CHAPTER TWO
━━━━ season one, episode two

kangaroos and chaos!
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"This violin is made of... the finest maple wood. It was... Uh, it was hand carved—" Ally was in the middle of explaining to a customer about the instrument in her hand when a paper ball hit her head from Austin and Dez playing Banjo Badminton in the store. "Would you excuse me for a sec? Yeah."

The customer walked away with the violin in her hand, leaving Ally to turn to the boys. "Do you guys have to do that here?"

Austin looked at her in disbelief. "Hey. We're not complaining that you're working right in the middle of our banjo badminton court."

Adelaide finally returned from the bathroom and approached the three, with her attention on the blonde. "Then move your game someplace else where things can't get broken."

Austin stuck his tongue out at her like a child, in which she responded with the same action before they turned to Dez who chimed in. "Well, we'd rather be making a music video but somebody hasn't finished writing the song yet."

"Believe it or not, my sister does have another job other than being blondie's songwriter." Adelaide reminded the redhead, getting two different reactions from the others — Ally looking at her in appreciation and Austin feeling offended.

Ally nodded. "Exactly. I'm busy working right now."

Dez shrugged his shoulders. "Fine. Then we're busy badmintoning. Game point!" He said before going to serve, using the banjo that was broken seconds later after Dez accidentally whacked it onto the counter.

Ally approached Dez. "Would you like to pay cash for that or should I put it on your tab?" She asked the redhead who chose the second option. "Oh okay." She smiled awkwardly, the receipt dropping from Ally's hand, the end of it touching the floor to indicate how big the tab was.

"Told you." Adelaide smirked, looking at Austin who sent her a playful glare before walking away just as the twins' father came walking out, holding an accordion to his chest.

"Well, I am off to the accordion convention. And 'accordion' to my watch, I should have left an hour ago." Lester laughed at his own joke with Dez joining in. Noticing Lester's stare, Dez then stopped laughing before walking away.

"Well, sweeties, you two are in charge." Lester informed his daughters before looking around the store. "The store looks a little crowded. Are you sure you two will be okay?"

"Actually, dad. We probably—" Ally began to say, only for Lester to interject, not acknowledging what she was saying as he left the store as if she responded on a positive note.

"Okay. I'm coming off my break now to help you, Ally." Adelaide said, stepping behind the counter with her sister before the twins were quickly crowded by customers and rushed to help them, obviously struggling slightly.

"No, this isn't the eye doctor." Ally shouted to one of the customers who nodded before turning around to leave the store, only to crash into the cymbal racks.

"Guess who got a job at the yo-yo cart?" Trish announced as she walked into the store just as the customer left. "Watch this."

The twins and the boys were quick to duck down behind the counter in attempt to avoid getting hit by the yo-yo's. After a moment, they slowly began to stand back up to see Trish struggling with the yo-yo's and ended up getting the strings tangled around her neck.

"It's my first day and..." Trish chuckled nervously as she started to pull the tangled strings off herself. "Probably my last."

The De La Rosa girl dropped the yo-yo's to the floor before turning to Ally in question. "So, Ally, have you finished writing Austin's new song?"

"It-it's almost done." Ally answered before continuing her explanation. "I've just been really busy lately. I've got work, school, book club. I have to read this by tomorrow."

"Tomorrow of what year?" Austin questioned the girl as he flicked through the pages to the giant book that Ally dropped onto the counter.

"You would not catch me reading that, that's for sure." Adelaide mumbled, stopping beside Ally with a water bottle in her hand.

Dez sighed. "Well, we need a song. I can't make a video without a song." He reminded Ally who was quick to send one back in return. "Hey, it's not like I've been spending all my free time training to eat a 20 pound hamburger."

Dez huffed before pulling out his trophy. "You're just jealous."

Trish approached the twins. "Ally, if we don't get a new video up on the website quick, people are gonna forget who Austin is."

"Seriously, it's been a whole month since the last video." Dez chimed in.

Their responses caused Austin to sigh. "Guys, cut Ally some slack. A month isn't that long. It's pretty hard to forget Austin Moon." He tried to reassure his friends.

"Hey, it's Ralphie Hayes from the dog food commercial! Oh my—" A customer pointed out as they stood near the door with their friend, looking at Austin.

Adelaide smirked, moving to stand beside Austin to chime in with a remark. "Boom! Your ego just dropped."

"Dog food commercial?" The blonde-haired boy furrowed his brows in confusion before turning around to look at Ally in panic. "Ally, you gotta finish that song now!"

"Fine. Y-you want the song? Ah! Here!" Ally rhetorically asked, scribbling something down on a piece of paper before throwing it to Austin, the paper ball hitting him in the shoulder.

"See? That wasn't so hard." Austin said, picking up the scrunched up paper, earning a look from the girls.

"No way! It's the same guy who won the 20 pound hamburger eating contest." The same girl from before gasped when she noticed Dez by the counter, earning confused looks from the others who were still by the counter. "Can I have your autograph?"

"Sure. Turn around." Dez told the smiling fangirl who did as he said before receiving an autograph on the back of her jacket, done by Dez in ketchup.

