Heart to Heart

I just wrote this. A loving confrontation. Let me know what you think! "I know something is wrong. It is your choice if, when, and to whom you disclose that information. I understand that. I also understand that you have been on your own for a long time. As much as Henry tried, a big brother is not a substitute for a mother or father. Especially when he was alone and raising a child by himself. I know that you were like PJ's mom, and that you still take that role when you are with your family. You are one of the most independent people I know. Life has forced that upon you and it has helped you develop into the amazing and beautiful person you are today. It is because I know this that I understand you do not let people in. Henry and I have been the exceptions, but we are not under any illusions. We realize that there are times when you do not tell us things because you think we need protecting. That is part of your amazing personality. To protect those you love. I would not want you to change anything about yourself. If you did, you wouldn't be you, my girl next door. However, there are some things you need to understand. You are not alone. You do not have to handle any situation or struggle alone. I am here. I have always been here. I plan to be here, forever. You are running right now. I don't know what you are running from, but I know you are running. I know this because I have seen you do it before. I have talked you out of it and I have watched you struggle to let me help you. This," he motioned to himself then to her, "is not going away. You are not pushing me anywhere. I will be here. With or without your consent or permission. That is my choice. I will run behind you until you decide to let me catch up. If you want to run, I accept that. It is your choice. But sweetheart, you have another choice. Let me run with you. I will be there, I can run beside you if you let me. Just know this: I will not be waiting patiently for you. I will be running behind you or beside you. Until you realize you are not alone."

Dem Chapter 1

I brought the covers over my head. Hoping somehow that I could become invisible. The door handle turned... Sitting straight up in bed, I look around and realize that it was a dream, a nightmare. They would be so happy. All they wanted was for me to remember. All I want to do is forget. As the door of my room opens, I realize that I not only woke up scared, I woke up screaming. James walks in quietly. James, the only person who hasn't pushed me to talk; the only one who lets me be me. He sits on the edge of the bed. This is the closest he ever gets. James understands me. "Nightmare?" he asks. I just nod my head. James knows not to expect any more than that. "Want to read or watch TV for a while?" He asks this because he knows that sometimes escape from my own mind is necessary. I shake my head as I look at the clock in my room. What I need is to talk to Charlie, the one who can reassure me after my nightmare. James looks where I look, this is how he gets inside my head since I have no words. "It's 2:00 am." That's all he says. He wants to know how important the call is. I nod my head again. James picks up the phone. It seems to take forever for her to answer. "Hey. It's me. I know it's late, but is it possible for Dem to talk to Charlie?" I watch as James talks for me. He explains that I had a nightmare. Luckily, Charlie lives with James' best friend Sky and Sky is very understanding. James smiles and hands me the phone. Charlie knows she won't hear my voice tonight. That is not what's important. "Dem?" she sounds tired and I feel guilty for waking everyone up. If only I could stop the nightmares. I tap the phone so she knows I am listening. This is our code. Codes are how I communicate. "I'm sorry you had a nightmare. Maybe we can see each other tomorrow. And spend a day together. That would help wouldn't it?" I tap again. "Dem, I'm alright. Today Sky took me to the bookstore after school. I got to buy 3 new books! I bought 2 for me and one for you. I'll bring it tomorrow ok?" Another tap. My eyes start to fill with tears. I love her so much. She is my heart. James sees my tears and decides to end the conversation. I agree so I don't resist when he takes the phone back. "Hey Charlie. Tell Sky I'll call tomorrow to work out the details." He smiles. "I know. Love you too." James looks at me as he puts the phone in his pocket. I see tenderness, love, and understanding. That is why I let him closer than anyone else. The understanding. That is what I need most. "Think you can sleep now?" I nod my head slowly. I hope so. I hope no more nightmares interrupt my night or his. "Night." With that he leaves. James never says good night or sweet dreams. He knows that my nights are not good and my dreams never sweet. He understands. I close my eyes and push the bad thoughts away. I recite the facts that I know will calm me and I hope they will ward off any more dreams for tonight. Charlie is fine. Charlie is with Sky. I am with James. No one can hurt me here. I will see Charlie tomorrow. I will see Charlie tomorrow. I will see Charlie tomorrow.

CHAPTER 4

Hailey and Jesse smiled after Taylor explained herself. “You are totally fine,” Hailey said reassuringly, “We understand why you didn’t tell us. It is not a big deal.”

“I know. But I feel bad now that your name has been put into the circus.” Taylor looked upset.

