Camera Flashes (1) - Taylor Swift

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Taylor walked out of the bar and stood with her back against the brick wall while she waited for one of Grace's security guards to call a car for her. She was going to go back to the house, gather her things and head anywhere else, maybe cry on the phone to her Mom for a few days and listen to her say I told you so.

Before the car finally pulled up, Taylor felt the overwhelming urge to throw up as the headline of it actually being over flung itself at the front page of her mind. She tried to find the nearest trashcan but there wasn't one close enough, she leaned over and threw up on the street near some loose trash.

"Miss Swift, are you okay?" The guard asked with concern. He put his arms out in case she needed something to steady herself with but she declined. Her throat burned from her body rejecting the alcohol.

"I'm fine," Taylor pulled a page right from Grace's book. She could hear their song start to play when someone opened the door to the bar and it bled through the bricks and mortar long after she looked and saw it was not the person she hoped would follow her out.

She got into the back of the car, took one look at the driver and realized she didn't care what he thought about her and began to cry. She put her head in her hands, the same hands that had painted Grace and wrote those songs for her. She shoved it all down, Taylor couldn't handle thinking about it being over.

There was only so long she could stand at the bus stop and wait for it come before she turned around and walked home. The defeat had never felt so catastrophically painful.

Grace sat in that spot in the bar for what felt like eternity. People walked by, couples stumbled out of the place and shots went down easy as she waited to wake up from the dream where she was finally confronted with the last ultimatum and did not remember how to speak. It was the equivalent of getting on stage in your underpants and everyone laughing, paralyzed right on the spot.

"Where did Taylor go?" Charlie's voice finally snapped her out of it, she must have zoned out for a while if he cared enough to go looking.

"She left me," Grace swallowed, she finally met his eyes and noticed how a lock of his brown hair had worked against the gel and reverted to a cowlick over his forehead. His hairline was starting to recede.

"She left...?" He asked, stepping closer to keep his voice quiet against the loud music.

"She left," the heiress gulped, "I'm going to get another drink."

"I'll get it," he called the bartender over as he processed the news. He couldn't believe Grace didn't pull the trigger before she lost the singer after his talk with Taylor days prior.

Taylor removed everything of hers from Grace's house. She wasn't in the habit of leaving things behind because of Grace's parents but a couple rogue sweatshirts and knickknacks had started to make themselves at home. She put it all in the car with red puffy eyes, she had cried the entire way while in the backseat.

She couldn't stand to think that she had been ready to fully come out for Grace. Ready to jeopardize her career and friendships and everything for what she thought was going to be the greatest love of all time, the end of all the endings.

She got in the car as fast as she could and did not look back because she had done it again. She ripped the bandaid off and escaped into the sunset like some outlaw after the shootout in a cops and robbers western film.

It killed her to do it.

When Grace got back to the house it was as she expected. Taylor's things were gone without a trace as if she had never existed, the only living proof in the photos and videos on her hidden USB, the smell of her shampoo on the pillow.