FIVE

"Oh, I can't

Stop you putting roots

In my dreamland..."

———

Taylor had just arrived at Electric Lady Studios when her phone buzzed in her pocket. As she climbed the stairs up to the studio suite, she pulled out the device and smiled at the notification on the screen.

She tapped it.

The album's a banger.

Thanks again for being so kind to me that night at The Pearl 💕

Taylor's smile pouted in awe. Dorothea was sweet. And the compliment on her music made her heart jump. For some reason, it made Taylor even happier with the album. A few steps from the door to the recording suite, a sudden impulse sent her fingers typing on the screen. She then hit Send right as she walked in on Jack, who was wearing headphones and nodding rhythmically at the keyboard.

Taylor laughed. "Is that the sound of another unborn Grammy you're listening to?"

"Jesus!" Jack launched back from the instrument on the wheeled seat beneath him, nearly yanking the headphones from the receiver. His face turned pink as Taylor burst out laughing. "How many times have I told you that I literally can't hear you come in when I'm wearing these?"

"Maybe don't wear them until I arrive," she suggested, dropping her bag on a purple velvet ottoman.

"I'm sure this will sound surprising, but inspiration isn't dependent on your presence, Miss Swift," he noted, fixing the baseball cap on his head.

"Fuck you." She laughed again. She walked past him and sat down on the couch. Without even realizing, she pulled out her phone and checked the screen. She had become quite detached from the device when she disappeared. What she just did was like a sudden, strange blip back to 2016 Taylor.

"So what are we jamming on today?" Jack asked, swiveling around to face her.

Taylor snorted, her eyes dropping to her phone as it lit up. "Please don't say that ever again," she said.

"What's wrong with 'jamming'?" Jack said defensively.

"It makes you sound like my dad at a PR meeting."

"Well, okay, then why did you come here today, Miss Taylor?" He prompted, nodding at her phone, "Needed a private place to text some secret new love interest?"

Taylor's eyes shot up to meet his bespectacled ones. She felt the slightest hint of heat bloom on her face, but she forced herself to laugh at Jack's amused smile. "No," she said, shaking her head. She then dropped the phone face-down on the couch. "Nice try, though, Antonoff."

Jack raised his eyebrows, smiling as he turned back to the keyboard. "For a bad liar, that was one of your worst attempts yet," he muttered.

"What was that?"

"So, what would you like to accomplish this afternoon, Miss Swift?" The brunette reiterated, standing to adjust the settings on the amplifier next to him.

"World domination," she answered flatly, standing and approaching the microphone surrounded by an acoustical barrier. Taylor grabbed the noise-cancelling headphones hanging on the music stand and placed them over her ears. She closed her eyes and began humming to herself to warm up her voice. But all she could picture was the flash of a message notification from Dorothea Madison.

Taylor's blue hues fluttered open and she cleared her throat. Again, an unusual impulse sent her attention to the iPhone face-down on the couch. She was almost giddy, yet also uneasy. She had always had a tendency to dive into something that interested her headfirst, her excitement often outpacing reality. And unfortunately, that habit over time had left her with multiple deep-seated scars.

But she was getting ahead of herself. Being present and not fixating on the unpredictable future is what had led her to produce another album. Being present is what brought her true, sustainable happiness.

And if being happy meant meeting someone new in an unexpected place, why the fuck shouldn't she be entitled to that?

———

You were lovely.

And thank you for saying that about the record 😻

I hope you've been doing well since that night.

The message that Dorothea had read from Taylor—once she retrieved her miraculously non-shattered phone from the bathroom floor— played on a loop in her mind through the remainder of her shift.  She was so overwhelmed that she hadn't even thought twice about replying to the blonde again. It was only after she hit Send and left the restroom to resume polishing glassware that she remembered their first encounter. She wondered if the I hope you've been doing well had been an indirect reference to her crying at the sink. Even if it wasn't, something told Dorothea that Taylor hadn't forgotten that moment, either.

