(A/N: Ok, here's chapter 9. Sorry for the three month delay. I was extremely busy with performing and school. On top of that, I had writers block. Hope you people enjoy!)
(Alex's POV)
Another day, Nate and I walked into rehearsal again. Jessica walked up to us, again. She was wearing a tiny denim skirt with rips in the front, gold high heels, and a tight pink tank top that had princess written across the front.
"Russo, you will pay. You don't deserve Nate," she sneered. I sighed.
"You don't deserve Nate. You don't really deserve anyone, from what I know about you. Do you even have friends? All you do is put people down. I don't even really know you."
She smiled at me. "You will in time, and I do have friends. Girls!"
She snapped her fingers and two girls came running up behind her. One had Dark Brown hair and was wearing a purple Hollister shirt, light skinny jeans, and a pair of clogs. The other had blond hair and was wearing a pink Abercrombie shirt, dark flare jeans, and a pair of silver heeled sandals. They looked innocent, or at least not as bad as Jessica did.
The blond girl smiled at me. "Hi. I'm Rosie. This is Jennifer." She gestured to the brunette.
"Hi, I'm Alex."
Her face lit up. "I know. Your boyfriend is Nate. I love his band, a lot. You're really good at performing, too. I saw you in concert with Nate like four times.." Nate nodded his head as if to say thanks.
"Thank you, Rosie. That's really cool," I said, and we started to talk, just about stuff, that is, until Jessica had to say something about it.
"Rosie, don't make friends with this scum," Jessica said as she pulled her away from us. "Bye Russo." She went up to Nate and put her hand on his chest. "Bye Natey. You will be mine, someday, and why wouldn't you be? I'm Jessica Shinn for crying out loud. Anyway, bye, Natey-poo." I cringed, as did Nate. Honestly, that's the worst pet-name I've ever heard in my life.
She walked away with Rosie and Jennifer behind her. Rosie and Jennifer looked back at us, and I knew they weren't happy with the devil known as Jessica.
Nate squeezed my hand. "What did she mean?" I asked.
He chuckled. "I'll protect you. That's what I'm here for. Cliché right?"
I smiled and gave him a quick peck on the lips. "I love you, Nate."
"I love you too." He grabbed my hand and we walked over to Shane and Mitchie.
"Hey guys!" Mitchie said. We both waved to her, and we had small talk. Soon enough, Todd started rehearsal.
"Okay, everybody! You may have noticed that we've been moving slowly with the production because we have been missing a very important cast member. Please welcome our mean girl, Tess Tyler!"
Just then, Tess walked in, and she reminded me of a model. Her shoulder length blond hair blowing, and her icy blue eyes looking at the cast. She was wearing a form fitting shirt with Hollister written across the chest in white letters. She had on a denim skirt and white heels. She was gorgeous, and she got nicer since Camp Rock. The only thing I was worried about was, she still had her mood swings, and she liked Shane. I was worried for Mitchie. Suddenly, Tess walked over to us.
"Hey guys!" she exclaimed. We all waved. "Uh, hey Shane." Tess blushed. It kind of made me sick. I have never really forgiven her for her attitude at camp. She always made fun of Mitchie and I, because she was richer than us. I helped Mitchie in the kitchen sometimes, it was a lot of fun. Sometimes Caitlyn Gellar would come help, too.
Tess would make fun of us for that too. She would embarrass us in front of the whole camp, but I guess it didn't mean anything. Nobody liked her.
She had supposedly changed, I haven't talked to her in a while, so far she hasn't caused any harm. I suppose all she did was say hi.
"Hi Tess," Shane mumbled. Everyone sat there awkwardly, until Mitchie broke the silence.
"Alex? Who was the blond girl you were talking to? Not Jessica." I thought about it for a second, she was obsessed with Nate and Connect 3, at least, it seemed like that. She liked my performance, which was pretty cool.
"Rosie, that's it," I said. I saw Mitchie and Shane look at each other, wide eyed.
"She's in the movie?" Mitchie asked.
Shane nodded. "I guess so. How weird is that?"
"Pretty weird," he said. I was extremely confused. I looked up at Nate with a puzzled look on my face.
I was going to ask how Shane and Mitchie knew her, but Nate beat me too it.
"Mitchie and I ran into Rosie at the mall. She was with her little sister, Katherine. Katherine wanted an autograph, and Rosie ran to find her. She was asking us a bunch of questions, and it was really awkward."
Mitchie rolled her eyes at Shane. "What Shane means to say is that, Katherine and Rosie are really great fans. Although, we had no idea she was in the movie. I thought she would have told us." Shane nodded.
"Alright.. Well, Nate, we better start running lines before Todd calls us up on stage." Nate nodded, and I took his hand and we walked away. I looked back and I saw Mitchie holding Shanes hand, and Tess staring at them.
Nate and I found a spot to run lines and started working. Nate and my character were love interests. funny how that works. Right?
"Nate, did Robert Shinn say anything yet?" He shrugged. "
I haven't heard anything yet, we'll check when rehearsal is over." I nodded, then I realized something, Jessica Shinn and Robert Shinn. Crap.
"Nate, are Jessica and Robert related? They have the same last name."
"Oh god. How did I forget? Oh god, oh god. I didn't really talk to Jessica when I was younger. She was doing other things, probably something stupid like, child beauty pageants or something."
I couldn't help but chuckle at that. I could just imagine that, 7 year old Jessica in a short poofy dress, spray tanned, and wearing fake teeth. Yuck.
I snapped out of that thought. "Will Jessica help Robert? Ugh. She is. She's going to ruin my life." I put my face in my hands.
