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All Julie can do is stare up at her ceiling, the faint outlines of the ceiling fan visible in the dark.
She decided to go to sleep what feels like forever ago, but she can’t stop playing the night’s events over and over again in her head.
The electricity she felt playing the Orpheum with the guys, the sheer joy she felt when they poofed onto the stage with her. There’s no words for the elation she feels when she’s playing music with them, the way everything feels like the stars have aligned and nothing in the world exists outside of them and their music.
She almost lost them tonight. Almost lost Luke.
She thought she had.
The heartbreak sits in her chest like it's more than a memory, like it’s fresh and real and raw. Even the false belief that they had crossed over had hurt, because it meant they wouldn’t be with her anymore.
No music is worth making, Julie, if we’re not making it with you.
They would have chosen oblivion over selling their souls to Caleb. She knows that it’s partially about them, about their integrity, but the fact that they wouldn’t abandon her like that...
Tears threaten at Julie’s eyes, and she has to remind herself that they were okay. Well, as okay as three already-dead ghosts could be. They were out in the garage, not in some other realm. Luke was out there, and he was okay.
Luke. She could still hear the way his tears coated his voice, could see how they made his eyes shine. Could remember how his hands felt in hers, dry and warm.
Before she can put too much thought into it, she sits up and switches on her light. Her eye catches on the white Sunset Curve t-shirt Flynn found in her mom’s chest.
Tears prickle in her eyes. She slips her feet into her monster feet slippers, grabs the t-shirt, and pads downstairs as quietly as she can.
The cool nighttime air leaves goosebumps on her skin as she gently pulls the doors to the garage open. She doesn’t know exactly what she’s expecting, doesn’t know what the guys do at night, whether they stay up messing around or writing music.
The garage is silent and shrouded in darkness, with no telltale shadows anywhere.
“Reggie? Alex?” she hisses. “Luke?”
As if invoking his name summoned him, Luke appears in front of her, slightly obscured in the dark.
“Julie,” he says, and she can’t help but smile. “Nice slippers.”
He has one of his beanies pulled over his hair, no longer in that coiffed style from the Orpheum. It makes her feel warm, makes him feel more like the Luke she’s gotten used to. He is, of course, wearing a shirt that only shows off his arms. Jesus, is he allergic to sleeves?
“I couldn’t sleep,” she says, a greeting and an excuse. She leaves out why.
“Yeah, me neither,” he says, and even in the dark of the garage, she can see that trademark, slightly lopsided grin pulling at his mouth. Something inside of Julie twinges, the same thing that happens every time he looks at her. She knows the feeling so well it’s almost become her natural state of being.
“Ghosts sleep?” she asks.
“Sometimes,” he laughs. “Especially if they’re Reggie.”
She frowns. “What about Alex?”
Luke pauses. “He went looking for Willie,”
She nods. “Oh.”
Everything in her wants to reach out and touch him, see if she still can. She remembers the warmth of his hand, glowing, brushing against her cheek. The way his arms felt wrapped around her waist.
But since she also remembers the disappointment of reaching for his hand and only meeting air, she keeps her hands by her side.
“You wanna go outside?” Luke asks. Suddenly in desperate need of fresh air, she nods again. She follows him through the doors and takes a seat next to where he perches on a low garden wall. She sits close enough that if she wanted to, she could let her knee press against his. Her veins thrum with the possibility.
She doesn’t know why she’s so nervous about it, when just earlier that night she had been wrapped in his arms, but whatever the reason, she stays still. These past few weeks, she’s been so accustomed to the assumption that touching him, touching any of them, would be useless, that even now she almost forgets. It was such a part of how they interacted even as a band, her resting her hands in the air during their band circle, always keeping a careful distance when they performed, not even being able to grab any of their hands for their final bows.
Almost like he can read her mind, she sees Luke’s fingers twitch where they’re resting on his knee. But he doesn’t move them.
“What’s that?” he asks instead, gesturing to the bundled-up t-shirt in her hand.
“Oh, it’s, um,” she starts to answer him, but can’t find the words. It feels so big, this connection between them, that she almost can’t add more fuel to it. She swallows.
“Luke?” she says. “Do you believe in signs?”
“Signs?” he asks.
“Yeah, like, signs,” she lifts her free hand and shakes it a little for emphasis. “From… beyond.”
He lets out a slow breath. “That’s a big question.”
“Is it? I mean, you’re literally from beyond,”
“I guess so,” he says. “Yeah, I mean, if… if people, like me, Alex and Reggie can appear after we’ve died, I guess it makes sense that smaller messages can get through. Why?”
“Earlier, before the Orpheum, when you guys didn’t show up and I thought you were - ” she’s cut off by a sob trying to claw at her throat. “When I thought you guys had run out of time, I went to talk to my mom,”
She almost expects him to make a joke, but he just looks at her with soft understanding.
“I just felt so lost without you guys, without her. All I wanted was for her to be there and tell me everything would be okay.”
She has to fight from crying again. Luke must sense her struggle, before he pauses a little before saying, “And?”
“And then a woman stopped and gave me a dahlia. My mom’s favourite flower.”
