"No, Dez, you'll be fine," I promise him, coming up from behind the counter.
"But we both know Austin will go to Hannah and say that I 'lied' to him and told him that Hannah was cheating on him!" Dez exclaims worriedly, putting air quotes around the word "lied." He whimpers. "Ally, what am I gonna do? What am I gonna do? What am I gonna do?!" he repeats over and over. I grab his shirt and bring him down to my level so I can look him in the eye.
"Dez, get a grip! You'll be fine! Just wait until Trish—"
"Why are you talking about me? What did I do?" Trish asks, walking back in. "And what are you doing?" I let go of Dez's shirt.
"Nothing. Do you have a plan?" I ask her. Her eyes light up again the same way they did yesterday.
"I have a plan... But we have to do exactly what I say," she says. I nod in understanding. "Okay. First, you need to—"
"Wait a second. Anything but a blowtorch," I cut her off. She sticks her tongue out at me.
"Fine. We'll have to go with my other plan. Okay, so Dez, you invite Blake and Hannah over, telling them that Austin wants to hang out. Then, when they get to your house, make sure you have your camera set up to record them. When they ask you where Austin is at, tell them that you'll give him a call to see what's taking him. Then just leave the room and pretend to call Austin. If you set it up, we can also watch what they're doing from here. It's foolproof!" Trish exclaims. I run her plan through my mind, looking for any problems.
"There's one vital flaw. What if Austin really wants to hang out with Hannah?" I ask.
"You just have to ask him if he wants to hang out with you. Duh," she says.
"What if he doesn't want to hang out with me?" I ask.
"Who wouldn't want to?" she asks. I narrow my eyes at her. She rolls her own eyes. "Alright, fine since you believe someone wouldn't want to go out with you. Uh... tell him... ooh! Tell him you need to work on a new song!" I smile but it quickly fades away.
"What if Hannah calls him or texts him or—?" I start but Trish cuts me off.
"Hold on," she says, taking out her phone. She talks in a sweet tone at first. "Hey, Austin, could you pretty please come to Sonic Boom for just a second?" There's a pause and her face gets dark. "Austin Monica Moon, get your butt over here right now! We need to talk about some stuff! If you don't come, I will stop being your manager! Imagine trying to get yourself a gig then! Get. Over. Here!" She hangs up the phone and smiles like a little angel.
"What—?" Dez starts to ask but Trish holds up a finger to silence him.
"Six... five... four... three... two... one," she says and Austin runs through the door, completely out of breath. "Hello. Give me your phone."
"What? Why?" he asks.
"I need to program your schedule for the week into your calendar," she answers. He glances at Dez for a second, obviously thinking of what he said earlier. He hesitantly hands her his iPhone. She looks down at him and hands it back. "Unlock it," she demands. He types in his pass code and gives it back to her. She turns it over in her hands.
"Ooh, this is a nice case. What kind is it?" she asks.
"It's... um... it's a Life Proof case..." he says slowly. Trish takes the bright pink case off of his phone and sets his phone on the counter. I look down at it at his home screen wallpaper. It's a picture of Austin and Hannah making out. Disgusting. I casually turn his phone over, putting it face down. Trish examines his case.
"I thought you were going to program my calendar into my phone," Austin says, confused.
"Hold on, hold on," Trish says, apparently very fascinated by his phone case. After another minute or two, she picks up her phone to put the case back on. She drops his phone to the floor and it shatters.
"My phone!" Austin exclaims, dropping to his knees to gather up the remains. He gets a piece of glass stuck in his finger. "Ow!" he yells. He stands up. He brings his finger to his mouth to get rid of some of the blood that's trickled slowly from his finger.
"Don't do that," I warn him.
"What? Why not?" he asks, stopping his finger in mid-air and looking up at me.
"Would you like to have glass in your tongue?" I ask him, moving out from behind the counter. He lowers his hand.
"No," he answers. I lean down to get the emergency kit from under the counter, rolling my eyes as I go. I set it on the counter top and open it. I rummage around in it until I finally find what I'm looking for: tweezers. I walk over to Austin, grab his hand, and bring it close to my face.
"Seems like we're all getting hurt today, huh?" I ask as I begin to dig through Austin's finger for the piece of glass. He shifts uncomfortably every time I move the tweezers around.
