Chapter 2
The car whooshed through the fall air as they turned the corner, passing the Hanson home.
"Hey where are we going?" Startled, Zac woke from a daydream. He had the remains of a dopey smile on his face.
Having long ago abandoned showing curiosity to Zac's fantasies, Isaac had concluded that his little brother was no longer capable of thinking things neither gross nor weird, so he simply answered the question,
"The mall."
"I thought you said we were late." Frantically searching the area, Zac's jerky movements began nagging at Isaac's calm spirits.
"What's wrong with you? Sit still!" In an effort to avoid certain danger to Zac's health, Isaac one-handedly forced the boy back into the car seat. "I just gotta grab some milk for mom. That ok?" The violent tightness in his nerves melted as Zac stayed put.
"Yeah! Whatever. I don't care." Zac put his hand through his long hair trying to seem cool. "I just think we should practice is all." He kept an anxious eye on the sidewalks and then through the mall parking lot.
The engine began gurgling while the car waited for an elderly lady to back out of her parking spot. Lightly smacking the dashboard, Isaac complained about how new cars shouldn't burp at a person when he has just brought it back from the mechanic's.
"We really should get this fixed." He poked the dashboard, letting the car know whom he was talking about. The lady pulled half way out then stopped, looking around nervously at the people walking in front of her and the teenager hitting his dashboard in the waiting car. He stopped and looked at her.
"Do ya think she's gonna pull out sometime today?" He smiled at her encouragingly. She scrunched up her face in a look of disapproval. The teenager seemed to be urging her to get going. Beside him she could see what seemed to be a long-haired boy erratically jerking his head in all directions. They're probably both hopped up on drugs, she figured. What more could you expect from a long-haired boy and his colleagues? She frowned at them again.
"What is she doing?" Isaac spoke between clinched teeth as he smiled at her. "Zac?" Isaac turned around to find his little brother slouching so far back in his seat that he was practically on the floor. "What are you doing?" Zac looked up at him as if he did this every time they got in a car.
"Whatever." Isaac gave up. The lady frowned and drove back into her parking spot. Those roughens could find somewhere else to park.
"What the..." Isaac watched in disbelief as the lady pulled back in. "Remember this day if mom ever says I'm not respectful to my elders." He declared pulling away without so much as a bad word. Finding a vacant space nearly two blocks down Isaac squeezed the car into park and grabbed his wallet,
"You coming?" He asked Zac, who shook his head vigorously. "Suit yourself," Isaac laughed, "Are you gonna be ok in here?" He wasn't sure if that was a joke or not. Zac waved him off, so he left.
The brisk breeze absorbed through to the bone, making Isaac wish he'd brought a light jacket. It seemed cooler in Tulsa than usual for this time of year, or maybe, as he feared, he had simply become accustomed to the LA life. His hometown did not seem so large now that he had been living in a California condominium. Inadvertently he began to lean farther and father away from the grocery store and conveniently closer to the food court. He soon found himself in a one man line at 'Mr. Pepperoni's Pleasant Pizza Shack.'
"What'll it be?" An overweight oriental man asked while putting the last slice of pizza on a plate and passing it over. It was cold.
"That, I guess." Isaac surveyed the specimen. No hairs, some funny looking green things and pineapples (which he didn't like) but nothing truly inedible, on the surface anyway.
"Good, that's a dollar fifty."
"I'll give you one and I want a pop." The man didn't seem to care much and complied to the demands. Thanking him, Isaac began a full-force scan of the food court looking for a seat primarily on it's own. Spying a vacant bar seat, he hurried his way thorugh the crowd presuming himself unnoticed.
"Eh! Ike!" A voice boomed joyously, shocking the skin off his body. He turned around to see his brother, Taylor, waving at him from a far off table. Knowing he was exactly where his mother had told him not to be, Isaac considered ducking out of view, then realized that was a pointless plan.
"What are you doing here?" Taylor asked as Isaac neared the table.
"I was gonna ask you three the same thing. Shouldn't you two be in school.?" Isaac asked the young girl and boy, also seated at the table. The three laughed, making Isaac feel momentarily excluded. He constantly forgot that his goody-two-shoes brother, did not always hang around with as well behaved kids.
The boy sitting across from Taylor casually took another sip of his drink, "Yep," He answered with a broad smile, "Supposed to be there." He flipped his brown hair, leaning back in his seat.
Cluing in, Isaac dropped the subject. Taylor and Zac as well as all the other Hanson children were all home schooled, making it extremly hard to skip class, not that Isaac hadn't tried, during his school days. Taylor, on the other hand, always had a way of finishing his classes quickly and perfectly, giving himself earned free time and Teacher's Pet status, not that it mattered, his mother was the teacher. All of that, including other 'Best Son' traits Taylor had been born with, always made Isaac wonder how his friends (all miles short of perfection) put up with him.
"Our teacher's won't even notice we're not there, it's a 'bring the kiddies to school day' everything's all wacked up." Isaac figured that Kale was saying the grade eights were touring the high school, and nodded.
"You'll still get caught." Taylor laughed. "Micayla's with you." He playfully kicked the girl lightly in the shin. She scrunched up her face at him.
Micayla, though not perfect, was, in Ike's opinion, a female Taylor. They thought alike, joked alike and until Taylor's fifteenth birthday, they had looked alike as well. But like all near perfect people, she was under the unavoidable curse to always be caught if she failed to live up to standards.
"You know if you're caught it'll go on your permanent record!" Taylor continued, in a deep serious voice, laughing as Micayla stuck out her tongue. Had he not known better, Isaac could have confused Taylor with a giddy 11-year-old.
"Ya gonna finish that?" Kale asked, leaning over Micayla's tray and pulling over Isaac's untouched pizza.
"Help yourself." Isaac smiled since Kale already had half the pizza in his mouth. As intriguing as he was finding this little rendevous, Isaac then remembered his original proposing.
"We gotta get home Tay." He stood up so abruptly, it made Kale choke on Isaac's pop.
"Whaaa...? Why?" Confused, Taylor looked disappointed.
"Ya can't go! We took the whole day off so we could hang out." Kale, looking annoyed, put down the empty pop can.
"I just rememebered. We gotta call from Mercury..." Kale's loud groan interrupted Isaac's explanation. "Dad said I needed to find you and Zac and bring you home."
"I knew it!" Emphatically, Kale threw his arms in the air than back at the table, getting up. "You said that you were staying home for about a month." He accused Taylor. "It's been two weeks.!"
Smile faded, Taylor shrugged his shoulders, helplessly. Micayla threw out the garbage then returned to the table. "So are you going back to LA?" she asked.
"I don't know." Honestly, Isaac replied, feeling guilty.
Quietly the four of them walked to the grocery store and bought the milk. Storming like an irritated elephant, Kale brooded around the mall grumpily. Micayla, though tight lipped and stone faced was more rational. After moments of silent waiting in the cashier's line Isaac finally spoke,
"This might not even be about leaving. Maybe they just wanted to check something with us?"
Kale grunted. It was a sensitive subject but still common knowledge that the boys' record company did not ususally care about the band's input on anything other than the music. If they were told they were going to LA, Japan or Canada, for a month, in two hours, that was generally what happened. Taylor stiffened his back a little and cleared his throat.
The November air bit at them as they exited the store.
Taylor groaned. "It was so freaking warm this morning." He pulled on the zip of his jacket. Cold silence fell over the afternoon once again until a flurry of high pitched squeals broke the stillness.