Perfect Harmony / Luke Patterson

2. Where's My Shirt?

"OHHHHHHHHH" Delilah screamed. What was happening! It felt like Reggie was driving and taking a turn WAY too fast like usual but 10x faster and 50x more gut wrenching. "Ouch!" She yelped as her body hit the ground and the wind was knocked out of her. She tried to sit up but couldn't quite catch a breath yet so she stayed on the ground for a minute before standing up with Luke's help. "Are you okay?" He asked, concern lacing his voice "yeah, i'm fine" she barely managed to cough out. "Woah, how did we get back here?" Luke asked when suddenly the couple's ears were filled with a high pitched screaming. Her hands flew to cover her ears as she found the source of the wretched noise. A girl who seemed to be around the same age as the band but maybe a little bit younger, who had... enormous..monster? Slippers on? Delilah giggled at the sight before the girl sprinted out of the garage, and Luke smiled down at her laugh filling his ears, oh how he loved that sound. "Who... was that?" Reggie asked while he slowly removed his fingers from plugging his ears. "I have no idea" Alex coughed and removed himself from the arms of Luke, which he had jumped into while in the panic of being screamed at by a teenage girl in, like stated before, monster slippers. "Whoever it was, she screams loud" Delilah groaned while rubbing her temples, she had given the girl one massive migraine. Delilah quickly walked out of the garage for some fresh air to get rid of it and the boys followed, Reggie rubbing her shoulders as she walked, he too was a victim of chronic migraines. She stood out there rubbing her arms from the wind and Luke wrapped his jacket around her shoulders to keep her warm, he would burn down a building to keep her warm, which may seem a bit extreme, but hey they always say it's the thought that counts. "Wait, where's my mom's car? Or the boxes? Where did all of our stuff go?" She asked, something was really off about this place all of the sudden. "That is weird. Something feels weird." Alex agreed. The bandmates all stood out in the dark for a while thinking about it before wandering back into the garage to inspect it as well. When they walked in they were met with the girl's voice again. "I'm not crazy!" She reasoned with herself. Luke stepped forward "Well we're all a little crazy." He chuckled, which in turn made the girl whip around and start screaming again. Delilah winced and hid her head in Luke's chest as he wrapped an arm around her and put the other over her uncovered ear. "Oh! Please stop screaming!" Alex yelled and she stopped. Delilah slowly lifted her head up but stayed close to Luke in case the screaming began again. When she finally looked up at her she almost giggled, she was holding a cross at the band like a gun. "Wuh-d-Who are you and what are you doing in my mom's studio?" Luke stepped forward "Your mom's studio?" the girl thrust the cross at him with full force and Delilah finally let out a laugh, this was ridiculous. Luke threw his arms up and tried to avoid her wrath "This is our studio!" He stumbled over the top of the piano as she swung it at him again "the grand piano is n-new but...My COUCH!" He laughed in excitement as he flung himself onto the couch his girlfriend couldn't help but smile at his enthusiasm, but that smile was quickly replaced with panic when the frightened girl almost hit her face with the cross, Delilah swiped her arm at it to get it out of her face but her hand just went right through. "Wha?" She questioned and looked down at it. Last she checked her hand wasn't supposed to go through things. "Can you give me just one second?" Luke reasoned with the young girl who was very threatening with her cross, as he walked toward the band. "Just give me one second! Thank you!" He flinched and pulled the three teens into a huddle "Guys, What is going on! How did she get her stuff in here so fast!" He exclaimed, waving his hands around like a mad man. "Maybe...Maybe she's a witch!" Reggie reasoned "Yeah cause that's a thing" Delilah scoffed "There's chairs floating on the ceiling Lilah!" he shouted at her quite frantically while pointing to the ceiling. "OK, There is no such thing as witches" Alex responded and Reggie just kept going "you sure? I used to think there was no such thing as ghosts!" "ok that's fair" Alex sunk. "Ok, so we're going with the witch?" Luke asked and Delilah put a hand on him and Reggie's shoulders. "Honey, honey were not going with the witch. She's not a witch ok? I mean look at her, she's just scared!" she reasoned with the boys gesturing to the girl in front of them practically shaking in her monster slippers. Alex nodded and put his hand up to his chest "Let someone with a softer touch handle this." He then turned to the girl and asked "Why are you in our studio?" quite abrasively one might say. The girl didn't respond, instead she thrusted the cross at his chest and it went right through him. His eyes widened "It happened again!!" Delilah yelled as she pointed frantically in Alex's direction. "Oh my gosh! How did you do that?" the new girl, shocked, asked "Ok clearly you're not understanding" Alex started as he put his hands up to reason with her. "Ok. Look, we're all ghosts alright. We're just four ghosts and we're really happy to be home." He gestured around the room as he continued his speech. " So, thank you for the flowers. They really brighten up the room." They still didn't think she was getting it quite yet. Luke then stepped forward "We're a band called sunset curve." "Tell your friends'' Reggie winked and their female bandmate decided to step in. "Look, last night was supposed to be like a huge night for us. Our lives were never gonna be the same." Luke sighed next to her and Alex chuckled. "Uh.. yeah pretty sure it did." "This is freaking me out!" The girl held up the cross again and pulled.. Something out of her pocket. "What is that, what are you doing?" Luke asked her. It was like a tiny box or something. "It's my phone..." She answered. "No! Stop talking to them, they aren't real! There's no such thing as cute ghosts." She laughed and Delilah smacked Reggie's chest " Ay Yo She thinks we're cute reg, we did it" she chuckled "Who ya callin'?" Alex asked, speaking like an old woman with hearing problems.. He would. "I'm googling sunset swerve." "It's uh... curve." Delilah coughed. The darker girl gave a sarcastic smile before looking back down at her phone "Woah. There was a sunset curve. You did die... but not last night... Twenty five years ago?" "Woah woah woah.. That-that's impossible!" Reggie exclaimed "After we floated out of the ambulance all we did was go to that weird dark room where Alex cried." Alex squeaked "Well... I don't think... I think we were *cough* all pretty upset OK?" Delilah squeezed his shoulders "But that was just like an hour?" The girl scoffed. "Well I'm showing you right here. It says you died in 1995, when you were 17. It's now 2020" All four of the teens' eyes widened "SO.. so it's been 25 years?" Alex cried "I'Ve been crying for 25 YEARS!! How is that possible?" "Well you're a very emotional person" Reggie replied. "I AM NOT!" "It's okay buddy." The female reasoned with the boy, who in fact was very emotional.. But he didn't need to know that. "Talking to your ghost friend?" a boy asked as he walked right through her. "Hey! Th-that's not very nice!" she shouted. Shuddering at the sensation. Alex put a hand on Delilah's shoulder and gave her a small sympathetic smile "Like you said. It's okay buddy."

