Lukes POV
Julie began to cry in her sleep among thrashing in her bed. I didn't know what to do but call out to her so I tried calling her name but then she just started screaming, a blood curdling scream that shook me to my core. I hopped out of her bed thinking maybe if she woke up I might give her a fright and continued begging her to wake up from her very bad nightmare. Her father rushed in and I thought for a moment that maybe he did care but no, he turned on the light and slapped her across the face several times till she woke up, then he screamed at her to go to sleep and be quiet or he would leave her soaking in wet clothes in the basement overnight, he slammed the door shut. At some point Alex and Reggie had poofed in half dressed and wondering what was happening but I just saw red, I was about to poof out to somewhere where I could just scream when Alex grabbed my hand reminding me that I wasn't just alone.
Julie was sitting up but rocking back and forth on her bed, arms around her knees, head buried in her arms and crying as quietly as she could. Reggie had taken up residence beside her and was trying to talk to her. Alex sat down at the other side and tried to stroke her hair while I paced, it was only one in the morning, the night was young and it was probably time for us to check on the assholes to see if they were tucked in their filthy beds for the night. "I'll be back Julie" I whispered and poofed. I came back a minute later with a cup of hot chocolate from France with whipped cream and chocolate dusting on top and marshmallows on the side. I also came back with some hard liquor, Jack Daniel's Tennessee whiskey in my other hand. I placed both next to her on her bed side table figuring she could pick what she wanted the most. I then sat down in front of her on the bed, we had her surrounded again but this time she didn't seem to care.
"Julie, did you want to talk about your nightmare at all? It might help?" asked Alex very tentatively. Julie shook her head from side to side and continued hiding behind her hair. "Julie, would you like something to drink? I brought you a hot chocolate or there's alcohol here" I asked.
Julie looked up at that but not at the drinks, she looked straight at me with tears streaming down her face. She needed a hug or something and we were useless although we could poof anything to her. I reached out and tried to touch her cheek to wipe her tears away and then poofed again. I came back with a litter of kittens in a small box for her which got her to smile and pick a few up for cuddles.
"Thank you Luke, that's very sweet and definitely thinking out of the box and around not being able to touch me!" she said. I smiled and gave her the hot chocolate which she gratefully began sipping after she added the marshmallow on top.
"Hey Julie, what kind of music do you like? Music always helped us feel better and we could sneak you out to the garage and listen to some quietly if you want?" asked Reggie, he had always found music helped him forget or deal with his emotions of his parents fighting. "Um.. I don't think you guys would like my kind of music.. It's stuff like Underoath, Emarosa, Bless the fall, Picturesque, and Sleeping with Sirens" she said while wiping her face with a tissue that I had offered her. "Honestly we get it, music has the power to change your mood or help you deal with shitty situations, even if we don't like something, it's more about helping you not what we want to listen to. Besides who knows, it might be something we all like anyway, we never had perfect parents either we just tended to make happier music when we were together" I said in a rush.
Julie finished her hot chocolate, locked eyes with me then said "Alright let's do it, we might need shot glasses though, who knows maybe you guys can drink? And you gotta poof these kitties back or at least to the garage, I'm not going to sneak out successfully if I have cute fuzzballs running all over the house!"
I poofed them back to the shop then we helped her sneak out of her house and into the garage that was toasty warm from a heater that Reggie and Alex had added. We needed to start thinking of how to hide things better in case her dad started noticing and wondering where this stuff came from. Once inside I wrapped Julie up in a blanket and started pouring her drinks, we tried with water first outside but it just went right through us which was fine, at least we got to make sure she was alright and bring a smile to her face, that was better than any high. It was strong liquor though and she definitely took the first shot slowly as it probably burnt her throat going down. I had picked it based on personal memories of needing that release rather than considering the fact she might not have drinken before.