"Don't worry, Alex. We'll look when we get home." He scratched my back, and comforted me some more.
We started working with Todd, blocking and such After a few hours, it was time for lunch. Nate walked me to the cafeteria. We saw Jason, Ella, Shane and Mitchie. Tess was at the next table, sitting with Caitlyn. They called out to us.
"Alex! Nate! Have you seen this?" They were holding up a magazine. Of course, this happened right now, after I was thinking about it. I better hear the music.
I looked at the magazine.
Alex Russo: a cheater?
It showed a picture of me walking around town with Nate, and one of me kissing Jason, a while back. My worst memory. Ouch, that sounds bad. I just don't like Jason like that.
Alex is confirmed to be dating Nate Brown ,by an inside source, and we have numerous pictures of them together, but who would of thought we would have seen a picture of her kissing best friend of Nate Brown, Jason Adams. What will the mysetery girl think? People say Alex is just using the boys of Connect 3 to get to fame. What will happen next, will she backstab her best friend Mitchie, and start going out with Shane behind her back? Who knows?
-Robert Shunn"
I rested my head on the table, and my eyes started to tear up. I would never do that. None of this is true. I looked over to Nate, who had a blank look on his face. This article seemed so persuasive, anybody could believe it.
"Nate! This isn't true! I would never use you guys." I was crying by now.
"I know, and I know you wouldn't go with Shane behind my back. It just really hurts to read this about you."
"You don't believe it, do you?" Nate shook his head. I started to freak out, and Nate held me in his arms, stroking my hair and scratching my back.
"I'm sorry Nate. I'm sorry I have to put you through this." I said between my tears. "I'm sorry everyone, that I've done this to you guys."
Mitchie tried to comfort me. "It's not your fault Alex. It's the stupid reporters, he doesn't know anything."
Jason started to comfort me too. "If anything, it's just as much my fault as it would be your's."
"We'll all go to a press conference to clear this up, tommorow? We don't have rehearsal," Shane said. I nodded.
"Thanks guys, I'm so sorry." Jessica came up to us.
"Oh, so you saw the article?" she sneered. "You deserve it you big, stupid cheater." I looked up at her with tears running down my face, and she scoffed. "You just want attention, anyway."
I didn't have anything to say. I tried to be the better person.
"Are you going to say anything? Or are you just going to sit there and let me win, and steal your boyfriend?"
I stood up. "No! I'm not! I hope you know, by trying to mess up my life, you are not going to date Nate! A good boyfriend like Nate likes people who are nice, he doesn't base his relationships on looks. I don't want you to ruin my life! I'm not dating Jason! You know that!" I was screaming at her. Nate got out his phone, and started texting someone, at least, that's what it looked like.
"Oh yeah? Well it could be a good thing I wrote that article! You don't deserve to have a perfect life! I do! Me! Maybe I should ruin your life! Maybe I already did! It'll be hard getting past this rumor miss Alex Cheater Russo!" She then pulled my hair.
"Knock it off!" I screamed, and pushed her away.
"What are you going to do?" She slapped me.
"This!" I slapped her back.
She rolled her eyes, and then smirked. "Owwww... Alex hurt me!" Rosie and Jennifer ran to Jessica. I felt bad for them.
Todd caming running out. "What it going on between you two?" he cried. I sighed, and he beckoned us to come to his office.
"What happened? Alex?" he asked.
I sighed. "Jessica is trying to ruin my life. Her dad is a reporter/paparazzi. She wrote a nasty article about me, and now it's everywhere. She started talking smack to me, to my face! She is trying to steal my boyfriend, and she pulled my hair and slapped me. She started the fight."
Todd seemed to take it into consideration. "Jessica?"
"Yeah! I started the fight! Happy? She does not deserve to have the perfect life. I do! I have been working so hard to get famous, but I am just unknown, but when little miss Alex comes in with her rockstar boyfriend, she gets instant fame. I want that fame! I want to be with Connect 3 because I would get fame!" She cupped her mouth, and I smirked, just what I wanted to hear.
Todd raised his eyebrows. "I've read this article, and it says how Alex is only with Nate for the fame, but you just admitted that you wanted to be with Nate for the fame. Funny. Well, I don't know much on behalf of how this happened, so I'm going to have to punish you both. Until I get proof of what either of you say, you will both have to stay after rehearsal and clean up every night."
Nate came through the door. "Todd, Alex doesn't deserve to be punished. Here, look at this." Nate got out his phone, and showed him a video. He raised his eyebrows, again.
"Alex was only defending herself," Nate said.
"Well, Jessica, it seems as if Alex has done very little wrong, so you will be cleaning by yourself after rehearsal. Alex, I'm going to let you off with a warning for rough-housing. If it happens again, you will get a more severe punishment," Todd said. I smiled really widely. Jessica scoffed and walked out of the room.
"Thank you so much! I promise it won't happen again, and I'm so sorry for all this."
He patted my shoulder. "It's alright, kid. I know how Jessica can be." I nodded. "Good luck getting everything cleared up, Alex. You can leave now."
"Okay. Thank you again."
Nate and I walked out of the office. "How did you do that?" I asked him.
"I've worked with Todd a lot. He trusts me." I smiled and hugged him.
"Thank you. You're the best boyfriend ever."
"My pleasure. I wasn't going to let you be punished for no good reason." I looked up at him and pecked him on the lips.
"Also, I promise that everything will work out, Alex. These things happen a lot. We'll make it through this, so will your friends. I promise." I blushed.
"I believe you, Nate," I honestly said. "Thank you."
