I go more review than I thought I would :D Thanks guys. I decided to write the second, I hope it's as good as the rest.
As he strummed away at his favorite cherry red guitar he flipped his hair out of his eyes. He sang out the lyrics that she had written for him. This was always his fall back song, his favorite. He fell into the lyrics as he went, singing Not a Love Song without thinking about his volume. This happened a lot to him, he realized, when he sang her songs. There was always so much feeling in them, there was no way that he could control himself. She might have said that he was the one who put so much feeling into it but he knew different. The song was nothing without her words; without her. Shaking his hair again to get the thoughts out of his head, he risked a peek, still strumming the strings. He almost fell backwards as his eyes met hers. She stared at him, smiling to herself. His finger's slipped and he looked back to his guitar. Why was she looking at him like that? He looked up again expecting her to have gone back to her book. She just stared into his eyes, still smiling away. He gave her one of his pop star patent smiles and started to laugh. She had to have been messing with him. She didn't move.
"Ally?" he questioned when he found that it really bothered him. She made no move to reply. He frowned and dropped his guitar into the stand near his left leg. Making his way over from the Piano bench where he sat, he stood a step from the counter where Ally leaned, still smiling like a small child who recently had been given anything in the world that she wanted. He waved his hand in front of her face a few times before finally getting a response. Her smile dropped off of her face before looking up at him through the spaces in-between his fingers.
"Austin?" She asked, still leaning on the counter. "What are you doing?" Austin leaned over the counter, bringing his face not an inch away from hers. He stared her in the eyes before pulling back. He made a mental note not to stand up that quickly; he suddenly felt dizzy.
"Are you ok?" he asked before raising his hand to her forehead. He was pretty sure that was how his mother checked for a temperature. He couldn't quite place it but something was wrong. "You were staring at me" No not staring at me, just spacing off, he paused. "-spacing off really." He corrected himself. His stomach turned when she shook her head with a smile.
"It' nothing," she said as he raised a hand to his stomach. "I'm just not feeling too good." She finished. He looked down at her. worry laced his face.
"Well you don't feel too warm," he said "but your face is definitely red." He grabbed her wrist before pulling over to the stairs. "Maybe you should go up to the practice room and take a break." He smiled down at her with everything he had, attempting not to show the worry he was holding in. "I'll watch the store until you feel better." He said. She gave him a look of indiscernible nature before pulling him into a hug. His stomach flipped and his heart threatened to jerk out of his chest. No. This could not be happening. He pushed her away. Making sure to smile, he looked down at her. "Get up there, will you?" he posed the question as a command. Ally nodded, that indiscernible look still covering her face. He watched as she walked out of his hands and up the stairs, stopping to look back before quickly walking into her practice room; closing the door behind her. Austin stared at the door for what could have been minutes before spinning around and dropping his on top of the counter.
"This can't be happening." He whined bouncing his head up and down on the counter. He had promised himself that he wouldn't do this with her. Not with her. So many times he had had these feelings and acted on them. It would be great until something went wrong. He wouldn't have minded if it could ever end well, but it never did. There was no going back to the way things were. He would never be able to see her again. He would lose his songwriter; his best friend. He told himself these things over and over again, whenever something like this happened. He thought that He and Ally could have made it with just being friends, and it was working for the first three months. He felt nothing when she hugged him, when she smiled; he left nothing, until now. He and Ally where opposites. They had nothing in common other than their love of music. So why did his heart leap when she hugged him this time. Why did he feel the need to pull her closer, keep her safe? Was it because she was sick, was he simply feeling responsible. Even though this seemed improbable, he dug this into his brain. He knew that if it was anything else, he was utterly screwed. There was a ding as the front door of the store opened. He stood up straight, a smile on his face.
"Welcome to-"he said loudly before stopping. "Oh, it just you Des." He said to his red headed friend. This was just what he needed, a distraction; something to get his mind off of things.
