Chapter One
"Okay, quiet on the set please!"
The director called. The two director's aids hurried off the set, hoping the babies were going to stay in their beginning position, playing with the toys in front of them. One of the aids, made some cooing noises in the direction of the camera to make the two babies smile.
"And action!"
"Hi. You must be Daniela, Skyla's mom." Daniela turned around and faced the person who had spoken to her.
"Yes, I am. You must be Ezra's dad." Daniela smiled, knowing who he was. That was part of the reason she had accepted this job for her daughter. She thought that Natalie was going to be there, like she had in other jobs, but not this time. "Where's Natalie?"
"Oh-" He paused, sidetracked. "She's taking advantage of my day off. She talks a lot about you. With the kids doing a lot of commercials and stuff together, you guys spend a lot of time together I guess."
Daniela smiled. Natalie was one of her best friends.
"Yeah. With Ezra and Skyla doing so much work together, we do spend a lot of time with each other. You must be Taylor."
"I am. Nice to meet you finally, Daniela."
"Nice to meet you too, Taylor."
They shook hands. Taylor inhaled the scent of her perfume. Daniela felt a slight tinge of uncomfortability when Taylor looked at her. His sly smile gave her goosebumps, like he had a different agenda. Trying to jog Taylor's memory, she asked about his wife again. "So Natalie has mother duty off today? You got a surprise day off or what?" Daniela noticed a change in his blue eyes. It looked like boredom.
"Yeah. My brothers and I have been in the studio, finishing our album, touching it up and stuff, and trying to figure out our next tour dates, and we decided that we should take the next day off to pick the cities we each wanted to go to and how many. Just minor details. Besides. I think Zac has a hot date today." He smiled, and his eyes changed again, back into a flirty kind of look. "You do know my brothers, don't you? You know who we are?" He smiled cockilly. Daniela looked at him flatly with a 'duh' expression on her face.
"Of course I-"
"And cut! Next scene." The director called.
"I know who you are, and I know you're married, and I know Natalie, and I know she loves you."
"Okay. Let me start over again." He shook his head, his blond hair flying. "Hi. I'm Taylor Hanson, Ezra's dad, Natalie's husband. Natalie's not here because I have the day off, and she's relaxing and managing the house." Daniela smiled.
"Nice to meet you Taylor, I'm Daniela, Skyla's mom, and Natalie's friend."
"Would you like to sit?" Taylor motioned to a set of two empty directors' chairs.
"I suppose." They walked over to the chairs and sat down.
"So how old is Skyla?"
"She'll be a year next month."
"Wow. That's so cool. We should get together for a birthday party for her." Daneila looked at him, surprised.
"That would be awesome. At least she'd have a friend at her party."
"Doesn't she have any other friends her age? Family?"
"She does, but not here in New York. I'm the only one she has, and she sees me every day. That doesn't count."
"Why are you the only one here? What about her father? Your parents?"
"I moved to New York against my parents wishes when I was nineteen to persue a modeling career. I already had an agent, and she said that I would have no problem getting work out here, and that she would set jobs up for me over the phone and all, and that worked out great, and then I met Brock. He was a model too, and we worked in a couple Abercrombie ads together, and we got a long great. We started dating, and eventually we moved in together. Skyla just happened. She wasn't prevented or unplanned, if it happened, it happened, and it did. A year after we moved in together, he decided he was too young and too good looking to have a family and be tied down, so he took off. Now I raise Skyla all by myself. And I was pretty much disowned by my parents, so they never see Skyla."
"That's a sad story."
"Daniela on the set please for a diaper change on Skyla."
"Excuse me. I'll be right back." Daniela grabbed Skyla's diaper bag and headed for the set. Taylor watched her, interacting with her daughter. He smiled as Daniela made Skyla laugh. Daniela quickly changed Skyla's diaper, and set her back on the floor of the set. She waved once to Skyla, and returned to her chair next to Taylor as the director set up the next scene.
"So Daniela, I was thinking that if you were interested, I could set you up with someone, I know they'd like you, your style, and Skyla. And I'm not talking about me. Even though I do." He gave that sly smile again. Daniela rolled her eyes. "Anyway, would you like to go out on a date with Isaac?"
"You think so?"
"Well, Zac is too young, isn't he?"
Daniela laughed. "Yes."
"I'll call Ike right now and tell him to come down and meet you."
"If you think he wouldn't mind."
"I know he won't mind." Taylor whipped out his cell phone, hit a button, and he was talking to Isaac. "Hey. It's me. I have a friend here, and if you're interested in going out with her-.....she has a baby, she's almost a year old....they're both really cute....her name's Daniela...she's a model, her baby does commercials with Ezra..." he turned to Daniela. "How old are you?"
"I'm almost 22."
"She's almost 22...I'm telling you, she's hot..no she doesn't have a man, I wouldn't be hooking you up with her if she did..." he laughed. "Hell yeah if I didn't have Natalie. Shit...if Natalie and I have a fight and you're not with her..." he laughed again. "Just come down here right now...you can meet her and tell us what you think...she is friends with Natalie....yes, we can go out on double dates...just come down here. Okay, see you in ten." And it was arranged. He smiled at her. "Nervous?" Daniela laughed.
"Not really. I'm excited, yeah, because he's a Hanson, but nervous? No."
"A Hanson, huh? So let me ask you. Were you a fan back in the day?"
"Honestly? One of the biggest. I had a lot of rare stuff, a lot of normal stuff. Just a lot of stuff...fortunately for me, at the time, my parents were divorced, so I had two bedrooms with big closets I could wallpaper. And believe me, the ceilings were too. I even took drum lessons." Daniela laughed at the memory.
"What kind of rare stuff? Do you still have it?"
"I had a pen pal that sent me a copy of Boomerang and MMMBop, and I had posters from c.d. stores, the promo ones they had up. I even had an almost life size cardboard cutout- it was from a music store used to hold c.d.'s. I feel kind of stupid telling you this."
"Don't be. It's interesting how much stuff fans actually could get a hold of. What else did you have?"
"I collected concert tees, I bought like, one of each at the two concerts I went to, and the back stage pass look alike necklaces, plus the concert programs, I was subscribed to MOE, and I even tried to teach myself how to play the piano so I could use my music book- the one with all the notes in from 'Middle Of Nowhere', so anyone could play it, but I just kept it, I gave up pretty quickly on that. And then I collected all the books, even the unauthorized ones, and all the different versions and remixes of the songs, plus all the imports, on both c.d.s and tape, and if they wern't on tape, I made them on tape. But somewhere along the way, I lost all the c.d's..they were all at least worth a grand I had spent on them. Imports were expensive!"
"Wow. You were a dedicated fan. Is there more?"
Daniela laughed. "Of course. I told my dad I'd pay for cable if he got it at his house- I bought my first t.v. and v.c.r. so I could tape all your t.v. apperances- I still have the t.v. and v.c.r., and when I wasn't at my dad's, my v.c.r. was set to record, and I learned how to program my mom's v.c.r. so I could record the local channel appearances. And then I think I recorded the singles every time they came on the radio that I could record, plus every thing the d.j.'s said about you, plus the concert announcement when you came the first time. I don't think I should tell you this, but what the hell. It was a long time ago, and I'm not like that now, but when that announcement came on, that was the first time I ever hyperventilated." Daniela laughed and shook her head. She couldn't look at Taylor after telling him that.
"So do you still have any of that stuff?"
"With me here, I have a c.d. of 'This Time Around', a tape version of 'Middle Of Nowhere', and the tape of 'MMMBop' and 'Boomerang', and then a couple magazines and news clippings, but that's it. The magazines and some of the posters are at my mom's. Plus my scrapbook of pictures and ticket stubs from the concerts. Maybe a few shirts, but I doubt it. The rest was thrown away or given away when I moved out." She said into her hands.
"Can I ask another question, the last one?"
"Yeah."
"Who was your favorite brother? I know all fans had a favorite." Daniela looked away from Taylor. She definitely couldn't tell him this. Should she lie to him? She knew she wasn't good at telling lies. Anybody could tell when she was. So maybe she should, and he couldn't ask again because he said last question. She looked him straight in his eyes and said, "Zac." He squinted his eyes at her, and started to question her answer.
"You said last question." He closed his mouth and nodded. "Why do I get the feeling that wasn't the real answer." And at that moment, Isaac walked in.
Chapter Two