Dorothea's phone had lit up with another message from the singer, once again surprisingly quick. But she decided to wait until her shift ended to read it. She was working the Wednesday afternoon, business-executive lunch crowd, but it wasn't that she was slammed with tables. What she really needed was for her mind to slow down; focus on the present. Though Taylor's initial message caught her by surprise, she hadn't forgotten what she was planning to do seconds before it appeared. So while the singer's text ebbed curiously in her mind, she also had to force herself to plan how she was going to tell Maeve about the baby.

On the subway ride back to her apartment that evening, a heavy sensation of dread had started to build within her. As soon as the words were spoken out loud to another person's ears—because somehow she still hadn't managed to speak them to herself—it would make what happened on New Years' Eve real. And the first thing her sister would ask her would be if the other person involved in that event knew what happened. And because Nick hadn't answered her multiple calls again after work, she would have to say he had no knowledge of their baby.

Dorothea thought she'd be able to read Taylor's message on her walk to St. Marks, but she couldn't bring herself to pull out her phone until she arrived at her apartment and collapsed on her bed. She swiped past the unread DM to unlock the device. She then took a deep, shaky breath as she tapped Maeve's number onto the screen for a second time that day. But now she didn't hesitate to press the Call button firmly with her thumb. She lifted the smart phone, the ringtone shooting through her ear and causing her to jump.

"Hey girl—" Like rocks being fired out of a slingshot, Dorothea felt a swell of tears brim at the sound of the soft southern twang in Maeve's voice. "Thea?" Her sister said, sounding like she was using the Bluetooth in her car (Dorothea prayed she was alone). "Can you hear me?"

"Yeah—yeah, hi!" Her voice, though cheerful, faltered when she spoke. Dorothea squeezed her eyes shut as a few tears silently slid down her face.

Maeve immediately detected something was off. "Hey, what's going on, Babygirl?"

"Oh uh—" Dorothea hadn't even thought about what her sister was in the middle of. Was she in her scrubs, on her way home from her shift at the hospital? On her way to her shift? It suddenly felt like she chose the worst possible time to call. "Ah—Are you busy right now?" She asked.

"Just on my way to spin class," Maeve answered happily. She then added, "But I have a few minutes to chat. How have you been? Is it cold up there? It's been unusually freezing here. Oh, Thea, you'd think it was so funny if you saw how bundled up people are since it dropped into the forties—"

Dorothea tried to take another deep breath as quietly as possible. This was going to be much harder than she imagined. "Oh, I'm sure," she agreed, laughing a little. She then cleared her throat. "But actually, I need to talk to you about something."

"Go ahead and shoot, Pretty."

"I—It's—" Dorothea's words scattered out of her lips like a jar of upturned marbles.

"Did something happen?" Maeve asked, a note of concern entering her tone.

"Remember when I told you that I wasn't going to do anything on New Years' Eve?" Dorothea suddenly prompted, "I said that I was just gonna chill at my apartment and order food?"

"Yes, I remember,"

"Well, that was what I did—At first."

Maeve waited for her to continue, but after a moment said gently, "Okay, then what happened?"

"Nick showed up. Out of nowhere! I swear, I had no idea he would do that!" She exclaimed, her voice jittery with tears.

But her sister was still calm. "Okay," she said, "so what happened after that?"

"We had sex," Dorothea cried, tears now flooding down her face. She swiped her hand over each of her eyes, suddenly angry. "I don't know why I did it! Like, why? Why am I so fucking stupid? I swore I would never let that jackass back into my apartment ever again and then he shows up with fucking flowers and I—"

"Okay—Hey, hey. Thea," Maeve cut in. She waited for Dorothea to quiet down until she said, "You're not the first person to have sex with their ex. It's okay!"

"But it's not! It's not okay!" Dorothea argued, "Because I haven't been on birth control since November!"

There was now silence on her sister's end of the call. Dorothea shuddered as she took another breath to speak, but the faint sound of Maeve sighing laced through the receiver. "Did he use a condom?" She breathed.

Dorothea's face crumpled. "I thought so."

Maeve sighed again. "So, you're pregnant?"

