Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Depending on who you ask, it either happens very gradually or the very second the boys walk through the Molinas’ front door for the first time. 

In the very least, what starts it all is a complete accident. The boys aren’t in the music program, and Julie has only ever heard vague rumors about the three of them as individuals and a threesome. Luke has a bad, cocky attitude, Reggie does and says really weird shit, and Alex is annoyingly worried about every single thing in his life. And, on top of all of that, they are disarmingly close to each other—where there is one, the other two will soon follow, if they aren’t already right there to begin with. 

Julie, admittedly, could care less about them. She has college-level classes, she has the music program, and she has Flynn, so everyone and everything else is pretty irrelevant to her past the acquaintance level. Any whisper of, “I heard Patterson’s one detention away from being expelled,” and “Yo, I heard that Alex kid left in the middle of Chemistry because he started crying, what a freak,” goes in one ear and out the other. They’ve never spoken to each other, and Julie couldn’t tell someone what the three boys even look like if asked. 

And then, one sunny afternoon, Flynn leaves school early to go to a doctor’s appointment and Julie is left to her own devices in the music room. The theatre kids are putting on an extravagant production of Wicked and almost everyone involved in the music program is now involved in the musical, so she has the entire room to herself while they’re off rehearsing. Julie decides to try and work through a difficult set of lyrics that have been bothering her, and is sounding out various things on the piano when she hears a loud crash, several swear words, and then: 

“Dude, you have a human wrecking ball of a voice!” 

Julie’s hands drop onto the piano in surprise, and an unpleasant, cacophonous noise follows that makes her flinch. She leans around the piano’s open lid, ready to tell off one of the careless freshmen always trying to poke around in here, and then stops. 

There are three boys in a heap on the floor. One of them, blonde and wearing a lilac shirt, is half-sprawled across a chair and half-sprawled onto the ground; the second, this one with a black leather jacket and a scuffed pair of combat boots, is laying flat on his back like Charlie Brown; the third boy is struggling to his knees, hair a wild mess and what looks like a guitar case strapped to his back. Despite the spill they just took, he’s grinning like he just won the lottery.

Julie says nothing, just stares and stares and tries to comprehend what the hell is going on here. And then, because she can’t help herself, asks: 

“Is that why you three just did an epic Crash Bandicoot into the chairs?” 

The boy on his back says: “That was uncalled for.”  

“But not entirely inaccurate,” the blonde one concedes, finally righting himself. He’s tall, and has an undercut, and Julie thinks she should be intimated by him but he reminds her a lot of a golden retriever. “We, uh, heard you playing. Out in the hallway.” 

Julie raises her eyebrows. “I figured, since you all decided to… drop in.”  

“We tried to be sneaky about it, but we’re not exactly subtle guys.” Guitar boy gets to his feet and practically teleports to where she’s still sitting. “But seriously—you have an incredible voice. And you shred on piano.” 

Julie realizes, with a little surprise and a lot of personal betrayal, that she’s fighting back a smile. 

“Thanks. I’m still working on the song right now, so it doesn’t really sound that great yet.” 

Blondie is helping the last member of their posse to his feet, but he stops long enough to look over and tell her: “If that’s what your songs sound like while they’re in progress then the music industry is in for a rude awakening.” 

Leather jacket sends Julie a wink. “Especially when we make it onto the scene, too.” 

She shakes her head, completely and utterly baffled. “Who are you guys?” 

“Sunset Curve,” the one next to her says, and something about the proud tilt to his head and his smug smile makes Julie feel like she’s experiencing deja vu, but she has no idea what prompted it. 

Blonde boy sighs, exasperated. “She meant our names, idiot. I’m Alex.” 

“Oh, yeah. I’m Luke.” 

Luke holds out a fist towards her, so Julie bumps it, trying not to let them see her reaction to this clarifying piece of information. If the blonde guy is Alex, and this guy next to her is Luke, then the last one must be— 

“And I’m Reggie.” He makes the I’ve-got-my-eyes-on-you gesture at her, but the severity of it is lost when some of his carefully styled hair flops onto his forehead. “Do not, under any circumstances, call me Reginald.” 

“Reginald.” Luke teases. 

“You’ve seen me naked—you’re allowed to call me that.” 

“Wow,” Julie says, while Luke splutters. “I knew you guys were tight, but that is a new level of friendship that I wasn’t expecting.” 

Luke holds both hands up defensively. “It was against my will! Reggie forgot to lock his bedroom door.” 

“You forgot to knock!” 

Alex hooks an arm around Reggie’s shoulders and tugs him over to the piano. Julie thinks that this is not the best idea, since Luke and Reggie might be ramping up for an actual fight, but she says nothing, just watches them come closer with wide eyes. While the other two continue to squabble, Alex smiles down at her, and she feels oddly soothed by the expression. 

“You’ve heard of us, then?” 

“Your names, not your band.” Julie feels the need to specify, even though it makes something in Luke deflate and makes her feel weirdly guilty. “Just in passing, though.” 

Reggie’s face changes at this, goes from playful to guarded in the blink of an eye. “Oh, so you’ve heard about us from other people in school? Nice.” 

Alex’s sunny expression shutters, too, and the rest of Luke’s bravado fades, leaving behind weariness. She doesn’t know them, but seeing this transformation makes her wish she did, makes a sick feeling grow in the pit of her stomach at the sight of their coldness and, underneath that, their fear. 

She speaks with as much honesty in her voice as she can manage. “I don’t pay attention to rumors. I actually don’t know anything about you guys, other than your names. I didn’t even know you belonged to them until just now.” 

They just look at her, closed off but also like they want to open back up, so she gives them a friendly smile. 

“I’m Julie.” 

For whatever reason, this makes Luke laugh. “Yeah, we know.” 

“Oh?” 

Alex explains, “Mostly because of Carrie and Flynn. We have a class with both of them and they’re always fighting. Sometimes Carrie brings you up in the heat of the moment, and then Flynn threatens to, um—”

Alex doesn’t continue after that, suddenly unsure of himself, so Reggie finishes with: “She threatens to exorcise her. As in demons, not jogging.” 

“That sounds about right.” 

“And we’d have to agree,” Luke jumps in. “Not about the demons part, but that you’re way better than Carrie. That girl and her attitude are rank.” 

“I think her choreography is kind of cool,” Alex says. “And the outfits Dirty Candy all wear. Lots of glitter. Lots of sparkles. Two of my faves.” 

“Well, thanks,” Julie replies, flustered and a little endeared. “I’m sure you guys rock.”

“We rock the hardest.” Reggie thinks about it for a moment, fingers steepled under his chin. “If we had a place to practice tonight, we could show you. But you’ll just have to take our word for it.” 

“I thought we were—” Luke starts, but Alex cuts him off with a pointed shake of his head. “Ah, well. Sorry, Julie, I guess you don’t get to listen to Sunset Curve rock your socks off after all.”

Julie doesn’t know them. She doesn’t know a single thing about them, besides the faintest memory of old rumors about Alex’s shyness and Reggie’s motormouth and Luke’s detention record. She doesn’t know them, but she knows that expression of defeat they’re all wearing, now that they can’t make music together tonight, and she knows what it’s like to watch all of the light slowly bleed out of someone until they’re grey and aching and just wishing for a chance to change things. 

Julie doesn’t know them, but she wants to. She can feel their greatness like she felt Flynn’s the first day they met, like she felt Mrs. Harrison’s when she walked into the music room on the first day of school and listened to her speak about the freedom and joy of expressing yourself through art. 

“If you guys want,” she starts, hesitantly, “you can come over to my house. We have a studio out back that I use to write music in. You can dazzle me with some of Sunset Curve’s greatest hits.” 

“You mean that?” Luke asks, just as hesitant. 

“Yeah. It’ll be fun.” 

The three of them look down at her, almost like they forgot how they got here and have no idea what’s transpiring as a result. But then Reggie lets out a deep breath, and Alex’s sunny smile returns, and Luke gives her an expression of such gratitude that it makes Julie’s face go hot, and all three of them say as one: 

“Let’s go!” 

~.~.~

That night, the boys do end up blowing her away with some of Sunset Curve’s greatest hits, and then she takes a turn blowing them away with a song her and her mom wrote together before Rose passed, and then they end up working together to finish Julie’s WIP, and then suddenly a month has passed and Julie can’t imagine life without them. Alex, Luke, and Reggie become a mostly-permanent fixture in her house and studio, and it’s like they were meant to be there all along, like Julie has been walking through life in a semi-daze until the very moment she met these three cosmic, wonderful dumbasses. It’s like Flynn opened her eyes and woke her mind up, and the boys reached into her heart and turned it all the way up to one hundred. She loves them so much it hurts. And so does Flynn, after her initial shock wears off from finding out that Julie basically took the three most notorious outsiders in school under her proverbial wing.  

(“You just adopted a bad boy gang!” Flynn had yelled, frazzled. “Julie Molina, you adopted a group of John Hughes villains!” 

“Do you really think those three are capable of being bad boys? Really?” 

“Yeah, I do, actually!” 

Julie had had to keep herself from laughing because the boys were in the studio with them, tinkering around on the old drum set she basically gifted Alex since he’d been playing on a cheap starter set only. “On the way home from school today, they all stopped and asked if they could pet this woman’s dog and Reggie and Alex both cried. Like, shed tears. Over a dog.” 

Flynn had looked at her, and then at the boys, who couldn’t stop running their hands over the drum set and making various ooh ahh shiny noises. 

“Well—just be constantly aware of your surroundings! If they try any funny business, I’m telling your tía, and then your dad, and then Carlos, and then the police, in that order.”)  

She can tell that her dad doesn’t understand it, doesn’t understand how the boys just waltzed into her life and filled so many of its empty places, but he’s nothing but supportive. Julie suspects, under his nonchalant dad persona, that Ray kind of adores them the same way that she does. 

“You really like them, huh?” he asks one night; they’re in the kitchen, setting up a buffet line of sorts for everyone to make their own pizzas, and the guys are playing Sorry! at the table with Carlos. “You’ve been hanging out with them for almost two months straight.” 

Julie looks up from her chopping board of jalapeños and banana peppers, curious as to where this is going. “Yeah, of course. They’re great.” 

Just as she says this, Carlos ends up sending both of Reggie’s active pawns back to start and he yells while Luke and Alex heckle him. Julie amends: “Well, not at Sorry!, but they’re the best in a general sense.” 

Ray smiles, and then inquires, almost off-handedly: “And their parents are okay with them being here all the time?” 

Something about the way he says this concerns her. “They’ve never gotten in trouble for it before. Are they… Do you not want them over all the time? Is it too much?” 

Ray must see his error, because he’s quick to stop kneading their pizza dough and bump elbows with her. “Of course not, mija. I just wanted to make sure that their parents aren’t worried about them being here on school nights, that’s all. They’re welcome any time.” 

It’s then that Julie notices what created such a dissonance when her dad asked after the boys and their parents—she has no idea what any of their parents are like, or if they are getting on the boys about hanging out with her so much. They’ve never said anything that would lead her to believe otherwise. She never even thought to ask. 

“I’ll talk to them about it later,” she promises, unease prickling under her skin. “I’ll make sure they’re not getting in trouble for being here all the time.” 

She waits until they’ve all made and consumed their pizzas, until they’ve watched the movie of choice (Reggie’s turn to pick, because the boys have earned that privilege in the Molina household by an unspoken agreement between its three occupants; he went with Spy Kids 3 ), until the sun has long since set and most kids would be forced to be heading home now, but all three of them are still here and completely unconcerned and none of their phones have been going off with calls asking where they are, not even once— 

She waits until they’re back in the studio, Luke babbling about an idea he got in History for the chorus of a song, to say: 

“Hey, can I ask you guys a question?” 

They stop talking immediately and turn to her. There must be something giving her apprehension away, because Luke’s shoulders tighten and Alex’s voice is falsely cheerful when he responds with: “Yeah, what’s up?” 

It occurs to Julie, milliseconds before the question slips out, that they might think she sounds like the other kids in school. Fishing for dirty secrets on the boys, taking an assumption and running wild with it and not caring how and if it pierces them. She chokes for that millisecond, staring back into Reggie’s panicked eyes, catching a glimpse of Alex’s knuckles going white around his drumsticks, and then it slips out. 

“Are your parents okay with you hanging out here so much?” 

The effect of these words is instantaneous. Any ease that followed them through their fun pizza dinner to the ridiculous plot of Spy Kids 3 and then out into the studio is gone as soon as Julie asks this question, and she’s met with a silence that is so deafening it makes her breath catch. She looks at them as a whole, and then individually, trying to find some clues, trying to find anything. But it’s like she’s looking onto three stone fortresses, and they are looking back, daring her to try and climb up and find what lies behind them. 

“Are you not okay with it?” Luke eventually asks back, voice flat. It’s like watching a polaroid develop in reverse. “Is your dad not okay with it?” 

“Of course I am. We both are.” Julie sits on the arm of one of the chairs and knits her fingers together, trying to think of how to say what she needs to say without it sounding like an accusation. “I didn’t mean for that to come out rudely or anything. It’s just—they know you’re with me, right? That this is where you’ll be until, like, 10 on school nights? Midnight on the weekends? And they’re all right with that?” 

They don’t say anything, just stare at their shoes or their hands or anywhere that isn’t Julie’s face. The thought of the silence being from anger makes her feel nauseous, but when she continues to look between the three of them, she once more sees that it’s fear, a raw, helpless fear that is shutting the boys down. 

She gets up again and walks to where they’re all clustered together around Alex’s drum set. They glance up at her, mouths tight and backs rigid; they look like they’re waiting for the other shoe to drop, like they’re waiting for Julie to throw a punch, and it all falls into place. 

Julie walks until she’s right in between Reggie and Luke, and then she reaches out and takes one of their hands in hers and squeezes gently. 

“Do they know you’re here?” she asks, soft, soft, soft. 

Reggie’s fingers close around hers like she is the only thing keeping him from falling backwards off of a cliff. “No, they don’t.” 

She doesn’t want to, already feels like she might cry if she does, but forces herself to ask: “Do they care?” 

Alex sets his sticks down on the floor tom and finally meets her eyes, looking bone-tired and ragged at the edges. “No. They don’t care.” 

“Only mine,” Luke admits, also clinging to Julie’s hand. “They don’t know where I go, and they hate that I’m out so late, but we—we clash a lot, and I would rather be free here than locked up there. It’s complicated.” 

Julie’s heart bursts in her chest, but she still pushes farther, as far as they’ll let her go. 

“Will you tell me?” 

And they do. They let Julie guide them away from their instruments to the couch, and the three of them squeeze onto it while she perches in the armchair, arms wrapped around her torso like it will keep the hurt out. Luke picks up where he left off, and he tells Julie all about the complicated relationship he has with his parents and they have with his dream of being a musician, and even so, it’s clear that he is the best off amongst the bunch. They fight all the time, but they still love Luke, and he still loves them, but they want different things and he feels like he’s wounding them when he’s there and can’t be who they want him to be. 

Alex tells her about hiding himself from his parents, about how hiding that he’s gay from them eventually stemmed into having panic attacks over them finding out and then bled into a generalized anxiety disorder that will remain undiagnosed until he’s an adult, probably, since he came out to them a year ago and nothing has been the same since. He tells her about the words they say, and the words they want him to read and follow, and he tells her that he would rather have all of himself than only a few parts of them. 

And then Reggie tells her about how his parents eloped after only a few months of dating because his mom got pregnant, and now it’s too expensive and too inconvenient and too this and too that for them to get a divorce, but Reggie has known they hate each other since he was a kid. And he knows that they’ve hated him for just as long, that he is their greatest failure, a product of their combined woes and mistakes and only serves the purpose of reminding them of this every time they look at him. So he only leaves the house after they’ve both gone off to work, and he doesn’t go back until they’re in their separate bedrooms, drunk and well on their way to passing out. He would rather do anything else than sit inside of his house and listen to his parents try to tear it down with all of their screaming and cursing. 

When they’re done, it takes Julie a few times to try and speak again. There are tears stinging her eyes, and her hands are trembling with a combination of revulsion and a fury that is so fierce and so bright that it burns to keep it inside, but this is not about her, so she reels it in as much as she can. 

She has one last important question to ask, one that she needs to know the answer to more than she will ever need to track these parents down and go to war with them. So she gets up from her seat and comes to stand in front of them, in front of these three boys who are talented and brilliant enough to change the world, but have lived their whole lives being told otherwise by the people who should’ve been the first ones to tell them. To show them how. 

They look up at her, pale and scared and loving despite it all, and Julie asks, “Do you feel safe here?” while praying with everything she’s got that the answer is yes. It won’t change anything, but it will help, knowing that there is somewhere in the Hell of their lives where they feel seen and heard and safe. 

They look at her, and then Alex reaches up and carefully takes her hands, the only one who hasn’t held them yet, and he whispers, “Julie, this is the only place we feel safe,” and it doesn’t change anything, but it also changes everything. 

She rests her knee on the edge of the couch, in between the sides of Alex’s and Luke’s legs, and then she winds her arms around Alex’s shoulders and holds him as tight as she can. He releases a startled breath against her shoulder, the sound he might have made if Julie told them all to get lost, and then he crushes her close, grabs her and holds on like he might drown if he doesn’t. 

On her right, Luke makes a similarly startled noise, and on her left, Reggie carefully touches Julie’s bicep, either to hold onto her or to throw her off. She decides for them and lets go of Alex’s neck to fit her hands around the backs of their heads. 

“Come here,” she says, no room for an argument. 

The effect of these two words does more than the question she first asked them, the one that sucked all of the air out of the studio. Luke and Reggie fold into her and Alex immediately, wrapping their arms around her back and Alex’s shoulders. Luke’s forehead ends up on the jut of Alex’s left shoulder, and Reggie’s ends up against Julie’s. She can feel all of their hearts racing, either from a surge of affection or from the fear of being thrown away again, and she rests her cheek against the side of Alex’s head and wraps her arms around Luke’s and Reggie’s backs. 

They are a mess of limbs, thrashing hearts, and hot, anguished tears, and Julie has never felt more full and more empty than she does in this moment, with the fate of three of the sweetest people she’s ever met resting in the palms of her hands. 

“You are always welcome here,” she tells them, voice steady and strong and unquestionable. They tremble in her arms, and she says it again, will say it as many times as she has to. “Always. No matter what time of day, no matter if you think I’m tired of seeing you, no matter if we’re fighting and not speaking to each other. You are always, always welcome here. And I want you to be here. We want you to be here.” 

“Thank you,” one of them whispers, maybe Alex, maybe Reggie, maybe Luke, maybe all three of them at once. She doesn’t know who said it, but it means that they heard her and understood her, and it is enough. And someday, when she is feeling less fragile, when the boys will understand that she means it, she’ll tell them that she loves them, and that they are her family just as much as her mami and her papi and her tía and Carlos and Flynn. That they are her home and she is theirs and family is who loves and chooses you no matter what. But for now, she holds them close and tells them she loves them by being a pillar of support, something that they’ve probably never known outside of each other, something that she will give them forever if she can. 

~.~.~

If Julie thought she loved the boys before their heart-to-heart, it’s nothing compared to how she feels after everything is released. The faint wall they had between themselves and her, even after weeks of spending time together, vanishes completely once Julie opens the front door to her house and tells them to come inside and stay. 

Carlos comments on it one night, while Ray is making them his patented spaghetti, and the boys, Julie, and Flynn are all crammed into the Molinas’ living room, playing Mario Kart. Currently, it’s Luke and Alex playing against each other on the ground in front of the couch. The other three are curled together right behind them, and while Reggie is hyping Alex up, Julie and Flynn are doing their best to harass Luke into losing. 

“Come on, Patterson, you can do better than that!” Flynn yells, tugging Luke’s beanie down over one of his eyes. 

He slaps her away, and then promptly goes flying off the track. “Hey, knock it off!” 

Julie starts jostling him by his shoulders. “Dude, go! Alex is almost a whole lap ahead!” 

“No thanks to you!” Luke shouts, and sends Princess Daisy hurtling down the track. “This is a conspiracy to let Alex win because he’s a sore loser.”

Alex makes a rude noise. “That’s called transference, dummy.” 

“No it’s not!” 

“You’re the sorest loser I’ve ever met,” Alex insists, and cheers when Princess Peach hits an item box. He gets some banana peels and immediately flings them out all over the track. “We’ve let you win since second grade!” 

“Lies and slander—” Luke cuts off when he hits an item box and is gifted with Bullet Bill. “Ohhhh yeahhhh, baby!” 

“No!” Julie cries, shoving Luke’s beanie further over his eyes, but the damage is already done. Princess Daisy speeds through the track until she’s only two racers behind Princess Peach and then Bullet Bill drops her down again. Luke pushes her past the next cart, the one holding Luigi, and Alex screams something nonsensical when Luke starts to gain on Donkey Kong, the other computer racer between them. 

“Are you there, God? It’s me, Alex!” Alex says frantically, racing as fast as the game will let him. “Please do me a big ol’ favor and let me win just once against Luke Patterson! Amen.” 

Luke says, “God can’t save you now, Mercer!” but is swiftly interrupted by Princess Daisy’s cart doing a dramatic wipe-out into the sidelines. It appears that one of the other computer racers, this time Bowser, got a few of the red shells on an item box and ended up striking Princess Daisy with one of them. 

“This is bull—!” Luke starts to yell, and Julie manages to clap a hand over his mouth at the same time that Alex whoops and crosses the finish line in first place. While the confetti and music celebrating Alex’s win go off, he turns to Luke and says: “Victory is sweet, bro!” 

Luke lets out a deflating balloon noise and flops backwards into Flynn’s lap, looking at her with utter betrayal. He reluctantly hands over his controller, since she’s the next one up, and tells her: “I hope he picks Rainbow Road.” 

“You are the sorest of losers,” Flynn says decidedly, shoving him off of her legs. “How about you pay attention this round and learn a few things?” 

He mimics her under his breath, but trades places with her so she can choose a racer. While Flynn is settling in next to Alex and customizing her (Yoshi’s) cart, Luke hauls himself onto the couch and rests his head against Julie’s shoulder. 

“I was so close.” 

Julie pats his hand the way parents do with their small children. “I know you were, buddy. You’ll get him next time.” 

“I’ll believe it when I see it,” Flynn snarks, and then groans. “You really did pick Rainbow Road! What’s wrong with you?” 

Alex grins at her. “Hey, it’s fair game! The gays have to play it at least once during Mario Kart.”  

“We’re all the gays,” Flynn points out, just as Luke says, “I wasn’t gay enough for you to choose it during our round? Hurtful, dude.” 

Reggie leans over Julie and tells him: “I think you should be grateful because if Alex had chosen Rainbow Road for your game, you wouldn’t have made it a single lap, let alone two and a half.” 

“Well, that was mean.” 

Carlos comes into the living room just as Alex and Flynn are starting their race, and he stops and stares at the sight of them from the entryway. Julie doesn’t see him right away, too caught up in cheering Flynn on and keeping Luke from messing up her race the way she did his. She eventually looks over at Luke after he pretends to bite her arm, and catches sight of her brother when she pretends to bite Luke back.

“What’s up, weirdo?” 

Carlos blinks. “You guys are the weirdos.” 

“Why?” Luke asks him, glancing over their group. 

“You’re like…” Carlos waves a hand, as if to encompass the supposed weirdness of this situation in the simple movement. “Freaking out and punching each other but you’re still, like, super close together. I don’t get it.” 

Julie tries not to stiffen against Luke and Reggie, but dread fills her immediately when Carlos says this. Not because they’re doing anything wrong, but because she doesn’t want the boys to think that they’re doing something wrong. 

Luke and Reggie don’t seem bothered, though. On the contrary, Reggie turns to Carlos and wiggles his fingers in a get over here gesture. 

“Come sit with us then. You can hang out and figure it out on your own, little dude.” 

Carlos purses his mouth, like he might call them all weirdos again and take off for his room. But then he gives Reggie a cute, bashful smile, and gallops past the TV as fast as he can and onto the empty spot at the end of the couch. Reggie arranges Carlos so that his back is against the arm of the couch and his legs are thrown across Reggie’s and pressing into Julie’s, effectively adding him to their tangle, and Julie’s heart grows three times its normal size in her chest.

When Ray comes into the room a while later and announces: “Time for dinner, kids!” Julie notices the way he also stops to take in their pile, and notices the way he visibly melts at the sight. And when Reggie asks: “Ray, is it okay if I say grace tonight?” and Ray responds with: “Absolutely, kiddo,” Julie feels blessed beyond words for her weird little family and the way they’ve all come together after the darkest year of her life. 

~.~.~ 

The first time one of them spends the night, it’s a regular Tuesday and Julie isn’t expecting it. The boys had tromped home with her for homework, enchiladas, and then a few hours of playing around with a new song. They decided to spend the last stretch of the night watching The Masked Singer, a show the boys are hilariously into, before Luke and Reggie split to head to their respective houses. 

Alex, however, lingers; he sees Luke and Reggie off, and then as the minutes start to tick by where he would normally also head home, he sits on Julie’s couch and fidgets. She asks if he’s okay, and he plays it off as coolly as he knows how, which is definitely not cool at all. She gives him ten more minutes to come clean, but when all he does in those ten minutes is start biting his nails and jiggling his leg, Julie gives up on being casual about it. She scoots all the way from her end of the couch to Alex’s and throws a friendly arm around his shoulders, ignoring his startled jump. 

“Hey pal,” Julie says, flashing a cheesy grin to lure him into a sense of calm and security. “How’s it goin’?” 

“Um,” Alex starts, and then stops, tensing under Julie’s curious stare. “Um.” 

They’ve all gotten better at this in the weeks since crying together in the studio, but sometimes the guys still struggle to open up to her or ask her for help. Julie’s usually pretty good at figuring out what they need, often before they do themselves, but then there are times like this where she can’t proceed on intuition alone. She softens her smile into one that is more comforting.

“Hey, it’s okay. You can tell me what’s going on. I just want to help.” 

It takes another long minute for Alex to work it over in his head and then say it out loud. Julie lets him have it, never anything but patient and ready to act.

“It’s—my parents.” Alex admits, the last part almost a whisper. “I, I don’t—” 

He clenches his jaw, like he can’t decide if he wants to say the words and be rid of them or choke them down and forget all together. The sensation of being seasick rolls in when Alex brings up his parents, but Julie forces herself to keep a calm exterior for his sake. 

Alex releases a breath and hunches into himself, tries to make himself look as small as his big stature will allow, before admitting: “I’m scared to go home.” 

Julie’s smile slips all the way off. “Did something happen, Alex?” 

He shrugs. “Kinda, but kinda not. They’re always the way they are, but—I don’t know. They’ve been really going for it the past couple of days, and I’m just... I have this gut feeling that it’s going to come to a head tonight if I go home.” 

She can hardly bear to ask, “Are they going to hurt you?”

Alex shakes his head, but it doesn’t provide any relief. “No, I don’t think they would do that. I think—” 

His hands start to visibly tremble, and then his body, and then his mouth, and Julie realizes with a great horror that Alex is crying.

“I think they’re gonna kick me out,” he gasps, voice cracking. “Julie, they’re gonna kick me out, and I don’t have any of my stuff, and I don’t have anywhere to go, where the hell am I gonna go—” 

“Hey, hey,” Julie gently interrupts, getting to her feet. Alex tries to tuck even further into himself, obviously ashamed by this display, but Julie just reaches out and cups his face in between her hands. “It’s all right, Alex, it’s all going to be just fine. You can stay here tonight, okay? We’ll set up the guest room for you and you can spend the night. You don’t have to go home.” 

“But—but my parents—” Alex chokes out, paling at the mention of them again. It makes Julie’s blood boil. “What if they—”

He stops speaking completely, face crumpling. Alex releases a gut-wrenching sob and Julie is right there, wrapping her arms around his shaking body, pulling him close, and wishing, wishing, wishing she could keep him from feeling like this ever again. So afraid to go home that he’s sobbing over it; so afraid to go home that he would almost rather go home and face their wrath now than be safe with her for a night and face a worse wrath the next. Alex buries his tear-soaked face into Julie’s sternum and cries helplessly, going from curling into himself to curling around her as much as he possibly can in her half-standing position.  

Julie lets him let it out, one hand moving back and forth across the plane of his shoulders in what she hopes is a comforting gesture. She lets him let it out, until Alex is shivering and hiccuping, and then she carefully eases back to look at him again. 

“I’m gonna go talk to my dad real quick, okay?” she asks, wiping away some of his tears. “I’m not letting you go home like this. Not if you’re this afraid of what they’ll do when you get there.” 

“But they might get really mad,” Alex protests, even though Julie can see that he would rather do anything than face his parents right now. “They might—” 

The thought goes unfinished, but Julie knows the end of it, sees the image of Alex cowering away and hears the crack of a hand across his cheek like it’s being burned behind her eyes. She almost vomits just thinking about it, and will be damned if she lets it happen. 

“You’re staying here. You are not going home when I know what might happen if you do. I refuse.” 

Alex sniffles and lets Julie dry some more tears from his face. She’s afraid that he might insist on going home, or play off the very real terror overcoming him at the thought of doing so, but eventually he takes a shuddering breath and whispers: “Thank you.” 

Julie is so relieved and so, so angry that she nearly starts crying, too, but refuses to let Alex see her break while he needs her to be strong. 

“I’ll be right back,” she promises, and then slips away from the couch and up the stairs to her dad’s room. 

Julie knocks softly, hearing the muted sound of Ray’s TV playing behind the door. After a brief pause, the sound lowers and Ray’s voice calls out: “Come in!” 

She almost shatters at the sight of his warm, loving face, knowing what she knows now. That Alex is in her living room and worrying himself sick over whether or not to go home. Is facing the danger of never seeing his dad again by his dad’s own will. 

Ray’s face goes from warm to concerned in a heartbeat, and then he’s getting out of bed, setting his hands on her shoulders, becoming the shield that Julie could never live without. 

“Mija, what’s wrong?” he asks, voice so, so soft. Julie’s throat closes up at the sound of it. “What happened?” 

“It’s Alex,” she explains, the words coming out warped and scared. “He—he told me that he’s afraid to go home tonight.” 

Ray’s hold on her tightens. “Did something happen?” 

“Not yet. But he’s afraid that if he goes home, something will.” Julie closes her eyes and does everything she can to keep herself from breaking down in front of him. “He thinks they’re going to kick him out because he’s gay. But if he doesn’t go home tonight, they might do something worse when he does go home tomorrow. He thinks they might—”

Julie’s voice breaks off and stays there, and Ray just makes a soothing sound and brushes away the tears that she can’t hold in. When she blinks her eyes open again, she sees the same horror and rage building inside of her stretched all across her dad’s face, and finds some solace in the knowledge that he would never send Alex away. 

“He’ll stay here tonight,” Ray tells her without hesitation. “And if he still feels unsafe tomorrow, he can stay again and we’ll come up with a plan. But we’ll worry about that when that time comes, okay? Let’s just focus on tonight and taking care of him right now.” 

While Ray is fixing up the guest room, Julie goes back downstairs to grab Alex. She finds him still on the couch, staring down at his bitten-down nails and not moving an inch, something that never happens unless he’s completely and totally exhausted. He looks up when she comes into the living room, and the sight of his damp face and his bleak, defeated eyes makes her feel like a livewire, like she might just storm all the way over to the Mercers’ house and scream at them until her vocal cords bleed. 

Instead, she goes to Alex and pulls him off of the couch, saying: “We’re getting the guest room set up for you, okay?” And he just dips his head in a half-nod and lets Julie guide him upstairs, grabbing his backpack as they go. 

Ray comes out of the guest room just as they reach the top of the stairs, and all of the horror and rage from earlier is back to his usual warmth. He’s holding a pair of sweatpants and presents them to Alex, who takes them with a tiny, tiny smile, but a smile nonetheless. 

“We’re the closest in size in this house, so hopefully those fit. You’re welcome to say the night tonight, and any night you need to, okay, Alex? You’re safe here. Every part of you.” 

“Thanks,” Alex replies, hoarse but sincere. “Thank you so much.” 

Ray takes a step closer and folds Alex up into a hug, instantly becoming his shield, his armor, everything that Alex should have had this entire time. “You don’t need to thank us. Family looks out for family. We will always look out for you. We’re not going to let anyone hurt you if we can help it.” 

Alex’s breath hitches, and then he wraps his arms around Ray and starts to tremble all over again. Julie presses a hand against his back, and quietly says: “I’ll go get you a toothbrush,” before letting them have a moment together. 

They get him settled in for the night, with Ray’s sweatpants and a spare toothbrush and as many words of comfort that they think Alex can handle, and then Ray goes back to his room and Julie goes to hers. She feels hollowed-out and sick, like she needs to sleep outside of Alex’s room to watch over him throughout the night. And even though Alex made her promise not to, knowing that it would just send them into a panic, Julie almost pulls her phone out to call Luke and Reggie and tell them what happened. She only doesn’t because Alex swears that he'll explain tomorrow at school, since he and Julie will be arriving together with Flynn, anyways, and he'll have to text the boys beforehand so they don't wait for him. 

Julie feels sick and tired, but she doesn’t feel wound down enough to fall asleep yet, so she gets into pajamas, brushes her teeth, and decides to watch Wreck-It Ralph. She’s just gotten underneath a fuzzy blanket and started the movie when she hears a timid knock at her door, and knows who it is immediately. 

She opens the door to find Alex on the other side, looking hopeful and sorry for disturbing her. Her heart clenches at the sight of him, even though they only said goodnight twenty minutes ago, even though he’s in the safest place he could possibly be.

“Hey, what’s up?” 

Alec plucks at his hoodie strings without saying anything for a moment, obviously fighting with himself. Julie lets him gather his courage, and he eventually asks: “Would it be okay if I came in for a little bit?” 

“Don’t want to be alone?” Julie replies, understanding completely, and steps aside to let him in. “Want to watch Wreck-It Ralph? I just started it.”

“Dude, totally—I love that movie.” 

Julie climbs back into bed with Alex and tucks him under the blanket with her, so that they’re curled up together, and starts the movie from the beginning. They rave about their favorite parts, and quote the: “Just because you are bad guy does not mean you are bad guy,” line in unison, and the wildness in Julie’s ribcage finally begins to mellow out, leaving her just tired and not rundown. Alex, too, seems to finally be relaxing, body going from slightly tensed to sinking into the mattress, and laughter coming easily in between their hushed commentary. 

They make it to the part where Ralph meets Vanellope for the first time before Alex turns to her and whispers: “Hey, Julie?” 

Julie mirrors him, shaking off some of the sleepiness. “Yeah?” 

Alex stares at her for a beat, like he’s not going to finish his thought, then smiles and tells her: “I know you said not to thank you, but thanks for letting me stay. It means a lot to me.” 

“Of course, Alex.” She worms a hand out from underneath the blanket and rests it against his cheek, so that he knows she means business. “Just like my dad said—you’re our family, and the Molinas always look out for family. No matter what, without question. We’ll go to the ends of the Earth for you.” 

Alex swallows heavily, but doesn’t cry again, so Julie counts it as a win. “You and the guys are the only family I have. I’d be lost without you.” 

“Me too,” she admits, so quietly that it almost doesn’t come out at all. “I didn’t even realize what I was missing until you three cartwheeled into the music room and stole my heart.”

“We didn’t cartwheel,” he tries to protest, but he’s laughing, so Julie starts to laugh too, and they have to push their faces into her pillows to keep from waking Carlos up. “It wasn’t a great first impression, I’ll give you that.” 

“No, it was perfect. You guys let me know right away what you were.” 

“Hopeless idiots?” 

“I was going for unforgettable. Exactly what I was looking for.” 

“Aw,” Alex says, and now he looks like he’s going to cry. “Julie.” 

Julie moves her hand from Alex’s cheek to his neck, and when she pulls, he goes easily. They fold into each other, arms wrapping around their sides, Julie’s face pressing into his shoulder, Alex’s cheek pressing into the crown of her head. She runs her hand along his shoulder blades again, to be both affectionate and comforting, and Alex squeezes her so tightly it hurts, but in a good way. Like he’s trying to leave an imprint of himself in her bones and muscles. Like he didn’t become her blood the day they all came home with her for the first time. 

“We’re going to figure this out together, okay?” she says. “No matter what, no matter how long it takes, we’re in this together. You’re ours and we’re yours and we’ll figure it all out together. It’s going to be all right.” 

Alex hugs her tighter. “Okay, we’ll do this together.” And then, after a heartbeat, she hears her favorite words. “I love you, Julie.” 

“I love you too, Alex. Forever and always.” 

