(Early the next morn)
Zac stood in the middle of the room, attempting to find some clean clothes before he and Ike went to find Tay. Ike watched his little brother and the method he used, rather amused if not anything else. Zac started rooting through his bag, saying things about the articles of clothing he came across as he went.
"Um, no...that has living organisms on it..." out went that shirt. "Oh, man, Tay's gonna kill me when he sees that chocolate ice cream stain..." out went that shirt. "Aha! A semi-clean piece of material!"
Ike grinned, chuckling to himself.
"Prozac, you have got to learn to use a washing machine," he remarked as he pulled a shirt over his own head. Zac looked up at him with a horrified look on his face and terror in his eyes.
"How dare you suggest such a thing? I've lost loved ones in the washing machine!" (This is true...Zac did lose a stuffed dog named Ralph in the washing machine when he was little. He was devastated.)
Ike just kept laughing, knowing what Zac meant. He was just too lazy to do anything about his dirty clothes, and thus was wearing something rather similar to what he'd worn the day before. Now he was adorned in a pair of jeans with a huge rip that was fraying at the knee, and a green long-sleeved shirt. Ike shook his head, and dragged him out of the room, so they might find their brother.
After Ike knocked for the fifth time, he remarked,
"What in God's name could they be doing?"
Zac suddenly became extremely quiet, and Ike stared at him with huge eyes.
"You're kidding...oh, fuck, Tay..." Apparently Ike took Zac's silence the opposite way as to how Zac had meant it, but now...Tay's gonna kill me, though Zac. Ike knocked again, and August finally came to the door, in a pair of black CK boxers and a huge Bugs Bunny and Taz Notre Dame shirt. She looked rather disheveled at this point; her hair was in a mess, there were bags under her eyes, and she looked like she'd just gotten up. Zac stared at the boxers, which were sagging beyond belief.
"Yes?"
Her voice proved it; August had just gotten up. Ike stared at her.
"Where's Tay?"
August's eyes temporarily widened, but she quickly regained her brawn.
"Asleep...has been since eleven," she answered. Ike raised an eyebrow.
"And where was he before that? Between your legs?"
August looked inclined to whack him upside the head a few times, but calmly answered,
"No...we talked, watched some TV, and he slept on the couch." She motioned inside, to where Tay appeared to be asleep on the couch with a pillow over his head and half his hair falling out from underneath it.
"Yeah, whatever...I won't say anything. Just make sure you guys show up for breakfast by nine," Ike replied, rather cold at this point. August nodded, and was quick to shut the door, wondering why the hell Zac hadn't been able to peel his eyes away from her upper thighs. Tay sat up.
"Could you explain two things to me?" he asked it calmly, so smoothly it reminded her of butter. August nodded.
"Sure...shoot."
He smiled slightly, then said quietly,
"Might I just ask why Zac couldn't keep his eyes off you, and why these boxers appear to be three or four sizes too small for me?"
August looked down, and started howling when she realized just why she hadn't been able to keep her own boxers up.
"Are those CK?"
Tay checked the waistband, then nodded, almost certainly confused.
"Yeah..."
August checked the waistband of the boxers she had on, and couldn't control herself.
"Perhaps because those are mine..." she trailed off, trying to stop herself from laughing. He closed his eyes, not so much embarassed as he was, well, playfully disgusted.
"I must really love you to sink so low as to wear your undergarments," he remarked. August whacked him.
"Excuse me? Undergarments? I sleep in those...that's it! I am not a guy, damnit!"
Here is where this part ends. I don't want to have to put any meaningless jibbering, so I just stopped, right here. There is something I wrote before, that originally belonged to Chapter Twelve, which is basically just the really descriptive sexual section. If you would like to read this, then feel free to go here. I changed this so people would leave me alone at my old email address. I want to get rid of it.
[This is about a month or two later, and after the video's been out for awhile. It was very successful. Happy? the details are like this: Tay and August are still going pretty strong, and it's March Break for her...Tay's visiting with his bros, and I started from the airport, otay? Gravy...]
Zac got to her first. He couldn't stand being cooped up in that closed in space for God-knows-how-long, sitting next to the window and listening to some airheaded twit beside him yatter on and on about what a nice ass he had. Zac flew through the terminal, straight to August, disregarding his bags on the floor at her feet and jumping into her arms. She sat down quickly in the chair behind her, chuckling softly.
"Watch it, Zac...I've got some pretty nasty bruises around the small of my back..." she trailed off, and returned the hug, not miffed about the leech around her at all. It was sweet. Zac finally tore himself away from her when a voice came behind him.
"Hey! Leave some for us! She's gonna be a bloody froth before I get a chance to do that," Ike exclaimed. Zac crawled out of her lap, and she stood up.
