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“Home is where my horse is” was scrawled across the top of the page that took up all of Luke’s vision.
“Reggie, I told you before I am not going to sing that!” Luke proclaimed, swatting the notebook paper away from his face. Reggie stubbornly brought that page back to Lukes attention.
“That’s just because you don’t understand the way country music speaks to the people!” Reggie said with conviction in the power of country music as he watched Luke storm off the couch and begin pacing the floor of the studio. As Luke began to displace the carpet with his bouncy momentum, Julie and Alex just watched him do it from behind their respective instruments. This would have been a very productive practice session if it hadn’t veered off into this age old conversation about what new music they should incorporate into their set list. Now, instead of getting anything done, Reggie and Luke were arguing over whether they should consider Reggie’s piece, “Home is where my horse is”.
Julie was ready to ride this argument out until she heard Luke say,
“I could get past the part about it being country music. My problem is that the song doesn’t even make sense,” he said, throwing up his arms in exasperation. He turned back to Reggie and said,
“What does ‘home is where my horse is’ even mean? Your horse isn’t in your home! Hell, you don’t even have a horse Reggie, you grew up in the suburbs!” Luke had gotten so wrapped up in his own tyrad against country music that he hadn’t even noticed Reggie’s defeated look. As Luke monologued on the lack of musicality and substance in the genre the beginning of tears began to well up in Reggie’s eyes, as he bit a lip trying to hold them back. Julie, ever the observant one, noticed how hurt Reggie was by his friend’s words. Just as she was beginning to open her mouth and defend him, Reggie stood up taller, looked Luke in the eyes and said,
“Well, I just want to have my music sung for once. How would you feel if nothing you ever wrote was performed Luke?!!” Luke’s pacing ended abruptly and the statement sunk into the now silent room.
“It would be just like how you felt after you found out Bobby had stolen your songs!” Reggie added, staring right into Luke’s eyes.
Julie could not help but think about how her and Luke did kind of dominate the writing portion of the band. Did Alex and Reggie ever feel left out or unheard? She just hoped that Luke was having similar thoughts and taking Reggie’s feelings into consideration.
Luke stood there looking at Reggie and he was bombarded with reminders of how arguments like this never went well for him in the past. He did not want another “Unsaid Emily”. He took a breath and then while nervously messing with the beanie on his head said,
“Well I guess I never realized how much it meant to Reg. If you really want to make it happen that bad we can do it,” he said and looked up to see Reggie’s face light up with excitement.
“But,” he said rapidly backtracking, “not for a show. It just doesn’t fit our set.” he said looking around to his other bandmates for support. They gave him stares that indicated only that he better tread this line carefully or they were going to kick his ass for getting Reggie’s hopes up. Before Luke could dig a hole for himself any deeper, Julie interjected with,
“I would love to work on the song with you Reggie.” she said in a sickly sweet tone that was matched with a glare at Luke. Luke stepped away from the glare as if it physically pained him and then said,
“Great! Let me know when it’s ready so I can learn it.” he said before poofing out of the studio and into the driveway to escape the tension. He was satisfied, a compromise had been made, he avoided breaking up the band with a stupid argument, and he just had to hope he did not regret letting Reggie sing his country song.
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After what seemed like weeks of long, hard work to Reggie, the song was done. It had morphed from a classic western to the country pop of 2020. Julie had added some sick beats with her computer under Reggie’s catchy lyrics and the new “Home is where my horse is” was born. Julie had not had much experience with country music before this but she was very proud with her creation that was very “Old Town Road” meets early Hannah Montana. Reggie was just overjoyed to have created something that was, “So catchy!” according to Flynn.
“Oh my God!” Flynn said after hearing the demo. “This could totally go viral!”
Within seconds of hearing it, she was already concocting a plan that would have this song stuck in everyone’s head for the next month. After many expressive hand gestures and brainstorming she had convinced Julie that this would be Julie and the Phantoms ticket to TikTok influencer fame.
“Just think of all the dances people could come up with to this beat!” she exclaimed.
“I’m not sure I want to,” said Julie, much more on the satisfying video side of TikTok than the straight dancing side.
“WAIT! What if the D'Amelio sisters dance to your song!” screeched Flynn, not noticing as Julie rolled her eyes.
So it happened that later that week when they gathered at band practice with Flynn present, she let everyone know she was going to record their first run through of the song. Luke, who was trying to play it cool but somewhat disappointed that the song had actually made it to the point where it would eat up practice time, was hesitant about being filmed.
“This isn’t going to be like that Youtube video right? The ‘Edge of Great’ video that did trending?” he asked Flynn with skepticism in his tone. Flynn let out a sound that sounded like distress with his misuse of the word trending but then said,
“No this isn’t like that at all, this is TikTok!” she said in a demeaning tone. Luke’s eyebrows raised and then fell as he decided not to ask any follow up questions. He finished tuning up his guitar and then looked over to check to see if Julie was ready before Alex counted them off.
