Chapter 7:

Zac woke up to a persistent and annoying buzzing in his ear. Never an early riser and a deep sleeper it took him a few minutes to fight his way of out his slumber. Then he pushed his hand under his pillow and felt around until he found and shut off his alarm clock. He looked at the clock with bleary eyes and disbelief. He couldn’t believe he’d set the alarm for 5 a.m. He figured that between writing his punishment assignment and whatever else his Dad came up with he was probably going to be short of time. Even with their home schooling on vacation until the New Year he only had two and a half weeks left to complete his job. Zac untangled himself from his blankets and dragged himself upright and staggered out of his bedroom. He wasn’t particularly quiet in his grumbling but it didn’t matter. Mackie, a smaller clone of himself, was sound asleep and very unlikely to wake up. A quick detour into the kitchen for some stomach fuel of several donuts and a Dr. Pepper and he was awake and high on sugar so he started working. Zac was really enjoying working on the family pictures. He was working on the beginning years of the Hanson Family history. A lot of the pictures were of his Mom and Dad when they were really young. There were a lot baby picture and pictures of both his Mom and Dad together going all the way back to when they were four years old. And a lot of pictures of his grandparents on both sides because they had also had life long friendships. He was now starting on the pictures of his parents when they were teenagers, when they started seriously dating. He had already timed a Billy Joel song for this part of the video and had calculated how many seconds each picture would remain on the screen and how many pictures he would need to complete the song. Zac let out a huge yawn and started scanning the pictures.

Taylor finished the last of verse of his song and played it through twice before he was satisfied that it was as good as it was going to get before Ike and Zac took their turn at it. If Zac was still interested, he reminded himself. Except for playing the drums once in the last week, Zac had shown no interest at all in their music. And, last night, he remembered. Last night had been fun. Singing capella had been fun. No instruments, no backup, no tracks, just the three of them singing for the fun of it. When they went back they would probably take their instruments and do a complete set-up. Taylor looked at his watch and realized that it was still only six-thirty in the morning. He thought briefly about returning to bed but only briefly. For whatever reason he didn’t seem to be on the same sleep schedule as most of his family. Taylor plunked out a few more notes and then decided that he was just trying to avoid the enviable. He had started his paper the night before, but what he’d written hadn’t been very good. He decided to return upstairs and try to work on it again. Taylor took his usual route from the basement studio through the family room, into the kitchen and jumped about two feet in the air when he ran into Zac unexpectedly. 

Zac had taken a break and he yipped, jumped and almost dropped the pitcher of orange juice when his brother barreled into the kitchen.

"Jeez, you scared me to death!" Taylor exclaimed. 

"Well, you didn’t exactly do me any favors!" Zac retorted setting the orange juice down on the counter and grabbing a bunch of paper towels to soak up what had spilled.

"Sorry," Taylor retorted. "I’m usually the only one up this early. What are you doing up this early? I didn’t think you even knew time existed before eight o’clock!"

"Very funny," Zac snorted grabbing a bagel and his juice and heading back to the den. 

Taylor wasn’t put off. His interest had really been piqued. Anything that could get his brother up in the morning had to be good. He followed Zac down the hall and into the den. 

"What’ca doing?"

Zac glared at Taylor but he knew it wouldn’t do any good. He gave an exaggerated sigh and turned his attention back to the computer. "I’m working on a job for Mom. I’m putting all her boxes, and boxes of pictures into albums and I’m scanning a lot of them into the computer and putting them onto a video tape."

Taylor picked up a couple of pictures and looked at them. Then he watched as Zac scanned a picture, put it into a decorative frame using the computer program, and then filed it away. "Hey, Zac that’s pretty impressive."

Zac grinned and showed his brother another part of the process where he would group several pictures together, type in a title and file it away as a timed sequence. He explained that he would add music later.

Taylor was suitably impressed. "This is really cool. Can I help?"

Zac hesitated and bit down on his lower lip.

Taylor noticed his brothers’ hesitation. "Hey, it’s okay. If you don’t want help that’s fine."

"Tay, it’s not that I wouldn’t want you to help, but..." Zac started to explain.

