A/N: I still don't own Camp Rock, but I do own the ideas.
As a side note the stories below are either bold, italicized, or underlined. Italics means in-progress, bold is complete, and underlined is ... well it pretty much means it'll go on for as long as I'm inspired by that series (like a drabble or something).
If you haven't read "Novelty", " Never Have I Ever", "Rose Garden", "Painting Wild Flowers", "Sharing", "Winning Roses", "In Sickness", "All in the Timing", "Guilty Pleasures", "The Campers Catalog","Her letter", "When I'm not lookin' ", "Barefoot CinderElla", "Seconds" or "Dear Amelia", I would appreciate it if you did.
For Logan and Anna
Ella slipped in to her royal blue dress, hooking her arm through the single halter strap on her left shoulder. She zipped herself in and looked at herself in the mirror. Ella should have been pleased at the way the gown looked after all the hard work she had put into making it, but it just felt a little lack-luster for her. The mermaid gown showed all of her curves, which was nice, but it wasn't the princess dress she had really wanted to make. Sighing unhappily she slung her heels on and headed out the door and drove to her dates house, because Adam Winingham did not pick up his dates. Nor would he allow them to wear pink, because dates had to match and in his book pink "is homo-licious". Ella scowled at herself in her rear-view mirror. She didn't really like Adam, but she didn't think he was a bad guy. A little controlling, maybe. Annoying, definitely.
But he'd never done anything to Ella for her to be legitimately upset at him or not like him. She saw her phone flash that she'd received a new text message and resolved to read them when she got to Adam's house rather than try reading them while she was driving. She may not want to go to prom anymore, but she didn't want to risk her life just to skip out on dancing with a guy she barely knows.
When Ella pulled up outside of Adam's house, she threw her Mustang into park and read her text messages. One from each of her guys.
From Naaaaaattttttteeeeeeeeeeeee:
Hey, we have a concert tonight. You coming?
From Poptart:
Dancer-bella! Concert, tonight, be there or be square!
From Jase:
Lady-dude, my bro is freakin' out. You gonna be here?
Ella groaned in disappointment, of course they would come through Miami on the day of her prom. Wasn't that just her luck? She tapped her screen and sent a blanketed text to the three of them.
Sorry, prom tonight. I'll text you laterrrrrr. :P
Adam was not a happy camper during their couples photo.
"What took you so long to get inside?" Adam hissed from behind his plastered smile and Ella's own smile tensed.
"I was texting my mom to tell her I got here safely. It kept getting dropped, is that a problem?" She replied, her eyes darting around to the other couples who seemed to be unaware of their awkward vibes. Adam gave a grunt of acknowledgement and continued to pose for pictures, but Ella felt her phone vibrate in the built in pocket and was already thinking of a time to check it later.
Nate glanced down at his phone one last time before he went on stage and sighed. Ella hadn't texted him back on who she was going to prom with. Was it that friend of hers that was always breaking up with his boyfriend? Or did someone ask her... as a date.
"Dude, she totally has a date. Get over it, we've got a show." Shane said checking his mic pack one more time.
"What do you mean she has a date?" Jason made motions of silence and pleading over Nate's shoulder, but it only seemed to goad Shane further. Shane smirked at both of his brothers.
"Like a date-date. You know, romancing, kissing, dancing, and since it's prom..." He wiggled his eyebrows suggestively and then paused, "Oh wait, you wouldn't... because you have yet to make a move on the girl." Jason ran a hand down his face as a look of horror crossed Nate's face.
"N-no. This is Ella we're talking about, she's said it herself that almost no one pays attention to her at school." Nate cradled his guitar close to his chest and let Jason guide him down the hall as Shane served him a big slice of HELL.
"Again, almost no one. It just takes one someone." Shane teased before they got to the rising platform.
"Dude, you're evil. Look, you've crushed the rest of his soul. It's Mister Fishy all over again."
Ella laughed while reading her text messages in the Brio restroom. The guys had their personal assistant, Eric, sending text messages for them. Apparently Shane had pulled a "Mister Fishy" and had broken Nate again, Shane was sending her knock-knock jokes, and Nate had only asked if she had a date. She didn't bother messaging Shane or Jason back but sent a text to Nate.
"Did she send a text? Did you get something? Anything?" Nate asked franticly as he was shoved from one outfit to another.
Eric sighed as the phone buzzed in his hand.
"Yeah, his name is Adam. He's the captian of the soccer team. Says Ella... through text... through me." Eric replyed, obviously not thrilled to be handling the sulky guitarist's personal life.
