TNT Short Fics

Oh My My My - Part 1

AN: You know I had to write about this. Also, the talk about her ink stained hand a reference to an earlier story I wrote called "everwhere, everything." You don't need to read it but it's on Wattpad if you are interested!

Taylor can just see him from her piano bench through the sliver of space left by the cracked door. His dark hair is ruffled in the back from her hands earlier this morning when they lay in bed for too long, talking about everything and nothing. Just soaking in this time together. Time that always seems so short. Still, he is all hers for a few more days, and she plans to make the most of it—just as soon as he finishes filming the podcast and she finalizes the surprise songs. She sent him off to film with a sandwich and a kiss on the cheek. And she hears his deep chuckle at something Jason says as she stands to shut the door.

Turning back to the piano and her notebook, she stares at the words she wrote earlier this week as part of her plan for the Amsterdam surprise songs.

Mary's Song

She's been thinking about this song for a while and almost played it in Paris. If she had known what was going to happen in Lake Como, she probably would have. Now, she's sure she wants to sing it before Travis leaves. But she knows it's best not to try at his last show in Germany—they'll already be emotional enough without adding more tears to the mix.

The question is, what should she play along with it? She has toyed with the idea of just playing it by itself. Letting it stand on its own merit, and hoping people understand her intentions behind it. However, when she thinks about doing that, it feels incomplete—like something is missing. She knows the invisible string that runs through the song is as clear as day, but she wants their story to shine through. Mary's story is the guide, the dream, the goal. Hers and Travis's story is the reality—the culmination of everything before them and everything they will share on the journey forward.

She splays her hands across the keys and closes her eyes. She begins to play, tracing the lines of Mary's love across the keyboard. She settles the melody back into her bones after sixteen years away. Feels the comfort of a love that grew over time, best friends who became more. Though their time together has not been as long, she feels that deeply, but with one difference. Falling for your best friend is one thing but your love becoming your best friend? That has been her privilege over the past year of her life.

"And all I need is you next to me"

Those words click a pathway in her brain and push her towards an opening to the next song. She pictures sitting next to Travis as he speeds down the highway on one of their many drives in Kansas City, LA, and even the Italian countryside. She sees his head thrown back in laughter at something she says. The lines around his eyes deep from how hard he's smiling.

Her eyes prick with tears, and she picks up on a familiar melody, moving through the beginnings of their song—tying the two together. Slowing So High School down makes it suddenly seem as if it has grown up. As if it has settled, is deeper and lower in her chest, just like their journey over the past year. She still feels that fluttery, excited newness every time she sees him, but now it's so solid around her. Around them.

The first song she wrote for him will always remind her of the beginning. Of the hope and promise of it all. Of being made brand new after so much sadness. As she plays, she recalls her ink-stained hand smeared with words from a song she had already given to the world but suddenly had seemed as if they belonged to him—"highest hopes." And how he'd traced them back across her hand so carefully as he promised to accept her exactly as she was.

Everything has changed with him. She feels herself altering the song once more. A year ago, he looked her way and held on to his highest hopes of getting to know her. When he finally stood before her, he made it his mission to understand her in ways no one else ever had. From that, he has become her home, her partner, her muse.

The music flows, and the words come together. It feels exactly as if she's writing a new song in a way no other mashup ever has before. Melding her past words and history with their new history and forging something new.

She pauses. Feels the weight of the past and the present, and then picks up again to the future.

I'll be eighty-seven; you'll be eighty-nine
I'll still look at you like the stars that shine
In the sky, oh my my my

As the last notes ring out, she wipes her eyes and then looks down at her hands resting on the keys. The ring on her left hand bright in the midday sun from the window beyond the piano.

Taylor is ready. Ready for this life. Ready to someday be Mary's story for someone else. Ready to share all these hopes and joy and love with anyone who might listen on Saturday, holding nothing back. She doesn't need to. They don't need to anymore.

She stands and cracks open the door. Travis is still working but he catches sight of her out of the corner of his eye and his face lights up in a smile. He holds up a finger and she nods, waiting.

When a break in the discussion comes, he tells the podcast team he's taking a quick break. As he slides his headphones off, he says, "Hey, sweetie, we're like fifteen minutes away from being done."

"Okay," she replies, "I just–"

She steps forward and pulls him up, wrapping her arms around him. He instinctively puts his arms around her and she feels him drop a kiss on her head.

"You okay?" he asks.

She tips her chin up towards him, resting it on his chest. She feels all the weight of her words from the song right there between them and feels herself smile. "I'm so good, Trav. I just wanted you, wanted this."

He huffs out a laugh and holds her tight, hand coming up to squeeze lightly at her side three times. Those eyes like home shine down at her.

"Well, I'd be a fucking idiot to ever say no to that, Tay" he teases.

She pulls back, reaching up to scratch through his beard as she says, "Come find me when you're done? I have something for you."

"Yeah?"

"Mmhmm, a song."

His eyes light up.

"You'll love it," she promises as she walks away.

Days later as she finishes the last note and looks up, she feels the wall of love and joy around her. She can just make him out to her right, hands high in the air. Taylor thinks of when she first played it that sunny afternoon and his tears and pink cheeks. She's sure she'd find the same now if she was closer. She bows and blows a kiss in his direction. The words ring in her head as she dives...

"You and I, oh my my my "