The last thing she found out was that the boy couldn't see her and he told the girl to come eat.

The girl groaned "Look. I'm very sorry for what happened to you guys. But this isn't your studio anymore. That made Delilah frown, perhaps it wasn't her home anymore either. "You have to leave." the darker girl said before turning around to walk out the doors. "Wait! Uh.. we.. we didn't get your name!" Luke shouted after her and she whipped around "It's Julie." "Cool. Uh I'm Luke by the way. And uh, this is Delilah" the female bandmate waved and smiled awkwardly "And reggie, and alex." He made some jazz hands "Ba-daaa" He softly said and the girl burst out laughing before quickly covering her mouth. "OK?" Julie stated before rushing out the doors to her house. "Julie seems nice." Reggie smiled "Did you miss the part where she kicked us out or..?" Alex asked, clearly annoyed. Delilah looked down and played with her fingers "So... what do we do now?" She asked. Luke noticed her sudden downfall in emotion and took her small hands into his to stop her anxious fiddling. "W-where's my mom? I don't know what to call home..." Reggie and Alex joined Luke and wrapped their arms around the disheartened girl's shoulders "We're your home Lilah, always will be" Alex reassured her and she smiled and leaned into her second family. After staying like that for a while she finally wiped the tears from her cheeks and sniffled softly. "We should probably go ask if we can stay in the garage, I mean it's not like anybody can see us." The boys nodded and headed up to the house. The four of them walked through the door but stopped when Julie screamed at the sight. Delilah quickly began to nudge the boys out the way they came. "Okay, maybe not the best time?" "You shouldn't be here!" Julie scolded "Oh yeah yeah, that's our cue to leave!" Reggie yelped before hurrying out the door, the rest of the band right behind him.

