I've Had The Time Of My Life

Chapter 8

a/n - do I proof read these? never. never did when I was in school, and I'm not starting now.

Of course the phone lost power as soon as Willie saw Luke. He was a little surprised, seeing as he had dialed Alex. Was Alex avoiding him? Except that couldn't have been the case as it would have shown as Carlos calling. Willie had gotten the sense that something had happened between Alex and Luke before they died... had that started up again? Willie thought Luke was in love with Julie. Willie had really lost his chance with Alex. But maybe if Willie could find a way to save Carlos and escape from Caleb, then maybe, just maybe, Alex would give him another chance.

***

Alex looked at Reggie in disbelief. "Really Reg? Really?" Reggie looked at Alex with confusion. "C'mon man, we're literally in a time crunch trying to save Carlos. We don't have time for pastries."

Reggie looked down, and mumbled that he had gotten some for everyone.

"Ooookay well moving on then. Reggie, can you show Luke the photo you took?" Julie asked. She loved Reggie, but she hoped he hadn't been too distracted to remember what was at stake here. Luckily, Reggie had taken a photo but Luke quickly shook his head.

"Nope, sorry guys. So where to next?"

Julie looked at the list they had made based off of time zones and big music cities. "Um let's do Canada next. So Reggie you go to Toronto, and Luke, you speak French right, so Montreal. And Alex, you can start in... actually you know what, probably best to go with Reg. Just in case."

"So where are we going?" Reggie asked. "Oh, Canada." Reggie laughed at his own joke while Julie crossed her arms, Alex rolled his eyes, and Luke tried not to show he thought the joke was hilarious.

The guys poofed off again, and Julie tried to not panic but focus on the task at hand. She quickly messaged Flynn and Carrie to see if they could come over and help. Carrie's dad travelled a lot for work, so she would probably have a good idea of big cities, and Flynn, well Flynn was like Julie's emotional support dog, so her being here would help to ease Julie's nerves.

Alex and Reggie returned moments before Luke. While their photo wasn't what Luke had seen, he did feel like there were some common elements. "Definitely night time lights. So that helps narrow it a bit, right Jules?"

Julie nodded, trying to stay optimistic. "Kay so next will be Atlantic City for Luke, and NYC for Reggie and Alex."

"Killerrrrrr, I can go by myself!" Reggie pouted.

"I know Reg, but um I'm not sure if Alex can be on his own, so you'd be really helpful." Julie whispered. Reggie lit up, feeling glad for the 'responsibility' and gave a wink to Julie and poofed out.

Luke walked to Julie and grabbed her hand gently. "We'll get him back Jules. But I need you to not give up, okay?" Julie gave a quick nod, trying not to cry. Luke gave a quick kiss on her cheek, and poofed out, leaving her alone.

"I lost him for one second so I couldn't stop him," Alex suddenly said. Julie spun around, terrified that something had gone wrong. And then she saw him.

Reggie had somehow managed to sneak away in the short seconds they were there to grab a souvenir. Reggie, always the joyful boy he was, was proudly wearing a shirt that read 'I ❤️ NY'. "I left them an IOU though since I didn't have time to pay... so I'll have to go back later!"

Luke returned, slightly stunned looking at Reggie's shirt, but shook his head when Julie asked about Atlantic City. "Reg, Alex, let's see the photo you took." Luke held out his hand to see the photos they took. He squinted his eyes and tried to focus on his brief call with Willie. "I think... I think this could be it. So boss, what's the plan?"

Julie hadn't really thought much past figuring out what city Carlos could be in... and of course, it had to be in one of the biggest cities. Julie had become so desperate that she turned to Reggie. He had a few good ideas lately, so maybe he would surprise them. "Hey Reg, what do you think we should do?"

Reggie couldn't believe it. People were finally taking notice of how smart he was. Okay okay okay, he couldn't let them down now. "Okay, so I'm thinking we go to Central Park and find a pigeon hoard. We then train said pigeons to scout the city. We obviously had to show them a photo of Carlos, but I don't think we have photos of Willie or Caleb, so I'll just have to draw them I guess. Then, when the pigeon finds them, they will let out a secret coo call, which then all of the other pigeons will sing to each other, till it reaches us back in Central Park, like a game of telephone. Then we follow the calls back to where Carlos is like Marco Polo. It's the perfect plan." Julie, Alex, and Luke looked at Reggie with their jaws open and eyes wide. "You know what, that might actually not work because I'm not very good at drawing. My back up plan was we could try to find ghosts either here or in New York to see if they've been to the club before and could point us in the right direction? But I wasn't sure how easy it would be to do that, so I'm still thinking we try the pigeons first."

"I don't even know how to respond to that," Alex said after a beat of silence. He turned away from Reggie and looked at Luke. "So where do you want to try first, here or New York?"

"I guess New York? At least that way we'll be in the right city?"

"Oh great! I can drop some money off for my shirt. But should we great some bread crumbs for the pigeons?" Reggie asked.

Alex took a deep breath, closing his eyes, trying not to smack Reggie. He nodded at Luke, grabbed Reggie's sleeve, and the three disappeared.

"What. The. Heck. Did. I. Just. See."

Julie inwardly groaned. How had she been so good at keeping the guys ghost status a secret for so long, but just kept on slipping it up by not being careful. She turned around to see the front door open. "Heyyyyyyyyyy..."

quote time.

"Life becomes easier when you accept the apology you never got." Robert Brault