A/N: Apologies, as I had to split this last part into two sections because it was getting too long. There are parts I'm struggling with still, but we'll see how it pans out, I suppose? Your guess is probably as good as mine.
Hope you all like it!
"Because there is nothing more beautiful than
the way the ocean refuses to stop kissing the shoreline,
no matter how many times it is sent away."
- Sarah Kay
Ally knows something is up Friday afternoon, when Trish is surprisingly tight-lipped about plans for the next few days. They're two best friends in New York City. The weekend practically schedules itself. But she lets Trish have her secret, if only because she's not quite up for the nightlife scene anyways. It's wonderful to see Dez and Trish again, but the missing link in Team Austin is all the more noticeable when she remembers the events of this past week. She hasn't told Trish about her confrontation with Austin; not because she doesn't want to tell her, but because Ally doesn't know if she can admit to herself that it was real. Right now though, lying in her best friend's guest bedroom, staring at the ceiling, three thousand miles away from LA, she thinks telling Trish everything might be what she needs to move on.
There are times when she's convinced the kiss was a figment of her imagination, the product of paint fumes and stress. It'd be easier that way. But the details are too clear for it to be a daydream: calloused fingers tangled in her hair, a boy that tastes like maple syrup and her favorite song, and the way he looked standing in her front hall, watching her go. Letting her leave.
She sighs into her pillow. She's been holed up in her room since her flight this morning, and she's surprised Trish hasn't been more inquisitive. But the girl has mellowed since their high school years, and it's possible that her relationship with Dez has made her just a tad more patient. She hears a light knock on the bedroom door and rolls to a seated position.
"Come in!" Ally makes a half-hearted attempt at neatening her hair before giving up as Trish walks in with two enormous grocery bags. The dark-haired girl looks at her sympathetically.
"I brought frozen yogurt and a dartboard with Austin's face on it."
Ally laughs softly. "Just like old times, huh?"
Trish pops open a carton and slides the lid onto the nightstand. "Want to talk about it?" She says as she scoops an absurdly large spoonful of mint chocolate chip and hands it to Ally.
Ally's voice is quiet. "He kissed me."
Her best friend looks more thoughtful than shocked, but Ally just attributes it to Trish's uncanny perception when it comes to the people she loves.
She continues. "He found out I was leaving. I told him I'm in love with him. He kissed me. I walked away. He let me." Ally lets out a breath. She's not this girl. She's cried more in the past week than she has in years, but she won't let this boy define her anymore. "And he's tried to talk to me, but I know what he's going to say. A half-assed apology, "the kiss was a mistake," some more meaningless excuses as to why he's never around anymore. And then back to his celebrity life." Ally pauses, looking at her spoon pensively. "But I think I'm finally done, Trish. I can't be this-whatever I am to him anymore. I'm giving up."
Trish, midway through her own scoop, drops the entire carton on the floor.
Her voice is strange as she leans over to pick up the frozen yogurt. "Maybe you should give it a little time, Ally. Or at least hear him out?"
Ally looks at Trish, bewildered. "I thought you were the one who said to let him go?"
Trish sits up, avoiding her best friend's eyes. "You know me. I might've been a little hasty. I think maybe you should give him one more chance; his time might be different. You never know."
"Trish, he's three thousand miles away. I doubt I'll hear from him until I get to Seattle, if even then." Ally suppresses a pang of sadness at the thought that she might've spoken to Austin for the last time in a long time. Moving on. Slow and steady, she tells herself.
"I wouldn't be too sure."
Ally hears the mutter and whips around to stare at her best friend. "What?"
But Trish is already standing with the spilled carton, changing the subject. "I'm going to take this out. I'll be right back. We can pop in a movie?" She moves towards the door. Her voice is gentle as she turns back for a moment. "Just... keep an open mind, Ally."
She shuts the door quietly behind her, leaving Ally to plop back onto the bed and finish her spoonful of frozen yogurt. "Moving on." She says to herself, nodding emphatically at her reflection in the spoon. "Yup."
It's eleven. She and Trish have just finished the second movie in their Harry Potter marathon, and Ally's popping more popcorn on the stove when she hears a knock at the door.
