1 (jaylor) wisteria hearts and caged folk songs

chapter four.

"There's nothing you can do to help me. Even if I were to face the skeletons in my closet, there's still the fact that I can't go anywhere without someone taking pictures of me, without a crowd of people calling my name and asking rude questions. I can never escape it. Adam said he'd always find me - that he's got connections." She paused. "You said so yourself that your life isn't like that. People know your art and not your face - but I don't have that luxury. I don't get to be anonymous. I don't get to have a part of me that's invisible, that no one knows of. No one that knows me gets to live a life of peace. And I cannot drag you into this mess. I can't, in good conscience, let you do that to yourself. You don't know how bad it can get. Having your every move watched by a million eyes. Having everything judged. As soon as anything goes public, it turns to dust." She'd had it happen in relationships before, and what she shared with Joe was something that she didn't want the world to know about.
"Nothing good lasts under those flashing lights. Nothing good lasts the winter."
"Well - we could move to the Lake District if we have to because I seriously doubt that he would find us there. No one would find us there. He doesn't seem like the wisteria-covered cottage type of guy. Besides, we could throw all our technology in the lake and live with only the radio and a few books." Joe said, and the thought made Taylor smile.
"Change our names, dye our hair. Grow our own vegetables, sew our own clothes..."
"Spend all day painting and writing. Making hot cocoa." She whispered and realised it appeared that he often had the same escape in his head that she did.
"That's the second time you've mentioned the Lake District. You have to tell me about it," Taylor sighed. "If it's somewhere far away, I'm going."

Over breakfast, Taylor and Joe sat talking about the Lake Poets, and Taylor decided that she had to see it. Some day, she was going to go to the Lake District and she would walk the path of the poets.
"It's somehow very romantic," Taylor observed. The group of poets had shifted to the Lake District to live out the rest of their lives in peace. To escape the world, to work on their poetry and write songs that live forever.
"Of course it is!" Joe watched her as she managed to eat an entire pancake. It was so good, and she thought that actually admitting that she might have an eating disorder helped. She hadn't said those words out loud, ever.
"This group of poets just packed their things and left, with nothing but their passion for words and life." Taylor admired the way that his eyes lit up when he talked about this. Loved how excited he was, how he sparkled.
"We'll have to go there one day." She says to him. "Seriously?"
"Of course!"
"Everyone else thinks that it is so weird. I mean, I guess it is... but I just... I'm tempted by the simple life, you know? Which is probably why I don't paint under my own name."
"I don't think it's weird at all. I think it's amazing - and I'm sad that I never knew that the Lake Poets existed until this moment." She smiled at him, and he grinned back. She knew that eventually, they would have to talk it through. Talk about what she was going to do.
"We should call the police," Joe suggested as they did the dishes together. "He can't hurt you from prison."
"No, no." The thought made her want to throw up those walls again... throw them up and never take them down again. But Joe's eyes were soft, so soft and kind. He wouldn't do anything to intentionally hurt her, and deep down, she knew that. "I can't do that. It's far too public. I can't have everyone finding out about this. It will ruin my career."
"You can be yourself here, Taylor." He ran his hands through his hair, leaning forward. "You don't have to be strong all of the time. This isn't going to ruin your career."
"I know," She told him because she did know that. She could tell from the way that Joe looked at her that he wasn't expecting her to be perfect. He was expecting a human. Someone who made mistakes and fell down, someone with bruises and imperfections. But he also knew that she was more than capable of getting back up again. So, she tried to take down those solid walls in her head, tried pulling at the ivy-covered bricks that she threw up around herself in order to protect herself. "Fuck," she says, exasperated. "Who would've thought? Taylor Swift, the global superstar, is a huge fucking mess on the inside." Joe looked taken aback by her outburst. But she continued. She couldn't stop.
"I'm such a coward - I didn't leave. And I knew pretty quickly that it wasn't normal and that it shouldn't be like that, but fuck. It's not like he kept me locked in a tower. I mean, I was allowed to leave. But still, I stayed. I'm just a failure... because you think that when you're seven and you hear grown-ups talking about what makes a healthy relationship, you think that you are brave enough to leave. You think that strangers are the ones that you have to worry about. But it's not always them. It's the ones you trust that stab you in the back. I'm just a fucking failure, Joe. Perhaps he did it to me because it's what I fucking deserve-"
"Don't you dare say that about yourself, Taylor. Hell, don't even think that! Okay?" He was so shocked by these words, she could see it written all over his face as he came to sit on the couch beside her. He pulled her into him and wrapped her in his arms.
"You don't deserve any of the shit that he did to you, because you are so beautiful and kind, so generous and loving. And you might be a mess. You're allowed to be a mess. But maybe we're all a big fucking mess on the inside but there's only a few of us that are brave enough to admit it. Anyone would be so, so lucky to have you." His voice wavered at the last sentence, and Taylor felt herself soften.
"But they're not lucky to have me, Joe, because I am difficult and-"