CLEAN || Taylor Swift Adoption

TWENTY-THREE

"You acted insane and that's the way I loved you..."

~EVERLEIGH~

August 7, 2019

"Okay, you ready for this?" Taylor asked, looking between Tree and me. I nodded, and Tree gave both Taylor and me a slight nod and a small smile as if she was trying to say just do it. Even though I knew that there was a good chance that nothing bad was going to happen from all of this, I still couldn't help but feel a little bit nervous. How was everyone going to react when they found out about all of this? How were my friends going to act when I had literally done everything in my power to make sure that they wouldn't find out until Taylor and I announced it to the entire world?

"Three, two, one..." Taylor counted down, looking at me for a second with her thumb hovering over the 'post' button on Instagram. "And, go!"

"Done!" I exclaimed, feeling the same rush of adrenaline as if I had just run three miles. "Oh, god."

"Quick, go post it on Twitter and Tumblr," Tree said, waving her hands at Taylor and me in a sort of beckoning gesture. Taylor and I immediately turned back to look at our phone screens, and I swiped out of Instagram, copying and pasting the same message and the pictures that Taylor and I had decided to post along with them—the pictures that we had taken together at both of the Secret Sessions. It wasn't like there had been any other pictures of us that we had taken together, plus, that would probably be the first thing that people thought of when they saw pictures with either of us now. Although I did have a feeling that Taylor was the type to take pictures quite often.

"Okay, I'm done," Taylor said after a minute. "How about you, Ev?"

I nodded in agreement. "Yeah, I've gotten everything posted, too."

"Good," Tree said, giving us both a nod of approval.

"Now what happens?" I asked.

Tree let out a sigh. "Now we wait. And I go back to my office and start crafting a bunch of responses for the press when they all catch ahold of this news," she said. "Taylor, not to pack your schedule any more than it's already going to be this month, especially considering the album release in a few weeks, but you might shoot into the spotlight from an interview standpoint. People are gonna want to hear about this."

I couldn't help the worry that crossed through my body. People wanted to hear about this, and yet, I had only been staying with Taylor for a few days now. I guess it made sense, because she was a celebrity, and a very well-known one. But how were people really going to act when they found out the details? And what details were going to be the ones that Taylor wanted to share with the world?

I knew from past experiences that I really had no say in what foster parents told other people about me; after all, they were all in it for the money, so it really didn't matter what I wanted. They just had to stay under Ashley's radar enough to make sure that neither she nor I would say something against them, and they could do whatever else they wanted. With Taylor having the publicity that she did, there was absolutely no way that it was going to be different with her. I mean, come on. There was a good chance that this was all some sort of publicity stunt, probably to make Lover a full comeback from all of the drama that had been going on during the Reputation era and beforehand.

Taylor seemed to sense the worried look on my face, because she put her hand on my knee as she turned to face Tree. "Well, let's not worry about that until we for sure have news about what the press wants to hear," she said, her tone firm, as if she was trying to tell Tree that it was the end of the conversation.