─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───
September 14th, 2020
Los Angeles
Luke's POV:
The guys and I have been in this dark room for about an hour and Alex hasn't stopped crying since. We should be at the Orpheum right now! But instead we ate some stupid hot dogs and now we're probably never going to be able to go home.
"Alex please, everything's fine. We just need to figure out how to get out of here." I say, turning to the blonde boy on the ground who was crying his heart out.
"You know I don't handle these things well!" Alex says as Reggie just looks at the two of us, obviously not wanting to say anything since he was just as confused and overwhelmed as we were.
Alex eventually calms down and finally stands up. When he does, everything starts to shake causing Reggie to also stand up.
We all start to fall and fall until we finally hit the ground. We all groan and cough from the sudden impact.
After a couple of seconds, we all manage to get up and I notice that we weren't in the dark room anymore, we were in the studio.
"Woah. Woah! How did we get back here?" I ask and suddenly we hear a scream that didn't come from us. It came from..a girl?!
"AHHHHH!" She screams and as we all turn to look at her, we all begin to scream too.
"AHHHHHH!" We all begin to huddle up and Alex and Reggie hold on to me while screaming.
The girls run away, still screaming, and the guys and I stop, watching her leave the studio as we let go of each other.
"What...WAS THAT? HOW ARE WE BACK HERE?" Alex asks as Reggie and I just look around. "I don't know, but we just scared the heck outta that girl." Reggie says as he fixes his jacket.
We all head to the back of the studio when we here someone enter. We peek around the corner and see that the girl came back, only this time holding a cross.
She walks around the garage for a second with a scared look on her face until she says, "Are you still here?" She takes a shaky breath until again saying, "...whatever you are." In defeat, she puts her cross down. "I know I saw something. I'm not crazy."
The boys and I poof behind her and I say, "Well, we're all a little crazy." She turns around and holds out her cross to us, screaming in the process.
Alex covers his ears while I take a step back, Reggie holding out his hands in defense. "Oh god. Please stop screaming!" Alex says, the girl stops and keeps her cross pointed towards us.
"Who are you, and what are you doing in my mom's studio?" She asks.
Her mom's studio? This was OUR studio.
"Your mom's studio?" I scoff, walking up to her. She get closer to me with the cross and I try to explain myself.
"This is OUR studio. Trust me." I try to back away from her and end up sitting on top of the piano. "The grand piano is new, and-and-and...MY COUCH!" I jump on my couch, which I missed so much by the way, and lay there for a few seconds before sitting up and realizing that a few things have changed since we were last here.
"But that is definitely not my six-string."
Confused, I look around the room and notice that there are chairs on the ceiling. Chairs in the ceiling?! We definitely didn't have those before.
I go up to walk back to the guys and tell the girl, "Can you give me just one second?" She tries to shove her cross towards me but I back up. "J-Just...give me a second. Thank you."
We all huddle up, and based on the looks of the two guys next to me, they were just as confused.
"Guys, what is going on? How did she get her stuff in here so fast?" I ask looking at them hoping they have an answer.
"Maybe...maybe, she's a witch. There's chairs floating on the ceiling." Reggie says as we both look up. "Ok, there is no such thing as witches." Alex says. "You sure? Cause I used to think there was no such thing as ghosts." I look back at Alex with a "he's got a point look." He does the same and says, "that's fair."
"Ok, so we're going with...witch?" I ask, looking back at Reggie for confirmation. Alex hits me on the back and says, "No! We are not going with witch. She's not a witch. Ok...look, she's just scared. Ok? Let someone...with a softer touch...handle this." He touches his heart and walks towards the girl who was just watching us go back and forth.
Reggie and I step to the side to let Alex talk to the girl.
"WHY ARE YOU IN OUR STUDIO?" He says with a not-so soft touch. Frustrated, the girl shoves the cross into Alex's chest and it goes right through him.
She takes it out and looks at the cross and at Alex in disbelief.
"Oh my gosh. How did you do that?!"
She clearly wasn't understand what was going on and Alex was thinking the same thing.
"Clearly, you're not understanding...she doesn't get it. Ok, look. We're ghosts, alright? We're just three ghosts, and we're really happy to be home. So, thank you for the flowers. They really brighten up the room."
Alex joins us again and I take this as an opportunity to finally introduce ourselves.
"We're actually in a band called Sunset Curve." Reggie chimes in to say his classic line, "Tell your friends!" And I continue to explain the situation.
"Last night was supposed to be a really big night for us. It was gonna change our lives" Alex takes this opportunity to say, "I'm uh...I'm pretty sure it did."
"This is freaking me out." The girl says as she takes something out from her pocket. She puts down her cross for a second but then immediately lifts it back up.
"What is that? What are you doing?" I ask her. "It's my phone. No! Stop talking to them. They aren't real. There's no such thing as cute ghosts."
Flattered, Reggie says, "Oh, you think we're cute?" He smirks and the girl just goes back on her phone.
Alex smiles and says "who you callin?"
"I'm googling Sunset Swerve." She says. Ouch. "Sunset Curve" we all say in unison as Reggie makes a curve with his fingers.
"Woah. There is a Sunset Curve. You did die. But not last night."
Not last night? How long has it been?
