Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“Okay, but what about Now or Never?”

“No, Bright, I’m tellin’ you. It’s gotta be Bright.”

As the guys debate, Julie shrinks away from her laptop screen, busying herself with pretending to drink from an empty mug as she bitterly bites back a whiny do I really need to be here for this?

In the couple of months since the Watermelon Sugar video went viral, the band’s been getting a major increase in attention. Mostly people following Luke on Instagram, which sucks for those people because he basically never posts, but the band’s weekly gigs have gotten an influx of viewers too. Most of them are just there to demand similarly horny covers, but there are some people who tip and seem genuinely interested in the band’s actual music. Their numbers on Spotify and YouTube keep ticking up and, in a fundamentally absurd year, Julie can already say it’s one of those most absurd things that’s happened to her.

It’s not like Julie doesn’t get it, because she’s rewatched that video a lot. Even listens to it sometimes when she’s getting herself off, which is a fact she’ll take to her grave. But Julie knows that what started as a baffling joke for Luke has now become a massive thorn in his side. All the work he’s put into their incredible original songs, and this is the thing that’s putting them on the map? Someone else’s song? And accidentally becoming a meme?

Julie feels weird about it for different reasons. She’s gotten a noticeably smaller bump of followers on Instagram, even though she was in the video too. To be fair, she was the one playing keyboard, not the one growling suggestive lyrics. Luke’s getting attention primarily because people are reducing him to a piece of meat; she wants to be perceived as an artist or not at all, just like he does. But constantly being called “Watermelon Sugar’s Girlfriend” online is really starting to grate. The guys are trying to figure out how to capitalize on this ridiculous moment to launch the band to its next stage, but as far as the internet is concerned, she’s not part of the band. And it sometimes feels like the guys don’t think she is either, because they’ve spent the past week debating which Sunset Curve song to dust off and record for their YouTube channel.

Don’t mind her. She’s just Watermelon Sugar’s Girlfriend.

Is this how Bobby felt before he got kicked out of the band? Like a ghost attending his own funeral?

“But why Bright?” Reggie asks through a mouthful of grilled cheese. “Now or Never’s more of a crowd pleaser.”

“Did you look at the new draft of Bright?” Luke groans. “Cause that’s why.”

Julie rests her chin on her knee, blowing bored air at an errant curl on her face. She couldn’t even bring herself to open the email with the new sheet music for Bright—why does she need to be cc’d on her own erasure? Is it not bad enough that she’s had to attend these fucking meetings and learn how to shut off her own ears so she doesn’t have to listen to them icing her out?

“Um, guys?” she asks quietly. The Sunset Curve trio immediately shuts up and spins their heads back to the laptop like dogs obediently waiting for instructions. “I’m getting a headache. Can you do this without me?”

Luke’s forehead instantly crinkles with concern, serious eyes sweeping over her as if she’s just said she has Covid instead of a fictional headache. In spite of the storm of hurt swirling around her, that look makes her heart swoop pleasantly against her rib cage. If he was allowed to come over and take care of her, she’s pretty sure he’d already be out the door and sprinting for his car. “You okay?”

“Just need to lie down.”

The concern doesn’t leave his face, but he offers a gentle, “Yeah, we can pick this back up tomorrow. Feel bett-”

Before he can finish talking, she quits Zoom, shutting the laptop with extra force. For a moment, she marinates in her bitterness, waiting for… something. For Luke to fix this somehow? To take back going viral or stop the internet from reducing her to his girlfriend or say he won’t record Sunset Curve songs. Or at the very least for her bond touch bracelet to light up.

She traces a longing finger over the thick, oblong screen on her wrist that connects her to her boyfriend. In a rare piece of luck for 2020, Luke got them almost by accident the day after their first date. He’d been taking out the trash and run into a neighbor who had asked about the apparently unshakeable grin that was so big it had spilled out around his mask. Once he filled her in on all the details (“I had to tell someone, Jules!”), the neighbor had offered him the bond touch bracelets she’d used with her own girlfriend back when they were long distance. When Julie googled them and saw the price, she’d been surprised at the generosity, but she wasn’t too proud to accept them—she and Luke had just spent way too much money on fancy sex toys. And amidst all the terrible ways people were behaving in a pandemic, here was one of those vital moments of kindness. Someone took one look at her boyfriend—bouncing on his toes and showering joy everywhere as he gushed about his new girlfriend and how much he missed her—and offered them a small way to bridge the gap. The bracelets weren’t just a way to link Julie to Luke; they were also a reminder that good things could still happen. A reminder both of them seem to need.

