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Julie is out of breath when Bright comes to a close – thousands of faces staring back at her through the stage lights, and she wonders if she could remember then all, somehow. They’re screaming, names and songs and ‘we want more’ and Julie feels like she’s floating.
This cannot be happening, she thinks.
Except Luke walks up to her right and clasps her hand in his, firm and gentle, and the smile he gives her lets her know he’s feeling the same way. Alex comes on her left and Reggie’s next to him, and they’re waiting – they’re waiting for her.
So Julie raises her hands and the room erupts into blissful chaos.
This is happening.
They get off the stage with applause following them, and Julie’s heart is having a race around her ribcage. Luke takes her hand again and pulls her close against his chest, almost squeezing her. He smells like his cologne and sweat, and it’s so familiar that Julie feels herself melting against it.
Not falling from her high, though. Not just yet.
‘C’mon, guys,’ Luke calls, and spreads his free arm. Alex and Reggie rush in and Reggie’s hand wraps around Julie’s back, and they’re screaming and shouting and cheering and jumping—
‘Okay, I can’t believe we just did that,’ says Alex.
The group quietens, aside from an occasional chuckle or a disbelieving sigh, and they press their foreheads together, as much as they can (Julie just kind of ends up in the middle of the boys, but she doesn’t really mind.)
‘Had a group hug?’ asks Reggie.
‘No, I’m talking about the concert – the concert of our lives.’
Luke chuckles. ‘Afterlives.’
‘I don’t know,’ says Alex, ‘it’s starting to feel a whole lot like the after doesn’t apply anymore.’
The weight of the statement lingers in the air; for a few moments, the silence between the four is a stark contrast to the noise coming from the concert hall.
‘We’ve come far,’ says Reggie. ‘From ‘95 and Sunset Curve, to Julie and the Phantoms and Madison Square Garden… This is real. We’ve made it, guys. We’re the real deal now.’
It’s supposed to be happy, but there’s one thing on Julie’s mind – what happens now? What if they disappear before she gets to hold them again, and they never get to find out what’s next for the band? Inadvertently, Julie’s hand grips the backs of both Luke and Reggie.
She isn’t ready to give this up.
Julie feels Luke’s hand gripping the back of her jacket right back, as if urging her to come closer. He wiggles out of his position a little, enough to stay in the group hug but be able to look at her.
‘I think we should do one more song,’ Luke says.
‘We just did an encore with Bright,’ she argues.
Luke shakes his head; his eyes are dreamy and excited, call for adventure gleaming in them. ‘Listen to them.’
She does; the people who came to see them headlining a Madison Square Garden concert are screaming, still, the energy as high as it has been for the entire concert. They want more – and if Luke’s got anything to say, they will get it.
‘We’ve got nothing to play.’
‘I think we do.’
They have songs, lots of them, but none that Julie thinks would be good enough for something like this. It’s got to be something special. Something like nothing they’ve ever done before. Something—
Oh.
She knows that gentle gleam in Luke’s eyes; she knows the intimacy of what he’s thinking.
‘Okay,’ she says.
‘Okay? You sure?’
For the past few months, they’ve been deliberately secretive about what’s happening between them, and the idea of letting people in— Maybe it’s not the wrong thing.
It can’t be, when Luke is gazing at her like that. Maybe she wants to share that with the world.
She drops her hand until it reaches his, and gives it a tiny squeeze; his thumb is quick to brush against the back of her palm, showing her he’s not going anywhere.
‘I’m sure.’
Julie kisses him on the lips. It’s nothing unusual, but the two of them tend to not be overly affectionate in case someone sees, and most of the time it’s better to be safe than sorry. This time, Julie thinks she doesn’t want to hide anymore. Luke’s grip on her jacket definitely pulls her close, and she shifts a little – he seems to be thinking the very same thing.
Next to them, Alex and Reggie exchange a look with grins.
‘So,’ says Reggie, ‘what are we playing?’
—
Two minutes later, they’re ready to go back to the stage. Alex goes first – he carries his cajón in the dark, nearly stumbling a handful of times, and the crowd goes insane. He plays a solo that’s not a solo, an improvisation that sounds like an intro for the song they’re about to play.
Reggie comes on next, and the crowd loses it a little more. He plugs his bass into the speakers and changes some of the settings – when he joins Alex, he takes over the solo, and Julie’s convinced it’s one of the best things she’s ever heard him play (she makes a note to tell him to write it down so they can use it later, if he’d like.)
Next to her, Luke squeezes her hand. ‘You good?’
Julie nods. ‘I’ve just got something in my eye.’
He laughs and kisses her on the cheek, lips warm and lingering for a second before he joins the boys on the stage.
