Hope I Never Lose You

three

I woke up early in the afternoon the next day, my head throbbing and my body aching like never before. Rolling over, I fell off the bed and landed on my ass with a thud. 

Groaning, I kicked off my shoes and got to my feet. My head spun as I stumbled into the bathroom, cupping my hands and splashing water on my face. It cleared my head a little, and when I looked at myself in the mirror, I turned for the shower. I was an absolute mess.

The shower helped a lot, and so did the painkillers and the huge plate of food I ordered from room service. As I ate, I found my phone and scrolled through everything that had come through since last night. There were texts from a lot of my friends and family congratulating me on the amount of Grammy's I'd won that I responded to, but nothing from Travis. I even resorted to scrolling through fan pages on social media to see if he'd been seen out, but all I could find was some photos of him making a trip to the grocery store. He had a hat on so I couldn't really see his face, but he didn't look all that great. About as well as I was feeling.

As I looked through photos, I came across heaps of me from last night. Mostly at the Grammy's, but there was a few of me and Jack going into the bar. Luckily, there was none of me coming out. Tree would have killed me for that one. As I scrolled, the head of security called me and I swiped the green button, putting it on speaker.

"Hey Georgia." I yawned.

"Good morning Taylor, congratulations on last night!"

"Thanks." I smiled to myself.

"We have a flight ready for you to go back to Kansas City at the airport if you're ready." She told me. "We have a window to leave in about an hour." I thought about it for a second, trying to decide whether I wanted to go back just yet. "Taylor?"

"Oh, yeah." I sighed. "Thanks. I'll pack up and be there soon."

It took me twenty minutes to pull myself together, put on enough makeup to cover up the hungover look and change into clean clothes. I got to the airport with fifteen minutes to spare, and when I ascended the steps to see Tree inside, typing on her computer, I paused.

"Uh oh." I said, and she looked up. "What'd I do?"

"Nothing, for once." Tree laughed as I dropped into the seat opposite her, letting out a little sigh of relief that she wasn't here to tell me off about something. "I'm coming back to Kansas City with you because you've got that charity ball, remember?"

"Oh right, yeah." I nodded. I'd completely forgotten about that. "What's the final headcount on that by the way?"

"About five hundred." Tree put down the lid of her computer. "That's about the max for the location so I had to put a lid on it, but the launch is going to be great."

I nodded again, gazing out the window. We discussed the ball for a while, and then we landed back in Kansas City just before eight in the evening. Tree hugged me goodbye as she left for her hotel and I went to where I'd parked my car. Once I got in, I just sat there, staring down at the wheel.

After about ten minutes, I sighed and turned the car on. It was a twenty minute drive back home, and my heart dropped lower into my stomach as I punched in the gate code, said hi to security through the speaker, and drove up to park outside the garage. As I gathered up my folders and papers and purse, my phone rang, and I balanced it between my ear and my shoulder as I got out.

"Hello." I hadn't checked who was calling before answering.

"Hey Taylor, it's Sabrina."

"Oh hey, how are you?" I had hoped to see her at the Grammys, but she'd been on tour and hadn't been able to make it.