The bond touch is simple: one of them taps their bracelet and the other’s vibrates, like a gentle hand squeezing the wrist. They’ve developed a code—one long tap means “I’m thinking about you,” two long taps and one short is “I want to write with you,” one short and one long is “I want you.” Sometimes the tap sends them rushing to their phones or computers to follow through on the message, but most of the time it’s just a gentle nudge. A nonverbal “you’re on my mind” that brings a smile to her face and makes her feel a little less isolated from him. The bracelet has been her constant companion for the past couple months, a tactile assurance of his solid presence in another part of the city.

But right now, no vibrations come.

Pushing herself forcibly out of her chair, she trudges to the living room and throws herself face first onto the couch. From somewhere by the kitchen counter, Flynn asks, “What’s up?”

“The fucking video.” Flynn hums sympathetically, and Julie rolls onto her back to glare at the ceiling. “One minute, I’m the frontwoman, and the next I’m just Luke’s girlfriend.”

“Society sucks,” Flynn agrees instantly. “But your place in the band hasn’t actually changed.”

“Only cause the guys don’t know we’re really together.” Which sucks, because she hates lying to Reggie and Alex, and she wants to share this amazing news that makes her so happy. But she already feels like enough of a footnote—she’s not looking to make her place in the band even more tenuous by officially labeling herself The Girlfriend. “How did the internet even figure it out?” she spits out bitterly. “He could have just been performing. Or flirting. Why do they think we’re together?”

Flynn snorts. “Seriously?” She swoops across the room and sits next to Julie’s head on the couch. Pulling up Luke’s profile on Instagram, she holds her phone over Julie’s face like she’s presenting evidence to a jury.

He only has four pictures. His first one, posted way back in eleventh grade when he thought he’d actually post regularly in some vague attempt to boost his public profile, is a faux artsy black-and-white shot of his guitar collection.

But other three are her.

One of her at Disneyland on Grad Nite, her clothes soaking wet after riding Splash Mountain, Luke’s baja jacket draped loosely around her shoulders for warmth, laughing up at the camera around a Mickey-shaped Rice Krispie treat.

One from a couple years later of her at the piano in the studio, hair glowing golden in the early morning sun as she victoriously held up the lyrics they’d stayed up all night writing.

And one of her at El Matador Beach last year. She’d sprained her ankle the day before their group trip, but Luke had refused to leave her behind so he’d given her piggyback rides all day, carrying her down the cliffside steps and over the sand to set her safely on her towel. Reggie had snapped the picture on the way back up. Both Luke and Julie were in their swimsuits, her limbs koalaed around his bare chest, a bright laugh on her face at some long forgotten joke. Luke’s neck was craned so he could smile up at her, lit up like the sun. It’s one of her favorite pictures of them, and just looking at it reminds her of his smooth, ocean-cooled, lean body under hers. Of her breasts flush against his muscular back, and the pleasurable grip of his hands on her thighs. The memory sends a simultaneous spike of heat and wave of calm through her. Because she’d been overwhelmed by how hot he was and how firm his body was, but even more so by how soft and protective he’d been. He’d held her so carefully and so tightly that she’d never once worried he’d drop her.

She’s not sure what made Luke post those particular pictures and not anything else. But she can see why someone who found his Instagram would make the girlfriend assumption. Three pictures spread over several years only of one girl? And now that she knows how Luke feels, it’s so easy to read the honest, naked love on his face in that last picture. His obvious happiness at her happiness.

Almost as if he can sense her thoughts, her bracelet lights up and vibrates once, giving her wrist a reassuring squeeze. Flynn smiles. “What’s that one mean?”

