Summary: They warned him about the pressures of being apart of young Hollywood. For years, he listened to their warnings and followed them. And then he stopped caring. Channy. Chad!Angst. Implied SonnyOC.
Warnings: Implied and shown drug and alcohol abuse, heavy swearing. I tried to keep the drug and alcohol abuse to just mentions, but it's hard to refer to everything as "contents" and to not show it.
Disclaimer: I don't own Sonny with a Chance or the song lyrics in here. They are from the song Misguided Ghosts by Paramore.
This is my first time in this fandom. Go easy on me. :-) Please. I can take criticism but if I didn't get the characters right (and granted Chad is very OOC, because he kinda had to be for the drug/alcohol abuse to work), just know that I just started watching SWAC and I haven't seen every episode.
Also, you can disregard the Falling for the Falls episodes. In this story, Chad and Sonny have never dated; they both have feelings for each other, but they never have admitted them openly. And Sonny has a boyfriend.
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Despite what he told the psychiatrist that his parents, agent, and manager set him up with, he knew exactly the time and date and location of where he started to go downhill.
He was always the "good" bad guy of young Hollywood. He played with girls' feeling, wooed all the female leads in every role he ever had (and he's had a lot of roles), and done a lot of things for the publicity. He was Chad Dylan Cooper. He was a fuckin' brand name. A brand name. He was a household name too; he was basically a member of every family in America with a TV, especially on Tuesday nights. The Chad Dylan Cooper doll was a hit as well. Whenever he went to the nearby Target to check out how his items are selling, the doll was always sold out.
But she had to go and ruin it all for him. She, the silly breakout comedian from Wisconsin, had to ruin his reputation… and ruin him as well.
She had to get a boyfriend. She had to get a freakin' boyfriend from her hometown of Menomo-something that was just like her. He moved almost across the country to be with her. And he would show up at the studios every god-damn day and rub it in his face that he had Sonny,
And Chad Dylan Cooper didn't.
I'm going away for a while
But I'll be back
Don't try to follow me
His manager is the first to find his stash.
It is a stash he had bought from someone in the shady part of downtown Los Angeles who promised him that if he snorted a little bit of the powder every morning before going to film, he'd be high enough to not noticed the Wisconsin couple. Overachiever he is, the first day, he snorts all the contents of the small bag and can barely function at his own show. After sleeping for most of the day, he goes back to the dealer and buys a couple more bags and some other shit that would get him where he wanted to be.
There is a long period of time following that where he can't remember not being completely trashed or high. He is always eating the snacks on the Falls set and he later finds out that the producers considered taking a hiatus from airing, because there is no way they could have a show where Mackenzie is shaking constantly during each shoot and flubbing up lines.
"What the hell's your problem?" Portlyn snaps at him after he leaves the set while filming to go find some Doritos. Once the director realizes the star of the show had disappeared and has yelled cut, she had follows him to the snack table. "Since when did you become as bad as one of those So Random losers?"
He shrugs his shoulders, happily eating his chips. He ignores her questions completely, turning his back towards her. Through the door to the cafeteria, he sees her and her stupid boyfriend enjoying lunch together and she is giggling at something the boyfriend said.
He does nothing but storm off to his dressing room, furious with the sight.
When he arrives to the dressing room, his manager is standing in the setting, holding the plastic bag he used to store his stash. His manager has a disapproving look on his face and he quickly sobered up.
His manager flushes the drugs down the toilet and calls his parents, his agent, his publicist, and Marshall into the dressing room. The adults come to an agreement that he needs to go on a "vacation" (at least, that's what the publicist will tell the press) and for the first time in seven years of filming, Mackenzie Falls goes on hiatus.
As for him, he goes home and once his parents fall asleep, he sneaks out and goes back to the drug dealer. This time, he hides the stash much better, in a pair of Nike shoes that he had gotten at an awards show but never wears. He stares at the poster of her that he stole from the studios while he smokes one of the joints. She is laughing at him.
When did he become such a joke?
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On his nineteenth birthday, she visits him. He hasn't left his room except to buy more drugs (and occasionally strong alcohol, because he has learned that that makes him forget things just as well as the drugs do) in four months now, and the press is spreading rumors that MacKenzie Falls is reaching its death day very quickly.
