Taylor had once again gone too far. I had no idea what could be wrong with him, and personally if it's bugging him that much I don't want to know, but he's gone too far. I've always known Taylor to be the one that stopped fights between people in the family, always wanting things to be right in the world, but lately he's been starting more fights then he's ever stopped before. He hit someone, worst of all our brother, and it bothers me so much that nothing will come of this.
He's sitting at the front of the bus, doing whatever the hell he wants to do because he'll get away with it. I snorted. Ever since we got our record contract and he was put as the front man instead of Ike, he's always been favored. I hate him because he's being favored, but then again I don't know what to think about anything anymore. Everything's getting screwed lately. Ike looks like he's got the weight of the world on his shoulders but he tells me he doesn't know what his problem is yet. Taylor is being an asshole and--I don't know--weird. I don't know how to describe it. He's just not being Taylor. The Taylor I know would never hit anyone, especially Ike. But, as I said, I don't know what to think anymore.
"You know you should really tell Mom about what Taylor did to you," I told Isaac a few minutes later. He looked up from his book.
"Mom doesn't need to know. I'm fine. It stopped bleeding. You know all she's going to do is get worried and it's really nothing. So he hit me. Big deal. Taylor hasn't been himself lately, he won't tell us why, so I say let him figure it out by himself. If he doesn't get better soon then we can start to worry." He smiled, looking away. "Funny, I told him the same thing about you."
"What? What'd you tell him? Was it about me?"
"He thinks you're on drugs."
"Well that's stupid," I said, smirking. Leave it to Taylor to pick the thing the furthest from the truth.
"Yeah, I know, Taylor can come up with things like that." He let out a little laugh but looked back to me again. "Are you?"
I was taken aback. It was bad enough that Taylor thought so, but somehow he'd convinced Ike to doubt me as well. I guess it was a legitimate concern; I had been acting weird lately, but then again so have the both of them.
"Well?" he asked.
"Isaac, why would you even think that it was true?"
"Answer my question first."
"No, I'm not on drugs. I'm not stupid."
"Whether you're stupid or not has little to do with this, Zac." I waited for him to answer my question. "You have been acting weird lately and, I don't know, you kind of seem like a different person to me. I don't feel like I know you anymore. You're reclusive and you barely joke around with us anymore. You're acting all defensive all the time and you're late to shows..."
"I have my reasons for being late to the shows!" I yelled at him. I needed to let him know that I was in command of this before he started to put me down like Taylor did. I needed to be up front right away before I got another verbal bashing. "Are you going to pick on me too? Is that what this is about?"
"Zac, calm down. I'm just giving my reasons for asking. You're getting defensive again." I huffed. "I'm not picking on you. I don't want to pick on you. I know Taylor does it and I know you don't like it. I'm just letting you know that you're acting weird and I feel like we're all drifting apart."
"It's because it's true," I muttered, crossing my arms over my chest. I knew he heard me and I needed to get away before he got too serious with me. I quickly got up and walked away from Isaac. We had an hour or so before we'd get to the next city. I climbed into one of the bunks and closed the shade. The darkness was comforting. It always has been. There wasn't much room but I found a way to pull my knees up to my chest without a foot sticking out into the hallway. I wasn't always able to lie around like this. My knees didn't always curl up to my chest this easily and this comfortably. When I first starting doing this, I kept pulling them tighter and tighter to my chest and eventually I became flexible enough to do it comfortably. Now I'm like this all the time. It's my comfort position.
I didn't fall asleep although I wanted to. Sleep is something that is somewhat of a rare luxury and now that I actually have the time to do it, I can't. That's my life. Eventually I will have to accept that this is my life instead of running from it every chance I get. I sure as hell won't do it now, I'm too afraid of it now, but I figure someday in the future I'll get better.
I bet Ike is siding with Taylor in this drugs issue. I didn't do much to stop him from thinking it, and now that I've run away and pretty much disappeared, he'll believe it more. It's my own fault. I'm not doing anything but I'm leading them on to think that I am. I don't know. Maybe if I do start using it'll give them a reason to suspect it. I've tried drugs before. This was after Taylor told me all about his experience with them and warned me that I should never use them. I don't know why I did it, I figured I'd just be like Taylor and not like it, but I wanted to see for myself. When I did I found out I liked it. The only reason I didn't keep doing it was because I felt so guilty doing something Taylor specifically told me not to. It could help me get away from all my problems.
