Disclaimer: I don't own Austin and Ally (clearly, otherwise all of this would be canon?) and I'm in no way affiliated with Disney.

Word Count: 4 415

A/N: Hi, everybody! So, I actually started this fic before I started "And It Smells Like Coffee", so it's technically my first Austin and Ally fic. Crazy, right?! Anyway, so this is only going to be 14 chapters, since I've done a chapter-by-chapter plan this time and I'm actually organised for once. I plan on updating this once a week, but if you whip out the begging and I get insane amounts of reviews for a chapter I might give you multiple updates within the week since I've already written up to chapter 7 ;) This chapter, and the next one too, are going to be quite a bit shorter than my usual chapters since they're mainly introductory, but once our story really gets started, I promise you all much longer chapters.

For this chapter, and the next one, the first section (before the page break) is just introducing you to the characters, since this is an AU and their stories are slightly different from the regular show. After the page break, the actual story starts, though. Same with the next chapter. After that, though, it's just straight story. Yay. If you want to skip the boring, introductory bits where I just quickly go over their backstory and personalities, just find the page break and start from there. They're not very OOC in this AU. Anyway, I'm rambling, but let's go. On with the story!

Ally Dawson was anything but extraordinary.

That wasn't to say that she thought herself ordinary, because she didn't really believe anybody was 'ordinary'. To her, each person had their own little quirks and stories which made them interesting. There were some people, however, that lived extraordinary lives, filled with adventure, adrenalin, and superfluous wealth. Ally was yet to meet somebody 'extraordinary', but she would be the first to admit that most people were amazing or incredible in their own special way.

Ally was a sweet girl – anybody could see that. Generally, anybody who was able to have a conversation with her that went beyond the routine 'hello, how are you?' could tell that she was the sort of person to bring home to their parents, to prove that not all their friends behaved as though they were randy goats. She was polite and well-behaved, but perhaps a tad more reserved than the average person, preferring books to people, most of the time. It was arguable that this was due to the fact that her parents had gotten divorced when she was quite young, and she had withdrawn a lot. Her mother had begun to travel the world, but the two kept in touch and had a very strong bond. Her parents were on excellent terms, despite being divorced, and Ally stayed with her father most of the time. She loved each parent equally, and strived for perfection so that she could at least be the perfect child her parents had clearly wanted to raise.

On the surface, she certainly appeared to be perfect. Perfect grades, perfect smile, perfect figure, perfect employee at her father's music store – heck, she even participated in any club that her father's wallet and her physical abilities would allow. She had a charming disposition and the sort of singing voice that could dissolve any cocky and arrogant person to mere splutters and speechlessness. One might even call her a 'Mary Sue', but anybody who had seen her dance would agree that she was most certainly not good at everything she did.

Only two people, besides her relatives, had been able to break into her shell and really get to know her. It wasn't terribly hard to do so – it was more of an eggshell than a barrier, but only two people had pushed hard enough to break their way in. Ally was certainly an enigma, and didn't generally hold conversations for longer than required unless the other participant was particularly persistent. Trish de la Rosa, best friend since kindergarten, and Kira Starr, best friend since middle school, had been able to crack that eggshell surrounding Allyson Dawson, and ever since, they had joined in rebuilding that shell until somebody else was able to crack their way in.

Trish was the sort of girl who wouldn't take 'no' for an answer. She was loud and rude, and the opposite of Ally in so many ways. It was always a mystery to onlookers how the shy, quiet bookworm and the confident, loud socialite had ever become friends, but the pair had been together ever since Kindergarten, and weren't going to stop simply because society found it unusual.

Kira was the sort of girl who would show somebody all sorts of different possibilities available to them. She would never force anything upon anybody unless she truly thought that it was for the best, and she always tried her best to be kind. She was sweet and kind like Ally, but loud and confident like Trish.

The three girls sat together at lunch, despite the fact that Trish and Kira were each popular enough to sit with whoever they wanted. In fact, Kira was the co-captain of the cheer squad, and each day, was invited to sit with the squad. She had always chosen Ally and Trish over them, since they had been her friends for far longer, and she generally preferred their company. Trish often encouraged Ally to talk to other people, to claim the popularity that she could so easily get if she just looked up from a book long enough to take it, but Ally always preferred to 'fly beneath the radar'. She didn't need the validation of her peers to feel good about herself. She knew she was a good person, and she knew that she could have more friends if she really tried.

