"Ike!!!" Gracie ran to her boyfriend and threw her arms around him, embracing him tightly. Tears rushed to her eyes as she felt his arms around her waist, drawing her in closer until her body was pressed against his. She squeezed her eyes shut tight, not wanting to cry again. She'd cried so many times today�she felt his lips find hers and the tears slipped out of her eyes and down her cheeks.
He pulled away and her eyes fluttered open to find him staring back at her. "No, honey, don't cry�" he told her. It didn't help at all as she only felt herself cry harder until she was sobbing against his chest, her hands gripping the front of his shirt. "It's all right, Gracie. You're home now. We can't go anywhere if you're crying."
"I don't want to go anywhere. I just want to be with you," she said, her sobs easing up. She let go of his shirt and put her arms around his neck again. "I missed you so much�"
"I missed you too, Gracie."
"Bring me upstairs," she said. He smiled and picked her up, bringing her up the stairs to her room. He'd only seen her room once or twice, and each time it was completely trashed. He'd never seen it clean. When he opened the door, he was amazed at how big the room looked when it was clean�how everything was so organized. It seemed so unlike Gracie. "It'll never be this clean again so appreciate it while it lasts." He set her down on the bed and the two lay together, staring into each other's eyes.
He didn't ask what was wrong with her, which she had expected to be the first thing out of his mouth when he saw her. They began to talk, mostly of his success and what was going on with him, and he avoided talking about her until she brought it up.
"Are you even going to ask what's wrong with me?" she asked, getting upset. He was being so nice. She couldn't stand it. She wanted him to be rude and ask he where she's been the past month and a half, why she wasn't home and what was going on in her head.
"I didn't want to bring it up."
"Why?"
"Because I don't know if you're comfortable talking about it. I didn't want to ask if you weren't."
"Well I'm fine with it." He still didn't ask. "Ask what's wrong with me!"
"What's wrong with you, Gracie?" She sighed. After all that, she wasn't quite sure she wanted to tell him.
"I'm not sure I want to tell you." He rolled his eyes and sat up.
"You go through all that, asking me to ask you and you don't even want to tell me? That's why I didn't want to ask, because I knew you didn't want to say anything." She sat up and held onto him, her eyes gazing up at his.
"I was getting annoyed because I know you want to know but you're too polite to ask. I'm fine with talking about it, but the doctor told everyone else what it was and I don't know how to start. I didn't get to see anybody's reaction so I don't know how you're going to react to it. I�I just think you're going to treat me different because I have something wrong with me."
"I'm not going to act any different, Gracie. It's obviously not contagious or otherwise you wouldn't be hanging on me like this, so there's nothing to worry about."
"No�it's not contagious."
"What is it, Gracie?"
"I have schizophrenia." He gave her a blank look. "Do you know what that is?" He shook his head. "I don't know all of the facts because I haven't been able to research it yet, but there's something wrong with my brain which causes hallucinations and delusions�which is where Bob comes from. Bob was a voice in my head that controlled me, he told me what to do and how to act. I couldn't fight him. There were more of them, but Bob was the one who was with me all the time. He didn't let me eat or sleep and he told me to cut myself all over. He tricked me. He said if I cut myself he'd go away and when I did, he'd still be there. He was the one who made me skip school and be mean and moody towards everyone. He showed up the day I met you."
"I didn't have anything to do with it, did I?" he asked. She shook her head, smiling.
"No, not at all. It was just coincidence. I'd been acting weird a few days before I met you, but he was my first hallucination and he happened to speak for the first time when I met you. He always tried to get me to have an episode around you but I never let him. I flipped out against my sisters, my parents, and everyone at school, but I never let him get to you. You don't know how hard that was. He kept telling me to do all these things and I wouldn't�and when I got home I'd get the brunt of it. Finally I snapped and I wanted it all to end. The only way I knew how was to kill myself. I didn't know it was an illness, I didn't know there was ways to help me. I thought I was going crazy and that was my biggest fear." She took in a deep, shaky breath as Isaac held her in his arms. "I thought they were going to send me away and I'd never see anybody again. Technically that's what happened, for a month and a half I was sent away to the mental hospital and that's where I found out what was wrong with me and I that I could be helped. Bob hated it in there and before they gave me medication to get rid of him, I tried every way possible to kill myself but I was being constantly monitored so I couldn't. But then the medication began to work and I began to feel more like myself. I've been Bob-free for a month now."
