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“Whatcha writin?” Travis asks, eyes still glued to the golf tournament on the TV. Despite several trips to the private golf course housed in Travis’ neighborhood, Taylor doesn’t know a thing about the sport. She asks him questions about it when they’re there, to be polite and to fawn at the way he immediately turns into a golf instructor, all serious eyebrows and hand gestures and sports metaphors. She also likes an excuse to get out of the house, somewhere where their only company are white-haired corporate execs who don’t know who she is (of course, they know who he is). And when he wraps his arms around her to show her how to swing the club properly? She likes that too.
“Song idea,” she responds, not looking up either. This time she doesn’t have phrases yet, but she does have a feeling. A feeling like a pit in her stomach, despite the fact that she’s curled up on the couch next to her favorite person for the first time in weeks, rain drumming softly on the roof. She flew in to Kansas yesterday after finishing her stint in Europe and tomorrow he’s already leaving for the first game of the preseason. It’s coming up on a year since their first date in New York—but she still isn’t used to saying goodbye to him. Sometimes it seems like it’s the only thing they ever say to each other.
Ships in the night. She scrawls it out messily at the top of the page. Is she crazy for writing about how much she misses him while he’s sitting right next to her at this very moment? She always had a knack for finding the cracks in things, no matter how successful she’s become. She reminds herself tour will be over in less than four months. She’s scared of that vacuum, but it means she’ll finally be able to stay in one place. She’s already begun to make the mental list of things she needs to ship here when she moves in this December.
“Is it about me?” he teases, pulling her out of her spiral.
“No.” Taylor rolls her eyes but smiles nonetheless.
The kitchen timer starts to beep, prompting her to shut the journal. She places it on the coffee table and heads for the source of the noise.
Once in the kitchen, she takes the shortbread cookies out of the oven, then starts sifting powdered sugar into a bowl for the glaze.
“Hey, Trav?” she calls. Her back is to him so she has no idea if he’s paying attention.
“Yeah?” he calls back.
“Can you read something off for me from my notebook? The lemon shortbread recipe—the page should be folded.”
Paper crunches faintly from behind her. “You’re reading my journal, aren’t you?” she jokes, when he takes longer than she expects.
“No,” he answers, too quickly. “I was just looking at the wrong recipe.” Yeah right. “Here it is. One and a half cups of flour, half a cup of butter—”
“No, no. Skip to the glaze. How much corn syrup? It’s two tablespoons right?” She’s made this recipe countless times but she can’t mess this step up or the glaze will come out all gloopy.
“Correct!” he announces in his podcast voice.
Taylor adds two tablespoons of honey instead. Both of their dietitians would be proud. As she’s stirring the mixture, it’s quiet. Suspiciously quiet. Even if a golf tournament is on, she still expects one corny joke per minute, and she’s heard nothing at all.
“You better not be reading my journal,” she says, finally turning around, and sure enough, his eyes are no longer on the TV but on the tiny red book holding nothing short of Taylor’s heart and soul.
“Hey, you can’t read that!” She snaps, mixing bowl forgotten on the kitchen counter as she rushes back into the living room. “There’s proprietary information in there.” She launches herself onto his giant form, but he slides the book past her arms with ease.
“Proprietary?” he laughs, holding the notebook out while she struggles. “Then this page must be mine. After all, it has my name on it.”
And Taylor knows exactly which page he is talking about. She’d written it, in a trance, the day after they met in person the first time. She stops struggling and settles between his legs. Half because she knows he won’t give up this opportunity to embarrass her and half because deep inside, she doesn’t really care. There’s a reason she doesn’t keep her journal in a drawer anymore. She trusts him with most everything these days, her words included.
“Travis,” he reads with a planet-sized grin on his face. “His eyes. That’s all it says. Just ‘his eyes’. Okay.” Taylor remembers now that she had written this journal entry in bullet points, as if Travis was the Topic of the Day in history class. Blood rushes to her ears.
“Tom Selleck,” he continues, a question written across his eyebrows.
“The mustache,” Taylor reminds him. He tilts his head in understanding.
“Rubs his right eyebrow when he’s nervous. Underneath: He was really nervous.” Taylor laughs at this one. “Well fuck me,” Travis retorts. “It’s almost as if I was on a date with the most famous popstar in the world.” He pauses for a second, then adds, “I didn’t realize that I do that."
“You do,” says Taylor. She brushes her thumb, gently, against said eyebrow.
“Metropolis Vintage.” Their favorite Vintage store in the East Village, the one she introduced him to the second time he saw her in NY. She knew he’d like it as soon as he walked into their first date in 90s Armani.
“Is he ticklish?” Travis laughs at the innocent question.
Taylor doesn’t remember writing that, but she also isn’t surprised. “I was a few glasses in when I wrote that.” It’s the truth.
“He smells like winter. He made me laugh,” he continues. The shit-eating grin is gone, replaced by a small smile. Taylor leans back into his chest.
“I can wear heels.” They both laugh at this. “Same bday as Grandma.” Taylor plays with her hands and they both sit in silence, taking in the gravity of it, the quiet hope.
And then, finally: “I’m afraid to fall in love with him.”
Travis looks at her now, but she doesn’t meet his eye. The special thing about this line is that it’s already on a song, somewhere in a hard drive in Jack’s studio—he’ll hear it soon. The other special thing about this line is that it’s still a little bit true.
“How’d that last one work out for you?” Travis asks, green eyes smiling.
The truth is, it's scary to love someone who shines as a bright as she does. They can both walk away and each of their worlds will remain just as big. And they have plenty of practice walking away. They do it practically every weekend. But every time she finds herself back in Leawood, him back in Tribeca.
“Terribly.”
She tilts her head up, finally looking at him. His face changes. He must see the water in her smile. The secret fear behind the joke.
“You're never getting rid of me. You know that, right?” he says. She just nods. He kisses her, filling her belly with warmth, filling the pit that was beginning to form.
In the morning, Travis will zip up his suitcase and jet off to Texas. But tonight, they eat Taylor’s cookies and watch old episodes of Gossip Girl, legs tangled on the couch. They make love, and when Travis is soundly asleep, Taylor opens up her notebook to the page he hadn’t seen.
Ships in the night… Taylor’s pen hovers over the page. Sailing side by side, she writes, finally.