Red Soul | Eddie Munson

𝕏𝕍. 𝔻𝕚𝕤𝕒𝕡𝕡𝕠𝕚𝕟𝕥𝕞𝕖𝕟𝕥 𝔸𝕟𝕕 ℝ𝕖𝕘𝕣𝕖𝕥

"Now smile for the
camera. Breakdowns
are entertaining."
╰── ⋅ ⋅ ── ✩ ── ⋅ ⋅ ──╯

Eddie's POV:

I rolled up to Gareth's house to see everyone was already set up for band practice. I glanced around the garage, but I didn't see Julie.

"Where's your lady?" Jeff asked as soon as he saw me.

"Probably getting dressed in the back of the van," Gareth snorted.

"Hey, man, not cool," I said, opening the back of the van to get my guitar out. "I don't joke about your girl like that. Oh, wait, you don't have one."

"Real funny, Munson," he grumbled.

I hooked up my guitar and we went ahead and started our practice. I was too distracted to play well, though. Every car that drove by caught my attention. I had hope with every one that it was Julie.

"Eddie, what's going on with you, man?" Jeff asked. "You suck today."

"Fuck off, Jeff." I rolled my eyes. "Just an off day, I guess."

"It's because Julie isn't here," Gareth said.

"It is not," I snapped.

That was a bold faced lie. Julie said she would be here and the fact that she wasn't had me worried. Did she get in an accident? Did she just blow me off?

"You want to play our new song?" Gareth asked, breaking me out of my thoughts.

"Not today," I told him. "Julie's not here and—"

"And it's a song for her." Gareth threw one of his drumsticks at me. "Christ, man, you got it bad."

I grabbed some beer out of the refrigerator in his garage. "Let's just drink, man."

We all cracked open our beer and sat down. I came to the realization I hated being without Julie. She always sat on my lap when we were done practicing, lovingly petting the side of my head and sharing a beer with me. It felt empty with her gone.

"Can't believe Julie stood you up," Gareth said out of nowhere. "Honeymoon phase must be over."

"She didn't stand me up, asshole." I flipped him off. "She must be busy. I don't know."

"Busy with what?" Jeff chuckled. "One of her secret things she can't tell you about?"

"It isn't like that, she's just private with some stuff," I said.

"The girl is comfortable enough to piss in front of you, but she goes through spells where she can't tell you what she's doing?" Gareth rolled his eyes. "Sounds like she's cheating."

"We weren't even together until a few weeks ago, dude," I defended her.

"It doesn't matter, Munson. She probably has some boy toy that shows up every once in awhile that she doesn't tell anyone about. You think she's sporadically fucking you on the hood of a car with little experience?"

I hated to admit it, but Gareth was kind of right... Or maybe it was just because I was on my third beer. Either way, he had me in my head.

Julie did act weird when all the stuff with Will was going on, but I couldn't blame her. That was traumatic. She still woke up with nightmares about him missing. But then something else happened. She said it was because of Will again, but there was something she wasn't telling me. I didn't prod her about it, it was her private family life. The only concerning part to me was how she suddenly talked a lot of nonsense in her sleep about demogorgons and the mind flayer and the upside down. Sure, Will and I had been teaching her how to play Dungeons and Dragons, but she always sounded terrified, not like she was just playing the game in her dreams. And now... this. Maybe I was overreacting, allowing Gareth to infiltrate my mind with bullshit. But the way she made up lame excuses and would fall off the face of the earth for hours or days, always coming back nervous and strange acting, was weird.