"Alright Julie, what are we listening to? Educate us on what we've missed since we've been dead? Oh man, how long have we been dead for? We didn't even ask what year it is… guys, what if there are flying cars!" said Reggie.
"Well it's now the year two thousand and twenty, what year did you die in?" asked Julie.
"Wow, we've been dead for twenty five years guys" said Alex with a hint of sadness in his voice.
"Well let's have some fun and make up for the last twenty five years!" said Julie with a bright smile on her face, it was my favorite look on her face.
We connected the speaker to her phone and let her DJ, she had only had two shots but I could tell that she really dug her music just from the way her face lit up with excitement. "Okay well this is called Ten Thousand Feet by I see Stars" she said giggling uncontrollably as something deep and guttural started playing. We all raised our eyebrows at her and she started giggling again like it was the funniest show ever. "Well this definitely isn't the spice girls but dam, this I could get into" said Reggie.
It was Julie's turn to raise her eyebrows as she was expecting us to hate her music. But then the bridge started and we were all knocked to our bottoms, literally as she opened her mouth to sing we all were speechless and forgot how to breathe. This girl could sing! And not just sing but actually sing better than I could.
Julie had her eyes closed and when she had opened them as the bridge ended and saw our faces she giggled again and took another shot. I poofed out and came back with some snacks from a supermarket and a bottle of water just to make sure she wasn't sick tomorrow. There were a collection of chips, crackers and dips such as onion and garlic hummus that I remembered my mother enjoying.
The next song that Julie put on was Dead Flowers by Picturesque and she sang from start to finish. It was easy to see that these songs meant a lot to her. It got me wondering if her mother had taught her how to sing and play a musical instrument as there was a grand piano in here that wasn't mine. The next song that came on was Hey Baby here's that song you Wanted by Blessthefall and I turned it down a smidge to talk to her while Alex and Reggie were air drumming and guitaring to her music.
"So you can sing, and holy hell can you sing, did your mum teach you? Can you play that grand piano over there also? Because that isn't mine or any of my band mates!" I asked.
Julie looked down, took a deep breath then looked up again with tears glistening in her eyes. "Music used to be the air I would breathe, I lost that when my mother died and honestly, I haven't sung since then, I don't know why tonight, maybe it's the alcohol? I've never been allowed to drink before but it makes me feel happy and relaxed but emotional in all the right ways, in the way I used to feel, breath and live. I've spent a long time locking most of that away and only letting myself feel in this room on this couch. Maybe and please don't poof out of my life, maybe it's because I finally feel safe to talk and be alive because you guys came into my life, it's been forever since anyone cared about my survival. I really miss her Luke. If she could come back I know my life would be different, hell she would have thrown my father in jail for life if she came back at this moment. You haven't seen her at all have you? It's a daydream I used to fall asleep to, her coming back and saving me, then it turned to just anyone coming to save me. For years I used to wonder why my teachers never noticed the signs, the tiredness, the malnutrition or the abuse, I used to flinch when my name was called and no one put two and two together. Then as I got older I just accepted that no one cared".
My heart broke and I could see in my peripheral vision that Alex and Reggie had stopped goofing off and came to sit at her feet. "We sadly haven't seen her Julie but maybe we were sent to save you or help you survive till your eighteen, we definitely can make your life easier by poofing in whatever things you need and I think I speak for everyone here that we will love you and protect you in any way we can!" I said with tears streaming down my cheeks. Suddenly a song came on that she loved called We'll Sleep When We're Dead by Bless the fall and her entire face lifted, she closed her eyes and swayed her head to the beat with so much emotion expressed in those crinkled eyebrows. She was tipsy but letting loose all the emotion she had tied to these songs of pure ups and downs. It wasn't even about the lyrics, it was just about how the music made her move and feel. I could feel that too, I could barely decipher what was been said but could feel the same ups and downs and lows in the music she felt. It was a level that I had really understood. To chuck all musical talent into the ground and to focus on the pure emotion coming from a song. Didn't matter how much work you put into the lyrics or music, sometimes it was just the emotion that someone needed to connect to a song and we could all see that on her face. Julie was in love with music just like we were but hadn't had the courage to be herself in a long time. She lived literally in hell and there was nothing she was willing to do about it as it would sacrifice her brother to unknown horrors. Yeah he might land in one of those amazing foster homes where he would grow and be happy but let's be honest how often does that seriously happen.
