Zac
Not surprisingly, I woke up with a raging hangover the morning after the party, but I couldn’t have been happier. Now that Carrick knew the truth about my feelings for him, a weight had been lifted off my shoulders. I knew that one confession couldn’t solve all of our problems, but for the moment, it was good enough. I spent the next few days practically walking on air, and nothing at all could bring me down.
Even an early morning truck stop didn’t bother me that much. I groaned when I heard our tour manager calling out to everyone to get up, get out and be back in fifteen, but I didn’t really mind being pulled from my sleep, not when reality was almost as good as the sex dream I had just been having.
I was actually humming to myself as I hopped from the bunk and pulled on the cleanest pair of jeans within arm’s reach. I nudged past Isaac, giving him a nod and a smile, which he barely returned. No one else seemed nearly as chipper as I was at this early hour, and I couldn’t imagine why not.
Taylor was sprawled across a chair in the kitchen, his eyes barely open as he mumbled into his phone; based on the tone of his voice, he was talking to Natalie. I had to hand it to him. In spite of the weird arrangement that their marriage was, he didn’t shirk any of his duties to her. Early mornings, before she had woken up the kids to start their schooling for the day, were just about their only chance to talk uninterrupted, and he checked in with her like clockwork.
Maybe I didn’t put enough stock into stuff like that–regular phone calls, presents just because, all the things that just generally said a person cared. It wasn’t like I had done anything all that terrible in my marriage; I hadn’t even strayed until recently. Yet somehow my marriage seemed to be a house of cards, while Taylor had somehow built something incredibly solid in spite of the shaky foundation it rested upon.
I shook my head as I walked past him and off the bus. Those thoughts were way too deep for this early in the morning.
I was almost inside the Love’s we’d stopped at, somewhere in the middle of nowhere Wisconsin, when I saw Taylor’s reflection behind me in the door. I held it open for him like the good brother that I was.
“Morning,” he rasped, rubbing his eyes. “Need coffee.”
“You look and sound like a zombie, dude. Not a good look.”
“You don’t sound that much better,” he shot back, making a beeline for a cooler full of sugary Starbucks drinks. He grabbed a bottle of mocha-choca-something, cracked it open and chugged half of it in one go. I almost laughed at his sigh of relief; I’d seen drug addicts who didn’t fiend as hard as Taylor sans caffeine.
“Rough show last night?” I asked, raising an eyebrow at him over the top of the row of candy bars I was eying. We all had our addictions, I supposed, some more dangerous than others.
He shrugged, taking another long, slow sip. “Nah, just stayed up on the laptop too late.”
I eyed him for a moment, remembering the conversation I had almost convinced myself was a drunken fantasy. Taylor spent a lot of time on his laptop for someone who claimed not to watch porn, and I knew he wasn’t a gamer like me. What else was the internet for but games and porn?
Shaking my head, I turned to glance at Carrick. He was scrutinizing the pitiful selection of fruit the gas station had to offer, and I almost had to laugh at that. How did I end up with a health nut like him? In so many ways, Carrick and I couldn’t have been more different, but something about us just worked.
Trying not to smile too much as I thought about the little makeout session we had shared in the back lounge after everyone else fell asleep, I turned back to Taylor and said, “Well, I slept like a baby.”
“Made up with Carrick?” He asked, one eyebrow just slightly raised. “What was that all about anyway?”
“Huh? What was what all about?” I didn’t sound believable at all, but I hoped Taylor was still too sleepy to pick up on that fact.
He chuckled softly. “You seemed pretty upset when he was talking to that guy at the party. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you looked jealous.”
“How drunk were you, Tay?” I asked, letting out a nervous laugh that was at least an octave too high. “I think you were hallucinating.”
Taylor stared at me, obviously trying to find some fault in what I had said. I was sure I’d had far more to drink that night than him, but he hadn’t been all that sober, either. Finally, he dismissed whatever he’d been about to accuse me of, and shrugged.
“Maybe I was,” he finally agreed, and I hoped that meant the subject could be dropped. “So, hey, how’s Kate feeling?”
“Huh?” I asked, my head snapping back up from the Skor bar I had just nabbed. “What about Kate?”
“Nat just said she hasn’t been feeling well. Canceled their plans the past couple nights.”
“She… she hadn’t mentioned anything.” I also hadn’t talked to her for very long in the past week, but I still felt certain she would have mentioned something like that. The fact that she hadn’t, and the fact that she had sounded perfectly healthy when we had talked… well, I didn’t know what to make of that. Nat was a bit of a gossip, though; maybe she was making something out of nothing.
“Huh,” Taylor said, looking perplexed. “Well, it must not be that serious then, I guess.”
