Dreams ~ Second in the Crushed Trilogy
I know I’ve felt like this before
But now I’m feeling it even more
Because it came from you
Then I open up and see
The person falling here is me
~Cranberries, Dreams
June 6, 2003
**********
Allison Montgomery smiled as she climbed out of the cab. Taking a deep breath, she couldn’t hold back the grin. Home. It smelled like home. The good ole outdoors of Tennessee. Fresh. Green. Natural. Rain. No more smog or dirty London streets. Just good, refreshing, clean Tennessee. Something that she had missed over the last two years.
After paying the cab driver (her brother, Clint, was DEFINITELY paying her back for that!) she dragged her bags into the house. Stopping in the entryway, she looked around. She hadn’t been home in almost two years, but it honestly didn’t look like that much had changed.
She wasn’t sure what she had been expecting. So much had happened to her in the last two years that she’d expected the rest of the world to be changing too. But it hadn’t. Almost everything in the house was the same as when she had left it, except for a couple of new pictures on the fireplace mantle”a new one of Clint and his fiancée Lily, one of her and her roommate in London. A new picture of Justin and Clint, standing in their driveway.
Allison left her bags in the entryway, hoping Clint would get the hint when he got home from work that he was supposed to do the gentlemanly thing and bring all her crap upstairs for her, and wandered into the living room. Was it a new picture?
Studying it for a few moments, Allison decided that yes, it was definitely recent. Justin had the chin hair thing going, which she knew was something he’d just done this spring.
Justin. Allison told herself that the tiny flip of her stomach at the thought of her older brother’s best friend was a reaction to remembering her embarrassing episode of two years ago, and NOT a reaction to thinking about just him. Because she was over him. She was SO over him.
And she would prove it too, the next time they met.
**********
While she had vowed to prove that she no longer crushed on him like she had when she was younger, Allison wasn’t expecting to have to prove it that night.
Her parents were out of town for the week, which didn’t really bother her since they’d come to England to visit her a month ago. Clint was supposed to be there with her, but had ended up going out with Lily somewhere for a late, romantic dinner. Allison shuddered. Ick, gag her with a spoon. She was grateful they had gone out for dinner, rather than sticking around and making Allison watch them being all lovey-dovey with each other.
But when the doorbell rang, Allison’s sixth sense kicked into overdrive, telling her not to open that door; it was Justin and she wasn’t ready for this yet.
Allison ignored the little warning going off in her mind. She was out to prove a point, wasn’t she? This was what she had been waiting two years to do. Still she hesitated when she reached for the door. For that moment in time, as she stood with her hand on the doorknob, her kiss with Justin replayed over and over in her mind. Or maybe it would be better termed as an attack. He’d had no warning that his best friend’s little sister was about to kiss him, he hadn’t exactly been welcoming, and it had lasted for all of five seconds before he’d broken it off. Yeah, it was definitely more appropriate to call it an attack, not a kiss.
If the rain that Allison had smelled earlier hadn’t been coming down in sheets by the time Justin rang the doorbell, she might have lost the nerve to go through with her plan and might have just left him out there. As it was, all she could do was take a deep breath and open the door.
Oh God, he was so damn hot. Standing on the doorstep, a hooded jacket pulled up around his face, his arms wrapped around his ribs in an attempt to ward off the chill that had come with the night storm. He smiled up at her, and Allison felt her resolve weakening. Was she even strong enough to make him fall for her without reverting back to her childhood crush at the same time?
“Hey, Allison. You gonna let me in, or do I have to stay out here in the rain?”
“I dunno, Justin. Right now, you look like my own little Cry Me A River Justin. I just might have to keep you like this.”
Justin grinned and Allison felt like patting herself on the back as she moved out of the way to let him in. Not only had she managed to bring back the teasing attitude they’d always had between them”up until she’d kissed him”but she’d been the first to tease. Which was new. Justin had always been the one to make the first comment, give the first insult, whatever, and she’d always been the one responding.
Maybe, just maybe, these last two years away had given her the confidence to pull this off.
Pushing back the hood on his jacket, Justin looked around the house. “Is Clint here?”
“No, he took Lily out for dinner somewhere.”
“What, you didn’t want to go?”
“And spend the entire time ignoring the game of footsie under the table and pretending not to see the secret smiles? No, I passed.”
“You could have invited me and we could have gotten our own game going,” Justin suggested, grinning devilishly.
“Mmmm, that is so tempting,” Allison said, rolling her eyes.
“So how was England, Pipsqueak?”
Allison had to force herself not to respond to the nickname. Justin had called her Pipsqueak or Squeak for most of her life. It had never really bothered her before her “attack” two years ago. Now it reminded her of what a little kid she had been back then. And how determined to prove that she wasn’t the same little girl anymore.