~.~.~

They must fall asleep, twisted around each other underneath Julie’s fuzzy blanket, because she closes her eyes for just a moment and the next time she opens them, Alex is breathing deeply against her and there’s someone moving around at the foot of her bed. Julie’s still mostly asleep, isn’t sure she’s really awake at all, but struggles to find out who the person in her room is and if she needs to throw herself between them and Alex. She relaxes, though, when they step into the light of her TV and she sees that it’s just her dad. From this angle, he can’t tell that she’s awake, but she can see his face clearly: it’s fond, warm, and a little sad, and Julie feels so safe and so full of love that if she were awake she would probably be crying. 

As it is, she just sighs, tucks herself back under Alex’s chin, and lets her dad shut off the TV. She slips back into unconsciousness just as Ray moves to Alex’s side of the bed and pulls the blankets up higher around them, making sure they’re completely covered before leaving them to soundly sleep. 

Chapter Text

In a stroke of good luck, Flynn doesn’t look the least bit phased when she comes to pick Julie up for school the next morning and Alex is with her. Alex is obviously waiting for a pointed comment or invasive question, but all Flynn does is say: “Morning, cutie,” to him and then immediately jumps into complaining about calculus. It helps that Julie texted her beforehand, but it also helps that Flynn can discern when it’s time to be dramatic and when it’s time to be casual.

Flynn isn’t the one that she’s worried about, anyways. 

“Did you text them?” she asks, as they’re putting on their shoes. “About not waiting for you?” 

“I sure did,” Alex replies, glancing at his phone. “They’ll see it any second.” 

“Alex!” 

“What?” 

Julie flaps a hand at him. “You texted them just now? They’re going to freak out!” 

“No they won’t! They’ll be totally cool about it.” 

Julie loves the boys more than she can bear, but sometimes, they are maddeningly clueless. “When have Luke and Reggie ever been ‘cool’ about something in their entire lives? And what makes you think they’ll be cool about you not walking to school with them for probably the first time? So you can walk to school with me and Flynn instead?”

Alex says nothing while he thinks it over, and Julie watches as his expression goes from unconcerned to mildly alarmed. 

“Oh,” he notes, as if waking out of a deep sleep. “They’re going to murder me.” 

Julie shares a doomed look with Flynn; but, in spite of their pending battle in the trenches of war, she still puts a supporting arm around Alex because she’s a good friend. 

“Most likely, but we’ll make sure to hold them off as best we can. At least you learned from your mistake.” 

Flynn takes up his other side, so that they’re like Alex’s floaties in the wide open pool of life. He wraps his arms around their shoulders and tries not to cling too tightly. 

“We’ll escort you safely to the stage, sir,” Flynn tells him, and then they’re out the door and en route to school while Alex asks their opinions about various ways to explain the situation without making Luke and Reggie lose their shit. 

Julie tries to text Luke separately and say: hey dude maybe don’t go crazy ahhhh go stupid when you see him in a reasonable manner. Luke simply texts back: >:(((((((((((!!! $*%@^* so Julie knows it’s a lost cause and redoubles her efforts as one of Alex’s knights in shining armor. 

When they get to school, everything is calm and peachy keen for all of about ten minutes. Alex is wearing the exact same clothes as yesterday, but he assures Julie that due to having a hefty amount of anxiety, there are two changes of clothes in his locker for Reasons, so she tries not to worry about people noticing. They follow Alex to his locker so that he can grab his clothes, and then follow him to the bathrooms, where they sit on a bench to wait for him to change. Julie holds onto a small, lingering flame of hope that the other two will behave civilly when they arrive, will not make her want to do an about-face and go back home for the day. But the hope is dashed when Flynn, in the middle of complaining about calculus some more, glances over Julie’s shoulder and suddenly alerts her:

“Incoming at your six.” 

Julie turns to see Luke and Reggie practically flying down the hallway, weaving and cutting through the crowd like a pair of swords. She takes a moment to silently pray for strength, whether the strength is for keeping Luke and Reggie from freaking out or not rocket launching them into outer space, and then she jumps to her feet. 

She manages to catch Luke by the shoulders before he goes banging into the bathroom, instinctively knowing this is where Alex is. 

“Woahhh,” Julie drawls, holding him fast. “Not a great idea, dude. Let’s give the guy some privacy.” 

Luke grabs onto her elbows, and for a wild moment, Julie thinks he’s going to throw her off of him. Then she realizes that he’s clinging to her the same way Alex clung to her and Flynn on the walk to school, that he’s more scared than anything and needs something to keep him grounded. He needs, just as he has since that fateful night, for Julie to be his rock. 

“Did something happen to him?” Luke asks frantically, trying and failing to keep his voice low. “He doesn’t just ditch the morning walk to school! Ever!” 

“What did he text you?” Julie counters, neither confirming or denying, not sure what Alex would want her to reveal. 

“Only that he was walking to school with you two and to not wait around,” Reggie says, pushing in close. Julie hasn’t seen them this afraid in a long time, not since the night she asked about their families, and it makes her stomach twist. “And no offense, but his house is in the complete opposite direction of yours. AKA our direction.” 

“Which means he must have stayed the night,” Luke concludes, fingers spasming around her arms. “Which means he couldn’t go home, or he went home and then came back. So what happened?” 

Julie has spent hours and hours and hours with them, but these boys and their unfailing dedication and love for each other never ceases to amaze her. It’s Alex’s story to tell, his decision to give away what he wants, but Julie does what she can to comfort them until he’s ready. She keeps one hand on Luke’s shoulder, puts the other one on Reggie’s, and tries to stay unflappable for their sake as much as Alex’s. 

“He’s fine,” she assures. “He’ll explain more once he’s done changing, but he stayed over all of last night, and I promise that nothing happened to him. He’s all right.” 

The words work like a charm, and Luke and Reggie both let out a relieved breath when she says them. It doesn’t erase their fear, but it helps to ease it; Luke squeezes her elbow, and Reggie gives her wrist a series of grateful taps, like he’s strumming his beloved bass guitar. 

“Now,” Julie continues, gently pulling on their shoulders, “I think it would be in our best interest not to stand in front of the bathroom door like a bunch of creeps. We’re going to wait for Alex to come out by this bench the way normal friends do.” 

Luke attempts to joke: “That is normal for us,” but he still sounds skittish and a split second away from kicking the bathroom door in, so Julie instructs: “Sit down and focus on not catapulting yourselves at him when he’s done. If you cause a ruckus, he’ll just start lecturing you instead of answering your questions.”

Surprisingly, they do as they’re told, and Flynn flashes Julie a subtle thumbs-up for her good work. In an attempt to calm himself down, Luke turns to her and asks: “And how has your morning been thus far, Ms. Rider?” 

Flynn smirks. “Eventful.” 

“We get that a lot.” 

“Gee, I would have never guessed.” 

Flynn puts all of her effort into keeping Luke distracted, but this tactic doesn’t work so well for Reggie, who doesn’t try to engage in their conversation. He’s practically vibrating on the bench, leg going a mile a minute and hands twisting together. Julie knows that the only reason he isn’t trying to kick the bathroom door down is because she 1) forced him chill, and 2) is standing directly in front of him, effectively cutting off his escape route. And even though Julie is using her limited power to make Reggie chill, she hates seeing him so agitated and well on the way to a panic attack. 

“Reg, it’s gonna be okay,” she says, quiet enough that only the two of them can hear. He jerks his head up when she does, and Julie sets her hand back on his shoulder. “It’s gonna to be just fine, but he needs you to be calm. It’s been a long twelve hours, and what he needs most right now is for you to stay nice and calm. Take a deep breath for me.” 

He takes the requested breath, and then another, steadying himself. “Yeah, yeah, you’re right. I can do that.” Reggie leans firmly into her touch; then, after a beat of hesitation, takes another deep breath and leans forward until the side of his face is pressed into her arm. She can feel the muscles in his back starting to untense when he whispers: “Thanks, Julie.” 

Julie, who would probably fight God for these boys, swallows past the lump in her throat and replies: “Always.” 

In another stroke of good luck, Julie and Flynn only have to placate the boys for a few minutes before the bathroom door opens and Alex steps through it again. He’s wearing his fresh set of clothes (a pink, long-sleeved Nike shirt and black joggers), his face is damp and a little red, like he scrubbed it with water, and he looks totally, utterly, perfectly fine. The boys turn to him immediately, Reggie pulling away from Julie’s arm and Luke interrupting his own sentence. Not wanting to get in between their much needed reunion, Julie takes a step back so that Reggie can go to Alex, and Luke follows after. 

Alex gives them both a smile and starts to say: “Hey, sorry about not walking with you—” but Reggie cuts him off by enveloping him in a tight hug. 

“We’re glad you’re okay.” Reggie’s voice is muffled by Alex’s shoulder, but he sounds infinitely calmer than he would have prior to Julie forcing him into a time-out. “That’s all we were worried about, man. The morning walk can suck eggs.” 

“Seriously,” Luke reiterates, trying for humored and falling miles short; he lands right around petrified. “The morning walk can walk the plank. We just needed to make sure you were okay and that you missed the walk because you wanted to build a blanket fort with Julie last night instead.” 

Alex’s collected face wavers, just enough for them all to see how scared he still is. He hugs Reggie tightly, almost picks him right off of the ground, and Reggie’s knuckles go white where they’re clenched around his shirt. 

“I’m sorry,” Alex repeats, sounding lost. “I didn’t mean to make you guys worry. I just—I know we all have a lot of shit going on right now. I didn’t want to add to it.” 

Luke takes another step forward and puts one arm around Reggie’s shoulders and the other around Alex’s, so that they’re all tangled up. So that they’re in their natural resting state: together. “Hey. You don’t ever need to be afraid of telling us when something’s going on with you, okay? No matter what it is, what’s going on with the rest of us, or if you think it isn’t a good time. We’ll always make time to help you. You’re our family, Alex. You’re our shining star.”

Alex, clearly on the verge of breaking down, tries to salvage the situation by joking: “I thought that was Julie.” 

“Oh, you’re right. My mistake!” Luke shoots Julie an obnoxious wink, and Julie fondly rolls her eyes at him. “You’re our moon then.” 

“That’s dumb,” Alex argues, sniffing suspiciously. “You’re the moon. I’m just an asteroid.” 

“Yeah, you’re an asteroid,” Reggie says, “and you’ve left a huge crater in our hearts forever and ever.” 

Alex laughs helplessly, and with his arms still around Reggie, leans down to push his forehead against Luke’s. Luke’s face goes from humored to devastated in a split second, and he pushes into the fond gesture, tucks Reggie even tighter against his side like he’s barely holding it together. It’s a scene that’s too intimate for Julie and Flynn to be witnessing, let alone this hallway and the entire student body inside of it. She desperately wants to shield the boys from their prying eyes, to keep this sacred moment between them and them alone; instead, she stands next to them and dares anyone walking by to try and say something. Instead, she acts as their knight in shining armor, hovers near them protectively, and thinks: you are my blood and bones and lifelines and I will never let someone hurt you again. 

After a few more deep breaths, Luke requests: “Will you tell us what happened?” while looking unflinchingly into Alex’s broken expression. 

Reggie doesn’t let go, but he does lean back until he can look at Alex, too. “We want to hear everything. And we want to do whatever we can to help.” 

Alex says nothing, like he can’t bring himself to admit this great and terrible truth that only Julie knows, that only Julie was present for the aftermath of. He seeks her out over the tops of Luke’s and Reggie’s heads, and she nods encouragingly, even though her heart is splintering inside of her chest.

“My parents,” he eventually admits, inhaling unsteadily. “They’ve been really aggressive and shitty towards me lately. Everything I do is wrong and not good enough and shameful. And I don’t really know what was different about last night, but I just got this feeling that something was going to go wrong after I left Julie’s . I was… I was really scared they were going to kick me out. So I just didn’t go home.” 

The truth makes Luke and Reggie look so livid and destroyed that Julie has to close her eyes against it, just for a moment. Next to her, Flynn releases a strangled gasp, understanding what this situation is in full; when she slides her hand into Julie’s, both out of support and her own desolation, Julie holds on tight enough to bruise.

Luke asks, voice thin with rage: “Did they say anything?”

“Nothing. Not last night, not this morning. Absolutely nothing.” 

Reggie looks like he might throw up. “Are you going back there?” 

“I don’t know.” Alex’s hands start to shake. The memory of him sobbing and trembling everywhere punches Julie right in the gut. “I have to eventually. I don’t even know for sure if they’re going to kick me out. But Ray said I can stay with them again if I don’t feel safe enough to go home, so it doesn’t have to happen tonight.” 

At the mention of her dad, both Luke and Reggie turn to Julie. Reggie asks her: “Your dad really was cool with it?” 

“Of course,” she affirms, entirely sure about this fact if nothing else when it comes to these three and their compromised safety. “He wasn’t going to let Alex go home if there was any chance that he was in danger there, and neither was I. Alex can stay with us as long as he needs or wants to if it means that he’ll be safe.” 

All of them go a little wonderstruck when Julie says this, says it like it’s common sense, says it like it’s unquestionable. For her, it always has been, and she has to remind herself over and over that the boys have probably never known unconditional love or safety in their entire lives. That they might be surprised by being treated with kindness and love until the day they die. 

There are a million words that she wants to say to them, but before she’s able to, the five minute warning bell rings. Students all around them scamper off to their first class of the day, and Julie wants to stay and talk to the guys, tell them all one million words of love and support she has, but she reminds herself that she has time, that they’re always going to need these words of love and support, and makes herself let it go for now. 

“We’ll continue this at lunch,” Alex decides, already tucking his vulnerability back underneath his practiced calm. “Deal?” 

Luke looks extremely unhappy about this. “Fine. But if you need to leave or your parents try to start something, text one of us and we’ll come find you. Promise?” 

“I promise.” Alex curls his pinky around Luke’s when Luke holds it up. “Thanks. I love you guys.” 

He crushes Luke and Reggie into another big, two-armed hug, and they hug him back, mumbling their “I love you too”s into his shoulders. Julie and Flynn are both surprised when Alex, after detaching himself from his best friends, also pulls Flynn into a hug and says: “Thanks for escorting me today.” 

Flynn returns the hug with wide but warm eyes. “Any time, bro.”

And before he goes, Alex sweeps Julie into an enormous hug, one that does take her off of her feet and into his arms. It works a laugh out of her, her first of the day, and she hugs back like she’s trying to leave an imprint of herself in his bones and muscles, even though they are blood now and will be for the rest of their lives. 

“Thank you, thank you,” Alex whispers to her. “I love you so much.” 

“I love you, too.” 

Alex sets her down and then gallops down the hall to his first period, and as she watches him go, Julie’s broken heart starts to stitch itself back together. Flynn is still mildly stunned when she says: “I’ll see you in second period,” and takes off for her first class, fistbumping the other two on her way. 

Luke and Reggie are obviously not in the mood for attending class (or being anywhere that is more than two feet away from Alex Mercer) but Reggie tries to talk them both into it. 

“I guess we’ll just have to figure it out as we go. There’s no use in agonizing over it right now. Alex is good and that’s all that we need to worry about until lunch.” 

Luke grudgingly replies, “Yeah, I know. Let’s think of Plan B, though, just in case Alex’s plan is A for ass or is self-sacrificing.” 

“Sounds good.” Reggie affectionately bumps arms with him. “See you later, alligator.” 

“See ya, croc.” 

Reggie starts to leave for his first period, then changes his mind, spinning on his heel to face Julie. He lopes back a few steps to where she’s still standing, and says: “You are the light of my life, Julie Molina,” before pressing a loud kiss to her forehead and venturing off to class for real. It’s meant to make Julie laugh, but instead makes her want to cry and cry and cry. 

The one minute warning bell rings, and while Julie’s class is right up the hall, Luke is going to have to run to make it to his. But he still takes the time to wrap his arms around her, and she does the same to him, trying to provide any comfort that she can for them both. 

“Thank you for keeping him safe,” Luke says, with an undercurrent of terror. “And thanks for everything you do for us. I hope you know that you’re our family, too, even if I made it sound like I was just talking about the three of us. You’re our bright, beautiful, shining star.” 

Julie feels like she might split apart from how much she absolutely and completely loves these three boys. “You’re all my family, too. I told Alex as much last night, and I’ll say it as many times as I need to. I’ll do whatever it takes to keep you all safe.” 

Luke embraces her, tight enough that she fears they’ll both detonate like a pair of starbursts, and then he’s sprinting off, yelling: “See you at lunch, Jules!” over his shoulder. She watches until he’s completely out of sight, and then trudges to first period English, trying her best not to go find Alex and plant herself at his side, or convince Reggie to sneak into a practice room with her to hide from everyone else, or throw herself back into Luke’s arms and weep until she physically can’t anymore. 

~.~.~

At lunch, Alex decides that he’s going to go home after school and see what happens. Luke and Reggie are vocally against this decision, and Flynn recommends that Alex err on the side of caution, but Julie sees where he’s coming from, even though the idea of it makes her feel dizzy. He has to know once and for all if the relationship is going to be severed, has to know if there are any chances left for his parents to accept him in all his different identities and pieces. 

“I don’t like it, but I understand it,” Julie says to him. “I know you need to know. So go home tonight and figure out what the final say is, and if it goes south, I want you to call me and I’ll come pick you up. My dad and I will shove as much of your stuff as we can into the car and then we’ll take back to our house and go from there. Okay?” 

“Okay,” Alex agrees, looking a little green, but also determined. “I’ll keep you guys updated.” 

Luke begins to push the issue further, but Flynn touches his arm, a silent warning that he’s lost this fight and needs to accept it before it gets ugly. 

“The very second,” he demands instead, taking both of Alex’s hands across the table, “the very second that you start to feel unsafe or they kick you out, I want you to call me or Reg first, and then you call Julie. We’ll come over and make sure your parents don’t pull anything, and while we’re waiting for Julie and Ray, we’ll take as much of your stuff as we can carry and go to my house or something. I know Julie’s got the car, but we’re right around the corner from you, and you might need to go somewhere safe before she can get over there. Got it?” 

“Got it.” 

Julie keeps her expression as neutral as possible during this interaction. But inside, where no one else can see or hear her screaming at the thought of Alex going home, she speaks to her mother. Mama, I know I ask you for favors all the time, but I’ll give them all up if you can keep him safe for me. Just for tonight. Keep their hands off of him. 

~.~.~

She hears absolutely nothing else for the rest of the day, and then walks home by herself for the first time in what feels like years. Julie’s able to meet up with the boys one more time, right after school ends, and give them all another enormous, crushing hug. But then she has to watch them walk down the street towards their houses, instead of hers, as far away from Julie as they can possibly get. She has to watch her family walk away, and then she has to walk away, back towards the rest of her family, and it’s a pain she thought she would never have to experience again. A pain that buries itself under her ribs and digs in further every step away from them she takes. 

At home, she does half of her homework before giving up, and only glances at the studio before knowing that she won’t get any work done in there, either. She resigns herself to a long, exhausting evening of sitting on the couch and checking her phone every five minutes to see if the guys have called or texted her. They don’t come over every single night, but they’re over more often than they aren’t; the living room feels empty without Reggie sprawled across the couch and Julie’s lap, waxing poetic about Star Wars, or Luke and Carlos playing a ridiculously competitive game of Guess Who? on the coffee table, or Alex and Flynn gushing about their favorite songs to get down to and then showing them off for the group. Carlos and her dad are at baseball practice, and Victoria is out doing dinner and shopping with a group of friends tonight, so Julie is completely alone with her thoughts. 

At one point, while she’s pretending to watch How I Met Your Mother reruns, her phone pings with a new text. Her heart lurches, and she grabs her phone so violently that she almost sends it skittering across the floor. Her heart sinks back down when she sees it’s just from her dad. It reads: Are the boys coming over tonight? and Julie stupidly feels her eyes well with tears, can barely see through them enough to reply: No, it’s just us three. 

Her dad notices right away when he and Carlos get home, bringing bags full of Japanese takeout with them. Ray got an obscene amount of edamame, and Julie’s favorite beef udon, but all she does is pick at it, absolutely miserable with worry. 

“Hey,” Ray eventually says, not accusingly. They’re putting the leftovers into the fridge together, and he makes sure to keep his voice soft so that Carlos won’t overhear.  “You’re being kind of quiet tonight. Is everything okay?”

She thinks about shrugging it off, wishes she could rid herself of this mounting dread and have a nice, relaxing evening with her dad and brother. But all she can think about is the three empty places at the table that have been filled for weeks now, that are empty tonight for the worst reason possible, and can’t bring herself to lie or play it down. 

“Alex decided to go home tonight,” she admits, leaning up against the island. “He said he would call if something happened, but I can’t stop worrying about him. What if he’s not able to call me? What if they took his phone away or something? How would I know if he needed my help?” 

Ray’s face changes, from supportive to concerned, but he tries to hide it from her as best as he can. Julie sees it like a neon sign, and anxiety fills her up like a sharp, burning poison. 

“I’m sure he’s okay, honey. Alex is smart, he knows when a situation is going downhill and how to get out of it. I’m assuming you or Alex caught the other two up today?” 

“Yeah, before school started.”

“And did you make a plan?” 

“Alex is going to call Luke or Reggie if something happens, so they can get him out of there, and then he’ll call us up to come pick him up. I told him we’d take as much of his stuff as we could and bring him back here to come up with a new plan.” 

“Good. That’s a really good plan. Even if Alex can’t use a phone, he’ll still get out of there and go to Luke and Reggie, and then they can call us. We’ll cross that bridge when we get there, okay? I’m sure he’s doing just fine if you haven’t gotten a message yet.” 

Ray looks about as convinced as Julie feels, but the sentiment is nice, and Julie knows that she needs to focus on calming down or she’ll end up going to Alex’s house with or without his cry for help. She vows to text him when she’s done talking to her dad, just to check in, and then work on distracting herself for the rest of the night. 

“You’re right—I’m sure he’s just fine. I’m gonna text him and check in so I can stop freaking out so much.” 

She texts Alex around twenty minutes later and is rewarded by him texting back almost immediately. The message says: i’m good!!! they were just mad about my chem and math grades!!! thanks for everything again!!!!!!!! with approximately one hundred heart and smiley face emojis after it, and even though Julie is still pissed that they pushed him to the point of breaking down and being afraid to go home, she’s still relieved that they didn’t kick him out. 

She finds her dad at his desk in the living room and lets him know that Alex is safe. 

“That’s great,” Ray replies, and Julie sees his shoulders relax, like they’ve been rigid since the second she brought Alex up. “I’m glad to hear it. But we’ll still get him if he needs us to, no matter the time.” 

“Yeah, I let him know. He said thanks.” 

“He doesn’t need to thank us.” Ray turns away from his laptop to face Julie fully, so that she can see how serious he is. “If any of the boys ever feel like they can’t go home, or they don’t want to, they can stay here. They don’t even need to give me a reason. The guest room is always open to them, no matter what or when or why.” 

“I’ll tell them. They already heard it from me at lunch today, but maybe hearing it from you will convince them to ask for help when they need it.” Julie drags a hand down her face, feeling exhausted and overwhelmed and serrated. “I hate this, papi. I hate not knowing if Alex is safe, or Luke or Reggie. They don’t even know from day to day if they’ll get to go home and be safe. No one should have to live like that.”

Ray sighs, and then draws Julie to him, holds her like she’s five years old again and still scared of the dark. Julie lets herself be scared, lets herself rest her head on her dad’s shoulder and not be brave for a few moments.

“I know, I know, me too,” he confesses, hushed, like he’ll break them both if he says it any louder. “It’s horrible. There’s no greater evil than a parent who hurts their child, who causes their pain instead of protecting them from it. I’ll never be able to understand it. But the boys know more about their situations than we do, and we just need to focus on what we can do right now to help them. Telling them that this is a safe space is a good start. Letting them know that they can call us and we’ll come and help is a good start, too. We’ll show them that they’re safe whenever they’re here, and if it escalates into them staying with us for a while, we’ll work through that together. But it sounds like all of them are fine for right now, so we’re going to take this day by day, just like them. Sound good?” 

“Okay. Day by day.” 

Ray holds out his finger, so Julie holds hers out, too, until they’re curled around each other in their secret handshake. It reminds her of Luke making Alex pinky promise to reach out if he needed one of them, swear that he was going to be fine going home that night. The thought eats Julie up inside, knowing that the three of them have only known some sort of stability for a few short months, only found some stability when they accidentally crashed into her’s and her family’s lives. 

“I love them,” she professes. “It hurts because I love them so much. I’d give anything to be able to help them through this.” 

Ray drops a kiss onto her head. “You already have, mija. You’ve given them love and somewhere safe to go. You’ve given them the two things every human being needs to survive. You’ve done more for them than anyone else in their lives, besides each other—you’re their guardian angel, Julie.” 

Julie closes her eyes. “And they’re mine.” 

We are all each other’s sun, she thinks, clinging to her dad. I’ve given them the warmth and they’ve given me the light. 

~.~.~  

Julie makes a point of telling the boys that her dad specifically gave the green light for them to stay over whenever they wanted or needed to. But Ray also makes sure to tell them himself, just in case they need further convincing. 

The night following the one where Alex goes home again, they come over as usual to hang out and eat dinner, tilting Julie’s world back onto its proper axis. They’re having tacos, and when Ray calls them all into the kitchen to make their plates, he casually announces: 

“Boys, I just wanted to let you all know that you’re welcome to stay with us anytime you need to. No questions asked, no worrying necessary.” 

This makes the guys stop short; Reggie, who is holding the spoon for the salsa, turns to stare at Ray in awe. Alex and Luke, who were in the process of thanking Ray for dinner, break off into silence and look at him like they suspect this is all an elaborate joke. Ray glances between the three of them and takes in their bewildered expressions with a small laugh.

“Hey, don’t look too shocked. You kids are already here so much, that invitation might as well extend to staying the night.” 

“Are you—” Reggie starts, then pauses again, nonplussed. “Are you sure?” 

Ray must have prepared himself for this reaction, because Julie has been on the other end of it already and it turned her into an absolute mess. She’s probably the only one who sees his expression turn a little forlorn at Reggie’s unconvinced inquiry and Alex’s and Luke’s unconvinced staring. 

“Of course. I always want you boys to feel like you have a place to go where you’re safe and accepted. I have no problem with that being our house. You can always stay in the guest room, or in the extra guest rooms in the basement, or even out in the studio. You’re welcome here anytime and any night.” 

They don’t say anything for a minute, clearly waiting for the rug to be pulled out from under them. Alex is the first one who manages to recover from Ray’s invitation, and gives him a hushed but heartfelt: “Thanks, Ray. That really means a lot to us.”

“Yeah,” Luke rushes to add. “We, uh—we really appreciate it. And everything else you guys do for us. We’re super grateful.” 

He winces as he says this, but Julie knows exactly what Luke means. The boys are grateful beyond words that could express just how deeply their gratitude runs. The boys are still trying to find the balance between being appreciative and overwhelming in their gratitude, are still trying to decide how many times they can thank Ray for taking care of them before Ray gets tired of taking care of them and demands they get out of the house. 

It’s clear that there are all sorts of things the boys want to tell Ray, but have no idea where to begin. Reggie tries, sets the salsa spoon down and turns to Ray with a fierce expression that is equal parts fear and love, and tries to find the words. 

“Thank you for giving us a place to feel safe in. None of us have ever really had that before, so we’re still getting used to the idea of that existing for us now. We’re not too good at letting other people in since we’ve been on our own for so long.” 

Ray lets out a long breath, like he might start swearing loudly, or like he’s on the edge of completely losing it, the same that Julie has been feeling for three nights in a row. But all he does is tell them: 

“Well, now you do. Never be afraid to stay here or ask for help here. You’re our family.” 

The boys all stiffen abruptly, like they, too, are on the edge of completely losing it. Ray gives them some space to process and goes to collect Carlos. 

Julie, from behind Alex and Luke, clears her throat. “So, we’re all on the same page now, right?” 

They all turn to her, faces a collective portrait of disbelief, longing, and adoration. She smiles sweetly, and Luke leans into her side, like he meant to hip-check her and forgot to follow through on the checking part. 

“Yeah,” he rasps, a thousand variations of broken and put back together. “Yeah, we’re on the same page, Molina.” 

~.~.~  

After dinner is finished, the group flocks to the living room to watch an episode of The Umbrella Academy before movie time. Julie realizes, as they’re pulling the show up, that Reggie went into the kitchen a few minutes ago and never came back out. 

“I’m gonna get a drink,” she says, passing the remote to Luke. “Anyone want anything?” 

She gets a responding chorus of negatives, and goes to the kitchen to hunt Reggie down. And if she happens to grab a drink after finding him, then it will be a successful trip in multiple ways. 

Julie does find Reggie in the kitchen, which is a relief—but she also finds her dad in the kitchen, and finds that the two of them are washing some of the leftover dishes together. She guesses that Reggie must have felt bad about Ray doing them, even though it’s his night to do dishes, but then she hears Ray and Reggie laugh together, and guesses it probably goes a little bit deeper than that. 

She hides behind the banister of the staircase and watches as Ray washes and Reggie dries. 

“I’ve tried making things on my own,” Reggie says, continuing their conversation, “but I’ve never really been taught how to cook or make something that didn’t come from a box, so none of it ever turns out.” 

“I’ve been cooking and experimenting with food since I was teenager. I’m sorry you haven’t really had the opportunity to do the same.” Julie knows that Ray means this in a friendly way, not as a reminder that Reggie’s parents are less than stellar. “If you ever want to learn the basics, or get started with cooking, you’re always welcome to help me make dinner. It’s up to you.” 

Reggie stops drying the plate in his hands and turns to Ray, shocked once more. “Really? It wouldn’t be annoying?” 

“Of course not. Besides, maybe it’ll get me out of having to cook a few nights a week once you get good enough, huh?” 

He pairs this last part with a gentle elbow in Reggie’s side, and Reggie beams so brilliantly that it fills Julie’s lungs with sunlight. 

“I would love that!” Reggie enthuses. “I’d love to help you out with dinner!”

She watches them for a little while longer, wanting to give them some time before grabbing a drink and pulling Reggie away. She watches as Ray continues to wash, and Reggie continues to dry, and thinks with a sudden ferocity: I wish you could all stay here with me forever. 

  ~.~.~

Julie’s starting to suspect, though he never says it out loud, that Ray wants the exact same thing. He doesn’t say stay with us, but he does say you’re welcome here anytime and Reggie is my new cooking protégé and the music you kids make together breathed a new life into this house. He doesn’t say you’re my sons but he does say you’re our family and it’s nearly the same thing, anyways. 

Ray checks in with Alex frequently following the night he spent with them. Each time that he does, Alex promises that there hasn’t been an escalation since that night, and that his parents really were just getting on him about his grades. Ray makes sure that Alex knows he can stay with them whenever he needs to, that they’ll still come and pick him up if things get out of hand, and Alex always promises that he remembers and will follow through if it comes to that.

Ray gets a huge kick out of cooking with Reggie. While the rest of them are doing homework at the table, or playing games in the living room, Julie will listen to Ray direct him on the basics of cooking and Reggie will cling to every word with a rapture that he normally saves for music. At first, she thought it was mostly a way for Reggie to get some parental interaction and support, but the more time that Reggie spends learning how to prepare food with Ray, the more Julie realizes that food is actually another great passion of his, just like music and Star Wars and reading gargantuan sci-fi and fantasy books. It’s something that he loves deeply, and doing it with Ray, who also loves cooking deeply, makes the whole learning experience even more precious to him. And every time that Reggie does something right and gets super excited about it, Ray grins at him the same way he grins at Julie when she shows off a new song, or Carlos gets a hit during a game. 

And with Luke, of course, it’s all about music. Her dad owns an expansive record collection and a beautiful turntable to match, and Luke has spent several nights at their house just talking about different albums that Ray owns and concerts he’s been to and how he came to acquire his record collection in the first place. Luke gushes about Ray’s taste in artists like Jimi Hendrix and Santana and The Doors, and Ray says that he can hear inspiration from them in Luke’s playing, which makes Luke look like he could burst from pride. It also makes Ray look like he could burst with pride, and it makes Julie feel like she could burst from a visceral need to make the boys a permanent addition to their household. 

Julie sees this greatest desire of hers flickering across Ray’s face every time Alex promises to reach out if he needs help, every time Reggie excitedly bounds into the kitchen to help him prepare dinner, every time Luke lights up when Ray compliments his songwriting. She sees it every single time and tries to make herself ask if the boys can stay with them, if there’s anything else they can do but support from the sidelines and hope and pray nothing goes wrong in the meantime. But Julie doesn’t know if Ray is ready to embrace such a huge addition to their immediate family when it feels like they just lost such a huge piece of it. Julie doesn’t know if she can ever ask him to love these three boys without it ruining him completely. So she doesn’t, and tries to focus her energy into making Ray realize that the boys belong with the Molinas permanently all on his own. 

~.~.~

One night, while they’re all out in the studio and tinkering around with different pieces of songs, Julie asks: 

“What’s your greatest source of inspiration?” 

She’s bent backwards over the arm of her chair, so that she’s viewing the boys upside-down. They look up at the question, and when they see her resting pose, Alex bursts out laughing, Luke says: “Julie, how in the hell is that even comfortable?” and Reggie tries to mirror her while still standing up, bends almost in half to his left and over his bass. 

“I’m trying to Hiro it up over here,” she explains, not moving. “You know? Like in Big Hero 6, when Tadashi picks him up and shakes him around? Unfortunately, I cannot do the shaking part, but I can do the brain reset part.” 

“If you want to be shaken up—” Alex offers, getting halfway off of his stool, but Julie yells: 

“Absolutely not! You’ll snap me in half if you do that, Beefcake.” 

Luke gives her an unimpressed look. “Alex would rather walk into the ocean than accidentally step on a bug.” 

“I didn’t say he would do it on purpose, just that he doesn’t know his own strength. He’s like a Great Dane.” Julie points accusingly at them. “And you’re ignoring my very important question! What’s your greatest source of inspiration?” 

“Humanity,” Luke finally replies, after thinking it over. “We are all connected to each other in an endless tangle of red strings. We all create a Butterfly Effect for each other. Music makes me feel connected to all of those red strings and like my contribution to the Butterfly Effect will be a good one. And, you know—humanity created art, and created human suffering, and music gives me the outlet I need to explore both of those concepts.” 

Julie has to try a few times to think of what to respond with. “Luke, I know I don’t say this nearly often enough, but you are a very thoughtful and intelligent person, and I’m honored to be part of your inner circle. And to get to work directly with your exploration of humanity.” 

Luke turns a nice shade of fuchsia when Julie says this, and looks like he might implode trying to think up something to say back, so she takes pity on him by pointing to Alex. 

“What about you, Scooby Doo?” 

He pretends to be offended by the nickname. “Well, I’m definitely not inspired by your rudeness.” 

“I’m not being rude! I’m being pragmatic.” 

“You’re really not,” he insists, but obligingly answers. “Well, at first, my inspiration for making music came from a very, very desperate need to find something that calmed me down during high volumes of anxiety and hopeless despair. I’m sure you all know that I’m prone to both of these on occasion.”

“‘Occasion,’” Reggie repeats, including air quotes. 

 Alex sticks his tongue out at him. “But then it became less about control and more about escapism, about falling into something that brought me joy and purpose in my darkest moments. So I would say that now my biggest inspiration is making something of myself through music. Playing with you guys and playing to make it big makes me feel like I can become more than what I’ve been told I am my whole life, which is next to nothing.” 

He says this last bit so casually, so factually, that Julie nearly leaps from her chair and to Alex’s side to embrace him. But he says it to be honest, not to ask for help, so she just tells him: “Well, you’re everything to us, so I would consider it mission accomplished,” while digging her nails into her palms. Someday, when she knows she can get away with it, she is going to find the Mercers and strike them from the Earth and into the pits of Hell where they belong. 

Luke’s face reflects this sentiment when he leans over the snare drum and into Alex’s space. “Yeah, buddy. You’re a priceless asset to this team of ours. And we’re going all the way to the top.” 

Alex grins at him, pleased and adoring, and Luke reaches out to ruffle his hair.

And lastly, Julie turns to Reggie. “What about you? What inspires Reginald Peters to play an absolutely gnarly tune on the bass?” 

She believes that Reggie could go either way with this question, could either profess his desire to touch lives and souls with his music, or profess his desperate longing to make a name for himself, a name that belongs to him and was created by him and their band and no one else. Everything filters across his considering face, all of these choices and truths, but then he exclaims: 

“Honestly? That Chinese food Ray bought us for dinner.” 

Julie chokes a little. “What?”  

“God, that orange chicken was diviiiineeee,” Reggie sings, adding a bass riff to it. “It makes me want to write a real Grammy winner—the next stadium song, if you will. Like Centuries by Fall Out Boy.” 

The laugh that suddenly explodes from Julie fills the entire studio, a sound that is completely involuntary but so full of delight that it makes the boys start laughing, too. She has to shut her eyes for a moment, just to laugh and laugh and let it all out, this euphonious, radiant joy. And when she cracks them back open, she sees Alex draped over the floor tom and clutching his gut, and sees Luke with his arms around Reggie’s sides, laughing so hard that he’s not making any noise at all. 