"Hey Austin, have you seen Trish?" Des questioned before pulling his backpack up on his back. "I've been looking all over the mall, but I can't find her new job." Austin's real smile came about and he walked over to his friend.
"Not today Des. What are you up to?" he questioned his friend before Des frowned.
"She said that she wanted to have a zalion's marathon today." Des's smile came back quickly "Do you want to join?" he asked hopeful pulling at his friend's hand. Austin stopped Des as he pulled him towards the door. Austin looked up towards the practice room. There would be no distraction for him this time.
"Sorry, Des, I told Ally I would look after the store for her while she took a break." Des nodded in understanding.
"Well," Des said shoving his hands into the pockets of his bright red pants. "If you see Trish, tell her I'm looking for her, K?" he said with a bright smile, exiting the store. Austin sighed and turned back to the counter. The last group of people exited the store and Austin looked up to the practice room and sighed.
Austin watched as the day passed. For four hours, he watched as a scarce number of people walked back and forth without buying anything. He distracted himself by ignoring the posted signs and playing every instrument on display. Luckily this took up his time, but he did notice how most of the tunes he played where slow and legato and he didn't hate it. Only a few minutes before closing the bell rang one last time as a familiar face made its way into the store, eyes peeled for a specific brunette. Dallas, the cellphone accessory cart guy, looked around the store before spotting Austin in the corner, a saxophone hovering outside his mouth. They make eye contact for a heartbeat before they both smile. Austin sets the sax back onto the stand before walking over to where Dallas leaned on the counter.
"I'm looking for Ally." Dallas said still leaning. Austin waltzed around Dallas. He wondered why it was so hard to be friendly to this guy when everyone else liked him. He was a nice guy, he admitted, but he couldn't bring himself to like him. Austin gave a smile that was maybe to obviously a fake one.
"She wasn't feeling well so I took over for her." he said still smiling, now standing behind the counter. This wasn't a lie as far as Austin could tell. Neither could Dallas. "So, if there's anything I can do for you-?" he asked feeling extremely triumphant. Dallas nodded and smiled.
"Well, could you tell her that I wanted to talk to her? It's not too important, but if you could-"Austin nodded along with his request trying not to laugh at the boy's unnaturally high pitched voice. He may not have liked the kid but he definitely couldn't do that do him. Dallas turned and walked out of the store. Austin glared at the boy, his smile dropping off his face and onto the floor.
Austin knew why he didn't like Dallas; for putting thoughts in his head. Just after meeting Ally, he had a problem. She wrote in her journal that she had a crush on someone with the same name as a city in Texas. Before learning that she was talking about Dallas, Austin thought it was him. After just a small amount of time he couldn't possibly have liked her like that. He tried his best to make her not like him. The worst part of the whole day wasn't being humiliated on the jumbo-tron in the mall; it had to face Ally's face when she realized that he was so against the idea of them being together. Even though it wasn't the original thought in her head and he knew that, her face was so sad. Even when she understood his reasoning, that face stuck in her head. He never wanted to see that face again, so for all of the time he knew her he tried his best to make her smile. He sighed as he locked the front door and flipped the closed sign. Dallas hadn't really complicated everything but he definitely had a part in it. Austin refused to accept that he had any blame in this. He replaced all of the instruments that he had messed with back in their spots. He swept the floor to the best of his abilities and made his way up the stairs.
Austin hesitated before knocking on the door. He waited but no response came so he slid the door open quietly. On the floor next to the couch was a thin red pillow, that he expected Ally to have used to block out the sun. He would have done the same. He laughed to himself as he walked over to pick up the pillow. He bent down to pick it up and turned to find Ally snoozing next to him. He found himself smiling and couldn't be bothered to stop himself. He laid the pillow on the floor and sat on it. He couldn't bring himself to wake her up so he figured he'd wait. She had been sleeping for the past four hours, she wouldn't be much longer.