In the morning Kris was looking massively hot and I couldn't do anything about it. She wasn't wearing a bra and she had on killer makeup. She bent down in front of me often, either sticking her ass in my full view or letting me see down her shirt. It was pissing me off and I found out that now Ginger had taken the bet, and now they were all against me.
It was Jenny's first birthday and Ginger was following her daughter around with a camera everywhere the little girl went. Jenny's been standing up a lot lately; she'll be walking pretty soon. That's about right; I remember Zo� started walking when she was about twelve or thirteen months old.
"Ginger, bloody hell, you don't need to take a million pictures," Kris said, walking into the room. "She looks exactly the same as she did five minutes ago."
"Yeah, but she's standing up now," Zac pointed out.
"Oh God�" Kris sat down next to me, handing me the drink she'd gotten me. "Taylor, baby, when we become parents, please don't let me act like that." She put her hand on my leg, dangerously close to forbidden territory.
"What the hell do you think you're doing?" I asked her.
"What?" she asked. "I'm not doing anything!" Ginger looked up.
"Oh, come on, guys, not here!" she said. "I don't want to see that and I'm taking a lot of pictures; I don't want to look through my photo albums ten years from now and see you two feeling each other up."
"Kris is feeling me up," I said. "I'm not doing anything."
"Oh, come on, I just needed a place to rest my hand," Kris said, giving me an innocent smile.
"Do you know what it looks like to me?" I asked. "It looks like you're trying to make a pass at me. And if you are, then all of you owe me lots of money."
"Do we have specifics on this?" Zac asked.
"No," I said. "But we should."
"All right," Kris said, moving her hand off my leg. "If you�"
"Or you," I pointed out. She rolled her eyes.
"If one of us admits it, then it's over. If we touch it, on purpose, then it's over," she said.
"What exactly is this 'it?' " Zac asked. I gave him a look. "I just want to clarify. If we don't clarify, then someone's going to get off on a technicality." Ginger started laughing. "Oh, grow up, Ginger. You're a fricken romance novelist."
"I'm sorry," she said.
"Okay, okay," I said. "We can't touch my penis or her vagina. Everybody clear?" Ginger was still laughing and suddenly she let out a loud snort, causing everyone to look at her.
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry�"
"Ginger, you're�"
"I know! I'm a romance novelist and a mother, I should be grown up by now. I'm sorry." Zac shook his head. The front door opened and Isaac walked in.
"Ike!" I said. He looked over at me, and then at Zac across the room. From what I could see, he didn't know Zac and I were here.
"Hi�everybody," he said almost reluctantly. "Hey Roni, come in here." A girl about Isaac's age, brown hair, brown eyes and tanned skin walked into the house. She looked just as Hispanic as Kris was, which made me wonder where Isaac met her. I didn't know what I was supposed to do. I didn't know if he'd let me get up and give him a hug and the same went for Zac, who looked at me quite puzzled.
"Oh, I didn't know everybody was going to be here," she said. She turned to Isaac, "Honey, introduce me."
"All right�Roni, this is Zac," he said, gesturing to Zac across the room. Zac waved. "And Taylor. I'm afraid I don't know the girls."
"Hi," Ginger said, getting up and taking the initiative to walk over to the two of them. "I'm Ginger, Zac's wife."
"Wife?" Isaac asked. "When did that happen?"
"May," Ginger said. Kris got up and walked over to them as well.
"I'm Kris," she said, waving a bit. "Taylor's soon-to-be wife."
"Wait a minute," Roni said, looking between Kris and Ginger. "You two live in Tampa, don't you?"
"Well, we used to," Ginger said. "We live in New York now. How do you�no!" She put her hands over her mouth. "Veronica Davis?"
"Oh my God!" Roni said, doing the same. "Kris and Ginger! Oh my God I never thought I'd see you two again when I moved!" The girls hugged and screamed a little bit, which confused the hell out of me.
"Um�" I said. "Hello?"
"Oh! I'm sorry!" Kris said. "Um, to clarify, when Ginger and I were younger we spent gobs and gobs of our time at the mall. Most of that time we were at the Gap, where Roni worked. For about three or four years Roni was, like, our best friend, but then she moved!" At the table, Jenny fell into a sitting position and started crying.