Julie rubs the screen gently, as if she can stroke the hand on the other end. “He’s thinking about me.” She can picture him smiling fondly at his wrist. Or maybe frowning in concern about her headache. Not wanting to leave him hanging, she taps back.

Lifting a knee up onto the couch, Flynn turns sideways to face Julie. Julie tilts her head back to see her best friend’s upside down face, and instantly regrets it. Flynn is in full tough love mode, and her voice is unbearably reasonable as she says, “I think you’re selling the guys short. They’re not trying to cut you out.”

“They’re literally talking about recording Sunset Curve stuff right now.”

“That doesn’t mean anything.”

“Of course it means something. This fucking pandemic is ruining everything.”

As soon as the words leave her mouth, Julie wants to take them back. They’re bratty and privileged. Her friends and family are safe, and several of them have been able to work from home. She has a job, a roof over her head, a city with a mask mandate, and a state government that isn’t listening to the president. She’s lucky. She knows she’s lucky.

But it feels like her whole life has been put in a blender and she’s so damn tired. A couple months ago, it had seemed like things were maybe starting to get a bit better, a faint light winking at the end of the tunnel. But now that light has been firmly shut off again as cases rise and restrictions slip back into place and thinkpieces pop up about the multiple years they might be spending in varying degrees of lockdown. How long will it be before she can start to crawl out of this apartment? Will she even remember how? How long before she can see Luke in person again? Will their relationship even survive that long? Or will it snap apart from a distance of nine fucking miles?

Because she vividly remembers when she was ten and her mother had been touring a lot, and Julie overheard her sighing to her father, “I keep hoping long distance will get easier, but it doesn’t.” Ten-year-old Julie had panicked—her understand of marriage was that couples were either blissfully happy or divorced—and she’d watched her parents’ relationship like a ticking time bomb for months. Even though her parents never seemed to have any big issues, she’d internalized the simple rule: long distance can damage any relationship. Avoid at all costs.

And here she was, risking long distance with one of the most important relationships in her life. Shouldn’t she have waited until they got out of lockdown to give them the best chance?

A sharp nudge in her side drags her back to the present and Flynn’s sympathetic face. “You should tell Luke how you feel. Both as your boyfriend and your bandmate, he’d want to know you’re worried about your place in the band.”

Oh right. She’d been telling Flynn about a completely different relationship worry. How many worries can one relationship survive?

Julie shakes her head. “He’ll say it’s ridiculous and that they’re not cutting me out.” Flynn opens her mouth, probably to agree with fictional Luke, so Julie barrels on. “He’ll think he means it, but look at what’s already happening.”

“Nothing’s happened yet, if you would just-”

“What am I supposed to say, Flynn? ‘Don’t record without me because I’m jealous?’ My pride isn’t more important than their careers. And Luke’s default state is feeling guilty about things he shouldn’t. I’m not adding to that.”

Flynn lays down on the couch and tucks her head onto Julie’s shoulder. The contact grounds Julie for a moment, a reminder that no matter what happens with Luke and the guys, Julie’s not alone. “Quickest way to kill a relationship is to keep things bottled up and not communicate. And I know you don’t want to kill this relationship.”

“Our relationship has enough obstacles. I don’t want to risk adding more.”

“Okay, one, your feelings aren’t obstacles. And two, you guys are solid. You’ve basically been married for years. I don’t get why you’re so worried?”

Julie runs her finger over the bond touch bracelet, trying to draw strength from the man on the other end. She doesn’t know how to explain that nothing feels real right now. Hasn’t since February. Like she’s been stuck in that semi-lucid stage at the end of a dream, just awake enough to know that her dream is absurd but not awake enough to break free of it. She keeps waiting for that final push to shake her out the dream and back into February 2020, for her rich fantasy world to dissolve to dust around her. Luke’s been her rock for twelve years and in all that time, there have only been two moments in the real world that made her feel like something might happen between them: the sixth grade peck, and that time on tour four years ago when they’d shared a bed in the band’s motel room and woke up spooning with his cock pressing insistently against her ass. They’d leapt apart immediately and, just like with spin the bottle, never talked about it again. How could those gun-shy people have stumbled into having non-stop Zoom sex? It’s too implausible to be real.