Of course, she would have chosen a better time for the showdown. She considered it pure luck that she’d had a nap and a shower that afternoon and didn’t LOOK like she’d just flown across the Atlantic earlier that day.
But would it be enough to make Justin want her? He hadn’t two years ago”he’d shown that obviously enough. And now it was her turn.
“It was great. But I thought you were out on the west coast, doing concerts and all that jazz. What are you doing here? Tonight?”
Justin gave her an odd look. Okay, maybe she needed to let up just a little…but she just hadn’t expected him to be in town tonight! She would have liked a few days to rest, to get her bearings back, to get used to being in Shelby Forest again. Grrr.
“No, we had to move the Oakland concert, do it a day early, so that was last night. And Clint told me you were coming home today, so I thought I would drop in and say ‘Hi.’” Justin gave her the charming grin that had made her melt on her Sweet 16, the day she had started crushing on him.
And oh, wow, him saying he’d come back to Tennessee just to see her on her return from Cambridge made the butterflies already cruising around in her stomach go crazy.
“Damn. That’s quite a compliment. A big, flashy popstar like yourself flying back here to see little ole me. If only I could sell this moment on Ebay.” She flashed an equally charming grin back at him. It had taken a lot of mirror time for her to perfect that smile. The I’m-so-confident-and-I-know-I-can-make-you-want-me smile. But since she’d made the decision a year ago that when she returned home, she would make Justin want her the way she’d wanted him for two years, she’d had a lot of time to spend in front of the mirror.
And she’d had a lot of time to learn how to be confident in herself. That was the biggest change she’d undergone over her two years in England, she knew. Learning to be comfortable with who she was. And it had taken her two years to realize that she didn’t have to go all the way to London to figure it out.
“Great, now you have me wondering how much it actually WOULD go for on Ebay,” Justin joked, faking a thoughtful look.
This time Allison’s grin was real. God, he was so cute, and fun, and could she really do this? She struggled to remember how Justin had looked at her that night she had kissed him. The shocked, disbelieving look. The what-the-hell look. The not-quite-a-nice-surprise look. The would-not-have-wanted-this-to-happen-EVER look.
Oh yeah, she could do this.
**********
Justin followed Allison into the living room. She sat on the couch, picking up a mangy ball of fur that had been sitting in the corner of the loveseat and pulling it onto her lap.
He stayed standing, leaning his shoulder against the fireplace mantle. “What the hell is that?”
Allison gave him an indignant look. “It’s a dog, dumbass. And be nice! Clint and Lily just adopted her from the pound yesterday, and she’s still scared of most people. Especially mean crackheads like yourself.” She nodded as she finished her defensive spiel and kissed the top of the mutt’s head. Talking to the dirty-looking thing, she petted its head in a calming fashion. “He doesn’t know anything. He’s probably a cat person anyway. Ignore him, you’re cute. Yes, you are.”
Justin tried not to laugh. The raggedy ball of fur looked like she could use a bath or two…or five. But Allison looked pretty cute, defending the mutt, her hand running down its back as she continued to “soothe” the thing.
There was something different about her, Justin noticed as he continued to just observe. Ever since she’d opened the door, it was almost like he was looking at a different Allison. And he probably was, he admitted. She’d been gone for two years; she’d probably changed a lot.
One thing that had changed, he’d noted right away, was that she had grown up. Grown into herself. She’d always been his best friend’s shy bookworm of a little sister. He’d sometimes have to work for ten minutes, trying to get her to talk to him, before she would give him more than a one word answer. The only time she’d been comfortable around him was when they were teasing each other or she was talking about her books.
He’d always felt a little bad for her when they were all growing up, and had paid some extra attention to her because of it. Not that he’d pitied her, but she had never seemed to fit in with everyone else in the small town of Shelby Forest. He’d identified with that, understood it, and had always felt like they shared that little connection.
And then she’d come back from England…all grown up.
“What’s up?”
Justin’s thoughts were interrupted by Allison’s question, and he was grateful for it. They had been traveling into a dangerous area. Clint had been his best friend since they were in diapers, and he’d known Allison all her life. He REALLY shouldn’t be thinking of her in a grown up sense”she was still Clint’s little sister.
“Nothing really,” he answered. “Just thinking about how much you seem to have changed.”
Dumb, dumb, dumb! He felt like hitting himself in the head! What in the hell had he been thinking, he asked himself, as Allison stood up from the couch, depositing the mutt back where she had found it. Her head tilted slightly to one side as she smiled at him. “Really? In what way?”
Justin gulped. Damn, she was pretty when she smiled. It was a smile he’d never seen on her before. Comfortable, beautiful, confident. Things he shouldn’t have been noticing about Clint’s baby sister. If he’d been wearing a shirt and tie, he would have run his finger around the collar, loosened it up a little bit. As it was, it felt like something was tightening around his neck, but it was only his imagination as he recognized the fact that this was risky territory.
