You Belong With Me

Taylor's P.O.V.

The next morning, Alex and I both awoke to the shrill sound of his phone going off. Jack called and told us to meet everyone at his house as soon as we could. I had to force myself to get out of bed; I didn't want to leave Alex's side. It felt too good to be there. After I ran home to pack a few things and tell my parents I wouldn't be home for the weekend, Alex pulled his car into my driveway and we drove over to Jack's.

Now, we were all in the car on our way to Ocean City. Kara borrowed her dad's van again, so all eight of us miraculously fit into one car. I had the misfortune of being squeezed between Alex and Jack in the backseat. When they each weren't poking and prodding me, they were shouting dirty jokes back and forth to see who could come up with the best one. I just rolled my eyes and prayed that we were almost there.

When we did get there, we immediately checked into the hotel. Jack was smart enough to make reservations for four rooms, one for each couple, so we went to our rooms to change and get ready for the beach.

Alex brought all our bags up to the room. I tried to help him, but he refused, muttering something about being a gentleman. By the time we reached our floor, he was practically dragging the bags to the room, so I just laughed and took it from him before he could say anything. I swiped the key card through the door and opened it, stepping into our room and looking around. It was a relatively normal room with a king-sized bed in the middle and a desk over by the window. The bathroom was by the door just as we walked in. Alex let me go into the bathroom and get changed first, so I turned on the TV and waited for him once I was ready.

A few minutes later, I heard a knock at the door, so I looked through the peep hole and was surprised to see Katelyn standing there in her bathing suite. I answered the door and looked at her curiously.

“Hi,” she said awkwardly.

“Hi,” I responded evenly. “If you are looking for Alex, he's in the bathroom getting changed.”

Katelyn looked down at her hands as she said, “Actually, I was hoping that maybe I could talk to you.”

What could this girl possibly have to talk to me about? I wondered. “Come on in,” I said as I held the door open for her. Once we were both inside the room, we sat beside each other on the bed. “What do you need to talk to me about? I asked.

“Uhm, I uh, I wanted to uhm apologize to you,” she stuttered. I don't know what I was expecting to hear, but it certainly wasn't that. “I've been such a bitch to you ever since we met and you don't deserve that, so I guess I just wanted to say I'm sorry and that I hope that maybe we can all be friends someday.”

“Whoa,” I said drawing out the “O” sound.

“I guess you never though you would hear that from me, huh,” she chuckled.

“No offense, but no, I never thought I would hear you say those words,” I said honestly.

“Well, things change,” she replied.

“People change,” I corrected. “I really appreciate your apology.”

She breathed a sigh of relief. “I'm so glad to hear you say that.”

“Good,” I smiled at her. “And I actually meant to thank you for letting Alex go at prom.

“You see there's this new thing I'm trying out and I'm really liking it. It's called being a good person,” she laughed. “I could tell Alex wasn't happy with me, so I didn't want to make him suffer when I knew that he could be happy with you.”

“Thanks,” I repeated. “Who would have thought that there would be a time that I would talk to you and not want to beat your ass?” We both laughed.

“Well, I guess there's a first time for everything,” she answered.

Alex's P.O.V.

The last thing I expected to see when I walked out of the bathroom was Katelyn sitting on the bed and bonding with Taylor. I never thought I would live to see this day.

“So I guess hell has officially frozen over,” I joked as I walked over to them.

“Yup, all those burning souls have actually turned into icicles,” Taylor countered.

“Satan actually turned into the White Witch from The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe,” added Katelyn.

“I think you mean the White Bitch,” Taylor corrected.

“Yeah, her too,” was Katelyn's response. “Anyway, I just came to apologize to Taylor about how I treated her before.”

“That was very...noble of you,” I said, trying to think of a good word to describe her good deed.

“Thank you,” she said as she shot me a small smile.

All three of us nearly jumped out of our skin when we heard a loud bang at the door. I looked through the peephole and opened the door once I saw that it was Jack.

“Dude, what is it?” I berated him. “You almost gave us all a fucking heart attack.

“Oh,” he said simply. “Sorry. Anyway, I want to go to the beach, so let's go!” He jumped up and down excitedly and the girls giggled behind me. We grabbed our stuff for the beach and met the rest of the group in the lobby considering their rooms were on a different floor.

A few minutes later, we found a good spot on the beach where there were the least amount of people and a great view of the water. My girlfriend (I loved calling her that now) set her chair up next to mine and asked me to rub suntan lotion on her back once she took off her white cover-up to reveal her blue string bikini. Just looking at her almost made my eyes pop out, not to mention my bathing suite. I was one lucky son of a bitch.

“Last one in the ocean is a rotten egg!” Jack suddenly exclaimed and then he took off running into the ocean. Once Katelyn realized what he just said, she ran after him.

“Come on!” Taylor said, taking my hand and pulling me up from the ground. “I don't want to be a rotten egg!” She pulled me into the ocean with her. We were joined two seconds later by Zack and Laura and Rian and Kara lagged behind. When they finally reached us, Jack laughed in their faces.