—---------------
Luke had to admit, the song was much better. But, he attributed that mostly to Julie’s help and to the enthusiasm with which the rest of the band sang the lyrics. It was still a country song, he internally grimaced.
The opening beats from Julie’s soundboard were catchy and as Reggie opened with singing the lines the song was named after, he completely forgot about how Flynn was filming. Instead he let himself ride the wave of their energy and even found himself singing with gusto on the chorus. When the closing notes rang out from the banjo Reggie had somehow acquired, Luke was surprised to hear Flynn’s overly enthusiastic claps and only then did he remember her presence.
The rest of practice went off without a hitch, no arguments over Reggie’s song, and Luke went about his week unbothered having satisfied his friend’s request to sing his song. It wasn’t till later that week when he was strolling down the streets of Downtown Hollywood that he was forced to remember “Home is where my horse is”.
Ever since they played the Orpheum and had that transformational hug with Julie, they had been able to experience the best of both worlds. They retained their ghost powers that allowed them to poof from place to place, but could also participate in the human world more. Most notably, they could remain solid and visible without needing to perform. Luke’s new favorite activity, when he wasn’t scooting up close to Julie, was just walking the streets like a normal human. And that was what he was doing on this sunny day on the strip, at least until he was stopped by some fellow teenagers.
“Dude! Are you the guitarist from Julie and the Phantoms?” they asked him. A huge smile spread across Luke’s face. He had never been recognized on the street before, not as a part of the Phantoms, not during Sunset Curve, not even when he was an active missing persons case. There were major perks to being visible these days, he thought to himself.
“Yeah I am! Did you guys see us play the Orpheum?” he asked, trying to figure out what had worked to get their name out there. The teens looked at each other confused, and then looked back to him and one said,
“No. We know you from “Home is where my horse is”!”, as if it was the obvious answer. Luke paused, not quite processing what they had said.
“Home is where my horse is?” Luke asked skeptically. To which they all nodded fervently,
“You know, the TikTok video you made.” the taller boy said.
“It’s my favorite TikTok sound right now!” said a smaller girl who was giving off big starstruck vibes from being around him. Then they all broke into off key singing, repeating the lyrics Reggie had written,
“Home is where my horse is! Don’t know what I’d do without her! She is the best horse there ever was, Hooooooome is where my horse is!” while someone whipped out their phone and recorded Luke’s confused reaction as they sang it to him. He was so stunned that all he could manage was a
“Glad you liked the song, tell your friends,” before rushing out of there.
He made it to a secluded alley where he could poof away without scaring anyone on the street, and poofed his way back to the studio. When he arrived, he popped in only to interrupt Alex and Willie playing tonsil hockey on the couch. He couldn’t stop the yelp of surprise that came out when he popped in and the matching one that came from Alex when he realized that someone had witnessed that. Willie just sat there smiling, not at all startled. Luke poofed out as fast as he had poofed in and opted for the driveway.
As soon as his feet hit the pavement he rushed up the steps to the house. He made it all the way to Julie’s room before he stopped and knocked. He went in before he even heard her response and she didn’t bother looking up as she said,
“Boundaries,” in a tone that suggested she had given up on getting that point through. She didn’t look up until she heard Luke uttering gibberish like,
“Alex… Willie… didn’t know they were at that point…. Home is… where my horse is??? Viral????” he said, not completing a single thought that came out of his mouth. Julie got the point, at least about the horse thing, and pulled up TikTok on her phone while he continued to sputter. She pointed the phone towards him and he saw clips of their practice performance of “Home is where my horse is” intermixed with clips of Alex, Julie and Reggie in… cowboy hats?!? Flynn had basically produced and edited a low budget music video for Reggie’s song and the band had been in on it, except him.
If there was one thing Luke hated, it was being left out. And he couldn’t believe that they would have done this without him. Was he really that big of dick about this song that they didn’t include him on it? They looked like they were having a lot of fun in the video. He felt a dark cloud of guilt settle in over him.
The only thing that he said however was,
“Wow, that looks great.” as the video looped back to the beginning. Julie looked at him out of the corner of her eye.
“Is that really all you are going to say?” she asked pointedly. “Not, ‘you were right’ or ‘I’m sorry’.” He tore his eyes from the video to look at her and he could see the sadness this division in the band was causing her.
“I’m sorry.” he said to her softly. She looked back into his eyes until suddenly she reared her arm back and brought a pillow down on his head. Downsides to being solid.
“Not to me you idiot! To Reggie!” she hollered at him as he backed off the side of her bed he had been sitting on. She was right he was an idiot, but not just for realizing she was talking about Reggie.
He did not understand country music, TikTok, or why kids these days found these crazy beats to be good music, but he could understand why this song was viral. Reggie truly loved his song and sang it with all his heart. And people liked hearing something that someone put so much love into. Maybe Luke could learn a thing or two from him about that.
This realization had him rushing out of the room and back downstairs. He eventually found Reggie playing basketball outside with Carlos. But before Reggie could ask him what was up, Luke enveloped him in a bone crushing hug.