Sunshine ☀️

twenty three☀️

"I'm the last standing, I'mma stand tall, I'mma stand tall." Julie giggled as she, Aurora, Carlos and Ray all walked up to the Molina household in a conga line.

"Tall!" Ray finished as they all split away. "You and your phantoms were unbelievable tonight." He spoke to his daughter, before looking over at Aurora. "And you, who knew you had that voice in you! You were amazing. Both of you were. You know, I'd like the thank them for bringing music back into your life ."

"I already did." Julie smiled towards her dad. "But I didn't thank you, papi." She handed her flower over to Carlos and hugged her dad.

Carlos smiled to himself, and then tapped Aurora on the shoulder, making her turn around. "A pretty flower for a pretty lady." He said as he handed Aurora the flower.

Aurora just chuckled at the boy and took the flower off him. "Thank you, kind sir."

"Hey Julie, can I talk to you and Aurora for a second?" Carlos asked his sister, making her pull away from the hug with her dad.

"Yeah, yeah. Just give us a minute." Julie said, looking at her brother.

"Okay. I'll wait up. Don't ghost me." Carlos said, winking in his sisters direction. Aurora and Julie just looked at each other in shock.

How did he find out?

"Just a minute." Julie said to her dad as she kissed his cheek, then walked over to Aurora and grabbed her hand. "Love you!" She called over her shoulder to her dad.

"Love you too." Ray said with a smile as he watched his daughters walk towards to studio.

                                   ☀️🌻☀️

Julie pushed open the studio doors, and the two girls walked inside, hand in hand.

"I know I already said this, but, uh... thank you, guys." Julie said sadly, looking up to the ceiling. Aurora just sniffled slightly, leaning her head on Julie's shoulder as she played with the flower that Carlos gave her.

"You're welcome."
"Dude."

Aurora lifted her head off Julie's shoulder in shock, and the two girls looked at each other. Aurora moved towards the light switch and flicked it on, revealing the boys huddled up together, groaning in pain.

"Why... why are you here? We thought..." Julie stammered out.

"We thought you crossed ove-" Aurora's words were drowned out by the guys getting jolted. 

"No... no. We thought you crossed over, why didn't you cross over?" Julie asked.

Aurora was wondering that too, but then she thought about something. The band was called 'Julie and the Phantoms', so did she ruin the boys chances of crossing over tonight because she played with them? She stayed quiet and just observed the scene in front of her, thinking about how it could have been her fault that they boys were still here, in pain. She put the flower down onto the table and walked next to Julie.

"I guess playing the orpheum wasn't our unfinished business." Alex huffed out as he and the boys all slowly sat up, leaning against the furniture to help them. 

"Point Caleb." Reggie said, leaning against the arm of the couch.

"We wanted you to think that we crossed over, so we pretended too." Luke said, looking at the girls sadly. "We just... we had nowhere else to go." He said shakily, trying not to cry too much.

"We thought you'd go straight to bed." Reggie said gently.

"Yeah, well... I knew they were gonna come in here, but nobody ever listens to me." Alex said, then stopped talking as he and the boys were interrupted by a jolt.