Jesse decided to step in. “You are in an impossible situation. Trying to protect yourself and trying to protect everyone else. Someone is going to get hit. It just happened to be you. And that is because you are the one that won’t tell. There is nothing the media loves more than a scandal, and your refusal to tell them anything makes them curious. Most people know that none of the rumors are true, but there are the few that will eat it up…so they still print it.” He smiled. “You are one of the strongest people I know. You have been through so much that the world doesn’t know about. You can handle this and anything else they throw at you. And you do not need to worry about us.” He looked at Hailey.

 Hailey smiled at him, “We have news too, and it’s good.” She looked nervous.

Taylor raised her eyebrows in anticipation. “Okay, my curiosity is peaked.”

“We are getting married!” Hailey said excitedly. “I’m really sorry you are finding out now, after you have had such a hard week, but I want you to be my maid of honor.”

Taylor jumped up and went to hug Hailey and Jesse. They both smiled. No matter what they should have known Taylor would be happy for them, that’s the kind of person she was. Always giving, always thinking of others. Most of the time this was a good thing. However, Jesse couldn’t help but think it might hurt her in the near future. Taylor was the strong one for the people in her life, she needed someone to be strong for her; everyone leaned on her. She needed someone to be her strong person.

“YAY! Of course, I will be your maid of honor. It is so exciting! We have to start planning.”

Hailey’s smile changed, “Well, we already planned most of it.” She looked at Jesse, “We agreed that we wanted it to be a short engagement and a small ceremony. That way there is less chance of anyone leaking it.” She took a deep breath, “So, we are going to have the wedding in two weeks. We have everything we need; the place, the food, the license, the wedding party, family and friends.”

Taylor’s eyes widened. She couldn’t believe it was happening so fast. “Wow…I can’t believe it’s so soon. Let’s go over the details please. I want to be caught up on everything, starting with the proposal.”

Taylor, Hailey, and Jesse talked for over two hours about the proposal, the wedding, Taylor’s life, and what possible solutions there could be. Taylor loved her best friends and could not ask for better people in her life. She was so happy for them, but in her heart she felt jealousy and a little resentment. Her life was not going as well. The media was speculating on her private life for the entire world to see, Jake was out of the country working, and Henry and PJ were in Tennessee at home. She wanted to go to sleep and have it all be a bad dream. Unfortunately, as she locked up after Hailey and Jesse left, Taylor knew this would not happen. She sighed and went to her room to get ready for bed.

As she got dressed the next morning she took time to pray. She knew she could not make it through without Him. “Lord, I don’t know what today will hold. But please let me handle it the way You want me to.” Her voice broke. “I think I am doing the right thing. Please let me know if I am wrong.”

After breakfast Taylor talked to Jake and Henry to assure them she was fine. Neither one of them believed her, she knew this, but they both knew that she could handle herself and Jake knew that it was her decision not to tell where she was on vacation. Henry had a different opinion.

“Tay, you need to tell them you were at home. No one will think anything of it.”

“Henry, no. We’ve talked about this. It would be different if I had planned the trip. The fact that I left so suddenly is the main problem, not the location. If I tell that I was home, they will start poking around to see why the visit couldn’t have waited. You were strong for me. Let me be strong for you. Please.”

Henry knew that tone. He knew that Taylor was not going to change her mind. And he also knew it was her decision to keep his secret; even though he did not totally agree. He sighed, “Okay, on a different note. I have decided that I will take you up on your offer. PJ and I will move to LA and live with you. I have it all worked out, we will be there in a month.”

Taylor jumped out of her chair and did a little dance, “Seriously?! Yes!”

Henry smiled; he knew this would be her reaction. “So, go buy that house you’ve been looking at and get settled before our bachelor ways and craziness invade.”

Taylor laughed, she knew it would be an adjustment, but it would be so nice to have Henry and PJ so close after being apart for so long. “Will do. I have got to go start making arrangements. Talk to you soon! And love you!”

Taylor hung up the phone before Henry could say good-bye. She immediately went and called the real-estate agent she had talked with before. As she sat down at her desk after the call, she thought back to the last time she and Henry had lived together, and how she would be strong for him and PJ because Henry had always been strong for her.

SEVEN YEARS EARLIER

Taylor sat and watched as her parents were lowered into the ground. Dry eyed she sat as the flag was handed to Henry. Sixteen was too young to lose her parents. Her mother wouldn’t be there to help her get ready for her first date or prom. Her father wouldn’t be there to teach her to drive or walk her down the aisle at her wedding. It was not supposed to happen this way. Life was not fair. Taylor thought about PJ and how at one, he wouldn’t even remember his grandparents. She thought about Henry, who had lost his birthmother at five, now he had lost his mother of eighteen years and his father.