“I don’t know what I was expecting,” Julie eventually gasps, a wonderful ache settling in her ribs. “But it should have been exactly that.” 

“I can’t help it,” Reggie shrugs; he’s got his arms around Luke’s sides in a perfect mirror, and the sight of it makes her laugh again. “Nothing inspires me more than a killer order of orange chicken and fried rice. Nothing makes me want to compose a gorgeous piece of music quite like the crunchy, deep fried deliciousness of a crab rangoon.” 

“You are unbelievable,” Alex responds, wiping his eyes. “Friends since kindergarten and I’m still totally surprised by the things you say sometimes.” 

“You definitely keep us on our toes,” Luke agrees. “You keep us sharp. A very necessary skill when it comes to writing music.” 

Reggie looks absolutely ecstatic when the boys say this, so Julie has no choice but to add: 

“You deeply inspire us with your poignant devotion to Chinese food. Our lives and music would be unbearably dull without you there to keep things interesting. Thank you and God bless.” 

“Thanks, guys,” Reggie says, his smile blinding. “That makes me feel like a million dollars.” 

Luke turns to Julie then. “And what about you, Julie? What inspires you?” 

Julie, for the first time in her entire life, doesn’t have to ponder the answer to this question. Her passion for music was born from a main source, and the inspiration to write her own music still comes from the same place, even after all of this time. It’s her driving purpose in all aspects of her life, the thing that got her to where she is now and helped her to fight through her mother's passing and the Purgatory that followed afterwards. 

It’s the greatest thing she’s ever felt; it’s what she feels every time she wakes up in the morning and remembers all of the wonderful people in her life. It’s what she feels every time she steps into this studio and knows her three guardian angels are there to make music with her. 

“Love,” she reveals, looking at all three of them pointedly. “Love is the reason for everything I do.” 

There’s a pause where she stares at them and they stare back, suspended in a silence that is overflowing with the love Julie speaks so highly of. And then Luke and Reggie are setting their instruments down and bounding over to her, and Alex is coming around the side of his drum set, and she finds herself in the midst of an enormous group hug, one that Luke and Reggie pull her into and Alex completes.

“You’re so cute,” Alex cooes; he’s got one arm wrapped around her neck, and his free hand is softly pinching her cheek. “Everything you say makes me want to scream.” 

“Stop!” Julie pleads, but she’s laughing even harder now, hard enough that her attempt to bat his hand away is feeble at best. “I’m not trying to be cute—I’m trying to be poetic!”

“You’re adorable,” Reggie insists; he’s hugging her shoulders from behind, and even goes as far as to smush the cheek that Alex isn’t pinching against his own. “You’re so cute I can hardly stand it sometimes!” 

Julie sees Luke gearing up to say his own piece, and shoves a hand over his mouth. “Don’t you dare, Patterson.” 

Luke unwinds one of his arms from around her side to pull her hand down, trap it against his steadily beating heart. “Julie, you are the cutest human being alive. Nothing you say or do will ever change this fact, so get used to hearing it.” 

She slumps back into Reggie, accepting defeat almost immediately, accepting that this is not a fight worth having or one that she wants to have at all. 

“Fine. But I’m poetic, too.” 

“The most poetic,” Alex acknowledges. 

Reggie giggles and gives her a tight squeeze. “You’re a poet and totally know it.” 

“The greatest poet of all time,” Luke announces grandly, giving her hand a similarly tight squeeze. “One who can take the words right out of my heart and put them on paper or sheet music.” 

Julie pats his chest, pushes her cheek firmly into Reggie’s, and slides her fingers between Alex’s. “Well, a poet is no good without their muse.” 

“And the muses are no good without their poet, the one person who understands them perfectly,” Luke returns, and Julie feels love light her up from the inside out, like a phoenix catching fire and being reborn from the ashes, stronger than before.

~.~.~

Julie almost says it a few nights later. The boys come over for homework, lasagna, and a very enthusiastic viewing of Monsters Inc , and when 10:30 rolls around, when they have to exit the house, Julie almost says: Please stay and don’t ever leave again. 

She almost says it when Alex, her cuddle buddy of choice, carefully separates their arms and legs from each other and gets off the couch. Julie watches him stretch and then watches as he begins to shove his belongings into his backpack, a very slight frown pulling down the corners of his mouth. Alex looks like he’s taking his sweet time, like he’s trying to pack up as slowly as possible, and Julie wants to tell him to stop and sit back down more than anything.

She almost says it when Luke, in lieu of hugging her goodbye, just tiredly slumps against her and hopes (demands) that Julie will hold him up. He whines about showering, and Julie makes a big deal of saying that he’s gross and needs to shower twice a day at least, but she hears what lies right beneath the surface of his words. He says, “I would sell my left foot to never have to shower again,” and Julie hears, “I would give anything in the world to stay right where I am.” 

She comes the closest she’s ever come to saying it when she sees the boys to the front door. Luke stops to give her a real hug, and so does Alex, and then they’re heading up the driveway. Reggie hesitates in the doorway, though, not immediately turning to follow after them. 

“What’s up, Reg?” Julie asks. She’s holding onto the door handle tight enough to snap it right off, so she won’t reach out and haul Reggie back inside forever. “Did you forget something?” 

His mouth opens and closes in quick succession, like he wanted to say something important but can’t remember what it is anymore. Reggie looks behind her, back into the living room, back into the place where they all just spent hours in a pile laughing at Mike and Sulley and each other. Julie sees his hands twist together, the way they do whenever Reggie is starting to fill with nervous energy, and then she sees a familiar emotion spread across his face: a terrible and desperate longing. 

Stay, she silently cries, stay stay stay—

“No,” Reggie finally admits, letting out a deep sigh. “Nah, I didn’t forget anything. I thought I might have.” 

Just like with Luke, Julie hears everything Reggie doesn’t tell her. He says, “I didn’t forget anything,” and Julie hears, “Every night I forget that I don’t live here, and I have to go home and pretend I do.” 

She tries one more time, tries to get Reggie to ask what she still can’t bring herself to. “Are you sure?” 

Reggie stares down at her for a moment, mouth working again, like he might help them both out and ask to stay the night. But then he just smiles, loving but melancholic at its core, and says: “Yeah, I’m sure.” 

“Okay. You know the drill—”

“—Get home safe and text you when I’m there, yes, I know the drill, Jules.” 

She smiles back, unconcerned with being called out. “Let the other two know.” 

“Yes ma’am, I surely will.” Reggie gives her his goodnight hug, and Julie tries not to break anything when she hugs him back, tries not to make it obvious how much she hates the thought of him walking away from her. “I’ll see you tomorrow, okay?” 

“See you tomorrow,” she replies, and stands in the doorway as Reggie walks up the driveway to meet Alex and Luke, stands in the doorway as he gets farther and farther away from her, stands in the doorway long after they’re gone and wonders what the boys would say if she ran after them and told them to come back and fill all of the empty rooms in their house. 

Carlos eventually comes and finds her, bundled into his pajamas and looking slightly concerned. 

“Julie, why are you just standing there with the door open?” 

She snaps out of it, turning to face her brother. “Oh—I was just getting some fresh air.” 

Julie closes the door, trying to ignore the painful twist in her sternum as she does; where Carlos would normally say something sassy about her odd behavior and depart, he instead glances at the door, then back to Julie’s sullen expression, and asks: 

“Wanna come watch Markiplier with me until Dad catches us and makes me go to bed?” 

And while Julie’s other brothers are gone and have taken her heart with them, she knows that she will always have Carlos by her side to ease the pain of their absence, that he is an unwavering and eternal anchor in her life, and that she loves him just as desperately and wildly as she loves the other three. 

“Let’s go!” she agrees at a whisper, and the two of them sneak off to Julie’s room to watch Markiplier videos, as many as they can manage before Ray comes to (rightfully) break up their party. 

Chapter Text

The only member of the Molina family that the boys are still slightly apprehensive around is, hilariously, her tía. She’s like the walking embodiment of a warm hug, but they’ve only interacted with her a few times on the weekends or when she swings by to drop food off. Julie suspects, based on their startled expressions and their sudden shyness whenever her tía visits, that the boys are afraid she’ll look at them one day and tell them to beat it, tell them to leave her family alone and stop hanging around so much. 

In actuality, Victoria hardly bats an eye when Julie starts hanging out with the guys, and bats even less of an eye when she starts to piece together why they’re over so much. And when the two of them go out for lunch one Saturday afternoon, Julie lays it all out, explains their situations and that she wants to be the one to help them through it, and Victoria echoes Ray’s sentiments about Julie being their guardian angel. She says that she thinks it’s wonderful that the boys and Julie have all found each other at just the right times in their lives, and promises to bring extra food over for them whenever she stops by. 

So Julie’s pretty sure that the boys are the only ones who think Victoria isn’t fond of them, but doesn’t know how to bring it up without sounding like an overbearing parent. And then Victoria comes over for burgers one night and takes care of it herself, all-knowing in the way that most aunts are. 

Julie is in the living room with the boys (sans Reggie, who is learning about the finer points of grilling with Ray), and Flynn, and they’re in the midst of watching Carlos and Luke try to beat a difficult level of Luigi’s Mansion 3 together. 

“Luke,” Carlos says, surprisingly calm despite the jam that Luke’s failures have gotten them into. “You need to pull the ghost to the left when you’re trying to suck him up.” 

“Oh, like this?”

Carlos sighs, sounding much older than a fifth grader ever should. “Your other left, dude.” 

“Whoops.” 

Julie, Flynn, and Alex have been laughing for the better part of fifteen minutes, Flynn’s legs across their laps and Alex’s arm around Julie’s shoulders. The other two are sitting on the ground in front of them, just like with Mario Kart, just like with the dozens of other games they’ve played in the living room, and Julie can’t resist the urge to reach out and tweak Luke’s ear. 

“Hey, Peppermint Patty, maybe you should just stop playing Nintendo games all together.” 

“Please do not ever call me that again,” Luke replies pleasantly. “Oh sh—oot, I thought I had it that time.” 

Luke did not, in fact, have the ghost that time, or any time before that, and Carlos is the one who ends up finishing the level. When the ghost is completely sucked up and Luigi and Gooigi are celebrating their win, Carlos turns to Luke and puts an amicable hand on his shoulder. 

“You’ll get better with time. I’ll teach you the ropes if you just promise to follow me, young Padawan.” 

Luke pats his shoulder in return. “Thanks buddy, I appreciate that.” 

Just before the boys get ready to start the next level, the other three laughing hysterically at their shenanigans, they hear Ray call out: 

“Kids! Food’s ready!” 

“Ooooh,” Alex groans, gently but frantically struggling away from Julie and Flynn. “I’m so hungry I could scream, thank God.” 

“You’re always hungry.” Luke, after saving their game, helps Carlos to his feet. “To be quite frank, you’re worse than Reggie.” 

Alex flicks him on the forehead. “Well, for starters, I’m almost six feet tall—” 

He leaps away with another loud, boisterous laugh when Luke pretends to kick him in the ass. “Take a hike, Squatch.” 

They all troop out into the kitchen together, following the mouthwatering scent of fresh burgers and the sound of Reggie enthusing about something he and Ray are discussing. Rounding the corner is like rounding the gates of Heaven: the entire island is covered with food, from burger toppings to fresh fruit to homemade macaroni and cheese to chips and dip. Julie thinks she might be tearing up a little, looking at the spread and Reggie’s proud, glowing face. 

“This is beautiful,” Alex whispers, like he might also be tearing up. 

Reggie, who is wearing a dorky and obnoxiously cute KISS THE COOK! apron, gestures at the spread with his hands. 

“A feast for you, my good lords and ladies and any other noble folk in the kingdom.” 

Luke, in a burst of uncontainable joy, rushes up to Reggie and kisses him soundly on the cheek. “This is the best thing I’ve ever laid eyes on. Except for you, my dearest Reginald.” 

Ray snorts, and Reggie says, “The same could be said about you, my dearest Lucas.” 

While the boys are making googly eyes at each other and Alex is making googly eyes at the stack of burger patties, Flynn leans into Julie and tells her: 

“I will die and waste away before I find someone who speaks to me the way that Luke and Reggie speak to each other.” 

“Oh my God, tell me about it.” 

Flynn’s face goes from wistful to humored. “Oh, you definitely have no problems in that department. You are the one exception, my sweet angel.” 

“What do you mean?” Julie asks, confused, but all Flynn does is wink and float away to start making a plate. It takes Julie a few moments of watching her to understand what the heck Flynn is even talking about, but when she sees her best friend gesture between where Julie is standing behind Alex, and where Luke is standing and listening to Reggie talk about grilling with genuine interest, she feels herself flush. She silently mouths: “Shut up!” and Flynn giggles, but drops it. 

They’re in the middle of the organized chaos of getting their food when the back door opens and a loud, cheerful cry of: “Hello, hello, familia!” echoes down the hallway. Victoria appears in the kitchen moments later, smiling beautifully and holding a baking dish. 

Ray, who has been standing and watching them all serve themselves, goes to greet her with a hug. He ends up rapping a knuckle on the edge of the ceramic dish in her hands and asks, “What’s this, Victoria? I thought you promised to let me handle all the food tonight.” 

“I promised to let you handle dinner. I never said anything about the dessert.” 

He suddenly looks a lot more interested and a lot less teasing. “Oh, are these your brownies? Can I try one now—?” 

Victoria snatches the tray away. “Ah, ah! You’re worse than the kids!” 

After depositing the tray in a safe spot, Victoria greets Carlos with a big hug and a kiss on the head, one that he reluctantly allows, then gives Flynn a big hug of her own. And then she sashays over to Julie and hugs her tight, the way she always does, like she’s trying to fill Julie to the brim with love and then add some extra in there for good measure. 

“I missed you, sobrina.”  

“Tía, I saw you two days ago.”

“I still missed you!” Victoria leans back to cup Julie’s face, like she’s seeing her for the first time after many, many years. “I feel like I blink and you’re a year older. I don’t want to miss a second of it.” 

After she hugs Julie some more, she turns to the boys and greets them. “And how are you boys doing?” 

They’re still vibrant and wild, as always, but something about Victoria’s arrival has dampened their rambunctiousness. Alex sounds like the paragon of well-behaved when he replies: “Oh, we’re doing great, thanks so much for asking!” and Reggie straightens his clothes out before telling her: “Yeah, we’re doing wonderfully!” They say nothing else, just smile sweetly and then get out of Victoria’s way as quickly and quietly as possible. Flynn and Carlos don’t seem to notice, but Julie does, and Victoria’s slightly troubled face indicates that she does too. 

“Are they scared of me?” Victoria asks, almost silently, so that Julie is the only one who hears. “I promise I really wanted to know.” 

Julie takes a gamble and decides to be completely transparent. “They’re not scared of you, they’re just scared that you don’t want them to be here.” 

“Ah,” Victoria nods, face smoothing out again. “That makes sense. I’ll be sure to clear the air in just a moment, then.” 

When they’re all at the table together, and grace has been said by Flynn, the conversation naturally continues from there. The boys focus on eating while the Molinas, Victoria, and Flynn catch up with each other, and Julie finds herself watching them more than she chats with her tía or her dad. They speak when spoken directly to, and make it pretty damn convincing, but Julie can see the glass wall around them like it’s made of iron and spikes. She can see the way they’re folded up to make themselves look smaller, or non-confrontational, and it leaves her feeling like she missed the last step on the stairs. Normally by this point, Reggie would be singing about how much he loves Ray’s mac and cheese, Luke would be agonizing over how deeply he despises his Biology teacher, and Alex would be trying his best to make Carlos laugh, laugh hard enough that it fills up the entire first floor. But instead they’re being polite and quiet and small and Julie hates it. 

Victoria sees it, too, must see it as clearly as Julie does, and she tries to smash their glass walls only moments after they begin eating. 

“So,” she starts, ruffling Carlos’ hair. “What did you do today at school? Anything fun and exciting?”

“No, school sucks—fifth grade is, like, the worst.”  

The boys, Julie, and Flynn, all juniors trying to prepare for their SATs and college classes, groan at this statement. 

“Well, how about baseball?” 

He lights up at this. “Oh, yeah! I got a home run yesterday and got more hits than that jerk Anthony on my team, so that was pretty cool.” 

Ray tries to keep his face neutral when he says: “Hey, Anthony is not a jerk, he’s ten,” but it’s obvious that he also doesn’t care for this Anthony kid. 

“Sorry,” Carlos responds, not sounding sorry whatsoever. “I meant to say that he’s a bad teammate and it felt really good to beat him and listen to him yell about it.” 

While Ray puts his head in his hands, trying to appear exasperated but in reality is probably just trying to smother a laugh, Victoria smiles proudly at Carlos. “Well, good job then, mijo. Keep the energy for your next game so I can yell and cheer for you in the stands!” 

“Oh, I’ll do anything to beat Anthony,” Carlos promises, and across the table from Julie, Reggie looks like he might pass out from trying not to react to her brother’s antics. 

“And how about you, Julie?” Victoria asks, adding a pointed eyebrow raise into the question. Julie’s not sure she understands, but she does her best to keep up. “Anything exciting going on at school? Or maybe in your music program?” 

“Yeah, definitely,” she enthuses, bumping shoulders with Flynn. “We finally get to do a pair project, so Flynn and I are going to write and perform a song together. We only have the chorus down, but it’s coming along super well.”

“We’ll show you guys when it’s done!” Flynn agrees, bumping Julie back. “I know Julie is already in a band, but maybe Double Trouble is going to have to have some side gigs in the future.” 

“Is that so?” Luke asks teasingly, but then abruptly looks back at his plate, like he’s ashamed, like what he said was astronomically rude. “Sounds cool. We can’t wait to see the finished product.” 

Flynn bumps her shoulder in Julie again, but instead of it being excited, it relays the question of: What’s wrong with the guys? Julie presses back to say: Hang tight, we’re working on it. 

Victoria tilts her head at Flynn, silently acknowledging this task. “Anything else going with you, sweetie? How are your classes?” 

“I’m doing well, but everything I’m taking this semester is lame. I took some AP classes to get ahead for college but they’re super boring and homework heavy. I hate AP U.S. History more than I have ever hated anything in my life.” 

“Same,” Reggie says, and then flushes. “Um, not to interrupt. But History is the worst, especially if it’s U.S. History.” 

He probably means to trail off awkwardly and not make eye contact with anyone again, but Victoria sees this as her in and takes it with both hands. 

“Are you in Flynn’s class?” Victoria asks, keeping her tone the same. 

“No, I’m in a different one, but it would be cool to have it with Flynn. She would make it less abysmal.” 

“What other classes are you taking?” 

“Uh—I was forced to take Ceramics this semester, which sucks since I’m horrible at art, but I’m also in Calculus 1, AP Econ, and AP Psychology, along with AP U.S. History.” 

Victoria looks positively impressed. “Gosh, you must be one smart cookie. That’s a lot of hard classes. I bet you’ll end up getting into one of the top universities around here, huh? I’d take you in a heartbeat.”

Reggie’s flush goes from light pink to an alarming shade of maroon. “Oh—um—I hope so? I’m not really sure or super confident when it comes to college. I’m good in classes but I’m not too good with test taking, and I’m also kind of bad at science so I won’t be able to get into AP classes for that—and we’re planning on going full time with music, anyways—”

“He’s being modest,” Alex interrupts, resting a comforting hand on Reggie’s tightening shoulders. “Reggie’s one of the smartest people I know. He’s going to work for NASA someday.” 

“I’m not good at science,” Reggie repeats, visibly trying not to ramble again. “NASA’s out.” 

Alex amends: “He’s going to work for the FBI. Or win a Pulitzer Prize.” 

“I have no doubt about that,” Victoria replies. “I can’t wait to see where you go, sugar.” 

“Th-thank you,” Reggie replies, looking lost and adoring all at once, like the first time Ray hugged him goodbye, like the first time Carlos coerced him into watching one of his beloved Markiplier videos. 

Victoria turns to Alex. “And what classes are you taking?”

Alex’s brief return to his natural demeanor cools again, back to his small, polite self. “Oh, I’m not smart like Reggie is. I’m not in AP classes or anything like that. I just go to school and try to get through it.” 

He hunches up when he admits this, like Victoria is going to think less of him for not excelling in school the way Reggie does, or the way Julie and Flynn do. It fills Julie with a swift and brutal anger, but all Victoria does is wave a hand at him. 

“Honey, school is great for a lot of people, but it’s also not great for just as many. You don’t have to go to school to succeed. There are hundreds and hundreds of options out there for you if you don’t like school or don’t feel like you excel in it. There’s no shame in that.” 

Alex looks up at Victoria through the curtain of his hair, looking terribly tiny and hopeful. “Yeah?” 

“Absolutely. I hear you kids practicing whenever I stop by—if you’re serious about going all the way with your band, I have no doubts that you’ll get there. Why waste your time feeling bad about school if you’re going to climb to the top of the world instead?” 

This earns Victoria one of Alex’s true smiles, the one that transforms his normally neutral or pinched face into something gorgeous and radiant. Julie’s heart unfurls inside of her chest at the sight of it, and across the table, Luke’s eyes shine in the reflection of the light pouring from Alex’s lips and in between his teeth. 

“We’re going all the way,” Alex promises her, “until we can’t go any further.” 

“And then we’ll go further anyways,” Luke adds, some of his fire coming back. 

Victoria, at last, turns to him. Luke is too busy grinning over at Alex, and Reggie by association, to notice that she’s moved onto him; Victoria takes it all in, all of Luke’s fire and his beautiful smile and everything sweet and wonderful about him that Julie loves fiercely, and it makes her smile widen. 

“I guess I don’t have to ask you if that’s what you want to do, do I, sweetheart?” 

Luke turns to Victoria, and though he flushes as her sudden attention, his fire stays right where it is, right where it belongs: where everyone can see it. 

“I’ve never wanted anything else. I’ll never want anything the way I want this.” 

Victoria reaches out and squeezes his arm briefly, just enough to pour sunlight into the cracking pieces of Luke’s armor. “You’ll get there in no time at all. You have real talent, mijo. You all do.”  

The fire inside of him goes from a steady flame to a roaring blaze. “Thank you. That means a lot to hear.” 

“I’m being honest,” Victoria simply replies, going back to her food. “Everyone is born to be creative, but very few people ever unlock the secret to turning their creativity into the kind of art that changes the world. And fewer people yet meet others who help them to change the world with their art. It would be a loss on us all to not celebrate your gifts and what they will do for others someday.” 

She couldn’t possibly know just how much these words mean to Julie and the guys, but the evidence fills the entire room, just like Victoria’s smile, just like Carlos’ laugh. The pride and hope that each of them feel at the thought of making art together, at the thought of taking their art to the very top of the world for everyone to witness, rises and rises until everyone at the table is beaming and shining from the force of it. No one more than the boys, who are finally sitting with their chins up and their shoulders relaxed, who are finally sitting at the table like they belong there. Who are finally sitting at the table like they realized Julie has been waiting for them to sit down for sixteen years of her life. 

Reggie looks Victoria right in the eyes when he swears: “Tía, you’ll be the guest of honor at our first concert. We’ll take twenty minutes out of it just to tell everyone about you.” 

“I look forward to it,” she replies, winking, and Julie grins at her with absolute, pure love. 

After dinner has been consumed, and Victoria’s brownies, Luke passingly states: “Your tía is the best.” And while all the boys and Ray are playing an enthusiastic game of Life, Victoria leans in and says in a quiet, adoring voice: “Your boys deserve the world and whatever you all find on top of it.” Julie doesn’t stop smiling for the entire rest of the night, even when Victoria leaves, taking Flynn with her, even when the boys all swing her into tight embraces and then have to leave again, back to the other side of town, back to the one place that Julie can’t follow. She’s spent hours agonizing over finding a way to keep them with her, but after Victoria assures them all that they’ll go to the top together, she knows that with patience and perseverance that she’ll get to have them one day. All she has to do is keep reaching and keep making music. 

~.~.~

“How do you feel about ‘Running from the past/Tripping on the now/What is lost can be found, it's obvious’ as the opening lyrics?”

“Yeah, that sounds good.” 

Julie turns her head at Luke’s lackluster tone. She’s spread out across her bed, and has been staring at the ceiling for the better part of fifteen minutes, trying to work on some lyrics with him. Luke is sitting on the floor at the foot of her bed, back against the end of the mattress and legs flung out in front of him. They’ve been making some steady progress since coming up here over an hour ago, but halfway through he suddenly started to fade in and out of concentration, something that Julie noticed right away but has been doing her best to ignore. Maybe he’s sleepy, or maybe he’s a little hard-up for lyrics right now. Maybe he wants to work on a different song. Julie tries not to think that maybe he’d rather be doing anything else right now than hanging out in her room on a perfectly warm and beautiful Saturday. 

“Are you sure?” she asks dubiously. He’s staring straight ahead at her dresser, doesn’t seem to even realize that she turned towards him. “We can go with something else, if you have any ideas.” 

“Nah, I like it. ‘Tripping onto the ground’ is a good lyric.”

“It’s ‘Tripping on the now.’” 

“Right, right, that’s what I meant.” 

Julie squints. “Uh huh. Is there anything you want to add?” 

“It’s pretty good so far,” Luke tells her, still in that same detached tone of voice. “What else you got?” 

She decides to see just how much he’s actually present. “How about after that we put: ‘The ice we skate is getting pretty thin/The water's getting warm so you might as well swim.’”

“Yeah, that’s really cool. I’m digging it.” 

Julie sighs, rolling onto her front. “Luke, I just quoted lyrics from “All Star” by Smash Mouth. You’re not even paying attention.” 

He jumps a little, as though coming out of a trance, and turns to face her. He looks tired, Julie realizes, all dredges of annoyance fleeing immediately. Tired and dejected and very much not like Luke Patterson. 

“Hey,” she says softly, resting her chin on her crossed arms. “What’s going on? 

Luke bites his lip, like he’s trying his best not to be honest with her, like he can forget the words if he tries hard enough. But as soon as his fight against them starts, it stops; he lets out a deep breath and slumps sideways so that his head is propped up against the edge of her mattress. 

“Sorry, I haven’t been sleeping that well.” 

“Any particular reason why?” 

“Stress,” he shrugs, not meeting her eyes. “School. The usual.” 

Julie replies, not unkindly: “I don’t think so. What’s really bothering you?” 

He picks at some of the loose threads in his ripped jeans and says nothing else. Julie has known him long enough (not nearly long enough, but longer than she might have ever gotten at all) to recognize it as one of his nervous habits, and reaches across the small space to catch his hand in hers. Luke looks up again as she does, and when Julie smiles and squeezes his hand, he squeezes back gratefully. 

“You can tell me anything. I promise.” 

Luke shifts so that their joined hands are carefully wedged between his cheek and the mattress, so that the back of Julie’s hand is pressing into the bruised skin under his eye. 

“Parents,” he says, voice rough with fatigue. “I barely see them anymore, and when I do, all they do is scream at me. They always act like they want me to just turn around and walk the hell back out of the house when I go home. I can’t do anything right, Jules.” 

“I’m sure that’s not true,” Julie assures him, though she’s not sure if she believes it, as angry as that makes her. “I’m sure they’re just worried about you staying over here all the time and not coming home until late. They’re just bad at showing it the way they should.” 

“Are you saying I should be here less?” Luke asks this calmly, like he won’t argue if Julie agrees, but she feels the way he tenses at the thought of her doing so. 

She runs her thumb over his wrist, over where his pulse is going off like a rabbit’s when it’s been cornered by a wolf. “No, of course not. If you’re going home to something like that, I would never want you to spend more time in that type of environment. I want you to stay here, where it’s safe.” 

I want you to stay forever. 

He relaxes back onto her hand, eyes fluttering shut. “I don’t know why they can’t say they’re worried or scared without shouting at me. In what universe would screaming at your kid make them want to be near you more?” 

“Have you tried saying something like that to them?” 

“Yeah, and they just started screaming louder. I spent—” He cuts himself off, another secret he wants to keep from her, another secret he wishes he didn’t have at all. Julie squeezes his hand again, and Luke inhales unsteadily, trembles all over like it physically hurts him to remember this secret of his. “I was going to go to Alex’s or Reggie’s, but I didn’t want their parents to freak out since it was so late at night, you know? So I just biked around for a few hours and then fell asleep down at the beach. I didn’t go back home until later that next night when I knew they would be asleep. They didn’t even wait up for me. They never even called.” 

If Julie had a goddamn nickel for every time one of the boys’ parents almost sent her into a murderous rage—

“I’m sorry,” she says, instead of the one hundred thousand other things she wants to say about Luke’s parents and what they’ve done to him. “I’m so, so sorry. You don’t deserve to be treated like that.” 

Luke blinks his eyes open, looking helpless and exhausted and so unlike himself that it makes Julie want to take a turn at screaming.  

“I’m doing my best. I’m not smart like you or Reggie, but I get good grades in school. I try to stay out of trouble. I found my calling in life at such a young age, and they don’t care. They hate that I love music so much. They just want me to get a boring, normal, stable accounting job and make money and live a boring, normal, stable life. It’s like they brought me into this life just to watch me die.” 

Julie swallows down one hundred thousand more words about how Luke could be a garden if his parents weren’t determined to be the weeds trying to suffocate him mid-bloom. 

“That’s not true at all. You’re one of the smartest people I know.” Julie continues to stroke her thumb over Luke’s pulse, focuses on the steady thud of his heartbeat and keeping it calm so that she won’t throw herself into his arms, or out of her front door and down to his. “You heard what my tía said to Alex—school is not for everyone, and it does not define anyone’s worth. Who cares if you’re not amazing at math or science? You’re smart in so many other, more important ways.” 

“Like what?” he asks, fragile, one wrong word away from shattering completely. 

“Like, you always know what Alex and Reggie need, even before they do. You know how to help them when they’re going through something, and you know what words they need to hear to keep going through it. You know how to take care of them and you’re good at it.” 

“That’s you,” Luke replies, but he’s got a tiny, tiny smile on his face, so Julie presses forwards. 

“Nope, this is all about you right now, so I don’t want to hear any arguments.” This earns her an even bigger smile, something much closer to Luke’s real one, and she smiles back, tries to pour every single ounce of love she has for him through their joined hands. “You’re one of the best guitar players I’ve ever heard, including famous musicians and random people on the pier. You play like it’s just an extension of your arms and hands, like—like you were brought into this world with it already strapped across your chest, with the perfect chords already programmed into your brain. You play so beautifully. And don’t even get me started on your songwriting, dude.” 

Luke tries to hide his face behind her hand. “Julie—” 

“I mean it! I tell everyone I know how incredible your songs are. Are you trying to tell me a dummy wrote the song “Bright” by accident? Without putting his heart and brain and soul into it? That’s not a song you create without putting everything you’ve got into it.” 

“No,” Luke agrees, with a peculiar glint to his tired eyes. “No, it is not.” 

“See? You’re so, so damn smart. You know how to reach right into your soul and find the words to express what’s filling it up. What makes your soul complete and long for more all at the same time. You’re so smart that you know how to reach into other people’s souls and find the same thing. Do you know how incredible you have to be to have that ability? To know the right words and how they’ll touch everyone who hears them?” 

Julie thinks the glint in Luke’s eyes might actually be tears, but she can’t be too sure. He’s still smiling, a smile that’s growing wider by the minute, and it’s like the first day of spring after the cold, bitter months of winter. The glint might be tears, but Julie feels like it might be something else, too, something she can just barely put her finger on before it’s out of reach again, something familiar and brand new all at once—

“You know, I wrote that song about us,” Luke admits, still hushed. “It’s supposed to be for all of us, for the band, since we’re growing stronger every day and blazing a bright, wide-open road to the top together. But—I also wrote it about us. About you.” 

Julie’s breath catches. “Me?” 

He nods, eyelashes brushing her knuckles. “Yeah. Of course. Alex, Reggie, and I have only ever really had each other, and we love each other, keep each other sane and right-side up. We were doing fine on our own, just the three of us. But then we met you, and it was so obvious that we’d been fumbling around in the dark for years, trying to find a way out of it, because you lit our entire worlds up. Meeting you and your family, and getting to become part of it these last few months—Julie, you have no idea what that’s been like.” 

“Yeah, I do,” she says, gripping his hand tightly. “It feels like walking on solid ground for the first time in years.” 

“It’s been even more than that for us. Meeting you and playing music with you has been like feeling the sun for the first time. It’s been…” Luke trails off, obviously trying to find the right words. His head is full of them, so many that Julie wonders how he hasn’t already written twenty albums worth of gorgeous songs, and yet he struggles to find the right ones now. “It’s been like standing in the dark, not knowing where I am or what’s in front of me, and all I know is that Alex and Reggie are on either of my sides. And then, just when I think the dark is going to suffocate us or something horrible is going to come crawling out of it, there are suddenly a million fireflies all around the three of us, turning the dark into gold.” 

“‘Fight through the dark/And find the spark,” Julie sings, in the same hushed tone that Luke is using. “That was about me?” 

That glint in Luke’s eyes intensifies, like those million fireflies are trapped inside of his ribcage, desperate to get out and flood the room. 

“Of course,” he says again, with so much tenderness and love that it almost hurts to be on the receiving end of it. “And so is ‘When I feel lost and alone/I know that I can make it home.’ That’s you, Julie. You’re home for us. We never knew what having a real home was like until you brought us here to play together in the studio. We never knew we could have that until you gave it to us without a second thought.” 

Julie doesn’t know what to say, what she could possibly respond with that could sufficiently express how much she loves Luke and Alex and Reggie and everything they’ve done for her and brought into her life. She doesn’t know what she can say that will keep her from bursting into tears. She tries reflecting the conversation back onto Luke, too overwhelmed and overflowing with adoration to let it sit for too long. 

“This is exactly what I was trying to say. You think just anyone could say something like that off the top of their head? Or at all?” Julie pushes herself up onto her elbows, so that she can take her other hand and grab Luke by the chin, so that he has no choice but to listen to her. “You are one of the most gifted, galaxy-brained people I’ve ever met and even your parents cannot tell me otherwise. You’re smart, Luke Patterson! Nothing you say or do will ever change my mind!” 

“What about the fact that it’s taken me almost seventeen years to figure out what BOGO stands for?” 

“One thing will change my mind,” Julie amends, and it makes Luke laugh, a beautiful, glorious laugh that fills the room and her stomach with fireflies. She lets go of his chin and rests hers back on her other arm, feeling a little unsteady at being so up close and personal with him. “I’m being serious, though. Screw your parents if they make you feel like you’re not good enough for loving music more than anything else. That’s your calling and you’re going to do great things with it. We’re going to do great things with it. If they can’t see how much it fulfills you, then that’s their loss.” 

Luke sobers, and Julie hates to see it, hates to see the light dimming inside of him again already. “But I want them to know how much it fulfills me. I want them to see it and believe it. I’ll do it without them if I have to, but I want my parents to be there when we go to the top.” 

Julie thinks for a moment, still steadying his pulse. “Well, have they ever heard you play? Like, with Alex and Reggie?” 

“Nah. I asked if we could practice at our house a bunch of times so they’d be able to hear, but they always got mad and told me no.” 

“Have you ever asked them to listen to you play?” 

Luke’s nose scrunches up. “What do you mean?” 

“Did you ever say, ‘Hey Mom and Dad, I’m in a band and I want you to listen to us play a song for you.’” 

“...No?” 

“Well, that’s where we need to start. You need to make them sit down and listen to you play just once. Maybe if we force them to sit down and listen to us play together, and they get to watch you play and sing, it’ll show them that you were made for this.” 

Luke sighs for what feels like the millionth time, a terrible, exhausted noise that makes anger crackle through her like a lightning strike.

“I don’t know, Julie. I can try to ask and see if they’ll at least agree to one song, but they probably won’t. They’ll probably just get mad and—” 

He stops again, biting the inside of his cheek, and Julie focuses on his heartbeat, focuses on lining it up with hers, focuses on that and that alone for fear of a catastrophic event if she doesn’t. 

“They’ll just get mad and tell me to stop wasting everyone’s time. Tell me to just keep my head down and in my textbooks so I can get into a decent school and get a decent job.” 

“That’s bullshit,” Julie whispers; she can’t stop herself from purposely pushing her knuckles into Luke’s cheek, into what is an unmistakable caress. “Don’t ever put your head down and float through life. You were born for more than just making a good paycheck and living in a nice house. You were born to touch the stars. You were born to touch every life you come into contact with and leave it better than it was before.” 

Luke holds her knuckles tight to his cheek, hard enough that she can feel the way his jaw is clenched, the way his teeth are grinding together to keep himself from breaking apart. 

“You too,” he whispers back, voice wobbling, eyes definitely shining with tears. “I was born to touch the stars with you and the guys right next to me.”

“Without a doubt.” 

A tear slips from the corner of Luke’s eye, the one pressed against Julie’s hand, and she uses her knuckles to dry it from his skin. 

