Taylor was in the living room when he heard the door knock. Still feeling stubborn with his mother from this morning, he refused to even get out of his seat to answer it, and ignored the knocking and turned his attention to the TV screen, trying to become absorbed in Timon & Pumbaa on the Disney Channel just as Jessica, Avery and Zac were.

Jessica, who was sitting almost right in front of the TV, turned, "aren’t you going to answer the door?" she asked, looking at him with quizzical clear blue eyes.

"No," Taylor stated firmly.

Zac glanced at Taylor for a half second, "Well, I’m not answering it," he mumbled in a sleepy tone.

He heard his mother swear "damn kids won’t get off their asses to answer the door" as she passed by the room to get to the front door, Taylor heard her voice, she suddenly sounded overly cheery.

"Just go in, he’s in there," Diana was saying from the hallway, "sorry for having to rush off, but I just left a four year old in a kitchen full of sharp objects."

Taylor realised this was the girl he was going to be tutoring, his mother must have prearranged it all before even asking him. Sneaky. She’d obviously intended him to say yes long before he did.

The living room door opened and a petite blonde stepped into the room, looking a little shyly around her.

Jessica and Avery paid her no attention, Zac, being always inquisitive raised his eyes to her and gave her a quick smile before returning his attention to the TV.

Before the girl had a chance to speak, Taylor decided to face the music, and he stood up sighing.

"Hi…I guess you must be Lauren," he said in a flat tone, not meaning to sound so unenthusiastic.

"And you must be Taylor," she gave a slight smile and reached out for his hand but he didn’t shake her hand, she nervously put her hand down, looking at him with grass green eyes that Taylor was making a good assumption were a result of tinted contacts.

"Did you bring your books?" Taylor asked, he motioned for her to follow him to the schoolroom where they’d get peace and quiet.

"Yes," she answered in a soft tone.

Taylor lead her into the schoolroom and he motioned to the large table, "Take a seat," he offered without a friendly tone, rather like a professional, he wondered if he’d picked up that attitude from so many unfriendly business men he’d co-operated with. He gave her a good glance as she took at seat at the far end of the table, her hair was blonde, sunkissed, pulled into a half-ponytail with a dark blue scrunchie. She was definitely good looking, but somehow, Taylor was too tired to notice this, he was more in the mood to get to work and get rid of her so he could spend the rest of the night doing nothing but relax. "Okay, so…what were you on?" he asked.

Lauren raised her eyes to his, "Huh?"

"The work…what books?" Taylor almost snapped.

"Oh," She blushed a little and began searching into her rucksack for a history book, she placed it down on the table, "This," she answered.

Taylor wished he hadn’t snapped, he wished he could sound even a little less apathetic, but exhaustion was just too great and he was testy. "‘kay," he murmured a little softer, he picked up the book and opened it, "Lets see what you’re on," he sighed.

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

Taylor was finding it hard to keep his temper with Lauren. She was distracted a lot, he wasn’t sure what by, he drilled her on everything but it had taken two attempts at everything to get the girl to listen, and half of the time she’d looked at him as if he’d been speaking French. Eventually, after managing to get her through a quarter of a five-hundred word essay, he’d given up.

"I guess we can finish up," Taylor said, glancing at her essay, the girl had obviously not listened to a word he’d said, he could see this by looking at her essay. "Y’know…you might want to change this paragraph here in the final draft…where’s your eraser?" he asked.

"Why?" she asked.

Taylor pointed out a spelling mistake on her essay, "you’ve misspelled prerequisite," he pointed out. "There’s no Z in prerequisite," he added, "and…um…this is a run on sentence…" he pointed out, he grabbed her pencil, used the eraser tip to rub out the Z and put in an S and then he put a full stop where there should have been one and changed a letter to a capital. "There."

She looked at him blankly, maybe a little angry with him, "Thanks," she muttered.

He realised his mistake of correcting her and making her feel bad about it, Lauren closed her folder – encasing the essay paper – and she put the folder away in her rucksack along with her history book. "When should I come over next?" she asked in a sharp tone.

Never would be good, Taylor contemplated saying.

"Tomorrow I guess," Taylor shrugged, trying to sound nonchalant, realising if he didn’t tutor this girl as he was supposed to and often as he was supposed to his mother would make life hell for him. "around four…" he added.

"Hey, wassup?" came Isaac’s soft voice as he walked through the door, he spotted Lauren and smiled, "hey," he said.

God, Ike never stops putting up those fake smiles and the cheesy politeness when there's a girl around, Taylor thought rolling his eyes.

Lauren looked up to Isaac, "Hey, I’m Lauren," she smiled, she was satisfied that Isaac’s smile was very genuine and he was the first to reach out his hand to her, she took it gratefully, glad for some friendliness at last.

"I’m Isaac…or Ike…I’m Taylor’s older brother…"

Not to mention weirder brother, Taylor thought.

Lauren pulled on her rucksack.

"I’m gonna be tutoring Lauren," Taylor said, so he wasn’t left out of the conversation.

"Cool," was Isaac’s response.

"Anyway, I should get going," Lauren realised.

"Yeah, lemme see you out," Taylor offered, actually glad to be rid of her.

Isaac frowned at Taylor's strange tone of contempt, "see you later," he said in a soft voice to Lauren, trying to make her feel as wanted in this house as he could.

Taylor walked Lauren to the porch out front, and looked at her before she headed down the stairs without saying goodbye, somehow this agitated him too. "See you tomorrow," he muttered and stepped inside.

The moment he got into the hallway he found Isaac there, looking slightly over a little down on him, "You’re a nasty little shit, you know that?"

"Hey, I didn’t even want to be tutoring her, she was just sort of dropped in my lap!" Taylor exclaimed.

"God, you’re so obnoxious," Isaac shook his head in disgrace and headed for their room.

Taylor sighed, he wished he hadn’t gotten Isaac mad. God, does Ike always have to be the all-around good guy twenty-four/seven? Taylor demanded in thought, he shook his head and was about to head down to the garage.

"Tay!" came Zac’s voice from the living room.

"What?" Taylor groaned and headed for the living room, opened the door and half leaned in, looked at Zac who was stretched out on the floor playing Action Man figures with Mackenzie.

"Rob from the music store phoned for you ten minutes ago…" Zac answered to Taylor’s question, he didn’t raise his eyes up.

"And you didn’t think to call me?" Taylor asked, feeling his anger rising.

"You were busy," Zac reminded. "Anyway, Rob managed to fix your keyboard," Zac stated.

"Oh," Taylor recollected taking the thing in last week because the wires had started sparking at the back.

"You have to pick it up tomorrow," Zac added, "I already told them you would."

Taylor sighed, "Okay, okay." He glanced at the clock, it was almost dinner time, "I’m going down to the garage to practise, so don’t bother following to bug me," he stated, and then left the room, leaving Zac with the conclusion that Taylor was having a bad day.