I don't know how long I was in the small bunk but it was long enough for Taylor to come looking for me. I heard his voice in the hallway and I closed my eyes. Don't find me... I thought. I didn't want to talk to him. He was going to yell at me. I didn't like it when Taylor yelled at me. He put me down and only added to everything that I was going through. Just in case he did find me, I got out of my comfort position and spread my legs out. I closed my eyes and feigned sleep. I didn't snore only because I don't know how to fake snore. I know I do it sometimes when I'm asleep but I don't know how I do it. I opened my mouth and I let myself drool everywhere. I know how I sleep. This will give a reason why I wasn't responding to Taylor. Maybe if he believed that I was asleep he wouldn't yell at me.
The curtain over the bunk was pulled open and I almost flinched at the sudden light. "Ike, he's in here. He's asleep," Taylor said.
"Wake him up. We're almost there." I felt Taylor shake my shoulder. Like that would ever wake me up normally. He punched me in the shoulder. My eyes flew open and I gave him a look.
"Ow! What the hell is your problem?"
"We're almost there. Wake up." He walked away. I grumbled and got out of the bunk, rubbing my shoulder. I had to admit, for a skinny kid, he could hit pretty hard.
After we got to the city, we found a restaurant on the outskirts and had lunch. I was starving by the time we got there, but after what happened this morning with my pants, I decided I shouldn't eat. I could just stop eating for a few days to lose a quick five pounds, and then start up a healthier diet that didn't consist of the junk I'd been eating lately.
"What are you going to get, Taylor?" Isaac asked me.
"You know, I'm really not hungry," I said. I didn't expect the reaction I got. When I looked up from the menu everyone was staring back at me. "What?"
"Taylor, you may not be hungry right now," my mother said in her typically motherly fashion, "but later on you will be and you won't be able to eat until at least six. I don't want to hear you complaining because you can't eat. You'll eat something now." Now that my mother has intervened, I won't get out of this.
"Maybe I'll just have a little something..."
"No, you're getting more than that," she said. My mother always made sure we had plenty to eat. When the waitress came back around to take orders, she ordered for me. Throwing my menu on the table, I could have easily started a scene, but I decided against it. The last thing I needed was to start a scene in a public place where there very well could be fans or press to make a big deal out of it.
I ate quickly, shoving down food faster than I ever had before, and then stood up. "I'm going to the bathroom, okay?" I asked. "Are you going to watch me go there too?"
"Taylor..." my mother warned.
"Ugh." I headed to the bathroom. It was a single room instead of the larger public restroom with stalls, so I had more privacy to do what I needed to do. I didn't want to do it, but I needed to. Mom just made me eat a very large lunch and I was not about to let any of that fester in my body any longer. I shut the door, locked it, then bent over the toilet and put my finger down my throat.
This has got to be the most disgusting thing I have ever done, I thought. With all the weird things I've done, all the sex and drugs and alcohol and everything else in the world that I have experienced, this is the worst. After seeing everything I've eaten for lunch come up in the most disgusting form, I didn't need my finger anymore.
When I couldn't throw up anymore, I made sure to wash my face and rinse my mouth out well before leaving the bathroom. I didn't know how long I was in there, but it wasn't long enough to arouse suspicion. I sat back down at the table and no one even gave it a second thought that I might have been throwing up instead of anything else. Maybe I could get away with something like this. Instead of just not eating like I had planned, I could just throw it all back up. Sure it was disgusting but I have a habit of doing disgusting things. No one will think anything of it. I can eat as much as I usually do without the constant snacks in between meals and then just throw it all up afterward.
After lunch we went into the city and checked into the hotel quickly before heading off to the arena we'd be performing at that night. Sound check was at five-thirty and the show started at seven. It was an early show, which meant an early release. If everything went according to plan and Zac wasn't late, we'd be back at the hotel at eleven-thirty. I could get in a good eight hours of sleep before we had to get up and leave. Eight hours? Wow...that's a full night's sleep. Most likely two or three of those hours would consist of something along the lines of bickering with my brothers and idle sitting and staring at nothing. I'd never be able to get a full eight hours of sleep. It's just something that will never happen. I actually have the time now, but I'm so used to living off of four or less hours of sleep that anything more just won't happen.