"Ask her more." Nate instisted taking his guitar from one of the stage hands.
"No," Nate turned to look at the bored assistant "you need to handle your Ella business, because you'd be sure that someone else wasn't doing what you would do and nothing would be absolutely correct unless you did it; So no, I will not send your texts." Nate never got the chance to reply because he was being ushered back on stage, and Eric gave a sigh of relief.
The dance was alright, Ella thought to herself as she watched her date dance with another girl, but she'd rather be at the concert. It wasn't like Ella didn't like dancing but she wasn't very good at this type of dancing. So she settled for a couple of slow dances with Adam and a few other friends, but she just wanted to curl up in her bed with her fuzzy slippers.
"Hey, we're going to an after party." Adam didn't give it as a request, it was a demand, and Ella just sighed with a nod.
The after party wasn't much better, unfortunately. Adam was consuming large amounts of beer and various drinks that Ella was sure would catch up with him later. She felt her phone vibrate and went to check it again, but a pair of arms had circled around her waist and roughly pulled her back.
"Y-you've been checkin' that d-Amn phone, all night." Adam growled in Ella's ear, nipping the side of her neck roughly.
"Adam, stop it, you're drunk." Ella pushed him away and started towards the door, but Adam grabbed her wrist tightly and shoved her against the wall.
"So? I know what I'm doing." He smirked arrogantly as Ella tried to fight her way out of his grasp. "Stop being such a baby, Pador. It's prom, this is what is about" Ella managed to escape once more, but he yanked the skirt of her dress causing it to rip and a loud cry from Ella as Adam pinned her back to the wall.
"N-no! Let me go!" He gripped her arms tighter and the crowd had started to goad Adam on. Finally, Ella had enough of being tossed around and jammed her knee in between his legs. Adam let out a howl of pain and Ella made a dash for the door, through the laughing crowd, hot tears of embarrassment streaming down her cheeks.
Through her tears, Ella limped a little ways away from the party and tried to dial any number in her phone that would help her. Her hands trembled violently while the ringer went through.
"Hey Ells, it's Eric. Nate is still on stage." Ella gave a choked sob as she crumbled to the sidewalk. "Ella! Are you okay?" She made a negative noise and continued to sob endlessly into her receiver, wiping her nose on the back of her hand. "Oh sweet Mary! Where are you?" She mumbled out her address as best as she could and stayed on the phone with Eric.
What felt like hours later, Eric pulled up in a black SUV with his "take-no-prisoners" game face on. Ella gave a watery smile to the gangly blonde as he helped her into the car and gave her his jacket.
"Now you just sit here and let me drive you back, Sparkles." He took Nate's nick-name while he strapped the seat-belt across her, clicking it into the holster. She nodded numbly and leaned her head against the window. So much for the perfect night.
Eric led Ella to the boy's wardrobe room and asked one of the stylists to get a set of clothes, a first aid kit, make-up remover, and Mitchie or Caitlyn on the phone as fast as possible. Once he was certain that Ella would be okay on her own, he went to pace back stage while the band finished up their show. How was he supposed to tell the boys that one of their best friends and possible love interest just called him sobbing into the phone? "Oh gee, guys! You have a crying, wilting, sparkly lady thing in your dressing room, be careful." didn't feel appropriate, but he was having trouble phrasing it in away that wouldn't lead to a massive man hunt. But the clock was ticking because the finale sparks were going off.
Leah, one of the many roadies, ran up to him in a panic. "I couldn't get a solid contact for Caitlyn or Mitchie!" Eric let out a stream of curses as the boys handed their various instruments to the staff and crew. "Keep trying, don't quit until you get a hold of one of them. This is an SOS, red flag, we're-going-to-die, and shit-hit-the-fan emergency." She nodded and scurried away. Luckily the show went well, so the gang was in a good mood, that made things easier.
"Hey Eric, how was the show?" Shane grinned whiping his brow with his towel.
"Uh-um, I missed the last half." He confessed, bouncing on his toes and glancing over his shoulder for Leah. The three teens looked at him quizically.
"Why?"
"Well, I went to pick up Ella..." He waved a hand and trailed off, unfortunately the boy's faces lit up and they went to rush past him. "N-now hold on!" They paused and took in his worried expression. "She called me, and something happened. But, I wanted to warn you, that what ever it was... the result wasn't so... pretty." He didn't have time to add anything else as they ran deeper into the backstage set up.
Nate sprinted as fast as he could to every room he could think of, with Jason and Shane in hot pursuit. Finally he wrench open the door to their dressing room, and almost instantly wished he hadn't.
