Somewhere Out There
Chapter One - Letting Go
by Taygeta
Author's Note: My first Austin & Ally Fanfiction. I started hearing "Somewhere Out There" randomly and this came to mind. Hope you all like it. This takes places when the group is in their late 20s.
Time changes. Life happens. It's not that the friends you thought would always be there aren't there anymore. They are - it's just that it's different now. We all went our separate ways after high school, like a lot of people do.
Things like that can be the same, even when you're friends with people like Austin Moon, who fills stadiums with screaming fans. And Trish, who is now one of the top managers in the business. And even Dez, who is now an in-demand director and whose eccentricities outweigh that of Jean Paul Paul Jean. (And everyone loves him for it, and you constantly wonder why.)
And ten years later - teetering on the edge of the last of our twenties - there's me.
Ally Dawson.
I really tried to make it out there. I was a singer-songwriter who overcame her stage fright. I even had a couple of hit songs on the Internet and a record deal.
And everyone believed I would make it. I believed I would make it.
But I didn't.
Austin calls me every once in awhile, especially when he's in Miami for a show. I'm guaranteed backstage passes every time - no questions asked. I usually get them, but not for me. They're usually for my best Sonic Boom music student that year. It helps keep business going - and talk about a lesson in motivation.
"Austin Moon Tickets?! I'm practicing every day!"
"You should be practicing every day anyway," I would say, like a broken record to each student every year.
"Right..."
Love of music? Yeah, right.
Love of Austin Moon, floor seats, and backstage passes? Boom.
"You know, I could always give you more than a pair of tickets," said Austin, a few years after I had settled in as the owner of Sonic Boom and hadn't showed up at one of his concerts in Miami or otherwise. He arrived in the back door and snuck himself up to our old practice room. If he had walked in through the front door, he would have been mobbed. "I'd love it if you were there."
He was sitting at our piano, playing with the keys. There was a pretty melody he was playing that wasn't familiar to me. His entourage was somewhere downstairs milling around the instruments. Waiting. Waiting for him. Meanwhile, my dad's probably hoping they'll buy something while they wait. Even though he's been enjoying retirement since he transferred ownership to me, he still likes to come in and pretend he's still running the shop.
I pursed my lips as I sat beside Austin.
"I would. It's just that I had a few other things planned tonight and forgot that you were in town..."
He raised his eyebrows and threw me his cute "I don't believe you for a second" smile, "You? Ally Dawson? Not put something on a calendar and double check that calendar a million times a day? With a pro's and con's list?"
I looked away from him. It was still too easy to get lost in his eyes.
I felt his hand rest against mine gently.
"Ally, what's wrong? I've hardly heard from you. You haven't written anything in months..."
His touch, as always, made me want to reach out to him. But I couldn't. Not anymore.
I didn't belong.
I laughed nervously as I pulled my hand away, "Oh please, it's not like you need any more hit songs. You've written some pretty great ones lately."
"But the best songwriter I know is sitting right here and it's not me," he replied. At my silence, he said, "Are you okay, Ally? I know things haven't really worked out for you, but maybe - "
I turned my eyes to look at him seriously, "Maybe what, Austin? You're going to will people to love me and my music...that I perform? You can't guarantee that. If that was true I wouldn't be sitting here, don't you think?"
He put his hands on the side of my arms, "Ally, you are amazing. You just need to give it more time...don't give up. Maybe the world's just not ready for you yet. But they're never going to be if they can't hear you."
Once again we were too close. His voice was too sincere for this girl - woman - who had already lost hope.
"Ally, I -"
And so I said the thing that would make him walk away: "Austin, I appreciate the pep talk. But I'm fine where I am, okay? I don't need all that to be happy. Music is still a part of my life. Things are going good here. And um...and I'm even seeing someone, okay? His name is Rick."
There was an unmistakable look of pain in his eyes that felt like a kick in my stomach. His hands moved away from me and I felt suddenly cold.
He quickly tried to mask it all by saying, "Oh. I'm glad to hear that...that you're happy." And then there was the olive branch, "You know, he can come to the show, too? I might know some people to get even more tickets."