“Ask them,” she says again. “Ask them to give you a chance to show just how much music fulfills you, fulfills you the way college and a nine-to-five never could. They owe you the opportunity to prove you were born for greatness instead of just security.” 

“I’ll ask, but I don’t know if they’ll say yes. I don’t think they’ll ever understand why I can’t just let life pass me by while I work in a cubicle and earn a paycheck.” 

A brief silence falls over them, and then there’s a soft knock at the doorway to Julie’s room. It makes them both jump and glance up to see Ray leaning in through the open door, somewhat sheepish but mostly concerned. 

“I’m sorry to intrude on your private moment, but—can I come sit with you for a little bit?” 

Julie turns back to Luke, who doesn’t look upset by the intrusion at all. In fact, he remains perfectly relaxed, maybe even relaxes more at the soft, open expression that her dad is wearing. 

“Sure,” Luke tells him; he straightens up, so that his back is against the mattress again, but he doesn’t let go of Julie’s hand, so she doesn’t let go of his, either. “Come on in.” 

Ray carefully crosses the room and settles down onto the floor, back to Julie’s dresser, facing them both. He looks at Julie first, silently asking: Are you okay?, and when she subtly tilts her head to say: He’s the one hurting, he turns to Luke. 

“I didn’t mean to eavesdrop, I promise—I was actually coming to ask if you two had any ideas for dinner, but I think there’s a more pressing matter at hand, huh?” 

“Yeah,” Luke agrees, sounding small again. “I was just, uh, explaining that my parents aren’t very supportive of my passion for music, but I’m sure you already knew that.” 

“Yeah,” Ray echoes. “Unfortunately, kiddo, I had my suspicions. And I’m sorry that you’re dealing with that. I know how hard it is to be at odds with your parents when you want to do one thing and they want you to do another thing entirely.” 

“I wish you were my dad all the time. If you were my dad, I could have grown up with music like Julie and Carlos have, and I wouldn’t have to worry about fighting every step of the way for it.” 

Ray both softens and becomes pained when Luke announces this. “Hey, I know it must seem like your parents don’t love or care about you, but I bet that they love you so much they can hardly bear it. They’d have to be crazy not to. I’m sure that they know how talented and smart you are, but they’re just not able to let go of the perfect life that they’ve always envisioned for you.” 

“But I don’t even want that kind of life. Can’t they see how much it suffocates me to think about working at a regular job all my life? Just so that I can buy a house and a car and have retirement savings when I’m old?” 

“Some parents aren’t able to think about it like that,” Ray explains. “Maybe your parents grew up without a lot of money, or with parents who tried to take risks and lost everything afterwards. A lot of parents try to force their kids down a clear path to success because they were never guaranteed success like that and they don’t want their kids to live the way they had to. All parents want better for their children, and want their children to experience the least amount of pain that they can during their lives. Your parents just want what they think is best for you because they think it will keep you from experiencing life’s many, many hardships.” 

Luke closes his eyes for a moment, like he might start crying, or like he can’t stand what Ray is trying to tell him. “If I go down the path they want to, I’m gonna end up feeling nothing.”

Ray gently knocks one of their knees together. “I know, Luke. I didn’t say that they’re right, I’m just saying that that’s probably their thought process on this whole situation. Your parents just want you to have a good, stable life, and they believe that the only path that will lead you to this is going to a ‘good’ school and getting a ‘good’ job. There are very, very few people who ever get to make a life for themselves in the music industry, and even if they make it big, there’s always the threat of your band breaking up and wrecking you, or the dangers of substance abuse and out of control fans, or the possibility of your record label two-timing you and forcing you into a lawsuit—anything wild and tumultuous like that.” 

“Do you think that will happen to us?” 

“No,” Ray replies, without hesitating. “No, I don’t think anything of that sort will happen to you. But your parents probably keep themselves up at night fearing that it will, and they’ll be so far out of your orbit that they won’t even hear about it until it’s too late. Again, I’m not saying that they’re right or that you deserve to be treated the way you are when discussing your dream of being a musician, but I want to try and show you where their misinformation lies. So that you might be able to show them otherwise if you approach it the right way.” 

“I don’t know. I want to try, like Julie told me to, but I’m just not sure if they’ll ever be cool with it. They’re never going to support me the way you support Julie.” 

Ray knocks their knees together again. “I really am sorry, mijo. I know how different your parents are from me and Rose when it comes to music. We both come from families full of artists, full of people who paint and sing and play instruments and write—anything you can think of. It’s an essential, core piece of ourselves as individuals and as a family unit. Our entire families were raised with the belief that life without art is not a life worth living. And Rose and I taught our kids the same thing, that art is precious and should be encouraged to its fullest extent. But your parents were probably never encouraged to let art fulfill them and their lives. I’m sure that they were told that art is a waste of time, and they, in turn, are trying to pass that same belief down to you because they want you to have a secure, fulfilling life.” 

Luke thinks this over for a long beat, thumb pushing up into Julie’s palm and his other hand picking at the loose threads on the knee of his jeans again. Ray watches him, so fond and so heartbroken that Julie can hardly stand to look at him, at the warring desire for Luke to make his parents understand and the desire to take Luke under his own wing and let his art flourish. Julie realizes, like the moment you’re half-asleep and suddenly jerk awake again, like the moment your feet hit the ground after taking a great leap, that all of her worrying about Ray not being able to handle loving the boys as his own has been for nothing. That Ray has loved them for as long as Julie has, probably, that Ray’s heart has already decided even if Julie’s hasn’t. 

Eventually, Luke asks, absolutely helpless: “What do I do?” 

“Talk to them,” Ray tells him. “Sit them down and talk to them about this. Tell them that you’re almost an adult and you want to have an adult conversation where they listen to you and you listen to them and you try to come to some sort of agreement on this situation. The only way that the wound is going to start healing is if some sort of action is taken that will allow it to do so. If they love you, they’ll listen to what you have to say, and they’ll make an effort to understand that music makes you feel alive, and music is what is going to bring you purpose and stability throughout your life.” 

“And if they don’t?” 

Ray holds Luke’s gaze, takes in this expression that is so destroyed, and so relentlessly hopeful as always, the one thing that Luke would remember if he forgot everything else about himself. He takes it in and bears its weight and says: 

“If they refuse to see what forcing you into a life of quietness and one without art will do to you, then I want you to know that I will always support you and your love of art. You will always have a place to come where you have a family that loves you just the way you are and supports you in your pursuit of happiness.” 

Julie thinks, if she were in Luke’s position during this conversation, that hearing Ray say these words would turn her into an absolute wreck, would leave her gutted and without any response that could explain what they meant to hear. Instead, Luke’s face cracks open around a blinding grin, one that brings forth the words ‘find the spark’ in her head, and Ray is the one left speechless. 

“I love you guys so much,” Luke says to Ray, and then turns to Julie and says: “You’re the best thing that has ever happened to me, besides Alex and Reggie, and I mean it.” 

While Ray is left stunned and notably teary-eyed, Julie just grins back and says: “Us too, Luke.” 

~.~.~  

When Luke leaves later that night, completely by himself for once but in good spirits despite it, he gives Julie her usual hug, and then, to both their surprises, also gives Ray a hug. Luckily, Ray snaps out of his shock a lot faster than Julie does, and he gives Luke his best Dad Hug in return, the one that makes Julie feel stable whenever the rest of her life has her feeling lost at sea. 

“Thanks for dinner,” Luke tells Ray, looking leagues better than he did up in her room. “And thanks for helping me out with my parent situation. I think I’m gonna go home and talk to them about it tonight.” 

He releases Ray after he says this, but Ray takes him by the shoulders before he can slip away completely. 

“Let us know if it escalates at all. Like I’ve said before, kid, we’ll come get you in a second’s notice, no matter when, where, or why. Promise you’ll let us know if anything happens, okay?” 

“Okay,” Luke affirms, and then practically flounces through the front door, looking like he really is glowing from the inside out. “See you tomorrow!” 

“See you,” Julie returns, and waits until he’s at the top of the driveway before closing the door. 

When she turns back to her dad, ready to make some comment about Luke’s chipper mood, she falls short at the drained, wan expression on Ray’s face. It’s one she knows well, one she knows she wears whenever Luke talks about his parents harking on him, or Alex talks about how strict his parents are, or Reggie refuses to even discuss his. If she had any lingering doubts about how entangled the boys are in their family, any lingering doubts about her dad considering them to be his sons, this look vanquishes them all. 

“It’s so hard,” Ray begins, in a very, very quiet and hoarse voice, “to see what those kids have to go through every day. I just don’t understand it, honey. They’re so sweet and brave and brilliant, and their parents don’t see it at all. They don’t see how loving and giving they are despite everything they’ve been put through. It breaks my heart every single day.” 

“I know,” Julie says to him, and then gasps, “I know, I know, I can’t stand it, Dad.” 

Ray makes a pained noise, and then his arms are around her, giving her the Dad Hug, the one that makes her feel safe when there are monsters digging their claws into the floorboards of her closet and at the edges of her bed. The one that makes her feel like everything is going to be all right when her entire world is falling to pieces over three boys and their wretched, horrible parents. 

“We’ll figure it out,” Ray promises, for what must be the hundredth time, and still sounds like he means it with every single bone in his body. “We’ll figure it out together, I promise.” 

“We’ll figure it out together,” Julie repeats, breathing in the familiar scent of their laundry detergent and her dad’s cologne. “Thank you for everything you do for them and for me. We’d be so lost without you.”

“You shouldn’t ever have to thank me for that, for loving you unconditionally.” Ray’s words have an edge of anger in them, but he takes a deep breath, and the anger is replaced by earnestness when he continues: “I’ll love you no matter what, and the boys, too. No matter what.”  

She hugs him even tighter. “I love you. And they love you, too, more than anything.” 

They stand in the foyer for a while and hold onto each other, torn to pieces by their agonizing, desperate love for three boys who are always half a step away from danger, and stitched back together by the unconditional love everyone in their family receives no matter what, whenever they need it the most and without expecting anything back in return. Eventually, Ray leans back and suggests they go find Carlos and strong-arm him into the group hug, too, and Julie spends the rest of the night at their sides watching more Disney movies and trying not to see all the empty places that three bodies could fill in their living room. 

~.~.~ 

The boys come over to hang out all of Sunday, and when Luke offers to help Julie with the lunch dishes, she takes the opportunity to ask: 

“Did you end up saying anything to your parents?” 

She expects him to tense or shrug the question off, but to her surprise (and delight), Luke actually smiles. 

“Not yet, but I’m feeling kind of optimistic about it after our wonderful chat.” 

“Yeah? I’m glad to hear it. I hope it goes well.” 

“Me too.” Luke takes a bowl from her and carefully dries it. “I’m sure you’ll be shocked to learn that I decided to try writing a song first, before even talking to them directly.” 

Julie makes an exaggerated face of astonishment. “No way.”  

Luke makes an exaggerated face back. “Yes way! I figured that the best way to express myself was through my craft. Maybe it’ll even get us a platinum record someday.” 

“Oh, I’m sure it will,” she laughs, teasing but also very sincere. “Does it have a name yet?” 

Luke takes a cup from her this time, purposely bumping their shoulders together. It makes Julie feel like she’s standing in a meadow with no shoes on, warm grass between her toes, the summer sun on her face, and the scent of dirt and flowers filling her lungs. It makes Julie feel like she wouldn’t want to be anywhere else but right here, in front of this enigma of a boy and his firefly heart. 

“Yeah,” he says, grinning sweetly. “I think I’m gonna call it “Unsaid Emily.”” 

Chapter Text

“That,” Flynn declares, leaning against the Molinas’ front door, “was brutal.” 

Julie groans in agreement, thankful to finally be home. They were stuck at school from 8 A.M. to 8 P.M. today for classes and then for a collage concert rehearsal with the choir and band students, and though Julie always loves the collage concert they put on, she’s glad to be done with it until tomorrow night. The only time she was able to leave school all day was to grab food with Flynn and some of their music friends before being back for rehearsal at 5 o’clock on the dot. And the only thing that kept her going all day was knowing, after it was all said and done, that Flynn was coming over afterwards to spend the night. 

“I’m gonna go change into my pajamas,” Flynn announces, kicking off her shoes. “I don’t want to look at another pair of jeans for 48 hours.” 

Julie kicks hers off, too. “I’ll go call the pizza place and get our order in.” 

“God bless you.” 

Julie heads off to the kitchen to do as she promised, one of their post-collage concert rehearsal traditions: Flynn’s dad drops them off, they order pizza, they get into pjs, they do face masks and paint their nails, and then stay up as late as they can while watching movies and talking about life and the future and whatever else they can think of. She’s so lost in making a mental list of their order, including her dad’s and Carlos’ choices as well, that she completely misses it the first time she passes by the living room entrance. 

The sounds of someone talking and a dog barking, both on TV, filter out when she walks past the living room, but this is not what gives her pause; what gives her pause is someone in real life making a cooing noise, and a deep voice saying: “He’s so cute, I want a dog so badly,” that definitely doesn’t belong to her dad or Carlos. 

Julie doubles back and actually looks into the living room, both with extreme confusion and rising elation. What she finds melts her heart—the boys, all of them, are sardined onto the couch together. Alex is sitting on the left end, Luke is sitting on the right, and Reggie and Carlos are squished in between them. They’re watching one of the infinite veterinarian hospital shows that air on Animal Planet, and Carlos is so relaxed that he’s got his legs thrown over one of Alex’s and his head is cushioned on Reggie’s left bicep. 

The sight of the boys chilling together is not what’s jarring to Julie, but rather that they’re chilling without her even being home. It’s only happened once or twice, as far as she knows; if they know she’s going to be gone, they typically hang out at their own houses or down at the beach, not wanting to ‘impose’ on Ray and Carlos or whatever it is they’ve convinced themselves of doing. She knows those very few times in the past where they’ve stayed over while she was gone were because they showed up without knowing she would be out and Ray invited them in regardless. But she made sure to let them know she’d be gone pretty much all night, and yet here they are, purposely and premeditatively hanging out with her little brother on a Friday night. 

Julie stares at the sight for so long that Flynn leaves to change and comes back without her moving a muscle. She also almost passes the living room without a second thought, but must see Julie at the last moment, because Julie hears her socked feet squeak on the hardwood floor and then hears her whisper: 

“What are you doing?” 

Julie doesn’t look away when she waves a hand at the boys. “Look at them.” 

Flynn leans around her to take the requested look, and makes a similar cooing sound to whoever did before. “Oh my God, I’m gonna cry. This is the cutest thing I’ve ever seen in my entire life.” 

“I didn’t even know they were going to be here,” Julie tells her, maybe kind of sounding just a little choked up. “They definitely knew I wasn’t going to be.” 

She feels Flynn rest her chin on her shoulder, can hear the smile in her voice when she asks: “Are you really that surprised? They’d live here if they could.” 

They should, Julie wants to reply, but instead says: “Hold up, I need to immortalize this moment.”

She pulls out her phone very carefully, afraid of getting caught and ruining the scene, and proceeds to take several photos of her brother and her boys cuddling on the couch together. She even manages to get one of them all laughing at another dog’s antics, this one a border collie with an affinity for playing intense games of fetch, and if she ends up making it her home screen wallpaper then that’s no one’s business but her own. 

“I’m going to print this out and put it on my wall,” Julie tells Flynn, showing her the wonderful, beautiful picture she took.

Flynn makes an I’m silently screaming really really loudly face. “Send that to me immediately.”  

The two of them stand in the entryway to the living room for a few more moments, the boys none the wiser to their presence. They watch them long enough for Alex to proclaim his undying love for the lead veterinarian of the show, and for Reggie to compare Luke to one of the dogs with long hair and a lolling tongue, and for Carlos to fall to pieces laughing over this statement while Luke pretends to vanquish Reggie on behalf of his own honor. Julie grins at them, at the sight of all of her boys together in one room and at complete ease, and Flynn grins back when Julie catches her eye.

“Hey,” Julie says, leaning closer, voice barely above a murmur. “Feel free to say no, but how would you feel if I invited the boys to our annual ‘collage concert rehearsal is garbage’ sleepover?” 

Flynn is already nodding before Julie even finishes the question. “Yes, yes, yes! Go ask your dad!” 

Julie takes off with one more glance into the living room, feeling like she could and should dance her way over to where her dad is. She finds him in the dining room, working on something at the table, soft music playing from his laptop. He looks up when she sashays in, a fond smile spreading across his face. 

“Hi, honey. How was rehearsal?” 

Julie groans again, this time much louder and with much more frustration. “Those four tuba players are doing another cover this year.” 

“What song?” 

“They’re doing “Come On Eileen” this time.” 

“Ah, so it went poorly.” 

“You can say that again. At least it’s over until tomorrow.” Julie smiles back at him, mostly with sincerity, but maybe with a little cheese. “Heyyyyy, Dad?” 

Ray catches on immediately. “Yesssss, Julie?” 

She tries not to get her hopes up too high when she asks, “Would it be okay if the boys joined our sleepover tonight? Flynn and I think it would be fun to hang out with them and bully them into doing face masks.” 

Ray squints at her, long enough that Julie can feel her hopes crashing and burning, but then he grins and tells her: “Of course they can stay over, I don’t mind. Make sure to order enough pizza for everyone.” 

Julie bounds around the table to give him an enormous hug, one that’s tight enough to elicit an “Oof!” from Ray. “Thanks, Dad!” 

He hugs her back, laughing. “You kids have fun.” 

She flies out of the kitchen as quickly as she flew in, heading right for the living room. She flashes Flynn a triumphant hang-loose when she gets to the entryway, and then marches into the actual living room, where the boys are still completely unaware of her arrival. 

“Hello, cowards,” Julie greets, stopping right next to the TV. 

“Julie!” Reggie exclaims, the evident delight in his voice making her heart squeeze. “We didn’t even hear when you got back.” 

“Oh, I know,” she says teasingly, hooking a thumb at their show. “I can see that you were all otherwise occupied.” 

“This is quality television,” Luke protests, and at her look, hastens to say: “And you are a quality girl, so now we’re ready to be occupied by your sudden return. Your Highness.” 

“Good, because I have an announcement.” 

“Are you getting a dog?” Alex asks, and Julie now recognizes the voice from before as his. “I’ve always wanted a dog.” 

“Sadly, we are not getting a dog.” Before their expressions can deflate, even (and maybe especially) Carlos, who already knew that they’re not getting a dog, she finishes with: “I am here to formally invite you all to mine and Flynn’s ‘collage concert is garbage’ sleepover.” 

“A sleepover?” Alex asks, sounding taken aback. “We haven’t been to a sleepover since the third grade.” 

Luke clarifies: “Wait, the one where Reggie broke that kid’s pinky during a pillow fight?” and Reggie yells: “We don’t talk about that!” in response. 

This is when Flynn twirls into the living room, her braids twirling with her and the beads at the ends clacking together like the best kind of Sailor Scout transformation. She stops at Julie’s side, hands on her hips and a dazzling smile on her face. Reggie takes a break from beating Luke up to exclaim: “Flynn!” in a similarly delighted fashion as when he said Julie’s name before, and Flynn wiggles her fingers in his direction. 

“Our sleepovers are most righteous: there’s pizza, face masks, mani-pedis, and sometimes a viewing of The Breakfast Club after Mr. Molina goes to bed.” 

“I heard that!” Ray calls from the dining room, audibly amused. 

“Dude, you had me at pizza,” Luke replies. “I’m totally game for a sleepover.” 

“Me too!” Alex says. “As long as Reg agrees not to break my pinky during a pillow fight.” 

“A pillow fight is not on the agenda,” Julie tells him, and then Reggie offers: “I can break your pinky without having a pillow fight, if you’d like me to.” 

Flynn shakes a finger at him this time. “We would prefer if you didn’t, because then we’d have to spend tonight in the ER instead of eating garlic knots and rewatching Mulan for the millionth time.” 

“Fine,” Reggie concedes, fake-glaring over at Alex. “You win this round, Mercer.” 

“As opposed to every other round?” Alex snarks, and then scream-laughs when Reggie digs a tickling hand into his side. “Okay, okay, I take it back!” 

“Just go get changed into your pjs,” Julie sighs, trying to sound stern but only sounding disgustingly fond. “I’m going to order the pizza—any requests?” 

Luke says, “Yeah, I want Hawaiian,” and is immediately met with a chorus of “No, Luke!” from them all. “Okay, cowards, we can just have pepperoni then.” 

The boys troop off to get changed while Julie orders the pizza and Flynn regales Ray with more stories of their mediocre concert rehearsal. After the Alex’s Parents Are Jackasses occurrence, Julie convinced all the boys to bring over a few changes of clothes to keep in the guest room’s dresser, and knows that they have at least a set of pajamas in the event of another emergency sleepover needing to take place. Even knowing this, and having already seen them in some sort of sweatpants/hoodie/loose shirt combo during the course of their friendship, doesn’t keep her from melting when they pad back into the kitchen wearing various versions of the sweatpants/hoodie/loose shirt combo. They look unbearably soft and at ease in these clothes, maybe the most at ease Julie’s seen them thus far, and it fills her with warmth. The picture is complete when Carlos tumbles down the stairs moments after them wearing his favorite Iron Man pajamas, and Reggie fistbumps him and says, “Woah, those are amazing pjs, little dude! I want a pair too!” 

“Cute jammies,” she says to them. “I especially love the creative grey sweatpants and black t-shirt duo Luke picked out.” 

He immediately responds with an equally sarcastic: “Sorry, I left my monogrammed two-piece at my mansion in London. This is all you get from me tonight, Molina.” 

“Gee dang it. Your monogrammed robe, too?” 

“And his slippers,” Reggie adds, sounding forlorn. “He really went from platinum tier to chocolate coin wrapper in the blink of an eye. Press F.” 

Before it can turn into a full squabble, Julie decides to head upstairs and get into her pajamas now that the pizza is ordered. But on the way out, she stops long enough to tickle Luke’s elbow, and he tickles back with a smile. Julie pretends that the sight of his smile, something sweet and small and just for the two of them to see, doesn’t fill her stomach with a million fireflies. 

When she’s done changing, she comes back to the sound of the boys and Flynn fighting over what movies to watch for their sleepover. She stops in the entryway and watches them all, much like she did with the living room, wanting to just stand back and take in the sight of all of the loves of her life coexisting and thriving in one place. 

Reggie and Carlos are standing behind the island, looking for all intents and purposes like a pair of brothers planning on taking over the universe together. Flynn, Luke, and Alex are all seated at the island chairs in front of them, looking humored by their display. 

“We are not watching Spy Kids 3 again,” Alex states, most likely not for the first time. “We’ve already watched that four times in as many months. I don’t want to watch for at least another four months, you freaks.” 

“Fine, fine.” Reggie waves the complaint away, but the mildly sinister expression on his face remains. “Then we should at least start with another classic to set the mood, like National Treasure.” 

Fed up, Alex turns to Flynn and asks: “What movie do you want to start with tonight, O Goddess of Common Sense and Impeccable Taste?” 

Flynn brightens. “I always love to start a good sleepover by watching Step Up.” 

Luke takes this as an invitation to jump in and say his piece. “You know, I’ve really been in the mood to rewatch Attack of the Clones for some much-needed Jar Jar content. What do y’all think?” 

There’s a beat of silence, and then Reggie says, voice dangerously calm: “Lucas Patterson, if you decide to commit a war crime and make me sit through that movie, I promise it’ll be your last.” 

The two of them verbally spar for a minute—“Peters, I’d like to see you try and beat me in a lightsaber battle.” “I would literally drop you off on Jakku without batting an eye, don’t test me.”—until Carlos pipes up with: 

“Guys, I think we should just watch Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs.” 

This brings another beat of silence, before Luke says, “The kid is talking some sense, unlike you, Reginald,” and Reggie replies, “Carlos will be my sole heir when I perish, and you’ll get nothing but dust, loser.” And that, somehow and in some way, decides their first movie of the night. Julie finds that she wouldn’t have it any other way, despite the idiotic lightsaber battle Luke and Reggie pretend to get into and the prayer Flynn says in response to missing the chance to rewatch Step Up. 

When the smorgasbord of pizza, garlic knots, and cinnamon sticks arrives, Ray takes his share upstairs and leaves the group to their own devices with the request that they not get too rowdy. Julie and Flynn spread an old blanket out across the living room floor and everyone piles on like they’re attending a picnic, food boxes strewn around everywhere and several cups of Coke precariously set next to them. Julie ends up crammed between Flynn and Reggie during their watch of Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, and in the midst of eating an obscene amount of bread and quoting all of her favorite parts of the movie with the loves of her life, Julie wishes desperately that there will always be Friday nights like this one, that there will be infinite Friday nights full of comfort food and comfort movies and knocking knees and pointy elbows in her side and Flynn’s Tinkerbell laugh and Reggie’s furnace-like warmth to come. 

The food disappears quicker than is probably healthy, something that is made apparent when Luke suddenly flops across several laps and moans dramatically. In fact, the only lap he doesn’t end up draped over is Flynn’s, which he remedies by flinging his arms above his head and over her shins. 

“I’m so full,” Luke whines, and though he’s talking to all of them, he looks only at Julie when he says it. She tells herself it would be an incredibly ridiculous thing to get flustered over. “I don’t think I’ll ever be able to move again.” 

“That’s what you get for eating five slices of pizza, you monster,” Alex reprimands; the bite in his words is softened immensely by the careful way he pats Luke’s knees. 

Luke pushes up into his careful patting, but his words are similarly biting when he replies: “This is coming from the guy who just scarfed down approximately twenty five garlic knots.”

“Well, I’m not the one on the ground writhing in pain, am I?” 

“I can’t help that this is what I do when I’m in it.” 

Alex asks: “When you’re in what?” and Luke belts out an unprovoked: “Aaaaaagonyyyy!” that’s so scarily close to Chris Pine’s version that it makes Julie snort soda out of her nose and makes Flynn wheeze around her cinnamon stick. They choke so severely that Luke sits up, previous agony forgotten, and does his best to calm them both down before they start to choke for real. 

“This cannot be the way you two go out,” he says, looking both pleased by the reaction to his singing and absolutely horrified. “I’ll never hear the end of it from Ray or the guys. And you two, since you’ll probably come back as ghosts and haunt me in very annoying, torturous ways.” 

“It’s what you deserve,” Julie manages to get out, the words strangled but less choked than before, and the blinding grin Luke gives her for it nearly sends her into another attack. “We’ll never be laid to rest.” 

“We’ll follow you around and play “Manic Monday” by The Bangles all day every day except on Mondays,” Flynn adds, also calming down. 

Luke, appropriately fearful, asks: “What will you play on Mondays, then?” 

And Julie takes another gulping breath before saying: “We’ll play “Friday I’m In Love” by The Cure.” 

“You’re both heartless demons,” he swears, but it’s with an edge of pride, and another one of his small, private smiles, and “Friday I’m In Love” suddenly doesn’t seem too off the mark. 

They work together to clean up the mess of empty boxes and balled-up napkins, and when the living room is back to a more presentable state, Flynn tells the boys: 

“This is around the time when we move onto Phase Two of the night: self care and self love.” 

Alex straightens. “I do recall face masks perhaps being mentioned?” 

“I’ve got a bunch,” Julie says, ticking them off on her fingers. “Sheet masks, clay masks, cream masks, peel masks, even that one that bubbles up on your face after it sits for a few minutes. The choice is yours.” 

“Or,” Flynn points out, “we can give them all the Double Trouble Spa Experience.” 

The boys glance among each other, making various facial expressions and tilting their heads back and forth, before Luke agrees: “Door #2, please.” 

It takes Julie and Flynn a few minutes to round everything up, and then they’re coming back to the living room with it in a basket: all of Julie’s many, many face masks, enough eye and lip masks for each of them, a few facial rollers, a handful of fuzzy headbands for keeping their hair back, and her favorite serum to finish the job with. Reggie immediately plucks out one of the sheet masks that has an animal print on it, deeply intrigued, and Alex excitedly begins to examine the several tubes of cream masks Julie has. 

“So,” Luke starts, waving one of the rollers around. “What exactly does the Double Trouble Spa Experience entail?” 

Julie explains it as best as she can. “Basically, I’m going to go step-by-step and put a bunch of different masks on you and moisturize to end it with. You’ll get to put on a cream mask, and then a sheet mask, and then the eye and lip masks after I massage the sheet mask serum into your skin. You’ll feel like a million dollars afterwards.” 

“It’s the best,” Carlos reassures him, sounding dreamy. 

Luke seems convinced. “I don’t know what you just said, but it sounds cash money.” 

Flynn snorts, and then flings one of the fuzzy headbands at him. “Here, Vanilla Ice, put this on so we can give you the spa experience without your sheepdog hair getting in the masks.” 

She hands one out to the other boys, too, until all four of them have their hair pushed back from their faces. Alex even goes as far as to snag a hair tie from Julie so he can put his hair into a little bun, something that fills Julie with the great and terrible desire to pinch both of his cheeks. She refrains, only because she knows it will result in Luke and Reggie teasing Alex relentlessly and in Alex kicking their asses to the moon. 

“All of you can put the cream and sheet masks on at the same time, and then we’ll do the rest of the treatment on Carlos and Alex first so you two—” she pauses to point at Luke and Reggie, “—can see what the hype behind skin care is all about. Cool?” 

“You’re the boss,” Reggie tells her, smiling gamely. “We’re just along for the ride.” 

The six of them squeeze into the downstairs bathroom together so that the boys can wash their faces and put on the first mask. Julie and Flynn supervise them, directing them on how much mask to apply so that it will dry evenly and work as needed. 

“This is lowkey gross,” Luke says, slathering on the one made of avocado and honey. “I’m digging it.” 

“You’re gross,” Julie fires back, and when Luke asks: “Are you digging it?” she replies: “No.” in a way that is not even a little bit convincing, but luckily the others are too preoccupied with their masks to call her out on it. Except for Flynn, who pokes Julie in the back where Luke can’t see; Julie responds by gently and lovingly kicking her in the ankle. 

They finish the end of Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs while the cream masks are drying, and then the boys wash them off in preparation for their sheet masks, marvelling at how soft their skin is already. Reggie, of course, goes with the one he originally picked out, the one that looks like a zebra; Carlos also picks out an animal one so that he can match with Reggie, his in the image of a tiger; Alex is much more thorough with his choice, reading over the skin benefits of each before selecting one of the hydrating cucumber masks; Luke picks out one at random, one that has a hodgepodge combination of bold, red fruits on the packaging. 

“You’re going to want to fit it fully to your faces,” Flynn instructs, as the boys rip open their masks. “Make sure that you don’t tear the mask when you unfold it, and make sure none of the flaps get stuck underneath when you put it on your skin.” 

“Thanks for the directions on how to put on a face mask in the shape of our faces,” Luke teases, tongue poking out of the corner of his mouth. 

She raises both of her eyebrows. “Have you met you?” 

“That’s a valid point. My sincerest apologies.” 

Reggie gets his out first, looking over the moon at the sight of the zebra print. “This is going to be so sweet!” 

Julie watches him struggle with unfolding the serum-soaked mask, not wanting to be overbearing but not wanting him to accidentally rip it in half. She waits until it’s mostly on his face, and then steps up to pull down the flaps that have inevitably gotten stuck to the underside of the cloth. 

“Here, Reg,” she offers, and Reggie stands nice and still while Julie works to spread the mask out over his face. She carefully untucks the flaps and presses them over his nose and under his eyes, and smoothes down all of the edges, until the mask is laying the way it should on his face. “Okay, you’re good to go.” 

“Am I cute?” he asks, and then makes a pair of claws and says: “Rawr XD!” 

Julie laughs loudly at his antics, loud enough that it fills up the entire bathroom and spills out into the hallway. “Always, dude.” 

Underneath the mask, Reggie is obviously trying not to grin since he knows it’ll mess his mask up; but the way he looks down at her, eyes gleaming and warm, and the way his mouth still curls into a small but loving smile, the most he can give her with the mask on, tells her everything she needs to know. 

Once the boys are set, Julie and Flynn lead them back into the living room. Julie watches as they pile onto the blanket on the floor again, all with their sheet masks on just right and their hair going every which way, thanks to the fuzzy headbands. Her heart gives another great squeeze at the sight of them, at the sight of their ridiculous masks and their crazy hair and their mismatched pajamas, and before they realize what she’s doing, she pulls out her phone to take a few pictures of the four of them. To immortalize one of her new favorite nights of all time. 

Alex is the only one who actually sees her do it, and he makes as indignant of a face as he can. “Hey! That better not be going on Snapchat or you’re toast, Julie Molina.” 

“Oh, surely not. This is for my eyes only—and Flynn’s, because I just sent it to her.” 

“Thank you bestie,” Flynn trills, checking her phone. “This is truly a piece of artwork. I’m going to cherish it forever.” 

Luke turns to Alex, apparently unphased by Julie taking a picture of their get-up. “I don’t know why you’re threatening her, Alex. We look dashing right now and the whole wide world would be blessed to see it.” 

“The whole wide world of Los Feliz’s student body? Which all probably follow Julie on Snapchat since she’s an extremely wonderful and entertaining individual?” 

“God, you’re right,” Luke gasps, the oh shit going unsaid but distinctly heard. “Julie, for the love of Ninki Minjaj, please do not post that on your story. We already get threatened to be thrown in trash cans enough on a daily basis for people thinking we’re weirdos, they don’t need to know it for a fact.”

“Who’s threatening to throw you in trash cans?” Julie asks, sudden and sharp. “I’ll throw them into a trash can if I ever catch someone trying to—”

“It was just a joke,” Luke assures her. “No one’s ever tried to do that. But they do think we’re weirdos.” 

“Good,” Julie says defiantly, tilting her chin. “You are weirdos, and you’re magnificent because of it. Everyone in that school who thinks you’re weird has the personality of chalk.” And then, thinking of the song they’ve been working through together the most lately, half-says, half-sings: “‘Let your colors blind their eyes/Be who you are, no compromise.’” 

“Aw, shucks,” Reggie mumbles, and next to him, Luke’s exposed ears are turning a soft shade of pink. The sight of it makes Julie’s heart go from squeezing softly to thumping rapidly in her chest. “Thanks, dude, you’re a weirdo too.” 

“I don’t think that’s what she was wanting you to reply with,” Alex tells him, but he’s smiling in a very pleased fashion as well. “But you are a weirdo, Julie.” 

All she does is beam proudly and say: “Thanks, guys!” 

While the sheet masks are sitting, the group picks out another movie to watch. Luke suggests Aladdin, but Alex complains that every time they watch it he gets “Prince Ali” stuck in his head for many, many, many days afterwards; Alex, in turn, suggests they watch E.T., but Flynn complains that she doesn’t want to spend part of the sleepover crying profusely, especially after doing skin care; Reggie and Luke spend nearly a minute debating whether it’s better to start a Marvel marathon with Iron Man or Captain America: The First Avenger before Julie loudly suggests they just watch the original Avengers movie, and that’s what’s put on. 

After fifteen minutes are up, Julie instructs Alex and Carlos to go throw their masks away without touching their faces afterwards. 

“This is where the Experience comes in,” she explains, while Alex and Carlos are in the bathroom. “This is what brings all the boys to the yard.” 

Luke grins. “Not that this isn’t thrilling, but it’s going to take something truly impressive to beat out milkshakes for what brings all the boys to the yard.” 

Reggie says, “I know right, ice cream is my fave dessert,” and Flynn, after choking on air, responds with: “Reggie, my dear, I think you need to go listen to that song again before proceeding.” 

When Alex and Carlos come back into the living room, Julie is grateful for several reasons, #1 being that Carlos heard none of this and #2 being that they can derail the conversation indefinitely. She takes the distraction with an overly-loud: “Carlos, my main man! My ten year old and perfectly innocent main man! Come on over here!” 

On any other night, Julie’s whip-smart brother would probably be suspicious of her behavior, and possibly demand to know what’s going on before letting her get anywhere near him. But Carlos has been in a state of blissful euphoria since Julie invited the boys to stay the night, and maybe even before that, too, so he just floats over to her and takes a seat without fussing. 

Julie picks up one of the jade rollers and presses it to Carlos’ chin, and Flynn picks out one of the quartz rollers, doing the same to Alex. Luke and Reggie crowd in closer to watch, expressions hilarious and laser-focused under their masks.

“These are called facial rollers,” Julie explains, gently pressing it into Carlos’ skin. “You use them to massage serums or oils into your skin, or for specific purposes, like decreasing puffiness or increasing blood flow to your face, stuff like that. It mostly just feels really good.” 

“So good,” Carlos sighs, as dreamily as before. 

Next to them, Alex hums happily as Flynn starts to push her roller up across his cheeks, and then under his eyes, and then over his temples. Julie follows her path across Carlos’ face, until both of them are basically boneless and glowing from the effects of the rollers. 

