"I just took a walk..."
"Yeah, right! Mom was worried all fucking day! Are you stoned?"
"Listen, Isaac..."
"God damn it, Taylor! Fuck you!" He pushed me. "You didn't even leave a note! Don't you even give a shit? Why don't you just disregard everything this family is going through and run off like you always do!"
"Right." His words made me feel as if I had just been kicked in the gut. "Right, like I don't give a shit that my brother just died. Yeah, fuck you, Isaac. God. Fuck you."
I took off my coat and threw it at him, slowly making my way to the staircase. "I just went out for a little while, okay? I wanted to think. I'm sorry I didn't tell anyone, but fuck you for making accusations! I haven't done shit to you."
"Why don't you go tell Mom you're here, at least!"
"Fine. I will." I stormed up the stairs and ran to my parents' room. Nobody there. I had no idea why I expected anyone to be there in the first place, I just wanted an excuse to run up the stairs and be pissed off at Isaac. I huffed and took the second staircase back down to the next most likely place: The Kitchen.
"Mom, I'm home." I muttered, as I walked through the doorway.
She grabbed me and hugged me, crying desperately as she held on. "Oh, Taylor... I was so worried about you."
"Mom..." I said, "Don't cry. Don't worry." I began to feel bad for my thoughtlessness. I had never intended to upset anyone, much less my mother who had just about broken in half at the feet of our tragedy. My mother was the strongest person I ever knew. When my father threatened to kill me and put me out on the street, she stood by me, steadfast. She held me when I cried. Sang to me when I couldn't sleep. She even held my hand as I ruined myself, right before her eyes. I was ungrateful, unfair, and every single word my Dad had ever called me. But she loved me anyway. Almost worse than the event itself, was watching her cry. Completely doubled over. Helpless with grief.
"Thank God you're okay. Thank God. Oh God... Oh God..."
"Mom, I'm okay. I promise. I won't hurt myself. I just wanted to get some fresh air. I promise that's all. I'm sorry, I should have thought to tell you." I held her tight, becoming distressed by her hysterics. "Please, Mom. Don't cry. It's okay. It's all going to be okay..."
I think I believed those words. I don't know to what extent. I guess, I believed that life went on, even though I couldn't see how. As far as I could see, it didn't get any worse. If we got through the next few days, the next few months, the next year, then maybe we'd just about make it. That was what I wanted to tell her, but I didn't have the words to overcome her defeat. I had barely the words to reason with mine. All she ever wanted to do was love us, and God played a nasty trick.
I finished writing that night. It was a vehicle to get my mind off of tomorrow, and the next day, but only for so long. I was nervous. And numb. There was nothing, nothing at all to settle me. I slept restlessly until the morning, when Zac's hysterical girlfriend, Alexis, woke me.
"Tay, it's time to wake up. You've got to go. The wake is in two hours! You have to get up!" She was frantic, as if the news were the most urgent in the world. I hadn't seen her since we left the hospital. She was already dressed and made up for the day, her long red hair tied up neatly into a bun.
I groaned and rolled over, away from her anxious tears.
"Taylor!" She said, shaking me, but then giving up and just collapsing beside me. I could feel her tears landing on my back. I stared at the dashes of morning sunlight scattered across the carpet. My head felt as if it was split down the middle, and this girl, crying on my back, was the last thing I needed.
"Alexis..." I mumbled, finally. "I'll be up. Just go. Please."
I don't know when it happened, but she left, silently, and again I was alone, this time staring at the clock as the minutes turned. Time to get up.
I showered for the first time all week, and it felt good. Even with the pit of dread that sat like a rock in my stomach. It was odd, looking in the mirror and shaving. I felt like I hadn't seen myself in years. And every perfunctory task, though perfectly natural, felt out of body. My hands moved, but they were the hands of a robot controlled by someone else that didn't seem to be me. I grabbed my bottle of pills from where I hid them underneath the bottom of a drawer. It was compulsive, a habit I had picked up from many years of hiding everything from everyone. I didn't really understand why I did it, still. It wasn't like it was any secret to anyone that I was taking them, but I was ashamed. I was ashamed that I had to take them at all. Prescribed Valium, doubled dosed, just enough to shut my mind the fuck up or fall to thoughtless sleep.
You'll be okay. You'll be okay. You'll be okay.
In my head I said it over and over as I watched everyone around me run around.
The wake was long. It started for us at eight in the morning with preparations that had started long earlier. There was a line outside already for the nine o'clock opening time. A guest book sat on a table by the door, I looked at it curiously, feeling a distinct desire to sign it, but without a pen, I could not. It was no surprise to us that a small group of fans had already started a miniature vigil long before they were due. As a family, we had decided not to let fans in until the afternoon for the sake of those who were actually close to us. I walked into the front hall of the funeral home, but no further before I had my first cigarette of the day, standing on the front porch with a whole gaggle of girls at my feet. It was my mother who forced me inside to pray. I had gone through three or four cigarettes in an attempt to avoid it, staring in the faces of the Hanson fans that watched me so diligently. They were waiting for something to happen. I liked to watch them wait.
