"Hey, Cory."
I looked up from my desk. I was working on a case write-up that all of the psychologists were forced to do. It was due the next morning, so I was in late finishing it up. Tonight was the night after Serena and I had talked. The day had gone mediocre. Taylor and I had had our usual session, but I couldn't bring myself to look at him, and I'm sure he had sensed it.
I took off my classes, letting them dangle from in between my thumb and pointer finger. I looked up at the silhouette standing in my doorway. "Hi, Taylor. What can I help you with?"
He sauntered into my office, standing behind one of the chairs on the other side of the desk, his left hand casually resting on the top of the chair. I looked back down at my computer keyboard uncomfortably. His sudden presence made me nervous and I found myself beginning to sweat. "Nothing," he finally answered me. "I was just wandering through and found your office was lit up."
I frowned. The stay-in patients had lights out at ten 'o'clock, and it was well past eleven. "You aren't supposed to be up," I sighed. "And you aren't allowed in this part of the building after five. How did you get in?"
Taylor shrugged. "Zac may be a trouble maker but he has taught me a few things over the years," he held up a bobby pin, "like picking locks."
"What would provoke you to pick the lock to a lobby and some offices, Taylor?"
"Um, I don't know. I just wanted to be alone for once. It's impossible to be alone in this place. You're even escorted to different rooms. It sucks."
"Could that be because you're in a rehabilitation center? One where people try to commit suicide?"
Taylor frowned one eyebrow and looked away. "Oh."
I sighed and nodded, putting my glasses back on. "Anyway, since you aren't that unstable, I won't walk you back to your room, but you should probably go."
But he did the opposite and pulled out the chair, sitting down. "Actually, I wanted to talk to you about something."
I raised an eyebrow nervously, taking my glasses off again. This time I began chewing on one of the ends. "And that would be?"
"Well, I talked to my mom today and she said that we were all invited to your wedding."
I frowned and began chewing more rapidly. "Uh-huh."
"Do you always do that when you're nervous?" Taylor chuckled, reaching a hand over and batting my glasses away from my mouth. I scowled at him. "Anyway, I know your mom invited us and not you."
Since it was such a habit, I started bringing my glasses back to my mouth, but before I could stick one of the ends in my mouth, Taylor reached over and took them from me. "Hey, give me those!" I exclaimed. I leaned over the desk, but Taylor held them out of my grasp. I got up out of my chair and ran around the desk. "Taylor Hanson, if you don't give me those glasses…" Laughing, Taylor got up and backed up to the wall, holding the glasses high over his head. I got up close to him and began jumping. "Give me back my glasses!" I screeched, stretching for them. Taylor laughed again and dangled them just above my hand. I put a hand on his shoulder and jumped again, pushing down on his shoulder to give me more height. All of a sudden, Taylor's face paled and he dropped the glasses, bringing his hand to his shoulder. I pulled my hand away and stepped back. "Taylor?"
He inhaled deeply, clutching his shoulder and grimacing. Without a word, he strode out of my office, ignoring my voice calling him back. I blinked after his shadow had stepped back through the door that led to the dorms. I leaned over and picked up my glasses, wondering what had happened.
I entered the room that I had been entering each day in the past week, sighing. It was early in the day, time for another cup of coffee. I wandered over to the coffee pot and poured myself a cup. "Hello, Taylor," I sighed as I dropped a cube of sugar in my coffee.
I had spent the entire night pondering over Taylor. It was obvious that his shoulder had hurt, but why did he flee like he did? Why didn't he sit down and tell me what was wrong with it? Perhaps it had something to do with the accident he had had before being admitted into rehab. Needless to say, after getting home at twelve-ten AM, I didn't get a wink of sleep. Luckily, some genius had made a cover-up for baggy eyes for this morning, and I was set. Except for the exhaustion seeping through my every pore.
"Hi," he responded quietly. He was picking at his nails again.
I set my coffee down on the table and plopped down into the chair. "How's your shoulder?"
Taylor shrugged. "Fine."
"What did you do?"
Taylor still was not looking at me.
"Nothing," he shrugged again.
"Did you hurt it in the accident?"
"Yeah," he mumbled.
"What happened to it?"
He sighed heavily and looked over at the wall, then back to his fingernails. "When I went off the road, the window broke and a few shards were stuck to it and I dislocated it."
