I started cutting when I realized that the cocaine wasn't doing anything to help me escape from my problems, however by that time I was so addicted I knew I'd never be able to stop. Two weeks previous I would have said the only time I ever went near a razor was to shave the hair off my face and I didn't even like doing that. I was afraid of razors and needles and, well, anything that had to do with pain. I didn't like pain. I was terrified of pain. I was one of those kids that wore safety pads everywhere just in case I tripped and fell. I was an extremist in those kinds of situations but recently I became better. I actually started to cause pain in myself. Cutting was the only thing that seemed to comfort me.
Taylor knew about my drug use. He never caught me, but he knew. He was able to tell. He'd done it before. I knew he was still kind of skeptical about his reasoning because he hadn't found anything and I was denying it, but he was right on the money.
I sat myself the back of the bus, rubbing my sleeves in between my hands. It hurt as it grazed fresh wounds, but I appreciated the feeling. Taylor was sitting in front of me, eyeing me. I'd been wearing long sleeves lately to cover the cuts on my arms. It had also been pretty cold, even Taylor could vouch for that because he wore sweaters all the time as well.
I reached out onto the table subconsciously and grabbed my cigarettes. I took one out and put it to my lips. As I reached for my lighter, Taylor spoke up.
"Don't smoke around me," he said. I looked up at him. He was staring back at me, a stern look on his face.
"Okay..." I put the cigarette back in the pack and put the pack back on the table. I wasn't going to listen to him but I remembered I wasn't supposed to smoke on the bus.
The tiptoeing Taylor and I were doing around each other was really starting to get annoying. It was like we didn't know how to act around each other. Ike was okay to talk to. Lately I didn't speak to Ike because of the whole thing with Rose. I wanted to leave him alone and have him figure things out for himself before I had a conversation with him. Unlike Taylor, he actually acted like he was my friend as well as my older brother. Taylor had been acting like my enemy more than anything else. I knew I wasn't the best person around lately either, but if someone was nice to me I'd kindly return the favor. That is, if I wasn't high.
Ike appeared at the doorway leading to the hallway. "Guess what guys," he said. I looked up at him. "Tonight's show is sold out." My face fell. Oh no...no... The thoughts went through my mind before I could even register what they were. I stopped fiddling with my wrists and stared at my brother with fear in my eyes and a cold expression on my face.
"Are you serious?" Taylor asked. I couldn't say anything. Ike nodded. "How?" Our ticket sales had been terrible lately. Our fan base had been so small and I didn't mind because it meant less people I had to prep myself for. Our upcoming show was at a huge arena. I shook my head but neither of my brothers noticed.
"Well in preparation for the concert they've been playing the new single on the radio a lot and people are going crazy for it. It's a hit here, so much in fact that other stations are playing it and the rest of the shows are picking up in ticket sales. Tomorrow's show is sold out too and lots of people are asking us to do TV."
It was worse than I thought. I might have been able to handle one sold out show, maybe, but the rest of the tour? TV too? My hands began to shake and I sat on them to stop it as my vision slid out of focus for a few moments. I was perfectly happy with what we were doing, having just a couple hundred fans at every show, a radio interview now and then, and some promos. It was so much better than what we had when we were just starting out. I wasn't sure if I could go back to that again. I never wanted that again.
"Zac, are you okay?" Isaac asked. I looked up at him.
"What? I'm fine." I got up and quickly brushed past Isaac as I headed to the front of the bus. I sat down there, close to hyperventilating. I closed my eyes and put my hands over my face, taking in deep breaths. I'm all right; I'm okay...I thought. Oh my God that's a lot of people! Oh God, oh God. I needed to calm down. I had no reason to be panicky. I've done it before. This arena wasn't even as big as some of the ones I used to be at when they were sold out. I'd performed and done perfect in front of twice as many people. I was okay. I wasn't okay.
I felt a pair of hands on my shoulders but I couldn't stop shaking enough to move my hands away from my face and open my eyes to see who it was. "Maybe I shouldn't have told him," I heard Ike say. He was too far away to be the one who was trying to calm me down.
"What? And let him find out when we got to the arena? He probably would have freaked out on stage and that wouldn't have been good. It's better he does it now and has time to calm down before we have to perform," Taylor told him. Taylor was also too far away so it must have been someone else. It was when I stopped listening to them that I heard another voice, this time closer and more soothing.
"Zac, Zac honey calm down." It was my mother. Although her voice was comforting, it didn't seem to be doing much for me. I had absolutely no control of myself. I could hear myself muttering something but I didn't allow myself to understand it. My body was shaking heavily and I heard myself crying. "Can't do what?" my mother told me. "What can't you do?" I blocked her out and listened to myself.
"I can't do it...I can't do it..." I was repeating the same phrase over and over again. I was telling everybody my problems and I couldn't control it, which made me only cry harder. I waited until I started to coherently speak. It came sooner than I thought. "There's too many people, I can't do it. I can't go out in front of that many people."
