by Micol Ostow
His silky straight, shoulder-length hair shone as it swayed in the sunlight.
Were we … having a moment?
Willie looked at me.
Oh, right. I’d gotten totally lost in my own head. “Alex,” I said finally.
“So what brings you to Hollywood?” Willie asked. “Picture with Fake Spider-Man?”
I shook my head. “I was having a minor afterlife crisis, so I was clearing my head. That is, until you scrambled it.”
Willie laughed, showing even white teeth. “I totally pancaked you.” When I gave him a stern look, he amended with, “I mean, I’m sorry. So, minor afterlife crisis, huh?”
I decided to level with him. What did I have to lose by being honest? “Yeah, I just keep freaking out wondering why we’re here. Shouldn’t we have gone to heaven or something?”
“Who’s ‘we’?” Willie asked.
“Me and my bandmates. We all died.”
“That’s tragic, bro. You guys in some kind of accident?”
“You could say that,” I hedged. “We ate some bad hot dogs.”
“Oh, weirdly, that’s what happened to Mozart,” Willie said, grinning.
“That’s actually comforting,” I said. “Can I ask you a few more questions?”
“That kind of your thing, isn’t it?” Willie asked. “It’s funny. You thought you’d get answers when you died. Now you just have more questions.”
“Yeah, hilarious,” I said, flat.
“So what caused this crisis, specifically?”
“Julie. She’s the girl who discovered us. Or brought us back. I don’t even really understand what exactly happened. And did I mention she can see us? Are you understanding my whole freaking-out thing now?”
Willie’s forehead crinkled in surprise. “A Lifer can see you?
I nodded. “It gets even crazier. This morning when we played music with her, we became visible to everyone at her school.”
Now Willie ran a hand through his hair, pulling it back from his face. “Whoa. I’ve never heard of that before. Maybe this Julie is connected to your unfinished business.”
“Mmm-hmm,” I said. “I would totally agree with you … if I had any idea what you were talking about.”
“Having unfinished business is why people become ghosts when they die. There’s still something they need to accomplish. And once they complete it, they can cross over.”
That was a new theory. So this situation the guys and I were in was … temporary? Possibly? “So how do we figure out what our unfinished business is?”
Willie looked down for a minute. “I don’t know. Some ghosts never do. I haven’t.” At this, he brightened. “But I’m not really worried about it, because being a ghost lets me do my favorite thing: skate anywhere I want without getting busted. When I’m not skating here or at the beach, I’m skating in Justin Bieber’s empty pool.”
I had to admit, that didn’t sound terrible. Except … “I’m sorry, who?”
Willie laughed. “You seriously have a lot to catch up on. Check ya later, Hot Dog.” He gave me a little hip check to show he was teasing.
“Not a big fan of the nickname. That’s how I died,” I reminded him, even though I knew it was just a joke. He bent over and grabbed his board, getting ready to leave.
“Wait, how can I see you again?” I asked. “You know, so you can help me with my ghost questions.”
“I’m around. Come find me.” He gave me a small smile. “Even if you don’t have questions.” And just like that, he poofed away.
Even if you don’t have questions. Hmm.
I liked the sound of that.
When I got home from school, Dad was at the kitchen table drinking from one of Mom’s many old dahlia mugs, surrounded by enough piles of papers to qualify the scene as a fire hazard. “What is all this?” I asked.
“Oh, good, you’re home,” he said, looking a little frantic. “It’s a bunch of info on other schools with music programs and some private lesson stuff. It may look like a mess, but your dad’s on top of it …” As he said that, one pile toppled completely over, snaking sheets of paper across the floor.
I moved to help Dad pick up everything. “Then good thing for you I got back into the music program at my school,” I reassured him.
His eyes lit up. “Please tell me you’re not joking.” He leaped up and pulled me into a hug so tight I could barely breathe. “I’m so happy!”
“Me too,” I said, resting my cheek against his shoulder.
