The Twins' Mom [Taylor Swift x Joe Alwyn AU]

iii

Taylor Swift road the elevator down to the lobby of Atty. Robert Dudley office building, sagging with relief against the paneled wall. That had gone much better than she could have hoped and she was almost positive that the job was as good as hers.

It was a good thing, too, because the situation was far worse than she could have imagined.

Clearly Joe Alwyn had better things to do than care for his twin nieces. He was probably too busy living his life like a playboy.

Taylor wasn't one to listen to gossip, but in his case, his action and reputation as a womanizing partier painted a disturbing picture. That was not the kind of atmosphere in which she wanted her daughter raised.

Her daughters. Only recently she began thinking of them as hers again.

With Patrick and Ash gone, it seemed wrong that the twins would be so carelessly pawned off on someone like Joe.

But she would save them. She would take care of them and love them. It was all that mattered now.

The elevator doors slid open and she stepped out. She crossed the swanky lobby and pushed out the door into the sunshine, heading down to the train station, feeling hopeful for the first time in two weeks.

Giving the twins up is the hardest thing Taylor ever done in her life, but she knew it was for the best.

Between her loans and exorbitant rent, not to mention her dad's failing health and mounting medical bills, she was in no position financially or emotionally to care for infant twins. She knew Patrick and Ash the girls adoptive parents, would give her babies everything that she couldn't.

But in a blink of an eye they were gone. She had been standing in front of the television, flipping through the channels when she paused on the flash report about the plane crash.

When she realize it was Ashley and Patrick they were talking about, her knees had buckled and she dropped to her shag carpet. In panic she had flipped all the channels, desperate for more details, terrified from the depths of her soul that the girls had been on a flight with them. She'd sat up all night alternating between the television and her laptop, gripped by fear and soul wrenching grief that had been all consuming.

At 7:00 am the following morning the early news confirmed that the girls had been in fact left with Ashley's family and and were not in the crash.

Taylor had been so relieved she wept. But then the reality of the situation hit hard.

Who would take the girls? Would they go to Ashley family permanently or God forbid, be dropped for adoption.

Taylor contacted a lawyer immediately, after a few calls she was shocked to learn that it will be Joe Alwyn would be their guardian.

What the hell was Patrick was thinking, choosing him? What possible interest could a womanizing, life of the party, ex-actor have in two infant babies.

Taylor asked her lawyer to contact him on her behalf using no names, assuming that Joe Alwyn will be more than happy to give the girls back to their natural mother. She would find a way to make it work. But Joe refused to give them up.

Her lawyer said she may try to fight him for custody, but the odds weren't in her favor. She had severed her parental rights and getting them back will be lengthy and expensive legal battle.

But knowing Joe would undoubtedly need help, and probably would be thrilled with someone of her qualifications, Taylor managed herself to get an interview for the nanny position.

Taylor boarded the train going to his father. Normally she visited her dad on Wednesday, but she had an appointment with Joe in his condo tomorrow so she had to rearranged her schedule. With any luck he would offer her the job on the spot, she could go home and start packing immediately.

She took a cab from the station to the dumpy third rate hospital where her dad had spent the past fourteen months.

As she passed the nursing station Taylor said hi to to the nurse seated there and received a grunt of annoyance as a response. She would think that being in same profession there would be semblance for professional courtesy, but opposite was true. The nurses seemed to resent her presence.

Taylor hated that her dad need to stay in this horrible place, where the employee are apathetic and the care was borderline criminal, but this is all the Medicare would cover and hospital care at this late stage of the disease was just to expensive.

Taylor dad's lost his ability to perform anything but the most basic functions. He couldn't speak, barely reacted to stimuli and had to fed through a tube. His heart was still beating, his lung still pulling in air,but eventually his body will forget how to do that, too. It could be weeks or months. Her dad might even linger for a year or more. There was just no way to know.

If she could get him into the place in St. Luke's it would be a bit harder to visit, but at least he would be well cared for.

"Hi Matthew," Taylor greeted the patient beside her dad, his roommate. A ninety-one year old ex-military who had lost his right foot during a war. He was dressed in a dark brown pants and a moss green cardigan sweater that were old and tattered as the wearer.

"How is dad today?" Taylor asked dropping her purse in the chair and walking to his bedside. It broke her heart to see him shriveled and lifeless. Nothing more than a shell of a man he used to be, the loving dad who single handedly raised her and her little sister Olivia. Now he was wasting away.

"It's been a good day." Mathew said.

"Hi daddy," Taylor said, pressing a kiss to his papery cheek. Her dad was awake but didn't acknowledge her.

On a good day her dad lay quietly, either staring at the dappled sunshine through the dusty vertical blinds. On a bad day, he moaned. A low, tortured, unearthly sound. They didn't know if he was in pain, or if it was just some random involuntary function. But on those days he was sedated.

"How is that little boy of yours?" Matthew asked. "Must be reaching about school age by now."

She sighed softly to herself. Mathews' memory wasn't the best. He somehow managed to remember that she'd been pregnant, but he forgot that she'd given the girls up for adoption.

And clearly he was confusing her with others people in his life because sometimes he thought she had an older boy and often times it was a baby girl.

And rather than explain yet again, Taylor just went with it.

"Growing like a weed," Taylor told him and before he could ask more questions they announced over the intercom that it was time for snacks.

"Gotta go!" Matthew said, wheeling himself toward the door. "Can I bring you a cookie?"

"No thanks, Mathew," Taylor responded.

When he was gone Taylor sat in the edge of her dad's bed and took his hand. It was cold and contracted into a stiff fist. " I had my job interview today," she told him, even though she doubted his brain could process the sounds he was hearing as anything but gibberish. " It went really well, and I get to see the girls tomorrow. If the other applicants looked anything like a bimbo who interviewed right before me, I'm a shoo-in."

She brushed a few silvery strands of hair back from his forehead. " I know you're probably thinking that I should stay out of this band trust Patrick and Ashley judgment, but I just can't. The man is a train wreck just waiting to happen. I have to make sure the girls are okay. If I can't do that as their mother. I can at least do it as their nanny."

And if that meant sacrificing her freedom and working for Joe Alwyn until the girls no longer needed her, that was what she was prepared to do.