"But, you don’t want my help," Taylor interrupted with a laugh.

"No seriously," Zac exclaimed worried that he was going to hurt his brothers feelings. "It’s just, I’d kinda like to do this by myself. From start to finish."

"It’s okay, Zac," Taylor responded just as seriously. "Contrary to popular belief, the Hanson brothers aren’t attached at the hip. It’s okay to want to do something all by yourself. You’re allowed to be an individual."

"Is that possible?" Zac asked looking uncharacteristically unsure of himself and getting an almost funny look of puzzlement on his face.

Taylor sensed that for once his younger brother wasn’t just smarting off at the mouth. He wished that Ike was here instead of himself. Ike with his great ‘big brother’ wisdom would know what to say. Taylor picked up a few pictures and thumbed through them casually.

"Zac, I know that sometimes you may think that Ike and I don’t take you seriously, but we really do. We both know that you’re an equal part of the group. You’re the backbone to the rhythm and beat and we do trust your judgement. You have almost an extra sense about rhythm. It’s real neat and we admire it. If we give you a hard time, it’s just because we’re your older brothers, and shoot, that’s one of the perks of being older. If we didn’t harrass you it would be any fun. And, you gotta admit, you dish out a lot more crap to us, than we do to you. It’s okay. It gives us a chance to squash you once in a while. Seriously, though, whether you play with us, or not, write, produce, draw or whatever, it’s fine with us. We’ll support you no matter what you do."

"Really?" Zac asked.

"Well, sure," Taylor agreed. "I mean, you’re not just a band member you’re our brother and we’re stuck with you and you’re stuck with us. If you want to branch off, try something new, we’ll be right beside you, if not behind you giving you a boot if you need it! Sometimes it’s a good thing to try new stuff."

Zac grinned at his brothers’ words. He almost wished that he could let Taylor help him. It would be fun to share something with him again. But, it wouldn’t be right for Taylor to be working on something that he was getting paid to do. Especially, when the idea was for him to earn money to pay Tay back what he owed him."

"Tay, have you ever had an e-pitshany?" Zac asked suddenly.

"Epiths-anny?" Taylor mouthed the word in confusion. Sometimes Zac tried to use words he’d heard but he didn’t always pronounce them right.

"Yeah, you know, like a revelation?"

"Oh, you mean, epiphany," Taylor exclaimed correcting him. 

"That’s what I said, e-pitshany," Zac claimed still mispronouncing the word.

"Not that I know of," Taylor admitted. "Why?"

"Cause, I think I had one," Zac exclaimed. "Well, actually I think I had two. I was really messed up and mad and I was blaming everyone and everybody for it except myself."

"And, you had an epiphany and now you have the answers?" Taylor asked looking at his younger brother with confusion.

"Sort of," Zac explained. "I was talking to someone and all of sudden I saw myself as someone else was seeing me."

"And, that made a difference?"

"Uh huh," Zac nodded. "Tay, I didn’t like what I saw. So, I’ve decided to change myself."

Taylor was shaking his head as if to clear it. So much psychology coming out of his little brother was a little hard to comprehend. "Well, Zac I guess we could all use a little improvement, including you, but we’re kind of used to you ‘as is’. You’re not a bad kid. Kind of weird and strange sometimes, but not a bad kid at all."

"Thanks, Tay," Zac smiled. "I’m just going to work on some of the pieces that have been going sour inside."

"Does that mean you’re going to be willing to associate with us ‘riff-raff’ again?" Taylor asked hopefully.

"You mean ‘us’ as part of the band?" Zac asked.

"Well, yeah," Taylor admitted.

"Yeah, I think so," Zac admitted. "Last night was fun and I think it’s about time I stopped thinking just about myself and started thinking about the group."

"That’s cool!" Taylor giving his brother a high-five and smiling broadly. "Ike may not let you off the hook so easily though. He takes anything negative against the band as a personal insult."

"So, I’ll grovel and beg for a few minutes," Zac said laughing. "Then, I’ll turn on the puppy dog eyes and he won’t stand a chance!"

Taylor laughed and caught his brothers head in a headlock and gave him a nudge on the top of his head. "We’d better head upstairs to shower and change. If you’re going to be up early in the morning, there’s several things you need to know."

