You Are The Music In Me

Chapter 3

Reggie practically skipped out of the studio to the main house. Julie, almost in a trance, turned to follow. Alex, however, grabbed Luke's arm and motioned for him to wait. Luke knew what was coming and didn't want to hear it.

"Honestly man, what was that? You know how important the band is – how important music is to Julie. Why would you say that?" Alex wanted to know.

Luke sighed. "I don't know, okay? Just the idea of her with Bick sent my mind into a bit of a spiral." He mumbled the last part, but Alex heard anyway. Even if Alex hadn't heard, he could tell what was going on.

"Luke. Just tell her how you feel."

"What? I've already told you, we're just friends! Bandmates. There's nothing going on between me and Julie!"

"Um, my dad wanted to know if you wanted to have lunch..." Julie mumbled. She had walked back into the studio hearing Luke practically yell at Alex there was nothing going on between them.

Shoot.

Alex quickly walked over to Julie, throwing his arm around her shoulder while glancing back at Luke. His eyes said it all – this is your fault.

                                                                                       ***

Julie had wondered if maybe, just maybe, Luke was jealous of Nick because he liked her. But now she knew for sure. That was not the case. She knew she should be mad at Luke for going off on her the way he did, but she just felt too sad and hurt. She thought he knew better. She thought he knew how important he was – how important the whole band was. Maybe Flynn was right. Maybe she should have just said yes to Nick asking her out, and just leave Luke as the eye candy that he was. The eye candy with a voice that made her weak, lyrics that went straight into her heart, and a smile that was becoming her sunshine. Not to mention when he bit his bottom lip. She didn't think that was a thing that people actually did except for in stories, but when he did it, man, her legs turned into jelly.

She knew she couldn't think about that now. The boys were going to meet her dad. Who had questions. She should have probably prepped the boys on what to say, and that had been her plan till Luke, well, accused her of wanting to leave the band to spend time with Nick.

She walked into the house to find Reggie already seated beside her dad. She wished she could have seen how that interaction went. Hopefully Reggie remembered to introduce himself and act like he didn't know where everything was. Carlos was on the other side of Reggie, and kept touching his shoulder; not to get Reggie's attention, but to see if his hand would eventually go through.

Ray looked up at the latest arrivals and stood to meet Alex and Luke.

"Mr. Molina, it's a pleasure to meet you. My name is Alex. Julie has told us such wonderful things about you, that we feel like we already know you," he said, giving Julie a slight wink that caused her to smile.

"Yeah Ray, it feels like we're best friends already!" Reggie yelled from the table, which turned Julie's smile into an eye roll.

Ray chuckled at Reggie's comment. "Please, call me Ray. It's nice to meet you. Which means you must be Luke." He said, turning his attention to the uncomfortable looking guitarist.

"Um ye-yes sir. You have a lovely home" Ray had already known his name. Did that mean Julie had talked about him before? He felt like such an idiot about what he had said in the garage. Yes, he might have told Alex, and inadvertently Julie, that there were no romantic feelings, but it was a lie. God, she was an angel. Sometimes he wasn't sure if maybe they had gone to heaven. He had to fix this. The hurt she held in her eyes made him want to fall on his knees and beg for her forgiveness. He went to go sit beside her at the table, but Alex beat him to her, giving Luke another glare. Luke sighed in defeat and sat on Alex's other side.

The lunch passed without too much excitement, but Ray couldn't help but notice a tension. Julie and Luke glanced at each other whenever the other wasn't looking. But it wasn't the secret stolen glances of a new romance, but rather ones of hurt and betrayal on Julie's face, and guilt and remorse on Luke's. Ray knew from their chemistry on stage that the two cared for each other. What he didn't know was if he was going to need to give this Luke a good old butt whooping. He hoped that wasn't the case.

"So how come you don't have Swedish accents?" Carlos asked.

The boys shared a panicked look. Luckily Julie had told them a while ago that people thought they were from Sweden. The fact that there was a time difference and she couldn't just FaceTime them usually stopped people from asking questions that Julie couldn't answer.

"We're not Swedish." Luke said. Julie choked on her water and shot him a glare. Luke wanted Julie to look at him again, but not like that. He continued, "We went to Sweden a few years ago for an exchange program, and our families loved it so much that we decided to stay. We're actually from L.A. That's how we know Julie." Julie nodded quickly at this. Luke gave a pretty convincing cover story.

"Oh, so you're from the Los Feliz area?" Ray asked.

Alex jumped in this time. "No sir. We used to live in Santa Monica. We met through a friend of a friend." Hopefully that would be a sufficient answer.

"Yeah – my house is now a bike shack!" Reggie said.

Julie knew it was only a matter of time until her dad asked where the boys were staying. "Um Papi, the boys just let me know that they are going to move back here so we can focus on our band... when I'm not working on school of course!" She added after seeing her father's eyebrow raise. "So can they stay here while they look for an apartment?"

"As long as the band doesn't distract you and your grades don't drop, they can stay. But I think we should call your parents, I'm sure they would want to know where you are staying."

"That won't be necessary, sir." Luke said. "My parents aren't exactly supportive of our music and so I haven't lived with them for a while. Alex's told him to leave when he came out to them. And Reggie... well Reggie didn't have the best home life. We were already living together in Sweden."

Ray's heart went out to these kids. He couldn't imagine how bad it must have been in their homes for their parents to not want them around. He looked at Julie and Carlos. They were his whole life. While Victoria might think that he wasn't the strictest parent, or gave them spaghetti too often, he always made sure they knew they were loved. He didn't want these three boys to feel any different. They brought his baby back and filled her with life again.

"Don't worry about the apartment boys. We have more than enough space here. What is the point of having these extra rooms if we don't have people to fill them. But if you live in my house, you will have to follow the rules. I don't know how the Swedish education system works, so have you graduated?" The boys nodded quickly. They did not want to have to go back to high school... well Reggie might have been okay with going back, but they decided this was easier. "Alright, well I can't very well have three teenage boys sitting around the house all day. I have no doubt you'd eat me out of house and home judging by the clean plates. You'll need to get jobs – they don't have to be anything fancy. I know music is your priority – you're moving across the world for it, but while Julie is still in school, that is the rule. Also, the door has to be open if any of you are in her room." He had seen how Luke looked at her. While he trusted Julie to be responsible, he wanted Luke to know there were expectations.

"Thank you thank you thank you Papi!" Julie crushed him in a hug. This was all going to work out. She had her boys, and she didn't have to hide them, well not completely hide them.

"Of course, Mija." He looked down at his little girl. "Luke, can you help me clear the dishes?"

"Yes sir," He gulped loudly and pushed his chair back so quickly that it fell over. Carlos and Reggie started giggling, while Alex shook his head. Luke looked at Julie and saw her soft eyes on his before she quickly turned back to her empty plate.

I feel like this is where I'm supposed to throw in an author's note. I feel like as evident from the fact that this is my only Wattpad story, that I am obviously new to this. So thanks for giving me a chance with this :)