𝐑𝐮𝐭𝐡𝐥𝐞𝐬𝐬 | 𝐉𝐮𝐥𝐢𝐞 𝐀𝐧𝐝 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐏𝐡𝐚𝐧𝐭𝐨𝐦𝐬

𝟐𝟏 | 𝐇𝐚𝐮𝐧𝐭

"What's going on here?" I asked as I looked around what appeared to be the lounge.

That was when I was caught up on the fourth band member. No, not Julie. Bobby. You know, the vegetarian guy from before who didn't eat the poisonous hot dogs? Well, it turns out, he led a long and healthy life that involved back-stabbing and straight up robbery.

As we spread out around the mansion to try and find Bobby, we couldn't help but be impressed. It was insane.

"Have you seen these platinum records?" Alex pointed out.

"Platinum?!" Reggie exclaimed.

"He recorded My Name Is Luke," Luke fumed. "My name is Luke!"

It was at that moment a douchey guy wearing sunglasses and a leather jacket walked in the front door.

"It's him!" Reggie exclaimed.

We all joined Reggie at the end of the stairs to observe the traitor in the flesh.

"Hey, Carrie!" Bobby called out. "I'm gonna meditate!"

"He wears sunglasses indoors," Reggie mocked.

"I'm in the den!" Someone responded.

"There's a child here?" I looked around, having taken no notice from before.

"Bobby has a kid?" Alex questioned.

"Cool!" Bobby turned around and jogged up the stairs.

"I can't stand him!" Reggie exclaimed.

"Time for his past to haunt him," Luke smirked.

"Yup!"

As Luke and Reggie made their way upstairs, Alex hesitated.

"Wait!" He exclaimed suddenly, causing the others to turn around. "Let's not rush this. You know, it's my ... it's my first time haunting someone. I wanna make it special."

We all stood there in awkward silence for a moment.

"Okay, Alex," Luke rolled his eyes and headed upstairs.

"That was weird," Alex shrugged.

"That was weird," I agreed as we started making our way upstairs.

"Why'd I say that?"

"I don't know."

"Why'd you let me say that?"

"I wish I could've somehow prevented it, Alex. I really do."

"Wait," Alex came to a halt.

"Don't say it," I threatened.

"Say what?"

"The last time you said 'wait' it was followed by something weird, so I'm stopping you," I shrugged.

"I was gonna suggest we poof ahead of them," Alex said. "It's weird that we're walking up a bunch of stairs for no reason."

"I like the way you think," I linked arms with him. "Let's get haunting!"

———

The haunting was going pretty well until Julie caught us.

"So, did you guys have fun in there?" She asked.

"Um, yes!" I laughed. "You missed it, Julie, you should've seen the look on his - "

Alex cleared his throat, indicating that now was not the time for boasting about our adventures.

"Okay, you'd do the exact same thing if he stole all your songs," Luke told her.

"I don't think she'd moon him," I corrected. "Julie has class."

"You mooned him too, Ruth," Alex stated.

"I never said I had class."

"You have new songs, with me," Julie got us back on track. "The best way to get back at Trevor is for this band to do great. And to do great, we have to play at dances, then clubs ... "

"And tours," Luke continued. "I know."

Luke had already said more words to Julie than he had to me the entire time we were at Bobby's mansion.

"I'll see you guys at the school," Julie said. "We go on at nine. Please don't be late. There's gonna be a lot of people there."

"We got it, alright?" Alex reassured her. "Don't worry."

With that, Julie left and the guys burst into excitement over everything we had just done. Now, I had never haunted anyone before but I would've liked to have seen anyone else do it better. We totally freaked him out.

As Alex talked about his new ghost friend, Willie, a lightbulb appeared over Luke's head.

"You think he has a few more tricks up his sleeves?" Luke asked.

"Let's find out."

Alex and Reggie vanished, and just as I was about to join them, Luke grabbed my arm.

"Hey," He said. "There was something I wanted to show you first."