"Taylor..." She said to me softly, "It's time, now, for you to go inside."
I didn't say a word, but I closed my eyes as she took my hand.
Inside again, the relatives were all greeting each other. I noticed more, as I walked by, trying to avoid the thought of what was ahead of me. There were food and flowers. Collages and knick knacks. A whole paper trail of Zac stuff, including a table dedicated solely to the band. It hadn't even started yet and the gifts were already piled high. The room was full of energy, and if I didn't know any better I would have expected this to be a happy social occasion. Everyone inside seemed to be having casual conversation about every day. Relatives who haven't seen each other in years, hugging and kissing and saying their hellos. I just didn't get it. How was I supposed to feel?
We approached a doorway and my mother stopped. "Go, Taylor..." She said, softly, and I was faced with the casket, surrounded by perfectly arranged flowers and a single rose in the hands of my brother, who lay still. I felt sick to my stomach, the reality, the true reality of his death settling like shards of glass. Everything began to move in slow motion. I saw my tears fall, floating away from my face like feathers and shattering like crystal against the toes of my perfectly shined black shoes. I had barely gotten to the center of the room and my whole body was shaking. I stumbled forward and knelt in front of the casket, out of a force of will. His face, his placid, perfectly made up face, it made me scream. All I wanted to do at that moment was run away and never feel this again. Everyone in the room had their eyes on me as I clasped my hands together and prayed, my hands shaking and my shoulders heaving with every gasping breath. My mind was racing with a thousand prayers and questions, each one interrupting the last. I couldn't breath, and when it came down to it, what was the point? As I rocked back and forth. As I grabbed my hair and covered my face. As I moaned and screamed, the room started to turn a spotty black and four arms surrounded my middle. They carried me outside, in front of the girls. And the friends. And the relatives. When they set me down I vomited.
"Taylor... come on, let's go out back."
Hands were rubbing my back as more and more I threw up, my stomach clenching and pinching against the hole in the very center of me. When the nausea slowed, I followed my guardians with dizzy tears. "I'm sorry... I'm so sorry..."
"Don't be sorry, Taylor." It was Isaac and our bodyguard. When we were behind the building and away from the crowd we sat down on a bench. I rested my elbows on my knees and put my head in my hands, still crying softly, but slowly calming down. Isaac put his arms around me.
"I don't think I can do this." I said, "I don't think so, at all."
"Taylor," Said the bodyguard, "Did you take your medicine today?"
I shook my head, but I pulled the bottle out of my pocket. I dropped two into my hand. I was handed a bottle of water, and as I swallowed each pill my father came around the back of the building.
"Taylor? What happened?"
"He had a panic attack, it's okay."
"I made a scene." I said, embarrassed. "I'm stupid."
"You're not stupid." Isaac said. "You can't help how you feel."
My Dad knelt down in front of me to face me. "Taylor, look at me, okay?"
I looked up at him, a small part of me afraid of what he was about to say. It was then, for the first time, that I saw tears in my father's eyes. My strong, stoic father, who even by my mother, stood strong against the highest waves. "You're going to be strong, today. For Zac." I nodded, solemnly and he placed his hand on my shoulder, "We're all going to be strong today. If you have to bow out for a little while, do it, but be strong. Your sisters need you. Your mother needs you. Isaac needs you. Mack needs you. I need you. We need to support each other."
"I wish..." I said, after a long silence, "That there was some kind of magical fairy dust that could make this all go away."
He smiled at me gently, and the four of us made our way inside, this time more calm. I hugged all of the relatives. My grandmother, my great aunt, three of my cousins, two of my uncles, and six more of my aunts. Then, my sisters and brothers and parents. We all lined up. My Dad first, then my Mom, then us. And after us, Alexis, Zac's red haired fiancé. All extended relatives stood after her. I closed my eyes and waited in silence so thick I could barely lift my arms when the people started filing in.
It was a blur. I likened the process to an album signing, but much more exhausting. People came through, hundreds and hundreds of them. Relatives, Friends, Co-workers, Musicians, and fans alike. My sisters were screaming hysterical, and Zoe couldn't stand more than a few hours. My Mom and Dad stood their ground equally, and all I could feel, after wiping my eyes red and raw for four days now, was tired. And sad. I was no longer in control of my body, or my tears, or the words I said. I had become a witness to my own body, as my knees grew tired and my eyes began to close.
Our fame had changed everything. After our lunch break, and the moment the fans were allowed in, I felt it. Strangers, press. They were hysterical in ways that just didn't seem fair. We hadn't thought about the fans until our email boxes had filled up and our managers told us we had to make a decision. We wanted them there. It was a decision that only felt right at the time, but I was slowly beginning to question. To them, it was not a person lost, it was an icon. I didn't know how much more I could take. Standing there, for hours and hours, looking every last person in the eye as they cried and said their sorries. It was hard to be a professional and a person all at once. The professional stood strong, but the person just wanted to collapse. I wanted to be taken away by an angel that understood like nobody else seemed to. Not my brother, not my father, my friends, or the fans. Each moment that passed made me feel a more positive alienation than the last. I couldn't even put my finger on it, all I knew, really knew, was that I was too tired to even think.