They were in their senior year, and Ally didn't see much point in making friends now. Especially since she had plans to move away from the warm beaches of Miami and to the cool bustle of New York City once she graduated. She had to maintain her perfect grades, and did various extracurriculars in hopes of getting a scholarship to her dream university – the Music University of New York. Several other colleges and universities had offered her scholarships for the same degree, but she had her heart set on MUNY. One day, she hoped to become a professional musician, the kind that could inspire young people and make their situations seem just a little bit easier.

Ally Dawson was not extraordinary – but she did have extraordinary dreams.

The bell chimed cheerily, signalling the end of class and the beginning of lunch, and several people groaned loudly as the zip of backpacks and pencil cases and the click-clack of binders opening and closing filled the air, accompanied by noisy chatter from students and the teacher raising her voice to be heard over the humdrum as she tried to relay the homework that was due tomorrow. Only one girl remained patiently in her seat until her teacher had finished speaking, and as she packed up her things (after neatly writing the homework down in her planner), the teacher smiled and mouthed 'thank you, Ally', as though having one student who paid attention made the whole job worthwhile.

Ally hopped up from her seat and slung her backpack over one shoulder, hugging her heavy binder to her chest as she carefully navigated her way through the crowd and out the room. As the crowd moved along sluggishly, she impatiently drummed her fingertips against the brightly decorated exterior of her binder, before she finally found herself in front of the set of lockers. They were set out so that there was a row of lockers on top, and a row of lockers on the bottom. As Ally reached up and fiddled with the dial, aided by the extra height of the heels she wore, she finally opened her locker door and the same question that she asked herself each day filtered through her mind.

Why would they give such a high locker to such a short person?

The middle of her locker was about eye level with her, but she couldn't reach the top shelves in the locker due to her height. She had asked for a locker change before, but the office staff had never gotten around to it, and now that Ally was in her senior year, she didn't see much point in getting it changed. She pulled her textbooks out of her backpack, and slotted it into the shelf that she was exactly eye level with, making sure it was secure. She shut her locker, and then happily turned on her heel, ready to stroll to the cafeteria without the added weight of her heavy textbooks. Luckily, her last class of the day was music, and the teacher always had spare textbooks in the room, so the students weren't required to lug around the thick book.

When Ally spun around, however, she found herself face-to-face with Marino High's co-head cheerleader; Tilly Thompson. She bit her lip to stop herself from groaning – in all honesty, the short brunette was sick of having to deal with the crazy blonde's antics, after knowing her for almost thirteen years during the course of her schooling career. Each encounter was the same – Tilly would say something rude that she thought was hilariously witty, Ally would roll her eyes, and continue on without being affected. She knew why Tilly constantly attempted to bully her, and it was quite pathetic, so Ally had long ago decided to be the bigger person and let the blonde take out her weird, freaky grudge out on her in a harmless yet annoying fashion.

"Those heels don't even help you reach the top of your locker," Tilly sneered, and a few sophomore girls behind her chorused, 'yeeeaah.' It was clear that they had recently joined the cheerleading squad, and were eager to please the co-captain, who happened to be one of the most popular and well-known seniors in the school.

"I hadn't noticed. Thanks for that," Ally responded dryly, before attempting to push past her.

Of course, Tilly wasn't having any of that. She clamped down a perfectly manicured hand onto Ally's shoulder, smiling as her sophomore minions crowded around the short girl, clearly trying to intimidate her. Ally rolled her eyes, before folding her arms across her chest and leaning against her locker, a perfectly plucked eyebrow arching as she motioned for Tilly to expand on whatever so-called cutting remark she had planned.

"I would have thought you were wearing them for practicality, since they're clearly not for aesthetics. I mean, they make your ankles look fat and swollen and your legs look stumpy."

"Luckily for me, my ankles aren't fat and swollen, even if they look that way, but thank you for the concern," Ally responded in a monotone, a clearly bored expression on her face.

The blonde girl opened her mouth, no doubt to respond with another one of her apparently stinging remarks, but she was interrupted by one of the sophomores elbowing her fiercely.

"Tilly! Your boyfriend is watching!" She hissed, motioning over to a tall and handsome blonde boy who was walking down the corridor, in the general direction of the group of girls.

