Love, Taylor | TS

Thirteen

February 2004

Taylor invited me over on Saturday to spend the day. Ever since she came back from her family trip, I only ever really saw her on the weekends. Most afternoons after school, her mom drove them to Nashville so Taylor could work with actual songwriters. Other afternoons, I had swimming practice. At least, we got to hang out at school and we had the weekends.

Mostly, we hung out with Abby, either at the mall or the movies or the bowling alley but this time, it was just Taylor and I.

We were up in her room, watching Dawson's Creek on her small television. We were sitting on her bed with a bowl of popcorn between us and I could tell neither of us was really focusing on the episode.

I was busy watching Taylor's hand every single time it picked up a piece of popcorn from the bowl. Apparently, she was busy thinking about the boy who sat next to her in Algebra.

"Drew kinda looks like he could be on the show," Taylor mumbled.

"Huh?" I asked, a little confused.

"Drew. From Math class. He could fit in with these guys. He's so cute!"

"Oh, yeah, right," I said, clearing my throat. I didn't really find him all that cute. He wasn't my type at all, but I could see why all the other girls at school swooned over him. "He's cute, yeah."

"Rory, am I dumb?"

I chuckled and looked at Taylor weirdly. "Sometimes. Why?"

"Because! Drew is going out with Jessica and he's just never gonna like me like that and yet, I can't fricken seem to stop thinking about him!"

"They'll break up eventually," I said with a slight shrug. Everyone at school seemed to be breaking up right now.

"Still, I don't think he'll want to date me!" Taylor whined, pulling her pillow into her lap and hugging it. "All he does is tell me how I'm a great friend and I'm cool enough to be one of the guys! It's because I'm so nice to him, Rory! I need to be mean."

"You can't be mean," I responded with a chuckle. "You're too nice."

"I know and I hate it! Being nice is ruining my life!" She groaned and buried her face in her pillow.

"You're saying Drew doesn't like you back because you're nice?" I asked, scratching the back of my head. That didn't add up.

"Too nice. He asked me today where he should take Jessica on Valentine's day and stupid me told him about that Italian restaurant dad took us to last week because she'll really like that. I could have sabotaged his entire relationship but instead, I gave him advice and Jessica's gonna love him forever and they're gonna get married and have babies and I'm gonna be a spinster for the rest of my life!"

That made me laugh. "Who says spinster?"

Taylor groaned some more and dropped her head into my lap, getting popcorn all over her duvet but she didn't seem to care.

"I do. I say words like spinster which is also why he doesn't like me!"

"Uh-uh, not true. Spinster is like a very sexy word. You say that to him, and he'll break up with Jessica immediately!"

Taylor let out a small laugh as she sat back up and only then did I realise that I hadn't been breathing all too well.

"Don't you have a crush on anyone?" She asked me but I just shrugged.

"Ryan Gosling in The Notebook."

Taylor laughed, shoving my shoulder. "That doesn't count. He's an actor."