I raised my eyebrows and wrote it down on my notepad. "I see. So I take it it's still healing."
"Among other things."
"What other things?"
"My ankle and my head."
As I thought about it, I had seen him limping. But the part about his head gave me a blank. "What happened to your head?"
I had noticed his newly shorn hair when I had first seen him, but I hadn't really thought about it. He turned around and ran his fingers through the short hair. "My scalp was just about ripped off."
I grimaced as I saw the red cuts. He turned back around and settled back into the couch, crossing his arms and looking down. I sighed and blinked a few times, collecting my thoughts.
"Um, you wanted to ask me something last night?"
"Oh, yeah," he said dully. "Do you really want me at your wedding?" Now he looked at me squarely.
I looked at him, my eyes shifting between his eyes. After a minute my eyes trailed back down to my pad of paper and I raised my eyebrows, inhaling deeply. "Well that was certainly-"
"Just yes or no."
I raised my eyes slowly and looked steadily at him. "I, I, I, I," I stuttered. "I don't," I paused, my mouth still open, my eyes looking sideways, my breath sighing repeatedly. "I don't want you there if you are going to try to stop me," I finally spit out.
Taylor's eyes squinted a little and his chin rose. His lips were pursed and his fingers were picking at his nails. He kept staring at me, though, trying to read in between the lines I had spoken, trying to find the truth underneath it. Honestly, I really didn't know what to say. I didn't know how to say that I wasn't sure that I would be able to step into my future when my past was sitting only a few pews away.
Finally Taylor broke our gaze, clearing his throat and rubbing his hands together. "Well then," he sighed, getting up. He tottered to the door. "I hope you have a nice wedding."
I watched as the door opened and closed, and my past walked away.
"Shawn?" I called out when I got home. I dumped two bags of groceries on the counter and dropped my keys next to them. "Shawn!" I called again. I still didn't get an answer, so I shrugged and began putting the groceries away. Tonight was my night to make dinner, but since I was so tired, I was making macaroni and cheese and broccoli. It was actually one of Shawn's favorites, since he could dip the broccoli in the leftover cheese. Personally I thought it was a gross habit. My dad fed that to my sister and I when we were young, but by the age of twelve I had outgrown it, and my sister wasn't far behind.
I wasn't too worried about Taylor, amazingly. He had made the right decision. In part, I think, he had known that I was not comfortable with him being there, but I think part of it also was that he didn't want to see me marrying Shawn.
Shawn had become Taylor's archenemy. They despised each other. When Taylor had come back from the tour- the one that I had been on through most of our relationship and our break-up-, he had tried unmercifully to get me back, even though I was dating Shawn. And so, Shawn had had many-a fight with Taylor to get him to leave me alone, all which had proved unsuccessful. In result, Taylor hated Shawn and Shawn hated Taylor. Both with a passion.
As I was pouring the noodles into the boiling water, I heard two voices laughing together and a door opening and closing. I frowned. One of the laughing voices was obviously a woman, and I felt a little green monster nip at me.
"Oh, hey, Cory," Shawn said, still laughing a little as they sauntered into the kitchen. He kissed me on the cheek. "Cory, this is Vanessa McCary, a friend of mind. She's a singer down at one of the local clubs," he winked.
She looked about twenty or twenty-one, with mid-length wavy brown hair, tan skin, rosy cheeks and a cute nose. She was dressed in black slacks, a blue shirt, and a tan leather jacket. Her grin lit up her face. I almost expected a ray of heavenly light the shine upon her and a halo to pop out of her head.
"Hi," she smiled, sticking out her hand.
I stiffly smiled and grabbed her hand, shaking it. "Hi," I said, between clenched teeth.
"I've heard so much about you! You're really lucky, you know. Shawn's such a great guy."
"I know," I smirked tightly. "He's just great, isn't he?"
Vanessa laughed. Shawn was giving me the what-for look, and I turned back to my macaroni.
"I really should be going," I heard her sigh. I scowled at the noodles.
"Oh, would you like a ride?"
I cleared my throat and took out the block of cheese and a knife. I began cutting the cheese rather loudly.
"Why don't I just call my boyfriend? I'm sure you just want to stay in now with Corrine."
I felt myself snort sardonically.
"Okay, the phone is right there."
"Thanks."
I continued chopping the cheese. When it was just about down to the consistency of dust, I reached into the bag for the cream cheese. I began unwrapping it as I listened to her phone call.