The crowd really loses it. They have a vague feeling Luke is the favourite but the way he’s playing on that acoustic guitar, following a solo in the vein of what Alex and Reggie did, Julie can see how anyone would find him irresistible.
He looks like the world’s greatest rock star.
(But he’s hers.)
Julie thought the crowd couldn’t get even wilder, but the screams and the excitement when she comes on change her mind. Her heart is still racing and she’s sweating a little, but this—this euphoria—is what it feels like to be alive.
(Julie wonders if they’re feeling alive, too.)
She exchanges glances with all of the boys, eyes locked with Luke before she pulls out her microphone – not the fancy one that they’d given the group at the Madison Square Garden, but the very original one she sang with. The one that has her doodles and her birthday cake, for Luke.
‘Hello again, New York,’ she says, followed by the boys playing an improvised melody in the background. Julie smiles at the people in front of her, soaking in the energy bursting off of them. ‘We thought we’d do a little acoustic song for you guys, one that we’ve never performed before.’
The only response is screams from thousands of people; she can’t make out a single voice. She knows her family is somewhere there, watching, waiting. Supporting her even when she can’t see it.
Julie finds the stool she sat on and goes back onto it, fingers dancing on the microphone. She lets out a shaky breath then almost whispers into it: ‘But for this one, we need you to be very, very quiet.’
As if a spell has fallen over the concert hall, the crowd goes nearly silent. It’s magical – thousands of people holding their breaths, with only three instruments to fill all this space.
All of them just listening; waiting.
Julie glances at Luke, who is staring in front of him, looking just as enchanted by the moment as she feels.
She gives him a nod, and one to the other boys. The melody falls away – all she can hear now is Luke gently strumming his guitar, playing the familiar chords over and over again, but not singing. He’s walking up to her instead, looking at her like there’s nothing else in the world worth looking at.
He leans into her mic, not breaking the eye contact. ‘Step into my world,’ he sings, and Julie feels the world melting away as she does just what he asked her to. ‘Bittersweet love story ‘bout a girl. Shook me to the core – voice like an angel, I’ve never heard before.’
Alex joins on the cajón and Reggie plays a soft melody on the bass, and Julie feels herself breathing life into what she and Luke have, in front of everyone – she breathes in, feeling— feeling something more.
(Nothing else exists. Just the two of them and Alex and Reggie.)
‘Here, in front of me,’ she sings, and her voice flutters from the emotion. ‘Shining so much brighter than I have ever seen.’ She grins wide, ignoring the stinging in her eyes, and takes Luke in as he is – he’s always shining in her eyes, ever since the day she hugged him first.
Julie collects herself and lets out a soft lyric that feels almost like the start of a confession: ‘Life can be so mean.’ She reaches out without thinking, and her hand finds its home on Luke’s cheek. ‘But when he goes, I know he doesn’t leave.’
The lights dim, and Julie feels the magic seeping from where her palm touches his skin. For a moment, nothing exists but them; her hand on his cheek and her eyes open just for her, and Julie – oh, how she loves him.
They miss their cue and they laugh into the microphone, before turning to the audience again.
The pre-chorus begins and Julie tries to be performing for the audience, for her family, for anyone but herself and Luke – except she keeps glancing at him as much as she keeps catching him glancing at her.
Halfway through it, when they sing their worlds collide when they’re together, Julie finds herself unable of being apart from him anymore.
She dashes to him, across the stage (’Our voices rise and soar so high’) and when she’s right in front of him, she can hear the smile in their voices (‘We come to life when we’re’) and then everything stops again.
She loves him.
And she knows he loves her, too.
He crosses the distance between them and tils his head forward, leaning his forehead against hers.
‘In perfect harmony.’
They break apart again, harmonising the ‘oh’s and the rest of the chorus as they go to another member of the band each. Julie goes to Alex, leaning a hand on his shoulder as he grins at her from the cajón. Luke is pressed back to back with Reggie as the bassist does another gentle solo, with Luke backing him up on the acoustic guitar.
This – this is what the guys, her guys, came back for.
This feeling that they can do anything.
Across the stage, Luke turns to Julie as the chorus ends, and all the distance between them is as good as none. ‘You set me free.’
She thinks of the Orpheum—of holding him for the first time—and sings back, ‘You and me together, it’s more than chemistry.’
It always has been.
It always will be.
‘Love me as I am,’ they sing together, and I do, she thinks. ‘I’ll hold your music, here inside my hands.’
Luke winks at her but it doesn’t break the spell – all it does is make her chuckle, on the microphone, and her voice flutters as the continue singing the story of their relationship.
