When Taylor wakes up, she feels as if she's been hit by a truck. She didn't even drink that much last night, so the blame is placed on the floor she had slept on. She was positive that she had laid down on the couch and fallen asleep, but at some point in the night Taylor must have fallen off and not even woken up.
With a groan, she pushes herself up on her elbows and sits motionless for a moment, letting herself return to consciousness. She rolls onto her side to rub at her eyes, ripping the cobwebs of sleep from them. The singer sighs and urges herself to sit up. Her spine cracks and tingles as she straightens up and Taylor feels at least a dozen knots in her back and shoulder from the floor. She now regrets not just getting in bed with Karlie; the girl had said she wanted her to anyway.
But Karlie was drunk out of her mind. She probably would have woken up and gotten scared at seeing Taylor in bed with her again without remembering their conversation the night before. Taylor knew it was better to play it safe than go after what she wanted.
Standing up from the floor, Taylor slowly walks towards her bedroom. The house is eerily silent on the upper floor and the only sound is Taylor's heart gently thudding in her chest.
When she reaches her bedroom, her heart starts spazming and leaping around in its cage. The bed is empty, all of the lights are on, her drawers are open and torn through, and Karlie is nowhere to be found.
Taylor lets out a whimper as stress begins to bloom in her. She was just thinking that her and Karlie were doing good and now Taylor had gone and fucked up and made the girl run again.
Too exhausted to even consider dealing with the situation, Taylor turns in her spot and goes to walk downstairs. Her eyes are swirls of red veins from lack of sleep and blue from her tears.
It's not until she's halfway down the stairs does the smell of food cooking waft into her nose. Her gait slows now and her head tilts in confusion. Taylor wonders if maybe Selena or Lily had stayed over. She's embarrassed that she never really checked or thanked either of them for clearing out the party and cleaning up to the best of their anility (she thinks as she observes a stack of red solo cups and bent paper plates littering her coffee table). Taylor pushes the door to the kitchen open gently and peeks her head in. Her jaw drops.
Karlie is leaning over the stove wearing an apron, pushing around what appears to be eggs with a spatula. There's other various breakfast foods decorating the counter; a generous stack of pancakes, slices of toast, cereal and milk. A whole spread. A short gasp tumbles from Taylor's lips and the stripper looks up with a grin.
"You're up! Man, you sleep late." Karlie shakes her head and flips her spatula gently in the eggs.
"You... You're... You didn't..."
"Leave? No, I didn't." Karlie frowns slightly at the older girl's assumption. The tears are still in Taylor's eyes when she had stepped in the kitchen and Karlie isn't blind. She doesn't take offense, though, because she doesn't have the best track record of sticking around.
"Sorry, I had just... I saw you weren't in there and my room was a mess so I just thought..."
"No, I get it, it looked extremely suspicious. I was looking for some different clothes because I was still in my dress from last night. I hope you don't mind," Karlie spins and Taylor notices she's wearing her pajamas. Something about this makes her heart flutter.
"Well, I'm glad you didn't leave," Taylor says through a yawn, taking a seat at one of the stools. She brings her arms up and rests her head on her hands. The pure energy of Karlie flitting around the kitchen is mesmerizing. It's like the girl has been up for hours. "You weren't lying about not getting hungover."
"Nope! I don't know how it happens but no matter how drunk I get, I don't feel anything the next morning. It's actually quite great."
Something about the statement worries Taylor. The singer wasn't a heavy drinker because it was too dangerous for someone of her status. Plus, she didn't really see the need in getting shitfaced drunk. She tended to forget things that happened when she drank so she only did it in casual doses. It wasn't enjoyable to have people come up to her and recant a story about when they partied with her and she had no recollection of it.
"Amazing..." Taylor mumbles, blinking her heavy eyelids. Karlie smirks at her and slides over a glass of orange juice.
"Drink that, it'll wake you up."
Taylor accepts the drink graciously and gulps it down.
"I hope you don't mind that I went through your refridgerator also. I saw you had egg whites so I'm cooking some of that and I made some pancakes and toast and..." Karlie trails off, embarrassed as she registers just how much food she had made.
"It's fine. I'm starving anyway," Taylor admits as she grabs a plate and fork. She stabs a few pancakes and drags them onto her plate and bites into a piece of toast. "I'm usually too lazy to cook after drinking so I'm glad you're here."
"Speaking of, last night was pretty crazy! The last thing I remember was making a drink for Justin Timberlake. Wild, man."
Taylor's midbite of a pancake when Karlie says this. She intakes a breath of air in surprise and the food gets uncomfortably lodged in her throat. She begins coughing and patting her chest anxiously and Karlie looks up in concern. The stripper rushes over and holds Taylor's shoulders. Only a few more coughs and the food is dislodged, but Taylor looks pale as a sheet.
"What's wrong? Are you alright? Were you choking?"
Taylor looks up at the girl standing next to her. Her eyes are as wide as a terrified animal and her brain is processing a thousand thoughts per second.
"I... uhm... I need to excuse myself for a minute," Taylor says with rush, turning from Karlie. She takes fast, long strides away from the girl and leaves the kitchen. When she's outside in the living room, she sits down on the chair and takes a deep breath.
Could she really have forgotten everything that happened last night? Taylor forgot things too something, but forgetting nearly two hours of a party? That was insane. Or could she be lying? Why would she lie, though? To protect her? To protect you? To pretend she didn't admit her feelings?
As Taylor runs over the possible reasons in her head, her fingers grip into the chair roughly. It's not until she starts feeling cramps in her fingers does she stop.
With a shaky breath, the singer stands up and goes to return to the kitchen. Karlie is now washing the dishes she had used to make breakfast and smiles warmly at Taylor when she walks in. Taylor's stomach convulses and does flips.