“Oh, you know. You just seem…a lot more confident, a lot more sure about yourself. Which I imagine came from being in England for the last two years, getting out, seeing the world. It seems to have done you some good.”
Allison’s smile changed a little then, lost some of its happiness and took on a slightly sadder note. “Did getting out and seeing the world do that for you?” she asked.
Justin noticed that she looked pretty interested in his answer. “I suppose. I mean, getting out there, doing my thing, I guess that it’s given me some confidence.”
Allison threw back her head and outright laughed at that one. “Justin, one thing you NEVER lacked while we were growing up was confidence. Trust me, the level of confidence you have did NOT come from being out and about, doing your ‘thing.’”
Don’t laugh with her, don’t laugh with her. But he couldn’t help it. Because it was so true. He’d always been confident, had never lacked in that area growing up in Shelby Forest. So he supposed his self-assuredness hadn’t come from being away from their little town.
Smiling at her, he asked, “Does that mean your newfound confidence didn’t come from your being over in London? Because, trust me when I say this, you were not like this when you lived here before. And you seem happier.”
She was genuinely pleased by his compliment, he could tell, and this time he had to resist the urge to bang his head into the mantle in self-recrimination. Damn, this was Allison; he shouldn’t be paying her compliments like this. Because she really wasn’t Clint’s little sister anymore. She was twenty years old now, and damn! she looked good.
“I am happier. And no, it didn’t come from being in London. When I left here, I thought being over there would change me, you know? I thought if I could finally find a place I fit in at, everything would be going my way.”
She paused and Justin looked at her, remembering. “You’ve always been a dreamer. Even when you were five years old, and you swore to me and Clint that you were going to be a princess one day.”
Nodding, she smiled, and Justin could tell she remembered the day she’d walked down the stairs in her mother’s silk nightgown and declared to Clint and Justin that they were her subjects and all should bow down and worship her. When they’d refused, instead of crying or pouting, she’d turned and headed back upstairs. At the top, she’d looked down at them where they stood, joking and laughing about Clint’s baby sister, and had determinedly told them that one day, she WOULD be a princess.
Justin had known, right then and there, that Allison wasn’t like any of the other kids in Shelby. She was like him, she had the big dreams like he did, the determination to see them out. But over the years, she had lost some of that determination. Not the dreams, but the drive to see them through. She’d grown quieter about her dreams, hadn’t started living them young like he had. When she’d gotten the scholarship to Cambridge, he couldn’t have been happier for her. It was what she wanted, and at the time, what she thought she’d needed.
“Yeah, I was a dreamer. Not so much anymore. I went over there, studied English literature like I’d always wanted. But it wasn’t like I’d always imagined. I guess I thought I would finally find people like me over there. People who understood me and my big dreams. I was so sure that when I went to England, when I got out of this two-bit town, I would finally fit in some place. And it took me two years, but I finally realized that greener pastures aren’t always on the other side. I’m the same person, no matter where I am, Tennessee or England. And I’m finally comfortable being that person.”
Damn, she looked so sweet, and pure, and beautiful, standing there in front of him. He smiled, brushing some of her baby hairs behind her ear, leaving his thumb resting on her cheek. She took a few shuffling baby steps into him, and Justin started to lean down, knowing that she wanted this as much as he did, knowing that she would welcome this kiss, realizing that after knowing her for twenty years, he was finally seeing Allison as who she really was.
Beautiful. Confident. Assured. And Clint’s little sister.
Shit! He jerked back, half-a-second before his mouth would have brushed hers. Oh God, Clint would kill him. He would absolutely KILL Justin for even thinking of touching Allison. Let alone almost kissing her.
“Uhh. Just remembered. Gotta go. Talk to you tomorrow,” he said hurriedly, backing away, toward the entry hallway. Goddamn, what had he been thinking, he wondered as he reached the front door. This was Allison! The Allison he’d grown up with, had thought of as his own little sister for most of their lives. And he had almost kissed her.
He closed the front door behind him, leaning back against it. Breathing heavily. The rain washed down his face as his head was tilted back slightly to rest against the door.
He’d almost kissed Allison. Little Allison Montgomery. His best friend’s little sister. There were certain rules to be followed between friends, Justin knew. Thou shalt not touch thy best friend’s baby sister was probably the biggest law.
And Justin had broken it. Not only had he touched, he’d almost kissed her. Had wanted to like nothing he’d wanted in a long time.
Because the Allison on the other side of the door was what he had wanted without ever realizing it. She was the big dreamer he’d grown up WITH, only now SHE was all grown up. The little kid who’d never fit in, only not so little anymore.
And even though he knew he should, even though every survival instinct he had was screaming for him to get in the car, and get the hell away from Clint’s little sister, he didn’t move from the front step.
