He skidded, almost losing control on the dirt road, he panicked seeing the dust billowing out from under the wheels as he quickly turned, and managed to regain his balance on the dirt-bike. He sighed in relief and paused the bike, one foot propping it up, he looked through the visor of his helmet, contemplating the ramp, "I’m gonna do it," he stated calmly.

He started the motor up again, psyching himself up for the stunt, he turned around, so he was going in the opposite direction of the ramp, then, once a good distance away from it, he spun around, gritted his teeth, and headed for Isaac’s home-made ramp.

It’s easy, he promised himself. I must have watched Ike do this ramp a million times already. This he had done. Watching Isaac take the ramp in perfect stride made it look like child’s play. If Isaac could do it – and Isaac had owned his dirt-bike just as long as Zachary had owned his and the two boys practised with identical determination – then Zac decided he could do it.

He heard himself whine as he began up the ramp, he panicked at the last moment, seeing how high it really was and what was about to happen, he lost his concentration, he reached the end of the ramp and went flying off, the bike landed on its wheels, but Zac had been thrown off long before the bike had a chance to hit solid ground. Zac flew through the air and landed almost twelve feet away on a soft muddy patch.

He lay back, helpless for some moments, the shock sliding through every vein in his small body.

"Zac! Oh my god!" he heard Taylor’s frantic cry, he felt his slightly older brother pulling his helmet off. "Zac, are you okay?" Taylor grabbed both of Zac’s cheeks and lifted his head a little, looking at him in frantic concern. "Zac, c’mon, speak to me, man!"

"I’m okay, I’m fine," Zac managed in a voice tinged with pain, "I just lost my grip," he mumbled, staring up at Taylor who’s hair was shining in the early morning sun. Zac sat up as Taylor pulled his arms to help.

"If mom and dad had—" Taylor began, but was interrupted.

"If mom and dad had seen that I would be grounded and the bike would be thrown away, yeah, I know, I know," Zac climbed to his feet, a little shaken, he fell to his knees, suddenly a little dizzy.

Taylor was about to grab Zac’s arm and haul him up, but Zac refused the help.

"I’m fine, I’m fine," Zac assured, he faked a smile. He rubbed his shoulder, which ached from when his arm had swung out helplessly when he’d been thrown from his bike.

"You don’t look it," Taylor smirked, he helped Zac up anyway, "you’ve went all pale…"

"Well, I’m naturally pale person," Zac commented.

"Oh, sure," Taylor rolled his eyes.

Zac and Taylor headed back to the house, Zac still seemed shaken, but alright, Zac didn’t feel particularly affected, but he was trembling, he gathered his body was in shock more than his mind was.

Their little sister Jessica met them in the hallway of the house, Zac pulled off his yellow and black leather riding jacket and tossed it on a hanger.

"Geez, that the heck happened to you…" Jessica asked, noticing Zac had a trail of mud caked up one leg of his leather pants and over the arm and back of his leather jacket.

"Nothing," Zac pulled off his gloves and threw them on the floor stubbornly.

Taylor chuckled, "He went on Ike’s ramp and his bike threw him off," he explained.

"Geez, you trying to kill yourself?" Jessica asked suddenly.

"No," Zac sighed, blinked tiredly. It seemed he’d never stopped feeling tired lately, in fact, he was going to blame his little accident on his exhaustion. Being a celebrity wasn’t as much fun as it used to be.

"You better take a shower," Taylor commented, "You’ve got forty minutes until we start home-school."

Zac sighed and headed for the bathroom, too tired to refuse, despite the fact he felt more like going to bed than taking a shower. He wasn’t particularly thrilled that he was having to do home-school over the summer, but this was because he’d missed so much of his studies due to lack of time while performing concerts and other various things.

He stripped off in the bathroom while running the shower water, and while passing, the mirror on the back of the door caught his eye, he looked at himself, a skinny five foot three inch frame, with long blonde hair that hung to his shoulders in wisps. His dark-brown eyes stared at him back as if he were a stranger. He did look pale, but not because of the accident. Lack of sleep made him look around fifteen rather than twelve. He noticed a slight bruise on his arm and he reached up and rubbed it gingerly.

I’m a mess, he realised, his little body was a mass of bruises and cuts from his most recent biking accidents, and he had a long scratch on one arm from a rollerblading incident two days ago.

If the fans could see me now, he thought dejectedly, he rubbed at the dark smudges under his eyes, wondering if it was maybe just dirt, but it seemed that lack of sleep had taken its toll on his face.

Sighing unhappily, he climbed under the shower water, and tried to relax.

* * * * * * * * * * * *

Taylor shook his head watching Zac heading down the hall to the bathroom to take a shower, the kid had scared him for a moment, flying through the air like that, Zac hadn’t even given any warning that he was going to go over that ramp, he just did it. Taylor wished his brothers spontaneity came with some actual consideration.

But Taylor envied that spontaneity.

Taylor hated to be the only kid in the family who had to think things out before doing anything. Everything trivial for Taylor needed some kind of thought. He wished for once he could be spontaneous and let his worry melt away from his mind completely.

But worry was always constantly on his mind, and being a celebrity with constant responsibilities had left him burned out, he felt close to a nervous breakdown – if he had the strength for a nervous breakdown that was.

