Daylight - Taylor Swift

Chapter 35

July 29th, 2017

Jo was sitting at her father's countertop island, a bowl of mixed berries in front of her and Charlie on her phone on the couch. Taylor was busy filming again, and Jo got lonely so she brought Flynn to Nevada to see her family.

"Does Taylor have any secret cute younger brothers?" Charlie asked, she looked up from her phone at her older sister.

"Nope," Jo chuckled, then put another blueberry into her mouth, "Where's father?"

"I don't know."

Josephine was wearing a casual pair of sweatpants and a T-shirt, trying to beat the heat. Flynn and the other dog laid next to Charlie, piled on each other in a ball.

"Shouldn't you know? I just got here, he's not my responsibility anymore."

"He's old enough to do his shoes up now, didn't you hear?!" The younger sibling said sarcastically, "He's not here sometimes, I don't really care."

"Weird," the singer hummed.

A few minutes later the truck door slammed outside and the doorknob turned. Jo was washing out her bowl, she glanced at the soldier quickly.

"Hey, my pals. Nice to see both of you in the house," he cleared his throat, shutting the front door behind him. Billy slipped off his shoes and approached the couch, carefully scooped up the boys and placed them on the dog bed instead, "Hey, sport... come on over here for a couple minutes, I want to talk to you both."

Jo raised an eyebrow, taking a seat in the armchair but not relaxing, "Everything okay? Last time you gave us that look was we moved."

"Yeah," he nodded quickly, "Relax, I think this is— I think this is good."

"Did they finally figure out how to bring people back from the dead so I can meet Mom?" Charlie asked, her face serious.

"Uhhh...?"

"You met Mom, you just don't remember anything but her dying," Jo chimed in, throwing a pillow at her sister.

"Cut it out," Billy sighed, he then folded his hands together on his lap, "As you know, I go grocery shopping sometimes."

"In the cursed stalker store, I'm aware," Jo hummed.

She still refused to go anywhere near that store. Kennedy had scarred her for life.

"Anyways, about two months ago I met someone there."

There was a solid pause before Jo and Charlotte looked at each other, neither of them having a clue what to say. Their father had never dated as far as they knew, and if he had, he never told them about it.

"Oh," Jo nodded slightly, startled by the out of the blue news, "That's fantastic, Dad."

"I loved your mother very much, and no one will ever change that love I still have for her... but I'm not getting any younger and with Charlie going to University next fall, it's just going to be me and the mini Sergeant," he began to explain.

"You don't have to explain yourself," Jo said, smiling to try and ease the nerves her father was clearly exhibiting.

"I kind of want to hear it," Charlie admitted, "You don't talk about Mom, and you never told me you were going on dates. I guess I'm kind of... I feel a bit betrayed?"

"Charlie, I know you were so young when your mother passed away and I should've done a better job trying to make sure you got to know her even though she wasn't here. I will tell you girls anything you want to know about her, I promise," Billy placed a warm hand on his youngest's shoulder, giving a watery smile to the girl.