"Twenty-five years ago?" She says.
What? No, no, no. That has to be wrong.
"What? No. No, no, no. Th-th-that's impossible. After we floated out of the ambulance, all we did was go to that weird dark room where Alex cried." Reggie says, clearly in denial.
In a high pitched voice, Alex says, "Well...I don't think. I think we were all pretty upset. Ok."
"But that was just for like an hour. We just showed up here." I say to her.
Was she right, has it actually been twenty-five years?
She shows us her phone and says, "Look. I'm just telling you what my phone says. See? You died in 1995. When you were 17. It's now 2020." Realization hits me. She was right. It has been twenty-five years.
The realization hit both Reggie and Alex too. Alex even says, "So, this is the future? Wait. So-So it has been 25 years. I have been crying for 25 years? HOW IS THAT POSSIBLE?!" He shouts.
"Well, you're a very emotional person." Reggie says. "I am not!" Alex cries trying to defend himself.
Her brother then walked in and the girl realized that he couldn't see us. Nobody else could see us but her. She tried to walk out, telling us that we had to go but I introduced ourselves before she could.
"But wait. We didn't get your name." I say as she turns around, clearly annoyed at us.
"It's Julie."
"Cool. I-I'm Luke, by-by the way. A-A-And this is..." I say as Reggie lifts up his hand to say hi and says, "Reggie, I'm Reggie! Hey." Giving her a big smile.
"And..." I continue to let Alex introduce himself. "Alex. How's it goin'?" I raise my hands in a jazz like form and quietly mutter a "ba da!"
"Ok?" Julie says as she walks away, still annoyed.
Reggie clearly trying to see the bright side of things says, "Julie seems nice." Alex of course objects saying, "Did you miss the part where she kicked us out or....yeah okay."
• TIME SKIP •
After realizing that people could hear us play, the boys and I went to a couple a clubs to listen to today's music.
We heard plenty of new songs that I had to admit were really good. We even decided to play some of our own songs and people seemed to really enjoy them.
When we got back to the garage, we got some of our old stuff like our songbooks, and instruments.
Not too long after, Reggie and Alex got a bit tired so they rested as I went through my songbook.
Early on, I found some songs that Emily and I had written. I would be lying if I said that she wasn't my first thought when Julie had told us that we had been gone for twenty-five years.
Even before we ate the hot dogs, she was my last thought.
I just couldn't wrap my head around the thought of her now being forty-two years old. 42!
We were supposed to grow old together. Have a life together, and I messed it all up because I was mad. I was really mad.
I just wanted her to be there for my big night.
"Hey man, you alright?" Alex's asks as he starts to wake up. "Yeah...yeah I'm just, just going through my songbook." I tell him, not looking him in the eyes.
He sighs until he says, "I miss her too man. You weren't the only one that didn't get to say goodbye."
Alex and Emily were best friends. He was the one that introduced me to her. They would always hang out whenever they had the chance.
They knew each other in and out and I could only imagine how he feels right now.
"I know...and I'm sorry." I finally look at Alex, giving him a small smile. He gives me one in return and says, "it's ok."
He goes back to sleep and I try to as well but I couldn't.
I tried and tried for what felt like hours but had no luck. I eventually decided to go out and take a walk alone so I could think things over.
It wasn't long until I decided to go to Emily's house. Maybe she was still there.
But was I really ready to see her? To see her with someone else, with a family.
For me it only feels like it's been a couple of hours. I ended things because I was mad, not because I stopped loving her.
I just stood outside her house for a while, but it didn't look like anyone lived there anymore.
What about her mom? Did they move? Why didn't a new family move in here?
I take a deep breath before going inside the house, only to find it completely empty. It looked like no one had been inside it for years. Everything was dusty but the house was still clean.
I go up the stairs and make my way to Emily's room. When I go in there, I see that it's completely empty. Her bed, desk, studio, and even her pictures were gone.
Where is she?
At this point, I just wanted to see her. To know that she's okay and that she's happy.
I leave and go check her mother's room.
Unlike Emily's room, her mom still had all of her stuff in it, but like the rest of the house it was clean but dusty.
I go back to Emily's room and slowly make my way over to the middle. My emotions take over me as I begin to feel tears go down my cheeks.
How could I let this happen? How could I let my perfect world crash?
I had it all. Great friends, an amazing girlfriend, a successful band, even my relationship with my parents was getting better, but everything was ruined because I wanted to get street dogs.
I feel horrible.
Eventually, I sit down and begin to cry, just wishing that this was all a dream, a nightmare. That everything was ok and soon enough I would hear Emily's voice again telling me that I was ok. That we were ok.
"I'm sorry." I say as I left out a shaky breath, more tears going down my face. "I was so stressed that night, and I took it out on you."
I take a minute to compose myself. Taking deep breaths and just looking around the room until I finally admit,
"I just wanted my biggest supporter there."
─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───
AN: hey guys!!!! Hope you all liked this chapter :) also sorry that it's a bit short but the next chapter will add a bit more spice to the story ! (Wait...NOT THAT KIND OF SPICE LOLLL I can barely write fluff let alone...that) I'll be updating soon! Hope you all have a good night/day! Love you all!
-El <3
[Edited: June 10th, 2021]