Rose's Journal

Chapter 22: The Offbeat

It was 1:00 PM, and Alex had been back at the garage for a few hours waiting for Luke. He figured he would be back by now and was getting nervous. Where the hell is he? He thought. Julie may have said some hurtful things to him, but Alex had thought that Luke would be right behind him to come back to the studio. He just sat there, bouncing his leg up and down, worrying about what might have happened to him, thinking of ever worse case scenario. Did Caleb get him? Did Bobby figure everything out? But the one that scared him most of all: did Luke run away too? He would probably have broken if Luke left him too. In 24 hours, Alex had to relive the worst moment of his life, lost Reggie, had a fight with Julie, and broke up with Willie. Willie. He hadn't allowed himself to think about Willie for a while, focusing purely on his bandmates, and how hurt they were. But here he went again, thinking about Willie agreeing with him that they should break up. He wanted Willie to fight for them. He wanted Willie to scream "I LOVE YOU" from the top of his lungs, but it never happened. He loved Willie, and the fact that Willie never said it back hurt him.

Alex looked over to the corner of the room and saw his drum set. He knew he wasn't supposed to play without Julie in the garage, but he couldn't help himself in that moment. He had to play. It was the only thing that would calm him down. There used to be two options, but now one of those isn't there. When he thought of that sad fact, he was practically running to his drum set to start playing. Then, he realized that the drumsticks he always used were there. Shit, Alex thought to himself as he slouched down at the drums, I gave them to Willie. He ran to get new drumsticks before he had the chance to cry. He found a pair in the loft. The pair was faded and had some weird weathering to them, but they would work for now. He ran back down to his drum set and just started planning. No rhythm or reason: just banging on the drums. As the sticks hit the drums, he started sobbing. He thought about how they betrayed Julie's trust. He played faster. He thought about how Reggie and Luke were gone, and he didn't know where they were or how to fix everything. He crashed on the symbols. He remembered Willie's hurt face as Alex told him that they should end their relationship. He played harder. He thought about how he could've prevented his best friends from dying if he had just been more insistent about the hot dogs. He punctured a hole through the snare drum. He stopped playing, looking at what he had just broken. It was symbolic of everything that was happening: everyone pushed too hard and held all their feelings in until everything broke. It was all broken, everything. The worst part of it all, however, was that Alex didn't know if everything was ever going to get fixed again. He just sat there and stared at the broken snare and felt the fear, guilt, and sorrow rise inside of him, consuming him until he felt like a shell.

Julie sat inside her house, playing a card game with Carlos. It wasn't her first choice for a spring break afternoon, but at least it kept her mind off of everything that had happened the day before. Carlos began to shuffle the cards for the next deal when Julie heard a banging noise coming from outside.

"Wait, Carlos. Did you hear that?" Julie asked.

"Hear what? Ohhhhh is it your ghost band doing something again?" Carlos snickered.

"You can't here it?" Julie realized that this meant that he was right: it was the boys. Julie yelled in excitement, "YOU CAN'T HEAR IT!"

"Well, you don't have to rub it in," Carlos pouted, still jealous that Julie could talk to ghosts, and he couldn't.

"Carlos, I promise I'll be right back, and we can finish the game," Julie said, sticking out her pinkie towards her brother.

"How old do you think I am? Eight? Just go figure out what your boy band is doing," Carlos smiled as he began distributing the cards.

"Thanks. You're the best," Julie said as she got up and ran to the studio, following the banging of Alex's drums.

She got to the doors and paused. She remembered that she was mad at them. She can't just go in there and act like everything's fine. It wasn't. They lied to her and snuck behind her back over something she had already asked them to stop doing. But she could understand why they did it at the same time. She heard the drumming stop and figured now was her opportunity to go in. Okay, so I'm just going to go in there and say that we're gonna be okay, but I won't forgive them right now, Julie decided. She fixed her face, so it was neutral rather than smiling. She opened the doors to go inside, and immediately saw Alex sitting at his drum set, his face red and soaked with tears. He turned to Julie with his big blue eyes filled with tears and began to smile slightly at the sight of her. Julie ran over to Alex to hug him, completely abandoning her previous plan to be slightly petty and distant. He stood up and opened his arms for her to come hug him. She wrapped her arms around him and squeezed him tightly as he did the same. They both spent that moment holding each other and just letting go off all the other crap that had gone on and just enjoyed that moment together. It felt cleansing and healing for both, and neither wanted to ever let go. Eventually, Alex broke from the hug.

"Julie, I'm so sorry I-,"

"Alex," Julie interrupted softly, wiping tears from her eyes, "I'm just so glad you're back. I thought I had ruined everything. I thought you left me for good."

"You could never get rid of us," Alex said, letting out a weak chuckle. Julie did the same.

"Is it just you here?" Julie asked, hoping the other boys would be there too, but still enjoying this time with just Alex.

"Luke said he'd be back, but I don't know when," Alex said, "As for Reggie... we still have no idea where he is. We looked out for him a little bit last night as Luke and I walked around, but we couldn't find him."

"Why didn't you just come back last night?"

"We wanted to give you your space. We knew how bad we hurt you."

Julie sighed, "You did hurt me, I can't lie and say you didn't. But I would never want to be rid of you guys. Friends fight and disagree, but I know that you guys are always here for me, and you thought you were doing what was best."

"Well, we're done with the whole investigation thing now," Alex replied, "Well, at least I am. I don't want to hurt you, or anyone else for that matter, anymore. So, I decided that I'm just gonna stay out of it."

"Thank you," Julie said. She looked down to see the broken snare drum and looked at Alex sympathetically.

"Oh? The drum? I'm sorry I wish I could pay you back, but well I'm a ghost, and I have no money. I'm really sorry Julie I didn't mean to I-," he paused, realizing that Julie wasn't mad or upset.

Julie slightly nodded, "It's okay. There's someone at my school that can recover it, so it costs less. I'll just text them," Julie said, making sure Alex knew she wasn't mad. She knew that this was just his feelings collecting themselves, and he took it out on the drums.

"Thanks," Alex said, still staring at the snare drum, as it taunted his failures.

"Well, I promised Carlos that I would finish the card game with him, so I should probably get back inside before he starts cheating. Mean Girls tonight?" Julie asked with a smile, "I got my bootleg back."

Alex smiled back, "Wouldn't miss it."

Julie continued smiling as she walked back into the house. Alex was back, and she was relieved. She went into the living room when she saw Carlos packing up the cards.

"Carlos! I told you I was going to come back. I'm sorry it took so long, but c'mon I'm ready to play now!"

"No it's fine don't worry about it."

"Carlos, I still want to spend time with you. I'm sorry I just really needed to check on the guys,"

"No, I mean I finished the game with one of your ghost boys. You're off the hook now."

Julie couldn't help but grin. It made her happy to know that one of them came back, even for a minute. It meant that there was still hope for them to come back to her again.

Luke stayed hidden so that Julie couldn't see him and smiled. He missed her, and it made him happy to think that she just might miss him too.