Disclaimer: I don't do anything with my life besides school, Netflix and writing I don't have the ambition to own Wait For You by Elliot Yamin or anything close to the brilliance of Austin and Ally.
Summary: Austin starts worrying that, since she's no longer a song writer with stage fright but he's still a singer that loves to be on stage, they might not exactly be a perfect match. AustinAlly.
Inspiration: I apologize in advance, but I was a tad unhappy with Ally getting over her stage fright. I presume I wouldn't mind it nearly as much if this major character development had happened a little further along the road, but sill: Ally is supposed to be shy around everyone but Austin because that is how life works. I wanted to reflect on the fact that the reason they work so well together in the first place is because of the fact that Ally had stage fright but Austin was able to perform her talent.
A/N: I know, I know, I've been a bit MIA recently. However, I have a new chapter for going to be gone in the works and have a few one shot ideas spiraling around in my head due to my new found obsession over the Auslly hashtag on tumblr. Thanks for sticking with me guys adn I hope you love this as much as you normally do :)
Dedication: This bad boy is going out to a cold day in december because she's the sweetest thing you'll meet and seems to always find time to write. Her stories are wondrous, if you haven't already checked them out you defiantly should.
The first time he realizes he might have a reason to be concerned is during class: how ironic, he learned something at school.
They're half way through chorus and she hasn't replied—or even glanced at, for the matter—a single one of the notes he had passed to her in trivial attempts of conversation. She sits in concentration, her bottom lip ever so slightly jutting out as she gnaws on the upper half, hands frantically scribbling out what he assumes to be fresh lyrics in her tattered journal.
Then the teacher asks for a volunteer soloist and before he blinks her hand shoots up into the air, sparks igniting deep in her eyes and she's smiling radiantly. The teacher's eyes dart wide and hold perplexity, but she gleefully calls on Ally and the skirt clad brunette stalks to the front hesitantly pulling on the hem of her shirt.
She takes a deep breath and doesn't even have to look at him to begin singing. Her voice is flowing, louder than he thinks he's ever heard her without a microphone and she's looks as if she's content with the attention. He gives a standing ovation and hugs her tightly because he can't tell you how many times he's pictured this moment in his head.
Compliments swarm around her and it's clear that she's overwhelmed, but she deserves the stardom feeling and he's beaming at her more than he ever had after any one of his performances.
And then it dawns on him that they might not be a perfect match anymore because the only reason she ever needed him is because she was a songwriter with stage fright.
The second time he realizes he should consider being concerned is when she blows him off: after they start being all coupley and lovey dovey.
"I really need to finish this song tonight, Austin. I'm sorry. Rain check?" She says swiftly before shutting her locker and making her way to the front doors of the school. He grabs her hand as soon as he catches up to her surprisingly long strides.
"Why don't I help you with the song, then," he suggests with an overdosingly happy smile. He begins to swing their hands back and forth and she emits the tiniest giggle at his adorable actions.
"I normally would want you to, but this one's for me."
He thinks that she might have been able to hear the tiny noise given off by his heart ever so slightly breaking, tumbling a part into pieces as she crushes it solely with her bare hands.
The third time his brain is worried about finding the time to be concerned is when he sees her dance for the first time in about a month. There isn't a single trace of spastic limb flailing, not a sign of uncoordination or even a hint of deranged movements. She dances exceptionally well with intoxicating moves that ensnare every last one of his senses while singing to her latest original song: it's an understatement to say that he's thoroughly impressed.
This becomes so common, however, within the short span of a simple week. Before he can even manage out a questioning sentence about her quick pick up to these choreographed wonders, she's doing flash mobs of her own and spending respective hours in the dance studio portion of their local gym.
He takes her to the Spring Formal and the whole entire floor clears just so they can have enough space to properly tango, and by the end of it he's feels as if she was the one leading, not him. He has a certain reputation built up around his parkour like skills and suddenly she's breaking out with her own moves that can match his. Ally is growing and changing rapidly on a day to day basis and it takes all of his self restraint not to lose the pride he has for all her new accomplishments.
The day he sees her ever so slightly grinding upon one of her back up dancers—like he had observed, her life was escalating so quickly she got her own back up group in less than a month—is the day he decides he misses the innocent and insecure Ally Dawson he meet over makeshift corn dog drum sticks.
The fourth time he knows he's concerned about what exactly their partnership is coming to is the day she tells him she forgot to write his new song.
Her voluminous eyes stretch on for miles and he sees all the apologies laced up within them as she explains that she had been working on her album photo shoot spread—did he mention it was news to him Dez had photographed her professionally?—for days on end now, and it's been hard to find time to sleep and eat, much less write.
