The Singer's Girl

Chapter 20

CAROLINE'S POV

We weren't allowed to light candles since we were on an airplane, but we did get Taylor a cake for her birthday. Taylor was turning 25 today and we were on a flight to England because Taylor was going to be on some TV show there tomorrow. I don't really know why she planned a transatlantic flight on her 25th birthday but I guess she was okay with it.

Once we were safely up in the air somebody got the cake out. There were a lot of other people on this flight; Taylor's parents, her publicist, her security, her backup singers, and the two of us. The cake was sat on the tray table in front of her and everybody stood in the aisle and gathered around , except me because I was sitting in the window seat and Taylor was sitting in the aisle seat beside me.

Her cake was frosted blue with yellow icing that said Happy 25th Birthday Taylor. We all started singing to her and instead of blowing out the nonexistent candles when she was done she cut the cake. Taylor started handing everybody paper plates with a piece of cake on it and everybody was chatting away. On most flights I'd been on in Taylor's private jet there were just the two of us and some security, maybe this time she was taking this many people because it was her birthday.

"Caroline have you turned 16 yet?" One of Taylor's back up singers asked me while she was getting a piece of cake.

"No, in February I will." I said as Taylor handed me a plate of cake and a little plastic fork.

Everybody eventually went back to their seats to eat and there were many conversations going on through the plane. Taylor was talking to her parents, who were sitting across the aisle, and I was only focused on my cake, as usual. I was beginning to get really tired, I got 3 hours of sleep last night, I was up having an anxiety attack and since it was the middle of the night I wasn't going to wake up Taylor, it would just worry her anyway.

The 3 hours I did sleep were nightmare filled, and when I woke up in a cold sweat I still didn't get Taylor, because again, it would just worry her. So when I heard her coming to my room to wake me up this morning I closed my eyes and pretended like I wasn't stressing out over unimportant things and that I'd been sleeping for hours.

Even though I was really tired, not even sleeping sounded good, because whenever I try to fall asleep I start to think about my dad and I start to stress about my life and it never ends well. After everyone was finished eating we watched a Christmas movie on the TV, per Taylor's request.

I could feel my eyes start to get heavy, but I was afraid to let them close, if I woke up with a nightmare in front of all of these people it would be very embarrassing. As soon as Taylor looked over at me she pulled me toward her so I was leaning up against her side and her arm was around me. Now I couldn't resist closing my eyes and letting myself fall asleep, even if it was an unhappy sleep, Taylor would be there. And sure enough, it was an unhappy sleep.

TAYLOR'S POV

Just as the movie was ending I could feel Caroline start to squirm in my arms. I didn't know whether to wake her up or just let her wake up when the nightmare is over. As more time passed the look on her face became more pained and I knew I should wake her up before she started to scream or something.

"Caroline." I lean in and say softly in her ear.

"Care, wake up." I say a little louder. As son as she opened her eyes she started searching for me, when she looked up and saw my face and realized where he was she started softly crying. She was startled when she woke up, but it's not like she screamed or anything. I hugged her tightly, knowing that she wouldn't want anyone else here to see her.

"It's alright." I whispered as she sniffled. I'd gotten her to stop crying but her whole body was still shaking. Her face was buried in my sweater, which was good because she couldn't see when people looked back at us giving me sympathetic looks.

Soon she pulled herself off of me and grabbed a blanket for herself. That wasn't as bad as it could've been, but I'm sure she was still embarrassed.

A few hours later the nightmare was forgotten and we were all sitting around playing cards to pass the time. I was sitting by Caroline, who was sharing cards with me for this round so she could learn how to play. It was a good time, even I was on a long flight for my 25th birthday I was having fun.

CAROLINE'S POV

I was mostly watching as everyone played cards, I had no real interest in playing, I was just sitting beside everyone because Taylor was. They were all drinking, but that's not the thing that bothered me, what bothered me was that Taylor was drinking. I knew it shouldn't bother me because she's old enough and it's not like she was drunk. It's completely normal for someone like her to drink, but it still made me uncomfortable.

I think it made me uncomfortable because my mom never drank and my dad rarely ever did. My dad would always talk about his alcoholic brother and how much he hated him for that. If you ever saw my dad drink it was no more than one beer, and even that was rare. He would always preach to me about drinking and how bad it is for you because of his brother.

So seeing Taylor drink felt like a punch in the gut. I can still picture my dad's face getting red hot when he talked about his brother. I knew I shouldn't compare Taylor having one drink to my alcoholic uncle, but I was raised somewhere where nobody drank, even if deep down I knew it was okay.

I kept repeating to myself that drinking was totally normal and fine when you're old enough. And I kept repeating to myself that nobody here was drunk, and that Taylor would not get drunk with me here. And now that I was in this situation I sort of wished I would've grown up with a little more drinking, because going from never seeing your parents drink to this was making me uncomfortable.

Finally I just stopped thinking about it, it was her 25th birthday, she could drink even if it did make me uncomfortable. Not long after this we were landing in London, and it was only about noon there. So after we went to our hotel and put our stuff down we were going to go shopping for Taylor's birthday.

Taylor, her backup singers and I spent the rest of the afternoon in stores and I let myself be okay with everything that was happening. I let the whole drinking thing go when I finally came to terms with the fact that my worries were irrelevant. And even though I'd only gotten so much sleep in the last 24 hours, I allowed myself to have fun.