When they’re done with rolling out the sheet mask serum, Julie and Flynn pull out a package of eye and lip masks and unwrap those before sticking them under the boys’ eyes and across their mouths. It results in them being unable to speak, but still looking incredibly relaxed, and Julie does a set of jazz hands as Flynn sings: “Tadaaa!” 

“You almost put them right to sleep,” Luke points out, sounding amazed. 

Julie says, “That’s the sign of a job well done—do y’all want to give it a try?” and Luke and Reggie practically sprint away to throw their sheet masks out and are back before Alex and Carlos even have time to crawl up onto the couch to chill. Reggie sits down in front of Flynn expectantly, legs and hands folded up into a perfect criss-cross-applesauce position, but Luke sits down in front of Julie much the same way he entered her life to begin with: in a messy sprawl. 

“Is this the yard?” he asks, smiling stupidly, and it makes Julie’s heart flutter hard enough that she pushes on his shoulder and tells him, “Shape up like Reginald or I’ll kick you out of the yard, effective immediately.” 

Luke playfully moans and groans, but folds himself into a more respectable sitting position, so that Julie can touch his face without having to worry about touching his arms or legs as well. He watches her pick up the jade roller with another one of those small, private smiles of his, the ones that curl at just the corners of his mouth and make his bright, hazel eyes look more amber than green. Julie loves that smile, loves the way it makes her feel like they’re the only two people left on Earth, loves the way it barely creases the edges of his eyes and makes only the smallest of smile lines appear around his mouth. It’s like all of Luke’s intensity is transferred into his eyes and his jaw, instead of his voice and his perfect, perfect teeth, where it’s usually kept. It feels more contained and bigger than ever at the same time, when he looks at Julie the way he’s looking at her now, and it makes her want to tip her head back and shout; it makes her want to look back at him with the same kind of quiet intensity, unafraid of what she’ll find when she does. 

Instead of doing anything of the sort, Julie takes a deep breath and begins to massage the mask serum into Luke’s skin. She avoids his eyes as she starts on the chin area, but they fall shut when she starts moving the roller over his cheeks, lashes fluttering. And then she takes a desperate, intense look at him, at the slope of his nose and his bold eyebrows and the way his bottom lip sits out slightly farther than his top, like he’s always pouting. At the lingering shadows under his lashes, at the long wisps of hair curling around his neck, at the place where his jaw and his throat meet. She takes a desperate, intense look at Luke Patterson’s face, something that is just as wild and fierce as the head and the heart sitting underneath it, and thinks helplessly: he is so, so beautiful. 

“What’s your Yelp review so far?” she asks, when she can’t stand the silence anymore. 

Luke makes a content noise, his smile deepening around the edges. “Ten out of ten for putting people to sleep. Definitely see why it brings all the boys to the yard.” 

“I only ever see us here, so this must be a new advancement,” Reggie says, but then hurries to add: “Um, not that I’m say you’re, like, a friendless loser or anything—” 

“Wow,” Flynn whistles, “that’s an exceptionally deep hole you’ve just dug yourself, Reggie. I’m actually impressed with how quickly that went south.” 

Reggie sputters out some kind of excuse or explanation, and Julie says: 

“First you call me a weirdo, and now you’re calling me a loser. What’s next, dude?” Reggie looks like he might genuinely be heading towards cardiac arrest, so Julie gives up the fake anger pretty quickly. She’s laughing when she leans across Luke and Flynn to punch him on the shoulder. “I’m kidding, Reggie. Besides, I kind of like that you’re the only boys in the yard. God knows you three keep my life interesting enough without even trying—I can’t imagine any more of you.”

She says it jokingly, but hopes that her true message comes across to them: she likes that they’re hers, and wouldn’t want any other trio of weirdos as her best friends. She couldn’t imagine life without them in it, or with anyone else added to the mix. She loves them as they are and doesn’t want to trade them for anyone else or have them act any other way than exactly how they are. 

She loves them unconditionally, endlessly, with her entire heart and soul, and always will. 

“That’s the highest form of compliment,” Luke proclaims, and when Alex pushes his toes into Julie’s shoulder in nonverbal agreement, she knows they all understand everything she meant to say. 

She finishes massaging the sheet mask serum into Luke’s skin and then pulls out the eye and lip masks, holding them up for him to see. 

“These are going to sit for about fifteen minutes, so pick somewhere to lay down and I’ll put them on you.” 

Reggie, after Flynn confirms this information, immediately stretches out over their floor blanket, but Luke pauses. He peers around the living room, gaze catching on the armchair, and then on the empty couch spot between Alex and Carlos, and then he looks back at Julie with that dorky, perfect smile of his. He wordlessly reaches onto the couch and plucks one of the unused pillows off of it, and before Julie can ask where he’s going to go, Luke simply puts the pillow right onto her lap and lays down. She stares down at him in mild disbelief, wondering if this is a joke, or possibly a dream, but all Luke does is grin cheesily up at her, getting perfectly comfortable. 

“I guess that’s a spot,” Julie eventually says, sounding both fond and unimpressed, and next to her, Flynn is trying not to laugh out loud. 

Feeling warm, both from embarrassment and her unfailing love and devotion to this dumbass boy, Julie proceeds to unwrap the eye and lip masks and carefully apply them to Luke’s face. He hums as the eye masks go on, says they feel nice and cool, and when Julie slaps the giant lip mask over his mouth, she can hear the giggles coming from underneath it. 

“Stop laughing,” she instructs, like she isn’t also starting to giggle. “It won’t stay on if you don’t lay still, and then your lips will remain crusty and sad.” 

He gives her one last crinkly-eyed look before shutting them again, clearly using this as a tactic to stop laughing. Julie smiles down at him long after he closes his eyes, not caring if the others see or have a smart remark to say about it. And then, because she can’t help herself, and because Luke still has those persisting dark circles under his eyes from many sleepless nights and bad dreams, Julie gently begins to massage her fingertips into his temples. Luke turns to putty immediately, melts right into her lap and tilts his head back so that she has better access to reaching his forehead and the corners of his eyes in her massaging endeavors. She feels it when whatever remaining tension leaves his body, like a physical weight being dropped off of his shoulders. 

Julie only ever sees him this relaxed when he accidentally falls asleep on their couch, while the rest of them are piled around him watching a movie or arguing about this or that. Or the one time they were listening to music in her room and talking about what they wanted to try writing someday and Julie looked over mid-sentence to find him passed out on her bed, face turned into her pillows, her favorite fuzzy blanket pulled up to his chin. She knows the second her smile goes from amused to adoring, to a gooey, melted mess of putty like Luke’s tired, trusting body, because Flynn makes another noise, this one muted and just as adoring. 

Alex and Carlos keep their masks on until the timer for Luke and Reggie’s go off, and though she doesn’t want to, Julie lets Luke go so that they can all toss their masks out. He uses her hands to stand up, and before following the boys into the bathroom again, he squeezes her fingers, lets his touch linger on her palms and knuckles, and then trails after the other three. When they’re out of earshot, Flynn turns to Julie with A Look. 

“Jules,” she starts, and then stops, apparently unable to find the words. 

But Julie’s been able to read her mind since the second they met, all the way back in kindergarten, so Flynn doesn’t have to say anything else. Julie can hear all her thoughts on the boys and Julie’s intense, unflinching love for them all. Can hear her thoughts on Luke and Julie’s aching, devastating love for him in particular. 

“I know,” is all she says, bumping Flynn’s knee with her own. “I’m in deep, brah.” 

Flynn bumps her back. “Yeah, but so is he.” 

The boys choose this moment to come back into the living room, so Julie doesn’t have to waffle desperately for an excuse against this allegation. Instead, she smooths her face out and smiles at all of them like she wasn’t about to confess her love for one of them. 

“What’s next?” Reggie asks, just as excited as he was at the start. 

Julie digs through her basket of spa-related wonders until she finds her favorite bottle of serum. “Just some of this. It’s an actual face serum that’s going to lock all of that moisture in, and then you’ll have angel baby faces. But—we were still going to do mani-pedis, if you guys are interested in those?” 

“Totally,” Alex gushes, coming over to her. “I’ve always wanted to paint my nails.” 

The boys all wait for Julie to give them some serum, and while they’re applying it to their faces, she and Flynn scoop up the mask products and go back up to her room to swap it out for her manicure supplies. They’re all ooh-ing and ahh-ing over their skin when the two of them come back, touching their cheeks and lips carefully. 

“You guys seemed to really enjoy that,” Flynn notices, laughing. 

“That was amazing,” Reggie agrees, touching his forehead reverently. “I’ve never felt so relaxed or pampered in all of my life. It was divine.” 

Julie grins at them. “Well, feel free to use that stuff whenever you want. Maybe we can have spa night once a week and chill out.” 

Alex looks like he could cry at the prospect. “If I liked girls, I would kiss and then marry you this instant.” 

Reggie immediately turns to him and yells: “Girls, am I right?!” to which Luke enthusiastically replies: “Yeah!” and Alex enthusiastically replies: “No!” It’s one of their many inside jokes, and one that makes Julie cackle whenever she hears it despite not knowing its origin story. She just yells: “Yeah!” and then Flynn does too, just to round it out. 

Carlos stares at them all like they’re space aliens. “Kissing is gross.” 

“That’s the correct answer,” Julie says, echoing her previous statement of Carlos being her ten year old, perfectly innocent brother. “Okay, who wants what color? I’ve got about ten million of them.” 

Julie dumps out her oodles and oodles of nail polish onto the community blanket and lets the boys paw through them. She’s wholly unsurprised to see Luke gravitating towards her black and dark purple/indigo nail polishes, as someone who tries desperately to keep up his ‘hardcore’ appearance and attitude at school, and is equally unsurprised to see Reggie going for the glittery nail polish since he loves anything sparkly and shiny. 

Alex eventually goes for his favorite color, a beautiful bubblegum pink, and holds it out to Flynn. “I want this one, please.” 

She takes it from him and nods approvingly. “Nice choice. Want some glitter on your ring finger as an accent nail?” 

“Oooh, yes please. That sounds amazing.” 

Flynn plucks the silver sparkles bottle out of the lot and sets it next to her leg for safe keeping. She gets as far as shaking up the pink color and opening it before Alex stops her with a: “Wait—!” 

They all stop and turn to him, concerned. His sunny expression has dropped into something crestfallen, and it makes Julie’s stomach turn. “What is it?” 

“I forgot,” Alex admits, touching the glitter bottle longingly. “I don’t think I should put nail polish on. My parents will probably freak out.” 

“Damn,” Reggie spits, face also going sad. “I forgot about that too.”

Flynn looks up at Alex’s heartbroken expression, face changing rapidly from confused to shocked to pissed, a hot, fierce anger that breaks through the shock like a firework going off. But then, not wanting Alex to see it, schools her expression into something more understanding and suggests: 

“How about just your toes? You can wear socks at home.” 

“Oh,” Alex cries, expression going from heartbroken back to excited. “Flynn, you genius. I forgot the pedi part of this event.” 

“Get your socks off and let me work my magic.” She shakes the polish up again, and tells Alex, voice loving and gentle: “Someday, you’ll be able to wear it on your nails too, cutie.” 

Alex’s eyes are shining when he smiles down at her, maybe from tears, maybe from the same kind of unflinching love Julie feels rushing throughout her blood and her bones and muscles. “Will you do them for me when I can?” 

Flynn also seems close to tears when she replies: “Of course.” 

Reggie picks out his color, a holographic blue glitter that shows different bits of the rainbow depending on which way the light is reflecting off of it. “Julie, can you paint my toes with this one, please?” 

“Most definitely!” While shaking up Reggie’s color, she casually says: “And when you can wear it on your hands, I think you should try tons of blues and greens. They’ll go perfectly with your dark hair and eyes. Sweep all the guys, gals, and nonbinary pals off of their feet.” 

Reggie’s responding grin is so big that it nearly shuts his eyes, takes up his whole face and takes Julie’s breath with it. “I can’t wait to try them all!” 

Reggie and Alex sit patiently while Julie and Flynn paint their toes, and then carefully move out of the way so that Carlos and Luke can take their places. Carlos presents Flynn with a green color that looks hilariously similar to slime, a choice Julie is, once again, unsurprised by, and Luke hands over his choice of black with little sparkles in it, almost undetectable unless you’re looking closely. 

Julie shakes the bottle and says, voice robotic and sarcastic: “I had no idea you were going to pick this color at all. None whatsoever. I am deeply shocked to find out that your first ever nail polish color of choice is going to be black, seeing as how you often wear bright and fun colors.” 

“What’s that supposed to mean, Captain Sassy?” 

“Oh, nothing,” she intones, cracking the bottle open. “Just that you always dress like you’re Alex Gaskarth.” 

Luke makes a wounded noise. “Hey, don’t talk about pop punk like that! It was never a phase!” 

Without missing a beat, Reggie starts to sing: “‘I got your picture, I’m coming with you—’” and then Luke and Alex are singing along with him, a perfect unison of: “‘—Dear Maria count me in! There’s a story at the bottom of this bottle, and I’m the pen!’” 

Julie paints his toes while the three of them are horsing around and singing “Dear Maria” in very exaggerated pop punk voices. They even try to sing the instrumental breaks by imitating the instruments they play, and in between cleaning black nail polish off of Luke’s toes, getting harassed into singing another rendition of “Dear Maria” with them, and Carlos being given a ridiculous crash course on who All Time Low are, Julie thinks to herself that she could spend every night like this and never get tired of it. Of Reggie’s impressive pop punk intonation, of Alex’s loud, unrestrained laughter, of Luke pushing into Julie’s personal space every chance he gets, of Flynn being right by her side for it all, of Carlos having the time of his life despite not knowing what’s going on with them for half the night. Of being with the loves of her life and being totally herself with them. 

A lyric comes to her then, in the midst of Reggie switching to “Missing You” and Luke admiring his freshly-painted toes. Their eyes meet over his knees, where his chin is tucked up on top of them, and Julie’s inner self sings: “Been so long and now we’re finally free.” 

“Whatcha thinkin’ about?” Luke asks. 

You, always you, Julie thinks, and says: “How our music is definitely not going to be classified as pop punk, sorry.” 

“The blaspheme!” 

~.~.~  

The rest of the night passes in a haze of snacks, movies, and so much laughter that Julie’s throat aches from it. After everyone’s nails dry, they whip up a bunch of microwave popcorn and settle back onto the blanket to watch some more movies. Once The Avengers is over, they decide to put on Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 1 because, according to Flynn, it’s “perfect for a group of himbos and their leader.” 

Carlos only makes it halfway through the movie before passing out, still a ten year old used to going to bed around 10:30 every night. He falls asleep on Reggie’s shoulder, and Julie creeps upstairs to grab a pillow and blanket off of his bed, a step they missed during all of the other exciting sleepover shenanigans. When she comes back, Reggie helps her to maneuver him onto his back, and she catches him smiling softly at Carlos, with the same kind of love that Julie feels whenever she sees the boys walking through the front door or whenever Alex calls her on the phone and beatifically announces they’re on the way over. The familiar pang of longing shoots through her, and she wishes more than ever that every night could be just like this one, nights full of belly laughs and Marvel movies and Reggie taking care of Carlos like they’ve been brothers all along. 

They make through Guardians, and then pause to go grab their respective blankets and pillows and brush their teeth. Julie and Flynn also turn all of the other lights off downstairs, until the only light that remains is the soft blue glow of the TV in the living room. Reggie and Alex set up camp on either side of Carlos, and Flynn sets up her stuff next to Alex, so that Julie and Luke are left on the end together. She suspects that this was intentional, if Alex and Flynn’s conniving expressions are anything to go by, but ends up being a blessing in disguise once they put on the long awaited,  contraband showing of The Breakfast Club. 

Everything starts out lively enough (and as quietly as they can manage, since Carlos is conked out) and the entire group quotes all of their favorite parts as the movie starts up. Alex falls asleep next, right around the part where Bender mouths off to Vernon and earns himself two months of detentions. Reggie says, “Sounds like someone else we know,” and when the rest look over at him, Luke to retort and Julie and Flynn to watch the fight go down, they find Alex peacefully asleep, body curled up towards Carlos and Reggie. Flynn goes next, right around the part where Allison and Andrew are sent to get Cokes for lunch and have a spat with each other in the hallway; she ends up with her back to Julie and her curled hand pressed into Alex’s shoulders. 

And then Reggie drops off around the part where Bender gets locked in the storage closet, sprawled out with one of his arms tucked behind his head and one of his legs thrown over Carlos’. Julie sees it before Luke does, and then nudges his side when she does. 

“Take a picture,” Luke whispers hurriedly, like they’ll move the second she turns away. Julie takes a few while Bender breaks out of the closet and crashes through the ceiling of the library again, and sends them all to Luke without him having to ask. She makes sure to include the ones from when she got home, and the ones of their face masks, too. 

This somehow prompts Luke to say: “Hey, that reminds me, there’s this TikTok I meant to send you earlier—” and then that prompts Julie to say: “Bro, there’s this one I saw yesterday that makes me think of that—” and it devolves into Luke and Julie curling up together on the floor and showing each other random TikToks. There’s one Luke shows her that makes Julie laugh hard enough she has to clap a hand over her mouth to dampen it. There’s one Julie shows him that makes Luke laugh hard enough that he pushes his face into her arm to dampen it, and she can feel the way his entire body is shaking, can feel the long, endless line of his laugh being syphoned right into her thrashing heart.

They end up going down Luke’s For You page and watching whatever ones come up, and when they come across one where someone is showing off her dream apartment in her dream city, this prompts Luke to say: “God, do you know where I’d love to live once we blow up?” and they spend several minutes talking about their hopes and dreams while the others continue to sleep next to them and the Breakfast Club starts to reveal pieces of themselves to each other. 

Julie and Luke talk to each other like this all the time, about real emotions, aspirations, and desires, but this time feels different. It might be because Julie has never been more aware of how she feels about Luke Patterson and his fierce heart and his black, sparkly toenails. It might be because Luke keeps knocking their hands together, either while he’s talking about living in Colorado when they’re old or when he’s emphasizing a point or if Julie says something he agrees with 110% and wants her to know how brilliant he finds her. 

And it might be because Julie knows, even if they never make it big, even if she becomes a music teacher or gives vocal lessons or does fashion designing with Flynn, and Luke becomes a wedding singer or works at Guitar Center or goes off on his own to do something like Broadway, she cannot see a future without him in it, in whatever capacity that may be. Even if they never leave California, and they never see their names in lights, Julie knows that she will always have a place in Luke’s life and he will always have a place in hers and he will always, always be her family. 

She’s staring at his profile while Luke stares up at the ceiling, still bumping their knuckles together, still wearing that wonderstruck expression on his face, when he tells her: 

“Soon, Jules. We only have one more year and then we’re free to do whatever we want, become whatever we want.” 

“Are you afraid?” she asks, barely above a whisper. “It’s so soon.” 

He turns and looks at her, eyes wide and beautiful and endlessly sincere. “No. Are you?” 

She looks back, knowing that she hasn’t been afraid of him since the first night they all came home with her and praised her dad’s spaghetti. “No, I’m not. I can’t wait to become who and whatever we want to become.” 

“We’ll do it together,” Luke promises, holding his pinky out. “Together or not at all.” 

Julie takes his pinky and shakes it, fireflies burning through every inch of her. “Got any ideas on how to get rich and famous?” 

He huffs out a laugh, something small and private like his smiles, something just for them. “We just gotta play and play and play until we can’t any more, and then play some more. We’ll make it if we’re relentless about showing everyone we can make it. When there’s a dream you have where you want something as badly as the one we have about wanting to make it big together, you have to grab it with both hands and hang onto it until the end. Wishing for your life to start and then making it happen has to come from a place of relentless action.” 

“Very insightful,” Julie replies, hoping she won’t accidentally say anything about the fireflies beating up against her ribs. “That sounds like a solid plan.” 

“We’ll make it in no time at all.” His eyes close into a blink, and then stay there for a few extra seconds, like he’s struggling to open them again. It’s then that Julie realizes how close to falling asleep they are, practically sharing the same pillow and foreheads almost touching. “It might be scary, but it’s also going to be the best thing that ever happens to us. Just you wait, Molina. You’ll destroy everyone with that wrecking ball voice of yours.” 

Luke’s eyes flutter open, so sweet and warm and sleepy that it makes Julie’s teeth ache. Sleep is pulling at her, too, but she finds the energy to say: “I won’t be scared as long as you’re there with me.” 

“We’re going to touch everyone’s souls,” he sighs, eyes shutting one last time. “We’re going to show all of these lost souls the way home.” 

And then, in between one breath and the next, Luke falls asleep. Julie traces over the smooth edge of his jaw, the bruises under his eyes, the way his mouth is slightly parted as he inhales and exhales. Looking at him like this, so tranquil and untroubled in sleep the way he struggles to be while awake, makes a tendril of that fear crawl up Julie’s throat.

I should be scared to love him this much, should be scared to love someone made of so much stardust, Julie thinks to herself. And then, feeling the fear turn to fireflies, thinks: No. I’ll never be scared to love him. Loving him is the easiest thing I’ve ever done. 

She falls asleep to the sound of “Don’t You (Forget About Me)” playing through her TV and to the warmth of Luke’s hand curled around hers, fingers tangled, knuckles resting against each other’s sides. Her last thought is: I will follow you to the end, and I will love you until then, too. 

~.~.~  

It takes Julie an inordinate amount of time, due to the residual euphoria of their first sleepover and their sudden increase in studio time/inspiration, to realize that there’s something wrong with Reggie. 

And not just that he’s stressed out about school or he’s feeling kind of bummed about having to go home every night. That there is something wrong happening in his personal orbit, that there is something affecting him more than a tough day of classes or an argument between his parents typically would. 

Julie finally notices that something is amiss a few weeks after their sleepover. She’s not entirely sure when the disconnect started, but once she notices it, she can’t stop noticing it. The dark circles, so painfully similar to Luke’s, are what tip her off, and then the others follow: Reggie picking at his food more than actually eating it, falling asleep during every movie night they have (often against one of them), stumbling through songs they’ve rehearsed a bunch of times, struggling to complete homework at night and rushing to half-ass it during lunch. She thinks she must’ve been dismissing it as Reggie staying up too late reading or watching dumb videos on YouTube and suffering the next day as a result, but the persistence of this exhaustion tells the truth. Even though Reggie is known for jokes going over his head and making poor decisions, Julie knows how sharp he really is, how bright and attentive Reggie is even if he’s misunderstanding a social cue or concept, and knows that there is really, truly something deeper going on here. 

She asks him about it first. Julie knows just about everything there is to know about the boys now, both the good and the bad, but she still hesitates to ask certain questions in case it seems like she’s trying to pry. She gives herself a good pep talk, one full of affirmations that she’s doing this for Reggie’s health and wellbeing, not because she’s nosy or overreacting, and then she approaches him. 

Like a lot of other important check-ins Julie has had throughout her life, she decides to have Reggie’s at the kitchen sink while they’re washing the dinner dishes together. The others are all in the living room, carrying on and trying to help Alex choose a movie for the night, so she takes the brief moment of privacy to do what she needs to do. 

“Hey,” is what she starts with, giving Reggie a light hip-check. “How’s it going?” 

Reggie, who is in the process of drying off a plate, smiles questioningly. “I’m good? How are you doing?” 

“Oh, you know,” she replies, hoping to sound casual and not stricken. “Same old, same old. Just thought I would check in.” 

“I appreciate it, bud.” Reggie sets the plate in the cupboard and grabs another to begin drying that one as well. “Nothing life changing has happened since we saw each other at school. Or since we walked through the front door together about three hours ago.” 

Julie flicks some water at him. “Okay, wise guy, I get it. I just wanted to see how you’re doing without making it a big deal. You’ve seemed a little worn out lately.” 

The shift that happens is barely noticeable, wouldn’t be detectable at all to Julie if she didn’t know the boys inside and out at this point. But she does, so she sees it when Reggie’s shoulders stiffen the tiniest bit, when they bunch up towards his ears like he’s trying to shield himself from her. 

“Blame APUSH,” he says off-handedly, voice almost completely normal. “I’ve been trying to review all of our old concepts while also reading the new ones and it’s been super draining, you have no idea, Jules.” 

“Thank God for that—I would never ever take APUSH willingly.” She sneaks another look at Reggie from the corner of her eye, assessing his tightened shoulders and his tired eyes. “Well, spa nights are always on the table if you need a pick-me-up in between studying. I’m also fond of watching cartoons when school makes me want to rip my hair out.” 

Reggie turns to her with a wild grin, much more like himself. “Dude, we should totally pick an old show to rewatch. Maybe Foster’s Home for Imaginary Friends?” 

Julie tilts her head. “How about Dexter’s Laboratory?”

Reggie stares at her intently, trying to think of the winner. Julie stares back, also trying to think of the one show she wants to watch more than anything from her childhood. And then Reggie’s mouth moves into the shape of an ‘eh’ sound and it comes to her immediately, so Julie says, at the same time that he does: “Ed, Edd, n Eddy!”  

They start cracking up and lean into each other as they laugh raucously, sides pressed together, Julie’s head on Reggie’s arm, Reggie’s head thrown back. In the middle of cracking up, Julie has to fight the strong, sudden urge to turn and throw her arms around him, beg him to tell her what’s going on, beg him to tell her what’s been sucking all of the sunshine out of his eyes and his laugh. 

Instead of doing that, Julie hip-checks Reggie again and grins at him. “That settles that. We’re watching Ed, Edd, n Eddy as soon as we can figure out where to pirate it from.” 

“Most excellent. I’ve been separated from the love of my life, Plank, for far too long.” 

“Mine was always Double D.” They go back to washing and drying the dishes, and after they chat more about their favorite cartoons, and Reggie’s shoulders loosen, Julie tries one more time to dig a little deeper. “I’m sorry that APUSH has been draining you so much lately. Like I said, spa nights are always welcomed. And—if you ever need to talk, I’m always here for you, Reg.” 

Reggie stops drying the cup in his hands for just a moment, just long enough that Julie thinks he might confess what’s actually been bothering him, but then he finishes drying the cup, puts it away, and picks up another one with a simple: “Thanks, Julie. I appreciate it. I’m always here for you, too.” 

He pairs it with a cute smile and another light hip-check, but it does nothing to quell the bad feeling in Julie’s gut, or the nagging suspicion that there’s something terribly, terribly wrong happening behind the scenes. 

~.~.~

She takes her concerns to Alex and Luke next. It’s one of the rare times where Reggie isn’t with them, and this time it’s actually because of APUSH running him ragged. Flynn asks him at lunch one day if he wants to come to a small study group with some of her APUSH class friends that afternoon, and Reggie agrees since they’ll be going over a chapter he’s been struggling with. Julie uses this as a perfect opportunity to get the others’ opinions on his recent wellbeing without having to sneak around about it too much. 

They’re tinkering in the studio when she decides to bring it up as casually as she can. 

“Hey, so,” Julie begins, while Luke is scribbling some lyrics into his latest notebook. He looks up, and Alex does too, both attentive to whatever she’s going to say. “I wanted to ask you both a question. And it might sound dramatic, or maybe I’m overthinking things, but I wanted to get your opinion on it.” 

Alex’s eyebrows raise, but his face remains open. “Shoot.” 

Julie glances at Luke and waits for him to nod before continuing. “I don’t know if it’s just me being hypervigilant of you guys, or if it really is from normal school and teenage boy stuff, but I feel like there’s been something going on with Reggie lately. I feel like he’s been mega exhausted and worn out the past few weeks, and like he hasn’t been eating that much, or been as upbeat as he usually is. I don’t know—I might be overreacting or seeing things that aren’t really there just because I’m always worried about you guys, but—” 

“It’s not just you,” Luke interrupts, and he looks both relieved and unsettled to have said it out loud. “I’ve been thinking the same thing.” 

“Me too,” Alex quickly agrees. “I’ve been meaning to bring it up to you guys, but I also didn’t know if I was reading into things too much since, ya know—” 

He makes a gesture at his head, one meant to encompass his anxiety and overthinking habits. 

“Have you guys said anything to him about it?” she asks. 

Luke confesses: “Yeah, I’ve asked him about it a couple of times, but every time he tells me it’s just APUSH ‘ruining his life and GPA like a better Team Rocket.’” 

“APUSH my ass,” Alex says, gripping his drumsticks tightly. “Did he say the same thing to you?” 

This is directed at Julie, and she nods, heart sinking. “I asked him how he was doing a few nights ago when we were washing the dishes. I told him he looked worn out and he said it was all because of APUSH. It’s a valid explanation, but my gut is telling me it’s not the right one.” 

“It’s not,” Luke sighs, also looking extremely worn out. He scrubs a hand through his messy hair and pushes the heel of it into his forehead, like there’s a migraine raging inside. “There’s definitely something going on with him. Reggie’s smart and has learned how to hide himself from people, but he can’t lie to me. To us.”  

Alex, miserable, says: “We’re the only ones he can be honest with. That’s why he’s trying so hard to make it real.” 

They share a tense moment of silence, one where Alex’s grip on his sticks tightens to a level that must be painful, where Luke clenches his jaw against some choice words he obviously wants to say, and where Julie looks between both of them, trying to think of what to do to fix a problem they don’t even know the origin of. Julie doesn’t know what the hell to do, but she wants to figure it out, and she wants to figure it out right this second. Whatever it takes to put Reggie back at ease; whatever it takes to put the sunshine back into his eyes and his laugh. 

“What should we do?” 

“We can try to stage an intervention or something, since we all asked him about it individually and got the same BS answer,” Luke suggests. 

Alex points a drumstick at him. “He’s a passable liar to us separately, but maybe he’ll come clean if it’s all of us together.” 

“I’m game,” Julie tells them. “How should we do it? We don’t want him to think we’re ganging up on him and forcing him into a corner, but we want him to know he can trust us with whatever’s bothering him.” 

“We need to be smart about it,” Luke says to Julie, though he’s looking at Alex when he does. “Reggie has never really acted this way before. He’s always told us when something’s been going on with him. It—” 

He breaks off, not wanting to finish the thought, so Alex does it for him. 

“It must be something bad,” he admits, even more miserable than before. “Something really, really bad.” 

Their twin expressions of terror push Julie to her feet, and she gets off of the piano bench to where the boys are both by Alex’s drums. Luke makes space for her immediately, unconsciously, and Julie fills it in the same manner. She curls her arm around Luke’s waist and reaches over the mid and high tom drums to grab one of Alex’s wrists, until he stops death-gripping his drumsticks and moves to hold her hand. 

“We’ll figure it out together,” she assures them both, squeezing Alex’s hand and patting Luke’s hip. “Let’s do it this weekend so we have time to talk to him and work things out if it is something bad. We’ll have the weekend to think of some solutions and get a plan in motion. No matter what’s going on, Reggie’s gonna know we have his back and we’re there for him, okay?” 

“Okay,” Luke accepts, barely above a whisper. Julie can hear how badly this has been eating him up in his voice alone, can hear the fear and grief in the rough, tired edges of it. “This weekend sounds good. Let’s do it when we come out here on Friday night and have a nice, long talk about whatever’s been bothering him.” 

“Sounds good,” Alex repeats, returning Julie’s squeeze. “Whatever it takes, we’ll help him through this.” 

They stand in another silence, this one more worried than tense, and Julie wishes, with one hand gently folded into Alex’s and the other pressed to the warm line of Luke’s side, that she could bear their crosses for the rest of their lives, that she could permanently relieve them of their various traumas. That the boys could know the weight of anything but the weights they’ve been carrying for their entire lives thus far, and will have to carry for the rest of them to come. 

~.~.~

They don’t make it to the weekend before everything crashes and burns. Julie finds out on some innocuous Thursday night what has been leaving Reggie bone-tired and highly unlike himself, what has been making Reggie act like he’s always standing on the edge of a precipice and one wrong move is going to send him tumbling down it. 

Julie finds out on some innocuous Thursday night that there is one thing she fears more than the thought of jumping and falling. That there is one thing she will always fear more than the threat of failure and mediocrity. 

She’s rewatching Haikyuu!! for the millionth time when she hears a knock at the front door. When she glances at her phone, it tells her that it’s nearing 11 P.M., and Julie guesses that it can only be one of three people. One of three people who just left for the night about a half an hour ago, and probably forgot something important that needed to be picked up before school tomorrow. 

Julie clambers off the couch and goes to the door, already smiling at the thought of whoever will be behind it, sheepishly admitting they forgot their phone or wallet while they were all messing around.

As she opens it, she starts to say: “I told you guys weeks ago that you don’t need to knock anymore, you have keys, you dork—” but stops when she looks up. 

Julie doesn’t scream out loud, but it’s a near thing. The boy who knocked turns out to be Reggie, wearing the same jeans and green sweatshirt he wore to school and then came over in. He has the hood pulled over his head, and when he lifts it, Julie’s porch lights illuminate the soft planes of his face. 

Nearly every inch of it is covered in blood, bruises, or cuts. Most of it centers around his left eye, already turning into a gruesome ring of blues and purples, and his mouth, lips split and dribbling blood in multiple places. There’s also blood caked underneath his nose, and on his forehead, where a nasty gash stretches from his hairline down to his left eyebrow. There are various other cuts littered across his cheeks and the bridge of his nose, and another gash across the cleft of his chin, like he slammed it down onto something. 

Julie takes it all in for what feels like three seconds and three years, the rest of the world falling silent and still around her. For a long, breathless moment, there is nothing but complete silence as she looks up at Reggie and he looks back, eyes huge and bruised and so, so afraid. There is nothing but the blood trailing down Reggie’s nose, mouth, and chin and the discoloration around his eyes and jaw. 

And then Julie gasps, a sound that echoes through the entire house like a bullet being fired from a gun, and she cries: “Oh my God, Reggie, what happened?” 

Reggie exhales sharply, an inverse of the noise she just made. He opens his mouth and says: “I—it was—I’m—” in a helpless manner, and then the words crack around an explosive sob, one that pitches Reggie forward, and Julie is right there to catch him when his knees give out. 

She manages to drag him all the way inside and slam the door shut before they hit the ground, Reggie’s entire body trembling and Julie’s arms caught around his ribs. He tries to speak again, gets out a strangled: “Julie—” before another loud, broken sob cuts him off. She tells him: “It’s okay, it’s okay, I got you,” and then Reggie starts to cry in earnest, great, terrible wails that cut Julie to the core to listen to. She wants to follow him, can feel the hot, unforgivable burn of tears at the back of her nose and throat, but she doesn’t let herself break down when she’s the only thing holding Reggie up. 

Julie wraps her arms more tightly around him, so that she’s bearing his weight and embracing him fiercely at the same time, and Reggie curls up in her arms as much as his long limbs will allow. He pushes his face into her shoulder and circles his arms around her sides, hands clenched in the material of her sweater. She holds him tightly, protectively, and tells him right in his ear: “It’s gonna be okay, you’re safe now that you’re here with me. I’m not going to let anything else happen to you.” 

Reggie cries harder at these words, so hard that Julie fears he’s going to make himself sick. He’s making noises like a wounded animal, agonized and shredded and the worst sound she’s ever had to sit and listen to another human being make, and she says, desperate and just as shredded: “I love you so, so much, I won’t let anyone hurt you like this ever again, Reg, never ever again.”

Somewhere above them, Julie can distantly hear the sound of a door opening, and then another, and the sound of rapid footsteps, but all of her focus is on Reggie and holding him up. She doesn’t realize that the other occupants of the house can hear what’s going on until her dad drops down next to them, looking bewildered, and Carlos appears behind him, looking pale and frightened. 

“What’s going on, kids?” Ray asks; his tone is forcefully calm, but Julie can see the alarm spreading across his face and into his voice. 

“I don’t know,” Julie replies, her own voice forced into calmness but rapidly spiralling into panic. “Reggie knocked on the door and when I opened it, I saw—”

She stops, afraid that she might throw up if she has to say it out loud. Ray’s expression darkens, going from bewildered to alarmed to thunderous, but he keeps the volume of his voice low when he prompts: “You saw what, Julie?” 

Julie opens her mouth and nothing comes out but a pained croak. She doesn’t think she can say it without bursting into tears herself, or releasing a long string of hysterical, outraged screaming. She takes one hand from Reggie’s back and touches the side of his neck, feather light, and urges him to look up at her. 

“Reggie,” she pleads, the words ragged, “please let me see again. We’re going to take care of you, but we need to see it first.” 

Reggie tucks his face farther into her shoulder, shuddering from his head to his feet at the request. Julie sees her dad’s lips thin, but his touch is also feather light when he rests a hand on Reggie’s shoulders and says, “Son, let me see. You can trust us. You’re not in any danger here.” 

