I Hate California

three

She stared at her phone, shaky hands as she looked at the photos of the blonde little girl posing with flowers in a grocery store. That little girl was hers, but she feels like she doesn't deserve to say that. 

"She's perfect." She types, deciding if she should hit 'send', but ends up doing so and throws her phone onto the bed, scared it would explode. 

She looked outside the window of her New York City apartment and watched as one by one, each buildings lights would turn on, making the night bright. 

"Taylor, have you decided the order of the surprise songs for LA?" Tree asks as she walks into Taylor's bedroom. 

Taylor nods, "Yeah, and the last night, I'm announcing my version of 1989 right?" The blonde asks the redhead, which nods in response. 

Tree says her goodbyes as she heads out of Taylor's apartment since it was getting late. Taylor looks at her phone to see if she had gotten any new notifications, she didn't. She opened up her text messages to Joe and her eyes go wide when she sees that he read it. 

She doesn't deserve to be talking to him, especially after everything she did; to their family. 

Taylor finished zipping up her suitcases as she finished packing for California. The state she used to love, now ending up hating. Whenever she had to go back to LA, it would only be if she really needed to and after that, she flew right back to Nashville or New York City. That state was too painful for her to be in. 

She wondered if Joe knew she was performing in LA, wondered if he even cared. It's been six years since she saw Sage last, only a month old. The only thing she had to hold onto was the pictures that Joe would send her. 

Taylor never gave up custody for Sage, but they were making it work, silently. The world didn't know about the star's daughter and she hopes it stays that way, for the safety of Sage. 

Taylor tried to send Joe money, but he'd send it back each time. She didn't blame him for doing so, she wouldn't accept her money either. She wondered if Sage asks about her, how much she knows about her, or if she even knew about her at all. There were so many questions that are unanswered. 

As she finishes up closing all the curtains in her apartment, making sure all of the stoves are off, and all the doors are locked, she makes her way back up the staircase. As she heads towards her bedroom, she stops at the door right before hers. The room that would've been Sage's, she always made sure each of her homes had a room for Sage, no matter what happened, she was her daughter at the end of the day. 

She ran her hand over the nicely made, untouched bed and sighed. Wondering what it was like to wake up her daughter in the mornings and tuck her in at night. She wanted that life, but when she had Sage, everything was going wrong. The whole world was against her, she felt like everyone was doing everything they could to make sure her career would end. She didn't want her daughter around that. 

Joe was always very introverted, from the very first time he met Taylor, he stayed the same. She trusted him with Sage, with her whole life that he would always keep her safe because she knew that she couldn't. 

-

"Hi Anna! This is Sage's Dad." Joe says over the phone.

"Oh Hey Joe!" Anna replies.

"I was thinking, how do you feel if I took the girls instead? I know Lily wants to go with Sage, I just don't feel comfortable if I'm not around. If you really insist, I can actually just buy a resell ticket, it doesn't matter what price, as long as I'm there." Joe proceeds to tell her.

"You know what, something actually came up the same day of the concert and I was worried on not being able to take Lily to the concert. I'd love it if you could go with the girls!" Anna says happily as Joe grins on the other end. 

"Wow, perfect! Please send me the information over for the overall concert, and I'll see you soon!" Joe says as they hang up. 

Joe smiles to himself satisfied that he can attend to his daughter. He makes his way out of his office and into the living room where Sage is waiting to head to the beach. 

"Wow! There are so many people Daddy!" Sage exclaims as she runs towards the sand. 

Joe chuckles at his daughters excitement and begins applying sun block all over her skin. 

"Do you want to get in the water now? Or do you want to play with your toys in the sand first?" He asks her laying down their blankets and little tent for shade. 

Sage looks around excitingly and begins to dump out all of her beach toys so she could start on her sand castle. She begins to aggressively pack sand into the buckets. 

"Why so rough babe?" Joe asks laughing which causes Sage to giggle and she structures her castle.

Joe begins to snap some photos of Sage, to send to their family group chat and also to Taylor; wondering if he'll get another reply. 

There was no way that Joe was going to mention to her that they were attending her concert. They just plan on attending, trying to make as little human interaction as possible, not knowing how that will go knowing how much Sage loves talking to people.