Chapter Text
Julie stared up at the ceiling from her bed, exhausted both physically and mentally. She’d lost everyone, even Carrie, who she didn’t realize how much she’d missed.
And what could she do about it anymore?
A soft knock at the door shook her out of her thoughts, and her dad poked his head in. “You’ve got visitors, honey.”
Visitors?
She sat up to see an incensed Carrie and Trevor, looking more baffled than anything, coming in behind Ray. “Uh, hi?” she said, trying to hide her surprise.
“Hey, Julie,” Trevor said, still managing a smile. “Long time no see.”
Carrie didn’t even bother to hide her ire. Julie tried to ignore it and directed her question to Trevor instead. “What are you guys doing here?”
“Well, I heard about your band,” Trevor started somewhat hesitantly. His smile faltered. “I—we—just wanted to come congratulate you on your Orpheum show the other night.”
“Weren’t they great?” Ray said, still grinning from the doorway. “Those holograms are next level. You’ll have to get them to show you the tech sometime.”
“Yeah. Great job,” Carrie said shortly, and immediately turned back to Trevor. “Can we go now, please?”
“Actually, I was hoping you might be willing to show us that tech now,” Trevor said, ignoring Carrie completely. He looked stressed, Julie couldn’t help but notice, like he’d just gotten bad news. “It was such a great show I thought maybe I’d try and get it worked out to use it myself later.”
Julie’s heart sped up slightly. God, what had Carrie told him? “Uh…” she started. “Well, the thing is—“
“It doesn’t have to be in depth,” Trevor interrupted. “Just the model of the projector, anything basic you’d be willing to show me. I’d really appreciate it.”
Julie looked back and forth between Trevor and Carrie, then at her dad, watching with expectant curiosity, and finally stood up. Maybe she could get an answer out of Carrie outside her dad’s earshot. “Okay, I guess. Everything’s out in the studio.”
Relief crossed Trevor’s face, rage crossed Carrie’s, and Julie almost shuddered as she headed down the stairs. Behind her, Carrie and Trevor whispered furiously to each other.
She knew it had been a mistake to go to Carrie. She knew it would probably get her nowhere considering how their relationship had been for the last year. And she knew if it backfired it could ruin their chances of ever repairing that relationship, but god, it had been her only hope!
And now she’d dragged Trevor, who had almost just as much of a stake in the whole situation as she did, into it. This conversation was going to be one for the ages.
As they reached the studio, Julie tried to compose herself and hide the bubbling anxiety as she pretended to look for the projector that she knew had been left behind at the Orpheum after the show. She was scanning the room, hoping she didn’t look suspicious, when suddenly a spot of red on the couch caught her eye and she froze. Reggie’s flannel, Alex’s hoodie, Luke’s beanie—everything was still there. She was screwed.
She couldn’t come back to herself and tear her eyes away before Trevor’s gaze followed hers and he was walking toward it. “What’s this?”
“Oh, that old thing?” Julie blurted out, far too loudly, far too quickly. “That’s just some…some fabric I thought about turning into a pillow once. Nothing important.”
The lie wasn’t working. Trevor was already picking the flannel up and scrutinizing it closely, looking more pale every second. Carrie watched on, the skepticism in her eyes slowly turning to concern. Yep, definitely screwed.
“Dad?” Carrie ventured.
Trevor didn’t respond, but sat down hard on the couch, still staring down at the flannel like he’d seen a ghost because, well, he had. “Julie,” he finally said quietly. “Where did you get this?”
Julie tried impossibly hard to keep her eyes from wandering to the other items the boys had left. She did not succeed. “Just the attic, I think,” she mumbled.
Trevor stayed quiet, and Julie turned to Carrie, trying to keep her voice to a stage whisper. “What did you say to him?”
“I didn’t say anything!” Carrie said defensively. “I just told him you came by to ask for help and then it became ghosts and magicians and crazy talk! I didn’t know it would do this to him!”
“You knew about this, Carrie?” Trevor interjected, looking up from the flannel at last.