"That's wonderful, sweetie."
"You don't think I'm crazy, do you?" she asked, softly.
"Of course not." The words were plain, but coming from him they were comforting. He'd been able to do that with her, even when she wasn't on her medication. He was able to calm her down, make her think rationally and forget that she'd ever had a problem in the world.
"So I was listening to your album earlier�" she said, moving away from her problems.
"Oh no."
"No, I liked it! It's not exactly what I normally listen to, but it was still really good. I love A Minute Without You to death because my baby sings it�" she paused to kiss him before continuing. "�but I think my favorite song is Weird. After I listened to the whole album I put it on again and stuck it on repeat for about two hours. It's going to sound weird, but that song just triggers something in me�that song explains every emotion I felt before I went to the hospital. It kind of makes me feel that I'm not all alone in the world."
"You're not alone, Gracie. I'm here."
"Yeah, I know you are, but you're going to be leaving soon. You'll be off doing whatever it is that you do and I'll be here thinking about you. I'm going to miss you when you're gone, honey."
"Can we not think about me leaving so soon? I just got back and we can spend all weekend together." She nodded, looking away. She was surprised when he stood up. "Gracie, let's go somewhere. You've spent the past month and a half cooped up inside and now all you want to do is lie around? I'm not going to let you be lazy like that any longer."
"Honey�"
"Come on. We can see a movie, or just go to the movies and make out in the corner�" She smiled. "I saw that. Let's go, I don't want to lie around all night when we could be doing something." He held out his hand to her. She reluctantly looked up at him. "Gracie, we're going somewhere."
"Oh, all right."
She got up off the bed and held his hand as they walked out of the room. She stopped at the living room to tell her mother she was leaving, and then they were off. When they got to the movies (Gracie couldn't think of anything else to do), Gracie smiled at the notion of being in society again.
Gracie squirmed. This was actually the first time she'd met the Hanson family. Although her family was already good friends with theirs, she'd been living in a hospital room for the past month and a half and wasn't included in the familiarity of it. Sarah had mentioned that they'd done this before, considering the parents were all so close as of recently. That meant Ren� and Sarah had already met the family and Gracie was stuck being nervous about meeting all of them.
Apparently the family was huge. Along with the other two brothers that were in the band with Isaac, there were also two younger sisters and yet another younger brother. That totaled to six children. And Gracie thought three had been bad. Well, three could be bad, if the three came at the same time.
"They're all really nice," Sarah reassured Gracie. "Even the little ones are polite. Zac gets weird when he's nervous but as the night goes on he'll settle down. Taylor's pretty shy and you know Isaac."
"You know them well enough to know how they get when they're nervous?! This is what I get for falling off the face of the earth for a month and a half. My sisters know my boyfriend's family better than I do," Gracie said. Sarah gave her a look. "I'm sorry. I'm just nervous about meeting them and the circumstances are all so weird. Everybody knows everybody already except for me and I don't like it. I feel like an outsider and the last thing I need is to feel like an outsider."
"You're not an outsider. They're a lovely bunch of people. They can make you feel welcome immediately. That's why we know them so well, because we warmed up to them right away. You'll love them."
"Are they all as sweet as Isaac?"
"Even sweeter," Sarah said. She'd been reassuring Gracie for the past fifteen minutes now. It was getting annoying, but she understood what the girl was going through. She'd had enough problems trying to get adjusted back to a normal life and now she felt like an outsider in her own friends and family, which was a main symptom of her problem to begin with.
The doorbell rang and Gracie jumped. "That must be Isaac. He said he'd come early," she said and got up. She smoothed out her skirt and walked to the door. Before she opened it, she ran her fingers through her hair and checked herself out. She opened the door and smiled at Isaac. "Hi honey."
"Hi. You look beautiful." He kissed her and stepped inside. He immediately noticed how nervous she was. "Calm down, sweetheart, you're going to love them and they're going to love you."