"Oh, Jenny," Ginger said, turning around. She picked her daughter up.
"Ginger, you had a baby?" Roni asked.
"Oh, yeah," Ginger said. "This is Jenny. She's a year old today."
"Really? Oh wow, happy birthday Jenny," Roni said, taking Jenny's little hand and giving her a smile. Roni looked up to Ginger and nodded over to Zac.
"Yeah," she said. "She's his."
"What's with the screaming?" my mother asked, walking into the room. "Oh, hi kids."
"Hi Mom," Roni said. "Sorry about the screaming; I haven't seen Kris and Ginger in a really long time."
"Oh, so you know each other?" my mother asked. Roni nodded. "Great. Isaac honey why don't you go over and say hi to your brothers? You haven't seen them in over a year."
"I'd rather not," Isaac said, and with that he left the room. Roni huffed.
"I'm sorry," she said to Zac and me. "He's a bit bitter. It's great seeing the two of you again!" She gave a smile to Kris and Ginger before running around of the room. "Honey, what did I tell you about being rude to your family?" My mother walked over to Ginger and said a happy birthday to her granddaughter.
I didn't even see Isaac or Roni until around three o'clock when Ginger decided to do cake and Roni dragged Isaac into the kitchen. "Is she even going to be able to blow out the candles?" Jessica asked.
"Candle," Ginger corrected. "She's only a year old. And, no, she probably won't, but I'll do it for her. It's tradition! It's her first birthday! A year ago today I was screaming my lungs out."
"Yeah," I said. "For ten minutes."
"It wasn't ten minutes," Ginger said, giving me a look.
"Excuse me, seven minutes."
"Was it really seven minutes?" my mother asked.
"No," Ginger said. "From the time I got there to the time Jenny was born it was, um, twelve minutes."
"Are you serious?" Ginger nodded. "That's so not fair. I've had seven kids and let me tell you, none of them came out in twelve minutes." Ginger shrugged.
"Just lucky I guess." Ginger sat down in front of the cake with Jenny in her lap. Jenny reached out to touch the cake but Ginger held her back. "Not yet, sweetie, we've gotta sing before we can eat the yummy cake." Ginger smiled. "She just wants to mash her hands in the icing. It was the same way for Zac's birthday."
Zac lit the candle (that was in the shape of a big number one) in the center of Jenny's cake. We all sang, although I felt a little silly singing happy birthday to a girl who could care less and obviously didn't know what was going on. After we sang, Ginger told Jenny to make a wish and then blew out the candle for her. "All right, get her some icing, baby, she's squirming like crazy," Ginger told Zac. Zac cut up the cake, giving Jenny the first piece. My mother had found Zo�'s old high chair and set it out for Jenny. Ginger put her in it and gave her a piece of cake that was mostly icing. Jenny immediately stuck her little hand into it and began to lick her fingers.
"Oh that is so cute," Roni said upon seeing it a minute later. Most of the family had cleared out by now, only showing up to sing and snag a piece of cake. Everybody left except for Kris, Ginger, Zac, Roni, Isaac, and me. Roni and Isaac were only there because Roni insisted. "Baby, when are we going to have kids?"
"Right after you tell your parents we're married." Roni looked a little embarrassed by this but Ginger smiled.
"Don't worry," Ginger said. "My parents don't know I'm married or that I have a child."
"But you're a different story, Ginger," Roni said. "You don't talk to your parents and you never have. I still talk to them often. I just don't want them blowing up over not inviting them to the wedding."
"Well that's the point of eloping," Ginger said. "You don't have to tell anyone you're doing it."
"So I'm guessing the two of you eloped?" Roni asked, pointing a plastic fork at Zac, but looking at Ginger.
"Yeah. It was kind of on a whim sort of thing. You would have heard about it if we didn't elope."
"Probably not," Roni said. "I mean I've been married to this lump for a year." Isaac gave her a look. "Well just look at yourself! When I first met you, you were so energetic and lively, you actually wanted to do stuff. Now you're just�just�there. Now you can continue the way you've been living, moping around the house all the time, or you can talk to your brothers! They're right here!" Isaac looked at me and I waved. "We'll even leave you alone to talk, okay?"