--

Music blasted through the speakers as Delilah and the band sang along to her favorite song that Sunset Curve had written so far. The guys had found all of the instruments and equipment in the loft collecting dust bunnies and well, it seems they couldn't just let them keep collecting dust. But sadly their tight music was quickly interrupted by a furious Julie stomping into the garage. "Guys! CUT! IT! OUT!" she screamed "the whole neighborhood could hear you! AND! I thought I told you to leave!" Luke looked at his bandmates, confused "Wait, people could hear us play?" "Yes!" Julie whispered "And so could my dad and my brother!" "Wai-wah-wait wait, so everyone can't see us... but they can hear us play?!" Alex began to ramble. This was huge! Julie's dad suddenly walked in and the band formed a huddle "Okay okay this is huge! We can still play for people!" Delilah excitedly told the boys. They all began to ramble on about where they wanted to play and what they could do but the girl bandmate trailed off when she noticed Julie storming out of the garage, she quickly followed her by poofing outside. "GAH!" She screamed "Please stop doing that!" The slightly older girl chuckled softly "Okay, I'm sorry. I know things are weird right now and this is all just... crazy but people can hear us play! That's huge for us!" "Yeah. It's just, I've had a really really awful day. I've gotta go." She stated before continuing to storm off. "Wait. Julie. I'm sorry you've had a bad day, really. But we just found out that we've had a bad 25 years But we can still play. And that is what matters to us which is just great and yeah. I get it. Bad day." Delilah finished before Julie could cut her off. "You have to understand how this feels I mean, clearly your mom was into music!" she argued "Was." Julie replied her head falling, "She passed away." "Julie..I- I'm so sorry that's awful." She smiled softly at Delilah "Look, you can stay just please don't play unless I'm there and yeah just be quiet. I've gotta go." She smiled again before turning on her heel and climbing up the steps to her front door. Delilah ran back into the garage before dancing around the boys ''Wo-ho! Somethings got Lils All happy" Alex hooted. She grabbed Luke's arms and giggled as she danced with him around the room. "Okay okay!" Luke laughed, "What's going on?" 'Weee can stayyyyeyyyy!" She shouted in a sing-song voice. It seemed to her that things were finally starting to work out. Maybe not everything was lost like they previously thought.

--

"Oof" Delilah groaned as her butt hit the canopy above the ticketing office of the Orpheum abruptly. "Look you guys." Luke began "I know being a ghost isn't very rad, but it sure is easy getting around!" Reggie scoffed "easy for you to say! I lost my shirt on that one!!" Delilah laughed before pointing at his chest "Oh! There it is!" She laughed with the boys before Alex began his always necessary (apparently) downer speech "Soooo, why'd you bring us here? Just a painful reminder of where we never got to play? Thanks buddy!" His female bandmate slapped his arm in response "Take the positive level up several notches Alex! Yeesh!" The four of them then poofed down to the sidewalk "I'm telling you guys! The game isn't over yet! I say we jam in as many clubs as we can before morning!" His girlfriend cheered in response "Here, Here! All hail king Luke!" and he kissed her cheek in response "shut up dork." he teased. "Alright then, let's go!" Alex (reluctantly) agreed. This was going to be quite the night.