"What’s that?" Zac asked puzzled.

"Pre-dawn protocol. One, you have to be really quiet. If Dad or Mom hear anyone walking around and get scared thinking it’s a burglar--you get yelled at. If you leave dirty dishes in the sink early in the morning--you get yelled at. If Mom and Dad think you’re not getting enough sleep--you get yelled at."

"Is there anything you don’t get yelled at for?" Zac asked wondering if getting up early was really worth it.

Taylor shook his head in denial. "Not much, if it happens before 7 a.m. Also, never, ever show up to the breakfast table wearing what you slept in. Mom hates that, at anytime, but if you’ve gotten up early she thinks there’s even less of an excuse for it. I suggest, we both head upstairs and get changed before our parental warden’s alarms go off. You have a serious case of ‘bed head’ anyway."

"Like you look like prince charming or something!" Zac retorted.

"Ah, but I am the epitome of fashion, Taylor exclaimed throwing out his arms and showing off his green flannel plaid boxers, white tee shirt and faded red terry cloth robe dragging along behind him with no belt. "I have had many years of experience at pre-dawn fashion."

Zac giggled at his brothers’ antics and shut down the computer program. Tay was such a morning person, it was awful.

The brothers headed for the stairs quietly. Zac followed his brother into his bedroom and then went to adjoining door to enter his own room. He turned around suddenly.

"Hey, Tay. Thanks."

"For what?" 

"For listening, and for not calling me a dork!"

"Ha!" Taylor snorted. "I never said you weren’t a dork, or a dweeb, or a doofus. What are you, a., b., c., or d., all of the above?"

"e., None of the above," Zac retorted with a grin.

Taylor emitted a sound not unlike a buzzer. "Wrong, the answer is d., all of the above, plus a little bit of nerd and a little bit of mad genius!"

"Oh, I like the genius part!" Zac claimed laughing. 

"Mad! Mad! Mad Genius!" Taylor retorted. "That wasn’t meant to be a compliment!"

Zac giggled again and Taylor smiled and hit his brother square in the head with a pillow aimed with malicious intent. 

"Morning, Mom!" Zac exclaimed flying into the kitchen with a smile on his face. He sneaked a piece of bacon off platter and she smacked at his hands.

Diana was alternating between trying to get breakfast ready for her brood and trying to feed her youngest. Zoe was busy banging on her high-chair tray and spitting out her breakfast as fast as Diana could spoon it into her mouth. 

"Here, Mom, I’ll feed Zoe," Taylor offered entering the kitchen with Avery trailing behind him still in her pajamas. 

"Tay, stir the oatmeal, please," Diana ordered seeing that the pan that was about to boil over. "Good, morning sweetie," she said kissing her daughter on the top of her head. "Why don’t you go back upstairs and ask Jessie to help you pick out something to wear today."

"Okay, Mommy," the seven-year-old agreed and skipped back out of the room.

"Mom, this stuff is getting awfully thick!" Taylor warned from his position at the stove.

"Okay, trade with me," Diana suggested taking her son up on his original offer to feed the baby. As she switched places with him, she gave him a ‘good morning’ peck on his cheek. She slid the pan off the burner and added some milk and butter to it, stirring it thoroughly. 

Zac joined his mother behind the kitchen island. He started stuffing bread into the toaster for toast. "Mom, I’m going to need your help to pick out the next batch of pictures this morning."

"You’ve finished the others already?" Diana exclaimed surprised.

"Yep, got up early and finished it." Zac said proudly as he captured the first batch of toast and refilled the toaster again.

Diana looked at her smiling son and studied him for a moment.

"Okay, who are you and what have you done with my Zac?" Diana demanded. "My son who has to be dragged out of bed. My son who is grumpy every morning just at the thought of having to get up?"

Zac laughed and Diana gave him a hug realizing that her little Zac wasn’t so little anymore. He was almost as tall as herself. Zac was looking happy. There was a gleam in his eyes that had been missing for the last several weeks. Maybe this vacation was just he needed to regain and find his natural sense of humor again.

The preparation of breakfast was finally finished and with all the children gathered around the table, grace was spoken and the eating began. 