Nothing about this year seems realistic. What have they shared—The Hug back in March? Hundreds of hours of online fucking? Vibrating bracelets and linked sex toys? One incredibly awkward morning at Runyon where she could barely talk to or even look at him? Their relationship is built around flimsy, virtual facades, and she has no idea how to make it feel like it’s actually happening.

“Pandemic,” she answers through a heavy sigh.

Flynn’s hand finds Julie’s, the touch more real than anything Julie has shared with her boyfriend. “Is there anything I can do to make you feel better?”

Julie bites her bottom lip. “Tell me it wasn’t a mistake to start dating him now?”

Flynn squeezes Julie’s hand. “I know the timing sucks, but you two always seemed inevitable. I believe in Juke.”

But her conviction doesn’t lighten the lead in Julie’s gut.

A weight that only gets heavier that night when Julie opens Instagram and finds a new picture from Luke—the four guys squeezed into the trunk of Willie’s station wagon at one of the overlooks on Mulholland Drive. It’s what the Julie and the Phantoms quartet has done in the past when something good happens with the band. Stargazing in LA is pointless with all the light pollution, but looking down over the twinkling lights of the city from the Hills feels like a close urban second. It makes her feel infinite, a tiny cog in the whirling machinery of the city who’s finally clicking into place.

Why did the guys go today? What musical decision did they make that she wasn’t there for that warranted the trip?

And what does the new picture mean? Sure, she’d only realized how Julie-heavy Luke’s Instagram was a few hours ago, but it had reassured her. Evidence that she was special to him. Now this new picture is evidence of how quickly everything can change through a fucking screen.

She runs her finger over the bracelet again to remind herself that good things happen.

But tonight, the reminder isn’t strong enough.

As weird and uncomfortable as the Watermelon Sugar thing is, Julie can’t deny that it’s done good. In fact, there are a lot of good things happening for the group, and she feels guilty for not being happier. Watermelon Sugar has given the band a much needed kick up the ass—they’ve been much more motivated and their manager is suddenly much more attentive. Maybe their career hasn’t been killed by the pandemic. Maybe just hers.

Willie is finally starting to feel better, and Alex is doing better because Willie is doing better. Reggie’s been canvassing for the election, which has kept him distracted and meeting people virtually. And Luke always seems ridiculously happy whenever he talks to Julie. As much as their relationship terrifies her, it’s the best thing about her year. Which technically isn’t saying much, but it would have been the best thing about a really good year too.

They’ve been hooking up for months now, but he’s still awed whenever she undresses on screen. Still delighted whenever she comes because of him. Still shy and giddy whenever she appears on screen, even in a group Zoom call. Sometimes when they’re writing together, he’ll send her an “I want to write with you” message through the bond touch, and offer a shy “I want it so much that I need extra ways to say it.”

It makes her even more resentful of the pandemic because she can so clearly imagine what their relationship would be like in person. Subtle touches at group hangouts, fingers brushing arms and knees pressing together. Luke giving her that slow, memorizing look from across the table. In the beginning, they would have holed up in one of their apartments for days, never putting on clothes and constantly seeking pleasure from one another until their bodies were too worked over and sensitive for more. Hours of gentle cuddling and kissing, Luke keeping her close in the circle of his arms. Their respective roommates complaining that they’re never apart anymore. That magnetic, intoxicating need in a new relationship would be in overdrive.

She loves that honeymoon stage, and it’s being wasted. By the time they can see each other in person, they’ll be old news, too used to each other to enjoy that frantic early phase where they can’t get enough.

And the longer they have to wait, the more time they spend talking and not doing, the more nervous she gets. Luke is experienced, so much so that when she asks how many people he’s slept with, he pauses for several seconds and counts on his hands multiple times. It wasn’t news exactly, because she’s been aware of the revolving door since high school graduation, but he’d never talked about it around her and she’d tried not to think about it. It had hurt seeing all the people he was interested in, but it wasn’t relevant to her. It had hurt because it wasn’t relevant.

