✓ | line without a hook, reggie p.

CHAPTER SEVEN

"Guess that means I'm buying lunch that day. I know all your secrets, you know all my deep dish. Guess that means some things. ." Luke sang until Reggie cut him off.

"Wait, so, when she says deep dish, is she talking about, like, pizza, or. ." Reggie trailed off as Alex suddenly poofed atop of the piano, looking at his friends and sister. Annabelle tilted her head, he had been gone all day and suddenly decides to pop up again. "Oh, oh, hey man! Where ya been?" Reggie asks.

The big sister in Annabelle settled as she walked so she was standing in front of Alex. She crossed her arms over her chest and gave her younger brother a curious glare. "Yeah, Alex. Where have you been?" She asked him, eyebrows together.

"Um, kind of everywhere. Yeah. No, I met a new ghost friend." Alex explained. He looked at his older sister, "Chill out."

Annabelle was confused by the new slang. Chill out? That was a new one. "For real?" Reggie asked Alex, eyes wide. She loved Reggie, she did, but the way he was so interested in what Alex had to say reminded her of a lost puppy.

"Yeah. He answered a ton of questions." Alex explained, waving his hands.

"Yeah, like Julie's gonna join the band or not?" Luke asked as he yanked his songbook from the bottom of Alex, almost ripping out a page.

Annabelle looked at Luke. "Luke," she warned, giving him a look. He mumbled a sorry as he slammed his book back down on the piano.

Alex gave him a confused look. "Um, well he didn't. . . We didn't really get to that," Alex turned to look at Reggie and Annabelle, "but I think I know why we're here. Okay? All ghosts have unfinished business. So, we need to do our unfinished business so that we can cross over."

"Why would we do that?" Luke asked, Annabelle humming to signify she agreed with him. "I'm just saying, this is like our second chance. All we need to do is get Julie to play with us."

"Yeah, Luke's right." Annabelle agreed. "She can sing and she can write. If you guys got her to join the band, this could be really big. Listen Alex, while you were gone, Luke and Reggie made a killer melody to one of her lyrics."

Luke nodded and showed Alex his book. "Oh," Alex said, "Without your drummer. Cool."

Luke clapped Alex's shoulder, "Drumming is so 90's. Okay? We're just gonna stomp our feet now."

Alex turned to Luke. "Okay. Well, you know what else is so 90's? Being rude. All right? Get woke. These are sensitive times." Alex closed the book and hit it on Luke's chest, Luke muttering a ah, Alex.

"Woke?" Annabelle asked.

"Learned it from my ghost friend, Belle."

"Cool word." Reggie added.

"What does it mean?" Annabelle asked.

"No clue."

Annabelle laughed and ruffled up Alex's hair. As the group talked over the song and how they could add music to it, their conversation was then interrupted by Julie running inside. Their heads turned to look at her, the curly haired girl letting out a sigh.

"Alright guys. Show me what you got."

Within thirty minutes, they had come together to add music in the right places, how Julie would sing it and more. Annabelle sat on the couch, watching as the boys gave each other thumbs up just as a knock was heard on the garage doors. "Oh! That must be Flynn." She ran up to the doors and opened them, revealing her best friend. "Thanks for coming. We just wanted to rehearse the song so it was perfect, which it's not, but whatever."