He froze in the door way and could tell that Ella had been deck out to the tens at the beginning of the night, but look like she'd been run through the ringer.
"Holy..." Jason strode past the stunned Nate to Ella. "Ella, what happened?" Shane took the kits from the stage hands and set them on the counter as Nate finally came out his stupor to take one of Ella's quivering hands. She took a gulp. "T-things didn't quite turn out like Adam had hoped."
He dragged his eyes up from her hands and glared at the bruises that littered her arms and marred her porcelain skin. His free hand traced the bruises as Shane tried to clean up a few of the small cuts that she had. "He did this?" Jason ground out, gnashing his teeth together. Ella began to tear up again and she nodded her head. "A-and my car is still at his house." Leah rushed into the room, waving her phone around. "Jason, Jason, a-and Shane! The phone is for," She took a moment to get her breath together "you."
The older brothers nodded and left the younger to take care of his wounded crush.
"Hello?" Shane spoke as Jason switched the phone to speaker.
"Shane? Is Jason with you?" Mitchie's voice rang out in the room.
"Yes ma'am, he is." Shane tapped his foot in annoyance, wanting to get back to Ella and kick the ever living day-lights out of this kid "Adam".
"Good," Her voice was tense "Now, I need you to both listen to me, especially you Jason." The mentioned huffed and crossed his arms, not liking the direction this was taking. "Don't you scoff at me, Jason Allen. We know you can be a Papa Wolf." Shane couldn't help the tiny smirk at the TV-tropes referance, despite the gravity of the situation. "Now I know you both want to go beat him to a pulp, and from what I've heard, he probably deserves it; but right now you two need to think like Nate and take Ella's feelings into consideration. Not just her pride. Does she really want any more violence tonight?"
They both mumbled out a "No ma'am."
"Good. Shane, I love you but go help Nate." Shane nodded his head and said his good bye's to Mitchie.
"Jason, I want you to listen very carefully. If you talk to this guy... don't leave a mark where you can see it easily." She sighed. "I know I shouldn't indulge this, but he should never have even thought about laying a finger on Ella. Nate and Shane can stay busy fussing over Ella, that's not a problem. But I know you, and I know that you'll go after him even if I didn't want you to... God, Caitlyn would just tell you to beat him senseless." Mitchie gave a dry laugh, but continued. "Lay a finger on that kid, and Ella better never hear about it, I'm serious Jason." Jason rolled his shoulders, giving his back a nice popping before responding.
"Of course, why would I do that?"
Nate dabbed the hydrogen-peroxide on Ella's cuts and she gave a weak hiss. "I'm so so sorry Ella." Nate whispered, folding his legs underneath himself and adding a touch of Neosporin to the now clean cuts. Her hand covered his, but it still trembled slightly, even when Nate met her bloodshot eyes. "It isn't your fault, Nate. I didn't see this coming, how in the world could you have?" She gave him a watery smile as her eyes filled back-up. Nate opened his arms up and Ella tumbled right into them, locking her in a warm embrace. He hadn't showered yet so her ruined dress was soaking up his sweat and his shirt was now taking in her tears. Her fingers balled into little fists, clawing at his shirt and pounding at his chest; but he continued to rub her back, whisper nothings, and kiss her head softly, his sole though being on Ella.
They sat there until Ella was all but asleep from the amount of crying she'd done. She closed her eyes once, twice, and then finally, a third time... and she could have sworn that she felt a pair of lips kiss her forehead.
Shane didn't immediately go back to his brother and friend, he knew that there would be a few things that would need to be taken care of before hand. First he called their mother back at the hotel and asked her to book a room for Ella or to at least find a place for her to sleep, no way was he having her go back to Ella's Hatching Pod on a night that had tanked this hard. Thankfully, she agreed and made him promise to update her a soon as possible. It wasn't hard considering he was a self-professed mama's boy.
Then he had a slightly less important phone call to make.
"Hello Tobias, it's Shane. I'm gonna need to call in that favor. There's this kid that I'm gonna need picture of for blackmail." He paused. "Yeah, it's probably going to be a repeat of the back-up dancer thing." He sighed, he hated dealing with photographers. "Look, he hit Ella." That shut the blabbermouth up and Tobias quickly agreed. Because he knew just as well as the rest of the paparazzi, no one messed with Ella Pador with out the Grey men's wrath.