Because there was a little voice inside his head, arguing quietly beneath all the big voices yelling at Justin about his best friend’s little sister. And it was the little voice that he wanted to listen to. The one that said she was twenty years old. Not someone’s little sister anymore. Not really off limits. She was an adult, full grown, fully capable of making her own decisions.
And, the little voice argued, if she hadn’t been Clint’s sister, would he be in there, right now? And Justin knew without a doubt that if he hadn’t always thought of her as Clint’s little sister before tonight, if she had been any other girl in Shelby Forest, yes, he would be in there with her. That if it had been somebody else, and he had found a connection with her like he had with Allison, he never would have walked away.
That was the thought inside his head as he reopened the front door. Because he knew she wasn’t Clint’s LITTLE sister anymore. She was just Allison, the girl he’d always felt that he had something in common with who had come back to Shelby Forest all grown up. Just Allison.
She had disappeared from the living room. He walked quickly through the downstairs, unmindful of the trail of water he was leaving throughout the house.
He was about to head up the stairs to check her bedroom when he saw her through the back window. In the backyard, her arms wrapped around herself, looking out into the forest behind their house, getting soaked as the rain came down. Looking like she was trying to figure out the answer to the world’s hardest question. Standing there, confused, disheartened. Sad.
The back door was open and he had crossed to her in three steps. She’d turned when he’d opened the door, and her arms went silently around his neck as his hands went to her hips and his mouth came down on hers.
**********
Oh God, Allison thought, as the kiss with Justin seemed to last forever. This was what she had dreamed about. This was moment that had played in her mind since her Sweet 16, Justin being the one to initiate the kiss. Justin wanting her as much as she had wanted him. And this was the moment she had been dreaming about for the last year, but for a different reason. For the last year, she had wanted this moment, just so she could have her revenge on him.
Only now was she realizing just how hard it would be to pull off her part of the revenge scheme. Because she was discovering that she WASN’T strong enough to not fall for him all over again.
But she had waited too long for an opportunity like this. A full year after initially deciding to turn the tables on Justin Timberlake. And she COULD do it.
Allison pulled back from the kiss. Not quite as decisively as Justin had pulled away two years ago, not as abruptly, and not with the same amount of shock. But she did it.
She smiled. It felt fake, and she could only hope it didn’t show. “Hmmm. Thanks, Justin.”
Justin gave her a confused look as she pulled away from the kiss. His arms fell awkwardly to his side as she stepped out of their reach, as his hands slid off her hips. “Um, okay. For what?”
Oh God, she couldn’t keep the smile, no matter how hard she tried. She couldn’t keep the cynical, revenge-filled smile she’d practiced in the mirror for the last year, since she’d first decided to show Justin that she could make him want her just as much as she’d wanted him for years. Instead, she turned away. “Thanks for showing me that dreams do die, that crushes go away, that I AM over you.”
Allison was thankful that she couldn’t see his confused look anymore, his what-just-happened-here questioning gaze. Because she could hear it in his voice, and it was killing her. She’d thought herself in love with him for three years before deciding it was time to get over her crush, and right now, she almost couldn’t take the hurt she’d heard in his voice. It would be impossible if she actually had to see it.
“So that’s what this was? Just a little test for yourself?”
His voice had changed, from hurt to anger, and Allison turned back around, faced him again. Because anger she could deal with. Anger was what she’d been dealing with for the last year within herself, and she could respond well to it coming from Justin.
“What’s wrong, Mr. Popstar? Can’t take the idea that someone doesn’t want you? Can’t handle the fact that I outgrew my crush on you? Did it make you feel better when your ego needed a boost over the last few years? Remembering the way I went after you before I left, remembering the way I tried to kiss you? Did thinking that I was pining away for you while I was in England make you feel better about yourself?”
Justin shook his head in disgust as he backed away from her. “Is that what you think, Allison? Because, honestly, I forgot about it a few days after it happened. But obviously you haven’t. Has it been eating away at you all this time? Is that why you came back here, ready to tangle again, feeling the need to prove something to yourself? Well, if that’s what you came to do, and you feel that you did it, I hope it provides a comfort for you. Because obviously, this night will replay in your mind as much as the last time we kissed did. And if you think you proved anything, that you got me out of your system now, you’re going to find out how much of a lie that is. Because you’re still going to be thinking about me, every night. You’re still going to be thinking about this kiss. And the last one. So tell me, where’s your comfort now, Allison?”
Allison had turned away from him, faced the backyard forest again when he’d started getting to the truth of the matter, when he started talking about the fact that their kiss would replay in her mind every night. Because it would. And he knew it.
But she stood there. She ignored him until she heard the fence gate slam and Justin’s car start a few seconds later. Then she sat down, in the rain, in the muddy grass, the storm raging on around her. And she cried.