"Where’s Dad?" Ike asked one of the last ones to come into the kitchen. 

"He got up early, and left to get some errands done," Diana explained.

"He’s probably out buying our prison jumpsuits," Taylor moaned.

"Only for you," Diana warned giving her second son one of her famous mother ‘looks’ that the brothers claimed could scare a hardened criminal. "We talked very late last night about what would be a suitable punishment for you guys."

"And?" Zac questioned.

"We didn’t come up with anything that we agreed upon," Diana explained. 

"Ouch!" Ike mumbled. 

The three oldest boys exchanged worried glances and then returned to their breakfast. Their sisters just giggled at their distress. They were almost through with breakfast when their father breezed through the back door.

"Where have you been?" Diana questioned.

"Household Wholesale," Walker exclaimed and chuckled as his entire family groaned in pretend terror. Household Wholesale was one of Walkers’ favorite places and he was known to disappear into the store for hours. It was a huge warehouse, open 24 hours a day and full of both new and salvage items. Its’ inventory including everything from candy and sundry to books and electronics and hardware and lumber. Walker was known for his ‘do-it-yourself’ projects. They usually involved the entire family and in some cases required having to hire a contractor to ‘fix’ the projects especially if they involved plumbing requirements. Walker just couldn’t seem to get the knack of plumbing.

"Walker what have you done now?" Diana asked in pretend horror.

"I had a brainstorm and I’ve come up with appropriate punishments for these three," he replied with a grin.

Ike, Taylor and Zac were starring at their father with a mixture of dread and amusement. Walker was looking at them with a look of self-satisfaction.

"Okay, I’ll bite," Taylor exclaimed unable to contain himself. "What horrible project are you planning for us?"

"Three different projects," Walker answered while helping himself to the bacon left on the breakfast platter and folding it into a slide of toast. 

"Follow me boys," Walker exclaimed and lead the way out the back door to where he had parked the van in the driveway. Diana, asked Jessica to watch the baby, grabbed her jacket and Zac’s off the rack outside the mud room and she followed them. Walker threw open the back doors of the van to display some lumber and about twenty-five quarts of mis-matched paint in all colors. 

"Taylor, your punishment is to ‘do’ something with the studio walls." Walker explained handing his son a bag that was full of small paint brushes and sponges. "The walls are too dull. I miss your pictures. Paint a mural, whatever, it’s up to you."

"Zachary, your punishment is that we’re going to build a tree house for you and the younger kids," Walker explained pulling out a two-by-four and standing it on end. Zac automatically gripped the board and held it up in the air. 

"Dad, are you serious?" Taylor asked with disbelief in his voice.

"Absolutely, now get cracking guys. Unload the van, there will be another lumber delivery this afternoon," Walker commanded and he motioned Ike to follow him to the front of the van.

"Ike, your punishment is more work related," Walker explained handing him a plastic bag. Ike pulled several computer programs out of the bag. One was an accounting program, the other was a animation program. "I want you to work up a complete video treatment, budget, production costs, and storybook layout, everything. Pick whatever song you guys think will be your next release. If the company agrees we’ll use it, if not, it will be practice for your working on the real thing."

"Wow! Thanks, Dad!" Ike mumbled his attention focused on trying to read the back of the program packages and walking back towards the house at the same time. 

Taylor was in the back of van, packing the paint cans into a cardboard box to carry into the house. 

"Thanks, Dad!" Zac exclaimed giving his Dad a hug and his face beaming.

"Oh, guys," Walker explained grabbing the attention of his sons again. "These jobs aren’t exclusive unless you want them to be. You can help each other if you want and Zac and I are definitely going to need help with building the foundation structure to the tree house. We’re going to need your muscle power."

"I remember when we build the other one," Taylor exclaimed with a smile. "Only then, I was too little to do much more than hammer a few nails. Mostly, it was you and Ike and Uncle Frank doing the building."

"Well, this time it’s going to take all of us," Walker warned. "But, mostly Zac and myself after the foundation is up. Maybe we can get Jes and Avie involved, after all it is for her and the little ones."