We had time to work out conflicts in the show and make final decisions before we had our meeting. We usually had a meeting a bit before the sound check. I don't really know the purpose of it; it's the same thing every time. Okay, this is what you have to do and make sure you don't screw it up. Be good and remember this is the name of the city. Don't screw up. It gets annoying.
Zac disappeared quickly after he looked over the set list with the rest of us. I don't know where he went but I was going to find out. I wasn't used to him leaving now. He usually had some kind of kink he needed to work out in the show that would take up all the time until the meeting. This time nothing posed a problem for him and he disappeared. I began to ask around.
"Have you seen Zac?" I asked one of the roadies as he lugged by with an amplifier in his arms. He set it carefully down on the ground. I knew the roadies liked to toss them around like they were trash, but since I stood directly in front of him, he moved it with care.
"He went that way a few minutes ago," he said, pointing, then picked up the equipment and started to walk to the stage. I walked to where he pointed, looking around. There wasn't much back here, just a whole bunch of various equipment that had been unloaded already from the buses. I've never been back here. I guess I'm always so busy with the other things that I have to do that I don't have time to explore.
I swear that boy is on drugs. I know almost for sure that he is on drugs. There's no other explanation for why he's acting like this. I do think he's a good kid and I do think he knows better, but there's no explanation. Why else would he suddenly be acting so weird? A month ago he was perfectly fine, the same old Zac, but now he's late to shows and talking back and he seems really defensive. When we were fighting last night, for a long part of the conversation he seemed like he couldn't even look at me and that he couldn't get the energy to fight back. All he was saying to me was "I'm sorry, Tay, I'm really sorry..." He looked ready to cry. Zac doesn't cry. I don't really believe it, though, because if he really were sorry he wouldn't be gone again.
I searched the entire arena and I didn't find him. I even checked all of the rooms, thoroughly, and I didn't find him. I don't know where he could be. For all I know he could have left the arena and run off to some place in the city. Where were we? I pulled a piece of paper out of my back pocket. I looked at my watch for the date and looked on the sheet for what city we were in. Baltimore. We're in Baltimore. What could possibly be so interesting about Baltimore that he had to scamper off? Shoving the piece of paper back in my pocket, I huffed and turned away.
I walked back up to the backstage area of the arena. Isaac was talking to the stage manager. I walked up to them. "I thought you said you'd keep an eye on Zac."
"I am."
"Well do you know where he is right now? I searched this place up and down and I cannot find him." Isaac gave me a look and excused us from the stage manager. "Ike, I don't know what to do about him. It's bad enough he disappears when the opening act takes the stage, now he's disappearing even before sound check? If he's doing drugs..."
"Taylor, you're overreacting. Again. Zac is not on drugs. So he's spending some time to himself, so what? Leave the boy alone. If there is a problem, it won't be solved by the two of us hounding him and following him all the time. Now I'm sorry if I let him slip out of my view, but I had more important things to worry about. He'll turn up. It's not like he's been really late to a show. He's been at the most five minutes late, and I do recall you were a half an hour late at a show we did a month or two ago. His performance, if anything, has gotten better since this started. Yours hasn't. If anyone has a problem, it's you."
"Don't turn this around on me!" I yelled at him. "We are not talking about me here. We are talking about Zac. He has a problem, I'm worried about him, and I want to solve it."
"Taylor we all have problems. Zac's isn't any bigger than mine or yours."
"What is your problem anyway?" I asked. I didn't mean to be rude, like I thought he had a chip on his shoulder or anything, but I was curious to know what had been bugging him lately. He didn't respond to it.
"I've got things to clear up. There's a messed up set list and it's better than talking about my brother behind his back. Lighten up, Taylor, he's just being a teenager." He was clearly avoiding whatever the hell it was that had been bugging him and straining his relationship with Zac and I. I was determined to find out what it was.