𝐟𝙪𝐥𝐥 𝙘𝙝𝙖𝙧𝙜𝙚 ┃ 𝐥𝙪𝒌𝙚 𝐩𝙖𝒕𝒕𝙚𝙧𝙨𝞸𝙣

Chapter 3

I wake up to Mom shaking me awake.

"Hey! There's instruments in the garage, wanna go play?" I open my eyes to see her kneeling next to me, waking Ben up as well. Alex is gone, and no sign of Reggie or Luke.

"Let's go!" Ben agrees.

Before he took over and made us downsize, we had a whole corner of our basement dedicated to music. Mom and Dad met while he was in a small band and she was working at a small club. Music was huge to them, and after we lost him to cancer we promised we would keep the tradition going. My mom can kill it on a drum set as well as sing, play piano, and she's able to play guitar too. My dad used to play guitar, and if we begged him enough he would pull out his old banjo from his grandpa and play it. We gave that to our uncle for safekeeping before we moved, not wanting it to get ruined. We also gave him my guitar, Kota's and my shared acoustic, and Kota's electric guitar as well. Ben plays piano and is learning how to drum, and we're teaching him acoustic guitar before he's allowed to switch to electric.
My guitar was my dads. Kota wanted a flashy orange and blue one at the store when he was 12, and Dad, to his credit, bought it for him knowing how cool Kota thought it was.
I just wanted his.

"What should we play?" Mom asks, sitting down at the drum set. I grab one of the guitars that she brought down from the attic, noticing how heavy it is compared to mine. Plugging it in, I notice the strap is all colorful. Interesting. Whoever's guitar this is has good taste. I mentally make a note to be careful with it, until I can get my guitar.

"We should do that Taylor Swift Perfect Fight Song Mashup." Kota suggests.

See, we made this mashup of about 15 Taylor Swift songs, Fight Song by Rachel Platten, Perfect by
P!nk, and Love Me Like You Do by Elle Golding. It's complicated, but the chord progression works, and we all get to jam and have fun with it.

"I like it!" Mom encourages, before getting a beat going.
Kota strums first, and that's when a smile grows on both our faces.
"I remember when we broke up, the first time, saying this is it I've had enough." Kota starts, and the song snowballs from there, me getting lost in the music. I look up to the loft at one point when Mom is singing to see Alex sitting there mouth open wide catching flies. Reggie is jamming next to him, and Luke is staring me down, and I notice the fact that he's still got that stupid AC/DC shirt on. He notices me notice, and proceeds to strip right there and then. Uhhhh.... someone worked out before they died. He grabs a shirt out of a bag he's sitting by and pulls it over his head. It's just a white muscle tee, which I can handle. I look back at Mom and she's got the biggest smile on her face. We make eye contact and she does a little extra beat in there, preparing to hit the part of the song Dad included Bad Blood by Taylor Swift in. I feel so at home singing with them that I forget about all the crap we've been through and just enjoy it. Pretty soon the song slows back down, and Kota steps back, letting me take the ending.
"But I've still got a lot of fight left in me."
I quietly end it.

We haven't played as a family in about three years, but we know the song by heart. Dad helped us write it. Back then, he was lead guitarist. I give Kota a reassuring smile, and Mom grins at him.

"You sound just like him when you sing."

"YEAH!" Applause and cheers come from the loft, and I notice Reggie and Alex going nuts.

"Like my guitar?" I turn and notice Luke walking up behind me. He must've poofed down.

"Yours?" I ask. He nods, no grin anywhere to be seen. "I'm so sorry it was just up in the loft and I don't have mine from my uncle yet and..." I start rambling, and he puts a hand up to stop me.

"Anne, don't even worry about it. You shredded it! He grins, bouncing a little. "Why didn't you guys tell us you played?" Reggie asks, pretending to shred an air guitar.

"We haven't in a few years." Mom tells him. "We had to move all our stuff to my brothers when I agreed to move in with my ex. That was just kinda a Hail Mary attempt at that mashup."

Alex looks way too excited.

"I LOVE IT!"

"Wait, Anne?" Luke says quietly, grabbing my attention as I gently put his guitar in its case. I look up and notice him looking at my bare arm. Ugh right. Bruises.

"Yeah?"

"I know you don't like talking about it, but if we're going to help you guys we need to know every detail you can possibly tell us."

I look at my mom with hesitation.

"Honestly Luke, I don't remember a lot. I know it was physical but I've blocked out most of it." I confess.

"We learned this trick from my ghost friend, and we can see memories if you let us. But we have to be touching you so obviously we only do it with permission." Alex tells us.

"Please, I want to help." Luke gives me a pouty look. I can't read him. When I first met him he was cranky and ornery, and now he wants to get all buddy buddy? Bad day maybe? Do ghosts even have bad days?!

"We should do it." Mom nods. "As long as it doesn't hurt."

"No, we tried it on a friend of the girl who used to live here and all it did was make her tired." Reggie grins.

"Ok." Mom nods.

"Wait, we should do it with you two, get a better picture of what happened." Alex says looking at Ben and Kota. Both nod.

"What about you?" I ask Mom. She nods, willing to try.

"Reg, go get Willie, tell him to bring Mac with him." Alex instructs Reggie, who poofs out.

"See, Willie got out of Caleb's curse because of Alex, and he got one of the other guys out as well. His name is Mac, and if I'm right he died around the same age your mom is now." Luke tells us.

"Caleb's curse?" I ask confused.

"Right, long story." He tells me. "I'll explain later."

They show up, and the other guy heads towards my mom. Both Kota and I immediately get defensive.
"Relax ok? He can't hurt her." Luke reminds me. I watch this stranger sit down next to Mom, and I notice his body language. Completely relaxed, all movement around her is slow. Ok, maybe I can do this.

"Ok." Luke puts a hand on either side of my head, and all of a sudden I can feel him. Wait, what?!
"Forehead to forehead." He instructs, resting his against mine. I close my eyes, until I hear my mom whimper. I try to pull back, to see what's going on, but Luke holds me.
"She's ok."

I hear Mac tell her it's ok and that they can go slow, and I relax a little bit. I also hear Alex and Kota smack heads as he yanks out of Alex's grasp to check on Mom.