Trish pops her head into the kitchen. "Can you get it? It's probably the pizza, and I'm in my pajamas."
"News flash: we're both in our pajamas. And did we even order pizza?" Ally says, switching the stove off.
Her best friend shrugs, and the knock sounds again.
"Just a second!" Ally shrugs on a sweatshirt and turns to Trish. "If I'm not back in ten minutes, your city has taken me hostage."
"I'll call Liam Neeson." Trish deadpans as she pushes Ally towards the hallway. "Go! I want pizza."
She stumbles into the hat stand she opens the door, and the entire thing comes tumbling down around her feet and into the hallway.
"Only Trish." She sighs as she untangles her ankles from a mess of animal-print haberdashery. She looks up to apologize to the poor pizza boy bearing witness to her stellar coordination.
"I am so sor-Austin?"
It's not pizza.
Austin's heart stills when the door opens. He hadn't expected the onslaught of pink leopard print top hats, but it's still Ally standing in the doorway, still her smile (fading) and her eyes (tired) and her clumsiness (so familiar it hurts). He thinks briefly that he's glad this was the moment he chose to knock on the door; because if he hadn't, he wouldn't be seeing her as she is in this second, right now, an old UCLA sweatshirt and a messy ponytail and wide eyes.
So he stares at her, she stares at the light fixture above his head, and the silence stretches on until Ally shifts impatiently.
"What do you want?"
Austin blurts out the first thing that pops into his head.
"Is that my sweatshirt?"
Ally tugs on it defensively. "Um. Yeah. You can have it back, if you wa..."
"No!" Austin says hurriedly. "Keep it. Looks better on you anyways."
She fidgets with the sleeve and looks down. "Why are you here, Austin?"
Austin's never heard her sound this defeated, and digs his fingers into his palms to keep himself from reaching out to tug her into his arms. Focus, Austin. He's made so many mistakes with her; Ally doesn't trust him anymore, and he knows hasn't earned that trust back yet. But he's doing his damn best to become the kind of person she deserves, and he's going to prove it to her.
"I'm here to woo you."
Ally stills. Of all the things he could've said, she never expected this.
"You... what?"
"I'm here to woo you." Austin's grin is bright and familiar, and Ally's head spins.
"To... woo me?"
"Yup." Austin's smile widens as he starts backing away from the door. "That's all."
Ally blinks at the newly vacated space in front of her, stunned. A minute passes before she finally chokes out a word.
"What?"
Austin's almost to the elevators when he pauses. Still processing the past ten minutes, she doesn't realize he's running back until he's right in front of her.
"Also." He whispers, and suddenly he's dipped her into a kiss, chaste, languid, and entirely heart-stopping. Her head spins as he lets her go, and she shakes herself back into focus just as he steps away, dark eyes meeting hers for a moment. Then he's actually gone, and she's standing stock still in the hallway, fingers pressed to her lips, heart in her throat, chanting movingonmovingonmovingon under her breath.
Trish comes out to the doorway and catches the tail end of the mantra. There's laughter in her voice as she pulls Ally back into the apartment. "Oh, you are in so over your head."
Ally spends the entire night tossing and turning, coming up with a million different reasons: for Austin's appearance in New York, for Trish's uncharacteristic silence on the topic ("He should be the one to tell you."), and for the kiss. She talks herself in circles until she finally falls asleep, sometime in the early hours of the morning. She wakes up when the doorbell rings at 9 in the morning.
"Trish, I am not doing this again!" She swings her feet onto the floor. "Trish?"
There's no response. Padding to the front hall, Ally looks tentatively through the peephole. The hallway is empty, no Austin in sight, so she swings open the door and looks down. At her feet is a vase of sunlight-golden freesias and inky blue violets. There's a card tucked under the vase, and she unfolds it with trepidation.
In vintage typography, the store has listed the flowers and their meanings. "Violets-take a chance on me. Freesias-trust."
But the two lines after are in Austin's handwriting, and Ally's breath catches in nostalgia.
Just break down the walls, whoa
Don't be afraid to let them fall.
