Lost Pieces (Kaylor)

18) Safe And Sound

"Karlie?" The green-eyed girl heard her friend call for her somewhere in the house. She was still staying with Cara but it was more on and off. She would go back home for a couple days, then come back here and spend a few nights with her best friend. She was happy to say that she was rarely lonely anymore. And even though it shouldn't, her heart still ached and longed for a certain feeling just as much as it did months ago. She had tried so hard to ignore it, possibly forget about it. That was part of the reason she was staying with Cara so much. Even if it was just a few temporary minutes at a time, the other model was certainly able to keep Karlie's mind off of everything. She was glad she had a shoulder to cry on but she wondered sometimes how Taylor was holding up through everything. She tried not to but it was hard when even just the simplest of things could bring back such a happy, dramatic or intense memory.

"Kar? Where'd you go?" Cara called out again, her voice climbing closer to the location of the other girl. Karlie had almost forgotten that she wanted her attention. So she got out of bed and headed down the hallway only to meet the blue-eyed girl halfway downstairs.

"Hey, where have you been?" She asked, turning around to head to the bottom of the stairs. The other model followed closely behind as she answered.

"Up in the guest bedroom." She almost had to force those words to come out. She was exhausted from all the extra sponsoring, photo shoots, interviews and so on that she had been doing over the past few weeks. She was only really doing so to... well, forget and keep her mind busy. Yes, it was that bad.

Cara turned around to give Karlie a look as if to elaborate on her statement. She could hear the tiredness in her friend's voice and to her, it was almost exactly what she sounded like whenever she was upset.

"I was just getting some rest. I'm fine, I swear."

"Okay." Cara smiled and pulled her in for a quick hug. "Want to help me with the last of the Christmas decorations outside?"

The taller model shrugged her shoulders. "I'll probably get sick. I'm sleep deprived and it's cold out there." She tried to argue to be able to go back to bed but a small part of her really would rather spend time with Cara. Even if it was outside in the bitter cold of winter, hanging Christmas decorations.

"Just bundle up. You aren't going to run out there in a t-shirt and jeans, are you?" She giggled but the other girl didn't. She almost immediately remembered something.

Flashback
The minute she saw her girlfriend getting out of the car, she pulled on a pair of shoes and ran outside, a t-shirt and jeans at the end of November.

"Karlie?!" Taylor said with a laugh, extending her arms as she got closer to the taller girl. Karlie leaped into her arms and hugged her tight as if she shouldn't ever let go. Taylor did the same, wrapping her arms around the girl that was now freezing. "You're cold now, you should be wearing a coat." She said. The younger girl pulled away slightly, just enough to look at her and roll her eyes.

"So? I just really missed you." She told her with a fake frown on her face. The older girl just laughed and nodded her head, starting to walk to the house with Karlie still in her embrace.

"You always say that and I just find it ridiculously cute. With that frown, it just melts my heart."
End of Flashback

"No, I'll bundle up." Karlie forced a little smile then proceeded to do as she had said.

After a warm coat, hat, gloves, scarf, and boots, the two girls stepped outside, Cara gathering the Christmas decorations she stored in a box.

"That should be all of them." She said, taking some out for herself to put up. Karlie wandered over and took out the blow-up snowman the shorter model had had for years. She smiled, memories flooding her mind but they were all happy memories and Taylor, she wasn't really in these memories.