Carrick wandered over then, saving me from discussing my wife any further. I could have kissed him for that, but I wasn’t exactly ready to explain that to Taylor.
Taylor leaned against the cooler next to Carrick and gave him a smirk that made me just a little bit sick to my stomach. “So, looked like you made a friend the other night. Get his number?”
Carrick shot me a quick glance, almost imperceptible, but it didn’t pass me by. “Nah. Seemed nice enough; just not really my type.”
“Hoping he’d hook you up if it didn’t work out, Tay?” I fought the urge to scowl. Taylor had no clue what was really happening, of course, but if I didn’t deflect attention from my obvious jealousy, he would figure it out before too long.
“Don’t worry,” Taylor said, rolling his eyes but otherwise not acknowledging me at all. He was used to me joking about his preferences, I was sure, but used to it didn’t mean he liked it. “We’ll get you some action this tour.”
“No offense, Tay, but I’m pretty sure I can find my own action. But… thanks for the offer.” Carrick gave him a wink and a nudge, then grabbed a sparkling water from the cooler and wandered off. He passed just a little too close to me on the way, giving me a wink that I was glad Taylor couldn’t see.
“That’s not what I…” Taylor huffed, trailing off as Carrick passed out of earshot. His face was bright red, and I couldn’t resist grinning. It was just too easy to get under Taylor’s skin, especially with Carrick’s help.
“Well, I’ll see ya back on the bus,” I said, glancing back at Carrick one last time before stepping in closer to Taylor. “Get some rest, dude. It’ll do you some good. It’ll help with those hallucinations, at least, but maybe not the, uh, sexual frustration.”
If it was possible, Taylor turned even brighter red at that. I could almost see the wheels in his head turning, trying to come up with a suitable comeback. He was no match for my wit, though, and he knew it. Practically purple in the face now, he turned on his heel and stalked off without another word.
I couldn’t resist laughing out loud as I walked off in the opposite direction, hoping to catch Carrick alone before everyone else made it back to the bus. On second thought, I paused, and grabbed a Butterfinger, too. Breakfast of champions.
Zac has a certain way of looking at Taylor, a certain way of touching him. Without a single word, it says, mine.
Taylor can’t help testing him, though, pushing his limits. He’d find a cute guy in any crowd and turn on his charm. Smile a bit too long, laugh a bit too loud, and soon enough Zac would be right there. Thick, powerful fingers wrap around Taylor’s wrist, then pull away so quickly that no one but Taylor even notices.
Taylor knows to follow him wherever he goes. Zac would find some secluded spot, maybe just around the corner of a hallway where the party could still be heard but no one else dared venture. Taylor would no more than round the corner when he’d find himself shoved up against the wall, Zac’s body pressed up against his, breath hot and wet against his ear.
“Mine.”
He knows better than to argue with that. And why would he? It’s true. There are parts of their lives they can’t share with each other, for practical reasons, but all the parts of Taylor that mattered were Zac’s and always had been.
Zac’s hand somehow manages to snake its way in between Taylor’s body and the wall. He pops the button on Taylor’s jeans with practiced ease and wraps his hand around the erection Taylor didn’t even realize he had. He doesn’t have to speak; Taylor still hears him loud and clear. Mine.
He jerks Taylor roughly, his other hand fumbling to lower Taylor’s jeans and underwear. He swirls his thumb through the precome gathering on the head of Taylor’s dick, one knee wedged between his legs to push them further apart. His thumb comes to rest right against Taylor’s entrance, little more than a tease.
“What’s this?” He asks.
“Yours.”
Zac murmurs his agreement, his thumb pushing just past what little resistance Taylor’s body offers. He thrusts the digit in and out a few times, a pale imitation of what they both really want. When he pulls away, Taylor’s hips buck backward almost involuntarily, and Zac just chuckles.
He’s inside Taylor so fast it takes Taylor’s breath away. He rests his forehead against the wall, his hands grasping at worn wallpaper that offers no purchase whatsoever. But it’s okay, because his real anchor is Zac, fingernails digging into his hips as he thrusts ruthlessly in and out.
His pace is slow and steady, each thrust feeling deeper than the last. When Taylor reaches for his own dick to try to match the pace, Zac laces their fingers together and plants their hands right back against the wall. Taylor gets the message.
Zac gives little more than a soft grunt to announce his impending orgasm. He rests his head against Taylor’s shoulder as it racks his body, each tremor sending another stream of warm, thick come into Taylor. He holds Taylor in place until the last tremor subsides, then pulls Taylor’s pants back up. They strain against the erection Zac has done nothing to help with, but Taylor doesn’t dare complain.
As Zac walks away, his shuffling footsteps fading into the distance, Taylor hears the echo of the word left unsaid.
Mine.