Luke’s eyebrows raise. “Whoa.”
“Yeah,” she laughs shakily, “And last night, I was looking through my mom’s chest of clothes, and I found this.”
She unfurls the shirt for him.
“What is this?” he asks, taken aback.
She blinks. “It’s a Sunset Curve t-shirt.”
“Yeah, I can see that,” he says, and the shock he’s feeling is laced in his every word. “How did you get it?”
“I told you, it was in my mom’s chest,” she reminds him. “I guess she could have been a fan of you guys or something.”
“It’s got all these rhinestones on it,” he says, going to run a finger along them. “We never added rhinestones.”
She laughs a little. “Well, my mom was pretty creative. She probably added them herself.”
“Whoa,” Luke breathes, and she can’t help but agree. He gives it back to her, and she lays it on her knees.
“Crazy day, huh?”
Luke lets out a soft laugh, which was what she’d wanted. She watches his face as he smiles, the dimples in his cheeks, the soft crinkles around his eyes. Those eyes, so green and mesmerising.
When they were on stage, she felt like she could look into his eyes and read his thoughts, but right now, as she looked into his eyes and he looked back into hers, she just felt open and vulnerable.
And it felt okay.
“Speaking of,” he says, looking away from her face. She’s almost disappointed until she follows his gaze to her hand. His own fingers twitch again.
He swallows, and her eyes follow the movement in his neck. She can hear her heartbeat in her ears, a drum going a mile a minute. Slowly, he reaches for her hand. She prepares to feel nothing, steeling herself against disappointment, but instead feels warmth as Luke carefully interlaces his fingers with hers. Her breath catches in her throat. She feels like every part of her is on fire, and she’s literally only holding his hand. She rubs her thumb along Luke’s almost subconsciously, and he lets out a shaky breath.
“This is an interesting little relationship you and I have,” she says, and he laughs.
“You’re something else, Julie,” he says. “I’ve never met anyone like you.”
“Well, of course not,” she manages to joke. “I’m 100% original.”
“Don’t I know it,” he smiles.
“You are too,” she tells him. “Something else.”
“Uh, yeah. A ghost.”
“Luke, I’m serious. I don’t know where I’d be without you. You’re a star, and it’s infectious. Ever since I met you it’s like I can be the person my mom always knew I could be. I can get up on stage in front of my entire school, in front of total strangers. We played the Orpheum! ”
“Hey, you’re the star here. We wouldn’t be Julie and the Phantoms without Julie!”
She elbows him. “Learn to take a compliment.”
“You think I got this far in my career being humble?” he raises an eyebrow. “I’m just telling the truth.”
“Alright,” she drawls.
“Julie,” he says, full of intent, and there’s something in the way he says it, almost like it’s a song lyric all on its own. Like just saying her name deserves all of his attention. “I’m serious.”
She looks into his eyes again, admiring his long eyelashes. He quirks an eyebrow at her, and she bites her lip on a smile. His face is always so expressive, every expression telling a story.
Because she wants to, and she’s not afraid to, she takes the hand that isn’t entwined with his and cups his cheek. His mouth opens, like he had to let out a gasp.
Carefully, he mirrors the action, and they’re both holding each other’s faces, like they were in the garage earlier. But something about this feels different, when it’s not in front of Alex and Reggie. When it’s just the two of them. She can feel his breath on her face, and it sends shivers down her spine.
Then, Luke leans forward and presses his lips against hers.
She’s not going to pretend she hasn’t thought about kissing Luke. She rejected Nick because of how much she thought about kissing Luke. But they were always more abstract, more about the lead up to the kiss than the kiss itself. Which is really just as well, because she never could have come up with the feeling of Luke’s lips, soft against hers, warm and insistent. How when she kisses him back, he has to pull away because he’s smiling too much. And when they kiss again, he squeezes her hand, as if to keep himself rooted.
Her heart doesn’t feel like it can survive this; everything inside her feels like it’s on fire. She slides her hand to Luke’s neck, gently brushing against his hair. He doesn’t move, almost like if he does, she’ll be the one who poofs away.
Until gently, he pulls back, and just leans his forehead against hers. She moves her hand away from his neck, and his hand that isn’t holding hers falls to his lap. She doesn’t know how long they sit like that, just existing in each other’s presence, relishing each point of contact. She didn’t know Luke knew how to be so still.
Eventually, the intense urge to yawn shocks her out of the moment. Regretfully, she pulls back.
“I should probably go back to bed,” she says, standing. The expression that takes over Luke’s face is close to an honest-to-god pout, and she nearly laughs.
“Wait,” he says, not letting go of her hand. Quickly, he pulls her back and kisses her again, and if he asked, she would sit out here all night, no matter what she had to do the next day.
But he pulls back, and lets her hand go. He gets up, moving towards the open door of the garage.
“Goodnight, Julie,” he says, shoving his hands in his pockets, grinning wide. He looks almost like a puppy, and she remembers when they performed Great, how wide he had smiled at her when she finally gave in and lost herself in his eyes.
She can’t help but smile back.
“Goodnight, Luke.”