But now it is relevant, so it hurts in new ways. She thinks she’s gotten better at dirty talk, but she feels like such an imposter doing it. She’s slept with three guys—who does she think she is, promising that she’s going to blow Luke’s mind? Maybe when they’re in person, she’s going to disappoint him and ruin everything. She’d much rather have them break up because long distance is hard than because she’s bad at sex. So she tries to collect knowledge, like she’s studying for a Juke Sex exam.

Which luckily Luke seems just as invested in passing.

“Let me find a good one,” he hums as he scrolls through the list of intimacy questions on his laptop. It’s a thing they’ve started doing every couple of weeks—settling into bed naked with their toys on remote control mode and asking each other questions. Whenever they get an answer they really like, they raise the intensity of the toys, literally getting off on learning each other’s needs. She never thought she’d be a fan of drawn out, low intensity sex, but hanging out with Luke while they slowly pull orgasms out of each other is hot in a lazy, domestic way that she’s quickly getting attached to.

“Okay.” Luke runs his tongue around his lips and lounges back on his pillows, the lean lines of his naked body highlighted by the shadows in his room. He wraps a hand around his toy, partially shielding it from view, and she soaks in the image of him leisurely palming himself while his hooded eyes take in the sight of her. “How do you like to be kissed?”

Um. There are ways of being kissed? Is she so inexperienced that she doesn’t know all the apparently well-established subgenres of kissing?

She leans back on her forearms, feeling self-conscious about how naked she is. But Luke taps his phone, letting the toy between her legs come to life with a reassuring buzz. She hikes a sharp breath into her lungs, tossing her head back as she adjusts to the sensations. But Luke must recognize it for the delaying tactic it is, because he adds gently, “No wrong answers here, Jules. I just wanna know what you like. Or don’t like.”

Biting her lip, she admits quietly, “I don’t like tongue kissing. But Nick said…”

Luke’s jaw tenses as if he’s preparing to fight a high school memory, but his voice is soft and encouraging as he asks, “Said what?”

“That I’d grow into it.”

Luke rolls his eyes sharply. “If you don’t like it, you don’t like it. That’s not an age thing.”

“Maybe I would like it with you.” She eyes him up through her lashes, hoping the image looks more seductive on his end of the call than it is in her preview window.

But it doesn’t seem to work on him—he just shrugs. “We can try it if you want. But I wanna kiss you how you like to be kissed. Is there anything in particular you do like?”

“Um…” She runs a finger over her neck, tracing along her pulse point. Fluttering her eyes shut, she pretends that the gentle touch is his nose nuzzling down her throat, and the scratch of her nails is the playful nipping of his teeth. “I’m sensitive here. Like, really really sensitive.” The faint groan over the speaker pulls her from her daydream. Luke’s face lights up hungrily, the expression overwhelming when he’s naked and lazily reclining in his bed like he’s memorizing every inch of her. The intensity in his eyes is enough for her to confess, “Nick was absolutely useless down here,” she waves between her legs, “but he almost, um, got things done by kissing my neck, and he wasn’t exactly-”

Why does she keep mentioning someone she slept with in high school while she’s hooking up with the love of her life? Someone needs to teach her how to be sexy.

But Luke doesn’t look bothered, just another thing that makes him more mature about this stuff than her. “-competent,” he finishes for her.

Trying to restore the seductive mood, she tilts her head to expose her neck and drags her nails over her pulse, making a show of inhaling shakily while she does it. “Probably the most sensitive part of my body.”

Luke’s tongue darts out to wet his lip before his mouth curls slowly upwards. “Good to know.”

“What about you?”

“I’m easy.” He shrugs again, his shoulder muscles tensing and relaxing with a hypnotic roll.

Cutting him a glare at the non-answer, she lowers the vibration on his toy in punishment. He barks out a laugh, sticking out his tongue at himself. “Come on, give me something,” she insists.