Disgusting.

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"Are you kidding me?" Austin groaned, following Ally back down the stairs after watching the dog food commercial. "That guy doesn't look like me at all."

"I mean, are you sure?" Adelaide hummed as the blonde stopped beside her. "I don't really see a difference, apart from your hair—" The girl went to grab at Austin's hair when he gripped her wrists softly, stopping her before she could.

"Never touch my hair." Austin said, looking down at Adelaide who widened her eyes. She pulled her hands away from him, raising them in the air in defence while muttering. "Alright blonde Bieber."

Dez groaned in disgust. "This dog food is horrible."

Adelaide raised her brows in question, although slightly concerned. "Then why are you still eating it?"

Dez simply shrugged in response, looking at his blonde-haired best friend who sighed. "We need to shoot this video soon. I don't want to be remembered as the guy who looks like the guy who sells horrible-tasting dog food."

"Guess who got a job at the dry-cleaners?" Trish announced as she walked into the store with a leather jacket in her hand.

The twins approached their friend from behind the counter. "What happened to your job at the yo-yo cart?" Ally was first to question.

"It's a long, complicated story."

"You got fired." Adelaide nodded along in theory, her comment making the blonde boy chuckle from behind.

Trish furrowed her brows. "Huh. I guess it's not that long or complicated." She said before showing the group the piece of clothing in her hand. "Check out this amazing jacket I'm borrowing from work for the music video."

"Doesn't that belong to somebody?" Addy asked.

Trish nodded. "Yeah. Some big burly ultimate fighter guy named Facepuncher."

"Facepuncher?" Ally rhetorically asked, pulling a worried expression. "You took a jacket from a guy named Facepuncher? You know what he's gonna do?"

"Facepunch!" Austin and Dez yelled before they both mimicked that action.

Trish sighed. "Don't worry about it. He'll never know." She said, trying to reassure them as she walked over to put the jacket on the piano. "He's gonna pick the jacket up at 8:00."

"Wait, what does the jacket have to do with the music video?" Austin questioned.

"It's a line in Ally's song." Trish said, unfolding the piece of paper that held the song lyrics. "'My jacket's in the lost and found'."

"My jacket'?" Ally furrowed her brows through her confusion, snatching the paper from her friend before correcting. "It says 'I like it.' The line is 'I like it when you hang around'."

"'Hang around'?" It was Dez's turn to be confused as he snatched the paper from Ally to double check the lyrics. "I thought it said 'kangaroo'. 'I like it when you kangaroo'."

Adelaide sighed as her sister snatched the paper back from Dez, with her brows furrowed in question. "Why would I write 'I like it when you kangaroo'?"

"Look, nobody's accusing you of writing good lyrics." Dez retorted, making Adelaide whack him in the chest with the back of her hand.

"Uh, those aren't the lyrics. My handwriting was only sloppy because everyone was rushing me. I went to calligraphy camp!" Ally shouted the last part.

Austin shook his head in disbelief. "Book club, calligraphy camp— now you're just making stuff up."

"She's not lying. She would've made me go if my handwriting wasn't already neat." Adelaide informed him, tilting her head slightly. "She did take our old friend, Aiden though, but he didn't make any progress. His handwriting is terrible."

"Well, whatever." Dez interjected, making Addy snap out of her thoughts, the mention of Aiden getting a look from her sister which she just shrugged at. "I still think Austin wearing a cool leather jacket singing with a kangaroo would make an awesome music video."

"I don't know. I'm starting to worry about this video. I think we need to come up with a better idea."

Dez winced at his best friend. "Yeah, it might be a little late for that."

"Did somebody order a kangaroo?"

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The group ended up taking the kangaroo which the kangaroo sitting didn't last long before it turned into a complete disaster.

The window in the practice room was completely smashed and Facepuncher's jacket was covered in caramel. So, not only did the Dawson twins had to fix the window before their father returned, but Trish, needed to clean the jacket before Facepuncher came to collect it.

Although in her words, it wouldn't be a complete loss if she ended up losing her job. She would most likely get a new one the next day if that happened.

And Austin was still complaining about his video, so that didn't help.

The twins went to the dry cleaners to help Trish clean the caramel off the jacket before Facepuncher arrived, leaving Austin and Dez at the store to look after it with the kangaroo.

Bad idea.

Adelaide knew she made a mistake on not staying at the store with the boys as soon as her, Ally and Trish spotted the kangaroo at the front desk of the dry cleaners.

Leaving the jacket in the washing machine, the girls returned back to the store, walking into the practice room to see it was an absolute mess.

"You'll never guess what happened." Austin said as soon as he spotted the girls.

"The kangaroo ran away!"

Austin grinned in disbelief, not knowing that the three saw the kangaroo at the dry cleaners. "Man, you're good at this game."

Trish marched towards Dez. "How could you lose a kangaroo?!"

"I was attaching a camera to its pouch when I accidentally stepped on its tail and woke him up from a deep dark sleep, and then for no reason he just freaked out."

Adelaide furrowed her brows in question. "Why would you attach a camera to a kangaroo?"