She comes with a card, and leans against his dresser while staring at him in the bed. He can tell she is worried about him, as she keeps looking at his features and then looking away. Looking at him, looking away, looking at him, looking away. Over and over and over.
"You're very casual today," she finally says something. She crosses her arms in front of her, defensively. "I didn't realize you own anything other than skinny jeans, dress pants, and private school uniforms."
Her words are supposed to a joke, like the banter they always had when he was sober and she was single. He doesn't laugh and picks at the loose threads in the seems of his black athletic shorts. He pushes his shaggy hair (he hasn't had his weekly haircuts to keep up with Mackenzie's looks for awhile now and hasn't been to a salon in five months, since he doesn't care) out of his eyes and looks up at her.
"What do you want, Sonny? Shouldn't you be with your boyfriend?" he sneers.
She frowns at him, confused at his tone of both questions. "Josh went back to Wisconsin to visit his family," she says, with a shrug. "And it's your birthday. I brought you a card." She hands him the pastel blue envelope. "Happy birthday."
He takes the card reluctantly and places it on his nightstand, not saying anything. If he could've had it his way (the way he's used to), Josh (finally a name to the asshole's face, he thinks) wouldn't have needed to visit his family and he and she would be doing something special for his birthday, even if it isn't a very special birthday (who cares about when you turn nineteen?). But for once, the world didn't go the way he wanted it to.
"Are you okay, Chad?" she asks him. She pushes herself away from the dresser and sits on the edge of his bed. He resists the urge to nudge her off the bed with his foot. "Your eyes are really red."
"Allergies," he lies quickly.
"Portlyn keeps coming in every day, hoping you start filming again," she changes the subject.
"Someone should tell her to give up already; I'm not coming back," he replies. "Fuck being an actor," he says sharply.
She straightens up and, subconsciously, leans away from him. "You love being an actor."
"Fuck it," he repeats.
"Happy birthday, Chad," she says again. She stands up and walks toward the door. "Take care of yourself," she adds softly.
He looks at her back as she walks away. "Hey, Sonny?"
She turns her head slightly. "Yeah?"
"I can't make the promise that I will," he tells her.
Surprisingly, she nods. "I figured that."
She leaves and he reaches over for her card. He opens it slowly and carefully, so he doesn't ruin the envelope. He looks at the card. The card has Mickey Mouse on it jumping. In bubble letters, it reads "Be happy." He wonders if she picked this one purposely, as if she knew he wasn't happy. He opens the card and underneath the message about birthdays, she signed it "love, Sonny" with a heart after it.
He reaches under his bed and shakily takes out a bottle of tequila that is barely empty. It's barely past noon, but he feels overwhelmed by how the card ended and why she ended it like that. He gulps down some of the liquid and it burns his throat.
He drinks and he drinks, and eventually, the tequila is gone and he is passed out on his bed, once again sleeping away another day.
-SC-
When he wakes up early the next morning, he turns on his 55-inch LCD TV and the channel it's on is one of those celebrity gossip channels. He keeps the channel on, especially after seeing his own face pop up in the upper lefthand corner. It's an older picture, from his sober happy days. He turns up the volume and listens to the reporter's story about him.
"Thank you, Rusty, and now for the story you've probably been waiting for. Is Chad Dylan Cooper following in the footsteps of many young Hollywood stars and starlets? It has been reported by a young man, who prefers to not be named, that the star of TV's hit show, Mackenzie Falls, has been seen numerous times in downtown Los Angeles interacting with a drug dealer and coming back with many packages. Cooper, who has been MIA for the past four months, has been on an extended vacation from television, according to his camp. When asked by our reporters about Cooper being addicted to various drugs, including marijuana and cocaine, his representatives refused to comment. Is Chad Dylan Cooper hiding something? Is this the reason of his disappearance from TV? Keep tuning in to Celebrity News Daily as we uncover the latest real life drama of Mackenzie Falls."
He turns the TV off and grabs his phone from his nightstand. It's lighting up manically and he has at least twenty voicemails from thirty missed calls. None of them are belated birthday wishes. Looking at his Twitter, every tweet popping up is linked to his name and is talking about his recent start in 140 characters or less.
