"I'm not doing it; I'm not. I'm just going to let us make asses of ourselves because I'm not getting in front of a camera and singing. I'm not Taylor; I can't get in front of a camera and sing," I said, five minutes before we were supposed to go on stage. "I can't do it."
"Zac, you're a moron. Your life for the past seven years has been cameras and now you can't get in front of one to sing a song?" Isaac asked, rolling his eyes. "It's not my fault Taylor lost his voice. It's your fault."
"What? My fault?" I asked. "I didn't do anything!"
"I'm kidding."
"I'm still not doing it." I sat down and folded my arms over my chest, pouting.
"Don't pout, you look like a little kid. You're going to sing the fucking song and that's all there is to it," Taylor whispered from his seat across the room.
"Shut up. You're not going to say a word so you can get your voice back and sing it."
"Zac, I don't get why you're being so uptight about his. We've been on this show a million times," Isaac said. "You've done this before."
"I've hid behind my drums on every show! I haven't been out in front with nothing to hide behind and sing an entire song by myself! I'm not a person who can do this."
"Oh just shut up about it; you're not getting out of singing the song."
"Dammit!" The door opened.
"Okay, it's time to go on stage." My eye flickered to Taylor. He was rolling my drumsticks in between his hands. He can't do the twirl, so he's stuck with rolling them back and forth. He was just going to have so much fun behind those drums and I had to have everyone's eyes on me.
We got up and walked over to the stage. There was a mike stand in the front center of the stage with my name on it. Not literally, but it might as well have a bright blinking sign.
"Zac, you could have at least let your clothes match is everyone's going to be looking at you," Isaac said.
"I match."
"No you don�t. You look horrible!"
"Well what do you want me to do? We're walking to the stage now!"
"Do you have anything on under your shirt?"
"Yeah..."
"Then get rid of the shirt." Ugh. I hated when Isaac was right. But it wasn't my fault! Our stylist picked it out. We'd fire her but she's our mother so we can't. We can stop paying attention, but we can't fire her. So now I was performing in front of everyone with less than usual clothing. Taylor can do the wifebeater thing and get away with it. Me...well we'll find out after tonight.
I stepped up to my mike and looked back to my drum set. Taylor sat down at my seat, hunched over. "Taylor, if you're going to play my drums you could at least sit up straight." He gave me a look. "Well, sit up straight or sing." He sat up straight. I turned back around. I'm so going to bomb this.
It wasn't until after the performance and the interview that I really began to worry about how I did. Isaac told me I was off and Taylor wasn't too happy with how I sang it. I thought I did all right; I did change it a little.
When we got back to the hotel, I really got it laid on thick. Isaac and Taylor came into my room. "What the hell was that? What did you do to that song? You completely butchered it!" Taylor tried to scream, squeaking.
"How could I butcher it? I wrote the Goddamn thing! I think my version was perfectly fine." I said, trying to protect myself. I was getting good at defending myself, because my brothers and I never used to get along. "I was complimented and the crowd loved it. Shut up, you don't want to admit that I could be better than you!"
"You're not better than me, Zac. You will never be better than me. Everybody knows that I am right and you are wrong." What?
"What the hell is up your ass?" I yelled. "And why are you even trying to yell at me? You should be resting your voice so you can actually sing again and not give me the chance to mess it up again."
"You fucked up my song!"
The door opened and Dad walked in with a tape in his hands. "You boys have to listen to this." He put the tape in the stereo across the room.
"What is it?"
"Someone taped it off the radio." He pressed play and girl's voice filled the room.
"Do you have the new Hanson song?" the girl asked.
"Yes we do," the DJ said.
"Do you have the Zac version?" I glanced over at Taylor. He was looking away.
"No we don't."
"Oh...nevermind." Dad turned to me.
"We got about ten of those already and it's barely been an hour," Dad said. "Zac, I think you've got yourself a hit."
"But it's my song!" Taylor squeaked. "He can't take it; it's mine!"
"People don't want to hear yours," I told Taylor. "They liked my performance. You suck."
"Fuck you!"
"Taylor, watch your language," Dad warned.
"But�But Dad! It's my song! Why are you saying he's got a hit? It's my hit!" I turned slightly away from Taylor so he wouldn't see the smile on my face. He didn't seem to notice he was sounding like a four-year-old.