With that, they knew my problem. They knew I had a problem with people. For a long time I figured it was just stage fright, even though that doesn't seem like me at all, but then I started to not want to be out in public with a lot of people around. I didn't like a lot of people. I didn't like being put on show for everyone to see and judge. I didn't like being in front of cameras, and I didn't like having to talk to people in interviews. I didn't like every aspect of my life.
I continued to listen to myself go. I was spilling out just about every single one of my fears quietly to my mother. My brothers couldn't hear because I was talking too lightly; I'd be surprised if my mother could even hear. I had yet to come out of my shaking and my crying situation, but I was speaking coherently. I began to have a little more control of what I was feeling and doing, but I didn't stop anything. The only thing I didn't tell my mother was my new drug habit and that I was cutting myself.
It was a few minutes later when I ran out of tears and I pulled my hands away from my face. I opened my eyes and looked at my mother sitting next to me. She gave me a comforting smile but I could see how scared she was for me. She was trying to hide it and she was doing a good job of it, but I could see right through it.
I realized what I just did and almost freaked out again. "Oh no," I said, and got up to run away. I felt like I couldn't move. My heart was heavy and so was my head, so she easily pulled me back down. I winced slightly as she grazed a fresh wound but I couldn't say anything about it or she'd know. I already told her enough to want to send me to a therapist.
"How long have you been feeling this way, honey?" she asked. I didn't even know what I told her. I didn't even remember what I said to her in the past few minutes. I was sure whatever I told her all originated when the tour started a few months ago. I didn't want to answer her question. I wanted to get up and leave and go into my comfort position and never come out of it again. I wanted to find a hole in the ground and lie in it until the day I died, which hopefully would be soon.
"I'm not saying."
"Well a few moments ago you had no problem saying anything to me."
"That's because a few moments ago I had no control over what I was saying." I got up again, this time shaking her grip away from my arm. I saw Isaac and Taylor in the back. They would ask about me too. I wasn't going to say anything to anyone. Glancing around, I slipped into an empty bunk and went into my comfort position. My mother knew all my problems. She'd tell my father and they would most likely want me to "seek help." I didn't need help. I was perfectly fine by myself. The drugs and the cuts were my therapy. I didn't need a shrink who would just nod, smile, and say everything would be okay. I knew if things would be okay.
I wasn't the one who needed help anyway. I had perfect control over my problems. I knew how to help myself. Taylor needed help. He was throwing up his food so he could lose weight. Ike had an emotional outlet problem. He took the Rose situation with a smile on his face. I knew he couldn't be happy about it because it was going to mess up everything. It was already messing up everything. He picked a perfect time to knock up his girlfriend...right when everything is going wrong with Taylor and me and when the band was just starting to pick up again.
I sighed and waited for us to arrive at our destination. As much as I didn't want to face the music, I knew I'd have to sooner or later.
"Ike, I'm worried about Zac," Taylor whined to me about ten minutes after Zac's panic attack at the front of the bus. He said something to Mom, most likely the problems he refused to tell us, that was enough for her to shoo us to the back of the bus so we wouldn't hear.
"Taylor, when are you not worried about Zac? I'm worried about him too."
"No, this isn't about what happened up there. I found this out before all of that." I looked up at him. "Last night he was asleep and I wanted to see why he was wearing long sleeves...I thought he had tracks that he wanted to cover up but that's not it. Mind you I still think he's doing drugs, but this is something that might be coming from that."
"What is it, Taylor?" I asked, annoyed.
"He's got scars on his wrists. He's been cutting himself." I turned to my brother, suddenly interested. "I don't think it's enough to actually try to kill himself but he's definitely been doing it to himself."
"Do you think he's suicidal?" I asked. Zac may have had some self-esteem issues, but I none of it went deep enough for him to want to kill himself. Taylor shook his head.
"No, no he's got too much to live for than to kill himself. I mean who would play video games all day if he wasn't around?" I gave him a look. "Okay, maybe that wasn't an appropriate time to joke."
"No it wasn't. Did you tell Zac you know?" Taylor shook his head again. "Good. Don't. If anybody confronts him about this, it's going to be me. I don't want you to say anything to him about it, even after I talk to him, that is if I talk to him."
"What do you mean if you talk to him? Of course you're going to talk to him! This is Zac here, we can't have him digging too deep and killing himself. You saw what happened out there, the boy needs some serious help and I think we need to get it to him. I know we've just started to get back up there with this sold out show and everything, but Ike I think we're going to have to stop touring and let him disappear for a while. He's not a people person anymore."
"No, we're going to keep doing this. We'll get Zac help on the side or something, if we get him help at all."
"I can't believe you're not taking this seriously! Ike, he needs help!"
"We really shouldn't be talking about this right now," I said. "We'll talk about this later when he's not walking around. He could hear us and get freaked out by it. I don't think we need him disappearing before tonight's show." Taylor made a face but didn't continue speaking. He was clearly upset by this, and I was too. I always thought Zac was smarter than that. I guess he's not.