Shane alerted Nate of the now dubbed "Ella situation" and what the general plan was, only confirming that he and Jason were picking up Ella's car from Adam's place. Nate carried Ella to one of the couches before taking her phone and going through the texts she and Adam had exchanged.
"Dude, did he really tell her to NOT wear pink?" Nate gave a curt nod, and as he continued to read his blood started to boil. Shane tapped Nate on the shoulder. "Look broski, we need his address. We'll read the rest later." Nate found the address and sent it to Shane and Jason's phone, digging in Ella's pocket to retrieve her keys.
"Give. him. hell."
Jason brewed on the entire way over to Adam's house, letting Shane drive and keeping the radio off so he could concentrate on excatly how he was going to extract justice.
"Screw it, I've got no plan. I break his nose, it's a nose."
Shane parked the SUV in front of Ella's Mustang and let at a low whistle at the area they were in. "Looks like he could afford a few of those." Shane kept the tabs on that just in case something came up later.
As if their desires had been answered, a long stretch limo pulled up to the house, a tall blonde boy tumbled out giving a drunken laugh. The Grey brother's watched as he stumbled over to Ella's car and the limo drove off. He seemed to be thinking about something and Jason started walking over when they had figured out what was going to happen.
"I wouldn't do that if I were you." Jason warned, the teen scoffed at him but clicked his belt back into place anyway.
"Deserves to be pissed on anyway, the no good who-" Jason's glare intensified and Adam backed up. "H-hey man, who are you anyway?"
"I'm a friend," He reached in his pocket and pulled out her keys "Of Ella's." Adam seemed to sober up at the way the taller teenager referred to Ella.
"T-that's cool?"
"Yeah, it's pretty cool. But from what I can tell, you thought it'd be fun to hurt her, right?" Adam tried to back away but ended up stumbling over the curb and running into his mailbox. Jason looked over the frightened boy again and knew that if it came to blows, he could easily take down the drunk. He rolled his eyes and picked the boy up by his jacket. Finally, it clicked to Adam that Jason had partially threatened him, so he shoved Jason away and went for a left hook.
Jason blocked and knocked the hand away. "You don't want to do this kid."
"K-k-id?" Adam stumbled waving a fist belligerently, "You're barely older than I am." He charged again causing Jason swung a right hook to Adam's jaw and a quick knee to the chest.
"Yeah, but I've seen more than you probably will ever see in your entire life." Jason countered as Adam landed back on the pavement with a groan.
When it was clear that the soccer captain wouldn't be moving, Jason slung one of Adam's arms over his shoulder and carried him to the door. When his parents finally answered, they floundered over what to say or what to do with their drunk child.
"Hi, I'm Jason. I brought Adam back, he got into a fight and I just wanted to get him home before something to bad happened." Jason gave an easy smile and he hoped that the adult Winninghams wouldn't notice that Jason was not in formal attire.
"You look familiar," Adam's mother studied Jason. " You must be one of those boys that Adam talks to from chess club." Jason tried to play it cool, but his nerves came back in spades as Adam let out another groan. "Oh, here! Let's get him to the couch! I'm so sorry, usually he just would stay at a friends." Mister Winningham had disappeared into the house, clearly uninterested in what was happening. "Thank you, Jason. Do you need any compensation? Gas money?" Jason shook his head with an easy grin.
"No ma'am, I just came to drop him off and get Ella's car." Jason almost panicked when the light went off in her eyes.
"Oh! Where is she?" Mrs. Winningham looked over Jason's shoulder and he chuckled nervously.
"She went home early." Mrs. Winningham smiled at his answer and patted her hand over her heart.
"She's such a sweet girl. I wish Adam would bring home girls like her more often, she's such a gorgeous young lady." Mrs. Winningham let out a small laugh, "Even if she was a little distracted by her phone. But what girl isn't now-a-days?" Jason grinned and nodded, exiting as fast as he could.
"Shane," He flinched and faced a very angry Caitlyn Gellar. "where is my Man-Child?" She was tapping her foot in the most never wracking way, the way that usually meant someone was getting beat up.
"He went to take care of Ella's car." Shane shrugged, tossing his jacket on his bed.
"I did NOT just take a red eye flight because Jason went to pick up a car." Shane placed a finger to his mouth and tried to silence the she-devil.
"Look! I'll tell you." He poked his head into the hall way and then came back. "You're right, we didn't just go to pick up the car. Jason was going to wait around to- uh- talk to Adam. We didn't have to wait long, he showed up pretty much right after we got there. I left right after Jason told Adam to not piss on Ella's car." He glanced at the clock on the night stand. "He shouldn't be too long."