Suddenly Henry took her arm. The funeral was over. Taylor wasn’t sure how much time had passed, or what exactly had happened during the service. She felt like she was in a daze.

“Honey, it’s time to go back to the house.” Henry said gently as he led her to the car.

“Okay.”

“It will be alright. Somehow. I promise.”

Taylor looked up at him in his uniform. So like their father is made her heart ache. She looked at her own skin. Henry’s mother had been African while her mother was Caucasian, so the pallor cause by stress, anxiety, sadness, and every other emotion possible made her white skin look even paler next to his. She looked back at the graves that help her parents’ bodies, took a deep breath, and prayed for strength.

“I know. We will make it through. Somehow.” She gathered all of the courage she could and smiled up at her brother.

They went back to the house and sat while people gathered and gave their condolences once more. Taylor was exhausted by the time the last mourner left. Then the door rang. Thinking that there was no way she could handle this, she looked for Henry, when she saw that he was busy with PJ, she knew she would have to face the person at the door.

Taylor opened the door prepared to force a smile and ‘thank you,’ when she got the best surprise of the day, Jake. Jake smiled and took her into his arms; Taylor burst into tears and cried on his shoulder.

FIVE YEARS EARLIER

Taylor stood holding a tired and confused PJ as she waved one last time to her brother. He was being deployed to some far away land and she was now in charge. At eighteen this was not easy, or normal. She looked around at the families there to say good-bye to their service members and once again wondered how anyone could walk away from a husband and child because of the military lifestyle. PJ’s mother had done this very thing when he was six months old and Henry had been set to deploy. PJ had come to live with Taylor and her parents for the duration of the deployment. Then the accident had occurred and Henry had been granted emergency leave. He had been home with them on base for almost two years. It was a blessing he hadn’t been deployed sooner. Henry was the strong one. Taylor went back to the house and put PJ down for a nap. She looked around the house and thought about how much it would take to run a house and thanked her Lord that she had taken extra classes and graduated early, so she didn’t have school to manage as well.

She heard a knock at the door. She had no idea who would be coming by so she had no expectations when she opened the door. Jake’s smiling face greeted her and she squealed as she shut the door behind her so they wouldn’t wake PJ.

“What are you doing here?” Taylor asked. “You are supposed to be working.”

“We finished early and I don’t start my next project for three weeks. So I thought I would visit my best friend. Plus, I knew you could use me since Henry left today.”

Taylor was confused. She never told Jake a specific date for Henry’s departure. She hadn’t known until a couple of days ago herself. “How did you know?”

Jake smiled, “Henry. We talked about me coming while he was away to help and visit. I just wasn’t sure I would be able to with my schedule. But we finished and here I am…for three weeks! We haven’t spent that much time together since I moved to LA.”

“I know! This is great.”

PRESENT DAY

As Taylor stepped out of her memories, she was more determined than ever to protect her family, including Jake.  Henry and Jake had been there through the hardest moments of her life when her parents died. Jake had been there when Henry deployed. They had both been there when she moved to LA for college. And Jake had helped her find the role that made her famous. ‘Yes.’ She thought. I can do this. I will not let them be dragged through this. I will be strong for them. 

chapter 3

CHAPTER 3

Taylor made it through the final day of work on the season finale. As she sat down in her trailer, her entire body hurt from the tension she had carried all day. Dodging questions about the article, avoiding calls to the set from reporters, and finally walking through the crowd of reporters and paparazzi trying to get a picture or comment from her had drained the last drop of energy she had left.  

Taylor was ready to be home. She thought about the dinner sitting in her passenger seat that she had picked up from her favorite Mexican restaurant and smiled. At least she could have a quiet and peaceful dinner. Her good mood was increasing as she mentally picked out which movie she would watch during dinner. That good mood was shattered as soon as she could see the entrance to her apartment building; it was filled with reporters. How had they found her? Three years of being on TV and in movies and they had never found her! Someone must have tipped them off. This was NOT a good thing.

The only bright spot Taylor saw was Joel, her doorman/security guard. With a sigh of relief she sent up a prayer of thanks that he was on duty tonight. Joel and his family had taken Taylor in when she first arrived. They were very close. Taylor even thought of his daughter Kim as a sister. Joel had called in backup. Normally there was one security guard, tonight she counted four. Four guards trying to make a path for her to drive through. It took a couple of minutes, but finally there as a path. Taylor parked and took a deep breath as she grabbed her stuff and opened the door. Joel was there; ready to shield her as much as possible. Taylor knew that she had to say something; she had to express her feelings, even if she was not going to answer the reporters’ one burning question.

