"Hi, could I speak to David Lidster, please,"

"Speaking,"

"Oh hi, David - it's Walker Hanson here, Taylor's father,"

"Hello, Walker, good to speak to you at last! Is Dean OK?" asked my dad, immediately assuming that the only reasons warranting an international phone call would be something terrible happening to me, or me doing something terrible. Terrible? Moi?

"Yeah, he's fine - I don't think I've ever seen Taylor so happy! Don't those two look just great together?"

"You're right - they act just like Fran and I did when we were their age."

"You too? Man - I only just told them that I thought they were like Diane and myself! Thing is, I'd like to do anything I can to keep it that way: I've seen teenage crushes before and this seems a whole lot deeper than that, ya know?"

"I've thought the same... Four thousand four-hundred and forty-five miles is a long way, though..."

"Four thousand four-hundred and forty-five?" chuckled Walker.

"Dean's corrected me on the distance so many times I've kinda remembered it..."

"I see... Dean tells me you're in computers, right?"

"Yeah - I'm in what you could call a dead-end job right now - over here you can only move sideways within a company - not up - if you're anything to do with I.T. I'm giving serious thought to going freelance before I'm too old to break out of the loop..."

"Really? Well in that case I have a proposal for you..."

"Zac WATCH OUT FOR..." yelled Gareth as Zac leapt. Too late.

I opened my eyes to see a lump of junior Hanson flying at an alarming speed directly over the back of the couch, his arse heading straight for my and Tay's mid-sections.

Give him his due, he did try his best to alter his trajectory, but Newton's laws were not to be argued with. He landed on us with all his weight, producing a combined "umph!" from both of us.

"Morning guys," he grinned.

Tay pulled a cushion over his head and groaned. "Zac, can't you go fuck Gareth for a half hour or sommat?"

"Or what?"

"Huh?"

"You said 'sommat'... Hahahah Tay's even talking like Dean now!"

"I never said 'sommat',"

"Did too,"

"Did not!"

"Did freakin' too!" bounced Zac. Tay brought his right leg up sharply behind Zac's back, levering him abruptly from his sitting position and onto his feet.

"Did too," I whispered into his ear. "But I think it sounded cute."

"Yeah, well, as long as I don't start talking like Ringo Starr - just ask Ike about that one!"

"Huh?"

"He's just got something" said Tay, shooting a glance at Zac, "about Ringo right now."

"And Puff Daddy,"

"Yeah, and Puff Daddy..."

"Anyweih," I said, putting on the broadest Derbyshire accent I could, "ahm teachin' Tay the speak proper,"

"Oh, that's good - we can sing 'Bloke from Burminum' and 'I'll be wiv yer when yer kippin''..."

"Just coz you're upset you ain't got English as eloquent as wot I got."

"So," said Tay, butting in to diffuse the mad 'kill Zac' session he could see rapidly approaching, "what are we gonna do today?"

"How about we go trawling?"

Now this had me confused. Was my geography so naff as to have misclassified the state of Oklahoma as non-coastal? And going trawling?

"Hey yeah! We haven't tried that for ages,"

Tay hauled himself off the couch and slumped himself in front of the PC that was presumably buried within the mixing console. A few mouse clicks later, the oh-so-familiar sounds of a modem warbling and chirruping to some distant computer over the phone.

"Trawling?"

"Yeah - for stuff about us! Some of the shit the fans come up with is seriously funny... I mean the stuff they write about: It's so... well, intense; so real to them it's almost as if it really happened!"

Tay surfed over to Yahoo and did a search for Hanson. A few moments later, yahoo spat back a page full of links, declaring it had found about thirty thousand matches.

Tay raised his eyebrows and flicked through the first five or so pages, then clicked on a link at random. Again after a short pause (quite horribly unlike the Internet I loved to hate) the screen was filled with mini-windows full of the advertising blurb that seems intrinsic to the "free" web hosts. After the standard ritual of "X" clicking, Tay eventually managed to unearth a half-decent site.

The page began with a large banner declaring that its owner was the ultimate Hanson affectionado and, as such, knew everything there was to know about Hanson. Surprisingly, the page did seem rather levelheaded about Tay and his brothers and after the initial skepticism we all held, we decided it was actually a very good site.

"It's a pity Hansonline can't come up with some stuff like this," said Zac. "The best they seem to be able to do is tell everyone where we happen to be in the globe, as if people need to know..."

"The fact that the guy who runs it hates our guts doesn't help matters," grinned Tay.

"Huh?"

"The Hansonline Web Master - the guy freakin' hates us! Of course, he'd never say that to our faces - he's too weak-willed - but we've heard enough from our 'moles' to know the truth. I dread to think what would happen if he actually wrote the page,"

"You mean he doesn't?"

"He'd have problems writing his own name! No, he sub-contracts all the work out to a few web design outfits..."

"That's so cheap!"

"Thing is, for some reason Mercury seem to think he does a good job! You win some..."

We clicked our way through the site and ended up on a links page, listing another twenty-odd pages that the author thought worthy of being her site. Instead of leaping off to another site from that links page, Tay clicked on the e-mail link and typed a short message to her.

"How will she know it was from you?"

"She won't - but she'll enjoy the concept that it might possibly be..."

Tay sent the message and went back to Yahoo, this time doing a search for "Gay Hanson". A few moments later, a whole new set of links were presented to us, Tay clicking on another one at random. We were whisked away to a completely different style of site: This one seemed 'tatty' in comparison with the previous site, but something about it caught Tay's attention. It was run by a lad about our age in Canada and, as we read a little, found he was very gay, very out and had a very big crush on Taylor. Just below his 'mission statement' was his picture: He was also very cute!

Tay scrolled down the page slightly and clicked a link, a smile appearing on his face as we were presented with "Taylor and me" - a story that this guy was in the process of writing.