After helping my dad clean up the papers that had fallen (which, by the way, took about a thousand hours), I headed to the studio to see the guys. Reggie and Luke were on the couch with their guitars, fine-tuning something. As I walked into the space, I heard a huge power chord echo out.
“Guys, you aren’t supposed to be out here playing alone,” I reminded them.
“We’re not alone.” Reggie motioned from himself to Luke at his side. “We always have each other.”
“We had the volume at level one,” Luke said.
“But we rocked it at level ten!” Reggie said, enthusiastic. “Want us to play it again?”
I gave him my best not-amused look.
“I don’t think she does,” Luke said, correctly reading my expression. He went on. “We’ve actually been waiting for you to get home. We have some pretty major news. We had a band meeting earlier and …” He paused dramatically. “Brace yourself, this is big. We’d like you to join Sunset Curve. And no, you’re not dreaming.”
I was still thinking about how weird things had been at school today. I was too distracted to give Luke the reaction he was counting on. “Oh.”
Luke and Reggie exchanged a glance. “That’s it? Oh?” Luke asked. “That’s what you say when someone gives you socks for your birthday, not when you get invited to join the most epic band ever.”
His feelings were hurt. “I’m sorry,” I said, trying to sound it. “I’m honored, but I can’t think about anything but Flynn right now. She’s still mad at me for lying. She won’t even answer her phone.” She had been sending me straight to voice mail every time I’d called.
“Man, you’re in a tough spot,” Luke said, sympathetic. “So, you gonna join the band?”
So much for sympathetic. “Read the room, dude,” I said.
“Come on,” Luke pleaded. “We need you. And you need us. Because you need music. We found this poem you wrote. And Reggie and I were working on this melody that would be perfect for it.” He held up a piece of paper with my handwriting on it.
“Where’d you get that?” I demanded.
“Uh … not in your dream box,” he stammered.
“You went through my stuff?” My face got hot with anger. “What happened to boundaries?”
Luke stood up. “You need to accept that you’re annoyingly talented. I mean, listen to this.” He pulled the paper closer to his face and began to sing—my words to Sunset Curve’s melody.
And if somebody hurts you / I’m gonna get hurt, too / That’s just how we work, yeah, that’s just how we work/ My life, my life would be real low, zero, flying solo without you
He looked at me, his gaze piercing. “That’s a great hook.”
But not even the emotion in his eyes could pull me back. “I wrote that about Flynn when she was helping me with all my mom stuff.” I thought back to that time, how scary it was, how lonely and afraid I felt.
Lonely, but not alone. Never alone. Because Flynn was by my side through it all.
A lump grew in my throat, but I felt motivated. I knew what I had to do. I looked at Luke. “I’ve gotta go.”
“What about the band?” he asked.
“I almost forgot,” I said. He perked up, curious. But I wasn’t talking about the band. “Stay out of my room while I’m out!”
I stormed off, but not too quickly to hear Luke’s reply.
“We will, if you join our band!”
I was on my way to find Flynn, but the thing was … she happened to
find me first. When I came out of the garage, she was coming up our front walk, carrying a giant tote bag. “Flynn!” I was so happy to see her.
Judging solely by her expression, the feeling was anything but mutual. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you,” I said, just plowing ahead despite the total lack of response she was giving.
“Not everywhere,” she said, dry, “’cause here I am.”
Right. “And … I’ve been texting you. You could’ve at least texted me back.”
She widened her eyes in frustration. “I sent you that poop emoji. I think it said everything.”
I tried not to roll my eyes. “Come on, Flynn. I want to tell you how sorry I am. You mean everything to me, and there’s no way I would’ve made it through the last year if it wasn’t for you.”
She put a hand on her hip. “Yet it was three strangers who got you back into music.” She shook her head. “I don’t need someone in my life who lies and keeps thing from me. Goodbye, Julie.”
She stomped past me. What do I do? She was leaving! This was my last chance to come clean!