Taylor lifted the heavy box out of the van and looked up to his parents with a grin. "This is so cool," he exclaimed.

With an arm around his wife’s waist Walker looked at his sons with a smile. 

"Since when are punishment chores supposed to be fun?" Diana whispered into her husbands’ ear.

Walker shrugged and kissed his wife on the cheek. "Does it matter? Busy kids means they won’t have time to get into trouble. Ike’s to old to be punished even if he did use some pretty lousy judgement. Hanging around with Tay, and Zac so much keeps dragging him back down into childhood. If we treat him more like an adult, he’ll probably start to act more like one. Tay spends way to much time in his music. He’s too focused on one thing. He needs other interests and he loves to draw. Besides the music studio is dull. Let him liven it up."

"And, Zac?" Diana probed curious to hear her husbands’ logic.

"Ah, Zac," Walker said looking back over his shoulder to watch his son lifting two-by-fours up on his shoulder and carrying them out into the backyard. "Zac is caught up in an adult world and he still wants to be a kid. He deserves a chance to be kid for whatever time he has left before he starts pushing the boundaries. If you think Taylor’s a pain, wait until that one hits sixteen. We may both want to retire!"

Diana chuckled and smiled because she understood that could very well be a true statement.

By mid-morning, rough plans had been drawn up for the blueprint of the tree house and the best tree selected. By late afternoon the basic square foundation had been bolted and hammered into position. Zac had already smashed his thumb twice with a hammer and scraped his knee on the rough bark of a tree branch. He was having a ball. Jessica had tried hammering a few nails but she didn’t like it. For her input, just asked her father if he could put a ballet bar in the tree house along with a mirror. Zac was appalled at the idea but he wisely kept his mouth shut because they were building the tree house for the younger children and that would be Jessica and Avery until Mackie got big enough to stake a claim on what Zac considered boy territory. 

Taylor offered his help only for hard labor of lifting the heavy support beams into place. He knew enough to help out, Walker hadn’t raised any of his boys to be helpless around tools, but he really didn’t like carpentry very much. He much preferred his own ‘punishment chore’ of painting the music studio. He disappeared into his bedroom and searched the Internet for pictures. When he found what he was looking for, he would print out two copies. One to keep for reference and another to add to his mural that he was planning. Taylor decided that he was going to paint the history of rock and roll on the walls of music studio. He would have pictures of Chuck Berry, and Jerry Lee Lewis and Elvis and all the music legends. He would start at one end with the late fifties and go around the room with fifty years of music stars. Of course, the Beetles and Kiss would be there along with dozens of others and he would end the mural by painting a picture of Hanson on the short wall by the door. As he found the pictures, Taylor was pasting them up on a long piece of cardboard to show his brothers and get their approval before he actually started to work. He figured that was only fair because they had to work in the room too. He didn’t want to put something on the walls that they would hate. He would use the second printed picture to put in a projector and project the image onto the wall for tracing. It would save him a ton of time from having to draw them freehand. 

Ike spent his afternoon in his room working on the new computer programs that his Dad had brought home. He would have to get a general idea how they worked before he could even begin to outline the production costs on a music video. Ike was really excited by his project. He was very interested in production. 

About an hour before dinner was to be ready, Diana called a halt to all the various activities. She pulled everyone together into the family room for some family interaction. 

Zac commandeered the remote immediately and proceeded to surf through the stations at such a quick pace that neither of his brothers stood a chance of finding something they liked. After three attempts to get Zac to stop at a station, Ike pried the remote from his brothers’ fingers and he settled on a repeat of a movie they had seen several times before. 

Taylor wasn’t really interested seeing the improbable Volcano movie again so when the phone rang he was the first to jump for it. 

"Hello?" he answered.

"Is this the Hanson residence?" the caller requested.

"Yes," Taylor answered.

"This is Stephen Spielberg," the caller said.

Taylor groaned, "Sure you are, and I’m Prince William and I’m about to be crowned King," he said sarcastically and he hung up the phone.

He barely got back to the couch when the phone rang again and again he bounced up to answer it again.

"Hello?"

"This is Stephen Spielberg, I would like to speak to Taylor..."

"This is Taylor. Look fellow, this is a private line and this isn’t funny!" Taylor snapped and he hung up the phone again.

Ike looked up with a questioning frown.

"Some jerk," Taylor explained. "Somebody’s gotten our private number again!"

The phone rang again, and again Taylor answered.

"Please don’t hang up, I really am Stephen Spielberg," the voice tried to explain. 

But Taylor already recognized the voice and he wasn’t really listening. "Listen, whoever you are. This is a private line and one more call and I’m calling the police. They can trace your call in seconds and then you won’t think this is so funny." Taylor warned and he hung up the phone for the third time.

It worked for a few minutes. Taylor returned to his place on the couch and zombied out watching television just like his brothers. Then the phone started ringing again. 

"You answer it this time. I’m not getting up. It’s probably that idiot again," Taylor told Ike.

Ike got up from his comfortable position and answered the phone.

"Hello. Oh, Hi Christopher. You’re kidding. No, he didn’t know. Hey, well, don’t yell at me I’m not the one that was hanging up the phone." Ike put the phone down on the table. 

"Tay, Mr. Sabec on the phone for you," Ike exclaimed.

Taylor having heard Ike’s end of the conversation picked up the phone warily. "Hi, Christopher." He had a right to be wary. Their manager started bawling him out immediately. Christopher ended the conversation with the warning. "The next time someone calls and says they are Stephen Spielberg--DON’T HANG UP!"

"Yes sir," Taylor answered and he hung up the phone. Taylor plopped down on the stairs and looked up at Ike with a shocked look on his face. 

"I hung up on The Stephen Spielberg,"

Ike was smiling broadly and laughing at his brothers’ predicament. 

The phone started ringing again but Taylor just looked at it.

"Tay, answer it!" Ike demanded.

"I don’t want to," Taylor whispered. "What do I say to him. I hung up on him!"

The phone was on its third ring. "Well answer it," Ike ordered.

Taylor just shook his head, so Ike picked up the phone. "Hanson residence. Yes, he’s here. Hold on a second." Ike cupped the receiver in the palm of his hand. "Tay, take the phone," he hissed at his brother.

"What do I say to him?" Taylor hissed back.

"I don’t know, he’s not calling me!" Ike exclaimed and tossed the phone at his brother forcing him to take the call.

Taylor put the receiver to his ear reluctantly. "Hello? Yes sir, this is Taylor Hanson. I’m sorry, I didn’t know it was really you, I thought a joker had somehow gotten our number."

With Ike listening and grinning, Taylor just gulped and tried to pay attention. He listened to the great Director speak for a few minutes and then he finally responded. "But, I’m not an actor. I’m just a musician and singer. Well, maybe but I don’t think I’d be very good at it. No, just a little bit in a Christian video when I was real little. No, I just don’t think I’d be very good at it. Well, thanks. Are you sure you’ve got the right Taylor Hanson? Yeah. Sure. Thanks again. I’m your biggest fan. Goodbye," and he hung up the phone slowly.

"So what did he want?" Ike demanded.

"He offered me a part in a movie," Taylor said somewhat bewildered. "Me! He saw me on a video and said he thought I was perfect for this character that he’s having trouble casting. Can you believe that? Me?"

"Did, I hear you right? Did you turn him down?" Ike demanded.

"Well, yeah," Taylor explained. "Ike, I’m a lousy actor. I can’t even tell a simple lie without getting caught. What makes you think I could act in a movie. Plus, even if I wanted to, when would I find time for it? He said he’s going to send me the script anyway."

"Well, if he’s sending you a script then he must think there is a chance you’ll do," Ike theorized.

"But, I told him I wasn’t interested," Taylor said. "Naw, he’s probably just sending it so I’ll know what I turned down. You know, rubbing it in."

"We’ll see," Ike said looking suspiciously skeptical at his brothers’ words. "Maybe, Mr. Spielburg just doesn’t like to take no for an answer. 

"Will you guys quit yapping!" Zac yelled. "You’re messing up a really bad movie, with some really bad dialog and some really lousy acting! Who was on the phone anyway?"

"No one," Taylor denied with a quick look at Ike. "Just someone who definitely got the wrong number."