And now, he wants to wake up from this nightmare. He is tired of letting people down and even though all press is good press, the last thing he needs as a tween role model, is for his name to be stained by his stupid mistakes because he was in love with someone who didn't return the emotions.
Someone knocks on his door and his parents enter the room, as well as every thing person that works for him to keep him as Chad Dylan Cooper, teen heartthrob. They all share the same disappointed look and he gulps down his guilt and wishes he could escape to his bathroom to get rid of the smell of alcohol in his breath. He contemplates jumping out of the window as well, but if he broke both his legs, he'd never get away from the house.
The next five hours of yelling and arguing and contemplating are brutal, but his parents end up with the final decision, despite the fact he's an adult and he can theoretically handle his own problems. His agent and publicist agree that if he's ever going to be on TV again, he needs to go to a place that can help him and he needs to accept help.
By ten o'clock that night, he's sitting in his new room in rehab. He shares it with a man who got high, got in a car accident, and killed his best friend and paralyzed himself. There's a way to look at the effects of what could've happened to him.
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She visits him when he's halfway done with rehab. He is surprised by her appearance, as no one except his parents and his former staff have come to see him. But he is glad she came.
"You're taking care of yourself," she points out when she comes in, jumping straight to the point. "You look way better than the last time I saw you."
"I'm sorry."
"Don't be sorry. These things happen."
He walks over the small stand by the twin bed he sleeps on and picks up the card she had given him on his last birthday. He shows it to her.
"Thanks for this. I just want to know if you meant the 'love' and 'heart' parts of the inside."
"Yes, I did."
"Well then…"
"I loved you, Chad. I just didn't know if you loved me. I shouldn't have copped out and settled for Josh. But we broke up awhile ago. Before I gave you the card."
"Oh," he pauses, and then, "I loved you too. I still do love you."
"I want the old you back. Is he coming back?"
"I hope so."
"Find me when he comes back. I'll wait for him. In fact, give this to him for me. As a reminder."
She leans up and kisses him lightly. For their first kiss, it's not at all what he would've hoped for. He didn't want it to ever happen while he was the small bedroom at the rehab facility. She pulls away and winks at him.
"See you."
And now I'm told that this is life
That pain is just a simple compromise
So we can get what we want out of it
He pulls his SUV into one of the visitor spots at Condor Studios and gets out of the vehicle, looking at the studios he used to spend so much time at. It's hard to believe he's been done with Hollywood for two years and he's been clean for seven months. Mackenzie Falls has been officially done since he started rehab and the studio is being used for some new melodrama teen show. So Random! however is still as popular as ever and of course, she is still on the show. He knows, because he kept up with it in rehab and after as well.
He walks into studio three and after talking with Marshall, he goes to where she is rehearsing. He leans against a wall as he watches her. She looks as beautiful as ever and he is certain that he looks good too. He always looks good, after all.
She finishes the rehearsal and starts walking in his direction. At first she walks straight past him, but she stops and turns around to look at him. She smiles brightly and rushes up to him.
"Oh my gosh! Chad!" she squeals as she throws her arms around him. He picks her up and hugs her tightly as well. She looks him straight in the eye. "Are you back? For good?"
He nods his head, saying no words. She keeps on smiling and leans in towards his face. He does the same and they kiss for real this time.
He realizes while they're locking lips that the world is finally back to going the way Chad Dylan Cooper wants. And he likes that.
THE END.
Weeellllllllllll, I hated that ending. I could've done so much better but that was all I could think up. Hmm. Maybe you'll like it though. I guess I like the last scene, because it kinda is like Chad on the show, but the scene before it? Not so much. It was necessary though for the last part and why Sonny would run up to Chad when he came onto the set.
Oh and bee-tee-doubs, Menomo-something… well, that is Chad trying to remember the town Menomonie. It's a real town in Wisconsin and since I couldn't find anything about a made-up town that Sonny lived in; I picked that one. I feel like it isn't the part of Wisconsin she lived on but still, it's good enough.
Hope you liked this! Maybe I'll write more SWAC if you want.(: