[ discovering you ] - sequel to camp discovery || a tayvis story.

chapter six.

JULY 1, 2013

4:19 PM

Tree sat on the couch with the brown envelope in her hand. She had contemplated opening it, seeing what was inside, but kept stopping herself. "Am I ready to see what's in here?" She asked herself more than she asked Kylie, who was sitting across from her. They had been back from the furniture store for about 30 minutes now and were waiting for the company to make the delivery. Now wasn't even a good time to look at the documents, but she wanted to. She wanted to look at them and get it over with. She wanted to be able to wash the images from her mind and never think about them again, but before she could do that, she had to look at them. "Should I do this without Lance here?" She continued to question herself. "What could Andy have possibly seen that made him react the way he did?" Tree patted the envelope on her leg.

"What are you talking about?" Kylie asked, looking over at Tree. It didn't take her long to notice the envelope that was in the woman's hand. It was the envelope that Taylor had given to Andy. that made Andy make the face he did when he brought it back to her. Kylie was curious about the contents of the envelope, but she wasn't sure if she was ready to see what was inside of it. She wasn't sure if she was ready to see what had happened to Taylor that caused her to run away to Pittsburgh to be with them. She knew things had been bad for her back in Tennessee, but she wasn't sure she wanted to know just how bad by looking at evidence that was used in a court case. "Oh..." Kylie said once Tree looked up at her. "I'm here with you if that means anything," Kylie said, offering her support. She walked over to the couch and took a seat next to Tree. 

"It means a lot, Ky. It really doesn't." Tree leaned over, wrapping an arm around Kylie's shoulders and pulling her in for a hug. Prolonging. She was prolonging the process of opening that envelope and seeing what was inside. Prolonging seeing exactly what had happened to Taylor back in December, not too long before her twenty-third birthday, that she had almost never seen. Tree removed herself from Kylie. She took a deep breath, undoing the little bronze brads on the envelope. She took another deep breath, opening the envelope. She reached her hand in, taking hold of the many pieces of stapled-together paper and holding on to it.  

"You don't have to do this if you don't want to," Kylie told Tree, placing a hand on her back. The truth of the matter was she wasn't ready to see them. For Tree, it needed to be done. She needed to know what Taylor hadn't told her. She needed to know what Taylor was still holding inside of her that made her so scared, so afraid when she heard the smallest sounds in the night. What had this man done that made her this way? She would never know if she never pulled out those papers and read them. 

"I have to. I need to know," Tree said. She pulled the papers from the envelope, with her head to the ceiling, not ready to look down at them. She placed the documents on her lap. She took another deep breath and soon looked down at the paperwork that lay on her lap. "This one's a restraining order. Okay. Protected person, Taylor Swift. Restained person, Jacob Lawrence. God, her mom set her up with a man more than ten years older than her." Tree's voice was barely over a whisper, and she looked over the order. "Additional protected person, Michael Swift, age 6. We're going to have to take this to the lawyer and get it updated when their names change." Tree said more to herself, as something she needed to tell Lance later, than to Kylie. She continued to look at the paper, taking in all of the information about Jake. She couldn't believe the age difference she was seeing. Never in a million years would she think setting a teenage girl up with a significantly older man would be a good idea. 

She flipped the paper over and placed it neatly on the coffee table. The next thing she was faced with was medical papers. She took another deep breath and began reading. Tree skimmed over the first page, seeing all of Taylor's basic information. She turned to the next page, finding everything that Taylor had been treated for. "Stitches under left eye. Four fractured ribs, Internal bleeding, multiple lacerations and bruises, traumatic brain injury, medical abor...." Tree gasped, feeling a pain suddenly hit her in her chest. She couldn't get the word out. She didn't want to say the word.