"Oh how do you know that?" she asked, turning away. "I'm not like the rest of my family. I'm not like anybody else." Isaac felt unsure of what to do. Her sisters had mentioned to him that she'd be acting weird until she got completely used to her medication and the side effects, but he wasn't sure if this was part of it.
"Gracie, don't be so down on yourself. They'll love you, and do you know why?" he asked, reaching from behind her and taking both her hands in his. She shook her head, looking away. "Because I love you." She turned to him, a small smile on her face.
"Really?" He nodded. "Oh honey I love you too." She threw her arms around him and kissed him, feeling completely sure of herself for the first time since before she met him. He had something about him, she couldn't quite pinpoint it, but there was just something about him that made her feel special and not such of an outcast that she'd always thought herself to be.
The whole idea of her being an outcast was silly, really. All her life she'd had two doubles of herself running around, people always getting her confused with her sisters until they dyed their hair so they could be told apart. All her life she'd strived to be an individual and now she'd do just about anything to get back to that.
They walked hand in hand to the living room where Sarah had accumulated in front of the television. "Where's Ren�?" Gracie asked. She almost felt her heart breaking as Sarah involuntarily flinched at the sound of her voice. Gracie hadn't meant to pick on her so much. She hadn't meant to do any of the things she did while Bob was around, but Sarah was just the insecure feeble one, so Gracie found her an easy target. There was so many things she did to Sarah, she'd called her every name she knew and yelled at her and made her feel even worse about herself�she'd done everything except hit the girl and that was enough to scar her for life.
"She's around. I think she might be upstairs finishing up her make-up." Sarah glanced at Isaac and then back to Gracie. "She has a little crush on Taylor."
"Well she better not be putting on too much, we can't pull off the triple thing if she changes too much."
"What triple thing?" Isaac asked.
"Well, honey, we were going to do it for you, but you came too early and Ren� isn't quite ready yet. Sarah, stand up." Sarah stood up and Gracie stood beside her. Isaac immediately noticed they were dressed the same, down to the very last detail in their makeup, but in different colors that matched their hair. Isaac felt that he was looking at two different shades of the same person.
"Oh�"
"Yeah. I want to make a cute first impression, and there's no better way to do that than to fool people." Gracie said. "I'm going to check on Ren�." She excused herself and ran up the stairs to see where Ren� was. The bathroom door was closed and Gracie lightly rapped on the door. "Ren�? What, did you fall in?"
"No, Gracie. You can come in." Gracie opened the door and walked inside. Ren� was applying her makeup, trying very hard to hide her nervousness from Gracie.
"Honey, I'm the one who's supposed to be nervous here, not you."
"Taylor's coming, you know." Gracie stood next to Ren� and looked at the both of them in the mirror. "I want to look good for him."
"You look beautiful, Ren�. You look exactly like me. Remember we're not supposed to look different! After we greet them you can come back up here and put on some more makeup, but you're putting on too much right now." Ren� stopped and turned to Gracie, smoothing out a wrinkle in her pale yellow dress. "Just put on the lipstick and let's go downstairs. They'll be here soon."
"Is Isaac here already? I thought I heard the doorbell�"
"Yeah he's here and I don't want to keep him waiting downstairs with Sarah. She'll bore him to death in the next five minutes." Ren� applied her lipstick then put all her scattered tubes of makeup away. "Come on." The two walked down the stairs and into the living room. Sarah was chatting away and Isaac was trying to look amused.
"�and the chick said to me 'No, Australopithecus made tools and stood upright, you're wrong.' " Isaac looked to Gracie, sort of a 'help me' look on his face.
"Sarah are you boring him with your stupid facts that nobody cares about?" Gracie interrupted, sitting between them on the couch. She looked to Isaac. "At least she's pretty."
"Some people find anthropology exciting."
"Yeah, you. I'm sorry she bothered you, honey." Sarah stuck her tongue out at Gracie then turned away. Ren� sat on the other side of Isaac, and as soon as her butt hit the couch the doorbell rang.
"I'll get it!" she said, and got up again. Gracie pulled her back down.
"No you won't. You know the plan. Mom will get it and when she calls us we'll all go in there together." The girls waited on the couch until Mrs. Cole called out for them.