We drove through the better part of the morning, and I spent most of it curled up on the bus couch with Carrick. While Carrick worked on some book that was far too highbrow for me, I switched back and forth between playing the newest game I’d downloaded on my iPad and checking for new reading material of my own. If anyone thought it was strange that we were intertwined like a pretzel, they didn’t see fit to mention it.
My mind was elsewhere the whole time, though. Something about that conversation with Taylor hadn’t sat well with me. Part of me thought he was starting to catch on to what was happening between me and Carrick, but that wasn’t what really had me worried. I couldn’t shake the feeling that there was some deeper meaning in his passing comment about Kate, yet I couldn’t figure out what it was.
When we finally made it to our next town and checked into the hotel, Carrick and I naturally volunteered to share a room. No one thought twice about that; we always shared when we toured together. When everyone started making plans to get lunch, I gave Carrick my order and feigned sleepiness; that would buy me a few minutes to call my wife and try to get to the bottom of this feeling that kept nagging at me.
If Carrick suspected anything, he didn’t say. He just smiled when I offered to take both of our bags to the room and promised to be back as soon as possible. As soon as I’d tossed them down, I pulled my phone out and found Kate’s name in my recent calls.
It rang so many times I was sure the call would be sent to voicemail when finally her voice came on the line. “Zac, hey.”
“Hey,” I said. “Everything okay there?”
“Just helping Junia in the bathroom,” she replied. “I left my phone in the other room.”
“Is she okay?”
Kate chuckled softly. “She’s fine, if you don’t count the fact that she felt the need to use an entire bottle of expensive soap to wash her hands. Why?”
“Oh, I just thought–” I began. “I mean, I heard through the Hanson grapevine that you’d been under the weather lately, so… you said bathroom, and I just figured she’d caught whatever you had.”
“Oh, for goodness sake,” Kate said, and I could practically hear rolling her eyes. “I told Natalie it was just bad PMS. These new pills aren’t really agreeing with me yet, I suppose. But you know if anyone sneezes, Nat acts like the plague is coming to get us all.”
That was true enough, I supposed. Still, her mention of the pills ruffled my feathers; true, we probably weren’t in a good place to have any more kids, but why did she get to make that decision on her own? Given the circumstances, I decided it probably wasn’t the right time to have that argument again. Heaving a sigh, I replied, “Well, I’m just glad you’re okay. I was kinda worried when I had to hear through Tay that you were sick or whatever.”
“Well, neither Nat nor Tay needed to be talking about my health. Especially since it’s perfectly fine. But if you called a little more often, you would have known that for yourself.” There was just a hint of a teasing tone to her voice, but not enough to cover the accusation.
“You know I call as much as I can,” I replied, my voice as measured and reasonable as I could manage. “You’ve been on tour before; you know how busy it can be.”
“I know, I know,” she said, her tone just as measured as mine. Neither of us wanted a fight, I supposed. “But you hardly seem to answer when I call, either.”
“Katie, what do you expect if you call when I’m on the walk? Or in soundcheck? I know it’s hard to keep up with my schedule; I barely can. But you can’t expect me to always be available.”
“No, I guess I can’t,” Kate shot back, an edge to her voice that I didn’t quite understand. There was a moment’s pause, and when she spoke again, she sounded like herself. “But hey, it’s just about lunch time here, judging by the number of times I’ve seen your son glance longingly at the kitchen in the last few minutes. Call me the next time you have a chance?”
“Yeah, I will,” I replied, laughing softly at the mental image of Shepherd; like father, like son. “You better go make lunch before the natives get restless.”
“That’s the plan. And Zac–if you don’t have a chance to call me, do you think you can make one?”
“I’ll do my best.” She knew as well as I did that my best wasn’t very good.
“Bye, Zac.”
The line went dead before I could say goodbye or even offer a half-hearted ‘I love you.’ It was just as well; the words sat heavy on my tongue and made me sick. It shouldn’t have felt wrong to say that to my wife, I knew, but that was my reality now and I couldn’t change it.
And there was still something off with Kate, something I just couldn’t quite identify. There was a distance between us, and I didn’t just mean the literal one. Our conversations were strained in a way they never had been before. A part of my brain said that was all my fault, that of course things were off now that I was going behind her back with Carrick. But that wasn’t quite it. The truth still eluded me, so close but still just out of my reach.
I had only just plugged my phone into its charger and placed it safely on the bedside table when I heard a key card beep in the door. I jumped up to hold it open when I saw Carrick struggling with arms full of Chinese take-out boxes.
He gave me a big smile that made me just about melt into a puddle right then and there. Maybe it didn’t matter exactly what was wrong between me and Kate. I knew right then that I wasn’t going to fight to save it.