“Wow, look at her. She’s amazing.” Zac gawked over his latest crush as she waltzed
by.
“Zac, snap out of it, and go over and introduce yourself,” his brother Taylor
suggested, knocking Zac out of his trance.
“No! I mean...”
“What is that? Zachary Walker Hanson is - what - afraid of a girl?!
This must be first!”
“No, I’m not afraid of her, I’m just.....”
“Afraid of rejection. Eh young man, when I was a young man in Scotland-”
“What the hell Tay! You were never in Scotland!”
“Oh yeah! Well I’ll be damned!”
“Anyways, ‘when you were a young man in Scotland’ what did you
do?”
“But you said I was never in Scotland!”
“But- oh you’re impossible!”
Zac threw his hands up in the air and marched over to his locker. Sometimes
Taylor could be too weird....for Taylor.
Zac gathered his things and ran out of the doors to avoid the after school
traffic. From the sidewalk, he caught a glimpse of her through the open window of the
science room.
Jen, o, Jen, where for art thou Jen? For I am the east, and Jen Flanders
in the sun.
He must have been acting out, physically, the scenes, because about twenty
kids were laughing at him, and his right hand was flung wildly into the air, while his left
was on his heart.
Zac turned beet-red and quickly walked into the direction of home, only to run
face first into a stop sign, causing the other students to laugh even harder. He then ran
faster home, turning redder by the second.
“Howdy ho!” Mackenzie greeted Zac as he walked through the door. Mackey was all decked out in his South Park’s Cartman wear. He had on Cartman PJs, a Cartman doll, a hat just like Cartmans , and Cartman Slippers.
“Yeah whatever.”
“Well screw you! I don’t wanna be in your penis-choppin’ family anyway!” Mackey stormed out of the room, leaving a jaw dropped Zac beside the door.
“Oh well, it’s about time the kid learned to swear anyway.”
“Yeppers youngin’!” Tay agreed in an Alabaman accent as he walked through the door. “Why when I was a young heifer in Jerusalem, I was swearin’ and a spittin’ and a-”
“Damn it Tay! You’ve always been a human boy, and you’ve never been outside of the United States of America!” Zac protested.
“Uh, no?” Taylor guessed, and wandered into the general direction of the kitchen.
Something must be seriously wrong with todays grading system if he’s a straight ‘A’ student. Zac thought. Now I must turn my thought back to the almighty Jen Flanders.
“No!” Zac declared. “Jen Hanson!”
He ran upstairs to his room, threw his books on Tay’s bottom bunk, and dug through the desk drawers to find the sacred piece of paper that he got from his friend’s friend’s cousin, who just happened to be Jennifer Flanders cousin also. That piece of paper contained her phone number.
“Ah ha!” he cried in triumph as he found the old piece of Holiday Inn notepad paper.
Zac ran downstairs, and found Tay on the phone. “Tay! Aliens are attacking the dog!”
“Oh my god!” Taylor screamed, dropping the phone and running outside. Zac hung up the phone, picked it back up, and started to dial the number scrawled in purple ink.
“Hey!” Tay stormed in fury as he marched inside. “We don’t have a dog!”
“Taylor! Shut up and go away!”
“Fine then! Be that way!” Taylor, with his hands on his hips, stalked out of the room.
Zac proceeded to dial Jen’s number.
Ring.
Ring.
“Hello?” a voice finally picked up.
Ahhhh! Parents! Don’t Panic, don’t panic.
“Is Jennifer there?” his voice cracked.
“Yes, please hold a second.”
“Thank you.” You handled that well young Zachary, now, the big test.
“Hello?” a voice answered the phone, a voice that to Zac, was the most beautiful thing in the world.
“Hi, this is Zac Hanson, from school?”
Wait, I can’t just ask her out, I’ll have to find out if she likes me by becoming her friend.
“Oh, hello Zac.”
“Hey, I was wondering, you wanna go see a movie tomorrow, as friends?”
“That’ll be cool. Sure. What time?”
“Uh, I can have Tay drive us there at.....seven?”
“Yeah, okay, you know where I live?”
“Yeah, I know.”
“Okay, cool.”
“So....I’ll see you then?”
“Yeah, bye.”
“Bye.”
Oh my God! What if he doesn’t know! Jennifer Flanders thought desperately after hanging up with Zac
Jennifer had a secret. Her parents knew, yeah, but only a select few besides them knew. Jen, he said only as friends. But, maybe, he was lying and really wants me bad. Nah.
“She said yes! She said yes! She said yes!” Zac sang as he jumped around the house.
He bounced into the living room, where Mackey was hitting the family cat with a Barbie doll telling it, “No kitty! This is my pot pie!”
Zac picked up his younger brother, and kissed him on the top of his head.
“Ewwwwwwww! You dumbass! I don’t want your goddamn cooties all over my head! Ahhhhhhhhhhh!” Mackey screamed, running from the room.
Zac watched his brother until he was out of view, shrugged, and continued his song.
“You’re not serious!” Chelsea screamed back into the receiver.
“Hell I’m not!” Jen screamed back.
“No way, do you think he knows?”
“I’m not sure. I sure as hell hope he does, to save us both embarrassment.”
“Maybe someone can drop him a hint.”
“Like who?”
“Like one of us can tell one of his brother’s friends, and tell them to tell him.”
“Like which one?”
“Well, Tay is friends with Brian ain’t he?”
“Yeah, but I’m real sure Zac’s gonna appreciate when Tay just goes up to him and tells him, ‘Oh, and by the way, Jen’s a lesbian.’”