Ally recognised him from her music class – his name was Austin, and the few times that they had chatted and worked together in class, she had found him quite sweet and endearing, but they never interacted outside of class except for the occasional 'hey, how are you?' when they saw one another. They had been in a group project together once, with three other people, and the group of five had had to make a presentation on music from the 1950s. They were the sort of friends who acknowledged one another's existence, and had exchanged mobile numbers and social media details long ago, but never really interacted outside of class. He was friendly, that was for sure, but Ally was shy and had never stepped out of her comfort zone and made the effort to be more than an 'acquaintance' to him, and vice versa.

As Austin approached, Tilly stepped away from Ally guiltily, and then turned to face him, a wide smile plastered across her features. "Austy!" She exclaimed, throwing her arms around his neck and burying her face in his chest. He looked vaguely surprised before awkwardly patting her on the back, clearly uncomfortable.

"Um. Hey, Tilly," he mumbled back, looking at Ally with a scared expression. She couldn't help but feel amused, at his obvious dislike for his 'girlfriend'. 'Help me,' he mouthed to Ally, the frightened expression growing as Tilly refused to move away from him.

"Hey, Austin," Ally smiled, waving at him. "Tilly, here, was just giving me a friendly tip on how my shoes are ugly and impractical." She turned her sunny smile on Tilly, who was turning a deep shade of red, clearly embarrassed to have Austin find out how awful she had been to Ally just moments ago.

He looked confused, his handsome features scrunched up as he regarded Tilly. Luckily for him, Tilly was too busy fuming and glaring at Ally to notice Austin extracting himself from her grip. He mouthed a thank you at Ally, and she grinned in response.

"Anyway, as charming as this has been, Trish and Kira are waiting for me. Talk to you later, Til!" Ally exclaimed cheerily, before humming softly moving away from the crowd of sophomore minions and the very red and angry Tilly. As she passed Austin, she gave him a stern glance. "Saved your sorry ass," she muttered to him, and he smiled gratefully at her. She smiled back, and rolled her eyes before merrily making her way down to the cafeteria.

It was hard for Ally to 'hate' Tilly. She didn't think it was fair to hate anybody, especially somebody who she felt sorry for. She knew why the blonde girl disliked her so much, and in all honestly, even though Ally thought it was kind of dumb – she understood. It had been almost thirteen years ago, now, but she figured that Tilly was used to always getting her way no matter what. When Ally had been the reason that Tilly hadn't gotten her way, she supposed it had infuriated the blonde to the point of a meaningless and petty grudge for several years.

The moment Tilly Thompson had first started hating Ally was during kindergarten. Their teacher had given them all an assignment to write a little 'song' about bugs, and the student with the best song would be allowed to perform it at the next assembly. Of course, since they were only children, the teacher wasn't expecting anything substantial or all that good, but she thought it would be cute and a fun way to stimulate their creative minds at a young age. Ally had been creative right from the moment she had been expelled from her mother's uterus, and had always had a natural gift for making music. As soon as little five-year-old Ally had gotten home, she had written an adorable little song about butterflies. She still remembered it to this day. Tilly, on the other hand, had written a song about ladybugs which had no musical cohesion or even a proper rhythm. When the teacher had chosen Ally's song over Tilly's, on account of it being a real song and quite the impressive number for someone so young, Tilly had vowed to take vengeance on Ally one day.

So, Ally didn't hate Tilly. She pitied her.

When Ally finally reached Trish and Kira, at their usual lunchtime table, with the silver tray of food in her hands, her friends looked up.

"About time, Beauty Queen," Trish teased, nudging her friend. "What the hell took you so long?"

Ally groaned and speared a piece of what appeared to be asparagus with her fork, and inspected it as she spoke. "I had a little welcoming committee in front of my locker today," she stated, the annoyance clearly laced in the quiet girl's tone. Despite the fact that she seemed shy, quiet, and always cheerful to people who didn't know her very well, the two girls at the table knew her well enough to know that she was fiery and sassy, and had more emotions than just 'happy' and 'really happy'.

"Tilly again?" Kira asked, quirking an eyebrow. She was wearing a large sweatshirt over a bright yellow skirt, accompanied by sneakers and her hair in a tight ponytail. Ally knew that that meant she was wearing her cheerleading uniform, since she had practice after school, but Kira didn't enjoy parading around the school in it because her identity consisted of more than being a cheerleader.

"Mhm," Ally said, taking a chance and taking a bite of the weird asparagus thing. It tasted like the stem of broccoli. "I just don't think she understands that this isn't Glee. She can't just strut around in her uniform and expect everybody to fall to her feet. That's not how real life works."

