Someone's Daughter

28. i think you should come live with me

Hi y'all!! Happy Thanksgiving break if you're in the US! If any of you need essay help or anything like that, I love reading essays (sociopath, yes) so DM me!
Thank you to sysadmin666 and AmandaHutchinson for your help on this chapter! And thank you whoever added me to your reading lists in the last few days!o

Please be kind to yourselves reading this one!

Lovelovelove - r

April 29th, 2020.

Joe had paint behind his ears, never mind his clothes. Their project had migrated from the cleared floor to small pins in the wall. He'd stained a rug in the outlining stage with his fabric pencil, and though he knew it would wash out, he'd shoved all of the furniture to the door side of the room and lined the floor underneath him with plastic.

He felt like he was playing with fire. Emphasis on playing, emphasis on fire. He didn't grow up frugal, but even a 20th anniversary with Taylor would find him fretting over a stained shirt.

His father had littered his childhood home with things from different cultures and continents, brought back from crisis zone filming trips. Each one was rich in history, laced with importance. He'd shattered a Ugandan vase at ten, dodging one of Tommy's half-hearted attempts to kill him. They'd buried it between a few bushes in the backyard before Liz got home. They were sworn to secrecy over its whereabouts.

Almost every one of Taylor's houses gave him the same wide-eyed tiptoe posture. Every pillow looked handmade, a time capsule of a world he wasn't entitled to experience. And here she'd asked him to make a painting studio out of her historical monument mansion's dining room.

He hadn't had an audition since the beginning of the lockdown. One month off, the longest he'd gone without a role or a role to prep for since college, in his days of acting on a stage. He was dripping paint on a floor Katharine Hepburn had clawed her way to stand on. He was making a clumsy mess of the house of golden age films.

His skin crawled at the thought of damaging history, and his alien status overwhelmed him until he had to put his paintbrush down. Maybe it was time for a break. It was always good to step back when painting a mural.

The wood floors of his university had carried the sound of his feet much the same as where he stood. It was a home, his home, but somehow in the past hour, it had come to represent the industry of his craft and the way it could so easily slip away with time.

What was he doing with himself? He was holding space for Taylor, partially. Supporting his family, yes. But he couldn't prove himself by standing still. He had nowhere to go.

He had nothing to work on except for the project in his hands. It was a blessing he did, a blessing that Taylor had asked him to bring his flair into it.

He had a good sense of what she'd like, watching her dart off trails to document the smallest leaves. There was one she always seemed to gravitate back to, a little pink wildflower that sometimes stretched in stalks, sometimes bushes. It was barely summer; he hadn't yet seen it at full height.

He walked across the room and picked up his phone to find a reference, but as soon as he opened it, a pile of notifications burst out.

I'm sorry for spamming you but for the love of Christ bloke, answer your phone.

His Publicist. He immediately called her, smearing green paint on the back of his device for lack of awareness.

"Joe, I've got no better way to ask this. Were you in a car with someone last week?"