Ghost of You | JATP

Stand Tall... - Julie

It all happened so fast and somehow... not fast enough.

"There's something I have to tell you." This is how the conversation I never wanted to have started.

"We figured out that we have unfinished business. That's why we came back as ghosts..."

"We have to play the show we never got to play."

I went to reply to him, but he was thrown backward by a jolt I had never seen happen before.

"We don't have a lot of time."

"What was that? Are you okay?" I panicked. He said we, meaning not only him but the other guys, were experiencing this electrified pain too. Not him... not them.

"We did something that we shouldn't have. The night that we missed the dance, we met this ghost, and he put this curse on us," A ghost that can curse you, they met a ghost that could, and did, curse them. "And if we don't do what he says, then those jolts will destroy us." So, I would lose them too. Faster than I thought I would.

"Then you gotta do what he says. What does he want?"

"He wants us to be in his house band for eternity. But if we can play the Orpheum soon, then we can avoid all that and actually cross over." So I lose them no matter what.

"So it's either you cross over, be in his band for eternity, or be destroyed by those jolts?"

"Yeah."

"That's just great." I heard him call my name, but I couldn't look at him anymore. I lose people, everyone I care about, and they all disappear.

I went to my room to franticly let my feelings out in my sketchbook while I waited for Flynn. She may be eccentric and pushy, but I needed my best friend.

Flynn came as quickly as she could, and I started my rant.

"I just don't get it. Right when my life starts to get good. Great friend, great band, great guy..."

She went over to my mom's old trunk of clothes that I had torn apart in the days before this catastrophic one, doing anything she could to try and help put my life together somehow.

And then, as Flynn does, she found the one thing to put my head in the right space. An old Sunset Curve t-shirt tucked away in my mom's trunk. I'd never come across it before, and Flynn was convinced it was a sign that my mom sent me these boys in my time of need, so I needed to get up and help them in theirs. I believe it now.

I quickly left my room to get to the garage. I found the boys quickly. Reggie, sadly hugging his guitar; Alex, lying on the couch trying to balance drumsticks on his nose; and Luke, looking defeated on the floor.

I needed to get their attention, and I needed them to be on board.

"Snap out of it!" I yelled. Alex fell to the floor at the sudden sound.

"Jeez. I think you broke Alex." Reggie always with the sarcastic responses, even when he doesn't pick up on sarcasm when it's being thrown at him.

"Do you guys want to cross over or what?" Luke helped Alex up off the floor, and they all looked at me dumbfounded. Not off to a great start, "Get it together!" I said in between claps.

"They're never going to let us play the Orpheum." Luke forever the optimist until it's his life falling apart. Two can play this game.

"Someone once told me that you don't ask for permission. You book gigs by doing." I said, staring directly at Luke. He told me that when I got kicked out of my music program, now he needed to hear it for himself.