“Joel, it’s ok. I am going to talk to them. Just stay close.”

Joel looked skeptical, “Ok, if that’s what you want.”

“Apparently what I want is no longer being considered.” Taylor handed her backpack and food to Drew, another security guard that happened to be Joel’s nephew. Then she turned to address the crowd. “Hey guys, I would like to say that since I have been here, no reporter has ever come to my apartment and it is not appreciated.” She tried to continue, but no one was listening because everyone was trying to ask questions. “HEY!” Everyone got quiet. Taylor Robertson was mild mannered and polite; she did not yell. “A press statement has been released. However, apparently it was not to your satisfaction, so I will answer three questions…three. So ask wisely.” She looked out in the crowd and pointed. “You.”

The girl looked startled. She had not expected to be chosen, which is exactly why Taylor had chosen her. She was young and Taylor could tell she was a novice. Maybe this would help her career. Even in with the stress, frustration, and annoyance, Taylor was still trying to help someone else.

“Me? Ummm…okay.” The girl eyes were wide and Taylor saw her swallow. “The statement said you were at an undisclosed location and that you had no intention of disclosure anytime soon. Why have you chosen not to say where you were? Especially considering the reaction.”

Taylor smiled. The girl had guts, and she hadn’t asked where she had gone, which gave her a point in Taylor’s book. “What is your name?”

“Amanda.”

“Okay Amanda, thank you for your question. I have chosen not to say where I was because I believe it is my business and no one else’s. I do not think that the public needs to know where I am all the time. I take my privacy very seriously and I wish that everyone understood that.”

“Thank you.” Amanda said writing furiously in her notebook.

“Question #2: You” Taylor picked a veteran this time. Someone that she had seen on many occasions.

“Yes. Miss Robertson, I would like to know why you have chosen not to tell anyone. Sources have reported that not even your best friend Hailey Lewis knows where you went.”

Taylor was no longer smiling. She knew Hailey wouldn’t have shared this information so the source had to be someone on the show. And she had an idea of who it was. She could have screamed, but she was a professional, so she answered the question with a straight face, none of the reporters knew anything was wrong. “I would like to know who your source is. And I will not confirm or deny what Hailey does or doesn’t know. That is between us. I will say that you are wrong in the belief that no one knows where I went. It is just that very few people know.” He vet reporter did not like her answer, too bad. Taylor picked her last questions, “You.”

The woman smiled, she was happy to be chosen. “Okay. I would like to ask a question that may seem obvious. Any of the rumors of where you went true?”

“No. None of the rumors that I have heard are true. I did not have an abortion. I have never done drugs. I took one drink on my 21^st birthday just because and I have not had any alcohol since. And I do not have an eating disorder. Unless you count not eating due to impromptu press conferences.” She pointed to her now cold dinner and smiled.

A couple of the reporters laughed with her. “That is all I have. I am going to my apartment now.”

“Thank you” was expressed by several of the reporters.

Joel and Drew walked her to the door and went in with her.

“Are you okay?” Joel asked in his fatherly tone.

Taylor smiled. “It was the perfect end to today. But yes I am okay. And I am going to go to my apartment, eat, watch tv, and not think about it until I wake up.”

Drew joined the conversation with a compliment. “You’re tough I will give you that. And you handled yourself very well.”

“Thanks.”

Joel got back to business, “We are going to have two guards on duty as long as this,” he pointed to the door, “continues. I have asked that either Drew or I are here most of the time. Since we know you the best.”

Taylor was touched. It was true that she was more comfortable with Joel and Drew. Joel because he had taken over as her protector when she moved in and Drew because he had taken up right where his uncle had, as protector. They had both been working at the complex since before she moved in, so they had known her before she was ‘somebody.’ Joel had taken her in as family, she was invited to his house for dinner at least once a week and Taylor had become a big sister to Kimberly, Joel’s only daughter. Drew reminded her of her brother; early 30’s, veteran, and humorous even in tough situations. Joel, Drew, and Kimberly were Taylor’s Hollywood family – totally unexpected and absolutely welcome.

“Thanks guys. I appreciate it. Hopefully it won’t last long. Or I will have to come up with a new plan. Good night.”

“Night.”

“Night.”

Finally Taylor was alone. She was so ready for this part of the day. The part where she wasn’t Taylor Robertson. The part where she was just Taylor, a girl from Memphis. She knew though that she owed Hailey an explanation. She deserved to be told. So she picked up the phone and called her best friend.