‘We say we’re friends, we play pretend. You’re more to me – we’re everything.’ And the chorus comes again, but all Julie can think about are these words, these lines, and how much it hurt when she was hiding from Luke how she feels, and how much it’s hurting when she’s unable to let herself be happy and carefree around him because… Because…
The chorus finishes, and Julie still doesn’t figure out why. They’re singing back and forth and it feels like the questions they’ve never dared to ask, and all the answers they’ve never had the courage to receive.
But Luke nods at her, shows her that things are going to be okay.
She’s in the moment. She’s Julie Molina – she’s the star of tonight.
(She’s his star.)
She gives Alex an encouraging squeeze on the shoulder (and a thank you, and a give me strength, and an I’m glad you’re here) and walks to the front of the stage, feeling all eyes on her.
She closes her eyes and— ‘I feel the rhythm in my heart, yeah.’
Luke lets out a little chuckle and she glances over, seeing him give her the biggest smile she’s ever seen on him as he sings, coming closer: ‘You are my brightest burning star.’
I love you.
She laughs because she adores him, and then sings the truest words she could’ve felt in the moment: ‘I never knew love so real.’
‘So real,’ he echoes, and he’s right in front of her, close to touch.
I love you, Luke’s eyes are saying.
‘We’re Heaven on Earth, melody and words, when we’re together we’re in perfect harmony,’ they sing together, and embark on the chorus again.
Except they don’t pull apart this time; she stares into his eyes the way he stared into her, as if there is nothing and no one else for her. (Because there isn’t.) Alex’s drumming continues, Reggie supports him, and the two singing share Julie’s microphone as they walk further out the stage, nearing the very end of it.
‘We say we’re friends,’ she sings and he echoes, ‘We play pretend.’
And they laugh, because it’s so real, and Julie really wants to kiss him as they keep singing about something very few people know about (not after tonight, not after this.)
Julie changes the lyrics, then, singing: ‘You’re more to me,’ and he does the same with: ‘We create.’
And she looks at him, and sees the world—
And he looks at her, and sees the world—
There’s runaway tears streaming down their cheeks, and they lean their foreheads together as they end the song in an almost-whisper: ‘Perfect harmony.’
Nothing happens. All she’s aware of is Luke, and just Luke, and his forehead against hers and his hand over hers that’s holding the microphone, and his breath on her lips, and the smell of his cologne and sweat, and the fact that oh my god I love him so much—
And then everything happens.
People are cheering, even Reggie and Alex are clapping, and Julie feels Luke’s chuckle. His eyes are gazing into hers and she thinks she can truly see the entire universe in them.
‘Hey,’ he says.
She echoes it.
He wraps his hand even tighter around hers and pulls it to his chest, smiling as if asking for permission. She pulls away and smiles at him, and even though there’s noise coming from all around, it’s nothing but white music.
Luke puts a finger under her chin. He tilts it up gently, and places a kiss on her lips.
She doesn’t think about the noise in the hall suddenly reaching possible. She doesn’t think about the guitar and the microphone between them, or the thousands of eyes watching them. She doesn’t think of Reggie and Alex, even.
She doesn’t think of anything but him.
Her hand finds its way to his cheek again and she pulls him closer, and he turns the guitar to the side and takes hold of the microphone until he’s pressed against her, nothing keeping them apart.
Nothing.
When they pull apart, Julie’s out of breath even if the kiss was hardly more than a few seconds long. She lets her face show the adoration she’s kept hidden for months now, holding her hands around his neck just like they belong there.
‘Why’d you do that?’
He shrugs, then half of his mouth travels up in a shy grin. ‘Be who you are don’t compromise,’ he sings her own words back in a whisper.
Julie kisses him again.
She feels it, too – the magic seeping from where their lips touch, where his hand touches his cheek, where his hand is on the small of her back, still holding onto the microphone. She feels him growing firmer in her arms, and if she’s had any doubts about him being real before—
‘Luke,’ she breathes out.
He nods. ‘I know.’
‘It’s—’
‘I know.’
‘Why?’
Love, she almost wants him to answer. Because I love you. But he’s said it already – they’ve said it before.
He shakes his head, but she knows the answer, and sings back to him the very lyrics he just sang to her.
‘What do you mean?’
‘You’re honest to the world, without any fear of it,’ she whispers. ‘What more could it be?’
Luke buries his face in her neck and she thinks he might be crying. She looks at Reggie and Alex whose faces are happy, but not to the extent they’d be if they’d just become fully human, like Luke has.
Maybe this is Luke’s journey. Maybe theirs is something else.
(She knows they’ll find them. They’ll figure it out, together.)
For now, in front of thousands of people, Julie kisses Luke like she’ll never get to kiss him again – except they’ve got eternity, now.
Now and forever.