“I mean, no,” Carrie said. “But I guess kind of? I thought she was lying, Dad! Ghosts aren’t real!”
“So you did tell him?” Julie asked, ready to tear her own hair out.
“It’s not like I meant to!”
“Hey!” Julie was opening her mouth to retort when Trevor’s voice rang through the air, sharp but firm, and both she and Carrie were shocked into silence. “I’m going to need somebody to explain to me exactly what’s going on here. Right now.”
“What’s happening is Julie thought it would be funny to tell us—“
“Calmly, Carrie.”
Carrie rolled her eyes aggressively, but took a breath and started more calmly. “What’s happening is that Julie rolled up to our house this afternoon, and told me that the guys in her band aren’t holograms—“
“Carrie—“ Julie tried to interrupt, but Carrie pushed on.
“—they’re actually the ghosts of some band called Sunset Curve. And a magician has them trapped in some infinite void that we can’t access because we’re living. Oh, and Flynn’s there, did I mention that? And she wanted me to help her find them, and she was obviously lying, but now we’re here, so maybe I’m the crazy one, huh?”
She finished her spiel and sat down in the nearest chair, leaving Julie open mouthed, barely able to get a word out. Trevor was no better off as he looked back and forth between his daughter and Julie. “Julie?”
“Well, it’s…it’s true,” Julie said slowly. “Nobody was supposed to know. That was why I told everybody they were holograms. The Orpheum show was supposed to let them cross over, to finish their unfinished business, but that…didn’t work, for some reason.” She sighed. “I know this sounds ridiculous, and like Carrie’s right and I’m lying, but I swear I’m telling you the truth. Both of you.”
Trevor let his eyes wander the room, finding the beanie and the hoodie and then landing back on the flannel.“Sunset Curve?”
Julie nodded, then realized he wasn’t looking at her and said it out loud. “Sunset Curve.”
Trevor looked back up, sighed, and spoke again with a sense of finality in his voice. “A few weeks ago….something happened to me too. And I thought I was going crazy. But if this is true, then that means I’m not crazy. And neither are you.”
As hope rose in Julie’s chest once again, Carrie stood and took a step forward. “Dad, don’t tell me you’re actually buying this,” she said in disbelief. “This is insane!”
“It’s also pretty insane to see your own bandmates on stage looking just as alive as the day they died 25 years after the fact,” Trevor said, almost like he could barely believe it himself. “Or to see your name written in the fog on the mirror in handwriting you haven’t seen since then either. So, yeah. If that’s insane, I’ve lost my mind.”
Carrie threw her hands in the air and plopped back into her seat. “Fine. Fine! Ghosts are real, magic is real, Julie’s been playing music with a bunch of dead guys for months, everything is fine. Welcome to Carrie’s life, everybody.”
“So can you guys help at all?“ Julie asked.
“I have a few questions before we try and get into any of that,” Trevor said. “I don’t know any of the logistics of this or anything. To start, what did you do to find them in the first place?” He looked down at the flannel he was still holding. “Was it…this? Or something of theirs?”
“Well, I wasn’t entirely lying when I said stuff came from the attic.” Julie closed the studio door, then moved over to the CD player and popped it open. “I found this CD up there when I came to…clean the studio out. I thought maybe it was somebody my mom knew, so I played it and suddenly they were here. Out of the blue.”
“And you don’t know why?” Trevor’s brow was furrowed as he came to get a better look at the CD. He took it and looked at it closely, then placed it back in the player and hit PLAY.
The music began to blare through the studio, just as it had the first night Julie met the Phantoms, a different song this time. Luke had showed her this one on his own later—it was called In Your Starlight, and they’d talking about making it a Julie and the Phantoms song not long before the whole Caleb thing went down. It had been one of her favorites, but right now Trevor looked like he was going to cry, as much as he tried to hide it.
Carrie came closer, frowning. “Dad, isn’t this your song?”