"Yeah..." he says quietly. Finally, something hard hits the tweezers and I push the ends together, grabbing it. I pull the piece of glass out and put it on the counter. I finish with his finger and walk to the back room to get a broom and a dust pan. I walk back out. I clean up the mess and throw away the glass into a trash can, along with Austin's phone. See, I realized Trish's plan when she "accidentally" dropped Austin's phone.
"Austin, I'm sorry. It looks like you won't be able to... call or text anybody for a few days," Trish says.
"I guess not," he says sadly. "Thanks for fixing my finger, Ally." I nod.
"Well, I guess I'll go beg my mom for a new phone," Austin says, turning to leave. Trish nudges me and I remember my part of the plan.
"Wait, Austin!" I call. He turns. "Uh, do you want to... help me with a song tomorrow?" I ask, trying to put as much hope as I can in my tone.
"Sure," he says with a small smile. He turns around.
"Wait!" Dez calls. Austin turns around again.
"Yes, Dez?" he asks.
"I just wanted to say... I'm sorry for lying to you," Dez tells him. Austin's smile gets a bit brighter.
"Ah, I can't stay mad at you," he says, walking over to Dez and giving him a quick bro hug.
They do their little handshake and exclaim, "What up!" in a kind of high-pitched voice. I giggle. Austin turns again to leave but turns back.
"Trish..." he says, "is there anything you have to say?" He chuckles. Trish looks up, pretending to be deep in thought.
"Hm... nope," she says. Austin finally leaves. "Phase one complete. Commence phase two," she says, smiling evilly.
"What's phase two?" I ask. The smile falls from her face.
"Phase two is waiting until tomorrow," she grumbles. "But phase three will be inviting Blake and Hannah over to Dez's house." The smile returns as she probably thinks of the outcome of her plan. Her phone rings and she takes it out to answer it. "Uh huh... uh huh... uh huh. Be right over."
"Who was that?" I ask.
"My boss," she answers.
"I thought you got fired," I reply.
"Ooh, you're right. I meant my ex-boss," she tells me. "He wants me to return the earrings I bought with my employee discount or pay for them so... I guess I'll see you two later." And with that, she runs out the door. A thought crosses my mind.
"Hey, Dez... what did Hannah's face look like?" I ask.
"It was really, really red and there was some dried blood that came from her nose. And it looked like she'd just stopped crying. Like, it was really wet and stuff. And all her makeup was running. Ally, it was priceless, I tell you. Priceless," he says, beginning to laugh at the memory.
"Oh, I would have killed to see it," I say, trying to imagine it. I shake my head, smiling. "So, you know what you have to do tomorrow, right?" I ask him. He nods. "And if Hannah does anything to hurt you, verbally or physically, call me and I'll... I'll come beat her up. And then I'll call Trish to come help me finish her off." He nods, smiling.
"Aw, you're like the big sister I never had," he tells me, smiling and on the verge of happy tears. A few of my own well up in my eyes.
"Dez, even though you're older than me, that's the nicest thing you've ever said to me," I tell him, hugging him.
Ooh, I can't wait for tomorrow...
Sorry that it's late and short tonight. I had homework in every single class except fourth (obviously since that's lunch/rec) and seventh period. And then I had projects and... yeah, you guys don't care. ANYWAY, remember to vote (by the way, we've already passed ten voters; I've just forgotten to remind you in the last few chapters) and review, my lovelies!
WAIT! One more thing! We've got a new addition to the wonderful world of Fanfiction . net! GUESS THEIR NAME! GUESS THEIR NAME! Wait for it... wait for it... wait for it... 0NEONLIGHTS0! WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO OOOOOOOOOO! But, in all seriousness. *puts on serious face* If you could read her story, give her feedback, favorite, follow, subscribe, whatever you wanna do, please do. It would mean a lot to 0NeonLights0 and I. I will read her story for myself later on today when I get the time. And if I don't have time... I SHALL MAKE TIME WITH MY TIME-BENDING SKILLS.
Do you know what would be super awks...? If 0NeonLights0 was a boy... I've been calling them a boy... O.o Anyway, review!
LoVe, KeNzIe