"Are you feeling sick at all? I know just what to make to solve that," Karlie rushes to the refridgerator to get some ingredients but Taylor makes a noise telling her to stop.
"No, I just have a tiny headache, it's alright." Karlie's friendly instincts towards her right now are entirely heartwarming, but the fact that she doesn't remember shit from last night is overshadowing everything.
"...So you don't remember much from last night?" Taylor asks tentatively. She's curling inwards on herself, afraid of Karlie's answer.
"...No, why?" Karlie turns on her heel slowly to face Taylor. The singer is slightly pink and can't look at Karlie straight on.
"No reason," Taylor replies probably way too quickly. "I was just wondering."
"Ooookay. Well yeah, I can't remember much past when I started making drinks for people." Karlie gives a weak shrug and returns to cleaning up.
Taylor absently jabs her food with a fork, but she seems to have lost her appetite.
/ / /
When Taylor goes upstairs under the guise that she wanted to get into normal day clothes, Karlie gives her a smile and waits until she's out of the kitchen.
"Fuck." The stripper mumbles to herself, sitting down dejectedly on a stool. She lets her head fall into her hands and the balls of her hands push harshly into her eyesockets.
Taylor looked so hurt when Karlie said she didn't remember anything, but the truth of the situation was that she remembered every. Single. Fucking. Word. She had said to the singer. She remembered it all in excruciating detail, down to the way she referred to herself in third person.
Karlie has no idea what she's going to do. Taylor is fully aware of how she feels, but she probably thinks it's under a drunk curtain.
Karlie in no way wants to engage in any type of relationship with Taylor. The subject has been completely crossed off in the girl's mind; there were too many things that could go bad. She didn't even bother reconsidering because she had done that so many times.
She never really factored in Taylor being upset that they wouldn't ever be that close. She figured the girl would be grateful Karlie wanted a platonic distance; dating a stripper isn't something people are usually so eager and enthusiastic about.
She decides it'd be best just to push the problem away for now. That's what she always did, anyways. Avoiding her issues was way easier than dealing with them. It always worked for her so why stop now?
/ / /
When they reunite in the living room, there's an undeniable new dynamic between them. Taylor is barely speaking and whenever she comes remotely close to Karlie, the girl draws away. It's stupid sitting there in silence, really, but neither girl can figure out how to breach the subject. Taylor doesn't want to make things awkward with Karlie and Karlie doesn't want to admit that she remembers everything from the previous night.
"Well, I--"
"Do you wan--"
Both girls speak up at the same time. The constant blush on Taylor's face darkens even further and Karlie ducks her head down. They share an awkward laugh.
"You can go first." Taylor suggests, motioning for her to continue.
"No, it's alright, you can. What were you going to say?" Karlie pushes away the subject. She's afraid that if she speaks first, what she had to say will make Taylor will be upset. She was going to let Taylor know it was time for her to go home.
Taylor pauses for another second, giving Karlie the time to speak up if she really wanted to, but the stripper doesn't take the opportunity. Taylor licks her chapped lips and parts them again.
"I was going to ask if you wanted to go out with me today," Karlie's eyes widen. "No! Not like that, I-I just mean like, lunch and maybe shopping or s-something..."
Karlie looks at the floor. She thinks of reasons why she might not be able to go and suddenly her heart seizes as she remembers. Karlie feels nauseous for even being near the singer now.
"I can't, Taylor."
The singer's face falls quickly. Karlie hates herself for it.
"Why not?"
"I have to go to work..." The younger girl trails off, her voice fading into nothing. She's very aware of how much Taylor hates that she has her job and wants to avoid a conversation about it at any cost.
"Do you really have to?" Taylor questions, putting as much convincing tone into her voice as she can.
"Yes, I have to."
Karlie doesn't and can't mention Dominic's "deal" with her. If she went out to lunch with Taylor, it would mean that paparazzi would get pictures of them and there would be headlines about Taylor including her on them.
She knew what Dominic was capable of and that dug fear into her bones deeper than she could describe. Karlie felt terror in every fibre of her being when she remembered stories she had heard from long-time workers about Dominic. Some were tame, things that she had gone through herself, and then others ended with girls being hospitalized. She had been working for Dominic long enough and had caused enough trouble to the man that the latter was more likely to happen to her.
Taylor watches Karlie sit quietly in her living room, eyes clouded in thought. She worries about where the younger girl goes when she gets like this, and knows she can never ask. At least not yet.
Karlie snaps out of her self-induced trance and looks at Taylor staring at her. Her lips press tight together and she moves to stand up.
"I need to go home, shower, get my things ready for work... The party was great last night, Taylor. I'm happy you invited me."
Taylor gives her a weak smile. "I'm glad you came, Karlie."
Karlie hovers there for a moment. Taylor thinks she looks hesitant and wonders if she's about to say something, but she's disappointed when Karlie turns towards the door.
"I'll talk to you later, Taylor."
"Same to you." Taylor gets up from her seat and follows Karlie.
Their departure is uncomfortable and awkward. Karlie is being so distant and detached that it scares Taylor. Karlie is pushing Taylor away from her so that the inevitable seperation won't hurt as much.
Not much more is said as Karlie leaves Taylor's apartment. Taylor watches her enter the elevator and when the metal doors ding shut, Taylor closes her door and locks it.
She retreats back to her living room and lays down on the couch. Exhaustion catches up to her quickly, and as she fades into unconsciousness, she can't shake the feeling that something bad was going to happen, and soon.
/ / /
A/N: I post some oneshots on tswiftfanfics.tumblr.com when I get writers block here. Sort of losing a clear path with this fic, but I have endgame in mind, so I guess that's all that matters.
Comments and feedback encouraged and very much needed!