Trevor shook his head and was about to speak when the music seemed to fade down and another sound entered the air: a long, high pitched yell. Julie looked around, but didn’t see anything—was it just deja vu? No, Trevor and Carrie were looking too, and Carrie had her hands over her ears…just as Julie had that first night.
What was happening?
Suddenly, as the yell reached its height, five people landed on the floor in front of them: Flynn, Willie, Reggie, Alex, Luke.
Julie gasped. No way was this happening again.
Carrie jumped back and screamed, hand covering her mouth. “Flynn!” She managed to get out. “What—how…how did you do that? Where did you come from?”
Trevor’s eyes widened as he took in the group, looking from Luke to Reggie to Alex and growing paler every second. “What….” he started, but couldn’t manage to speak as he processed what was happening. “How?”
The group got to their feet one by one, some easier than others, all just as surprised as the lifers they were seeing. “Julie!” Flynn cried, running like her feet had wings and hugging Julie so tight she could barely breathe. “What happened to you? How did we get back here? What’s going on?” She looked around, saw Carrie and Trevor, and her eyebrows went up. “What are you guys doing here? Oh my god, I missed so much!”
Luke was the next to find his way to her, immediately followed by Alex and Reggie, each wrapping their arms around Julie each other and unable to keep from laughing. “Julie, how did you do this? What happened?”
“I don’t know,” Julie said, wiping away a tear. “I don’t know but whatever it was, I’m so glad it did. Oh my god, are you guys okay? Did Caleb hurt you?”
“We’re okay,” Luke said. “We’re all okay, but are you okay? Did you get hurt? Willie said Caleb poofed you out or something and they couldn’t tell what happened.”
Willie. They were still hanging back, looking unsure whether they could join the celebration, nonchalantly tying their hair back and watching on. Julie motioned for him to join. “Get in here.”
A smile bloomed on his face as Alex pulled him in and everybody reconfigured their hug. “I’m okay, guys,” Julie said. “And I’m so glad you’re all okay too.”
Suddenly a voice spoke up, both petrified and annoyed. “Um, what is going on?” Carrie was standing in the middle of the crowded space, looking in every direction and waving her hands wildly. “What are you guys all looking at? Who are you talking to?”
Trevor spoke again for the first time since the Phantoms had arrived. “You can’t see them?”
Everyone went quiet as the Phantoms became aware of him.
“Bobby,” Luke said. “You can see us?”
“I…can see you,” Trevor said, voice full of uncertainty and eyes focused on Luke. “What the hell is happening?”
“Hello? Can someone answer me?” Carrie begged.
“Wait, hang on a sec,” Flynn said, looking around. “Why can’t Carrie see them? I can still see everybody. And I’m alive…right?” She pulled out her phone and turned the camera toward herself, then breathed a sigh of relief. “Phew, yep, still alive.”
“Did you just check to see if you could still see your own reflection?” Carrie asked.
“Yeah?”
“That’s vampires, you dork.”
“Uh, we don’t know how being a ghost works. You thought they didn’t exist until five minutes ago.”
Carrie’s face reddened as she grumbled something unintelligible under her breath and turned away.
Suddenly Reggie snapped his fingers. “You were in the dark room with us, right?” he said. “I don’t think lifers can usually go in there. So maybe being in there gave you some kind of freaky ghost magic that lets you see us?”
Willie shrugged. “Even if he’s using his own magic to keep the dark room there, there’s no way Caleb has complete control over it, so I guess that’s as close to an explanation as we can get.”
“Hang on, let me get the board out,” Julie said. “We can work things out from there.”
She did just that, and from there the Phantoms introduced themselves to a still disbelieving Carrie, brought Trevor up to speed, and heard the rest of the wild story of their rescue from Willie and Julie.
It wasn’t the end of the mess, and Julie knew it. They still had questions to answer, an evil magician to take down, even songs to write. But as she watched the Phantoms and her best friends both past and present laugh together, plan together and revel in their fresh starts, she felt a little more hope than she had in a minute.