Without thinking, I blurted: “They’re ghosts!”
Flynn stopped in her tracks. Slowly, she turned to face me. “What?”
“The guys in my band. They’re not holograms. They’re ghosts. And when we play together, everyone can see them.” It sounded bonkers, saying it out loud. Heck, it sounded bonkers inside my head. But I had to trust that Flynn would trust me.
“What do you mean, ghosts? Like the kind that rattle chains and go Boooooo?”
“No. And I’m pretty sure that’s just a hurtful ghost stereotype. These guys are just regular, normal dead dudes.” I reconsidered. “Well, Reggie is a little questionable.”
I looked over at Flynn again to see how she was taking this all.
Apparently, she was taking it by texting.
“Who are you texting?”
“Your dad,” she said. “He told me to tell him if I was worried about you and, uh … I’m worried. You’re seeing things.”
I sighed. “All right. You wanna be difficult? Meet me down in my mom’s studio in half an hour and I’ll prove it to you.”
Flynn stared at me, steady.
“Please don’t text my dad,” I added.
Now it was Flynn’s turn to sigh. “You have thirty minutes.”
I smiled … until my gaze caught a carton of eggs peeking out of Flynn’s tote. “Eggs?” I asked, suspicious. “Why did you bring eggs?”
Flynn blinked, looking nervous. “Oh, I grabbed those by mistake.” Her eyes were wide, flitting around. “It’s not like I was going to throw them at your bedroom window or anything!”
Ha. Well, just another crisis we managed to sidestep. “Thirty minutes,” I told her.
Okay, okay, so I would never have actually egged Julie’s house.
(Probably.)
But I wasn’t bluffing when I said I was going to text her dad. That stuff Julie was saying about ghosts? That was nuts. And if Julie was being a little bit cuckoo, maybe she did need to talk to someone about it. There was no shame in that. After her mother died, she’d seen a psychologist, who helped her learn some coping strategies. I told her dad that if I ever thought she needed to go back for a few more sessions, I’d let him know. Because that’s what friends do for each other.
But first, I had to see what she had in store for me, here in her mother’s studio.
She’d left the door open, but I knocked, just so she knew I was coming in.
I walked inside to see Julie sitting at the keyboard all by herself. The room itself felt so much like the spirit of Mrs. Molina, I had to admit. So the fact that Julie was in here at the keyboard already told me how far she’d come since losing her mother.
Then Julie turned like she was about to say something—except, not to me. She craned her head like she was looking at someone else. Which would have been fine … except there was no one else in the room.
“All right, guys, here we go!” she called. Then she looked at me. “Could you stand over there?” She waved to one corner. “Reggie wants to be able to rock out, and he feels weird about walking through you.”
Whoo, boy. “When you create a world, you really live in it,” I marveled.
“Just get over there.” She shooed me. I moved.
“You’ll notice I don’t have any equipment that would produce a hologram. Feel free to look around,” she suggested.
I humored her and took a quick look right and left.
“The guys put a poem I wrote about you to music.”
A poem she wrote about me. I’ll admit, that one got me. “Aw, I wish I didn’t have to talk to your dad after this,” I said, meaning it. It really was a shame that my best friend had finally cracked.
“It’s called ‘Flying Solo,’ and I hope you like it.”
I gave the best grin I could muster, nervous for what was about to happen. But she was grinning back at me like she just couldn’t wait to blow my mind.
She launched into the opening notes of her song.
If I leave you on a bad note / Leave you on a sad note / Guess that means I’m buying lunch that day
I had to laugh. Darn straight.
I was still laughing when suddenly, out of nowhere, a flash of light exploded and the three boys from the hologram band appeared next to Julie, with their instruments.
Suddenly, all four of them were singing together, just like they had in school yesterday.
My life, my life would be real low, zero, flying solo without you
My jaw dropped open. These guys definitely weren’t holograms. And they were singing to me. One moved closer to me, serenading me. I reached out … and my hand passed right through him!