The humor was there, but the joke fell flat.
"He's not really into pop music. More of a classical music kind of guy," I said, leaving out the details where I wasn't really seeing this guy, it had only been a couple of dates with him.
"Oh."
A few minutes later Austin would make his good-bye, and when he hugged me, I remembered that hug we had that time we broke up years ago. How I didn't want to let go. How he didn't want to let go.
But we did.
A couple of years would pass without me seeing Austin. But I would get updates from Trish on the phone who made sure to walk the fine line. Dez, oblivious, would email me every once in awhile with some detail about a new music video they were working on together. I'm pretty sure he still had "Team Ally" shirts in stock. It was now actually a famous shirt of his - instead of being about me, it was about being "an ally," which I had to admit was pretty clever for his fashion line that he rolled out - Dezigns.
Rick and I would continue on dating in that time. He was an English teacher at the elementary school. I had met him through a set of parents who had invited him to their daughter's recital.
Despite not hearing from Austin, Trish stopped by with tickets to Austin's concert tour - the last one before his next album was going to come out.
"What happened with you guys?" asked Trish as we had lunch and caught up.
"Nothing, life happened."
"Is it because of Rick? He seems like a nice guy. Can't imagine that he and Austin couldn't get along, knowing the two of them."
So I confessed, "Rick doesn't actually know anything about me and songwriting or anything. He just knows that I own Sonic Boom from my parents and I'm a music teacher."
"Ally...that was a huge part of your life!" said Trish. "How does he not know about that? How does he think you get tickets to give away every year? Do you know much floor seats and backstage passes cost nowadays?"
"It's better this way," said Ally. "I don't want him to know about all that. That part of my life is over."
"I understand the songwriting, okay? I know how much it hurt that it didn't work for you like it did for Austin. But does the Austin part have to over too?" asked Trish.
Give it to Trish to state the obvious.
"I just didn't know how else to do it," I admitted. "Rick and I were hardly even dating at the time. I just - I don't belong in Austin's life. I didn't have the heart to write anymore and I couldn't just be there, feeling useless. Besides, have you seen the girls he's with? "
"Yeah, I've met them," said Trish looking unimpressed. "They make Dez look like geniuses. They fawn all over Austin. And even the ones who aren't like that, they're not you, Ally."
"Trish, it's just better this way..."
She looked unsure, but said, "If you say so..."
Rick arrived at the store the next day with a bouquet and a wide-grin. He looked pretty adorable with his brown tousled hair and white dress shirt and khakis.
He kissed me and I said with a confused smile, "What's all this?"
"I wanted to surprise you. You seemed kind of stressed lately, and I thought we'd head out for a night out for once."
Silently, I was glad he didn't know my stressing out was because of Austin being in town. Even though I knew there was no chance Austin was going to stop by - especially given Trish's delivery of the tickets the other day - him being in close proximity always meant there was a maybe. And I still wasn't sure how much I wanted that maybe to be true or not.
I looked at the flowers and smiled, giving him a hug. "Oh that's so thoughtful of you. Where are we going?"
"I can't take all the credit. Monica gave me tickets to the Austin Moon concert. Can you believe it?"
"Oh..."
"She won them in a radio contest, but got sick today. It's floor seats and backstage passes. I've always wanted to go to an Austin Moon concert."
I felt a sick feeling in my stomach, "Really? You did? You do? I thought you weren't really into pop music."
"Well, not so much anymore, but my sister was a huge fan when we were growing up. Jess followed him when he got big on the Internet and gave me a few of his songs and showed me a few videos. I always had to play it cool as the older brother, but I always thought he was talented. She's going to kill me when she finds out we'll get to meet him."
I felt myself panicking, "Huh..."
I always found Jess a bit annoying and I suddenly realized why. She would so be the fan that would have stolen and coveted an Austin Moon shoe when she was a teenager. Yet, suddenly I wish she hadn't moved to Wisconsin for school last year. She could totally go in my place if she hadn't.
He frowned, "You okay? I thought you'd be excited. You get tickets to giveaway every year."
"Oh, no. I am excited," I lied. "This is going to be...great."
End of chapter! Feedback appreciated!
