Staying or Going
Zac woke up alone in the morning, and that realization made a strange lump form in his throat. Was it all just a mistake? Had Taylor abandoned him? Before he could truly panic, though, he heard the coffee machine that he knew he hadn’t remembered to set the night before. Someone had turned it on, and that someone had to be Taylor.
He hated himself for doubting his brother.
It wasn’t as though Taylor had ever left him by choice. Deep down, Zac knew that. He also knew what it felt like to go years and years without the boy he looked up to and wanted to shelter all at the same time. He never wanted to feel that way again, and he was slowly beginning to accept that he wouldn’t have to.
With some effort, Zac pulled himself out of bed. He checked his phone, after finally unearthing it in his jeans pocket, and was dismayed to discover that he was very nearly late for class. He could still make it on time if he didn’t shower, but after the last night with Taylor, a shower hardly seemed optional.
It took a minute or two to locate a relatively clean outfit, and only slightly longer to force himself through a quick, cold shower. By the time he made it to the kitchen, Taylor was sipping a cup of coffee and had sat out two plates of toast, fried eggs and bacon.
“I overslept,” Zac said, as though it was an apology for something, and began assembling his breakfast into something of a sandwich he could take with him. By the time he was done, Taylor was holding out a hot thermos, and it only made Zac feel guiltier. “Thanks, Tay.”
“You’re welcome,” Taylor replied, glancing down. “I was, umm, I was hoping we would have time to talk.”
“Maybe after class?” Zac suggested. “I can skip the library and be home for dinner if you’ll… if you’ll be here.”
Taylor nodded. “I’ll be here. After last night, I’d say we still have plenty to talk about it, but I’m not going to push it, I promise.”
“No, it’s—it’s okay,” Zac replied, but the words sounded like a lie. They weren’t, exactly, but he had no clue what to say about what they had done. He let his hand brush Tay’s for a moment too long as he accepted the thermos and said, “I’ll see you later. And we’ll… we’ll talk.”
It wasn’t a lie, but it wasn’t really the truth either, and the words felt heavy in Zac’s mouth. He scurried out the door with another apology about running late, but now he didn’t feel so bad about his tardiness. At least it gave him an excuse to not prolong the exchange with Taylor. If they talked too long, Zac feared they would begin to talk about territory that scared him, or they would actually venture into that territory again. He was quickly realizing the strength of his feelings for Taylor, feelings that couldn’t yet put into words, and that scared him.
They needed to draw a line somewhere, Zac realized. But even as he realized it, he knew they were far past any possible point where a line could have been drawn.
With nothing else to do right then to solve his problems, Zac made his way to campus and hoped that he could make it through the day without thoughts of Taylor distracting him during every single lecture.
Still, Zac found his thoughts drifting all around while he should have been listening to his professors. He could try to focus all that he wanted, but it was no use. There was only one thought his brain cared about at all, and that thought had nothing to do with early modern artists at all.
It was Taylor. It was always Taylor.
For years, Zac had wondered what it would be like to see his brother again. He had tried to imagine how Taylor would look, and he had to admit that, makeup aside, his imagination had done Taylor justice. He had tried to envision how Taylor’s personality might have changed, what his interests would be. He had imagined a billion different possibilities, dreamed up so many different versions of his long lost brother that he’d really had no idea what to expect.
But somewhere along the way, Zac realized, he had fallen in love with this nearly imaginary brother. He had dreamt up the perfect version of Taylor, this illusory ideal that would somehow magically make everything in his life better if only he would return to be a part of it.
The real Taylor fell short of that ideal, but that didn’t make Zac love him less. If anything, his flaws only made him more perfect in Zac’s eyes. Zac knew that was irrational, and was only a sign of how much he had longed for this, how much he so desperately loved his brother. He would overlook nearly any fault, he reasoned, as long as it meant Taylor was in his life again.
And he loved him. Much, much more than he should have. Zac was quickly realizing that he had loved Taylor for years, but he hadn’t been able to put a name to the feeling until he felt Taylor’s arms around him or their lips pressed together. Of course he loved him; that was only natural. But somewhere along the way, in all of his hoping and dreaming of Taylor’s return, those feelings had twisted into a romantic sort of love.
The worst part, Zac decided, was that he didn’t want to change a thing. It might have been wrong, but maybe this was what they needed. Maybe being together like this was the only way the two of them could heal the years of hurt.
Even as he realized all of this, he knew that he couldn’t explain any of it to Taylor. Taylor’s insistence that they needed to talk, Taylor’s worry that Zac didn’t truly want it… what if Taylor didn’t truly want it? What if all Taylor wanted to talk about was how this needed to end before they got in too deep?