Annissa came up in line, and I took a break. I took her hand and I said nothing. We walked up the stairs.
"Taylor, what are we doing?" She asked, as we entered an empty room.
"I am sitting down." I saw a couch, and I lay down, closing my eyes, "I can't believe I have three more hours of this."
She laughed, a little. "Your fans are quite crazy..."
I shrugged, "I don't know. They're the only fans I've ever had."
"I think you should look out the window." She said.
"Why?"
"Just do it, okay? Just do it."
I got up from my couch and I walked slowly over to the window. What I saw made me angry in the most inexplicable way. It was the first feeling I had felt aside from helplessness in four days. Press. Police. And hundreds of girls sitting outside the funeral home with hundreds of candles lit down the street. I was touched and depressed. But mostly, I was infuriated.
"The news is here?"
She seemed surprised, "Well, of course the news are here... This is like the hottest stop in town. They've had to reroute traffic. The businesses are starting to get frustrated because everyone's in their lots."
"They steal everything." I said, walking away from the window. "This isn't a fucking circus."
"I think you underestimate yourself."
"No!" I said. "They have no right. None! They've taken everything valuable that I've ever had and destroyed it. Not this!"
Red hot tears charred my dry cheeks. I threw my arms in anger, and then pushed over the table. She stepped back, shocked tears in her eyes.
"I'm sorry." I said, willing myself to calm down. For her sake, more than mine. "I'm sorry. I don't mean to be like this in front of you. I just don't think you can understand until you've been in my shoes."
I reached toward her and she shied away.
"Annissa..." I said, softly. "I'm not going to hurt you."
"I have to go."
"Annissa!" I said, calling to the door as she left the building. "Fine. You leave me, too." I muttered.
I walked to the window again, and tried to look, this time, for what she wanted me to see. I stared for a long time at the crowd outside as it moved around below. The light from the candles made the town glow for as far as I could see. Thousands of them. I shook my head. "Shit. Fuck. Damn."
Outside, a thousand strangers were gathered to bid my brother a final farewell, and all I could see was the wrong thing. I had become so focused on myself, and the sheer ugliness of the situation, that I had failed to see the beauty in simple love. I opened the window so I could smoke a cigarette, and outside I heard silence. I saw some hands pointing up at me and knew they had spotted me, but I didn't much care. It was odd, I thought, how I was still always looking at them through glass. Even as I stood right in front of them. I was always, to them, a different person than what I could ever be. Nonetheless, it was because of them and their reckless honesty that I knew I was blessed.
I found her later, sitting by her car parked a block away.
"Taylor..." Isaac had said as he followed me into the mass of freezing women, "You're being an idiot right now. Dad said..."
"Fuck Dad. Honestly, we're grown men!"
"Taylor..." He sighed, but grabbed my hand as I wove between the rows and rows of cars and blankets.
I found her, though. Her tiny body adorned with a fur-lined coat and leg warmers.
"We got stuck here..." She explained, "But we figured we'd make the best of it."
"I'm sorry---" I started to say, but she interrupted me.
"No, Taylor. You're not allowed to be sorry."
Isaac sidled up beside me, cautiously. And a friend of Annissa's handed her a cigarette and a lighter. She lit the end and took a long drag. I knew the smell immediately. She passed it to me. I put it in my mouth, shielding the wind with my hand as I held the lighter in front of the one-hitter 'cigarette.' Isaac nudged me, but I ignored him, and inhaled the dream inducing smoke. I handed the cigarette to Isaac, who took it from my hands, begrudgingly. I could see he was only doing it because I was. And he was angry at me for it. The cigarette was passed around and around, and every time it passed I took a hit and so did he. I was dead stoned within minutes.
"We are so fucked." Isaac mumbled, "This was a stupid fucking idea."
I was laughing. Laughing and laughing and laughing and laughing.
"What's so fucking funny, asshole?"
"Dad... is going to kill me." Was all I could say, as tears began streaming out of my eyes. The feeling in my gut continued with my laughter, or sobbing. I couldn't tell which I was doing, but I couldn't stop.
"He should. For breaking your promise." He said, almost too soft to be audible.
We sat down for a long time. I inhaled cigarette after cigarette, numb and stupid, as we suddenly became the middle of it all. I could almost touch the invisible wall that made us different, but if you couldn't see it anyway, what did it matter? I heard their stories. Words, words, words filling my head like a bag of random syllables in a set of magnetic poetry. This means so much. I could tell it did. But I couldn't feel, exactly, how. I had lost that sense, the sense of How, sometime over the past few days. When the question comes to you, face to face, How? In big, bold, blinking letters... In icy weather, in innocent boys, in cars... When How becomes too big for your mouth... It is also when How falls apart.
I began to realize, as I stepped away from the crowd and back into our world, that the wall around me was more than just glass.