Sacred New Beginnings

Chapter 29 - I've been having a hard time adjusting

September 2nd 2016

"You've gotta finish it, Bells, come on," Taylor laughs as her daughter groans into the couch cushions, "but I'm bored," she drags out the last word and Taylor just looks to her mom who gives her the 'now you know how I felt' look. "You're nearly done, then you have the rest of the day to do whatever you want," she tries to sound a little more stern this time.

Bella enrolled in online school again and the plan is for her to do semester one online and then Taylor will enroll her in a real school after Christmas once things have settled down a bit for them. However, they all seemed to have forgotten how unmotivated and easily distracted Bella was when it came to school work.

"Come on," Taylor rubs Bella's ankles as her feet sit in the singer's lap and Bella groans again but sits back up, this time crossing her legs and giving her mom a disapproving glare to which Taylor just smirks and hands her the laptop back. "I'm going to make lunch, if you focus for thirty minutes then you'll be finished and have the whole weekend off." Bella just rolls her eyes and huffs at Taylor and the singer kisses her daughter on the forehead before pushing herself up.

They've been staying with Andrea since they arrived in Nashville and Taylor is really grateful for Karlie making the effort to come out here with Bella. She needed some time at home more than she realised.

"Hey, how was your meeting?" She finds Karlie in the kitchen making coffee and the model nods as Taylor leans against the counter beside her, "it was alright, I'm leaving on Tuesday morning for fashion week so that'll be interesting." Karlie hasn't done anything lately that requires an audience, and specifically paparazzi attendance. She's trying to avoid the questions about her split from Josh for as long as she can so she's been doing a lot of behind the scenes work like shoots and a lot of technical stuff for her company.

Taylor gives her a comforting smile, "you'll be amazing, you always are." She loves watching Karlie walk the runway, her confidence and beauty is unfathomable to the singer. "Thanks, T," Karlie laughs as she smiles back at Taylor, their eyes lingering for a second longer than normal before Taylor realises and quickly turns away.

"Teff..." Karlie has been going back and forth with herself for days, and in moments like these she can't help wondering if Bella was right. "Hmm?" Taylor looks back to Karlie as the model glances over her shoulder to her, "I.. urm... Bella, she said something the other day and I-" she's not totally sure what to say because she doesn't wanna freak Taylor out.

"Mom, your phone!" Bella calls out and pulls Taylor's attention, the blonde sighing as she leaves and goes back to Bella to get her phone from where she left it, telling Karlie she'll be just a second. "Am I being totally crazy, Dibbles? There's no way Taylor sees us as anything more than friends," she sighs as she cuddles the cat. She's so tired of all of this back and forth.

—-

Tree has been calling Taylor to finish organising her performance next month and the subsequent hiatus that she's planning to take afterwards. After the year they've had, she needs to spend a while focusing on her family and putting her own mental health first instead of her career. She just needs to live in peace for a little while until she can find a balance.

"Honey?" Andrea walks out onto the porch to find her daughter, "you've been out here for a while, are you okay?" The older woman sits down on the bench at Taylor's side and the blonde takes a deep breath as she nods, "I'm just trying to figure things out."

She's got a lot on her mind lately and she doesn't even know where to start trying to figure it all out. Bella's doing okay for now so that's one less thing weighing on her, but it feels like her entire career is on the hook and lately she's starting to question her entire identity too.