Austin Carlile Is My Father? (#Wattys2015)

Who Is This Girl? She's My Baby.

“What do you want me to search?” he asked gently. She looked slightly sick when she answered: “Of Mice & Men’s inspiration for lyrics.”

He searched what he was told with the pit in his stomach. He was afraid of what people were going to think his inspiration came from. He pressed the enter key and was surprised at how many results there were. About 3,010,000 results, and they were all probably wrong. All of the results that were on the song O.G. Loko because the lyrics had the word inspiration in it, so he looked at his daughter and shrugged. “Give me something else to work with.” 

She sucked in her cheeks looking a bit tired and sighed. “Then the thing I searched before. ‘Did Austin Carlile’s girlfriend cheat on him?’” 

Austin typed it in wearily, his mouth in a straight line. He really wasn’t excited to see what the results said, but once again, anything for Sienna. 

The first result consisted of the one that Sienna saw that was degrading to her mother. Austin exited out of that page quickly, seeing her eyes well with tears again. He scrolled down and clicked on the third link. 

“Look at this one here.” He directed, nodding to the screen. Sienna peeked through her fingers and Austin didn’t know whether to feel relieved or guilty that this one wasn’t about Lucy. “This one is about my ex wife.” 

Sienna’s eyes swept over the article. “It’s about the song The Storm too.” She breathed. He nodded, frantically, sorry that he was this excited over someone calling another woman in his life a whore. 

“Yeah, see, it looks so official too, because they have quotes from the song and different sites with citation.” Austin said, pointing them out as he went along, skimming the article. “But the funny thing is, is I never said any of this.” 

“You didn’t?” she breathed. Austin nodded. 

“Look, it says I said: ‘This song is about my ex wife, Gielle. She broke my heart and I didn’t do anything to deserve it-’ I never said any of that.” He smiled and looked down at his daughter, but she was frowning. 

“What does Gielle think?” She questioned. Austin sucked in a breath and shrugged. 

“I don’t really know. I mean yeah, I wrote songs about her, but I kept the dedication to myself. I just released the song. I wrote some about your mother too, but they were totally different than these.” 

“What songs did you write for her?” Sienna asked, looking up at him. 

Austin rubbed at his nose and raised his eyebrows. “There’s a song called YDG. It says: You won’t believe me, we’re not the same, ‘cause I dig, and I dig you too. Conformed in writing, I will fight for the sake of you. I will fight for this.”

Austin smiled down at Sienna when she smiled back at him. “So you really liked her, didn’t you?” She muttered. Austin nodded, shamelessly. 

“I loved your mother very much.” 

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Sienna

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Austin kissed her forehead as she clambered into the top bunk and curled up, closing her eyes. He had explained to her about the media these days and the way they warped words. She still didn’t get her phone back and she knew that Austin knew about her blades, but she didn’t mind it that much. 

She listened as the door to the bus opened and men piled in. She heard a sigh and the rustle of a couch being sat on and the TV being flipped on. “We’re moving in few minutes.” said Phil’s voice. “Make sure everything is inside.”