“Ha ha, you two are the rotten eggs!” he chanted. As a result, Kara stuck her tongue out at him, so he splashed her.

“Hey, don't splash my girlfriend,” Rian defended as he splashed Jack back. As you can imagine, a huge splash fight ensued after that. Taylor splashed me and then turned and ran in the opposite direction, so I chased after her until she tripped and fell into the water. I reached down and lifted her up out of the water. She squirmed in my arms, but I refused to let her go.

“How dare you splash me,” I said pretending to be angry. “You're going to pay for that.”

I was about to throw her into the water, but she held on to me for dear life. “No, no, don't!” she pleaded.

“Why shouldn't I?” I asked.

“Because I'm your girlfriend and you love me.”

“That might be true, but you're still going down!” I threw her into the water just as a wave was coming and couldn't help but laugh at her face as she came back up to the surface and spat out all the salt water she had just swallowed.

“I cannot believe you just did that!” she said shaking her head at me. “Now, you're going to get it!”

“Oh, am I?” I challenged. She came at me, so I ran and hid behind Jack. “If you try to splash me, you will get him. Is that what you really want?”

“Jack, will you do me a favor since you are my bestest friend ever?” she asked smiling sweetly at him.

“Sure,” Jack responded.

“Will you kick Alex in the nuts for me?” I looked at her face; she was dead serious. I hastily backed away from Jack before he could respond. Everyone else just laughed and continued splashing each other. I tried to get away from Taylor, but she jumped on my back and tried to dunk my head in the water. She kicked the back of my knees so that they would bend and then she jumped on top of me, pushing me under. When I came back up to the surface, she had a satisfied smirk on her face, so I grabbed her around the waist and tickled her until she couldn't breathe.

“Please stop!” she begged breathlessly. “Ok, ok, I'm sorry.”

“Sorry for what?” I asked as I tickled her unceasingly.

“I'm s-sorry for sp-splashing you,” she gasped.

“And...?”

“And for t-telling Jack to k-kick you in the n-nuts.”

“And...?”

“And for dunking you,” she relented.

“And...?”

“A-Alex!” she scolded and I laughed.

“Ok, ok, I'll stop.” And I did.

“You're such a j-jerk,” she said as she tried to gain her breath back and gave me a dirty look.

“I may be a jerk, but you know you love me.” I gave her a wide, toothy grin.

“Sometimes, I wish I didn't,” she huffed. She was about to turn away from me, but then I took her in my arms and held her close.

“I'm sorry I tickled you,” I said sincerely as I looked into her beautiful blue eyes. “I just love seeing your smile and hearing your laugh. Forgive me?” I gave her my best puppy dog eyes.

She gently caressed my face. “How could I ever be mad at you when you look at me like that?” she wondered. I leaned my head down for a kiss and my lips connected with beauty herself. I pleaded for entrance into her mouth with my tongue and she granted it, so our mouths moved in harmony. My hands reached up to touch both sides of her face as the kiss deepened. Pretty soon, we had to stop ourselves before our PDA became x-rated.

A few minutes later, everyone got hungry, so we decided to get out of the water and grab some lunch on the boardwalk. When we walked back to our stuff, I took out my iPhone and saw that I had five missed calls from our producer, Matt Squire.

“Huh,” I said frowning at my phone.

“What's wrong?” asked Taylor.

“Matt Squire called me like five times.”

“That's weird,” commented Rian. “I wonder what he wants.”

“I guess I should call him back and see what he wants. Why don't you guys go to lunch and I will meet you there? I'm not sure how long this will take.”

“I'll wait with you,” Taylor said. She was about to sit down in her beach chair, but I stopped her.

“No, no,” I insisted. “You go with them and I will catch up with you guys later. I don't want you to have to wait for me.”

“Are you sure?” she asked, studying my face.

“Yes, of course!”

“Ok.” She gave me a quick kiss goodbye. I watched her run over to everyone else who had already started walking toward the boardwalk and then I called Matt.
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Fifteen minutes later, I made my way over to the outdoor restaurant on the boardwalk and sat down next to Taylor. “Hey, Babe!” she greeted me, taking my hand and giving it a squeeze. Once the waitress saw that I had arrived, she came to the table and took my drink order. After she scampered away, I studied the menu and decided on a generic burger and fries.

“So what did Matt want?” Zack asked me after I ordered my food.

I took a deep breath and began my story. “Apparently, the label called him yesterday. They said that they really like our record, but there's not enough theme variation. They think we have too many party songs, so they want us to write another one about something different and then go in and record it as soon as possible.”

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Rian asked angrily. “They told us that we didn't need to record anything else. Isn't it too late to add another song on?”

“Yeah, won't recording another song put us off-schedule?” wondered Zack. “The album is supposed to come out in July and it's the end of May. How on earth would we have time to record and edit another song?”

“I honestly don't know,” I responded. “I know it sucks, but we're under contract with them, so we really have to listen to them.”

“I can't believe those fuckers have to pull this now,” Jack said throwing his arms up in the air in frustration. “We're on vacation for God sakes!”