Austin scoffed in disbelief. "Because we're trying to make an awesome video. Are me and Dez the only ones who care about my career anymore?"

"Don't you snap at me, blondie." Addy scolded, narrowing her eyes slightly.

"And I care about your career. I'm just not going to overreact because one person didn't know who you were." Ally told him just before Martin walked into the room.

"Hey, Adelaide, I'm here to—" Martin cut himself off when he noticed Austin. "Whoa, it's Ralphie Hayes the dog food guy!"

"Okay... that didn't help." Addy muttered under her breath, pointing out the obvious.

Austin sighed in annoyance. "I'm not the dog food guy."

"Hey, Martin, can you fix the window before our dad gets back?" Adelaide questioned as her and Ally approached the man.

"No problem, I fix a lot of—" Martin cut himself off once again when he noticed the damage to the window. "Whoa, this thing is really broken! You are in so much trouble, this is bad! This is bad!"

Ally pulled the man back into the room before he could leave, trying to calm him down. "Calm down, Martin! How much is it going to cost?"

"Uh, probably not—" He interrupted himself once again to freak out. "Whoa, this is gonna cost a lot! That's double-paned glass. I gotta get it custom built and then I gotta pick it up and it's so hard to find parking. And the place doesn't open until—"

Trish approached the man, pulling on his shirt to shout. "How much is it going to cost?!"

Martin scribbled an amount onto a piece of paper before handing it to the closest twin standing near him, which was Ally.

"It can't be that bad." Ally stopped herself to look down at the piece of paper, her eyes instantly going wide, along with her sister's. "Whoa! This is bad! This is bad!"

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Dez was out at the mall looking for the kangaroo while the twins had the problem of keeping a secret from Austin about the new upcoming show that he's apparently performing at.

Trish had lied to him about selling tickets to see Austin perform in the store an hour from then, but it turned out, people are expecting to take pictures with the kangaroo.

On the plus side, the twins got enough money to pay for the window to be fixed.

But they still had a problem on whether to tell Austin the truth or not.

And thankfully, after speaking to Austin upstairs in the practice room before the show started, the twins didn't say anything but leave signs of lying that left Austin to be suspicious, although he didn't catch on.

"What's up, everybody! Whoo!" Austin yelled to the crowd of people who barely clapped in response. Their actions causing the twins, Trish and Dez to follow Austin out the practice room, clapping loudly for him. "Thanks for coming out."

"Where the kangaroo?" Someone called out from the crowd, the majority of the people looking confused at the surprise guest on stage.

"Oh, we caught him. He's upstairs. Thanks for your concern, he's all good." Austin informed, oblivious to what the people were expecting to see. "All right, this is a new song. It's called 'A Billion Hits' and I hope you guys like it."

"Didn't go nowhere, never left, unh! You really thought that I was gone, gone, gone, gone. I heard you talking like I lost my swagger, said I was over you. Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong."

As Austin reached the chorus, the people in the crowd started to clap loudly, cheering for Austin who continued to sing with a bright smile on his face. The nervous smiles on the girls' faces had loosened as they joined in with the crowd in applause.

"Yeah, 'cause I know that I'll make it. Overload the internet. A billion hits is what I'll get."

The song had reached to an end and the crowd cheered loudly before chanting his name.

Austin looked to the crowd at the twins, pointing his finger before sending them a wink. In return, they smiled proudly, giving him a thumbs up.

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The group of five stood back in the dry cleaners, watching the video of Austin's perfomance off of Dez's camera.

"Oh, you really won those people over. They came for the kangaroo but they stayed for the Moon." Ally accidentally admitted without realising.

Austin chuckled through his confusion. "What do you mean?"

Adelaide huffed before whispering to Trish. "This is why you should not tell Ally secrets." She sighed, letting the girls know that she would tell him before approaching Austin. "Um, those people weren't exactly there to see you. They were there to get their picture taken with the kangaroo."

"So those people didn't know who I was?"

Adelaide perked up slightly before reassuring the blonde. "But, they do now and that's all that really matters."

Austin then shrugged, chuckling to himself. "Ok, I'm cool with that." His response made Adelaide smile, glad to know he wasn't mad at her. "But, please don't let Ally make me wait another month for a new song."

"That's fine." Adelaide waved him off, picking up the giant book that Ally was supposed to read by the next day. "Just read this for her book club and then she'll see what she can do."

She handed Austin the book who attempted to hold it, only for the book to be slammed down onto the table a second later.

The boy chuckled nervously. "That's okay. I can wait a month. No biggie."

Everything seemed to be going well until disaster struck as Facepuncher's jacket had shrunk and turned pink from the washing machine.

Thankfully, the jacket was just the right size for Facepuncher's daughter, Mad Dog who arrived with her father to the dry cleaners to collect the piece of clothing.

They were just about lucky enough not to get punched in the face by the man.

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megan speaks !

i hope you all enjoyed reading this chapter! the first mention of aiden! who will appear in season two or three, i haven't decided yet! 🤭

thanks for reading, i love you all!! <33