Before the song ended though she leaned over and whispered in my ear "If I could have one wish, it would be that you guys would never leave me alone again ever, I've never had friends, I've never had any one that gave a damn and I heard what you said before. Please don't leave me, please let me be selfish and keep you here forever"
I leaned over and whispered in her ear "If it's within my power I won't leave your side for as long as you need me" I wasn't going to make promises I couldn't keep but I wanted her to know I would try, I would fight to be with her.
She was on her sixth shot and now mixing in some water with crackers and garlic hummus which made me happy as I didn't want her to vomit all the nutrients her body seriously needed. She was very small for her age and bony in a not good way. It amazed me that her teachers never noticed, like seriously how do you not notice your student having a healthy weight let alone flinching when asked a direct question. There's nerves and there's abuse. There's a difference, open your goddamn eyes! I seriously wanted to just hold her but knew I physically couldn't. Had she been a girl in my school there's no way we would have not seen her, even before we heard her sing, it wasn't about the voice it was the principal that everyone deserved to feel love in some way.
The music progressively got more and more emotional on a different level to what we normally would listen to but I sat with her and gave her snacks and alcohol while she recited memories that certain songs brought out of her, some were of her mother, some were how she had contemplated slicing too deep on this couch to a certain song which got me worried. She said she always came to the same resolution of not wanting to because of Carlos, her younger brother but it still warranted a concern in my eyes. Reggie and Alex were busy back to air guitaring and drumming just loving the release of her music. There wasn't anything like this back in our day, it was like screamo and rock fell in love with each other and made many many children. The emotion in the songs were on a different level, even if they weren't your genre you could still feel it. I watched as closed her eyes to sway to the music.
It was nearing three in the morning and I had made a promise to her so I kissed her cheek and said I would be back in thirty minutes. Reggie took my place and continued jamming with her to Emarosa A toast to the Future while I headed to the scums place. I didn't want to do this but it was clear he wanted to hurt Julie so an eye for an eye. I disconnected his fire alarm then started a fire by turning his gas oven on high and stood in his room as I watched his house burn down and him with it. Eventually the fire department showed up but long after he had burned to death in his sleep. The joy of gas fires, you fall asleep to the fumes alone. I poofed back to Julie and relieved Reggie who poofed off to his person.
"What is going on, why are you poofing everywhere?" asked Julie "I said they would die, I just killed the person who was shoving his penis down your throat" I said with conviction mixed with mixed emotions. I couldn't look her in the eye and found a spot on the couch to stare at. I had never killed someone, it had seamed right at the time but who was I to play God? Although, who was I to not take action for someone who was hurting, a girl who needed help, sung the other song in my head. Julie tried to lift my face to look at her, when eventually I found the courage to look her in the eyes she had the most grateful look on her face and said "Thank you, you have no idea what that means to me, what all of you mean to me, it's like a dream come true and I'm scared I will wake up and it will be all that, just a dream''.
"It's not a dream Julie, I'll make sure I'm there when you wake up if you like?" I asked and she nodded.
Reggie poofed with a similar face and took over Alex who left with a face of anger on his face. We were all mad at the injustice but we were not killers, we just wanted to protect someone who deserved more. Eventually as the night wore on Julie began to feel drowsy so we poofed in some Chinese take out, made sure she ate enough before she passed out on my couch. I covered her in my blanket hoping it didn't stink of sweat and I fell asleep at the other end of the couch with my legs entwined with hers but mostly going through her body while Alex and Reggie slept in the loft.