“Yeah, but they don't care about that,” replied Katelyn. “The only thing they are concerned about is getting the record out and making money.”

“So what are you guys going to do?” Kara asked.

I shrugged. “I guess I will just have to write a song. There's really nothing else to it.”

“When are you going to have time to do that though?” Laura inquired.

“I guess I'll just have to go back to the hotel after lunch,” I answered. “I'll write it in the hotel room. It's a good thing I brought my guitar along.”

“Uh that is so unfair!” Taylor moaned, leaning into my chest. “You're supposed to be with me, not locked away in our hotel room!”

“I'm sorry, Swifter.” I gave her hand a squeeze and kissed the top of her head. “I will make it up to you tonight, I promise.”

“You better!” she affirmed.

The waitress finally arrived to deliver the food, so everyone ate and eventually, Jack got bored and started a food fight.
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After lunch, Taylor went back to the beach with the rest of the gang while I trudged back up to our hotel room. Now, I sat in the leather rolling chair at the desk with a pen in my hand trying to think of what to write. I tapped the pen impatiently against the desk as my mind went through various possibilities. Eventually, I got distracted and my mind wondered off to a different topic, the only topic that it had been on for awhile now: Taylor. A large smile played across my face as I thought of what happened between us yesterday and today. My pen clunked as I dropped it on the table and rested my chin on my palm.

The more I thought about it, the more I realized that Taylor and I were never really just friends. I had always loved her in one way or another, but I never actually realized it until I lost her for those two long months. What I had with Katelyn was just a mere infatuation compared with what I now have with Taylor. When I first realized my feelings for Taylor, I got scared. It took awhile for me to admit my feelings to anyone, not even myself and especially not her. Now, she was my whole world. I picked up the pen and began to write. It appeared I had finally found my inspiration.
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An hour and a half later, I heard the sound of the key in the door, so I turned around just as Taylor walked into the hotel room with nothing but a bathing suite and a towel on. Her curly blonde hair was drenched and dripping down her body. I marveled at her sexiness as she walked over to me. She said something to me, but I didn't hear it; my attention was only on one thing.

“Alex!” she screamed, smacking me lightly in the head.

“Uh, what?” I asked dazedly.

“I was wondering how the songwriting was going,” she said as she sat down on the bed facing me.

“Awesome. It's done. It only took me like an hour and a half.”

“Impressive,” she complimented.

“It's about someone I couldn't seem to get off my mind for these past few months, no matter how hard I tried.”

“Oh? And who might this person be?” she asked suggestively.

“You,” I answered simply.

“Play it for me?” she requested.

“It's not ready yet.”

“Pleeeeaaaassssseeeee,” she begged. Now it was her turn to give me puppy dog eyes as she turned her bottom lip down and lifted her hands into a prayer position. Of course, the weakling that I was, I immediately relented.

“Ok, fine,” I said, rolling my eyes. “I wanted to wait and sing it to you once all the kinks were worked out, but since you are so damn irresistible, I'll play it for you. Hand me my guitar.”

“Yay!” she cheered clapping her hands together excitedly. She handed me the guitar that was leaning against the side of the bed.

“The song is called 'Walls'.” I strummed the beginning notes and pretty soon, my voice resounded throughout the room. I sang with as much emotion as I could.

Hey there it's good to see you again
It never felt right calling this just friends
I'm happy if your happy with yourself
Take off your shirt your shoes
Those skinny jeans I bought for you
We're diving in there's nothing left to lose

I'm gonna break down these walls (down these walls)
I built around myself
I wanna fall so in love (so in love)
With you and no one else
Could ever mean half as much
to me as you do now
Together we'll move on
just don't turn around
Let the walls break down

I used to wear you like a ball and chain
I'd run and hide at the call of my name
It was obvious you were too much for me
oblivious
I was young and horney
In retrospect I would do it again
Stop talking shit to every one of your friends
I'm not the same boy you knew back then

Cause I could break down these walls
(down these walls)
I built around myself
I wanna fall so in love
(so in love)
With you and no one else
Could ever mean half as much to me as you do now
Together we'll move on
just don't turn around
Let the walls break

I can't breathe
My body's shaking
You've got a way with the way you take me
Cause you break me down
You know you break me down

I'm gonna break down these walls
(down these walls)
I built around myself
I wanna fall so in love
(so in love)
With you and no one else
Could ever mean half as much to me as you do now
Together we'll move on
just don't turn around
Let the walls break down

Let the walls break down
Cause you break me down
Let the walls break down

As I played the last few notes of the songs, I looked up and saw Taylor's face brimming with tears and a wide grin. The second I put the guitar down on the floor, she ran up and practically jumped on my lap, attacking me with kisses.

“That,” she said before she kissed me, “was,” another kiss, “amazing.”

Without another word, I lifted her out of the chair and laid her down on the bed, our mouths never breaking apart the whole time.

“Alex Gaskarth, I want you so bad right now,” she said breathlessly as she hungrily ripped my shirt from my body and threw it on the ground. Pretty soon, the rest of our clothes formed a small pile on the floor.