He headed for the kitchen to grab something to eat – since he’d left to watch Zac practise on the dirt bike at seven, he’d had no time for breakfast. "Morning," Taylor said to his mother, he gave her a polite smile and grabbed a slice of toast from the plate in the centre of the breakfast table.

Diana Hanson raised her blue eyes to Taylor’s, "Tay, I’ve been meaning to speak to you, a friend of mine…actually from school years ago…her daughter is around your age…"

Taylor sighed, "Oh god, what are you gonna ask of me?" he slumped into a chair, he dropped his toast onto the table top, suddenly no longer hungry.
"If you can tutor her daughter Lauren a few hours a day after school," Diana answered, she coiled a lock of her long blonde hair thoughtfully around her finger. "Her daughter is having some problems in history…"

"Huh?" Taylor asked, "But mom, I’m on vacation!" he responded. He couldn’t believe what his mother was asking. This was his first real long vacation in a very long time – and even then not an official vacation because he had to write songs during it for the upcoming album. How would he manage to juggle his home-school work, his song writing, tutoring some dumb girl, and still have time for fun? At this rate with all his responsibilities he felt like he’d end up taking a stress disorder and eventually need psychiatric help!

"Taylor, she’s a very nice girl, and I’m sure you’ll like her…its just some History and stuff, I’m sure it’ll be a piece of cake…" Diana tried to assure, she gave him her most confident smile, she was very confident her son was capable, despite the fact he looked more exhausted than he ever had in his life.
"Mom, this is my vacation time, I don’t wanna spend all my time teaching some girl, I just wanna go out and ride my dirt bike or…go on my blades or see some movies…" he sighed, "It’s not that I don’t wanna, its just my schedule is filled already, how do you expect me to tutor some girl, do my own school work, write songs and practise the band stuff, and still have time for normal stuff?! God, you always do this!" Taylor slammed his hand on the table, he got up.

"Taylor, the moment I sense you’re struggling with something, I’ll do my best to help alleviate any of that stress, even if it means lightening your school work load," Diana answered.

"Oh, sure, like you did before," Taylor bitterly retorted. "What about when we were recording snowed in and up at five in the morning trying to finish off a song…we didn’t get to sleep until six that morning, and just when we did, you woke us up for home school," he reminded.

"Taylor, don’t put the guilt stuff on me, it doesn’t work anymore," Diana took a sip of her morning tea, and then leaned her elbows on the table. "Taylor, it might be good for you to have someone else to hang out with anyway," she added.

"I don’t wanna hang out with a girl, god, I have them screaming in my ear and ripping my clothes practically every day, I need a break from them."

"Taylor, get a grip," she rolled her eyes. "If you don’t, I’m gonna cram even more school work onto you since you will have sooo much free time," she added. "So will you do it?" Diana asked hopefully, looking at him.

Taylor stomped off, "Like I have a choice," he muttered.

* * * * * * * * * * * *

Isaac was seated at the large round table in the school room studying his book on the French Revolution when he noticed his younger brother Taylor stomp into the school room and slam a pile of maths books, English text books and history papers onto the table in a foul mood and slump into a chair and fold his arms, frowning.

Talk about mature, Isaac thought, I bet none of our fans have any idea how much of a brat Tay can be.

Taylor’s cold blue eyes stared at the table – or rather into space – and refused to meet Isaac’s when Isaac looked at him for an explanation.

"Why are you fuming?" Isaac asked in a light tone, as if he really weren’t interested.

"Mom is making me tutor some dumb-ass girl after school," Taylor snapped, he turned his chair away from Isaac. "I hate this," he muttered.

"What's so bad about tutoring a girl?"

"Its our vacation, Ike, I thought this time I’d have a little spare time to actually have fun, god, I have school-work to do, songs to write, I have to practise on my keyboard for two hours a day…"

"Tay, first of all, you don’t have to practise two hours a day, you can cut back to one, secondly, we’ve got half of the songs for the upcoming album already written, and thirdly, if you didn’t have those things to do, you’d just sit and watch TV or complain about how Zac is bugging you. So lighten up," Isaac was particularly sick of Taylor’s consistent moaning. "Where is Zac anyway?"

"Taking a shower. He got muddy from riding. He went up that home-made ramp and the bike threw him off, he was covered in mud…" Taylor explained.

"You let him go on the ramp?" Isaac demanded in a sudden tone, looking at Taylor, he couldn’t believe that, he’d told Taylor time and time again not to let anyone go near that ramp, Isaac was still perfecting the ramp, it was wobbly, and it needed some more support, Isaac didn’t even go on it himself nowadays. Zac wasn’t experienced enough to know how to handle going over that ramp and surviving it if something should go wrong.

"Didn’t have much choice, Ike. He just kinda blurted out, "I’m gonna do it" and headed straight for it."

"He could have been killed," Isaac muttered in an agitated tone, "I’m gonna dismantle that thing," he muttered, "mom would go crazy if she found out."

"Yeah, well, who's to say when you dismantle it, Zac won’t build another one?"

"He shouldn’t be a rock star, he should be a daredevil," Isaac rolled his eyes.

Taylor sighed, feeling a little apprehensive, knowing that somehow this vacation was going to be a complete and utter disaster.