I didn't hear anything he said while he was having what I guess was a panic attack. I've known Taylor to have one before but I wasn't around when he had it. Zac has never had one before. I was upset that I didn't know what to do. I was supposed to be taking care of the boy and I didn't know what to do with him when he began to fall apart. What kind of father was I going to be if I couldn't even help out my little brother?
I got up and walked to the front of the bus. My mother was sitting at the table there. I sat in front of her and put my head down on the table. She smiled affectionately. "What's wrong, honey?"
"How am I supposed to be a good father for my child if I can't even take care of Zac?"
"Well, Isaac, it's going to be a good sixteen years before your child is like Zac. By then I think you'll have it down pat," she said, sliding next to me and putting a comforting arm around my shoulders. "And if you and Rose raise the child, I don't think he'll turn out like Zac anyway. You two are too laid back to have a child like Zac." I turned my head and looked up at her.
"I just hope I can be as good of a father to him that you are to me."
"Oh I'm a good father to you now?" I smiled.
"You know what I mean." She nodded and looked out the window as she rubbed my back. "Can I ask what Zac was saying earlier or do I not want to know?" I asked.
"You really don't want to know," she said, still looking out the window. "Just watch him when you're on stage, okay? He's really afraid of getting in front of so many people."
"All right." I didn't know if Zac told her about hurting himself so I decided not to mention it. If he did say something then she already knew and probably didn't want to be reminded about it. If he didn't, I didn't want to be the one to tell my mother her son could be trying to kill himself. "Mom?"
"Yes, honey?"
"Do you think I'll be a good dad?"
"I think you'll be a wonderful dad," she said, looking back at me. "You've been a great one to your little brothers and sisters. It's really not that different from what you're doing now except you have more control over your children and you're responsible, not me." I looked up at her. "And I'll be there if you need me."
"Thanks, Mom."
That night at the show Zac didn't go anywhere. He stayed in front, concealed from the crowd but still able to see a good portion of the fans. I couldn't read the look on his face and I really didn't want to. For a moment I actually wanted to know what went through his head as he looked at the crowd, but then I realized it probably wasn't a good thing. All I knew was that he has smoked at least half a pack of cigarettes since the house opened.
I didn't understand why he was so worried over this performance. I was thrilled. For the first time in a long time I was actually nervous about performing. The first part of the tour I got a little uneasy but it was nothing like this. I was nervous because there was so few of them before and then all of a sudden there were so many of them. The sound they made was deafening. The arena held about ten thousand people and all the seats were filled. That was amazing. I didn't know what we did right, I didn't even like the single we decided to put out, but there must have been something about it because it was enough to get us back up there again.
I stood next to Zac as he worriedly bit on his nails. Zac was not one to bite his nails but lately they seemed a permanent connection to his mouth. He really shouldn't do it but he was doing a lot of things he really shouldn't do.
"Big crowd, huh?" I asked Zac, looking out at the portion of the crowd I could see from our point backstage. He didn't say anything. He didn't even move. I guess my attempt at small talk with him wasn't working out. "Zac? Are you okay?"
"I'm fine, Ike."
"Are you sure?"
"I said I was fine, get off my back." I shrugged and didn't say anything more, but I remained standing next to him. He expected me to say something but when I didn't he went on. "God, haven't you heard enough about me already?" He looked over at me. "So what are you going to do to me? Are you going to send me away? Try to get me help when all I need is a break from this?"
"Zac, I have no idea what you're talking about."
"You heard me on the bus." He paused. "Didn't you?"
"No, you weren't talking loud enough and Mom pushed me and Taylor to the back of the bus anyway. I didn't hear a word you said." He collapsed into a nearby chair.
"Thank God."
"But you freaked the hell out of Mom," I told him. He only shrugged and looked back out to the crowd again. I noticed the opening act was saying their goodbyes. It was almost time for us to go on. Zac was getting more and more nervous as each moment went by. When the opening act came off the stage he took another cigarette out of his pack and lit it.
"You really shouldn't smoke before a show." He took a drag from the cigarette and defiantly blew the smoke at me.
"What? Are you going to tell me what to do now too? I've got enough people telling me what I should and should not do. You're lucky I'm even trying to be a team player and staying up here. I could be in the back 'shooting up' like Taylor likes to insist that I do."
"Well maybe if you didn't give him a reason to suspect anything, he wouldn't," I said to him. He gave me a look. "I'm serious. You're acting weird and--"
"I'm not acting weird! This is me, Ike. This is who I've always been, I just haven't been covering up with that bullshit that I used to do all the time because I was uncomfortable with who I am. I know myself now and I'm accepting myself now and if you don't like it then you don't like me." Zac got up and walked away with a puff of smoke and another curse in my direction. All this time I thought Taylor had the attitude problem.