"Roni�"
"You're talking to them, all right? And don't act like you don't because you've been wanting to since they left. Don't make up anything else." Roni got up, Kris and Ginger following suit.
"Baby, keep an eye on Jenny," Ginger said and then looked at Jenny who was covered in white icing. "Never mind, I'll just give her a bath now." Ginger picked up Jenny and brought her out of the room. When the girls left it was the first time I'd been alone in a room with my brothers in a year and a half, but all I wanted to do was leave.
"So�" I said. "How are things?"
"Oh, shut up, Taylor, I'm still pissed off at you," Isaac said.
"Me?" I asked. "Why me? Zac's the one who left!"
"You were the one who slept with Ginger which caused him to leave. It's all your fault." I huffed. "It's true."
"I know it's true," I said. "That's why I'm angry."
"Listen, don't put all the blame on Taylor now," Zac said. "I was still the one who left. I was the one who quit the band and moved to New York without any contact to the either of you."
"Well you might as well taken Ike with you because he never spoke to me again," I said.
"I had good reason not to speak to you again," Isaac said. "If you knew how to control yourself around women, then none of this would have happened. And I'm not putting all the blame on you, yes Zac did leave but it was partially your fault too."
"I know it was my fault. I'm not denying that! Zac and I had made our peace with that and I think you should too."
"Well I still don't have a job and neither do you, so obviously you didn't do a very good job," Isaac said. I sighed.
"Ike, Zac's got a great job producing and he loves that." Zac nodded. "I'm fine not working; Kris and I already decided that she's going to work and I'm going to stay at home. I'm happy; we're both happy. I think it's time that you start being happy too."
"How can I be happy when you two took away the one thing that made me happy? I don't know how to do anything else. Roni's not going to leave the city and I don't want to either, but there are no jobs here for me. I had a job and I was happy, but your loose ethics and your short temper cost me that. I didn't do anything, why the hell did you have to punish me too?"
"Isaac, I'm sorry," Zac said. "There are a million opportunities out there for you, you just have to find one."
"Don't preach to me, Zac."
"Fine. Whatever. But did you ever stop and think about what you would have done if you were me?" Zac asked. "If right now you found out Taylor had been banging your wife�" I shook my head; it always came back to me screwing somebody else's girl. "�then what would you have done? You've got this awesome job offer and all you can think about it getting away, wouldn't you take it? I would and I did and I don't regret that at all."
"Leaving everybody behind as well," Isaac said.
"You know, Ike," I said, "if you can't find a job here, if there's no openings for someone with your credentials, why don't you just create you own job? Start a record company or something�"
"You know, I never thought of that," he said.
"And you never did collect your share of the profits off the last album," I said. "It's still in the bank waiting for you. That's plenty of money to start up your own business." Isaac smiled. It was all I needed.
"Where's Ginger?" I asked. "She stole my watch earlier and I want it back."
"She said she was going to give Jenny a bath. She's probably upstairs." I got up and went upstairs. In the bathroom I could hear splashing.
"Dammit, Jenny�" I opened the door and immediately covered my eyes.
"Oh my God, Ginger, where is your shirt?" I asked. Ginger laughed at my embarrassment.
"Jenny always splashes me so I take it off when I give her a bath," she said. "Oh, come on, Taylor, it's not like you've never seen it before."
"But that doesn't mean I want to see it now!" I yelled. "Zac!!"
"What?" Zac asked. I turned and spread my fingers to look at him. "What the hell is wrong with you now, Taylor?" I nodded towards the bathroom and Zac looked inside. "Ging, baby, put some clothes on. Taylor, grow up." I dropped my hands.
"Oh, yeah, because if I was standing here without my hands over my eyes and you came along, don't tell me you wouldn't be yelling at me."
"Tay," Zac said, shaking his head. "That was a long time ago." He shook his head and walked away. I looked at Ginger and she gave me a smile.
"Get out of here, Taylor." I left the room, closing the door behind me.