“Genuinely, I love kissing. There’s probably nothing I won’t like.” Catching his tongue between his teeth, he squints at the ceiling like the answer’s up there somewhere. “Neck’s not really a thing for me, but here.” He traces a thick forefinger over that well-defined triangle of muscle between his neck and his shoulder. “Sucking. Biting.”

All at once, Julie’s struck with an image of him sitting on the counter in a green room, her riding his cock and sinking her teeth into that muscle to keep herself quiet, his pulse pounding against her tongue as he moans under her.

She taps to increase the sucking setting, and his eyes roll up, thighs pulsing desperately as he chokes out a grin. “Yeah?” he rasps.

“Do you mind being marked?”

His eyes flick over her like he’s consulting a menu of all the ways he can and will fuck her. A whine tugs out of her throat and she rocks her hips, trying to drag a deeper touch from her toy. “Not if you’re the one doing it.”

“Same,” she whispers back.

There’s a jolt inside her, a pleasant swipe across the perfect spot before he eases off again. She catches her breath as he smirks, his only acknowledgment of what he’s done as he skims the list for the next question.

“Favorite act to receive?”

“Oral,” she answers instantly. The trembling caress around her clit quickens, and her question comes out in a heady gasp. “Favorite to give?”

“Oral. So we’re gonna get along very well.” That dark intensity in his eyes promises hours in bed with his head between her legs, and it’s so hungry and desperate that it leaves her dizzy, squeezing her fingers into her sheets to keep herself from collapsing. “What about you?” he asks hoarsely.

“I like giving head.”

Letting her legs fall open, she waits for him to reward the answer.

“Really?” he asks flatly, forehead rumpled up in an adorably baffled surprise. “I always assumed having a dick in your mouth kind of…”

“Sucked?” she suggests, and he gives an exasperated shake of his head at the low-hanging fruit. She slips her thumb between her lips, running her tongue over the nail. It’s no substitute, but Luke is watching intently, and she lets herself imagine for a moment that she’s wrapping her lips around his smooth cock as he stares at her like she holds the keys to the universe in her throat. “I like how it feels. And there’s something about being completely in charge of someone else’s pleasure, you know?” The buzzing between her thighs leaves her warm and loose enough to add, “I’ve thought about blowing you a lot.”

“Shit,” he hisses, and now she gets her reward—pulses of pleasure eagerly licking her clit. Not the lazy touch of the past few minutes, but focused and targeted, like he’s quickly getting her off backstage before a gig with firm, precise laps of his tongue. She brushes her free hand along her collarbone, over her breast, down her stomach. Rolling the heel of her hand over her lower belly, she presses with the same rhythm he’s been using, ramping up the fiery tremors inside her until the burn engulfs every inch of her. The familiar throbbing in her core is urgent. Just a few more strokes, and she’ll be-

Suddenly the pulses ease off, just enough to keep the pleasant tingle between her legs without tipping her over the edge.

Whining, she bucks her hips to try to recapture that perfect touch, but he smirks at her. “Your question, boss.”

Smug little shit. As she tries to remember where the conversation left off, she palms her breast, idly massaging herself until he groans. “Do you like getting blown?” He’s probably gotten blow jobs with advanced techniques she’s never even heard of.

“Usually felt too guilty to really enjoy it. But if you genuinely like doing it, I’m happy to be convinced.” He tilts his head to the side, sweaty hair flipping into his eyes in a way that’s somehow simultaneously boyish and manly. “You like 69?”

“I’ve never done it.”

“I haven’t liked it in the past. Too much going on for me to focus, I guess? But we can try it if you want.” Of course he’s done it. And done it enough to have opinions on it. How many people has he—no, don’t think about that. Focus on the image of his head buried between her thighs while she takes him deep in her mouth, their bodies woven together in a warm, hazy knot of pleasure. “What’s your favorite position?”

None of her ex-boyfriends had been around long enough for much experimentation, and missionary and cowgirl had worked for her. Does that make her boring? Luke’s favorite position is probably something she’s never heard of. “Um, I don’t know what it’s called—like missionary, but with my legs over your shoulders?”

“Anvil,” he answers immediately. Is there anything about sex he doesn’t know?

