The Lucky One (2) - Taylor Swift

34

Taylor was doing her best not to embarrass Grace, she really was.

They had brought in a tray of hospital food for Grace to eat later that day. Andrea had told Taylor she would stay so Taylor could go shower and get some sleep back at Amber's but Taylor refused. Her mother went to check into a hotel but said she would be back in a couple hours, she wanted to make sure she found a place as everyone seemed to be travelling for the holidays towards their loved ones.

Grace wasn't hungry which was part of the problem, but the other problem was that with the pain in her shoulder from the dislocation and the two broken arms, she couldn't tolerate trying to hold a fork, especially with her dominant arm in a sling. Taylor was putting it onto the fork for her and bringing it towards her mouth, "The doctor says you should eat, sweetheart."

"I'm not hungry," Grace sighed. Taylor brought a fork half-full of runny mashed potatoes towards Grace's mouth and waited for her to open it.

"C'mon, Grace, you're not going to feel better if your body has no energy to work with," Taylor offered a very watery smile, "Do you want me to make airplane noises like you do for Gracie?"

"No," Grace laughed but stopped as it hurt too much. She winced and instinctively went to reach for her abdomen where the pain shot, but then it seared through her shoulder worse.

"It's okay," Taylor took a deep breath and waited for Grace to opened her eyes. She wore her pain on her sleeve, her eyes would crinkle up tight and she would be so stiff, "Do you want to try some water?"

"Yeah," Grace said. She didn't have the energy to polish her words, it was hard to open her mouth as the cuts began to scab over and the bruises became more firm.

"Open," Taylor guided the straw into Grace's mouth and then set the cup down when she released it, "Your doctor says that as long as you keep feeling better, we should be able to leave tomorrow sometime."

"At least we'll have all of Christmas Eve at Michael's."

"Tomorrow's Christmas Eve," Taylor said softly, not to correct her but just to let her know, "We might be able to leave tomorrow."

"Oh," Grace looked at the plate of disgusting hospital food, "I thought today was Friday."

"It's Saturday. You uhm, your accident was last night. You can't remember it right now, your brain isn't ready to think about it, but you did Friday already."

"I had a doctor's appointment," Grace recalled. She knew she did because she had set an alarm after kicking Meredith off the bed.

"You went, you got diagnosed with ADHD. You decided you are going to try just doing therapy first instead of doing it and medication," Taylor stopped to let Grace process and then said, "Then we packed and drove up to Michael and Amber's farm. Michael found out he is allergic to cats, so you two went to go pick up some allergy medicine and the truck hit a patch of ice and spun out."

"I see," none of that sounded familiar to her, "Thank you for taking care of me."

"Always," Taylor resumed scooping food onto the fork, "Can you do two more bites for me?"

"It has a bad texture."

"Then I'll ask Mom to bring you something. Do you want anything in particular?"

"A hug."

"I'll hurt you, you're fragile right now."

"Please."

"Can we compromise? I'll kiss your forehead," Taylor moved some of Grace's tangled, dried blood covered hair out of the way and pressed her lips to it oh so carefully.