wilder and lighter (a tayvis adoption au)
8 parts Ongoing MatureTravis Kelce didn't expect to find a little girl hiding in the football stadium after football practice... and Taylor Swift definitely didn't expect to be leaving the parking lot with a child in the back seat when she picked him up.
Seven-year-old Charlie Bennett wasn't supposed to be in that stadium. But when the world left her behind - when her parents gave up, checked out, and stopped caring - Charlie learned how to survive in silence. She never expected kindness, never trusted safety, and certainly never believed that anyone would love her. She'd only ever known what love wasn't. Her parents forgot to feed her, left her at home alone, and told her every day that she was a disappointment because she was a girl, not another son. Her whole life had been about being invisible - about not being a burden.
Taylor and Travis had talked about kids before. Someday. One day. After the season, after the Tour, in the future, when things had settled down. But nothing in life had prepared them for Charlie. For the moment when a scared little girl with tangled hair, a tattered football sweater and tired eyes quietly climbed into their hearts that December night and changed everything.
Because Taylor and Travis didn't look away. They didn't turn around or pass her off to someone else. They saw her. And for the first time, Charlie felt like maybe... just maybe... she was worthy of the kind of love she'd only ever read about in picture books.