For a minute, Julie doesn’t think Reggie is going to be able to lift his head from her shoulder, either unwilling or unable to. But he eventually takes a deep, gulping breath, one Julie can feel through the material of his sweatshirt and his trembling body, and then pulls away far enough for Ray to get a look at his face. He looks up at her dad with naked terror, but also with an infinite amount of trust, trust that Ray will never hurt him despite whatever hurt him tonight, and Julie has to bite the inside of her cheek to keep from losing her shit. 

Ray’s face goes from thunderous to devastated as he takes Reggie’s face in, from his black eye to his bloody nose to his split, cracked lips. He takes it all in, from Reggie’s tear-soaked cheeks to his scraped chin to the deep, bleeding gash above his brow, and then puts his hand on the side of Reggie’s head, holding him without touching any of the parts of him that have been beaten. 

“Reggie, who did this to you?” Ray asks, and this time, the words are so calm that it sends a bolt of ice up Julie’s spine. It’s the kind of calm that comes from a rage so hot and blistering that it sucks all of the volume out of the words it forms. 

Reggie bottom lip wobbles violently until another broken sob is ripped from it, and more tears spill down his bloody, bruised cheeks, and it takes Julie an eternity to figure it out in the long moment Reggie spends staring at Ray, not wanting to say it out loud in the same way she didn’t want to say what had been done to him out loud. But somewhere, in between the tears and the horrible silence, it clicks, and stars explode behind her eyes. 

“Oh my God,” Julie says, the hand that was on Reggie’s neck coming down over her mouth. “Oh my God, it was your parents who did this to you.” 

Ray swallows, a dry, angry click. “Is that true, mijo?” 

After another sick, silent beat, Reggie nods, grits out: “Yeah, they—” and then the sobs roll in again, until he’s crying so hard that it nearly bows him over onto the floor. Ray says several words in Spanish, ones whose implications make Julie’s blood boil and ones that she’ll never be allowed to say in the house herself, and then he scoops Reggie up into his arms and holds him as tightly as Julie did, one hand pressed his back, the other pressed to the crown of his head. 

“You’re okay now, honey,” Ray promises, bearing his weight, embracing him fiercely. “You don’t have to be afraid anymore. You’re safe with us here, mijo, we won’t let anything else happen to you.” 

Reggie pushes his face into Ray’s chest and clings to his shirt, knuckles white and straining. Ray murmurs some more comforting words, resting his chin against Reggie’s head alongside his hand, and the force of Reggie’s crying makes them sway in their kneeling positions. Julie watches as it happens with a nauseating combination of rage and total numbness sweeping through her, unable to stand the sight of Reggie so completely broken, unable to stand the thought of his parents ever wanting to do anything but cherish someone so beautiful and loving and full of sunshine. 

When she thinks she might split at the seams from it all, Ray looks over Reggie’s head at her. She can see the thunder and lightning underneath the visceral love he has for Reggie, and knows, no matter what happens in the coming days, or even the coming minutes, that Reggie has a parent in his corner that is ready to fight to the death for him. 

“Julie, I need you and Carlos to get some stuff around for me,” he says, voice back to its practiced calm. “Go dig the first aid kit out and set it up at the kitchen table, and then get me some ice, ibuprofen, and a glass of water and put it on the table, too. Okay?” 

“Yeah,” Julie nods, taking a deep breath. “Yeah, we can do that.” 

She leans forward enough to press a kiss to Reggie’s head, something that makes him tremble even harder in Ray’s protective hold, and then she forces herself to get up and walk away. She finds that Carlos is staring down at Reggie, still so pale and scared, and focuses all of her energy on pulling him away to find the first aid supplies. 

Julie goes to him and reaches for his shoulders, putting herself between him and Reggie and her dad. Carlos startles, and Julie has to fight the urge to scoop him into her arms and hold him tight enough to chase away the look on his face. 

“Bubby, Dad needs us to get some stuff that’s going to help Reggie—let’s go get it set up for him.”

“Okay,” Carlos replies, sounding as scared as he looks, and lets Julie steer him out of the entryway and towards the downstairs bathroom. 

They make quick work of digging out the first aid kit and the ibuprofen, and after setting both on the table, Julie instructs Carlos to get some water for Reggie while she fills a plastic bag with ice. When the ice is ready to go and the glass is set on the table next to the kit, she leans down and says, quiet enough that her dad and Reggie won’t be able to hear: 

“I need to go grab a washcloth from upstairs for Reggie’s face. Can you open up the first aid kit and set some of the bandaids and gauze out for Dad?” 

Carlos nods, looking a little braver now that he knows he’s helping Reggie. “Yeah, totally.” 

Julie smiles at him as best as she can, and pauses to press a kiss to his head, too. It’s a testament to how distraught this situation has left Carlos when he doesn’t swat Julie away or pretend to be sick, just stands there and lets her kiss his head and tell him it’s going to be okay. 

She slips past Reggie and her dad, who are still huddled up on the ground together, and takes the stairs two at a time, practically flying up to the bathroom. Making sure to shut the door behind her, Julie pulls out her phone and calls Luke while digging through the in-bathroom linen closet to find a washcloth Ray can use for all the blood. 

Luke picks up on the third ring, and the easy way he says: “Hey, Jules, what’s up?” makes her stomach clench anxiously. She feels the unforgiving burn of the tears she’s still holding back. 

“Luke,” she answers, voice cracking terribly around the ‘ke’ syllable, “Luke, I need you to get Alex and come over here right now.”  

She hears him shift, like he’s sitting up in bed. “Julie, what’s wrong? What happened?” 

Julie doesn’t want to say it, but she can’t hide this from him or Alex, no matter what Reggie might say, no matter what her dad might say. She would give anything in the world to not have to be saying this right now, knowing what it will do to Luke and Alex once she does. 

But she makes herself say the words, the two words that have the power to break them both in half, the two words that would destroy her if she had to hear them, too. “It’s Reggie.” 

There’s the squeak of his bed springs and then the sound of Luke swearing as he fumbles through his room. “What happened? What’s going on?” 

“He just showed up at the door,” Julie tells him, and her voice breaks again when she continues. “God, Luke, his parents—I don’t know if it was one or both of them, but they—they beat him really badly. They beat him up. And we’re taking care of him, but I need you both here. He needs you both here.” 

“Goddammit,” Luke snarls; she can hear the sound of a door slamming and then the scrape of his bike being picked off of the ground. “I’m going to hang up and call Alex, and then we’ll be there in fifteen.” 

“Please hurry. They hurt him so badly, Luke, I don’t know what to do.” 

His voice is suddenly the same controlled calm as her dad’s when he says: “We’ll be there soon. Just hold on until we get there.” 

“Okay, be careful.” She almost says I love you after it, but Luke beats her to the punch and says: “I will,” into the brief silence before hanging up. Julie takes a moment to compose herself, phone pressed to her ear and washcloth pressed to her face, and then she turns and walks out of the bathroom, face back into as much of a mask as she can manage. 

When she gets back downstairs, she finds everyone at the dining room table. Reggie is slumped in one of the chairs, face a constellation of bruises and cuts, both eyes nearly swollen shut from crying and being hit repeatedly. Ray is standing in front of him, using one of the alcohol wipes from the first aid kit to clean the blood off of his chin, his free hand cupped softly around the back of Reggie’s head. Carlos is sitting in the chair across from Reggie with his arms wrapped around his torso, like he’s cold or nauseous. 

“I brought this,” Julie announces, holding out the washcloth to Ray. They all turn to look at her, and she hopes for their sake that her face appears collected, and not a hairpin trigger away from shattering into a thousand pieces. “For the ice, maybe, or—the blood.” 

Ray takes it from her, squeezing her hand tightly. “Thanks, mija.” 

While he goes about cleaning off Reggie’s chin and applying a bandaid to it, Julie moves to Reggie’s side, close enough to touch but still out of her dad’s way. Reggie gazes up at her with a tiny, tiny smile, and it’s clear that even that small motion hurts him. 

“Hey,” she says, gentle and soothing. “Did you take that ibuprofen?” 

“Yeah, I did while you were upstairs. Thanks for getting it for me.” 

“Of course, Reg. It should kick in soon for you.” 

Julie takes another look at his face, at the places where one or both of his parents managed to injure him. Reggie stares back at her, exhaustion and pain chasing each other from his eyes to his shoulders, and even to his lower back, dragging him down until he’s practically hunched over in the chair. She fits her hand against his right cheek, the only part of Reggie’s face that escaped the beating, the only part of his face that he could hide against his arm, and thinks hopelessly about every piece of Reggie that his parents broke that weren’t anywhere near his face. 

He leans into her touch, so trusting despite what the last pair of hands near his face did to it, and she whispers: “I’m so sorry, Reggie. I’m so, so sorry.”

He shrugs, gives her another teeny tiny smile. “It’s okay, Julie. I feel better already.” 

She struggles to keep her voice even when she tells him: “Nothing about this is okay. I’d go to jail for you right this second if I wasn’t worried about the other two doing the same.” 

“No one in this house is going to jail,” Ray states, moving to clean up Reggie’s nose. “The only people allowed to go to jail over this are the people who did it.” 

Reggie, still with his cheek cradled in Julie’s palm, looks away from her and down to his jeans, where he’s picking at some of the loose threads the same way Luke does whenever he’s nervous. “I should’ve just turned the light off.” 

Julie blinks. “What light?” 

“The bathroom light.” Reggie glances up at her, and then at Ray, before dropping his gaze again. “I left it on all day by accident. Must’ve forgotten to turn it off on my way out the door. If I remembered to turn it off, maybe…” 

He trails off, and as he does, Ray’s hand stops moving under his nose. It takes Julie another long moment, like when Reggie was trying and failing to say who hurt him, for her to understand this situation in full. She stares at Reggie’s downturned eyes, and the way her dad’s grip around the cleaning wipe is starting to shake, and for that long moment, she struggles to understand. And then, just like with knowing it was Reggie’s parents who beat him until he was bleeding and sobbing in her arms, it clicks. 

“Are you telling me,” she says slowly, holding onto control by the skin of her teeth, “that your parents freaked out because you accidentally left the bathroom light on all day?” 

He shrugs again, sinking further into himself, like he can’t bear to see their disappointed expressions. “Yeah. I’m kind of an airhead and forget stuff like that all the time and it always annoys them. I guess they just got tired of telling me over and over to cut it out.” 

Julie, at a complete loss for words, turns to her dad. When she does, she finds that Ray’s eyes are closed, and he is clearly counting to ten in his head and also trying to maintain any semblance of rational thinking and control. It’s clear, from his shaking hands to his thinned mouth to his clenched jaw, that Ray is reconsidering his previous statement of no one but Reggie’s parents going to jail over this situation. She knows all the words he wants to say but can’t, out of fear of saying the ones he doesn’t, so she turns back to Reggie, pulls his chin up, and waits until he’s looking at her again to say: 

“This is not your fault in any way, Reggie. Nothing you say or do should ever end the way it did tonight. Especially over a light that you left on for a few hours. What happened to you is not your fault and not anything that you are responsible for.” 

“But—” 

“No buts,” Ray tells him, finding the will to speak again. His words are shaking, just like his hands, but they’re calm and sincere and they make Reggie’s mouth quiver. “Julie’s right, mijo. This is not and will never be your fault, no matter what you did or didn’t do. Parents never have the right to place their hands on their children with the intent to hurt them, and I don’t care what anyone else has to say about that. This is their fault, and they’re going to receive severe consequences for their actions if it’s the last thing I do.” 

Reggie glances between them, eyes welling with more tears, and then over at Carlos, making sure he’s still there, too. Julie’s heart breaks apart when he admits, so, so small and scared: “I don’t want to go back there.” 

“You’re not,” Ray says, before Julie can. It immediately eases some of the writhing anger and terror in her chest. “Never again, if we can help it. You’re going to stay here with us from now on and we’re going to figure out what to do and what it’s going to take to keep you here.” 

“Ray,” Reggie half-sobs, like he can’t believe what he’s hearing, like he’s afraid Ray’s going to take it right back. 

“If that’s what you want, then that’s absolutely what I want. What all three of us want.” Ray bends down, so that they are on level ground with each other, and he makes sure that Reggie can see how completely and deadly serious he is when he tells him: “You’re my son. You’ve been my son since you came home with Julie all those months ago and added the color back into our house. You belong here, and we want you to stay here with us.”

Reggie’s breath stutters, eyes huge and hurt and loving all at the same time, and it pushes Julie to run her thumb over his cheek and say: “We love you so much, Reggie. You deserve to have a home full of people who love you unconditionally and will stand in the way of anyone who tries to hurt you. You deserve to come home and feel safe.”   

Her voice cracks at the end, and the tears she’s been swallowing down are threatening to come pouring out of her like a hurricane, but she doesn’t let it stop her from holding Reggie’s fragile gaze, or stop her from telling him everything he should’ve been hearing for days, months, years, his whole entire life. 

“Will you stay here with us?” she asks, resisting the urge to beg and plead at all costs. 

Reggie looks to her, then to Ray, and then to Carlos, where he stops.

“Little dude?”

Carlos, as soon as he understands what Reggie is asking for, gets out of his seat and scampers around the table until he’s standing in front of him. After Julie and Ray move back to give him some space, he throws his arms around Reggie’s shoulders, taking care to avoid his face, and clings to him in a way he’s only clung to Julie when feeling distraught about their mom. 

“Stay,” Carlos requests, hugging him tightly. “Don’t go back ever again.” 

Needing this last piece, this last verbal confirmation, Reggie returns the hug and says: “Yeah, I’ll stay.” And then, after hauling Carlos up into his lap, Carlos going easily, Reggie admits: “I always wanted to stay. This has been more of my home in four months than my house has been my home in sixteen years.” 

“Us too,” Julie says, combing her hands through his messy hair, mostly to smooth it down but also because she can’t stand being far away from him. “This house has been so empty since Mom passed, but you came and filled it up without even realizing it, Reg. You belong in the home you helped to bring life back into.” 

A few tears slide down Reggie’s cheeks, but he’s starting to smile widely, even though it must be painful to do so. He pulls Carlos even closer, and then hooks his other arm around Julie’s side to pull her in, until his head is resting on her shoulder, and he squeezes them both as he looks up at Ray and whispers: “Thank you. I love you all so, so much.” 

“Of course, kiddo,” Ray whispers back, and then raises the alcohol wipe again. “We love you too. Now hold still so I can take care of you and then we’ll head off to bed, okay? You’re all staying home from school tomorrow so we can get a good night’s rest and have a long weekend to figure some things out.” 

The three of them stay exactly how they are while Ray cleans the rest of the blood off of Reggie’s face and applies some Neosporin to the cuts. Julie keeps petting his hair as her dad methodically smooths a bandaid over the gash on his forehead, and then a smaller one on the cut underneath Reggie’s black eye, touch always achingly gentle, always intending to help instead of hurt. Julie thinks of all of the words she wants to say, many variations of This home is not a home without you, and You becoming my brother was inevitable, and maybe even I’ll still take my chances with jail for what they did to you, but can’t find the energy to voice them tonight. For now, she’s content to stand and alleviate any of Reggie’s aches and pains that she possibly can; she has a lifetime to tell him how much she adores him, how much of him is always going to be in her blood and bones and muscles, how much of him is always going to hold her heart. 

Ray has just finished applying the last bit of Neosporin to Reggie’s jaw and given him some Vaseline to put on his split lips when the front door bangs open and Luke and Alex come tumbling through like their asses are on fire. They’re both breathing heavily and sweating a little, obviously from speeding across town to get there, and whatever brief feeling of relief Julie acquired while Reggie agreed to stay with them and Ray patched him up disappears. They look jagged and wild, bodies shaking with adrenaline, and almost seem to look right through Ray when Luke yells: “What happened? Julie called and said Reggie got—” 

Ray moves to Julie’s side at the same time that Reggie picks his head off of her shoulder and starts to set Carlos back onto the floor. Luke and Alex are stumbling across the floor to get to them, but at the sight of Reggie’s face, still a wasteland of trauma despite Ray fixing him up, they stop short and stare. There’s a long beat, where no one says or does anything, where the boys watch each other and the Molinas watch the boys try and fail to understand why anyone would do something like this. 

And then, because they know each other inside and out, because the boys have only had each other for years and years and years, they come back to life at the exact same moment. Reggie sets Carlos down and gets unsteadily to his feet, and Luke and Alex rush forward, hands outstretched, and the three of them meet in the middle of the dining room. Reggie throws his arms around their shoulders, holding on tight, and Luke and Alex throw theirs around his back, pulling him as close as they possibly can. When Reggie’s knees buckle again, they go with him to the floor, making sure to take the brunt of the fall, making sure to hold him so that he doesn’t have to feel anymore pain. 

“Oh, Reg,” Alex says, face creasing, tears already spilling down his cheeks. 

Reggie’s responding sob cuts Julie to the bone, and she doesn’t know if she can stand to listen to him make the same wounded animal noises. But something about Alex’s soothing hand on his head, and Luke assuring him: “We gotcha, buddy, we’re here now,” keeps the sobs from reaching that level. Instead, he curls around the boys, and the boys curl around him, and they weep on the floor of the dining room, devastated but so much stronger together than apart. 

Ray starts to say, so that only Julie and Carlos hear: “I think we should give them some time,” but Julie can’t bear the thought of leaving them like this, leaving them to deal with the fallout by themselves. She tiptoes across the room to where her boys are wrapped around each other, all of their heads and arms and legs one tangled heap, and kneels down in the space between Reggie and Luke, one that seems to be the perfect size for her to fill. She tucks one arm around Reggie’s heaving shoulders, and the other around Luke’s, and when Luke looks at her, shattered and wretched and still full of so much love, like the boy they’re all shattered over, Julie leans forward and rests her forehead against his and quietly vows: 

“I’m never gonna let anyone hurt you like this ever again. No matter what it takes. I’ll die before I let someone hurt my family and get away with it.” 

They stay there for a long time, the boys crying themselves dry and Julie holding them through it. Reggie eventually pulls his head away from Alex and Luke and looks at them, as if drinking in their perfect, unmarred faces. Alex and Luke look back, as if they still can’t believe someone could hurt Reggie as badly as he’s been hurt. And then Reggie turns to Julie, sniffling, and asks: “Can they stay here tonight, too?” 

“Of course,” Julie says at once, reaching up to dry his tears. She can feel the burn of Luke’s stare as he watches her do it, touch light and caring and gentle, gentle, gentle. “We can all sleep in the living room again, just like the sleepover.” 

Reggie’s shoulders slump, and another one of those tiny, loving smiles pulls at the corner of his cracked lips. “Thanks, Julie.” 

She turns to Luke then, who is still watching her. When he doesn’t flinch away, Julie reaches up to carefully dry the tears off of his face, as well. It sucks almost all of the tension from his shoulders, until he’s slumping into her side. “You guys still have some clothes here, right? We can all change and get some rest.” 

They get off of the ground as a unit, as a four-person support system that Reggie is relying on to keep him afloat and they are relying on to keep them from storming down to the Peters’ house to raise some hell. When they’re standing, Julie makes sure to go to Alex and dry his tears as well, so that he knows she’s there for him, too. He smiles wanly, leaning into her gentle hands, and the hurricane in her chest and lungs threatens to suffocate her. 

When she turns back to Reggie, just to make sure he’s okay and doesn’t need new bandages or anything, she sees that there are some stains on his sweatshirt, maybe from all the crying, maybe from whatever happened at his house before the crying. 

“Let me take your sweatshirt and wash it,” Julie says to him. 

Luke moves to help Reggie out of the sweatshirt, working it over his bruised face without letting the fabric scrape against his cut chin or his black eye. She takes it from them, and with one more request to get changed so that they can go to bed, she turns to head into the laundry room. Her dad and Carlos are both missing from the dining room and the kitchen, seemingly wanting to give the four of them some space, and silently reminds herself to tell them both goodnight after putting Reggie’s sweatshirt in some water to soak. 

When Julie gets into the laundry room, she goes to fill the skin in there, and then stops. She doesn’t bother turning on the light, so the only source comes from the kitchen light where it trickles down the hallway and into the open doors. She looks closer at the big, blotchy stains near the collar of Reggie’s sweatshirt, squinting in the dimness; is it from his tears, or Luke’s, or Alex’s? Maybe sauce from something he ate? 

Julie digs her nail into one of the bigger splotches, and when she pulls it back, her entire fingernail is encrusted with red. It takes her a moment, like in the entryway, like in the kitchen, to put the pieces together. And when she figures out, through the fatigue and the emotion draining out of her, that the stains are actually Reggie’s blood, maybe from his nose or his chin, Julie buries her face in the front of the sweatshirt and begins to cry. 

This is how her dad finds her: standing alone in the dark, face pressed to Reggie’s bloodied hoodie, muffled sobs coming out from underneath it. Julie doesn’t hear him walk in or up to her, but she knows it’s him when he embraces her, when he kisses the top of her head and tells her: “You were so brave tonight, mija. You did so good with the boys. But you don’t have to be brave all the time—I’ve got you now, you can let it all out.” 

Julie clings to him and weeps openly, weeps for Reggie and Luke and Alex and everything they’ve been through together, everything they’ve been through tonight alone. She weeps at the memory of Reggie’s beaten face, at the way he wrapped himself around her, at the way he wailed and sobbed, at the way he came to their house to find shelter when his safety was already so compromised, at the way he took a leap of faith that he would find safety with them instead. Julie weeps and weeps and weeps and Ray holds her through it, forever her shield and armor. 

“It’s all gonna be okay,” he assures her. “Reggie’s never going back there to them. And I don’t care what it takes or how long it takes, but we’re going to make sure he’s never in danger again, okay, honey?” 

“Thank you,” Julie whimpers, the only words she can think to say. “Thank you, thank you, thank you. I love you.” 

“I love you too, Julie.” Ray kisses her head again, and Julie lets out another broken sob. “I love you so much, sweetheart, and the boys, too.” 

Julie eventually cries herself out, and after Ray makes sure she’s okay, they fill the laundry room sink with water and detergent to see if they can get the blood out of Reggie’s sweatshirt. Ray takes her upstairs to get ready for bed, and with one more tight hug, he heads into his room for the night. 

She stops by Carlos’ room before going to hers. He’s nearly asleep, also exhausted by tonight’s events, but blinks his eyes open when she slips through the door. 

“I just wanted to say goodnight,” Julie whispers, creeping up to his bedside. Carlos smiles at her, and she can’t resist smoothing his hair back, or leaning down to kiss his head. “Sleep tight, Bubby. I’ll see you tomorrow morning.” 

“Do you think dad will make pancakes?” Carlos asks, already drifting off. 

Julie tucks the blankets in around him tighter. “I bet he will.” 

He’s fully asleep when Julie slips back out, making sure that his night light is on as she goes. She speeds through her night routine, changing into comfy pajamas, brushing her teeth, and grabbing her pillow and blanket before going back downstairs. 

When she heads into the living room, the boys are already spread out on the floor together, on top of the same blanket they used during the sleepover and with other miscellaneous blankets and pillows from the house. They have The Empire Strikes Back pulled up on the TV, Reggie’s favorite, and he’s squished in between Luke and Alex in their pile, Luke spooned up behind him, Alex holding him from the front. They look up at her expectantly when they see her walk in, and when Alex holds out a hand, the boy closest to her, Julie takes it and lets him pull her into the pile. 

She ends up spooned behind Alex, arms wrapped around his torso, cheek pressed to the side of his arm so that she can see the other two. Reggie smiles beautifully at her, despite the cuts and bruises, and Luke stares over at her with that same kind of burning intensity that he stared at her with when she was drying their faces of tears. Julie, after mirroring Reggie’s smile, stares back, and thinks it as loud as she can: I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you three so much I could shake apart from it. 

The way Luke’s eyes soften tells her that he heard her loud and clear; the way Reggie wiggles a hand from underneath the covers to take hers says the same; so does the way Alex leans into the cage of her arms, shoulders drooping and relaxing. 

They don’t say anything, too exhausted and too wrung-out to come up with something that could encompass this night and these emotions it brought. Instead, they all just hold each other tighter and fall asleep in their pile, Julie going with her face tucked into the center of Alex’s back and her vow to protect the three of them strengthening tenfold. 

Chapter Text

The weekend is long, and it’s exhausting more than it’s rejuvenating, but they come up with a plan. 

Julie wakes up on Friday morning with her face still pressed into Alex’s back and with her arms still wrapped all the way around him. She’s the first one up, and spends several minutes just watching the boys sleep, trying to burn the image of their peaceful faces over the memory of them breaking down in her kitchen the previous night. She spends the most time looking down at Reggie, at the way the bruise on his eye has darkened considerably overnight, at the angry, bloody scrapes that the bandaids don’t quite cover, at the way he’s perfectly curled up between his two best friends, body completely trusting despite all of the trauma it’s endured. Julie nearly crawls in between him and Alex just so that she can hold onto Reggie and reassure herself that he’s whole and well, despite all of the trauma he’s endured. 

Instead, she makes herself get up and go about her usual morning routine: grabbing a shower and some fresh clothes, brushing her teeth, doing her skincare, everything she would usually do on a completely normal, unordinary day. It helps to both calm her down and clear her mind, so that when they start to think of where to go from this point she can think with more logic than emotion, one of her greatest flaws. 

When she’s dressed for the day, she goes back downstairs and into the kitchen to make herself some tea, and then takes a seat at the island to think. She’s still thinking deeply when she hears another soft pair of footsteps enter the kitchen, and looks up to see Reggie ambling towards her, sleepy and sweet and beautiful, even with the cuts and bruises, so beautiful that Julie’s heart gives a great lurch. 

“Hi,” she almost-whispers. 

“Hi,” Reggie almost-whispers back. He comes up to her with a smile, but winces when it pulls at his mouth the wrong way. He keeps smiling, though, even as Julie’s lurching heart turns to lead. “Have you been up for a while?” 

“Not that long,” she replies, watching as he stops right in front of her chair. Julie takes a long look at Reggie’s face, where other bruises have developed from last night, where her dad painstakingly applied bandages and Neosporin to try and heal him, and feels anger and love grip her lead heart like a fist. She reaches up and carefully touches her fingertips to Reggie’s uninjured cheek, the one he was able to tuck against his shoulder and keep out of his parents’ reach. “How are you feeling?” 

“I’m good.” Reggie must see her disbelief, or her worry, because he keeps smiling and says it again. “I’m good, Julie, I promise.” 

She stares into his eyes, trying to find any hidden aches or pains, and Reggie says, soft, sincere, “I’m always good when I’m here.” 

Julie, against all odds, finds herself smiling back, a tiny little thing that, against all odds, makes Reggie smile even more. 

“Okay, I believe you. Are you in any pain, though? Want some more ibuprofen?” 

“Yeah, that’d be great.” 

Julie grabs some for him, and then gets some toast going for Reggie to eat so that he won’t get sick afterwards. Reggie stands next to her while they wait, close enough that their arms end up pressed together, and Julie wants to cling to him for the rest of the day, still so outraged by everything that’s happened that she can barely keep it all inside of her. 

“What do you want to do?” she asks him, softer yet than their greeting, and Reggie’s promise that he feels safe with them. 

“I don’t know yet. I’m not sure where to even start.” 

“You still want to stay with us, right? Live here and get out of there?” 

“If you still want that,” Reggie hedges, but his tone says it all, spills all of his truths and desires for Julie to see. 

“Of course I want that,” she says, taking his hand. “All of us want that. We don’t want you to go or be anywhere else, Reggie. You belong here.” 

He smiles again, but it’s wobbly and full of longing, like he still thinks staying with the Molinas is completely out of reach. “All I really know right now is that I want to stay with you guys. I don’t care about anything else.” 

“That’s okay. We don’t have to make a plan this second—let’s wait for everyone else to wake up and talk through it, and we can just chill for right now.”

“Okay,” Reggie agrees, sounding grateful and exhausted. When he wraps his arms around her shoulders, Julie wraps hers around his sides and holds him as tight as she can get away with, and they stand in a tired, content silence, even after the toast pops back up. She spends several minutes with her ear pressed to Reggie’s slow, steady heartbeat, and feeling him breathe in and out, and vows that if she does nothing else right in her life, she will do this right—she will go to the ends of the Earth to protect Reggie Peters from anything and anyone who tries to hurt him. 

Alex is the next one awake, and he goes right for Reggie when he finds them sitting together at the island, taking care to brush a smear of strawberry jelly off of his chin. 

“You okay?” he asks, still cupping Reggie’s face long after the jelly is gone. 

“Yeah,” Reggie says, patting Alex’s chest. “I’m okay, dude. I promise.” 

Alex’s face probably reflects Julie’s perfectly, between the worry, the anger, and the love, but he sounds like he believes Reggie when he replies, “Okay, I’m glad you’re safe,” and then gently kisses his forehead. Reggie leans into it, and grins when Alex pulls away, though it must sting for him to do so, and then goes back to eating his toast. Satisfied, Alex takes the empty seat to Julie’s right and rests his head on her shoulder without saying anything else, similarly exhausted; when Julie links their arms, Alex gives her a squeeze, and she squeezes back, there for him just as much as she’s there for Reggie. 

Luke, as per usual, is the last one up. He stumbles into the kitchen like he’s not sure where he is, hair going in a million directions, eyes half-shut against the morning light. It makes Julie snort, and makes her heart turn from lead into air. 

“It’s a party out here,” is what Luke opens with, but it sounds more like Issapardyouher. While he’s rubbing his face with one hand, he goes to Reggie and slides the other one around his shoulders, pulling him into Luke’s side. “How’s it hangin’, buddy?” 

Reggie, bless him, doesn’t sound the least bit exasperated by all of the smothering when he replies, “I’m peachy keen, man. What about you?”

“I am dandy,” Luke says. He pauses, though, when he blinks his eyes open and gets a full look at Reggie’s face. He takes his time looking at all of the cuts and bruises, and at the radiance still pushing through everything, in spite of everything, and then takes the hand off of his cheek to press it to Reggie’s. “We’re gonna take care of you, okay? This is never going to happen to you again. We’re gonna do whatever we have to to keep you safe from now on.” 

Reggie says nothing for a moment, taking his own long, lingering look at Luke’s face, at his sleepy expression and his wild hair and his bright, fierce eyes. He sounds reverent and a little scared when he replies, almost at a whisper again, “I know you are. I’d do the same for you.” 

“You already do,” Luke tells him, and Reggie ducks his head at that, ducks it so that it’s tucked against Luke’s neck and he can turn fully into him. Julie’s entire body hurts at the sight of it, and she reaches out and presses her free hand into Reggie’s back, just to let him know that she’s there. While Luke is holding him up, and letting him take what he needs, he moves the hand around Reggie’s shoulders down until it’s over Julie’s, so that their fingers are folded together and they are both holding Reggie up. When he meets her eyes, they’re devastated and full of so much love and affection that Julie has no choice but to hold his gaze and let him see all of her own devastation and love and affection, for everyone in the house, for him specifically. 

Luke and Reggie end up sharing a chair at the island, unwilling to be parted, and this is how Ray and Carlos find them after finally descending the stairs. Carlos looks the same as Luke, curls askew and eyes sleepy, but Ray looks the same as Julie and Alex, tense around the edges, loving in the middle. 

“Morning, kids,” Ray greets, smiling at all of them. He stops next to Luke and Reggie and, after ruffling Luke’s messy bedhead, gently sets his hand on Reggie’s shoulder. “How are you feeling, mijo? Need anything for the pain?” 

“Nope, I’m all set! Julie already took care of me,” Reggie chirps, still unbothered by everyone’s fussing. 

Ray smiles at him, adoration for Reggie palpable, and it makes Julie’s throat close right up. “I’m glad to hear it. After we’re done eating breakfast, I’ll change your bandages and make sure everything’s looking good, okay?” 

“Deal,” Reggie agrees. When he holds his fist out, grinning cutely, Ray laughs and bumps their knuckles together. “Thanks, Ray. For everything.” 

Ray ruffles his hair, too, but it’s almost a caress, like he wants to pull Reggie into his arms and cradle him like he did last night, like he can still hear the agonized sound of Reggie sobbing underneath his sunny attitude and his sunny grin. Instead of doing any of this, all Ray does is say, “Anything for you, kiddo,” and head to the refrigerator to get the breakfast stuff out. Only Julie notices the stiff way Ray carries himself, and the unhappy divot that appears between his brows, obviously upset all over again at the sight of Reggie’s beaten face.

They formulate the plan over pancakes and bacon, and it’s decided, despite everyone’s hesitation with the idea, that Reggie needs to go home and grab his things so that there’s nothing else tethering him to his parents besides their legal guardianship over him. Since it’s a weekday, Reggie’s parents are most likely going to be at work, which leaves them a perfect window to get his stuff out of the house. He knows their schedules down to the minute they leave and come home, and assures Ray that if they get there around 10, there’s absolutely no chance that either of his parents will be home to see them. 

“So here’s what we’re going to do,” Ray starts, pointing at each of them as he explains the master plan. “I’m going to stay in the car with Carlos, so that we can both be lookouts in case they come home for whatever reason, and so we can be ready to split immediately once we’re done. Boys, you know the house best, so you’re going to go inside and get what Reggie needs and bring it back to the trunk. Julie, you’re going to coordinate where everything goes so all of Reggie’s stuff can fit with you guys also in the car.”

“Is it all going to fit with us inside?” Julie asks, thinking about trying to stuff her most valuable possessions into one car with six occupants. “Maybe tía can meet us and drive us back—” 

Reggie interrupts, sounding uncomfortable. “It’ll, um—fit. All of it.” 

Julie looks at him, concerned. “Are you sure, Reg? I don’t want you to have to go back there again if you don’t need to, or leave anything important behind.” 

Reggie fidgets, not meeting anyone’s gazes. Next to her, Luke’s mouth thins, and across the table, Alex sets his fork down on his plate and doesn’t move again, focus entirely on his best friend. 

“Reg—” Alex begins, but Reggie beats him to the punch, eyes squeezing shut. 

“I don’t—I don’t have a lot. Not anymore. I just have my clothes and some records and books. I always keep my bass and music stuff here so that they can’t touch it. Anything else that’s important to me, like photos and other mementos and school things, I just keep in my locker so that they can’t—you know. Break it. Or throw it away.” 

Luke hands curl into fists. “Reggie.” 

“They started doing that a few years ago. I’d do something dumb to make them mad or annoyed and they’d go through my room and tear it up or throw things out that they knew were important to me. I never had much to begin with, but when they started making a point to wreck any of the things I’d managed to hold onto—I learned my lesson quickly, okay? So there’s not much to get. It’ll all fit in the back of the car.” 

Alex and Luke stare at him silently, both of them furious and anguished and clearly trying to think of how to respond without making it worse. Julie cuts in smoothly, resting her hand on top of Reggie’s, holding it just tight enough to get him to look at her. 

When he does, she calmly says, “That just means we can be in and out super fast and get you away from there for good. All you guys need to do is pack your stuff up in boxes and bring it out to me and I’ll organize it in the trunk. Sound good?” 

Reggie takes the out, squeezing her hand gratefully. “Sounds good.” 

They finalize their plans, and agree to get dressed and ready so that they can be at the Peters’ house by 10 A.M. sharp. Julie doesn’t let go of Reggie’s hand for the rest of breakfast, wanting to be a source of support while he’s working through going back to his house and what he’ll be taking from it. Under the table, she hooks her ankle around Luke’s, and smiles to herself when he presses their shins all the way together, like he’s leaning into her side. 

~.~.~  

To make sure they’ll fit, the boys cram themselves into the length of the back seat, and Julie ends up sitting on Alex’s lap, his arms wrapped around her in a makeshift seatbelt. 

“This is going to be interesting,” she says, mostly to lighten the mood. 

Alex tickles her right under the ribs. “I’ll try to make sure you don’t get ejected out of the windshield, if that reassures you at all.” 

“Oh, definitely,” she replies, monotone, and it makes the boys all laugh loudly, something they haven’t done since waking up that morning. Julie moves until her arms are wrapped around Alex’s neck the same way his are wrapped around her sides, and until she’s sitting sideways, so that they’re holding each other and her knees are bumping into Luke’s. “Nothing reassures me more than ‘I’ll try not to cause great bodily harm to you.’” 

“Exactly!” Alex agrees, and giggles when Julie tickles him back right above the ribs. 

The mood stays more or less the same on the way to Reggie’s place, as Reggie gives Ray directions and Luke tries to convince Julie that they need to purchase a theremin for their current instrument ensemble. It’s calm and mostly comfortable as they wind through the backstreets of the subdivisions Reggie lives near, while they’re harassing Luke and listening to the radio, but Julie knows the second they pull onto the right street, because Reggie’s jeering sentence dies in his throat and Julie feels both Alex and Luke tense up. A strange silence falls over the car as they drive down the street, until Reggie quietly says, “It’s that brick one on the left up here. 1709.” 

