almost | taylor swift au

chapter 11

"Hey," Taylor says, throwing her phone down onto the bed beside her as she leans back against the headboard of the bed. Her phone is set to speakerphone as she speaks with Anthony. Though she really doesn't want to bother him much, she has truly no idea what else to do. "Thanks for talking to me."

"Of course," he tells her. "What's up? Is everything good out on the road?"

Taylor pauses. "Uh... I guess so. There's just this one thing that I was looking for some advice on."

"Shoot."

"Have you heard the new song, the one that The Unprompted just released? It's a live performance."

"Yeah, it's good, isn't it?"

"That's the thing..." Taylor sighs. "They kinda... sort of stole my song."

"Did you write that?" Anthony asks.

"Well, no... but yes. I wrote a song with essentially all of the same key words and phrases, and played it for Jett just a few days before they wrote and played their new song at the show last night. I can send you a picture of the lyrics in my journal, and they're dated too."

Taylor hears Anthony sigh. "Yeah, send me a picture of your lyrics. We'll have to figure out from there... how big of a deal do you want this to be?"

Taylor pauses. She doesn't want to be a pain in the ass. She doesn't want the first time that her name is heard by the world to be in a lawsuit, or anything like that. But she was really proud of the song that she wrote. It was one of the first songs that she's written that she can truly see herself putting out for the world to hear. A song that she thinks represents her, that she worked hard on and that she's proud of.

"I think... I just don't want to have to throw out everything that I put into that song, just because he decided to steal it from me. It just hurts, you know? I went through a lot to even get him to listen to it. He didn't want to, and and I had to convince him... I had to make a trade that I would have rather not done, but he listened to it. I did what you told me, I did whatever it took to make them hear me... just for this to happen. I don't know what to do, but I can't seem to get it out of my mind."

There's a pause from Anthony, before he speaks up again. "What exactly did you have to do?"

Taylor feels her heart start to beat faster as his words ring in her ears. She didn't intend to tell anyone about the specifics of it, ever. She didn't want Anthony to find out about the relationship between her and Jett. She bites her lip, weighing the consequences of telling him the full truth, or making up a story. Then, she realizes that Anthony is supposed to be on her side. His whole job is to help her. She's going to have to learn how to be comfortable sharing the details of her life with him. And one way or another, she's sure that it'll get out that she's been seeing Jett. If he doesn't find out from her, he'll probably be more upset than if she's honest with him and tells him now.

"Well..." Taylor says eventually, "we've kind of been... dating. Jett and I. And in New York, the night before Irving Plaza, I just kind of went into his room and said I wanted to play him a song I'd written about him, about us. And he didn't want to hear it. He thought he was going to have to help me write it, and he told me he didn't want to do it until after the New York show, but I said that I didn't need help. That I just really wanted to play it for him, and so he told me that we could, if I gave him something in advance..." she trails off. "You can probably fill in the blanks of what that was." As the whole story tumbles out of her, she realizes that there isn't much use in keeping any details from him. He's going to find out one way or another.

Anthony is shocked to hear the words coming out of his client's mouth. The young girl hasn't even set foot in the recording studio yet, and she's already being manipulated by men in the industry. He feels his heart shatter. "You don't have to answer this if you don't want to, but did he... take your virginity?"