Zac walked into his house, swollen and still bloody. He could hear Gwen in another room, so he walked away from the noise and went into the dark living room, where he sat down and put his elbows on his knees again, looking at the floor. He'd been doing nothing but thinking since he got into the elevator and nothing was helping him out. He'd gone to that hotel with the happy thought of seeing Ginger again, and walked out the father of a six-month-old girl and on worse terms with his brother than he ever had been before. On top of that, his face hurt.
"Zac? Is that you?"
He didn't respond. He had tears in his eyes and blood still dripping down his chin and he didn't care. All this time he'd been thinking about Jenny, thinking about Ginger, thinking about Kris and Taylor even that he'd forgotten about Gwen. What the hell was he going to do about Gwen? There was no doubt that he loved her. He'd loved her for a very long time. But, he didn't want to marry her. He'd never wanted to marry her, and he made the mistake of telling her that. Now that he'd discovered he had a child, a relationship with Gwen didn't seem as important as it did three hours ago.
"Zac?" She was at the doorway. He didn't look up. "Honey, what's wrong?" She walked over and knelt down in front of him. He looked up at her and she gasped. "Oh my God, what happened?"
"I�I got into a fight," he said.
"I can see that." She put her hand on the side of his face and he cringed. "Oh, I'm sorry baby. You're all swollen. Let me get something to clean you up." Zac didn't want her to but she did anyway. She came back quickly with a wet washcloth and began to wipe the blood off his face. "Who did this?"
"Taylor." She paused.
"What were you doing talking to Taylor?" Zac didn't respond. "Did you go see Ginger?"
"Yes." She sat back.
"Zac, I told you not to see her."
"There was nothing you could have done to stop me from seeing her, Gwen," Zac said. "I wanted to and I don't regret going at all." Gwen stood up.
"I want you to leave."
"You're forgetting," he said. "This is my apartment." She crossed her arms.
"So what does that mean?" he asked. "Are you kicking me out?"
"You're a supermodel, Gwen," he said. "You have plenty of money to take care of yourself. You can find yourself your own apartment. I'd like it if you were gone by the end of the week."
"I knew this was going to happen," she said, shaking her head. "I knew once you saw her again you were going to get rid of me."
"It's not that, Gwen," he said. "It's not entirely what you think. You knew this was going to happen anyway. You want to get married and I don't. The rest of it just happened to fall at the same time."
"What rest of it?" she asked. "Are you in love with her?"
"It's not her," Zac said, looking up at Gwen. "We have a child."
"Really?" Gwen asked. "When were you planning on telling me?"
"I didn't even find out myself until about an hour ago, so don't even play that card," he said. "I can't just go on living my life the way it is knowing that I have a child. Things changed. Things always change. Unfortunately, you can't come with me on this one."
"Why not?"
"Because I don't want you there."
"Fine," she said, throwing the washcloth at him. "I'll move out. In fact, I'll do it right now." She went into the bedroom and immediately began to pack. He resumed his pose, ignoring her slams and curses and every other noise that she was making in her rage. She emerged a few minutes later with two suitcases in both of her hands. "I'll come back for the rest of my things when you're not here," she said.
"Gwen, where the hell are you going to go?" he asked. "You can stay here."
"No, I am not going to stay here," she said. "You don't want me here and I don't want to be here any longer. I'm going to a friend's." She opened the door and left, slamming the heavy door behind her. Zac jumped. He didn't know what just happened. They'd just broken up. He screamed loud in frustration and got up, walking to the bedroom. He was exhausted.
He took off his shirt and threw it into the hamper, then walked into the bedroom. It was routine for him by now. Take off shirt, wash face, brush teeth, take off pants, go to bed. But when he got into the bed it was entirely too empty. Gwen had only taken what she could carry in clothes and cosmetics. Everything else in the room still reeked of her. He could smell her scent in the sheets and could see random strands of hair on the pillowcases. It was too much. He took his pillow and went into the guest bedroom. The bed was smaller and the memory of his now ex-girlfriend was not there. There all he could think of was his six-month-old daughter and Ginger.
The next day Zac was out all day because he knew Gwen would come back to get the rest of her things. He drove around for a while, stopped off at the studio to supervise a record that was being recorded and he was mentioned as a producer, then sat in a park for about two hours thinking about what he was going to do next.
It was six o'clock when he stopped off at home to see how Gwen had done. She was gone and so were all of her things. She didn't have a lot of things in the main part of the house. It was hard to discern what exactly was hers considering she bought everything that belonged to her with his money. She barely took anything in the main part of the house. Once he went into the bedroom, it was a completely different story. She'd taken her pillows, her dresser; her closet was completely empty and so was the counter in the bathroom where all of her makeup used to be. It seemed so bare; Zac couldn't take it so he left again. This time he actually knew where he was going.
He knocked on Ginger's door and waited for her to answer. When she did, she scowled but let him come inside. "I don't even know why you bothered to show up," she said, taking Jenny from her playpen. She walked back over to Zac. "Would you like to hold her? You haven't exactly met formally yet."
"Yeah�" Zac took Jenny in his arms and looked at her. He could see himself in her and that was a scary feeling. He wanted to cry. He'd had that feeling a lot lately. He sat down with her.
"That was a ballsy thing you did yesterday, going over there and hitting Taylor like that."
"I was emotional," Zac said. "I was planning on apologizing after I left here."