"We're releasing that performance as the single until we can get in the studio and quickly re-record it. You guys have two days next week to do it."
"No!" Taylor said. It was pathetic to hear him speak, especially while whining like this. "It's my song! He can't have it just because I've been working my ass off and happened to lose my voice."
"Taylor, it's not that. He got out there and the crowd loved the way he sang the song," Dad argued. "This is just the song that could boost your career again and that's only going to happen if Zac sings it."
"But�"
"You can't do it anyway so shut up and go to your room!" Taylor stood there a moment, shocked, before he left. "You too, Ike, I need to talk to Zac." Isaac left, grumbling.
"What is this about?"
"You boys haven't seen the new album in its entirety yet, have you?" Dad asked. I shook my head. It was a rarity that we didn't see the album completed, but the three of us didn't expect anything different than what we put in. "Well, I think you should see it."
He handed me a copy of the album. I sat down and opened it up. It looked like what I had expected�pictures, lyrics and various clippings. "Look at the lyrics." I looked at the lyrics; they didn't seem any different than what I expected. I looked at the song title and directly under it was Z. Hanson. Just me. I looked over all the other songs. Just Z. Hanson. Nothing else.
"They're giving me the musical credit."
"We decided that since you wrote all the songs, you should get all the credit." Taylor and Isaac were so not going to like this. "And even though Taylor was against it, we put in your whole thank-yous." I flipped to the thank you page. Mine, of course, was the longest. I didn't read it, not yet at least. I turned the page and the first thing I saw was 'All songs written and composed by Zac Hanson.'
"You know Taylor and Ike are going to kill me for this. It doesn't give them any credit whatsoever."
"It's technically your album. You just don't sing. I personally thing it was a good move to have you sing the single. We're already getting more popularity than ever before."
"I don't know if I like this."
"The album comes out tomorrow. Let's see what comes of it." He left. I closed the lyric book. The front picture was enough to upset my brothers. They were in the background and I was standing in the foreground. They hated when I was in the middle, but now I was definitely the center of attention. The only thing that made me smile was that I was turned sideways and I could see the pack of cigarettes in my pocket.
I put the book down and ignored it. I wasn't happy.
"Baby I am so proud of you! You're great!" Lauryn told me, after I called her a few days later. "You did so great."
"Yeah, I know." Our album, because of my performance, was now number one in the country. Number one! Could you imagine that? Just because I was singing a song meant for Taylor. "When Billboard comes out tomorrow, our album will be number one."
"No way! Really?"
"Seriously."
"Baby, that's amazing!" Yeah...amazing. Everything's so amazing. Suddenly everybody wants to talk to me like I'm some undiscovered talent or whatever. I've sung a solo on every album we've had so far. This is just proof no one listens to our albums. So I'm this prodigy now, I'm some great singer and writer that suddenly gets credit for stuff I don't want credit for to begin with. This is just setting me apart from my brothers. Suddenly I'm getting a lot of hype from everyone and they all want me, me, me. I don't want that! I don't know what they're going to do to me.
"Baby, are you all right?"
"Yeah, I'm fine." The door opened and Taylor came in, looking very upset with me. He threw the CD case at me. I ducked and it hit the wall with an astounding thud.
"What the hell is that?" he asked. His voice was coming back, but he still couldn't yell.
"Lauryn, I have to go. I'll talk to you later."
"Okay. Bye."
"Bye." I hung up the phone. "What the hell is what? What'd I do?"
"You know exactly what you did. Suddenly every single song credit is given to you! It's like we don't have any talent anymore! You get all the credit."
"I didn't do anything, Taylor. It was Dad's idea to give me the credit for the songs that I wrote anyway! You didn't do anything." He slapped me across the face.
"Don't raise your voice to me!"
"You will not go back to hitting me again, Taylor. You are not any better than me." He raised his hand again and I caught it before he could hit me. He swung with his other first and it connected with my stomach, knocking the wind out of me. I punched him back, surprising him.
"You're not supposed to fight back," he told me. I punched him the face. He hit me back, starting a brawl. A few minutes later, my father walked in when I'd just punched him and he fell to the ground.
"Boys! What's going on?" he yelled. Taylor sat up and wiped the blood from his lip. "What happened that you two are fighting?"
"Dad, we always fight," I said.
