"You're nuts, Ally. Plain nuts," Austin shouted, banging his hand on the table in anger and frustration. I had just told him that I wanted to live the high life and wanted him to help me with my To-Do List.
I crossed my arms. "But I helped you with your To-Do List for years! Why can't you do this for me?" I argued.
"Because!"
"Because what?"
We were currently outdoors, standing face-to-face on the brack. I'm pretty sure the entire neighborhood could hear us but I couldn't care less. I was going to have my own To-Do List whether he liked it or not. Maybe when I lost my virginity to some random stranger, I'd be able to heal the 17 (almost 18) years of emotional pain Austin caused me.
"Because I said no," Austin said in a soft but firm tone after a pregnant pause.
I rolled my eyes. "Yes dad, anything you say goes, dad," I said sarcastically in a half-joking manner.
My ass of a best friend patted me on the cheek. "I'm glad you know that, Ally."
I rolled my eyes once again (I swear, one day my eyes will be permanently glued to the back of my head thanks to this prick) and walked back to my room to retrieve the book. I returned to Austin and turned to my page on the To-Do List. I already had five names on it.
It was quite ironic, actually. I had two motives for coming up with my own To-Do List: To make Austin jealous, and to get over him. You can call it contradiction but I call it killing two birds with one stone.
"Dallas Strong," I said as I pointed to Dallas' name. I patted his stunned cheek (bitchily, may I add) and walked away with my head held up high like a queen.
"I officially call this Team Austin meeting to order," I said, holding a toy gavel and knocking it on my desk in the practice room as if I were a judge in the court. Man oh man, do I love gaveling! "Roll call! Austin Moon?"
"Here."
"Trish de la Rosa?"
"Here… unfortunately."
"Dez Worthy?"
"H-h-h-h-here!" came Dez's frantic voice. We all looked up and saw him dancing like he had a mouse in his pants. Trish smirked and said, "Dez." He calmed down instantly and raised his eyebrow when he noticed that we were all staring at him bemusedly. What was he up to now?
Trish was happy to clear everything up for us. "Adam and I hypnotized him into thinking that there would be mice in his pants every time he hears his own name," she said, trying to oppress her laughter.
"You.. what… How could you?" he cried out, grabbing Trish by the shoulders and shaking her back and forth dramatically, just like how he shook her when he asked her why she flushed his goldfish down the toilet bowl during our freshman year.
If Adam were here, he'd probably have flung Dez out of the room for laying a hand on his girl. Unfortunately, he was babysitting some little terrors so he couldn't turn up for the meeting.
"Dez, calm down!" I shouted as I attempted to grab him away from Trish. He froze. Oops, I forgot about the trigger word.
"MICE IN MY PANTS! M-MICE IN MY PANTS!" he shrieked as he started dancing around the room again.
"Dez!" Austin shouted and Dez finally stopped jumping around.
I glared at Trish as she shrugged her shoulders and laughed nervously. "Crazy, right?" she coughed.
"Okay, EP update: we've written about 25 songs but we feel that only 3 of them are suitable for the EP. We're gonna start working on a couple more songs and select 2 more for the EP," I said as Austin wrote down everything on our Team Austin notebook. He was our note-taker, he wrote down all our meeting minutes into the notebook. "Manager, how about you?"
"Austin, what is the one thing you've been begging me to do ever since I became your manager?" Trish asked excitedly. We could sense that she had some really exciting news for Austin and we all leaned in towards her, curious to know what the big news was.
Honestly, I had no idea what Austin had been begging her to do and apparently, neither did Austin. "Uh… to stop making googly eyes at Adam and to just kiss the poor guy already? Which you already did?" he said uncertainly with a weak laugh.
Trish blushed and rolled her eyes in response.
"I meant something career-related, you doofus!"
"To meet Laura Marano and marry her?" he asked, casting a swift glance in my direction. When he saw that I was scowling, he smirked smugly. He knew that I didn't particularly like Laura. To be honest, I effing love her. If I were a guy, I'd totally marry her. But I despised the fact that she had Austin's heart and I didn't. I wouldn't say I was jealous… I was just competitive by nature.
Trish threw her hands up in exasperation. "You're a lousy guesser. I'm just going to break the news to you, so here goes…" she said, trailing off.
The suspense was killing me.
"WHAT IS IT TRISH? OUT WITH IT, YOU NINCOMPOOP!" I practically screamed after a minute of silence. Yeah, I could be a real badass when I was annoyed.
"You, Austin Moon, are going to…"
"Yes?" Austin asked all-too-eagerly.
"Perform at…"
"Where?" Dez shrieked.
"Dez!" Trish finished.
Dez started screaming about a mice apocalypse in his pants again, causing Trish to start laughing like a hyena. "Really, Trish?" I drawled monotonously. She put her hands up. "What? It's funny!"
"I'm going to perform at Dez…?" Austin asked, uncertain if he heard his wacko of a manager speak correctly.
Upon hearing his name, Dez calmed down again.
"So, what's the big surprise?" Dez asked as he clapped his hands together excitedly.
"You're going to be performing at Times Square on New Years' Eve!" Trish squealed.
Three seconds had passed and we were still staring at her in shock.
"OH MY GOD!" Austin screamed as we screamed along with him. We huddled into a circle, held hands (I HELD AUSTIN'S HAND) and started jumping around and screaming with one another.
This was HUGE! Austin only had one official song released before this. It was titled "Double Take" and it went viral on the internet. He made quite a big name for himself but his popularity dwindled after half a year of inactivity. He wasn't inactive though, he was just taking time off to work on his EP.
And now, to be able to perform at one of the biggest events, if not THE biggest event, in America… it was such an honor.
"How'd you do it, Trish?" I asked and looked at her incredulously.
"Well, I may or may not have kidnapped the concert promoter's daughter…"
"Trish!" I chided.
"Kidding! I just emailed and called the promoter to try my luck. Turns out, his daughter, Chantel, is a huge Austin Moon fan so he agreed almost instantly. And you know what the best part is?"
We shook our heads.
"You get to take Chantel out for dinner!"
Silence. If we were out in the jungle, you could probably hear crickets.
"Umm… okay…?" Austin asked unsurely. He loved his fans and all, but I knew he secretly hoped that the 'best part' would be something like getting to meet Laura Marano or scoring invites to the hot star-studded after-party.
"Well, apart from that, we've also been invited to the after-party! And most importantly… WE GET PAID!"
We erupted into cheers. Two things made the world go round: Music and Money. Of course, there's Austin Moon too but maybe that just applied to his fans and me.
After Trish left for her date with Adam and Dez left for his flight to Los Angeles (most of his family lived in LA so he and his family would fly over to tinsel town for Thanksgiving every year), Austin and I were alone in the practice room. Insert promiscuous wink.
"So, looks like we've got to release your EP soon, huh?" I asked Austin. We were both sitting at the piano, brainstorming for song lyrics.
"Yeah, gotta get it out there before the 31st of December."
I patted his shoulder. I could tell from his face that he was under immense stress. Sure, it was great news and it was a great opportunity to promote Austin as an artist as well as his upcoming EP and album, but this meant that he was going to be performing in front of the whole nation and even to some international audiences. Billions of people would be watching him. Even One Direction would crack under that kind of pressure.
"It'll be alright, we'll get through this together," I comforted him. He smiled (and melted me into a puddle of icky goo) and hugged me tight.
"Thanks, Als. There's no way I could've made it without you."