"Yes." A sob rolled out of Dorothea as soon as she answered the question. She still hadn't managed to say it; it was obviously going to be easier for anyone else but her. Dorothea's entire body shook as she cried; her tears falling with abandon onto her legs. The relief she thought she would feel from sharing her secret was still buried in the swamp of her anxiety. "Why am I so fucking stupid?" She cried softly.

"Thea, you're not stupid," her sister corrected firmly. "It was a mistake. A very stupid mistake."

"I know."

"Does he know?" Maeve questioned, "About what you're dealing with now? About any of this?"

"No!" She responded, a sudden burst of frustration heating beneath her skin. "Because I literally can't get in contact with him! He's gone! He won't answer one fucking phone call!"

"Go to his apartment."

"I can't! He moved out of his SoHo place last fall and I have no idea where he lives anymore! That fucking piece of—"

"Thea, stop," Maeve interrupted, "what about his roommate? Or former roommate—whatever. Tyler? Do you have his number? Or could you find him at work? Does he still work at that bar in the East Village?"

Dorothea's mouth twisted in disgust. "I have no idea."

"Well, start with him," her sister instructed, "then go from there and find out how to reach Nick. If that doesn't work, we'll figure something else out. It's not impossible, Babe—"

Dorothea suddenly let out an aggravated sigh. In a burst of adrenaline her eyes shot to the ceiling as she sat straight up. "Why should I even tell him?" She asked, "If he doesn't give a shit about me, then why does he even deserve to know?"

"Well, I guess that depends," Maeve said, "are you planning on keeping this baby?"

Dorothea was silent, but that was enough of an answer. Maeve drew in a slow, careful breath. "I'll go online when I get home later and see if there are any flights still available this weekend—"

"What! No," Dorothea protested, "Maeve, stop—"

"I'm coming to help you find him,"

"I'll find him!"

"Thea, less than thirty seconds ago you didn't even want to tell him!" Maeve argued.

Dorothea groaned. "I promise, I'll find him! Okay?"

"Fine. But if I don't hear anything from you by the end of next week, I'm coming up there," her sister decided.

Dorothea remained quiet as she wiped her eyes again. A new sense of dread was now forming within her at the thought of asking Tyler about Nick. Whether she and Nick were on good terms or not, the dark-haired, occasional coke-snorting, wannabe Wolf-on-Wall-Street was always a dick.

"Even if you don't find Nick and you still decide to follow through with the pregnancy, that doesn't mean you have to keep the baby," her sister reminded gently, "but no matter what, you'll get through this."

Dorothea nodded slowly, absorbing the words. She then, subconsciously, placed her hand on her abdomen. "Maeve?"

"Yes?"

"Don't tell Mom yet. Please," she said.

"I won't. I'm leaving that up to you. And hey," her sister mentioned, "as soon as we hang up, make a doctor's appointment. No matter what you decide to do in the end, you need to see a doctor."

"Got it." Dorothea sighed. A moment later she said goodbye to Maeve, then dropped her phone soundlessly onto the bed. The silence of her apartment rang in her ears as she buried her face in her hands.

"I'm pregnant," she whispered to herself. "I'm pregnant."

———

February 5th, 2018

I'm so glad to hear you're doing well.

BTW, your photos on here are AWESOME!

Are you a photographer?

During the first break in her kick-off session with the tour dancers, Taylor stared at the direct message she'd sent Dorothea almost a week ago. Beneath it, in teeny-tiny font, was the word Seen.

It wasn't that she needed a response. Dorothea was entitled to do whatever she chose, even if that meant ending their short-lived conversation. But Taylor also wouldn't have minded an answer.

Another habit Taylor was prone to was worrying about just about anything. And even though she knew next to nothing about the girl, each passing day without a response added another scoop of concern to the growing hill in her mind.

Now, when she thought of Dorothea, one of the first images to cross her mind was her tear-streaked face in the restroom at The Pearl. Taylor knew something wasn't right that night. And that thing most likely still wasn't.

Whatever it was, Taylor wished she knew.