"No, you used to always fight. You haven't fought at all lately! I thought you boys were finally getting along, but I guess I was wrong." I sat down on my bed, wiping at dripping blood from my cheek. "You have a performance tomorrow and both of you are completely beat up. I'll send your mother in here to clean you up, Zac."
"No, don't worry Mom," I said. "She doesn't need to see us like this. I can do it myself."
"She's going to see it tomorrow, Zac. It's either tell her now or have her find out tomorrow." I sighed. I really didn't want her to know; it'd upset her too much. But Dad left and Mom came in shortly after. Taylor didn't take his scathing eyes off me until she spoke.
"Oh, boys, why'd you do it?" The disappointment in her voice was so prominent I wanted to cry. No, I wanted to shoot Taylor for provoking me to do this to him. "Taylor, go back to your room. Your father wants a word with you." Taylor grumbled and got up.
"This wouldn't have happened if you didn't favor Zac so much," he said to Mom. "Give the rest of us some credit." He left.
"What was the fight about?" Mom asked, not affected by Taylor's words at all.
"The fact that you favor me so much." Mom shook her head.
"We don't favor you."
"Then why am I given all the credit for the album? That's what Taylor was upset about."
"I'm sure there's more."
"No there's not! He came in here, threw the album at me, and yelled at me for getting all the credit." I couldn't believe she was actually denying this. "You do favor me because I'm always the target. And I'm always the target because you favor me."
"We don�t�"
"You do." I stood up. "I can do this by myself. Please, I'm seventeen, I can take care of myself and I don't need you to help me."
"Fine," Mom said. She left. Did they not get it? This smothering, this babying, it was getting too far. Yeah I want my parents around for a little while longer but they're favoring me. I hate it. I'm not even the youngest!
I walked into the bathroom and turned on the light. I blinked at the sudden brightness�I guess my room had been dark. I looked up at myself. Shit, I thought. He got me good. And I'm supposed to go in front of the camera like this? I had my upper lip split and my cheek was swollen. I'm sure I had some bruises on my stomach and chest, but I wouldn't have to worry about them showing on TV. I knew tomorrow I'd have a nasty bruise on the side of my face.
I might as well call Lauryn back. I went back in my room, wiping at my lip. It was continuing to bleed. I picked up the phone, grabbing a tissue and pressing it against my lip. I dialed her number (being such the good boyfriend I am, I already memorized it) and waited for her to pick up.
"Hey Lauryn, it's me."
"Hi Zac. What happened? Taylor sounded really upset at you."
"He was. We got into a fight and my lip won't stop bleeding."
"I'd come over and kiss it but I have no idea where you are right now," she admitted. "Where are you?"
"I think we're in New York." I looked out the window. "Yeah, we're in New York."
"Well I'm still at home. When are you coming back?" she asked. I could hear the hope in her voice that I'd be coming home soon.
"Soon."
"How soon is soon? Soon like next month or soon like next week? There's a big difference."
"Two weeks," I said. She sighed. "Honey, we still got a lot of promoting to do. People already seem to be buying the album, but they want to see us on television. I'm just trying to please some fans."
"What are you going to say about your lip?"
"Huh?"
"The first question you're going to get asked is 'what happened to you?' Are you going to say you got into a fight with your brother? That won't look good."
"Well Taylor's pretty beat up too. It's really the only excuse."
"You can think of something to explain that. You and Taylor are starting boxing classes."
"Yeah, like we'd start boxing classes in the middle of the tour." The door opened and Isaac walked in, a smile on his face.
"Guess what," he said.
"Ike, I'm on the phone!" I yelled at him. "Don't tell me you're in here to beat me up too!"
"No..." he gave me a look. "What happened to you?"
"It's not important. What do you want? I hate being interrupted."
"Our album just went triple platinum!"
"Oh, great," I muttered, and sat down on my bed. "Did you hear that, Lauryn? Our album just went triple platinum! That means three million people knows that the entire credit to the album went to me when it shouldn't have."
"Zac, you wrote the album. You should get credit for it," Isaac said. Did Isaac really say that? He was actually okay with the fact that he didn't get any credit for the album?
"Are you serious?" I asked him.
"Yeah. You wrote it; I didn't. You should get the credit for."
"Tell that to Taylor, he beat me up for it."
"I'm sure he's worse off," Isaac said. "Well, I thought you'd like to know. Bye." I waved as he walked out the door.
"So, babe," I said, sighing. "How you doing?"