As luck would have it, there are no cars in the driveway when they get there, and Reggie lets out a held breath and confirms that they’re both at work. Julie takes a second to study the house that Reggie grew up and got beaten in—it’s beautiful, two stories made entirely of pale, grey-blue bricks and pristine white railing around the porch and windows. Their lawn is immaculate, and there are two beds of delicate, pink pansies on either side of the porch. When Ray puts the car in park and turns the radio off, Julie can hear the soothing sound of waves rolling through the ocean behind the Peters’ house. 

For all intents and purposes, it looks like a normal house in a normal neighborhood that’s being occupied by a normal family. It makes Julie sick, knowing all of the things that went on inside of it last night, all of the things that have been going on inside of it since Reggie was a child, and maybe even before that. 

“All right,” Ray says, breaking the weighted silence. He turns around to look at the four of them, expression both troubled and supportive. “Are we still doing this? It’s not too late to head out and come up with a new plan.” 

“No, I need to do this,” Reggie insists, unbuckling his seatbelt. He looks at his house for a beat, and then looks back at Ray, determination unwavering. “I don’t ever want to come back here again after this.” 

Ray reaches between the seats and grabs Reggie’s arm. “I’m right here for you, mijo. You kids get it done as quickly as you can and then we’ll go home, okay?”

Reggie glows at the word home. “We’ll be done in no time.” 

The four of them get out of the back seat together and go to the trunk, where they stored a bunch of plastic storage bins for this trip. As they’re dividing them up, and Reggie is fishing his house key out, Julie makes sure to say, “Be safe, you guys. If anything feels wrong, or any of us see anything, we’ll leave immediately and think of something else, okay?” 

“It shouldn’t take too long,” Reggie promises, and Julie feels bad knowing that he’s had to reassure them all more than they’ve reassured him today. He stops to pull her into a brief, but tight, one-armed hug, and then he’s leading the other two up the path to his house, calling out: “We’ll be back before you know it, Julie!” 

After it’s all said and done, the boys are in the house for less than ten minutes and all of Reggie’s important belongings fit neatly into five containers. Three of them are for his clothes, one is for his sparse collection of books, records/CDs, and movies, and the last is for any miscellaneous items he doesn’t want to part with, like his backpack, toiletries, notebooks, and a poster of the album cover for Van Halen by Van Halen. When they come out of the house for the final time, Luke is carrying his last container of items, Alex is carrying a few pairs of shoes, and Reggie has a blanket bundled up to his chest. He shuts the door behind them, and then throws his house key onto the front mat without locking up, and does not turn back as he makes his way down to Julie. She takes the blanket from him, and as she’s folding it up nice and neat, tells him that he can get in the car and relax, that he’s done enough for one day.

The ride back is subdued, but Reggie doesn’t seem too distressed. He doesn’t speak, but he does wiggle down until his head is resting against Luke’s shoulder, and he does reach out to take Luke’s hand, so they all know he just needs some time to process. Luke rests his head on top of Reggie’s, and holds his hand with both of his own, and Julie and Alex curl back up together, and the ride is quiet, but it’s a comfortable silence instead of a distraught one, so Julie counts the event as a success.

“We’re going to keep you in the guest room from now on,” Ray explains, once they’re back home and everyone is grabbing a container. “So let’s put your things up there, and then we can work on sorting them out. Maybe we can even swing by the store and grab a shelf for your books and records later today.” 

Reggie trips over himself, and then trips through a response, clearly flustered. “O-oh, it’s okay—I don’t want you to have to spend anything on me, or go out of your way to—” 

“Reggie,” Ray says, eternally patient and kind. “You’re staying with us, so I want you to have a place to keep your things, just like Julie and Carlos. We’re going to get you a shelf to keep your books and records on, okay?” 

Reggie’s mouth trembles, but he sounds mostly collected when he responds, “Okay. Thanks, Ray.” 

They make quick work of taking all of the containers to Reggie’s room, and while Ray and Alex are hanging up his clothes in the closet, Reggie sorts out his toiletries and puts them in the bathroom, and Julie and Luke work on neatly stacking up his other belongings in the far corner, where the bookshelf is going to go once they buy it. 

Julie volunteers to take the containers to the basement once they’re empty, and when she comes back upstairs, she sees that the front door is half-open, and that Luke is sitting by himself on the front steps, head bowed. She slips outside, discreetly shutting the door behind her, and moves until she’s crouched down in front of him on the walkway. 

When Luke lifts his head up to look at her, he’s silently and steadily crying, and Julie’s heart breaks at the sight of it. 

“He’s safe with us,” Julie swears, knowing what he needs to hear. “I know how scary this must be for all of you, and I’m not exactly sure what’s going to happen next, but no matter what, he’s safe when he’s here with us. We’ll do anything to protect him from them. We’re not going to let anything else happen to him.” 

Luke makes a soft, sobbing sound. “They might try to make him go back there, Jules. Those pieces of shit that hit him, or the courts. The Peters losing custody of their kid might ruin their reputation. And if he goes back, they could—” 

He chokes on the words, like they’re getting stuck around a shard of glass. Julie stares at him, a lump forming in her throat, her entire body thrumming with the wild, desperate need to keep all of her boys out of harm’s way. Luke makes another one of those helpless sobbing noises and says, “They could break him badly enough that he won’t ever go back together again. They could do a lot worse than hit him. And I can’t fucking live without him, Julie, he’s all I got—him, and Alex, and you, you’re all I have, I can’t lose anyone else—” 

He starts to cry for real, almost like Reggie did when he showed up at the Molinas’ house, and Julie pulls Luke into a fierce embrace, unwilling to let him reach that point. 

“It’s okay, it’s okay,” she whispers, mouth ducked so close to Luke’s ear that she’s nearly kissing the side of his head. “We’re not going anywhere, and we’re not letting Reggie go anywhere. I meant what I said last night—I’ll die before I let someone hurt my family and get away with it. I’m not gonna stop until I know for sure that he’ll never have to see them again. No matter what it takes, Luke. No matter what.” 

Luke sits in her arms and cries for a long time, long enough that they’re probably worrying the others, long enough that Julie nearly starts to cry, too. But she just sits and holds him, offering words of support and comfort, not caring who sees them. She thinks she might catch a glimpse of someone’s face peering out through the frosted window in their front door, but she can’t be too sure, and no one bothers them or comes to investigate their sudden absence. 

Just as she took the time to reassure Reggie, and Alex before him, Julie takes the time to reassure Luke that he’s safe with her, and that she will do anything within her power to protect him from harm. That she loves him endlessly, ferociously, unconditionally, and anyone who tries to hurt him or break him is going to have to go through her first, and will find out very quickly that fighting Julie Molina for her loved ones is always going to be an incredibly unfair match. 

~.~.~  

Monday morning, before Flynn comes to pick them up for the walk to school, Julie pulls Reggie into her room and sits him at her vanity. 

“So, I had an idea,” she says, fiddling with one of her rings. “It’s totally okay if you’re not down for it, but I thought you might feel better about going to school today if—maybe if I put some makeup on your face? Just so that people won’t stare at you so much or try to ask you questions or anything.” 

Reggie is silent for a few seconds, staring at Julie in surprise. And then he nods enthusiastically, replying with a borderline plea of, “Yes, please.”

He sits nice and still while Julie breaks out the color corrector, concealer, and face powder she covertly bought at Target when they got Reggie’s new shelf, hoping on a wing and a prayer that she bought the right shade. It ends up being perfect, and she works in small chunks to cover up the worst of Reggie’s bruising, and some of the smaller cuts that have healed over the last few days. There’s still some discoloration around his cheekbone and at the very corner of his black eye, but nothing that would cause unsuspecting students to do a double take or out-right gawk at him. 

“Done,” she eventually announces, after applying the final layer of powder and some setting spray. “How’s it look? Need me to touch anything up?” 

Reggie turns to look at himself in the mirror, and is once again silent, seemingly in a state of surprise. He tilts his head this way and that to catch the light at different angles, and stares at himself intently, as if trying to peel the layers of makeup off with just his eyes. 

And then he stands up and crushes Julie into a hug, careful not to smudge any of the concealer on her clothes or hair. 

“Thank you,” he says, voice slightly breaking. “I didn’t want to have to deal with everyone today. Thank you.” 

Julie crushes him back. “Of course, dude, I know exactly what you mean. I can do it for you every morning until it fades, okay? I’ll take care of you.” 

Reggie squeezes her tightly, and then giggles, taking a hand away to dab at his eyes. “‘m trying not to cry, man, it’ll ruin all your hard work.” 

“Don’t cry,” Julie agrees, getting his other eye. “Today you get to celebrate getting out and moving forward. They don’t deserve your tears, Reg.” 

He smiles at her, so big and brilliant and everything Reggie’s made of that Julie can’t see any of the bruising when his eyes crinkle at the corners, or when his cheeks push them half-shut. He pulls her close again and kisses her sweetly on the head. 

“You deserve only the best in life, Julie,” Reggie says, and Julie is fighting back her own flood of tears when she says, “You too, Reggie. Always.” 

~.~.~

A few nights later, Julie is sound asleep in her room when she begins to hear a strange, moaning noise at the edges of her dream. At first, she thinks it’s coming from her dream, some weird, nonsensical thing about being able to breathe underwater—but then it pulls her towards the surface of consciousness, and she starts to understand it’s coming from outside of her body, that something somewhere outside of her head is making this horrible, painful noise, and then she’s awake and blinking at her ceiling. 

She stares for a long, long moment, trying to rearrange her thoughts and put together why she woke up in the first place. She hears it again, that strange, moaning noise from her dream, the one that pulled her out of her head, and when she hears it coming from down the hallway, she realizes it’s someone in her house making that noise, and then she’s wide, wide awake and stumbling out of her room. 

The noise continues as she trips down the hall frantically, and it leads her exactly where she thought it might, exactly where she hoped it wouldn’t. She doesn’t hesitate to throw the door to the guest room open when she gets there, and she finds Reggie thrashing in his bed, blankets wrapped around him unnaturally, face pinched and wet with sweat and tears. She recognizes the strange, moaning noise as Reggie sobbing, a slower, more elongated version of crying in his sleep, and she goes to him, feeling sick and twisted and so angry she could scream. 

“Reggie,” she calls, and it’s soft and gentle despite the fury tearing her up inside. “Reggie, it’s just a dream. You gotta wake up, you’re just dreaming, none of it is real. You’re not in danger here.” 

Julie keeps talking softly as she coaxes him awake with her words and only a hand on his arm, and it takes nearly a minute, but Reggie eventually blinks his eyes open and stares down at her, panting and still crying and so, so afraid. 

“Hey, you’re okay,” she says, letting him come back to himself in pieces. “You’re still at my house, you’re still safe. You’re still safe with me, Reggie, it’s okay.” 

Reggie lets out another sob, this one fast and harsh now that he’s awake. “Julie—” 

He can’t say anything else, too overcome with emotion, and Julie carefully moves to sit at the edge of the bed and put her arms around him. Reggie clings to her, crying into her chest, and Julie holds him and keeps murmuring, “You’re safe with me, Reg, I got you, I’m not going anywhere.” 

  When Reggie calms down a little, just so that he’s not sobbing painfully, Julie asks, “Do you want to come sleep with me in my room?” 

Reggie’s nodding before she’s even done asking. “I don’t want to be alone right now, please—” 

“Come on,” she whispers, standing up. Reggie pushes all the blankets and sheets off and gets to his feet, sniffling and shivering as he goes. Julie holds onto his hands to keep him steady, and Reggie sways into her once he’s standing, letting out another sob. “You don’t have to be alone if you don’t want to be—I’m always here with you, okay?” 

He nods, and once Julie’s sure he can walk, she leads him out of the guest room and back down to hers. She takes the time to peel back her covers and help Reggie get settled into the same place Alex slept before, and then she turns on her nightlight, shuts the door, and gets into bed with him. 

They end up on their sides, facing each other, and Julie tries not to let any of the blistering, ravenous anger she’s feeling towards the Peters show on her face, or spill out into her voice when she speaks again. “Do you want to talk about your dream? I’m here for you, anything you need.” 

“No,” Reggie croaks, voice hitching on another sob. “No, I don’t ever want to think about it again. I wish I could forget everything.”  

Julie reaches across the space between them, the space she left so that she wouldn’t overwhelm Reggie, and sets her hand against his cheek, trying to dry some of the tears spilling down it still. “I’m so, so sorry, Reggie. I’m sorry I can’t do more to help. I wish I could give you peace from everything you’ve been through.” 

“You do,” he insists, trying to dry off the other side of his face. “You’ve helped me so much, Julie, you have no idea. You’ve done more than enough. Some of it I just have to carry myself.” 

Julie bites her lip, mostly so she won’t threaten to cause great pain and suffering to Reggie’s parents. “I’m always, always here for you, to help you carry some of that weight, to listen if you need it. I’ll do anything I can to help you.” 

“This is helping me more than anything else could,” he promises, giving her a tiny, tiny smile, like a flame in a pit of nothing but darkness. “Being next to someone I trust and love is exactly what I need right now, okay?” 

“Okay,” Julie agrees. “I’ll be that for you no matter what or when.” 

“I know.” And then, after sniffling and wiping more tears off of his face, Reggie asks, “Can—can we hug again? Your hugs are unparalleled, Jules.” 

Julie’s heart breaks and rebuilds itself all over again. “Of course, Reggie—come here.” 

Reggie curls back up with her, tucking himself into a tight ball, like he’s trying to hide in the circle of her arms. Julie lets him, arm steady across his back, fingers petting through his disheveled hair. 

As they’re laying together in that hazy state between being awake and falling asleep, Reggie presses his check to Julie’s chest and whispers, “You made me feel safe the second I met you. No one has ever done that for me before besides Alex and Luke. The greatest thing you could ever do for me is make me feel safe, dude.” 

Julie closes her eyes against another spark of anger and another roar of love for Reggie, and replies, “You make me feel safe, too.” 

She feels it when Reggie lets out a hushed, exhausted whimper. “I love you so much, Julie.” 

“I love you so much,” Julie whispers, and kisses the top of his head. She holds Reggie as he calms all the way down and falls asleep again, and holds him after that, too, even as she falls back into unconsciousness, even as the night pushes on and they both sleep without any more dreams, good or bad. 

~.~.~  

Slowly but surely, as the day after everything happens goes by, and then the next day, and then the day after that, Reggie starts to heal. His black eye fades, the cuts on his forehead and chin scab over and disappear, and the nightmares start to loosen their grip on him, so that he only slips into Julie’s room or is woken up by Julie in the dead of night once every great while. 

They’re all there to help him along the way in any form he needs: distracting him with writing music, letting him vent if he feels like talking through the situation, or sitting in a comfortable silence while watching a movie or listening to an album. They all worry they’re not doing enough, Julie especially, but Reggie reassures them all that them being around him is enough, just as much as they reassure him that they’re there for him no matter what. 

Julie focuses on helping Reggie cope with his trauma, and keeps everything else about the situation away from him. Anything involving his parents and their guardianship over him is kept between her and her dad, for as much of it that Ray will talk to her about. 

“It’s not that I don’t trust you,” Ray says one night, while the boys are taking Carlos out for ice cream on a ‘special bro trip’ down to the beach. “It’s just that you’re my children, mija, and this is a lot of weight to put onto both of you. It’s not something you should have to worry about or deal with. This is for me and me alone to deal with, as the adult who will have to interact with the lawyers and the court system and maybe even the Peters themselves.” 

“I want to know, though,” she insists, trying not to whine. All she knows right now is that Ray took pictures, started a report with the police and CPS, and that the Peters have a temporary restraining order in place to keep them away from Reggie. “It’s already keeping me up at night, not knowing if they’re going to force him to go back, or say that you can’t become his legal guardian. I’ve already seen what happens when they lose control of themselves, and I’ve already seen what it’s done to Reggie in the few months that I’ve known him. I want to know this, too.” 

Ray smiles at her, one that is full of both pride and a great, great sadness. “I know you have. And I think you’re so brave for wanting to help all of the boys, and for putting so much of yourself into helping Reggie through this. Your heart is so big, Julie—and that’s why I want to keep most of the legal stuff to myself. You shouldn’t be burdened with the hoops I’m going to have to jump through, the disappointing news we might get. It’s enough for you to focus your energy on checking in with Reggie and not giving too much of yourself to this situation.” 

“Easier said than done,” she replies, but knows what her dad is trying to say and doesn’t push it further. “Please promise that you’ll keep me in the loop enough to know what’s going to happen to him, okay? All I want to know is if he can stay with us or not.” 

“Of course, honey.” Ray pulls her into a big, squeezing hug, one that makes Julie laugh despite the stone in her gut. “I’m going to do whatever I have to to make that come true.” 

They seal the deal with their secret finger handshake, and it leaves Julie feeling more hopeful that this will all work out in their favor, if her dad isn’t visibly torn up at the mention of Reggie’s undecided fate. 

She does what she can to continue supporting the fact that Reggie is theirs now, no matter what happens, no matter the coming weeks and what they’ll bring. She tells him he’s family when she thinks he needs to hear it, she drags him along on boring grocery shopping trips so they can mess around in the aisles and pick out snacks, and she and Carlos often drag him into their petty arguments and force him to pick a side to see who gets to have their cool older brother on their side. 

As Reggie continues to heal, he also continues to fit seamlessly into the Molinas’ family, like he was there to begin with, like there was never a time he wasn’t there to split up the chores or take Carlos out for brother bonding time or sheepishly admit he finished off the Fruit Loops before anyone else had a chance to.

One night, while everyone is over and watching Flushed Away, Carlos ends up falling asleep on the couch between Reggie and Julie with his head resting on Reggie’s arm. It’s late for a school night, but Ray has grown kind of lax on their bedtimes as his soft spot for the boys has also grown, so it’s no surprise when Carlos manages to pass out before they’re even done with their night. 

“I should take him upstairs,” Julie says quietly, trying not to disturb him. “He practiced really hard tonight, I bet he’s exhausted.” 

“I’ll help you,” Reggie offers, and they work together to carefully get Carlos off of the couch and into Reggie’s arms, so that he can carry him upstairs. The others giggle at the sight it makes, but Luke pauses the movie, and Alex makes sure to pull his legs onto the couch so that Reggie doesn’t trip over them. Ray grins, obviously melting at the sight of one of his sons bundled up in the arms of the other, and his quiet, “Thanks, mijo,” makes Reggie grins back at him. 

Julie spots him on the stairs as they climb, and rushes ahead to open Carlos’ bedroom door once they’re at the top, so that Reggie can walk right inside and set Carlos on his bed. She helps to wrestle the comforter out of the way, and then helps Reggie arrange Carlos, so that he’s tucked inside the blanket and his head is perfectly resting on his pillows. Carlos, miraculously, doesn’t wake up for even a second of their adventure, and only sighs in his sleep and turns into his pillow once Reggie has let go of him, none the wiser to his move from downstairs to upstairs. 

She watches, blood singing, as Reggie takes another moment to adjust Carlos’ pillow to match his new sleeping position, and also takes the time to brush his hair back so that it’s not plastered to his eyes. The gesture is tender to its core, and so is the way that Reggie smiles down at Carlos, a smile that is overflowing with love and affection. If there was ever any doubt that Reggie belonged to their family, this display dashes it all. 

Julie waits until they’re back in the hallway and Carlos’ door is shut behind them to say it out loud. Reggie moves to head back downstairs, but she stops him with a gentle hand on his wrist. At his curious look, Julie says, without preamble, “You know he loves you, right?” 

Reggie stares, and then melts, the affection in his eyes leaking out into his voice. “Jules.” 

“He loves you so much,” she whispers, squeezing Reggie’s hand twice on the so much. “He’s loved you since the first time you came home with me. I hope you never doubt how much Carlos cares for you. Or how much we care for you.” 

He smiles at her, one of the big, brilliant smiles that nearly closes his eyes and turns his face into a burning star, something that’s almost too beautiful to look directly at. And then he hugs her, so tight that it lifts her onto her tiptoes. 

“I love you both so much,” he whispers, sounding both over the moon and utterly wrecked. “I hope you never, ever doubt that. You’ve changed my life in the best way possible, and I’ll love you no matter what, until the end of everything.” 

Julie hugs him tight enough to hurt, but in the best way possible. “Us too, Reg. You’re always, always going to be our brother. Our family.”  

When they head back downstairs, Luke and Alex are talking to Ray about something from school, the movie paused on the scene they left the room during. Julie and Reggie climb back onto the couch, and as Julie is confirming that Carlos is still asleep and they got him all set up, Luke and Alex press in closer to fill the gaps between them. Luke spreads out so that his legs are over Alex’s lap, his torso is over Julie’s, and his head is in Reggie’s, and Alex reaches across the back of the couch so that Julie’s head is cushioned on his arm and his hand is resting on Reggie’s shoulder. Reggie drops one of his hands into Luke’s hair, carefully petting it, and Julie rests one of her hands against the warm spread of Luke’s ribs and tucks the other one around Alex’s side, keeping him close. 

Ray looks at them for a long moment after they settle in, catching Julie’s eye as he does. When she tilts her head in silent question, he just laughs and says, “All right, let’s finish this movie so we can head off to bed, too.” 

As Flushed Away carries on, and Julie feels herself growing heavy with drowsiness and comfort, she knows for certain that even if things are up in the air right now, there is nothing and no one in the entire world that can take these moments away from them, and there is nothing and no one in the entire world that will ever be able to overcome the intense, undying love they have for each other. Or the intense, undying love the Molinas have for Reggie, who fits into their family unit like the missing piece of the puzzle they’ve been looking for all along. 

~.~.~  

Julie comes home from an arduous group project meeting one night to find the boys cooking in the kitchen with her dad. 

Usually it’s just Reggie (and sometimes Carlos) puttering around with Ray’s guidance, but it seems like tonight they all got roped into it. Everyone has an enormous smile on their face, though, and there’s music blasting from the bluetooth speaker they keep downstairs—“Twist and Shout” by The Beatles. 

They don’t hear her come in over the sound of the music and their loud chattering, so Julie gets to take it in for a good minute and a half. She watches Luke roll out a ball of dough while singing along, and watches as Alex and Reggie shimmy while putting together a salad and some bowls of side ingredients, and watches as Ray carefully shows Carlos how to put what looks like chicken wings into a boiling pot of oil, Carlos at rapt attention and Ray smiling adoringly at him. 

Luke is the first one to see her, and the blinding grin that takes over his face makes her lungs constrict. “Hey, Jules!” 

The others look up at his greeting, and give their own renditions of welcoming her home. She laughs at their enthusiasm, and as she’s setting her stuff down by the stairs, says, “I can’t believe I had to be at a group project meeting while you guys got to play Master Chef. Absolutely bogus.” 

“Sorry, honey, we needed to eat and I needed to put the boys to work,” Ray responds, winking at her. “The opportunity presented itself.” 

She goes to make some smartass remark, but Luke beats her to the punch, yelling: “There’s no time like the present to make up for the past, dude! Get in here!” 

This is how Julie ends up rolling out pizza dough for calzones with Luke, while the others continue their projects, and while the song changes from “Twist and Shout” to “Burning Down the House” by Talking Heads and Luke, Alex, and Reggie all go wild for it. They’re standing close enough together that sometimes they’ll knock elbows, and sometimes Luke will kind-of-definitely-purposely knock their hips together, trying to get Julie to groove with him. 

“You can’t listen to this song and not get down,” he teases, singing the next few lines, until Julie starts to, as requested, get down. “Oh yeah, baby! I bet this is much more interesting than your group project.” 

“It was for a slideshow presentation on the endocrine system, so yeah, I’d say this is slightly more appealing.” 

“Because of the music?” Luke asks, singing another line. 

Julie’s feeling a little brave tonight, a direct result of the serotonin rushing throughout her previously bored-to-tears and extremely-maximally-annoyed central nervous system at the sight of her family having so much fun together. So instead of casually agreeing and moving on, Julie teases back, gives Luke a flirty smile and says in a tone that means otherwise, “Most definitely because of the music.” 

She pairs it with another hip bump, and delights in the way Luke’s ears immediately turn a cute shade of pink, and the way he bites the inside of his cheek to keep from smiling like a goon. They don’t say anything else as they continue to roll out the pizza dough, content with singing along to the music and occasionally knocking into each other, but Julie feels the flirty mood linger, feels as it turns from teasing and flirting into affection, into an emotion that she can’t put a big or deep enough name to. It spreads from her solar plexus up to her throat, and down to where her knees are pressing into the counter, until not a single part of her has been left untouched. It feels a lot like sunlight, warm and incandescent and so incredible that it leaves her desperate to feel more. 

It’s so big that Julie doesn’t dare think the name that does belong to it, but she feels it, and she’s almost certain that Luke does, too, if his frequent glances and sunlight voice are anything to go by. For the first time in forever, Julie feels like she’s got time, so she lets it spread, lets the sunlight grow inside of her and the space between them, and doesn’t look away from everything it exposes. 

~.~.~

When the week before Luke’s 17th birthday rolls around, Julie starts to conspire with her family and the boys to make it special for him. She doesn’t have to ask to know that none of his birthdays thus far have been off the charts, and wants to take the initiative to change that, even if Luke claims he could give two damns about his birthday. 

“He cares about everything, if you haven’t noticed,” Alex says, but it’s fond. Julie is with him and Reggie at their usual lunch table, knowing that Luke is on the complete other end of school and that they’ve got five minutes to spare before he shows up. “He’ll moan and groan about the whole thing if we hint at it, but he’ll totally lose his shit once it happens.” 

“So we should make it a surprise,” Julie concludes, already thinking of how, when, and where. “Can you two handle hiding plans from him?” 

At Alex and Reggie’s shifting faces, faces that have rarely ever hidden anything from Luke, she snorts. 

“Okay, scratch that. I will plan the details with my dad and Flynn, and you two can show up Saturday morning and help us without knowing a single thing, so all you have to hide from him is that there’s a party happening. Deal?” 

“Deal,” Alex and Reggie reply, sounding relieved. 

Flynn is much more helpful, Julie’s partner in crime through and through, and gets right down to business helping her figure everything out. They agree that they should have Luke’s favorite foods (which is definitely Ray’s elaborate burger spread, with all the fruit and mac ‘n cheese and homemade french fries included) and that the party should be shark themed, because Luke is obsessed with them. They’re going to get a shark Happy Birthday banner, shark plates and napkins, and even a cake made to look like the poster for Jaws, except that the shark will be smiling and totally non-threatening and perfect for him. 

Her dad is also completely on board with this plan, and they work out the finer details of the party, like when the boys should show up to help, and when Luke should show up to be surprised. They make plans on where to order the cake from, and when to go shopping for everything else so that Luke won’t see it or get suspicious, and Julie gets so overwhelmed with gratitude for Ray’s unquestioning participation that she hugs him several times throughout the conversation and thanks him for doing this for Luke. 

“He deserves to be celebrated,” Ray simply replies, holding her tight. “All the boys do. And we’re gonna celebrate the heck out of them, starting with Luke.” 

Keeping it all from Luke is agony, but they somehow manage it. More than once, he notices that they’re all acting strange leading up to his actual birthday, and asks them about it.

One afternoon, the three of them are brainstorming possible gifts to buy him while Luke is in the bathroom, the only part of planning that Julie allows Alex and Reggie to know about beforehand. They’re texting each other, just in case he comes back faster than they’re able to stop talking, and he walks back into the studio to find them arguing out loud while still sending each other messages. 

“What’s up?” he asks, coming over to the couch. He takes in all their phones, and their combative expressions, and asks, “Is there, like, a Twitter fight going on?” 

Julie, in a moment of panic, locks her phone and hides it behind her back. “Ahhh, definitely that! Twitter fight! Very brutal, I’d stay off for a few hours until it blows over.” 

Alex is less subtle, going as far as to rapidly shove his phone into the pouch of his hoodie. “So ugly, dude. It’s just a lot of that dude from Supernatural yelling at—uhhh—” 

He flounders, unable to come up with someone else on the spot. Reggie, in a perfectly timed moment of utmost subtlety, throws his phone over his shoulder and says, “Yelling at Pope Francis, yeah, I’d stay off Twitter until like, next week, buddy,” while it loudly clatters against the ground. 

“One of the guys from Supernatural is in a Twitter fight… with the Pope?” 

“Mmmhm,” Julie agrees with faux cheeriness, and hopes it sends the wordless message of You absolute blockheads! to the other two. “That’s it. For your own sake, I’d do a social media break entirely and just focus on yourself.” 

Luke stares at her, and at Alex, and at Reggie, who gives him a cheesy grin. And then he raises his eyebrows and announces, “You guys are acting super weird. My BS senses are tingling.” 

“Whaaat? What are you talking about?” Alex replies, voice going high the way it does whenever he’s trying to BS someone. “We’re just a group of normal friends witnessing a normal Twitter fight and trying to spare you from it. Zero weirdness to be found here.” 

Luke says nothing, and Reggie says, “The Pope is surprisingly mean for a man of God. I wouldn’t risk it, dude, I really wouldn’t.” 

After another awkward silence, Luke squints at them and puts on a terrible British accent to say, “All right, then. Keep your secrets.” He lets them move on from there, but Julie has to have another conversation with the other two where she stresses the importance of them not blowing the surprise party at the first obstacles they face. 

Friday night before the party is terrible, since Julie has to come up with yet another elaborate lie to keep Luke out of the house so that they can deep clean and get everything ready. And the morning of is worse yet: Ray tells the boys beforehand that Julie and Carlos have haircut appointments at 11 A.M. that Saturday, so the boys aren’t able to come over until noon at the earliest. What this really means is that Alex and Reggie give Luke their own round of excuses and Alex shows up alone at 8 A.M. sharp, ready to do whatever Julie, Flynn, or Ray need from him to prepare for the party, and Luke is none the wiser. Julie’s just glad that his birthday happened to fall on Saturday this year so that they didn’t have to accomplish such a great feat on a weekday, or worse, on a Sunday.

Julie, Flynn (who stayed the night), Reggie, and Carlos are still eating cereal when Alex shows up, and Julie answers the door in her pajamas and monster slippers. Alex is dressed for a party in his best combination of a t-shirt, jean jacket, and trusty rainbow sneakers, and their obvious difference in attire makes him laugh out loud.

“You’re looking extremely glamorous this morning, Julie,” Alex says, smiling winningly. 

Julie gives him an unimpressed glare over the top of her glasses. “Cute, Mercer. You want some cereal or not?” 

“Yes, please!” 

Ray comes back from the grocery store with some last minute items while they’re finishing up, and greets Alex warmly. “I’m glad everyone’s here already! We’re sure Luke still doesn’t know, right?” 

“I told him I was meeting Willie for breakfast this morning,” Alex announces, and then immediately blushes, much to everyone else’s glee. Willie is someone Alex met a while ago after (accidentally) being ran over by his skateboard, and has been deeply infatuated with him ever since. When the boys aren't over at the Molinas’ house, Alex is often hanging out with him instead, and Julie loves hearing about Willie’s attempts to teach Alex how to skate or how to break into the fancy art museum downtown. “Um—I actually wanted to know if you guys would be cool with me inviting him to the party today? He really wants to meet everyone!” 

“Of course,” Ray replies immediately, and Julie says, “Absolutely, Alex, the more the merrier. I’d love to hear his version of your meet-ugly. I bet his is much more theatrical than yours.” 

“We’re not even dating,” Alex moans, but his blush deepens, and all of them can see how gone on Willie he really is. 

Reggie offers: “I said I was going with you guys for the haircuts, so I wasn’t able to hang out until we got back.” 

“And I said I was going shopping with my mom and aunt this morning,” Flynn says, rounding them off. “So we’re all booked and busy until he’s supposed to be over here today.” 

“Good job, kids. As soon as you’re done eating, we’ll get to setting everything up so we can be ready for when he does arrive.” 

This involves finishing up the rest of the housework, and then decorating the hell out of the deck in the backyard, since that’s where they’ll be hanging out for the day. While her dad and Reggie are getting the food ready inside, Alex and Carlos work on blowing up balloons and taping them to various pieces of furniture and the deck itself, and Julie and Flynn work on setting up the streamers, the shark decorations (including the Happy Birthday banner, shark party hats, and a hilarious game of pin the fin on Left Shark), and Luke’s array of presents. They also set up the table that will hold the food, and set up the speakers they’ll be using to play music that afternoon, so that Luke can have a truly spectacular birthday experience all around. 

Noon comes faster than Julie expects it to, and they’ve just barely gotten everything put together when she gets a text from Luke saying he’ll be there in ten. 

“Ten minutes, y’all!” she yells, pulling everyone outside inside. She says it again when they make it into the kitchen, where Ray and Reggie are still setting everything up before they get to the actual grilling event. “Luke’s gonna be here in ten minutes!” 

Reggie immediately springs into action. “I’ll grab the party poppers!” 

“I’ll grab the party horns!” Carlos adds, and runs after Reggie. 

While they’re hustling, Julie asks Ray: “Is everything ready to go?” 

“It sure is, mija. There’s just the mac ‘n cheese to finish, and the burgers and corn to cook once we’re ready to eat lunch.” 

Julie grins at him, and then gives him the twenty millionth hug in relation to the party. “Thank you for doing this for him. He’s gonna have the best time.” 

Ray hugs her back. “I hope he does. He deserves it.” 

They plan to stay in the kitchen and let Luke come to them, a spot where he can’t see them from the front door but where they can hear him coming. Reggie distributes the party poppers, and Carlos distributes the foil party horns, and they all stand in a cluster and wait patiently for Luke to arrive. 

“Waiting sucks,” Alex confesses to them. “I just want him to be here already.” 

“I can’t wait to see the look on his face,” Reggie agrees, and Julie can’t help but reflect the sentiment, so full of love for her family and the boy who will be there to complete it any minute that she can hardly stand it. 

After an eternity and no time at all, they hear the gate opening and shutting in the distance, and then the sound of Luke loping up the front steps. They immediately fall silent and prepare their poppers and horns, listening as Luke sings to himself, listening as Luke sticks his key into the door and turns it, pushing his way inside. Julie’s heart feels like it’s going to burst when he calls out, “Honey, I’m home!” 

He’s met with silence, and Luke sounds confused when he takes it in and then calls out, “Hey, are you guys around? I saw Ray’s car in the driveway! Julie? Reggie? Alex?” 

Julie holds her breath while Luke kicks his shoes off and pads out into the living room, and then back towards the front door, towards where they’re waiting for him. Luke says to himself, “Bet they’re already out in the studio—I hope we can work on “Finally Free” some more today, Julie’s gonna love the hook I came up with—” and then he turns the corner, so that he is in full view of the party and the party has a full view of him, and he stops short, eyes going comically wide. In almost perfect unison, the six of them shout: “Surprise!” and then pull the tab on their party poppers and blow their party horns, so that the kitchen is a mess of streamers and honking noises. 

Luke continues to stare at them. “Guys?” 

“Happy birthday!” Julie yells, and Reggie and Alex blow on their horns again, followed by Flynn, Carlos, and Ray. 

“We got you so good, dude!” Reggie exclaims, laughing at Luke’s stunned expression. 

Luke looks between their group, mouth opening and closing a few times, like he doesn’t know where to even start. He settles on: “You did all this? For me?” 

“Of course,” Alex says, humored. “You’re the Dancing Queen now—we had to celebrate such an unrivaled occasion with only the most unrivaled surprise party.” 

Luke stares at them for another moment, clearly trying to wrap his head around this situation. And then a radiant grin cracks open across his face, and he lets out a joyous, disbelieving laugh, one that easily outpaces the volume of their party horns, and he’s across the dining room and into the kitchen in just a few steps. He goes right for the three of them, arms stretching out, out, out, until he can wrap them around Julie’s and Alex’s shoulders and squish Reggie in the middle, until they’re tucked together with barely any room to breathe. 

“I thought you were all starting a secret book club or something without me,” he says, but he doesn’t sound the least bit upset. “I knew you were acting weird! You weirdos! I love you!” 

“Isn’t this better?” Reggie asks, crushed so close to Luke that their foreheads are touching. Julie glances up in time to see him lean into the touch, to see the aching fondness Reggie has for Luke spilling across his face like honey. 

Luke pushes into him, too, grin going wild around the edges. “So much better, dude.” 

When he manages to untangle himself from them, Luke makes sure to hug Flynn tightly, too, and then Carlos, and then Ray, who squeezes back extra-tight. 

“Happy birthday, mijo,” Ray says, laughing at Luke’s enthusiasm. “I hope you’re not too mad at us for keeping it a secret. We just wanted to make it a surprise since we knew you’d try to talk us out of it.” 

When Luke leans back to smile up at Ray, Julie’s gaze gets caught on the light pouring out of his eyes and the cute crinkles at the corners. “This is the best thing that’s ever happened to me. Thank you.” 

“Don’t thank us yet,” Reggie trills, tucking himself back around Luke’s shoulders. “We’re making burgers for lunch. And we bought you fresh pineapple.” 

Luke shuts his eyes for a long moment, and then Alex suddenly asks, “Luke, are you crying?” 