Both of her friends chuckled, smiling as they continued to eat. They knew that sometimes Ally just needed to vent a little bit, on account of always being the 'nice' girl who didn't talk behind people's backs because it was rude and unnecessary. They were more than happy to let her let out some of her pent up annoyance about the rude blonde.

"She's been extra annoying recently," Kira announced, twirling a French fry between her fingers. "I think she's trying to kick me off the squad. It's like she thinks we're not co-captains or something, and that she's the only captain. It's really weird. She keeps scheduling unnecessary rehearsals and yelling at people who miss it."

"She's a wackadoodle," Trish sang, reaching over and stealing some of Ally's chips. "I've told you guys this countless times."

Kira rolled her eyes, and Ally hid her smile by focusing on her food.

"Last week, she made Brooke cry," Kira added, her eyes wide and her voice low so that nobody would listen in on the three friends. Not that they would, considering everybody surrounding them were speaking to their own clique of friends.

"It wouldn't be that hard," Trish stated matter-of-factly. "Everybody knows that Brooke is always on the verge of tears, especially ever since Dallas refused to let her take a lock of his hair."

"Trish!" Ally exclaimed, swatting her friend. "That's so rude!"

The Latina simply shrugged with a smirk on her face, as the three friends ate in amicable silence. At one point, Trish snorted, and nudged both girls, nodding her head in the direction of her amusement.

"Looks like Tilly is wearing out her boy-toy," Trish giggled, and Kira and Ally both reacted in the same way – they clamped a hand over their mouth and looked scandalised, but little giggles somehow managed to worm their way out of them.

Across the cafeteria, it seemed that Trish's words rang true. Austin looked annoyed as Tilly reached up and ruffled those soft blonde locks of his, and he pointedly ran a hand through them again, clearly attempting to style it in the way he preferred. Everything she did seemed to tick him off, which was unusual, since Ally had always seen him as a pretty laidback kind of guy. Although, she reflected thoughtfully that she didn't know him very well, and perhaps under the layer of being an easy-going person, he was actually horrible and impatient. Somehow, that didn't seem quite right, and Ally also reflected that Tilly was just an annoying person.

"It's kind of disgusting how she just, like, clings to him," Kira said, wrinkling her nose. "I mean, look how scared that poor boy looks. He's probably too scared to break up with her. I bet she's forcing him to be with her, for aesthetics or popularity or something."

Ally giggled, and waggled her eyebrows suggestively. "Yeah, they're not a good couple. Unlike you and Elliot," she said, singing Elliot's name and nudging Kira. "Your one-month anniversary is coming up, right? That's pretty big!"

Kira bit her lip and looked embarrassed, but her eyes were shining. "Yeah. He's taking me to the arcade, but he says he's also got a really big surprise."

"A really big surprise, hm?" Trish commented, her voice dripping with suggestive intention. She waggled her eyebrows, and Kira made a gagging face.

"Trish!" She whined. "He's a gentleman. He's not going to – he's not going to proposition me or anything. We haven't – we haven't even done anything more than – than –" she broke off, blushing intensely, and Trish looked intrigued.

"More than…?" She prompted. Ally made a face – she wasn't sure she wanted to hear this.

"We haven't done more than, like, kissing. With – like – y'know – like – t-tongue," she managed to get out eventually, her eyes sparkling with acute embarrassment.

"Ew," Ally said pointedly, poking her tongue out. "I just want to hear about the romantic part. Not the sexy part."

It was obvious that Kira was getting embarrassed, and she smiled shyly at her two friend's, nodding in agreement to Ally's words. Trish seemed disappointed, having obviously wanting all the juicy details. Since Elliot didn't go to their school, there was an air of mystery about Kira's new beau, and Ally and Trish had only met him two or three times in the whole month that Kira had been dating him, and they were both very intrigued to find out more about this guy that their friend liked so much. When Ally was younger, she had met him on an arts camp, but who he was when he was seven was quite different to who he was as a seventeen year old. It was nice to be reunited with him again, but he had far more in common with Kira than he had with Ally. Of course, Ally had always found him incredibly pleasant and the two got along quite well. Trish was just loud enough to amuse him, but Ally felt as though she grated on his nerves at times.

"Anyway," Kira said, having finished her food and toying with the lid on her water bottle. "Did you hear? They're announcing the parts for Pippin tomorrow!"