"Hey, hun… Yeah can you come pick me up?" she paused. "Um, I'm over at my friend Shawn's house… Yeah… Um, hey Shawn?" I heard her whisper. "What street is this?"
"Carmen off of thirtieth."
"Carmen off of thirtieth," she repeated. "What number?"
"2627."
"2627. Okay. I'll see you in a few minutes. Bye Zac."
I heard the phone beep. "Thanks for letting me use the phone."
"Oh no problem."
Could she be anymore transparent? I thought. It is so obvious that she wants him like a dog in heat wants a poodle.
"Well, I should probably go look out the window. He only works a few blocks away."
"Oh really? Where does he work?"
Their voices faded away as they left the kitchen for the front room. I strained the noodles and shook my head, annoyed, as the steam wafted up over me. Suddenly tweedle dum and tweedle dumber (this one, of course, being Vanessa), walked quickly through the kitchen and into the laundry room. Something about cars was being said and I rolled my eyes. Shawn's car was his God.
I poured the noodles back in the pot and dumped the cheese on top. It began melting almost instantly and I stirred it extremely harsh as though the noodles were Vanessa's noodles. I didn't know why I was acting that way. She actually seemed perfectly nice, and she hadn't given me any reason to be jealous or suspicious. I guess I just wasn't used to another girl around.
As I began dumping some of the concoction onto my plate, the doorbell rang. I waited for a few minutes, but neither Shawn nor Vanessa were making their way towards the door. On the bell's second insistent ring, I sighed, irritated, and walked heavily to the door, licking my cheesy fingers. I flung open the door and was face to face with a man with long blonde hair. He was very built, and very tall, and very… hot.
"Corrine?"
"Zac?"
"Corrine!"
"Zachary!"
We grabbed each other in a big hug. It was Zac! My ole' buddy Zac! And, well, he was also Serena's ex-boyfriend and Taylor's brother, but it was Zac! We had had some good times, and I think he looked up to me as the big sister he had never had, and I definitely looked at him as the little brother I had never had.
"How are you, what are you doing here?" we asked each other. We laughed and hugged again.
"Come one in, let's sit down!" I led him into the living room, which was the "Chinese" room. We plopped down into the sandy-colored couch and grinned at each other.
"So you're Vanessa's boyfriend?"
"Of one year."
I looked at his proud and happy face, and I whacked his shoulder with the back of my hand. "Go Zac!"
He laughed. "And you must be Shawn's… fiancé? Yeah, aren't you getting married in a few weeks?"
"Yup," I grinned.
"Great! Well I'm going to be there," he grinned. His face suddenly darkened. "Is Taylor going?"
I felt my face fall a little and I tilted my head, pursing my lips. "No. No he isn't. He's my patient, as I assume you already know, and today we talked about it. I told him that if he was going to come and try to stop me then he wasn't welcome. And he thought about it for about ten minutes, told me to have a nice wedding, and walked out the door."
"Yeah. I don't know if he's still in love with you," Zac sighed, "or if he's in love with the girl he was in love with seven years ago."
"My guess is that he is still in love with a memory. He acts like he thinks he was unjustly tried for what he did to me. And he just won't let himself let go. And I think that part of that is because your family won't let him. I'm not trying to upset you. But. I think your family was too harsh on him and you didn't have to tell him that he was wrong. He knows he was wrong. Um. It seems to me like your family doesn't tell him the things that he does right, but you accent his faults. And he already knows those."
Zac and I exchanged a steady stare. I knew he was trying to process all that I had just relayed on him. I had spent many-a hour trying to figure out exactly the problem with Taylor, and those were the results that I had come up with.
Zac began nodding slowly, a serious frown on his face. "Yeah. Yeah I can see what you mean. I know that my parent's reason for being so hard on him is because before then, he was like, the angel child in our family. Isaac was the geeky one, I was the trouble-maker, Jessie was the independent one, Avie was the bookworm, Mackie was the one who looked up to me, and Zoë was the baby. Which left Taylor to be the perfect one. And then when he showed signs of actually being normal, our parents freaked. And then he just kept making bad decisions. I mean especially after Topanga…"
"Topanga? Who's Topanga? Like from Boy Meets World?"
"Yeah. Taylor hasn't told you about Topanga?"
"No…"
"Topanga is Taylor's daughter."