heroine (taylor swift and travis kelce)

in the house by the heath

The February rain was falling gently outside her window, and Taylor was keeping herself preoccupied in the kitchen. Because when she was cooking, when she was focusing on the ingredients on the countertop in front of her, focusing on how the recipe worked, how thinly she must cut the onions... she wasn't thinking about what was going on in her head. Her apron was tied in a double knot around her waist - the one that Abigail sewed for her when she was going through a phase where she was taking the occasional sewing class - providing a sense of comfort. 

Joe was on his way over for dinner. He'd been so invested in the film he was acting in - which he should be, Taylor knew that - and she'd been so busy with tour rehearsals, that the two of them had been finding it incredibly hard to find time together. While they'd spent every single day in each other's presence in lockdown, and as much as Joe had begged - and cried - for her not to go on tour... she hadn't wanted that. She loved Joe. She couldn't see herself with anyone else - no matter how bad his depression got. Mental health, particularly that of others, didn't scare her. She wasn't scared by bad mental health. No matter how many times he'd called her in the middle of the night sobbing at some empty bar. No matter how many times he'd gotten mad at her for trying to help and she'd let it slide because of his mental health. Couples had arguments, she knew that. It was normal. What might not be normal was the way he made her feel like it was her fault that his mental health was bad. It might not be normal how she felt like it was resting on her shoulders. That she was the one responsible for his happiness, keeping him afloat, keeping him alive. The pressure that she was under, the way it was consuming her every thought and action was something that would break her if she ever stopped for long enough to think about it. It had been creeping up on her for a wee while this feeling of crippling exhaustion. But she didn't care.

That pressure was worth it because she loved him. She loved him more than anything, even if she had to work for it. Joe had carried her from the depths of despair all those years ago and she felt like it was her duty to do the same to him. It was her duty to fix him, to make him happy. That's what she told herself, anyway - even if it was far from the truth.

She couldn't wait to see him. Tell him all about how she'd followed a new recipe and that she was so excited about tour. It was all getting real now - the costume fittings, the shoe fittings, everything. She would tell him that Benji had been waiting by the door all afternoon. Mostly, she couldn't wait to kiss him. To wrap her arms around his neck and smell him, smell the peppermint and English tea that he usually smelt like. She'd really missed him. She missed seeing him every day - he was her best friend, her favourite person to hang out with. So when she didn't see him, it was like a piece of her was missing. So she waited by the door with a wide smile. She knew how she wanted the evening to go, and she couldn't wait.

So when he walked through the front door and brushed off her kiss... brushed her off entirely, ignoring her outstretched arms, or the smile on her cheeks... for a moment all Taylor could do was stand there. Her eyes stuck on the back of her front door, her lips pressed together in a line as she willed herself not to cry. He didn't like it when she cried - because that always ended with him saying that she couldn't put up with him, that she didn't love him... that she didn't really want to be with him. And she did, truly she did.

At least, she really, truly thought she did.

"How was your day?" Taylor asked as she found him.
"I don't want to talk about it, actually." He snapped his head in his hands in front of the window. She hated how he always insisted on standing by the window. Hated that all it would take would be a fan taking a photo from the right angle and they'd see through the window of their house by the Heath. People were always watching, and she'd found herself getting incredibly stressed about windows. A stupid fear, she knew. Who the hell was afraid of windows? She was - because they'd become incredibly twisted and scary lately. She just wished that people wouldn't try so hard to peer through her windows, to unravel her love and her secrets, leaving behind a web of bitter lies and open wounds. She glanced passed Joe to the bushes and the fence that was supposed to protect them from onlookers from the other side. London, the city that he'd made her fall in love with. Lately, it was feeling incredibly far away from home.