"I feel so loved," she remarked as Ike pulled her a few inches off the ground. He set her back down, and grabbed the neck of Zac's collar as he attempted to heave a large spitwad at a sleeping fat guy in one of the plastic chairs. August looked around, waiting to see Tay any minute. First, Walker came out...no luck there. Then a whole bunch of other people. [We have it decided that Diana found some other means of getting to their hotel...it made life easier for me, the writer...] She looked around some more, wondering where on earth he could be. Zac appeared beside her, and whispered in her ear,
"He said it was a surprise...I think he slipped out early, right when they first opened the door."
With that, he went to go find his bag, which had found its way under a chair. August stood silently for a moment, pondering over what Zac had said. She must have jumped straight out of her skin when a hand touched her shoulder, and turned around, finding herself three inches away from Tay. (See, the really funny part about that was the fact that I only come up to Tay's collar bone right now, so he's a good head taller than me...did you really think I could write a Hanson story where the girl looked nothing like me? Hah! That's amusing...) He smiled.
"I like that reaction," he said quietly. She chuckled, then wrapped her arms around him in a huge hug. "Man, it's like you haven't seen me in months," he said innocently.
N.B. The nearest airport to where I live, and where August supposedly lives, is in Toronto, a good hour's drive if you take the highway. And I like the backroad way better. So that's an hour and 45 mintues. My truck comfortably seats 5, 6 if someone sits in someone else's lap. I took advantage of the opportunity that I had here. : )
For once in the past six months since August lost her mother, he father was actually sober for a week, and offered to get the Hansons to their hotel in New Berlin, about half an hour away from Shade's Mill. (I'm actually using the original names of the cities here. New Berlin was changed after WWI, for good reason...we were fighting Germans. And Shade's Mill...well, that's a long story...)Thing is, it was a five-seater truck, and there were six...August sat in Tay's lap. Neither of them had a problem with that, and pretty much ignored Zac and Ike's snide remarks about it. Ike had pretty much figured out the situation, but hadn't said anything. He knew how pissed Diana would be at Tay if she found out. Tay noticed how little August was saying to her father, despite the fact that he was asking Zac and Ike a million questions. Tay glanced at Mr.Maguire in the rearview mirror, growling to himself. Literally growling, and apparently loud enough for August to notice.
"Tay...don't growl at him...he'll think you're one of his kind," she whispered gently in his ear. He cracked, and turned the corners of his lips up in a strange little smile. She grinned, pleased that he wouldn't show his grudge against her father publicly.
"That's demeaning to animals, Coke," he replied. (See, for as long as I can remember liking Tay, I've wanted the nickname Coke...I only got it recently, from a friend...who says he's Tay.) August started lauhging, and after not being able to stop after a few minutes, gained the attention of the other two Hanson brothers. She turned red, still smiling.
"Um...hi," she whispered meekly. Ike rolled his eyes and looked out the window, and Zac turned the radio up to drown out the sounds of Walker and Robert (I needed to call him something! It comes in handy later, I swear!) who were having a conversation about politics or something demented like that.
It hadn't been so much as two days after they got there that the trouble started anew. August wasn't really the trouble, though...it was her father. And it was the night in the hotel. August had no idea how he figured it out, but somehow...whatever had clued him in, it didn't bring on the best of reactions ...it brought on the usual reaction. Once again, she had survived a brutal fight. Nothing out of the ordinary. Bleeding, bruised, and feeling as though she were about to fall apart, August collapsed on the couch in the living room, thanking God that the monster had left the building. He'd probably gone to drink away the night, and wouldn't be back until God-knows-when. The words he'd thrown at her were branded in her head. They came to her completely unwilling brain, and she couldn't push them away.
"You're a fucking fourteen-year-old slut!"
"Did you pay him, or did he pay you?"
"You ten-cent whore!"
August closed her eyes. She was in a lot of pain. Too much pain. It was all she could think about, besides what Tay would do when he saw her. The thought of Tay suddenly brought her to her feet, eyes wide and terrified. She sat down again, in too much pain to stand, despite the fear that was swelling up from some deep dark place within. She'd forgotten all about the plans they'd made earlier...they were supposed to go to the movies. There was no shot in hell now...she was horrified at the thought of his reaction.
"Oh, shit..."
She covered her eyes with her hand. She had half an hour...she had no idea what she was going to do. She scanned her arms and legs, fighting back tears of pain as she examined the already swelling purplish black bruises. There were a few yellowy splotches too, and she knew they'd be purple and disgusting come morning. With a swift motion, she attempted to stand up, but lost her equilibrium in the motion and had to sit back down really quickly.
"I'm so screwed," was all she could allow to escape her lips. "I'm so fucking screwed."
"You definitely caught us with a wet finger in the sugar sack this time...we are guilty."
-Ethan Hawke, as Jess Newton in The Newton Boys