“Anvil, yeah. Because I like how…” Why is talking about sex so much more awkward than having it? “You get really deep,” the dildo twists deep inside her, leaving her breathless for a second, “and you get close, and it feels really intimate. You?”

His mouth opens and he pauses, licking nervously at his lip. The pink on his cheeks is already there from the toy pumping around him, but the color highlights his embarrassment. God, his favorite position is going to be something so wild that she won’t even be able to contort into-

“Spoons.” He offers her a soft, bashful smile. “It’s close, good for slow sex, and I really like slow sex.” A new image springs to mind—him spooning her as he bottoms out inside her, lazily fucking her for ages until she doesn’t even remember how many times she’s fallen over the edge and desperately begs to hear him fall too. “But,” he cuts into her fantasy. “I think a lot of my preferences will be different with you.”

“Why’s that?”

“My favorite things avoid face-to-face cause I didn’t like making casual stuff personal. And,” he rubs a hand aggressively over his face, scratching off shame, “I know it’s fucked up, but sometimes I’d think about you, and that was easier to do if they weren’t facing me.”

His gaze is fixed somewhere off camera, and her heart flops around in her chest, not sure how to react. “You’d think about me?”

“It’s super shitty—to them and you—and the last time I hooked up with someone, I said your name and she tore me a new one, which is totally fair, so I stopped dating.” There’s an anguish in his eyes that doesn’t fit the mood, and she’s overwhelmed with the urge to step through the screen. Not to fuck him, but to gather him in her arms and kiss every inch of his face, painting over his pain with her love. “I tried for years to get you out of my system, and it never worked.”

She increases the pressure on his toy, and the anguish jolts off his face, eyes rolling up as his hips pump rhythmically off the bed, his body literally shaking off the misery. “I’m glad it didn’t,” she offers, not sure how to respond to the rest of it.

He flashes her a tight grin, neck muscles flexing as he squirms under her touch. “Everything’s gonna be different with you. Fuck, I’ve been dreaming about you for ages.”

Which reminds her of the question on the list she most wants an answer to. “What was the first fantasy you had about me?”

“I don’t remember,” he grits out. “Basically as soon as I started fantasizing, it was about you.” As if to prove the point, he twists inside her, hooking pleasure deep into her core.

“Tell me one?” she pants.

His hand clenches around his toy, forearm muscles rippling around the veins and making the beads of his bracelets tremble. “There was this one time in the summer when you were wearing that little blue dress and sitting most of the way up the ladder for the loft, about the height of my head. All I could think about was getting my face under your skirt.” She crosses her ankles, squeezing her legs together to deepen the touch inside her. Her finger fumbles with the setting for his toy, but the shocks firing through her knock her off-course and accidentally slide the intensity much higher than she meant to. The way his abs spasm as he throws back his sweat-soaked head and grunts out an open-mouthed cry makes it worth it. “I thought about that every time you wore that dress or sat on that damn ladder.”

“I still sit on it sometimes.”

“Believe me, I know. What about you?”

“We read this book for English with a sex scene, and I pictured us as the characters. Fully clothed, you lifting up my dress and fucking me against a wall.”

The waves of pleasure crash through her body with telltale urgency. She’s close, so close. And with the desperate speed he’s rutting his hips, he is too.

“What’s your wildest fantasy?” he gasps out. “Doesn’t have to be possible, I just wanna know what turns you on the most.”

She’s too near the edge to feel shame or censor herself. “We’re on stage performing for a crowd and I’ve got one of those wearable toys on. Somehow you’re controlling the toy with the app and playing guitar at the same time, but no one notices it’s happening. You nod me over to share the mic and as soon as we start singing to each other, I come.”

His lips pop open as he stares at her, and the pounding inside her goes into overdrive, hitting the right spot over and over again, almost too intense for her to bear.

“What about you?” she asks desperately, the lightning between her legs hurtling her towards release. She can’t keep her eyes open, giving over to the sensations in her body and the hoarse rumble of his voice.

“Well, now it’s that.”

Laughing breathlessly, she coaxes him. “Come on, I want to hear it.”