She takes the flowers into the kitchen, puts on a pot of coffee, and takes a shower. Feeling a little more like herself, she calls Trish. She doesn't pick up, so Ally leaves a short message, takes her mug into the living room, and attempts to put the flowers out of mind. She's moving to Seattle in two days; there's nothing Austin can do anymore to make her stay. And that's that. (But they really are beautiful.)
Ten minutes after she sits down, 10 A.M. on the dot, the bell rings again. She checks the hallway. Upon finding it empty, she opens the door and lets out a surprised laugh. In addition to a vase of tulips and buttercups is the biggest jar of pickles she's ever seen. It comes up to her hip and so wide she can barely wrap her arms around it. Ally has no clue how she's going to get it into the apartment, so she sits down in the middle of the hallway to open the card. "White Tulips-Forgive me. Buttercups-Childishness." And again, Austin's left a note.
I love the things you do,
It's how you do the things you love.
She can't keep herself from smiling as she uses the pickle jar to pull herself to her feet.
"What am I going to do with you." She wonders out loud, not sure if she's talking about the boy or the jar.
Ally finally gets the pickles in the door, wedging them next to the death trap masquerading as a hat rack. She calls Trish again, and this time, she picks up.
"I'm assuming you got the first flower delivery?" Ally senses the grin in her friend's voice.
"Yup. And the second. Where did he find a jar of pickles this big?" It's not the question Ally really wants to ask, but she's not sure she's ready for the answer-and she's not sure Trish is the person to give it. (what is he trying to say, what is he telling me, what does this mean, is this a love song?)
"So. You think you're going to forgive him?" Trish, as usual, cuts straight to the point.
Ally sighs. "I'm not sure. I'm going to Seattle. End of story. I don't know what he's trying to do. Trying to save our friendship? Our partnership? Who are we to each other anymore? When I left, I thought that was closure. I thought that it was what he wanted too." She pauses, and her lips quirk into an unconscious smile as she looks over at the flowers. "Although this is one hell of an apology."
Trish laughs over the phone. "Oh, young, naive, oblivious best friend of mine."
Ally tilts her head questioningly, then realizes Trish can't see her. "What do you mean?"
"You're Ally to his Austin." She says simply. "And he's Austin to your Ally. Which automatically means this isn't just an apology."
Ally mulls this over for a minute, but before she can respond, Trish cuts her off.
"Als, I have to go." Her voice is knowing as she hands up. "And I think you have to get the door."
The line clicks off and Ally has just barely slipped the phone into her pocket when there's a knock on the door.
"Well that's new."
This time, even though it's a knock, she doesn't bother to check the hallway. In fact, if she's being perfectly honest with herself, a part of her is hoping that Austin'll be standing outside. Instead, it's a mustached delivery man with a nametag that says "Marv", holding a positively enormous bouquet of dark pink roses in full bloom.
"Delivery for one..." He squints at his clipboard. "Ally Gator?"
Ally finds herself in the familiar position of being caught between exasperation and affection for this ridiculous boy. "That's me."
"Got somethin' else for ya."
He hands her the bouquet and she turns to set it carefully on the pickle jar, taking a peek at the note as Marv searches through a delivery bag.
"Dark Pink Roses-gratitude, love. Snowdrops-hope, friendship in trouble. Sweet Pea-departure, transition."
It's like I'm balanced on the edge,
It's like I'm hanging by a thread.
Ally finds herself itching to talk to Austin, if just to confront him about what message he's trying to send. She reaches for her phone just as Marv hands her an envelope.
"Here you go, Miss Gator. You have a nice day now." He nods at her and Ally suppresses a laugh at the serious expression on his face as he says her name.
"You too, Marv. You too."
She closes the door and rips open the envelope. It's empty, except for a few slips of torn paper that drift onto the floor when she turns it over. Confused, she checks the envelope again: for a message written on the envelope, or something taped to the inside. There's nothing.
"Stupid, cryptic, annoyingly charming boys." She grumbles under her breath as she picks up the scattered papers. Then her heart stops as she catches the logo of Austin's recording company. Her hands tremble as she pieces what she can together, but she doesn't need much to realize what Austin's sent her-what he's given up. His contract.
Next up: What else is Austin planning? What is he going to do without a contract? When's the happy ending coming?
(Actually though, when, because I am writing this on the fly, so I have no clue when these two are going to get their act together.)