Well, too late, Zac thought.
He zoned back in just as Dr. Phillips began passing out some sort of handout that she seemed inordinately excited about. A quick glance revealed that it was an advertisement for an exhibit of new, young artists at a trendy museum downtown. Amateurs were, apparently, encouraged to submit their work, and Dr. Phillips seemed to think this was a great opportunity for her students. Not all art history majors were artists themselves, a fact that Zac found odd, but enough of them were that Zac was sure the museum would be flooded with submissions. Even though he had spent most of his free time sketching and painting stupid portraits of Taylor, he had no desire to put his work out there for anyone’s judgment.
He did have a painting in progress that he’d like to get back to, though, but he decided the conversation with Taylor was probably more important. Even if it wasn’t necessarily a conversation he wanted to have, he supposed there was no point in drawing it out any longer. One the professor dismissed the class, he gathered up his belongings and headed back to his apartment, leaving the painting for another day.
When he returned to the apartment, he was greeted by the smell of warm, freshly cooked food as soon as he opened the door. It was becoming a fixture in his life, and he loved trying to guess what Taylor had cooked if his nose couldn’t immediately identify it. In this particular case, he had to walk into the kitchen to see that Taylor was just plating up a chicken stir fry of sorts that looked far healthier than anything Zac would have fixed for himself.
Zac grabbed a soda from the refrigerator and tossed his bag down on the counter. It was cluttered with papers, which was nothing new, but a few papers in particular stood out to him.
“What’s this?” Zac asked, holding up a sheet of photos.
“Oh,” Taylor said, glancing up from the table. “I was just working on my resume and portfolio. Making sure it was all up to date and stuff.”
“Oh… okay,” Zac replied, still feeling like he was missing something.
“You never know,” Taylor said, giving Zac a dismissive shrug. “There are some fashion shows and things coming up that would be great opportunities for me. I want to put my best foot forward, you know?”
Zac nodded, but a lump was forming in his throat. “Fashion shows? Around here? In Austin, I mean.”
“Some of them,” Taylor said, motioning for Zac to sit down. Zac hadn’t realized he was still standing, nor did he really have much of an appetite anymore. “Some stuff in Dallas, and a few in California that a friend of mine told me about. That’s where a lot of the work is, obviously—special effects makeup for movies and things.”
“Does that mean… does that mean you would have to move?” Zac didn’t want to know the answer, but it seemed obvious anyway. Of course Taylor would have to move. Of course he would have to leave him.
“Well, yeah,” Taylor said. “I mean, if I get one of the jobs and decide to take it. Which is all still very hypothetical at this point. But Austin isn’t… it’s a great place, but it’s not necessarily where I want to be forever, you know? It was just meant to be a stop along the way.”
“Oh.” Zac’s mouth went completely dry. He had only just gotten Taylor back, and now he was going to leave again? It wasn’t fair, and yet he knew he couldn’t ask Taylor to give up on his dreams because his little brother needed him.
“You don’t want to stay here forever either, do you?” Taylor asked, his tone softening a bit. “I mean, is this is? You graduate and get a job here and just stay in this apartment forever?”
“I hadn’t thought about it,” Zac answered honestly.
“Well, maybe you should,” Taylor replied. “I’m sorry, I just think… if this is what you want, that’s fine. But you could be more than this. You are more than this. Think what a great artist like you could do out in Los Angeles. You’ve got so much life ahead of you, and I don’t want to see you just coasting through it or doing what you think is expected of you. That’s all.”
Zac wanted to scream that if he followed Taylor to California, he would only be following Taylor’s dreams. But the truth was that Zac had no clue what he wanted out of his life. He didn’t know how to be anything but what people wanted of him. Being what Taylor wanted of him had to be better than most of the other options, though. Yet somehow it still made him feel sick to consider uprooting his life in Austin.
There were no good options. He couldn’t just end his life as he knew it to chase after his brother, but he couldn’t go on living without Taylor, either.
“I think,” Zac squeaked out, staring down at the plate of food he had barely even touched. “I think I don’t feel very good. Sorry.”
He pushed back his chair and stood up before Taylor could stop him, grabbing his backpack and heading for the door. He could hear Taylor calling after him that he would save him a plate to reheat later, but Zac didn’t pause to answer him.
He was taking the coward’s way out, avoiding conflict completely, and he knew it. But right then, he didn’t know what else to do. When every option presented to him—staying, going or whatever—made him feel like he was suffocating, running seemed like the only thing to do.