Caitlyn rolled her eyes and flung herself on to the bed. "Well, at least he won't press charges."
Shane nodded "Yeah, I called in my favor with Tobias."
"Why would you do that?" Caitlyn asked burrowing herself into the blankets.
"He-hey now! That's my bed." She shot him a glare and he backed up. "I did it so Adam wouldn't squeal."
"Why would he squeal?"
"Why wouldn't he?"
"Because who wants to admit that they got beat up by the 'sweet air-head' of a boy band?"
Ella's blinked her eyes sleepily and looked around the room at her surroundings. This wasn't her room. Propping herself up on her elbow, she realized her bed was much warmer than usual too. There, on the pillow next to her, was a very relaxed looking Nate with an arm slung around her stomach. How she hadn't noticed the weight before was beyond her, but she tried to scoot away. She didn't get very far because Nate let out a pathetic groan and dragged her closer, resting his head on her shoulder.
As if life couldn't ease up on the embarrassing, Mrs. Grey walked in and noticed the very alarmed Ella. Mrs. Grey laughed silently and held up her hands before retreating out the door, knowing her son would be more than a little embarrassed when he finally woke up. Ella's heart hammered against her chest and she tried to steady her breathing. It felt like an eternity when Nate finally woke up. She stayed perfectly still when his grip tightend and he moved closer.
Nate for his part was very confused. Hotel pillows were not this soft, or warm... and they defiantly didn't breath. His eyes shot open and he untangled himself from Ella in a flash of sweats and white muscle shirts.
"God! Ella! I'm so sorry! I didn't mean to," He ran a hand down his face as he paced back and forth "what I mean is..." He muttered a few profanities, pausing when he heard a giggle from the bed.
"Do you normally wake up swearing like a sailor?" Ella asked with a smile, going to stretch but flinching when her arms burned in protest. That's when she remembered last night, and Adam. Ella sighed and laid back down on the pillows. "Nate, come back to bed. It's okay. Plus, I'm the one who should be apologizing. I shouldn't have called last night. I completely buzz-killed your concert." He sat down and placed a hand on her shoulder.
"No Ella, you did the right thing. Our music is great, yeah, but you're important too." He saw the look of disbelief and he moved a strand of hair off of her face. "Promise Ells. You would have done the same thing if it was any of us." She gave a small smile, taking his hand and giving it a small squeeze.
"Thanks."
"... so that's what happened." Caitlyn finished, closing the cap to her nail polish and inspecting them for any smudges. Ella sat in an awed silence. Her friends had put their professional and personal image up on the line because some jerk had been a little rough with her. "Hey now, you don't need to cry." Caitlyn's eyes softened, wiping a stray tear. "They're just sorry that they couldn't take you to school on Monday." She let out a watery chuckle, clinging to one of the many pillows in her room. "But they did leave you a little something..." Caitlyn trailed off, carefully digging through her bag to hand Ella a box. "Be careful, I leave tonight but if you get scared I'll get my ass back here an whoop theirs."
Ella tugged Jason's scarf a little closer to her neck when she entered her school building. She felt a little stronger knowing that her friends had given her little pieces of them to help get her through the day. Mitchie had sent out one of her note-books on a rush delivery along with one of Ella's favorite pictures from camp, Caitlyn had painted Ella's nails with little abstract flowers and showed her how to throw a few punches, Shane had given her a few broken metal pieces from his tambourine which now hung off little hooks as a pair of earrings and a pair of his shades, Jason had given her one of his scarfs and a little flamingo key chain, and Nate...
She pulled his leather jacket closer and took a deep breath of his cologne. Nate had been impossibly sweet, calling her every chance he got, he even woke up a little earlier to call her this morning and wish her luck.
"Hey, you're Ella Pador!" A girl, who seemed to be a sophomore or freshman ran over to her. "You're such an inspiration."
"Wha-What are you talking about?"
"It's all over the C3 network! The new commercial they're shooting about teen relationships and violence." Another girl had over heard the conversation and had come over. "Yeah, I heard about that! A gossip site said that they started it because one of their friends was got hurt while they were here in Florida." The first girl nodded excitedly, "Yeah, this is Ella Pador!"
The crowd slowly started trickle over and Ella found herself surrounded by love and support of people she didn't even know. Out of the corner of her eye she spotted Adam and his new head gear. Apparently, Jason had a mean right hook. The girls that surrounded her chatted campaign and even asked for her autograph. Those boys sure knew how to make a girl feel special.
Amelia was definitely going to hear about this when she was old enough.