He laughed. “Weird, right?”
Oh. My. God.
Julie was telling the truth!
They kept playing as I leaped up and grabbed Julie by the shoulders. “They’re ghosts!” Ghosts! How was that even possible? I had so many questions.
The blond one—Alex, that was what Julie had called him—tapped at his drums while he grinned at me. “We prefer musician spirits.”
Still strumming his guitar, Luke sidled up to Julie, playful. “So, does this mean you’ll be joining our band?”
I shot him a look. “I think you guys are joining her band.”
Julie flashed the biggest smile I’d seen on her face in ages. “I’m gonna go with what she said.” She hummed a few more bars of the song—our song. Then she looked at me. “Still want to talk to my dad?”
I rested my elbow on her shoulder, relieved that the truth was out and there were no more secrets between Julie and me. “Nah,” I laughed. “I’m good.”
Since playing at the spirit rally and officially agreeing to join Sunset Curve after our performance for Flynn, it was like a switch had been flipped. Suddenly, I was feeling like my old self again: confident, outgoing, and even—yes!—happy at school. I practically strutted down the halls singing, breaking out my own compositions whenever the spirit moved me. Just this morning, I’d jotted down some new lyrics:
I got the music, back inside of me / Every melody and chord / Can’t stop the music / Back inside my soul / And it’s stronger than before
Not only stronger than before—stronger than ever. For the past year, I’d walked the halls of school like I was practically a ghost. But not anymore. Now I danced down the halls—and all my friends joined in.
Sometimes, I did get a little bit carried away.
“Hey!”
Like now—I’d been so caught up in the drumming in my head, I’d grabbed a pair of drumsticks from another guy in the hall just to bang out a rhythm against my locker. Now he wanted them back.
“Are you done?” He glared, impatient. “I need my sticks.”
Sheepishly, I handed them over and dug the stuff for my next class out of my locker. Once I closed the door, I found Flynn looking at me, grinning.
“What’s up?” I asked.
“Nothi
ng, it’s just nice to see you back to being your weirdo self,” she said.
“Thanks?” I joked, even though I knew she meant it as a legit compliment.
“So, how’s the band?” she asked. “Still hot? Still talented?” She lowered her voice to a whisper. “Still dead?”
“Amazing,” I gushed. “Luke and I had so much fun writing this weekend. Come on, you have to hear these.” I pulled her into the music room, which was blissfully empty at this hour.
“The music was just bursting out of me,” I told her as we closed the door to the room. “It was like when I was writing with my mom.” I sat down at the piano and began to play for her.
“Definite Gaga vibes,” Flynn said, nodding along approvingly.
“Thanks. And I think we have an anthem in this one. It’s something my mom and I were working on …” My eyes welled up, and I took a breath to compose myself. “Anyway, Luke and I finished it. Check it out.” I played a few bars.
I paused when I realized Flynn’s eyes were welling up, too. “That’s … beautiful.” Then she smiled at me knowingly. “My girl’s got a crush.”
“What?” My cheeks flamed with embarrassment. “Um, no way. Luke’s a ghost, remember?”
“Luke’s a cute ghost,” she corrected me.
I couldn’t help it, I melted, the warmth from my cheeks enveloping me like a fuzzy blanket. “With a perfect smile,” I added.
“Ha! I knew it. Just remember, he’s made of air.” Flynn wagged a finger at me.
“Cute air.”
“Obviously, you two have a connection. Just don’t get hurt, okay? Especially because everyone’s been asking when your band is going to play again.”
That was news to me. “Play again? But we don’t have anything planned. Luke and I have just been focused on writing songs.”
“Lucky for you, your marketing team is way ahead of you.”
“I don’t have a marketing team.”
“Yeah, you do,” Flynn insisted. She pointed at herself. “And surprise—you’re playing the dance tonight that I’m going to DJ! See?” She pulled out a flyer from her pocket and unfolded it so that I could read:
