The Better Days, chapter 13
Title: The Better Days
Genre: Gen
Rating: PG-13
Chapter: 13
Summary: When your whole world turns upside down in a minute, how do you handle it? How do you go on when you're missing a huge piece of yourself? This is Zac's story as he tries to survive the worst thing that's ever happened to him.
I know it's been awhile again, I'm sorry I'm so slow on updating this thing!! Here's another chapter. It might be awhile before anything more is posted just because this is the last complete chapter I have...I'll get another one finished asap! <3
I’m sitting in Tay’s studio again. The week between now and the day I walked into my house to find half my possessions stolen has been awful, full of cops, lawyers, statements, and hiding this newest wreck of my life from press and fans. Trying to get an exact list of everything the thieves took was probably the most painful. Every new thing Ike, Tay, or I discovered missing adds another little footstep in the path of separation between Kate and me. I haven’t played any music since a few days before the robbery was discovered. I’m cranky, snappish, teary. My breakdowns had been occurring with slightly less frequency, but being robbed seems to have set everything back into panic mode. I didn’t sleep at all when we got back to Tay’s after finishing with the cops the first day. I need Kate, and I can’t have her.
I’m a little surprised I’ve let myself go this long without touching an instrument again. And, if I’m honest, I’m a little bit scared. How can I write, how can I create something? Everything that’s happened in the last two months has thrown all the music completely off track. We haven’t worked on the new album since she died. Who knows when it’ll be released now? At least we have a reason for the delay this time, more concrete than with Underneath.
I stare at the piano’s keyboard, and the thought I’ve been having off and on re-enters my mind. Kate needs a song. A new song, something just for her, something that screams her presence in every chord. Maybe a song could reach her where I can’t go.
But no lyrics come to my mind, no melody starts playing in my brain, no beat taps itself out of my toes. I know it’s too soon, too painful. Someday I’ll give her the best tribute I can in my lyrics, but I don’t think it’ll start today. My creativity’s buried in my grief. But I still have everything before, the countless songs written with and without my brothers. One of them rises up in my mind now, and I slowly start to play Tay’s piano. I don’t sing, but the lyrics are there, and I can almost touch her, almost curl up beside her and bury my nose in her neck. Deep brown eyes watch me as I sleep, long dark hair washes over me…I tremble a little as my hands form the chords. Her song while she could still watch me sleep. So different now. I need you now, need you now, more than ever, and you’re gone. My hands shake; I flub a few of the notes. But I don’t stop playing.
I catch the sound of the studio door opening over the piano melody. Their eyes are on the back of my head, but they don’t interrupt me, just watch me play. And all of a sudden I know she’s there too. Not in the flesh, not living, but her love and her warmth are there. If she were really here right now she’d be dancing, spinning on the spot, smiling at my love song for her. She doesn’t want me to be sad all the time. I know this. It’s been so hard to be happy, with her loss draped over me like a big dark cloak, blotting out the sun. Her absence will probably never not hurt, but it doesn’t mean I can’t be happy sometimes. I’m almost happy now, doing what I love. She may be gone…her wedding ring may be gone…half of our material possessions may be gone…yet I have the memories, and I have the music. I’ll always have the music, and I’m surprised at how comforting that is.
I stop playing, bow my head for a moment over the keys. “I love you, Katie,” I murmur, and I swear, I feel her lips on my cheek for the briefest instant.
“You sounded good, Z,” comes Taylor’s voice from behind me. “Is this a private jam session, or can anyone join?” I turn to see him looking at me with a hint of worry. Everyone always looks at me with worry, or sorrow, anymore. I guess my family has a right to, though. I give him and Ike a smile.
“’Course you can join in. It’s your studio. And your piano.”
I start to rise from the piano bench, but Taylor stops me. “You can have the ivories for a while if you want. I’ll drum or something.”
“Okay,” I say, turning back to the piano. Taylor steps over behind the drums as Ike goes to get his favorite guitar. I try to lose myself in the music as we play, but it’s been awhile since we practiced together, and we’re kind of rusty; we keep having to restart. Frustration worms its way into our conversation, as so often happens with our music. We all love it, but our tendency is to be incredibly anal about it. It has to be perfect. Every note has to be just right. So it’s not a surprise when Tay huffs and throws the drumsticks aside.
“Ike, you’re rushing again! God, man, can’t you count?”
Ike rolls his eyes. “I’m not rushing, Taylor. You’ve slowed down like half a beat since we started playing!”
“Yeah? Who’s drumming?” Tay smirks.
“That doesn’t mean you can arbitrarily turn Tearing It Down into a ballad!” Ike snaps.
I roll my eyes. “You were both off. Tay, get up. I’ll drum.”
“I’m the fucking drummer for Tearing It Down!” Taylor glares. “It’s not that hard to follow a tempo; you’re supposed to stay with the drummer!”
“Not when you’re dragging the whole song down!” Ike retorts. The argument gets more heated, but I’ve stopped really paying attention. I suddenly don’t want to play music right now. I get up and walk away from the piano, away from my brothers. I leave the studio, noticing how they stop shouting and their eyes follow me out the door. I avoid the sounds of children playing in the living room and head back to the guestroom. I curl up on the bed and close my eyes, focusing on her sweet face. But the peaceful sense of her presence I had at the piano is gone now. I try to hang on to her love; tears threaten, but I picture her voice whispering to me, I try hard to call up our happy memories. I suck in a shaky breath and let my eyes drift closed. I can see her then, as real and vibrant as she was almost a month and a half ago (has it really only been a month and a half? It feels like decades), the last time I saw her alive.
I’d been working, trying to get a chord progression for a song we were going to work on in the studio. She’d come in, all smiles and strawberry scent, giving me a playful kiss as she asked if I needed anything from the store, she was going to run and get a few things real quick. I wish I’d said yes. I wish I had gotten up and gone with her. I wish I’d kept her from going. If I’d delayed her for just a minute, a few seconds, maybe her car wouldn’t have been in the exact location it was when she was hit, or the other driver would have been able to see her, or he wouldn’t have smashed into her car at just the right angle to snuff out her life, seal her beautiful eyes shut forever, steal her love from me and reduce everything she was to stillness and nothingness.
I shift slightly where I lie; glancing down I sigh a little. This has been torture of a different kind, knowing Kate and I will never complete each other again, never again will I come undone as she surrounds me. I’ve been pretending sex doesn’t exist since she passed. She was my first, my only. It’s too painful to try to bring myself off, because every time I even think about it, she’s all I can see, feel, remember. I thought I’d seen my last wet dream…they’ve reappeared over the last few months, ending up with the wetness of tears on my face as well. I feel so damn guilty every time, too. How can I even think about being aroused when the one I swore my eternal faithfulness to is gone? I miss her so much, and this…this is just another reminder of her complete and final absence from my life…just another pain. I roll onto my side, resolved to ignoring it. I could care less if I awaken to sticky boxers again later. If I can’t have Kate…I want nothing to do with it. I just want to curl up and let everything pass over me, everything except the memories that are so precious and the love I want so badly to feel, in my flesh and in my heart, again.