the television or pick up a magazine without seeing one of your ads. You're everywhere! I mean you're standing here and you're also out there on a billboard! I can't help but wonder what's next for you? Where exactly can you go from here? Are you planning on becoming a full time model with runway shows and everything?"
"Well, Carson, I'm not really a model," Zac said. "I'm just doing some ads and stuff in my free time, how little of that there is these days. I don't exactly see myself doing runway shows and other model type things. I don't know anything about fashion; I'm a musician. The only reason I look good in those ads is because I have people who tell me what to wear. Look at me, I had to dress myself today and I'm wearing the most boring outfit in the world."
"I think you look good. Don't you think he looks good?" Carson asked the audience. They screamed in response. Zac smiled. "So you said you have very little free time, what are you doing?"
"Well I'm in the studio right now with my brothers working on our next album," Zac said, "and that takes up a lot of my time. I actually had to fight to get out here to do this show because I'm so busy out in LA. When I'm not in the studio I'm doing stuff like this or I'm doing another photo shoot."
"What about school? You're, what, a senior now?" Zac nodded.
"Yeah. You kind of fit in school when you can. I do as much school as I possibly can fit in, but sometimes you're just too busy and you get behind."
"Are you good in school? Do you get good grades?" Zac shrugged.
"Sort of," Zac said. "I mean I'm usually too busy to do my homework, so my grades suffer a little bit, but I get mostly A's, a couple of B's here and there�no C's."
"Well that's really good. It's better than I could ever do. Do you plan on going to college?" Zac shook his head. "Why not?"
"Right now I'm able to put school wherever I want to in my schedule. I can do it at night or I can do it in the morning, you know, I can fit it in when it's convenient for me. In college, it's like, you have to go there all the time and you actually have to show up for classes and such. There's just no time."
"That's understandable," Carson said. "Well, thanks for coming on the show. Good luck with the new album and all of the other work you're doing."
"Thank you," Zac said.
"All right, Zac Hanson everybody! When we come back, more of your top ten most requested videos here on TRL." Zac let out a breath away from the microphone. Luckily, nobody mentioned his necklace or even asked if he had a girlfriend. It was good.