Big City Dreams

"Seriously?"

"Seriously."

I stared at her, my mouth dropped open. I could tell she wasn't fazed by my reaction. She seemed dead set on this getaway, no matter what I would say. She was a stubborn girl, a quality I've always loved about her, but right now, I hated it.

"You've got to be kidding me," I say, the blank look on my face as clean as a slate. Her hair blew in the wind around us, her hands tucked into the pockets of her pea-coat. She looked serious.

"I'm not kidding you."

"Sarah...you can't..." I shake my head. "You can't just leave! What would your parents say? What would yours friends say? What..." I take a deep breath. "What am I supposed to do without you?" I go to grab her hand, but she keeps it tucked firmly in her pocket. I let my arm drop as my brows pull down into a furrow.

She shrugs. "Austin, our run was good. But don't you think it's time we moved on?"

"How can you even say that?" I accuse judgmentally. "You said you loved me."

Sarah rolls her eyes, practically reaching out and ripping my heart out of my chest. "Love? We're eighteen, Austin. Shouldn't we be more focused on ourselves then making that big of a commitment."

This wasn't Sarah. This was someone else, some foreign girl that I'd never seen before. Since when did she want to run off to New York?

"You can't leave," I say flatly. "Not after everything we've been through."

"I'm leaving," she repeats, slowly, as if I were a mental child who had to be talked to like a toddler. "You can't stop me. New York is where my life, my passion, and my future is. Arizona is a dead end. Don't you see? We can't make anything of ourselves here. It's a waste of valuable time. We only have one life, Austin."

"Where is this coming from?" I mutter. "Just two months ago we had an entire discussion about you teaching grade school while I produced, and we would live in that house on Bleaker and we would raise kids together - "

"Things change," she mumbles. "People change."

I could tell she was hiding something. "Someone convinced you to do this."

She averts her gaze, glaring at the grassy floor. I could once again see her car parked at my curb, her suitcases showing through the window of the backseat. I could feel my pulse quickening, realizing she was really going to leave.

"Who?" I ask quietly. "Who was it that told you New York was where to go, Sarah."

She clears her throat, bringing her eyes up to me with only a little bit of confidence in her stare. "Ryan." With that one name, my entire world disappeared.

Ryan Osterman. Her ex-boyfriend from two years ago and the ex-bandmate of my best friends, The Maine. It was ridiculous that he still had so much affect on her, that he could convince her to do crazy things; such as pack everything up and move to New York the minute before she was to leave for U of A. I felt betrayed. She said she was over him and now she was ready to book it to another state after one word from him?

"I can't believe it," I say emotionlessly, my mouth a thin line. "After all this time..."

"What?" she asks hotly.

"You still let him push you around," I murmur. "You are so clouded by these big city dreams that you can't see he's manipulating you. Don't you know that he's using you since you're easy to persuade? You're his fall-back, Sarah! Always will be!"

Her face falls. "I never thought I'd hear my boyfriend call me a pushover."

"That's what you are," I growl. "And if you're moving to another state with another man, I don't think we can be classified as boyfriend and girlfriend." I cross my arms over my chest.

Sarah grimaces. "Fine. Goodbye, Austin."

"Goodbye, Sarah."

She turns on her heel and walks back to her car, her feet stomping into the grass of my front lawn. Just as she reaches the sidewalk, she turns and glares at me. "And shave that stupid mustache off your face! I hate that you quit shaving!"

"Not your concern anymore!" I yell back. "Now leave!"

She glares a second time before storming into her car and driving off with screeching wheels. I put a hand up and stroke my mustache.

I like it.