He lets out an exasperated sigh and tells his brain to chill out, they'll get back to that piano together eventually and a few weeks with nothing but Tweeter updates won't completely kill off his fan base. He pulls her in for a binding embrace and he feels her smile as their lips press together, and then all is forgotten as they bound to the food court and laugh over a classic pizza and wings date at Mini's.
The next day when he barges into the practice room unexpectedly he finds her scrawling notes down into her book with one hand as the other traces tentatively over new keys on the black and white sea of piano. She looks up to meet his gaze and he can tell that she had pulled an all-nighter just for his new song by the way her hair is tousled and her gleaming orbs held an indescribable amount of jaded fatigue.
"Finished," she utters out in a cracking voice through parched lips and a lopsided grin. He smiles and gives her a docile high five along with an over flowing amount of thank yous.
He tires really hard not to care about the fact that this is the first song she's ever written for him completely by herself, besides his very first hit single.
The fifth time he's flat out perturbed about what's happening to Ally, to his Ally: and it's getting so bad he's actually worrying about whether or not she's even his to claim anymore. Every day she walks into school for the past week her ombré locks stay artificially bone straight, not a single strand of her traditional spiral curls in sight.
This really shouldn't be a big deal in the least but for some reason his brain has twisted it out of proportion. Her ringlets have become somewhat symbolic to her character and he really does think they frame her face better, anyways.
He runs his hands through the smoothened tresses that reek as if they've been burnt, and tells her in a careful voice that he feels as if he misses her.
She rolls her eyes slowly but surely and complains to him that he has no reason to.
The thing is, though, is that he sees it in her eyes that she's beginning to miss herself, too.
The sixth time could almost be counted as the last, because it's where he's drawing a firm and metaphoric line.
He's barreling down to the shore line at his favorite place on the beach to catch a decent wave, right hand grasping his bright yellow surf board as his left hand rakes vigorously through his hair. His thoughts are rapid, pushing and shoving against one another in an endless battle until it reaches the point that his head starts throbbing. He's feeling exotic and foreign types of stress that he had managed to evade all of his life, but it seems as if karma has caught up to him as they all trample him with a force tenfold.
He feels as if this couldn't possibly get any worse, relationships and careers and friendships and grades and colleges and just plain old life all hanging in the balance, and he's pretty sure that he's right: that is until his eyes train over the sight of her, being beautiful and angelic as ever in a skimpy bikini laughing within a crowd of people he's never seen before in his life.
The majority of the grouping is guys and he knows that she knows he wouldn't exactly approve of this interaction without his presence, much less his knowledge. She pushes the hair out of her eyes as she starts an intimate looking conversation with a tall brunette that has a devilish smirk resting a little too comfortably on his lips, and momentarily, he forgets how to breathe.
His heels kick up sand in his storm over to her clique, and once her eyes flit up to him she sees the recognition in his eyes and senses that he would like to speak with her alone. His frantic brain pauses briefly to note that even through all these hard times, they still communicate through unvocalized thoughts and flickering eyes.
She excuses herself shyly and trudges slowly over to him with her head down, looking vulnerable and scared as her hands protectively cross over her chest. He pulls her farther from the crowd because he doesn't want prying eyes on this particular conversation.
"I just don't understand what you want me to do," she screeches out to him half way through their fight, voice taut and fractured while her mahogany orbs grow broad with tears.
"If you can't understand why I'm upset then I don't understand what we're even doing anymore, Ally," he croaks out as his bangs dangle in front of his eyes, the limited light of the evening darkening his face and (hopefully, he wishes) camouflaging his descending water works.
Her head turns away in a snapping motion as she bites down on her lip, eyes squeezing tightly shut as her arms stay firmly planted across her torso.
"And what does that mean, Austin? That we're over? Done being partners, friends, boyfriend and girlfriend?"
His sigh cracks as soon as it is emitted and it's no secret to her or the world that the great Austin Moon is full on crying at this point. He shakes intensely and involuntarily, not being able to muster even eye contact with her at this point.
"All I know is I'm done fighting for what's left of us when you don't even know there's a battle going on," he steams out before swiveling and limping off in the other direction, too afraid to turn back and see her shrinking form as it becomes a part of the distance: a part of his past.
She's changed, a single voice in his mind speaks out to him, she's changed and you haven't done anything wrong. This is her fault and her choice.
A second voice rings out, colder and more cunning than the last: but you changed, too, and when you did she was there for you and didn't judge.