"Fancy a storytime?" asked Tay?

"Yeah! Storwy!" grinned Zac as he pulled Gareth to him in a hug.

Spen smiled weakly back at his mum as she thanked him for the cup of coffee he'd just made for her.

"You're a good boy, Eugene - I don't know what I'd do without you."

Spen did his level best to keep the smile on his face as memories of Mack surged to the forefront of his mind once more. What would he do without him? It would've been bad enough for him to have moved or something but this... It was so ultimate - no comeback, no negotiation: Mac was gone. Forever.

"Eugene, I... I'm sorry about what happened to Macaulay. I know he was a very dear friend to you."

Spen looked up through teary eyes, a transparent prism forming from one of them, hanging precariously from the end of his nose before falling gracefully, twinkling as it fell.

"Mom I have to tell you something... You remember I told you I thought I may be gay?"

Mrs. Spencer smiled reassuringly back at her son. Life was hard enough for teenagers nowadays without the added agro of having to deal with their sexuality. She cared not a jot if Spen was gay, bi or whatever else there was to be. He was her little boy, and she wouldn't hear a single word against him.

"Yes, dear,"

"Well, I... I guess..." damn this was hard... "I guess Mac was my boyfriend," he sniffed.

The realisation of why Spen was so upset suddenly became all too clear to her - Spen wasn't just fond of Mac - he had... no - did love him! He had lost the love of his life and, all too well, she understood what that meant.

She put the cup of coffee down on the table next to her chair and spread her arms to her baby who was hurting so much and embraced him as tightly as she could.

She just hoped that her cancer would hold off long enough for him to come to terms with his loss slightly more before she had to be taken back into hospital...

"He can be charged with what?"

"Pre-meditated murder," confirmed Walker's lawyer.

"But he didn't kill him as such... What evidence do you have against him?"

"We have the testimony of the mother, and the phone was left off the hook after the boy dialed 911 - the whole thing is on tape."

"Peter, you're a star! That is wonderful! So there's no chance of him getting off lightly?"

"None - in a case this severe the judge will, in all likelihood, sentence him straight off without a trial and revoke all applications for parole. He'll never see the light of day again. No one takes crimes against minors lightly. It may be a while before the case comes to court, but that shouldn't be cause for concern."

"How often do you do this?" I asked as Tay connected to an IRC server.

"Quite often - unless we want to make people think it's us, no-one has any idea who I am on IRC... But I fancy some fun today," he grinned.

PiRCH informed him that he was connected to the server and Tay started typing.

/nick JordanTH

/join #HansonChat

NOTE: JordanTH (Taylor@hansonline.com) has joined #HansonChat

JordanTH Hi guys! What's up?

TAYLOvR Don't be so _SAD_!!!

JordanTH Who?

TAYLOvR YOU!! I wish people would quit pretending to be Tay...

JordanTH Who said I was pretending?

^Denver^ Yeah, right!

JordanTH Finger me

TAYLOvR I'd rather not

NOTE: JordanTH bashes his head against a brick wall that has miraculously appeared in just the right place.

"Have you ever managed to get anyone to believe it's you?"

"Nah - but it's always fun trying!"

NOTE: DCC Request from ^Denver^ (sublime@prodigy.com)

Tay clicked 'accept' and opened a private chat window with this Denver bloke.

JordanTH Hi.

^Denver^ Err - hi Taylor...

JordanTH So why do you believe it's me? :-P

^Denver^ Well, I checked your IP address and it came from HansonLine, so I guess it really is you!

^Denver^ I really don't know what to say!

JordanTH Well, as long as you don't start yelling "I LOVE YOU!" all over the channel we'll get along fine!

^Denver^ LOL! I think I can curb that desire...

JordanTH So, stats and location, please :-)

^Denver^ 16/m 5'10" alburn hair (:P) and I live in Colorado.

JordanTH Denver, right?

^Denver^ How did you guess? :)

^Denver^ Is Dean with you? I saw you guys on TV - it was soooo cool the way you handled that!

^Denver^ is proud :)

JordanTH Be who you wanna be, say what you wanna say... :-)

^Denver^ Yeah! Listen, I got to go because my mom's got the lunch ready... Cool talking to you, Taylor! Send my best to Ike, Zac and Dean...

JordanTH Will do: Take care man... See ya!

NOTE: DCC session closed.

Just then, Walker came rattling down the stairs into the garage with a rather large grin over his kind face. Tay immediately smiled back and raised his eyebrows in anticipation.

"Guess what, guys?"

"Your beard's been eventually classified as a wildlife reserve?" Quipped Zac. Walker grabbed Zac, flipped him upside-down and draped him over his shoulder provoking screams of mock outrage from him.

"Peter reckons that getting Mack's dad behind bars is almost a hundred percent certain - he can be had for murder one!"

"Does Spen know?" asked Tay, torn between the good feelings of 'revenge' against Mack's dad and the horrible emptiness created by the recollection of his suicide that he had temporarily forgotten about.

"Not yet... Peter needs to have a proper talk with him and possibly even use him as a witness to the way Mack's father acted around him to prove that the whole thing was pre-meditated malice. I'm going to give him a call now..."

"Perhaps it'd be better if we called him," volunteered Tay.

"Yeah, probably... Tell me what he says, OK?"

"Sure dad, thanks,"

Walker smiled and turned and walked back towards the stairs, chucking Zac onto the sofa as he did so.


On to Chapter Thirty-Four

Back to Chapter Thirty-Two

Chapter Index

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The Exchange is © 1999 by Dean Lidster. This work may not be duplicated in any form (physical, electronic, audio, or otherwise) without the author's written permission. All applicable copyright laws apply. All individuals depicted are fictional with any resemblance to real persons being purely coincidental.

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