"Well that's good," Ginger said, sitting down on the bed. "I don't think you understand what you put Taylor through, Zac. He loves you to death and all he ever wanted was for you to forgive him. He knows he made a mistake. So do I. You obviously are able to forgive me, otherwise you wouldn't have come over."
"That is true."
"She likes you," Ginger said, nodding to Jenny. "I think she knows who you are." Zac smiled and looked over at Ginger. She was still as beautiful as she was when he first saw her, and with a new baby that was a hard thing to accomplish.
"You look wonderful, Ging," he told her. She blushed and looked away.
"Shut up."
"No, I'm serious! You look absolutely beautiful."
"That's just because my tits are twice the size they used to be."
"No, it's not," he told her. "Although that doesn't hurt." She rolled her eyes. "Ging, I need to ask you something."
"Yes?"
"Well�it's not really a question, it's more of a request." She raised an eyebrow. "I want you and Jenny to come live with me. At least while you're out here shooting your movie."
"Zac, I don't know," she said, shaking her head. "What about your girlfriend?"
"Oh," Zac said. "We broke up."
"You didn't! You did not break up with her because of�"
"No, no!" Zac said. "Sort of. I was going to do it before I came over here, it was just, after I did come over here I did it sooner than I thought I would."
"Zac�" she said, still shaking her head. "What about Kris and Taylor? I'm not going to just leave them out here."
"I have a guest room," Zac said. "Unfortunately."
"Fine," she said, sitting up. "I'll stay with you, but I have a few conditions."
"All right."
"I'm not sleeping with you," she said, giving him a stern look.
"Okay."
"You will get along with your brother."
"Okay."
"And you will not bug me when I don't want you around," she said. He nodded. "Is that clear?" He nodded again. "All right. I think this will work. I'll call Kris."
"She's two doors down!"
"Eh," Ginger said. She picked up her cell phone and called Kris. Meanwhile, Zac looked down at the child in his arms, who wasn't doing much but seemed genuinely excited to be in her father's arms again. Ginger was right; Jenny did seem to know who he was. As Zac brushed away the bits of red hair on Jenny's forehead, she reached up and grabbed one of his fingers in her small hand. He looked away immediately, tears welling up in his eyes. The feeling that had just washed over him was unexplainable. For the past 24 hours that he'd known he was a father that was just about as far as it went. He had the knowledge that he was a father. However, he didn't feel like a father. At that moment he felt like a father. In his arms was his daughter, alive and kicking, and gripping his finger.
Ginger watched and noticed immediately. "All right, Kris? I'll be over in a minute." She hung up the phone and knelt down next to Zac's chair. "Are you okay?"
"Not�not entirely," he told her.
"I should have told you."
"But I know now," he said. "That's all that matters. It's not like she's going to grow up not knowing me."
"I just don't see how this is going to work, Zac," she said, falling back on her heels and putting her hands over her eyes. "Yeah, it's going to be great for a while; I'll be with you while I shoot my movie, but what happens when your record comes out, and when I finish shooting? You're going to be all over the place promoting and so will I."
"I don't really want to think about that right now," Zac said.
"All right," she said. "We'll talk about it later. Let's go over to Kris's." Ginger took Jenny from Zac and the both of them went down the hall to Kris's room. Ginger knocked on the door and waited for Kris to answer. She did a minute later, but only opened the door halfway once she realized Zac was standing next to Ginger.
"What does he want?" she asked, pointedly.
"He's over here to apologize," Ginger said, pushing Zac into the room ahead of her. "Don't give him that, he was just upset."
"It seems he's been upset for a long time now," Kris said.
"Kristina, stop it," Ginger said. "From what I heard Taylor wasn't exactly in the best mood either." Kris sighed.
"Yeah, you're right."
Taylor was on the balcony, the sliding glass door shut. Zac turned around and looked at Ginger. "Go on," Ginger said. "I'm not going anywhere unless you apologize to him."
"All right�" Zac said. He sighed and opened the door, going out onto the balcony next to his brother. "Hey Taylor."
"Come to hit me again?" Taylor asked. "I'm still bleeding from yesterday, so if you don't mind, I'd appreciate it if you came back later. I don't think I could burst any more vessels today."
"I came to apologize."
"That's a first."
"I know I've been an ass but you don't have to make it difficult," Zac said. "What you did was wrong and I'm never going to forget that, but the only way I'm going to get to see my daughter on a regular basis is to get along with you, and the only way to get along with you is to apologize."
"It has been a while, Zac," Taylor said, looking over at him. "You're different, I'm different."
"Yeah," Zac said. "You're getting married. Who would have thought that would ever happen?"
"If you would have been around, you would understand," Taylor said. "Kris is the best thing that's ever happened to me."
"I don't doubt it," Zac said. "Did she mention you all are going to be staying with me?"
"Yes. What about Gwen?"
"We broke up."
"Not because of this, I hope," Taylor said.
"Not entirely because of this," Zac said. "She wanted to get married and I didn't." Taylor looked confused.
"You don't want to get married?"
"Not to her," Zac said. Taylor looked inside at Ginger and Kris, trying to entertain Jenny with one of the many toys Taylor and Kris had lying around the room. It was almost as bad as Ginger's room. Kris was so close to Jenny it seemed she and Taylor had a child of their own.
"What about Ginger?" Taylor asked.
"What about her?" Zac asked.
"Do you still want to marry her?" Zac looked inside at Ginger. It was exactly the same. It felt exactly the same.
"Yes."