He reaches his car after a fit of struggle—not only physically but mentally as well—and he's feeling so many built up feelings that he's compelled to drive to Sonic Boom and make up with her, just like any other fight, but this still seems abnormal and there's one thing the two voices in his head agree on: they're not going to make up from this fight.
It's scarier than anything else they had ever said because he knows for a fact that it's true.
He lets time fade in and out because he knows it's fruitless to attempt to deal with whatever in the world they're going through: it's bigger than anything else they've ever encountered and it's too big for them to handle.
Then she starts showing up to school in those old floral dresses of hers that flow out and are paired with denim vests. Her curls pinned back and lessened, falling down into waves rather than ringlets. Her heels are replaced with southern styled boots, the familiar ones that added only an inch or two to her height. She chews on her hair when she doesn't know the answer to the question and she doesn't interact with anything or anyone other than her book.
Her face looks sunken, eyes puffed and rimmed with bags and cheeks hollow. He watches Trish pass her by in the hallways without a simple hello and realizes that her world must have hit a crash a burn about the same time he left. He swears her waist is shrinking everyday and starts to notice exactly how frail her little wrists are becoming.
He starts to develop habits, like leaving her cute notes in her locker telling her she's beautiful and making up random playlists labeled with her name. He realizes he's still falling in love with her, even after all this time. He wonders if she realizes it too, because he notices the conversations that break out between her and Dez that leave her laughing and how sometimes on those rare good days she has, he'll pretend he doesn't feel her stare and she'll just continue to gaze at him and smile.
He seals the envelope tightly shut and imagines her face once she receives his invitation, the blossoming and hesitant smile paired with shocked and simpering eyes.
"This is the first song I've ever written by myself, that's, you know, decent," he says, eyes desperately scanning the crowd as chuckles are discharged into the open air, strewn about and hushed by silence.
"And I hope you guys like it, because it might be the last one for awhile."
His hands graze over the piano chords, a deep breath taken in and out as his fingers tremble with nerves: nerves that are unexpected and irrevocably inappropriate. Closing his eyes, he begins the song and wills away the last minute doubts traipsing through his mind.
"I never felt nothing in the world like this before, now I'm missing you and I'm wishing that you would come back through my door," his head quirks up from the keys, regaining confidence as the words slip out past one another in a silky, hushed tone.
"You could have stayed, but you wouldn't give me a chance. With you not around its a little bit more then I can stand." He searches deliriously, eyes analyzing every last face in the crowd with devotion. She should have been here by now; she should have been here the whole time.
"But I know it's a lie, what you keep inside, this is not how you want it to be," and then he finds her, first row of all places blotting her smearing make up that's being destroyed with empathetic tears. "So baby I will wait for you, cause I don't know what else I can do. Don't tell me I ran out of time, if it takes the rest of my life."
He finishes but only because she's out in the audience, like she was the very first time he ever stood up in front of everyone, and she's still cheering louder than anyone else. She runs into his arms the first opportunity she gets and he all of a sudden is remembering how hard it was to forget the feeling of her wrapped up within himself in every way possible.
Then he kisses her because he wants to celebrate the fact that he was wrong: they could handle it because they always do, and he's never been more happy to have made a mistake in all of his life.
They walk along side of the waves that evening, hands intertwined as well as hearts and it's such a deep connection that he feels himself being swallowed hole by commitment. He doesn't mind it one bit because he knows Ally is worth it, that she's always been worth it and has no doubt that she always will be.
"We aren't that much of a perfect match anymore, are we?" She asks through terrified eyes and he wonders if this is how he has looked to her for the past few months, defenseless and afraid and clueless.
"You're a songwriter without stage fright, and I'm a singer who not only loves being on stage but can write an okay verse or two," he simplifies with a heavy sigh, feeling remorseful for the olden days where late nights were spent with Chinese food and childish dance parties while trying to figure out the bridge to their latest song.
She snakes her arms around his neck and he envelopes her waist, and they begin to sway back and forth while he murmurs out the tune of their very first tracks. The sunset fading in the background reflects clearly in her eyes, and he still can feel himself falling in love: he presumes that may be the very key to staying in love, to never stop falling.
"But I still think we're a perfect match," he whispers deeply into her ear, a chill or two descending down her back as he continues to dance with her in the sand dunes, thinking over what a wonderful night it is to fall back together.
A/N: and there you have it my friends! Don't be afraid to drop me a review :)' and can't wait for Freaky Friday & Fan Fiction, am I right? I mean, Dez is already one of Auslly shippers, and now he's writing Fan Fiction too? I might just have to marry that man myself...
xoxo