Life Makes Love Look Hard (Kaylor)

Prologue (2 am who do you love?)

It’s beautiful in New York City. She remembers how intimidated she used to be, how afraid, if she’s being honest. Now it seems silly that she could ever be intimidated by the city she loves so much, the only city in the world with enough lights to conquer the stars.

But the best thing about New York City? She met Karlie here. The single best word to describe Karlie could only be sunshine. She always had a positive energy about her. When they first met at the Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show in 2013 it was Karlie who calmed her down.

“You’ll be amazing,” she remembers the angel telling her just before she went on stage. And she was.

Since then Karlie’s always been her motivator. She’s been at her side, pushing her forward to conquer the world.

“You’re basically queen of the world!” Karlie says sometimes.

She’s been making lots of royal metaphors since then, thinking about her throne, her kingdom (the music industry), and her subjects (her fans). She doesn’t like to call them subjects, though, because that makes it sound like they have to do something for her when they don’t. They absolutely don’t, and it amazes her every day the support of millions of strangers for writing stories about her life.

So in her head, even with all her royalty metaphors, they’re not subjects. They’re still Swifties.

But what would Karlie be? In a world of royalty and Swifties? Would she be a princess from a distant kingdom? Sent to the ball by her father to dance with the queen in order to win her hand? Or would she be a knight? Would the sun glisten on her armor as she stood always at Taylor’s side protecting her from danger?

Where does Karlie fit in her world?

What is she feeling? She hasn’t felt this way in so long. Butterflies flutter in her stomach at the simplest thought of Karlie, of her smile, her eyes, and she can’t forget about that amazing body.

What is she doing?

She’s seen so much on tumblr about lgbt+ and thought maybe, just maybe, but no. She can’t have those thoughts can she? If she’s learned anything it’s that she should always be honest with herself, but she’s struggling again. Is she? Isn’t she? Can these feelings even be real? Be reciprocated?

A knock at the door has her nearly jumping out of her skin. She rolls her eyes at Meredith’s grumpy reply to the strange noise. What time is it even? 2 AM? Who even comes over to her house at this time of night?

“Karlie!” her first instinct is to smile, but fear and worry creep into her chest and seize her heart. Her lips open with a gasp at the blue and purple blossoming in her cheek. She’s never seen Karlie look so small.

“Karlie what- God where are my manners? Please come inside!”

Karlie doesn’t speak. She closes the door following the model’s entrance, locking the door before moving to be in front of her. She carefully, very carefully, takes Karlie’s cheek in her hand to closer inspect the damage.

“What happened?”

“Don’t.” Karlie jerks her head away, those green eyes glued to the floor. “I just,” the angel takes a shaky breath, “I just needed a place to stay and- and I didn’t know where else to go.”

“You can always come here,” Taylor replies, perhaps a bit too quickly, but it brings the twinge of a smile to Karlie’s lips. “No matter what.

“Can I get you anything? Food? Fluffy socks? A shower?”

“A shower would be nice.”

She rushes to the guest bathroom, turning on the warm water and grabbing several towels from the closet.

“So,” she turns back to Karlie, clasping her hands behind her back and shrugging her shoulders. “If you need anything you can just, you know, yell. I’ll be,” she points to the living room. “Right out there if you need anything, not that you’re gonna need anything, but I guess it’s nice to know someone’s there and-”

She feels lips press against her cheek.

“Thank you.” The tiniest of smiles crosses over Karlie’s lips, and she smiles right back. She bounces on the balls of her feet until distracted by Karlie clearing her throat.

“Oh! Right!” Scarlet rushes to her cheeks. “I’m gonna go now... for obvious reasons.”

She rushes out of the bathroom fast enough it could be called running, thankfully before she embarasses herself further.

Right now she can’t think straight. Her mind is full of questions seeking answered. What happened to Karlie? Why does she act like such an idiot around her? Who did could do something like this to the most amazing woman?

What is she going to do?