“I’m not,” he insists, though his voice does sound a little funny. “It’s just the fresh pineapple—it, it has magical powers, and it does weird things to my vision—” 

“Shut up,” Alex replies lovingly. He takes Luke’s hand and gently guides both him and Reggie towards the back door, the one that leads out onto the deck. “We’re not done with the surprises.” 

Julie tags along, hooking one arm through Flynn’s and the other around Luke’s waist to guide them both. In her best infomercial voice, she announces: “But wait, there’s more!” 

Carlos goes with them, both hands clinging to Flynn’s empty arm, and they move as one entity to show off the rest of the party. Luke gasps when he takes in the sight of the deck, in all of its shark-themed, balloon-and-streamers decorated glory. He stumbles when he sees the modest stack of presents for him, and laughs in utmost delight when he sees pin the fin on Left Shark taped to the side of the house. 

“Guys,” he says again, and this time it’s with a definite wobble in his voice. “You didn’t have to do all this for lil ol’ me. It’s just another day.” 

Reggie turns to him, completely serious. “No it’s not, Luke. It’s your birthday, dude. It’s the one day we have the best excuse to celebrate the hell out of you, and everything you do for us.” 

“Don’t try and act like you don’t love being the center of attention,” Alex teases, but it’s still with that same soft, reverent tone he used in the kitchen, and his touch is just as soft and reverent when he puts his other hand on top of Luke’s head and messes his hair up, part caress, part noogie. “You’re our Primadonna Girl.” 

“I thought I was the Dancing Queen,” Luke shoots back. They all pretend not to see the few tears that slip down his cheeks, especially since Alex is right there to dry them. His voice is a small, small whisper when he finally says, “Thank you. It means a lot to me that you guys went to all this trouble for my birthday. I—” 

He stops, clearly overwhelmed, and Julie rests her chin on his bicep while he collects his thoughts. Luke sniffles, wraps his free arm around her back, and continues with, “I haven’t had a good birthday since elementary school. I’m just scared I’m gonna mess this one up, too.” 

“No way,” Julie tells him, with no room for argument. “There’s no expectations for today, Luke. We’re just here to hang out like usual, but you also get to eat cake and open a few presents that Flynn and I painstakingly wrapped since Reggie and Carlos aren’t allowed to touch the tape. Or scissors.” When he looks down at her, with his puppy dog eyes and his tentative smile, Julie says, “You’re not gonna mess anything up. You’re just gonna sit back and let us tell you how great you are today. Nothing you don’t already do every other day, right?” 

“God,” he laughs, finally leaning away from the melancholy and back into his joy. “I would like to make a formal request that this idea that I’m the primadonna of the group be kept out of any and all interviews in the future, please and thanks.” 

“Nice try,” Reggie responds, and Alex snorts and says, “That’s the first thing our fans are gonna know about us, dude, absolutely not.”

Luke sighs, put upon. “Fine. I guess I can live with it.” Then he crushes them all close again, making sure to pull Flynn and Carlos into the mix, too, and says: “This is the best day of my life. Thanks for everything you guys do for me. I’d be nowhere without you.” 

“Us too,” Alex agrees, and everyone else follows, and lets Luke hold them in their group hug for a long, long time before letting go to get to the party antics. 

While Ray is grilling their burgers and finishing up the mac ‘n cheese and corn, the rest of them get the other food situated on the table, turn some music on, and hang out like normal, like Julie promised they would. Victoria shows up about thirty minutes after Luke does, bringing tamales and a few presents with her. Reggie nearly begins to weep at the sight of the tamales, and Luke goes bright red at the sight of the presents, stumbling over himself to tell Victoria that she didn’t need to get him anything. All Victoria does is say, “It’s your special day, sweetheart, of course you deserve to get some special things,” and hugs him tightly, and then twirls back into the kitchen to see if Ray needs any help. 

Willie shows up shortly after that, much to Alex’s conflicting anxiety and elation. He races to the front to grab him, and Julie can’t hide her smile when she sees Willie for the first time, from his long, beach-tangled hair, to his seashell necklace, to his bashful but warm grin, one that’s lopsided and sweet and probably something Alex panics about on an hourly basis. 

“Guys, this is Willie,” Alex says unnecessarily, fidgeting with his bracelets. “Willie, this is the guys.” 

“Hi, guys,” Willie says, laughing at Alex’s introduction. He turns to Alex, and still with that lopsided grin, requests: “Can you tell me who’s who so I don’t make a fool of myself, hot dog?” 

“Hot dog!” Luke blurts, and Reggie and Julie start to immediately lose their shit. “Dude, you told him the hot dog story? And he still wants to hang out with us?” 

“Me,” Alex corrects, like he regrets this decision already. But he does as asked, pointing at each of them when explaining: “That’s Reggie, our bass player and token Star Wars fan, that’s Luke, our guitar player and Dancing Queen, that’s Julie, our lead singer and single brain cell holder, that’s Flynn, Julie’s best friend and the best dancer in town, and that’s Carlos, Julie and Reggie’s little brother and an aspiring paranormal investigator.” 

“Those are quite the credentials.” Willie smiles at each of them, and then holds a fist out to Luke. “I’m sorry I didn’t bring you a birthday present, but I was hoping that a calm and ritualistic gesture of respect would suffice.” 

Luke looks extremely touched when he completes the fistbump. “Willie, where have you been all my life?” 

Willie turns his grin back onto Alex when he says, “Oh, you know, running over locals down by the pier. A hard day’s night.” 

Alex is incredulous when he half-yells, “And all you had to say was ‘You dinged my board!’ after I stood back up! Unbelievable.” And when Willie replies, “I said I was sorry, and I even made sure I didn’t actually crack your head open when it was all said and done,” and casually takes one of Alex’s hands, lacing their fingers together, Alex blushes all the way to the roots of his hair. 

“I guess I forgive you,” he eventually says, breathless and high and adorable. 

Willie’s lopsided grin stretches out, until it’s across his entire face, and Julie’s heart melts with it. “Lucky for me, dude.” 

Ray and Victoria give Willie their sincere welcomes as they’re finishing up the rest of lunch, and the gang get lost in learning more about Willie and, consequently, his blooming relationship with Alex, until it’s time to eat. Luke confesses his love for them several times while loading up multiple plates of food, and they just smile and tell them they love him, since it seems like Luke still needs to hear it, even though they pretty much just did the bare minimum for his birthday party.

After everyone’s gotten a little bit of everything, they sit down together at the long table on the deck. When Ray asks if anyone wants to say grace, there’s a beat of silence, and then Luke says, “It should be me.” 

They all take hands, even Willie, who keeps ahold of Alex with one and casually slides his other into Flynn’s, and shut their eyes. Luke takes a deep breath at Julie’s right, and she can feel the way he tenses and relaxes where his hand is folded up carefully with hers; she squeezes his hand once, and he squeezes back, grateful. 

“I just wanted to say thanks for this party and for everything everyone at this table has done for me these past months,” Luke starts, giving grace to them rather than an unnamed divine being. Though he feels tense, he sounds steady and completely sure of himself, and it eases Julie’s secondhand nerves. “It’s been hard, and it’s been great, and I never imagined I could find myself in a family half as wonderful as this one is. I’ll never be able to express how grateful and blessed I am for everything you’ve done for me, and for Alex and Reggie. This is the best birthday I’ve ever had, and it’s all thanks to you guys. I hope I can give back to you what you’ve already given me.” 

They wait to see if he’ll say anything else, and Julie doubts there’s a dry eye at the table, or a throat without a lump in it. Luke squeezes Julie’s hand again, and says, “Also, thanks for the pineapple. It’s out of this world.” 

This makes them laugh, and makes them all respond with a heartfelt “Amen!” Everyone starts in on their food, and while she’s assembling her burger, Julie tells Luke, “You are too obsessed with pineapple, my friend.” 

“That’s a lie,” he replies sunnily, and then immediately shoves a cube of pineapple into his mouth. 

Julie watches him chew it, both enamored and completely disgusted by the display. “I mean it’s great, but—”

“But not as great as you, I know.” 

The compliment catches Julie by surprise, but Luke’s shiteating grin does not, and she instinctively reaches out to shove him. 

“Shut up,” she says, trying not to let him see how flustered it leaves her. “I was going to say it’s not grace material, you know?” 

“Well, what else would I say I’m thankful for?” Luke asks. Julie can’t tell if he’s being serious, or still pulling her leg, or both. “I said I was thankful for the pineapple, and that I was thankful for you. What else do you want from me?” 

Julie stares at him for a moment, and Luke stares back, serious and smirking, honest and lighthearted, an open book and a wonderland of mysteries and secrets. Maybe it’s that Julie doesn’t think Luke could ever actually be serious about his feelings for her; maybe it’s that Luke has always been serious about his feelings for her, and Julie has chosen not to see it, too afraid of her own wonderland of honesty and secrets to see his without being afraid. 

Whatever it is, it makes her take his hand and squeeze again, tight enough to sting, tight enough that Luke has no choice but to squeeze back or risk crumpling under the weight of her love for him. 

“That’s a pretty good argument,” she concedes, and smiles a smile that’s for him and him alone.

Luke, to Julie’s total satisfaction, sounds winded when he inquires, “You think so?” 

“Definitely, because if I’d said it, I would say that I’m thankful for Left Shark, and that I’m thankful for you, too.” 

Luke holds her hand like it’s the only thing keeping him in his seat. “Julie.” 

“Eat your pineapple,” Julie instructs, not wanting to do this for the first time in front of their family. “Don’t let your grace go to waste.” 

“I wouldn’t dream of it,” Luke says, honest and serious and rough, maybe from Julie’s confession, maybe from the way his calloused fingers feel tangled up with her smooth pianist fingers. He finally lets go of her, though, so that he can pick up his fork and spear another cube of pineapple onto it. “I’d like to state, though, that anyone who wouldn’t include pineapple in their grace speech is probably a war criminal, or a Capricorn.” 

“You don’t even know what that means.” 

“Am I wrong, though?” 

“...Shut up and eat your pineapple, Patterson, or I’ll call the FBI and let them know we’ve got a war criminal right here.” 

“Aw, you’re too sweet to me, Jules.” 

~.~.~  

They’re rocking out to some Luke-approved tunes and playing another round of pin the fin on Left Shark when Julie hears a car pull into their driveway, and then the sound of the car’s door opening and shutting. She does a quick mental check of who the car might belong to, and who might be coming over for Luke’s party, but has no real idea. It might be one of her dad’s friends stopping by without knowing about the party, or maybe a distant relative dropping in unannounced. Julie’s about to ask when her dad suddenly stands to attention, clearly knowing who it is, and says, “I’ll be right back, kids,” before disappearing into the house. 

“Who is it?” Carlos asks, and Julie’s unknowing shrug makes him shrug back. 

“Maybe Ian,” Julie thinks out loud, mentioning her dad’s best friend. “Or maybe one of the cousins. You know how Ale likes to drop by without telling us beforehand.” 

Julie doesn’t have to wonder for long, because as soon as Reggie and Luke are finishing their game, and Alex and Willie are claiming they can easily do better, Ray is coming back onto the deck with their guest. Or guests, actually—they appear to be a couple, and are about her dad’s age, both with dark hair and modest clothing. The woman is carrying a dish overflowing with chocolate chip cookies, and the man is carrying a short stack of presents, and they are both wearing timid smiles, like they’re excited to be there but don’t really know if they’re allowed to be. 

“I hope it’s okay that I invited over some special guests for the party. They’re—” 

Luke turns to greet them, and then freezes in place, like he’s looking at a pair of ghosts. Julie’s first instinct is to put herself between them, not liking the expression on his face whatsoever, but then Luke stumbles forward, hands outstretched, and says, “Mom? Dad? What are you guys doing here?” 

Julie glances between them rapidly and puts the pieces together. In each of the strangers, she sees what they’ve given Luke: the dark, unruly hair, the kind, hazel eyes, the sweet, round shape of his face. In Luke, she sees what they’ve left him with: loneliness, confusion, a stature that is both fearless and fearful, every part of him that they’ve both nurtured to grow and tried their best to smother, for one reason or another.

She sees the love and sadness that fill Luke’s parents as they look onto his face, at the cold shock they find there. Julie steps closer to Luke, still ready to insert herself between them if she has to, still ready to fight to the death for one of the boys she loves most in the world. 

The woman speaks first, and Julie’s brain abruptly tells her that this is Emily, the Emily who inspired the song that made Julie beam in the studio when they played it together and made her cry for hours afterwards, when she was alone in her room and aching for her mom and aching for Luke Patterson. Julie feels that familiar spark of rage go through her thinking about it, thinking about everything that she’s seen Luke cry over, thinking about everything his parents put him through that she might never know. 

But Julie also feels herself start to give in immediately, looking at Emily’s warm, tentative smile, and his dad’s white-knuckled grip on his presents, the hesitant hope lighting up his weathered features. 

“Ray was kind enough to invite us to your birthday party today,” Emily offers. Julie can see her hands shaking around the cookie dish. “We thought that it would be a step in the right direction to make an effort to come to you, instead of expecting you to come to us.” 

His dad (Mitch, if Julie’s remembering right) clears his throat and continues with, “We know that we’ve been hard on you, Luke, and that we’ve pushed you away from us. We’ve pushed you far enough away that you might’ve spent your birthday alone, and we would’ve never known about this party in the first place.” 

“I wouldn’t have been alone,” Luke replies, so strong and so fragile, like the dish in Emily’s hands. “I would’ve been with my family, like I am right now. Even if there was no party, I still would’ve been with them, and it would’ve been perfect. It would’ve been more than—” 

He stops, choking on the words. Julie’s feet carry her up to him just as Alex’s and Reggie’s do, and they form a protective barrier around him, Julie’s hand going into his, Alex’s going to his shoulder, and Reggie’s going to his back. 

When their line of defense is complete, Luke lets out a shuddering breath and says, “It would’ve been more than I’ve gotten from you in a long, long time.” 

Julie waits for the yelling to start, or the manipulation, the claims that Luke caused all of the Pattersons’ problems, the claims that he was never and will never be who they want him to be. But instead of any of that, Emily’s smile grows and grows, until there’s sunlight pouring out of it, until it’s just as beautiful and wholesome as Luke’s. Her hands stop shaking, and her eyes travel over the faces on the deck, from her son to her son’s brothers, to Julie and her brother, to Willie, their newest family member, to her dad and her aunt, and to Flynn, her rock, her protective barrier always. They all watch her back, not wanting to interrupt, not wanting to let Luke get hurt. 

“I know, honey, and I’m so, so sorry about that. I’m sorry that we pushed you so far away and hurt you so badly. But I’m so glad that your family has been there to take care of you when we were too blinded by our pride to see what we were doing to you. Seeing you having fun and being celebrated on your birthday with people who love you is—I don’t have words for it.” 

“It’s wonderful,” Mitch says, voice catching and breaking around the ‘ful.’ “It’s more than we deserve, and everything that you deserve. You deserve nothing less than to be loved and celebrated by those around you, and we’re so blessed that you found a family who gives you that unconditionally.” 

Julie thinks she might start screaming, or demanding to know who the Pattersons think they are, coming over to Luke’s party and trying to pull this shit on his birthday. But when she glances up at Luke, trying to catch his eye, his gaze is locked entirely on his parents. He looks just like his mom, with all of that sunlight dying to break out of him; he looks just like his dad, with all of that hesitant hope filling the chipped corners of his expression. 

“Is that why you came? To meet my family?” 

“Of course,” Emily agrees, reaching up to dab at her eyes. “We wanted to meet and thank them for doing what we should’ve been doing all along. But we also came because we want to start doing right by you and putting in the effort to become your family again.” 

Mitch adds, “If you’ll have us. If you’d rather we leave, we will, Luke. We don’t want to impose on your day. But we’d love it if we were able to stay and celebrate with you guys, and try to start something good again.” 

Nobody says or does anything for a long moment, letting the Pattersons have their long-awaited discussion without interfering, though it’s obvious they all want to. Julie wants to shout at them until her voice gives out, and she can tell by the way Reggie and Alex haven’t relaxed their rigid poses a single inch that they’re ready to take a few swings at Emily and Mitch, given the chance to do so. But they don’t move, letting Luke set the pace and tone of how this conversation is going to go, and how it’s going to be finished. 

Just when Julie thinks that the Pattersons are going to take the initiative to leave, or Luke is going to tell them to get lost, he takes a few unsteady steps towards them. The three of him let him go, watching for any sign of trouble, ready to pull him back behind them at a second’s notice. He gets closer, until he could touch them if he wanted to; instead, he jams his curled fists into his thighs, maybe to ground himself, maybe to keep from swinging them. 

He looks between his parents, reading their faces, and they look back, both so hopeful and so, so anguished at the mistrust radiating off of their son. All three of them are crying now, these parents and the son they created to destroy, and even still, Julie can see the garden trying to sprout from the weeds between them. 

When Luke eventually speaks again, his voice is raw, but it’s hopeful, and it makes Julie’s breath still. “If you love me, you’ll have to love them, too. That’s unconditional. If you want to be my family, you have to be their family. I’ll lose everything before I lose them.” 

“Of course,” Mitch says, and his grip is so tight around the presents that Julie’s afraid he’s going to tear them, like he wants nothing more than to throw his arms around his son. 

Luke turns to look right at Emily this time, and it’s clear now that his fists are clenched to keep them from going around her middle and pulling her close. “And you have to know that music is part of that. There’s nothing I want to do more than make music, and our band plans on doing it until we can’t anymore, and then probably still after that. We’ve already got people who listen to us and want us to go full time. We’ve already gotten the attention of some managers and labels who want us to sign as soon as we graduate.” 

“Luke,” Emily whispers, sounding awed. “That’s amazing, sweetie. I had no idea.” 

“I know,” he tells her, but it’s not mean or resentful, it’s full of longing and sunlight and every beautiful part of Luke’s soul. “We’re going to the top, Mom. And I want you guys—” Here, he makes sure to look at Mitch, too, “—there with me, but it’s gotta be all or nothing. It’s all my family or nothing. It’s all my hopes and dreams or nothing. I can’t live like this forever—wondering if you care, hoping that you do, wishing I could tell you about the name I’ve been making for myself—the name we’ve been making for all of us. I want you there almost more than I want anything else, but I have to know right now if you can love all of me and all of my family unconditionally, because if you can’t or don’t, then you’re going to have to leave and let us thrive without you.” 

There’s another brief pause, and then Emily takes one hand off of the cookie dish and cups Luke’s teary face with it, a gesture that nearly brings Julie to her knees. She’s glowing with pride for her son, and seems to know that all of Luke’s words were meant to be a plea for them to stay, and not a demand to get out and stay out. 

“Of course,” she says, drying off some of his tears. “I know it’s going to take time for us to talk some more and heal, but we want to be there with you every step of the way from this point forward. You and your family, no matter what. We love you so much, Luke. We want to watch you go to the top.” 

Mitch takes one hand off of the presents and sets it on the back of Luke’s neck, steadying them both. “We love you forever and always, son. We’re going to make sure that we show and tell you from now on, and we’re going to make sure we do the same for your family. We’ll do whatever we need to to make sure you don’t ever doubt it again, and to make sure you can fulfill your hopes and dreams. We’re here for and with you.” 

Luke opens his mouth again, like he’s going to say something else about their complicated relationship, or what he needs from them to make this work, but instead, he starts to sob, and it’s a sound that is overjoyed and devastated, and Emily and Mitch are right there to pull him into a tight embrace. Ray swoops in to grab the cookies, and Victoria takes the presents, and then the Pattersons are all wrapped up in each other and crying, Luke crushed between their arms, Emily and Mitch holding him desperately. Everyone else on the deck watches it happen, just to make sure Luke is okay, and they’re all in various states of crying, too. Julie finds herself leaning into Alex and Reggie, who are probably just as relieved as Luke is that one of them is going to be able to mend their relationship with their parents. 

Emily was right to say that the three of them still have a long way to go with talking and healing, and a long way to go to prove to Luke that they’re going to love and support him no matter what, but Julie thinks that they’re going to be okay after it’s all said and done. If the way Emily is grinning against the crown of Luke’s head is anything to go by, or the way Mitch keeps kissing Luke’s temple as they hold each other, or the way Luke takes a deep, gulping breath just to say, “I love you both so much,” before going back to crying. 

It’s going to be long and wretched, but it’s going to be what they need, and Julie already knows that Luke is going to write the most beautiful music she’s ever heard as his heart starts to mend, and his stature builds all the way up to fearless. 

The music Luke will write while the garden inside of him grows to full bloom is going to destroy her, and it is going to save the world. 

~.~.~  

Julie spends a lot of the party after that getting to know Emily and Mitch, who are just as fierce and just as sweet as Luke underneath all of their familial trauma. They both give her a great, big hug, and then Alex and Reggie, too, who try their best to hide the way it makes them tear up again. Luke spends the conversation tucked around Emily, like he can’t bear to be parted from her, and she looks up at him frequently, like she can’t believe where she is and that her son is still by her side, despite everything. Mitch stands right next to them, arm around her side and against Luke’s shoulders, keeping them together. They seem genuinely excited and interested in their band and the progress they’ve been making together, and Julie feels the hope from before grow and blossom, her own sprout inside of Luke’s garden. 

The time for cake and presents finally comes, and they all laugh at Luke’s enthusiastic response to his shark cake. 

“Which one of you picked this out?” he asks, beaming at the cake, and then the people surrounding him. 

Julie says, “That was Flynn’s genius find, of course. You didn’t even need to ask.” 

Luke blows Flynn a kiss across the table. “You are out of this world, Ms. Rider.” 

“No, you,” Flynn jokes, catching his kiss and pressing it to her heart. “Only the best for the best, Patterson.” 

They light his candles, and sing him an obnoxious and truly hideous rendition of “Happy Birthday” that makes Luke laugh louder than their cacophonous harmonizing. And when Carlos exclaims, “Make a wish, dude!” Luke thinks about it for a few beats, and then blows the candles out, looking more alive than Julie’s ever seen him look before. He meets her eyes through the smoke and the cheering, and the grin she gives him is so wide that it’s hurting her, but she can’t make herself stop for even a second. 

The best part is watching Luke open his presents, which he does only after moaning and groaning about how no one needed to get him anything. It’s mostly records for the collection he’s always dreamed of curating for himself (albums like Electric Ladyland by Jimi Hendrix , A Night At The Opera by Queen, and Speaking in Tongues by Talking Heads) but they also get him a nice hoodie and a few shirts he’ll probably cut the sleeves off at some point, and his parents get him a pair of Vans that Ray told them Luke had been salivating over for months. Luke’s favorite present by far, the one that makes him stop and stare, is the one that Julie and the boys put together for him. Luke’s affinity for records bleeds heavily into an affinity for cassette tapes, so Julie thought it would be cool to get him a tape deck and a pack of blank cassettes so that Luke can make his own mixtapes, like a kid right out of the 80s and 90s. Alex and Reggie also worked together to hunt down a well-maintained Walkman, so that Luke can listen to the mixtapes and other actual cassette albums he may find whenever he wants. 

“Guys,” he whispers, already knowing who got the ensemble for him. “This is amazing. How did you—” 

When he doesn’t finish, Alex does it for him, flicking Luke’s hand. “We know you, dork. And we love you.” 

“Plus,” Reggie adds, tapping the tape deck, “when we record our first album, you can also record it to a tape and have the one and only Julie and the Phantoms debut cassette. You could make millions off of it.” 

Luke protests: “I’d never sell it!” And then, soft again, says, “Thanks, dudes. I love you guys so much.” 

Julie, while leaning against Reggie, chin propped up on his shoulder, easily replies: “We love you, too.”

They get lost in another whirlwind of talking and eating together, Luke enthusing about Brian May’s guitar technique to the entire table, Willie responding with the same enthusiasm, Alex and Reggie poorly singing “God Save The Queen” beside them. Julie sits and takes it all in, their easy excitement, the light pouring from everyone’s faces, and says her own version of grace to thank the universe for bringing them all together, all right to her. Her brother and her papi and her tía, her best friend in the whole wide world, Emily and Mitch, who already seem to be changing and flourishing, Willie, who already holds Julie’s heart with both of his hands, and her boys, the three boys who have changed her life completely, who she knows are going to continue to change her life for the rest of it. 

Her mama, who she knows continues to watch over and protect her family, though she can’t be right there with them. 

They get lost in each other’s company, and it takes Julie a while to notice, in the middle of watching Ray and Victoria talk to Emily and Mitch, and in the middle of listening to Willie tell a grand story about the time he almost got hit by a car while skateboarding along Sunset Boulevard, to notice that Luke went into the house and never returned. She makes the excuse of needing to refill her cup and goes in search of him, hoping he’s okay. 

He’s not in the kitchen, or the bathroom, or anywhere else in the actual house. Julie checks the front porch, a place he likes to sit when he’s overwhelmed and doesn’t want anyone else to see it, and after finding it empty, guesses he’s probably in the studio since that’s where he likes to go to think. 

Julie finds him at the piano, not playing, just sitting in a comfortable silence. She relaxes when she sees that he’s not crying or angrily scribbling away in his notebook, and knocks softly on the door. 

When he looks up, she asks, “Can I come in?” 

Luke laughs quietly. “It’s your studio, Julie—of course you can come in.” 

“It’s ours, actually, since we all make music here,” she says, going to the piano. He makes room for her on the bench, and Julie slides in next to him, close enough that their arms end up pressed together from shoulder to elbow. “What’s up?” 

He leans into her and shrugs. “Just wanted a minute to sit and think. Nothing bad, I promise.” 

“Okay, we can sit and think,” Julie tells him, and so they do, sitting and thinking in Luke’s comfortable silence for a few more minutes. 

She thinks about the look on his face when his parents walked onto the deck, and the look on his face while they were all singing “Happy Birthday” to him, and thinks that now would be a good time to give Luke her other present, the one she made him all by herself, one that even Alex and Reggie have no idea exists. She fears, for a split second, what will happen when he does, and then Luke leans further into her, the knuckles of his left hand brushing her wrist, and the fear is instantly replaced by warmth. 

“I have one more gift for you,” she announces, breaking their silence. 

“Julie,” Luke whines, throwing his head back. “You guys already did so much for me today, I don’t need anything else.” 

Julie gives him a light kick to the shin. “Stop being so dramatic, Dancing Queen. I didn’t spend any money on it. It’s, um—it’s actually a song I wrote.” 

That gets his attention, and suddenly Luke is alert and staring at her with the fire he always becomes filled with when they’re working. “A song? Like, one for our album?” 

“No—well, maybe, but—” Julie replies, voice shaking a little. “I wrote it for you.” 

Luke stills, and when he says, “Julie,” again, it’s also shaking around the edges, and full of everything Julie’s been afraid to look too closely at since discovering how deeply she feels for Luke and his beautiful, rose garden soul. If she thought she was aware of how much she feels for him the night of their first sleepover, when the others were knocked out and they spent two hours just talking to each other in the dark, it’s nothing compared to now, with sunlight pouring through the open windows and right into her heart and into his eyes.

“It’s called “Perfect Harmony,”” she says, unable to look away from him. “Can I show you?” 

Luke nods. “I want to see it.” 

Julie gets up and grabs the folder she hid in a random corner for this moment, bringing it to Luke. When she sits down again, their arms get pressed back together, and Luke is still watching her with that attentive, burning expression on his face. 

“It’s a duet,” she explains, giving him the sheet music for the song. 

Luke takes it like it’s made of glass. Julie feels her entire body lock up as he reads over the chords, and the words scribbled underneath them, but she doesn’t let fear override the thrill of watching his face crack open and spill fire from the gaps. 

“‘Here in front of me/Shining so much brighter than I have ever seen,’” he starts, voice as fragile as his touch. “‘Life can be so mean/But when he goes, I know he doesn’t leave.’” 

He looks at her over the paper, and Julie says, helpless to be anything but honest: “I just wanted to tell you how much you mean to me, and how much you’ve done for me since you came into my life. You’ve been my bright, shining star through learning how to live without my mom. And you don’t know how many times I almost asked you all to stay whenever you’d leave to go home at night. I would’ve given anything to have you stay. But I also had to learn that you’d stay with me no matter what, even if you had to leave for the night, even if life tried to tear us down and apart. I just—needed and wanted to get it all down for you. The light you’ve given me again.” 

Luke's throat works, like he might cry, like he’s trying to think of what to say to her, and rests his fingers over the gap on the sheet music between the title and Julie’s verse. “What’s the space for?” 

“It’s for you,” she says again, the final piece to her final gift. “It’s for you to fill in, so that we can make it a true duet, so we can write it together. If you want.” 

Luke traces over the front page, and flips through the others, taking everything in like it’s going to disappear the second he looks away. And then he turns to Julie and smiles at her, his most beautiful yet, something that burns through her just the same as the fire in his eyes. Maybe Luke writes beautiful music on his own, but the music they write together is always the most transcendent thing Julie’s ever listened to, the most transcendent experience she’s ever been part of. 

“It’s incredible,” he gushes, pressing closer to her. “I love it, Jules. It’s definitely going on our first album.” 

Then everyone will know exactly what I feel for you, Julie thinks, still gripped by the last dredges of fear, and then thinks, Good, that way no one will ever be able to doubt what I feel for you and how deeply it goes, all the way down to my roots. 

“I’m glad you like it.” She presses into him, too, wanting to be closer, even though they’re about as close as they can get without sinking into each other’s skin. “I’m glad you’re having such a great birthday, Luke. And that your parents showed up to celebrate with us. You deserve all of it. You deserve the whole, wide world.” 

“I wouldn’t go that far,” he laughs, bumping their shoulders together. “That’s you, anyways. You deserve the whole, wide world.” 

“I’ve already got everything I want and need. I don’t need anything else.” 

Luke is looking at her when he says, “Same.” 

“Everything? Are you sure? What about the wish you made when you blew your candles out?” 

“Well, if I tell you, then it won’t come true.” 

“Oh, so it is something you don’t have yet?” 

“No,” Luke admits, and then says, “I have it, but there’s always room to hope to have it a little more.” 

Julie feels it surge inside of her, this overwhelming, burning love she has for him, and watches as Luke’s face burns along with it, until Julie can see every single one of his truths and his secrets. Any fear is gone, excitement and love, love, love taking its place. 

“Well, a wise man once told me that when there’s a dream you have, you have to grab it with both hands and hang on until the end if you want to make it come true. I think it would be in your best interest to follow his lead.” 

Luke’s breath catches, audible in the short distance between his mouth and Julie’s. “You think so? Really?” 

“Definitely,” Julie says, touching the crook of his elbow, light and careful and tender. “Pursue your dreams at all costs, Luke Patterson. Make your deepest wishes come true by speaking them into existence and grabbing them with both hands. Ask and you shall receive!” 

Luke giggles at her grand display and moving speech, and then he finally admits, light and careful and tender: “It was you that I wished for.” 

The truth, so bare and without embellishment, still takes her by surprise. “Me?” 

“Of course it was you,” he replies, words stretching out with warmth and longing. He brings both hands up to hold her face, touch as tender as his confession. “I’ve been wishing for you since I met you, Julie. From the first time I heard you sing, I knew that I wanted everything and anything with you. I was lucky that I got what I got, but it never kept me from wishing for everything else, too. I want it as badly as I want to go to the top with you.” 

Julie looks at him, at his firefly eyes and the loving, elated curl to his mouth, and says, heart bursting, fingers pressing into the warmth of his skin: “Chase your dream, Luke.” 

Luke laughs, a breathless, wonderstruck noise, and then he leans down and kisses her softly, as sweet as the rest of him. Julie’s eyes flutter shut at the gentle press of their lips, and she moves her arms until they’re curled around Luke’s shoulders, pulling him closer, holding him to her the way she’s been starving to since they all came stumbling through the studio door for the first time. She feels both flayed open and perfectly content as she kisses Luke back, afraid of him seeing everything that’s been growing inside of her these past months, desperate to show him all of the love and the light that he deserves to receive after giving her the same. She feels like she’s falling through the sky and like she’s laying with him in a wide open field, the summer sun bearing down on them. She feels like she’s dreaming, and she feels like she’s wide, wide awake, the most awake she’s ever felt. 

When Julie pulls away after a few kisses, just to get ahold of herself and her spinning thoughts, Luke follows after her, pressing another kiss to the corner of her grinning mouth. It makes her laugh, and she opens her eyes again, just to look at him, just to see what Luke Patterson looks like after he kisses someone he’d give the world to if he could. 

“Funny thing about that,” Julie eventually says, low and teasing, “is that I, coincidentally, had the exact same wish.” 

“Ain’t that something,” Luke replies. He looks gorgeous like this: happy beyond belief, eyes like liquid amber, cheeks blooming with color, lips red, hair in a state of disarray. Knowing she put it all there makes Julie lightheaded. “I guess you could say that we’re always… in perfect harmony?” 

“I will revoke the song if you continue to use it in poorly timed puns.” 

“You wound me greatly,” Luke says, like Julie didn’t just spend a few minutes kissing him softly and holding him with obvious affection. He seems to remember it suddenly, because his face splits open around another wonderstruck smile, and he starts smoothing his thumbs over Julie’s cheeks, like he can’t believe she’s real. “Hey. You like me. You like-like me.” 

Julie thinks about taunting him some more, but when she goes to do so, what she says instead is: “I love you, Luke.” 

She’s embarrassed and scared for .3 seconds, but then Luke kisses her again, a quick, delighted gesture that quells her fear instantly. 

“I love you so much, Julie, you literally have no idea,” he proclaims. He kisses her again, and then kisses her cheek, right under where his palm is resting against her skin. “I’ve probably been in love with you since the second I laid eyes on you.” 

“Shut up, no you haven’t,” Julie replies, tugging on a stray piece of his hair, but secretly, silently agrees with him while thinking about how the first thing he ever said to her was that she has a human wrecking ball of a voice. 

“I totally have. I promise you that this is something you can’t try to argue with me about because you will lose.” Luke kisses the corner of her eye, where it’s creased from how hard Julie’s smiling, and then kisses the side of her head, right above her ear, and asks: “Will you please, please be my girlfriend now, or am I gonna to have to show you the notebook overflowing with songs I’ve written about you first?” 

Wanting to get one more tease in, Julie says, “Actually, I have something to confess to you.” 

Luke freezes. “Yeah?” 

“Yeah,” Julie agrees solemnly, nodding, and then says, “Alex and I have actually been having a very passionate love affair behind everyone’s backs, and it would be too hard to break it off with him this far into things—” 

Luke yells, “Julie!” and Julie starts laughing hysterically, unable to help herself. She laughs and laughs, harder yet when Luke starts to laugh, too, until she’s able to calm down enough to gasp: “Of course I want to be your girlfriend! Do you want to be my boyfriend?” 

“Of course, yes, right this second!” he shouts, and then starts to kiss Julie all over her face, from her forehead to her nose to her cupid’s bow, and especially on her mouth, even though she’s still laughing so he mostly gets her teeth or the corners. Julie holds onto his shoulders and lets it happen, sunlight burning through her blood, body weightless and thrumming with excitement. 

Luke stops after several kisses and leans away to look at her, eyes tracing over the shape of her face, over the shape of her ecstatic grin. Seemingly satisfied by what he sees, he leans in to softly kiss her forehead, and then rests both of their foreheads together and says, “I love you to the moon and back, Julie Molina. Thank you for giving me the best birthday ever. The best day ever. Thank you for everything you do for me.” 

Julie pushes a hand through his wild hair, feeling like she might burst from how much she utterly, totally, completely adores this boy. “I love you, too. I’d give you the moon if I could.” 

He beams, says, “You’ve already given me the sun, though,” and Julie has to kiss him again for it, even though they’ve kissed so many times already, even though their family is probably wondering where the hell they are. She kisses him again because she wants to, because she has to, because she doesn’t want to go another minute keeping herself from loving Luke out loud when it’s the only way he deserves to be loved. 

It only feels right that Luke gets to complete her heart in the exact same place he started putting it back together all those weeks ago, before Julie knew what he would come to mean to her, before Julie knew what it was like to be full of sunlight and fireflies and so much love that it had nowhere to go but out of her and into the hands of three boys who would do everything in their power to wield it with care. It only feels right that, in the place where all of Julie’s other greatest gifts have been given space to flourish, her greatest gift, loving and being loved by Luke Patterson, gets to flourish just the same. 

In between their millionth and millionth and one kiss, Julie makes sure to tell him: “By the way, you’re now obligated to show me every single page out of that notebook you just mentioned. Boyfriend rules.” 

Luke calls her out with a simple, smug: “Deal, but then you have to show me yours, Jules,” and Julie has no choice but to continue kissing him, just to hide her blush at his knowing remark, just because there’s no other logical move but to kiss the smugness right off of his face. It works beautifully, and by the time they manage to separate from each other and head back to the party, Luke is pink all over, and is wearing a dopey smile while Julie is wearing a smug one, resetting the balance of the universe once more.