Marino High School was a school well-known for encouraging creativity and sport, even if the academics were not as good as they could be. Each year, they held a musical, and this year they were putting on Pippin. Ally had been in the school orchestra since freshman year, and Trish had always joined the stage crew. Kira always tried out for a role, and Ally knew that this year was special to her – being her senior year, this would be her last musical ever, and she was aiming for the lead. Of course, she couldn't be Pippin, since she was a girl and Pippin was – well, a boy, and whilst it wouldn't be hard for them to make Pippin a girl, the musical department saw no reason to change the part when there was a female lead who had just an important role. Kira had tried out for the leading player, and so had Tilly Thompson and several other girls. Their music teacher had transposed the score so that the leading player was more suited for a female part, because she had felt as though there should be a female and a male lead – and since Pippin was the male, that left the leading player to be female. In Ally's honest, and unbiased opinion, she agreed that Kira was the best choice for the role.

The three friends continued to chatter amongst themselves, thinking about each role and discussing who they thought would get it – they had narrowed the role of Pippin down to either Austin Moon, or Jace Wallace, and Trish and Ally firmly decided that Kira would definitely get the role of the leading player. As the bell rang, signalling the end of lunch, Ally smiled and strode away from a still-protesting Kira, and happily made her to the music rooms – she always went ahead of Trish and Kira, since they preferred to go to their lockers at the end of lunch rather than the beginning.

Upon getting there, Ally noted that there were only a few of her classmates there. The strange part, though, was that Tilly was there – and it was strange, since Tilly didn't take Music. As far as Ally knew, Tilly had absolutely refused to do music ever since Ally had upstaged her in Kindergarten. Yet, there she sat, blonde hair tumbling over her shoulders and down her back as she laughed, her arms securely around Austin's neck as she sat, side-saddle, in his lap. Austin, however, looked mildly terrified at the pretty girl in his lap, and he awkwardly patted her back. Ally stifled a giggle as she watched Austin and his red-haired friend – Dez? Was that his name? – having some sort of silent conversation. To her, it looked to go something like this:

Dez. Bro. Help me. Bro.

Why would I help you, bro? I don't want that crazy ball of crazy turning on me. Bro.

But bro.

Don't 'bro' me, bro.

Bro.

Of course, she didn't really know what their silent conversation was about, but she assumed that it went something like that.

As she passed by them, carefully making sure she was separated from the couple by three rows of chairs and music stands, she gave Austin an amused look, and he made a face, turning his puppy dog eyes away from his friend and over to Ally as Tilly sighed and nestled in closer to him. With an unimpressed raise of her eyebrow, Ally stared right back at Austin, the silent conversation now between them.

What the hell am I supposed to do, Austin? Pull her hair and tell her to leave?

Help me. Please.

She sighed, and ran a hand through her hair, because Allyson Dawson had always been one to please everybody, no matter how ridiculous the task. She had once built a bird house for somebody, with real power tools and everything, at the tender age of ten years old simply because her elderly neighbour thought cages were inhumane. With a glare at Austin, as though to say that he owed her one, Ally walked towards them and tapped Tilly on the shoulder, her rose-coloured fingernails digging into the contacted surface of her folder nervously.

"Um. Excuse me, Tilly? I didn't – I didn't know you took this class," Ally said, looking sheepish.

One, two, three seconds passed. Tilly looked up, her blonde hair swishing and flicking Austin's face as it did so, and she stood up, her cheerleading skirt swishing about her thighs as she did so. "I don't," Tilly responded icily, looking at Ally as though she were some sort of insignificant gnat.

"Don't you have home ec right now? You wouldn't want to be late," Ally fired back. Something about that look Tilly had given her, as though she didn't think Ally could win against her, angered the small brunette, and she wasn't going to back down.

Tilly glared at Ally, before rolling her arms. "Bye, Austy," she said, leaning down to kiss the blond on the cheek, and then gave Ally one, final glare, before picking up her things and exiting the room. By now, a few more people had entered, but their music teacher was infamous for being late to class.

Austin gave Ally a very thankful look, and she smiled with a roll of her eyes.

"That's the second time today that I saved your sorry ass," she told him quietly, a smile dancing on her lips. "You owe me. Big time." With that, she turned and moved to the front of the class to take her regular seat, hearing Austin chuckle behind her.

A/N: So, there we go! Does this sound interesting? Are you InTrIgUeD? Read and review please, I love hearing feedback on how to improve or what you liked best. Thanks! ~Fishelle out, bitches.