Hello all! I am so sorry it has taken me so long to update but I hope it was worth it. Please let know what you think.

And a special thanks to my editor Manic221 for being so quick with getting this chapter back to me. :)

Chapter 9

Almost two weeks had passed for both Austin and Ally since the night they confronted their respective exes.

Austin had gotten off pretty easy in comparison to his brunette counterpart.

He and Sasha had managed to reconcile their friendship. It was a bit awkward at first, both found it hard to go from in a relationship to just friends but once they decided to push through they finally found a good balance.

Ally, however had not gotten off so easy. She had not seen nor heard from Blake since that night and it plagued her. At first she was glad that he had seemingly given up on her but after about five days or so she started to miss him. She hated this but the truth was it felt really good to see him again. Sure it was awkward and painful but that didn't make it any less nice. She had missed him so much over the years and she was sad to see him go again.

It was like he had fallen off the face of the earth. 'Maybe he had.' Ally thought to herself. She couldn't get away from thoughts of Blake. She felt bad about it because she knew for a fact that this affected both her work and song writing. She could feel the rifted that had begun to separate her from her friends, especially Austin. She didn't want to hurt any of them but she didn't know how to stop the process.

Ally was proud of herself though, for she knew she had done the right thing. She had to stop things before they started but that didn't make things any easier. She also knew deep down that too much had happened between her and Blake. They could never even be friends again let alone anything else. But the look in his eyes had become like a maze inside Ally's head, one that which she just couldn't escape.

Ally had crushed him and she knew it. She had crushed all the hope he had ever held that maybe one day he could make things right again; she had crushed his spirit and that was something she just couldn't live with. She also knew there was no way to change things or even make them better.

She knew that if she tried to talk with him she would either lead him on or she would deceive herself into thinking that maybe the past wasn't really the past.

The thing that made this so complicated was the simple fact was that no matter the things that were said that night she was still hopelessly in love with him; a love that she had come to despise.

'How was it possible to be in love with someone you don't even know?' This question rolled around in her head day and night to the point she thought she was going mad.

Ally was screwed; she knew she only had one option, the hardest of them all, to do nothing.

It killed her, she hated the thought of someone she cared deeply about was hurt because of her. She wasn't the kind of person who could tear someone down and not think twice about it.

No, she agonized over the conversation with Blake, it ate at her every waking moment and sometimes even in her dreams.

It was like emotionally she had gone back in time to right after Blake had cheated on her. She relived every emotion, every moment of guilt and regret.

She had somehow managed move passed it the first time around… No, not somehow she knew exactly what had brought her back, it was Austin. It was always Austin.

He had the power to take her mind off her troubles no matter how far gone she felt. The blonde goof ball who thought he was the coolest thing in the world had been her escape since the day she met him but after that night not even Austin could bring her back.

Everyone could see it, Austin, Trish and even Dez. The three wanted nothing more than to help her but none of them could figure out what to do. They had all tried multiple tactics but nothing worked. They were at a loss for what to do.

Austin's heart broke for Ally; he knew there was nothing he could do to make things better for her. He wanted so badly to put that sparkle that he loved so much back in her brown eyes but all his efforts came to no avail.

She had become uncharacteristically angry and short with everyone. Sure she was always uptight in the past but this was different and he knew it.

Everyone felt like they were on eggshells around her, any little thing would set her off and it just kept getting worse, she even made Dez cry once. Sure she apologized afterward but it didn't change that fact that she had crossed a line.

Ally felt trapped, trapped in world of swirling emotion. Her mind whirled as she tried to find her way out of this mental self-imprisonment; she had forgotten what it was like outside the four walls she had created inside her mind.

Austin didn't understand why she would do this to herself. He wanted to reach out and fix everything like he had done before but this time was different. She wouldn't open up even a little.

Ally's dad had picked up on it almost instantly. After about a week of it he forced Austin to tell him everything for Ally refused to admit something was wrong.

The blond reluctantly relayed the story to him. He felt like he had betrayed Ally in away, telling someone what was going on but at that point he was so worried about her he thought her dad deserved to know.

Austin had barely gotten out Blake's name when he could see in Lester's eyes that he had already put everything together. After Austin finished the upstairs music room filled with stony silence. The two stood there awkwardly as Lester absorbed the information just given to him.

"I knew something was wrong, I had no idea." Austin nodded in understanding. There was no way he could have known. Ally refused to talk to anyone especially her dad.

Another week passed and things only got worse as Ally slipped deeper and deeper into her depression. She had come very anti-social; she had also missed so many days of work her dad was forced to hire a replacement.

Austin volunteered for the job. With Ally in a musical dry spell and emotional rollercoaster also newly single he found a large void of activity in his life.

Yet another week passed which made it a full month since that fateful night. Ally had been missing in action for about three days. Her dad told Austin she had been held up in her room and when he'd try to check on her she would make some lame excuse why she wouldn't come out.

Austin had done his best to give Ally her space. He was her best friend after all and she just needed sometime and she would come around on her own but she hadn't come around even a little. The two had barely talked in a month and he couldn't take it anymore.

He had had enough, he missed his best friend and she was going to talk to him whether she liked it or not.

So what did ya think? I'm sorry for the cliffhanger. I just wanted to get y'all something today. I'll do my best to update soon! :) Please review and let me know what you think.