"Girls!" The three got up, Isaac trailing behind, and walked in the same fashion towards the foyer. They lined up, hands behind their backs and smiled at the people who had accumulated by the door.
"Hi," the three said in unison. Everyone looked over and Gracie bit her lip to hide her giggles as everybody did sort of a double take. At that time Mrs. Cole, who didn't know what the girls had done, looked over and shook her head.
"Girls�I thought I told you to stop doing that. It freaks people out."
"We didn't do anything, Mom," they said in unison again. Mrs. Cole looked sternly at them.
"Sarah and Ren�, go set the table. Gracie come here and meet everyone." Sarah and Ren� left the room and Gracie took a step forward to the people she'd been waiting to meet. "Gracie, this is Diana and Walker Hanson�" Gracie shook their hands with a polite smile and a 'nice to meet you.' "And their children, Taylor, Zac, Jessica, Avery, and Mackenzie." Gracie went down the line, properly greeting every one of them. "So, let's go into the other room."
They began to walk to the other room, Gracie noticing that Taylor was trailing slightly behind. She stopped, letting Isaac go ahead with the others. "What's the matter, pretty boy?" she asked him, smiling. He looked up, looking somewhat like a deer caught in headlights by the mere thought of conversing. "Come on, you can't become a great rock star if you're shy."
"I'm not shy."
"Well that's my first impression. Prove me wrong, pretty boy."
"My name is Taylor."
"I'm just joking with you, Taylor. I'm extremely nervous and this is how I break the tension."
"There's no reason to be nervous. Anyone Ike talks about that much has got to be a good person." She blushed. "At least you're not like Zac when he gets nervous. He won't calm down�we're thinking about putting him on Ritalin."
"All the more to make me want to get to know the boy." She paused. "You guys are close, aren't you?"
"Aren't you close with your sisters?" he asked.
"Not as much as we used to be. I guess because we're identical we try to steer clear from each other in an effort to find our own individuality."
"Nicely put."
"You didn't answer my question."
"Yeah," he said, as the two began to walk towards the living room. "We're pretty close. I guess it's because we have to share a room and stuff. There's so many of us we kind of have to. I don't mind, it's almost always been that way. But I can understand where you're coming from on trying to be an individual. I guess I've always been overshadowed by Ike and now I'm trying to pull myself through."
"I'm the oldest," Gracie told him. "I'm supposed to be the one setting the example and everything, but I haven't been doing a good job so far. I guess you've heard about me."
"I don't think any less of you because you're schizophrenic." She stopped.
"How did you know I'm schizophrenic?"
"I just kind of figured it out. Ike tells me about you and what you've been doing�I was interested and I did a little research and found out. But I still don't think any less of you." She shook an awkward feeling away.
"Just don't tell anybody about it, okay? It's bad enough people know I have a problem, I don't want them to know exactly what it is."
"If it helps any, Isaac refuses to tell me what the problem is. He doesn't know I figured it out."
"It helps a little." She walked ahead of him and into the living room, taking a seat down next to Isaac. A slight smile came to her face as Taylor realized the only available spot left in the room was right next to Ren�. He sat down and Gracie shared a smile with her sister.
"Hi Taylor, how are you doing? I haven't seen you in a while�" Gracie didn't quite understand the attraction to Taylor. He most definitely was a classic pretty boy, his long blonde hair and bright blue eyes only accented that. Adding to the fact he was two years younger than Ren� only made it more confusing.
"Oh she is so flirting," Gracie whispered to Isaac. He looked over and a smile crossed his face. Ren� was twirling a piece of her hair in her fingers as she spoke with Taylor. "They seem to be getting along quite well."
"He adores her." She lifted an eyebrow. "Maybe it's just the attention from an older woman."
"No, he thinks she's hot," she said, reassuringly.
"Really?" he asked. "You think so?"
"Oh, yeah! Ren� is my identical twin, of course he thinks she's hot. I'm hot, therefore so is she."
"And what makes you think Taylor thinks you're hot?" he asked. She gave him a look. "I'm just saying, my brother and I have very different tastes."
"Shut up. I'm sexy and you know it," she said, giggling.
"Don't even pull the self-confidence thing, Gracie. It doesn't become you," an all-too familiar voice said from the back of her mind.
Gracie went pale.