Jiley and TRITTANY Oneshots

Trying

A re-written outcome of the Jiley breakup causes the couple to meet six months later - and James questions if Riley is still the girl he fell in love with.

James's POV
That had to be her. Surely. If it wasn't I wouldn't have been disappointed. I would've been relieved! That couldn't be her. She couldn't have joined that team. She couldn't have changed that much in the last six months. She really couldn't have! And yet if it wasn't her - she definitely had some identical twin I had never known about.

I sat on the bench in Studio A, the entire team surrounding me. I couldn't process if any of them had also noticed her. I was solely focused on her myself. She stood with another two guys, both of them towering over her as she smiled and talked to them. She fit right in with the team, didn't look a tiny bit out of place. Even though I knew that she was.

It had been a stressful few weeks for The Next Step. After our Nationals win, we returned to the dance studio to see that we were due to be evicted. Later we came to find out that Lucien, the owner of Elite Dance Academy - our rivals for as long as I had been here - had bought our building. Elite had been defeated at Nationals, meaning that they had not qualified for Internationals. And that wasn't what Lucien considered acceptable. So this was his offer: The Next Step and Elite merge into one and go to Internationals together. Of course there was one problem. Well - okay - a whole sea of problems, but one which affected Lucien. Only ten dancers could dance at Internationals, with two being held as alternates. And with two teams of ten, half wouldn't be able to go. So this was what Kate and Phoebe suggested: the studio held head to head dance battles. One on one. Dancer vs dancer - and the winner earned a spot on the Internationals team. There was a hat with all twenty names in it, and every dancer picked a name to see who they would be facing in their battle. This meant that it could be Elite vs Elite, Elite vs The Next Step or even The Next Step vs The Next Step. Even though this was everyone for themselves - we were also dancing for our team as Kate and Lucien had another more low-profile agreement.

Whoever had the majority of their studio's dancers make the team became owner of The Next Step.

I knew I was ready. Whoever I was facing had better watch out, that was what I had told myself. I was gonna make the team.

And that brought us back to now. Where I sat facing Elite whilst we waited for Kate and Phoebe and Lucien to arrive - staring at her.

I had been sure that nothing could distract me. I was sure that it was all gonna work out. But then as Elite walked in, this small girl had caught my eye - and I couldn't believe who she was.

It was her.
It had to be her.
I'd know her no matter what she looked like.
And I did know her.

It was Riley...

Riley's POV
Walking through those green doors made my stomach ache and somersault. I hadn't been here in over half a year. I had gone from being here every day - to not being here for six months. And honestly - being back gave me great feelings of nostalgia. Walking past the trophy cabinets was like taking a walk through my childhood. Pictures of younger me still grinned behind the trophy cases.

"Hey," said Tess, "that's you."

"I know," I nodded back quietly, "same picture hasn't moved for fourteen years."

My reasons for leaving The Next Step were a lot more complex than they seemed. Trust me - it was hard enough to justify my leaving to myself, never mind the other nine dancers.

I didn't like to say that my heartbreak was the driving force behind my leaving - but in many ways it was. During our preparation for Nationals, my boyfriend had been given a duet to perform at a small competition with his ex-girlfriend. That alone bothered me. If it had've been any one of his other exes - and trust me: he'd built up quite a list - I wouldn't have minded. But this one was different. This one was Beth. And she practically worshipped him. In her mind they were still together - and I wasn't in the picture at all. That was enough to make a girl stir-crazy! But I had to push all that aside. I may have not trusted Beth but I knew where my boyfriend's loyalty was. And I trusted him.