With her eyes closed, she can focus on how raw and rough his voice is, the words rasping out of him like they’ve dug their way out of his soul. “My fantasies are pretty vanilla. I have so many about fucking you while we write. In every position, everything we could do, I’ve thought of it all.”

“Tell me one,” she breathes out as her thighs start to tremble.

“There’s one where I’m at the piano and you’re sitting on my dick while you play. One of my hands is between your legs, other one on your breast, and I’m sucking on your neck so hard that you can’t even keep your eyes open, but you’re still playing perfectly until you finally come and your fingers hit all the wrong keys.”

It’s enough to send her over the edge, her body writhing and moaning at the image of him pounding up into her, his frantic hands and lips traveling everywhere she likes to be touched until he breaks her apart. Desperate pleasure shatters through her, leaving her boneless and throbbing as the jolts fire through her, curling around every nerve ending.

When the fire finally burns down to manageable embers, she opens her eyes to watch Luke’s face screw up and then go completely slack, his mouth falling open as “Julie!” groans out of him. His palms mindlessly massage his thighs, like he’s imagining her body pressed against his, and his fingers dig into the skin, leaving behind visible marks. God, he would do that after sex, wouldn’t he? Grip her hips so tightly it almost hurts, keeping her flush against him as they ride the final waves together. Linger inside her afterwards for as long as possible, groaning when she finally pulls away. She longs for it so much it aches, throbbing bitterly through her.

When he stops shuddering, he licks his lips and flops back onto his mattress, catching his breath. Blinking dozily, he finally twists his gleaming head to her, the corner of his mouth curling up as soon as he sees her.

Rolling on her side, she offers him what she hopes is a sultry grin. “That last one, we can actually do.”

Letting out an exhausted chuckle, he swipes his damp hair out of his eyes. “Could do the ladder one too. As long as you don’t fall.”

“Could do the ladder one while we write,” she points out. “Two birds, one stone.”

His smile is hungry, but his eyes are already getting heavy as he drags a pillow under his head. “Can’t wait.”

“To eat me out on a ladder?”

“To be near you,” he replies softly. “And to fuck you for days as soon as we can be in the same room.” The glow on his face is impossibly fond, and she can read the I love you on his face. But he bites his lip and keeps the words to himself.

Even though it’s exactly what she asked for, it itches in her heart.

The next day, that itch still lingers alongside the pile of other worries as Julie makes her way to Elysian Park for a socially distanced hangout with Alex and Reggie. Luke had been part of the original plans, but he backed out at the last minute with a fake headache to avoid seeing her in person. From the loaded glance Alex and Reggie exchange before telling her, they don’t buy the headache story, but she’s not exactly sure what they do believe.

“Is he okay otherwise?” she asks.

“Yeah?” Alex answers on a delay as he gets settled on the guys’ picnic blanket six feet away from her. Her itchy patch of grass feels very insufficient by comparison.

“You don’t sound sure.”

“He, uh, spends a lot of time in his room.”

“But his mood seems good,” Reggie pipes up.

Guilt sprouts in her rib cage. He’s spending lots of time in his room to be with her, and it’s clearly worrying or at least confusing Alex and Reggie. Ugh, she needs to get over herself and tell them.

She’s not sure what expression is visible on her face around the mask, but Alex’s forehead crinkles up and he adds softly, “We’d tell you if we were worried.”

“If it makes you feel better,” Reggie explains cheerfully, “we’re pretty sure he’s just jerking off a lot.”

With a loud groan, Alex facepalms. “Okay, Julie definitely doesn’t need to know that.” He gestures apologetically at Reggie. “I’m sorry about him.”

What’s a normal reaction to learning about your platonic friend’s masturbation habits? Julie tries to keep her face blank. Have the guys heard him? Luke tends to say her name a lot when he comes—do they think he’s holed up in his room heartbroken about her dating someone else and jacking off to the thought of her?

… yeah, they’re definitely worried about him and not telling her. Even though she knows they don’t need to be worried right now, the fact that they’d keep it from her pours salt on her soul.

“Enough about him!” Reggie says quickly. “I want to hear about you! What’s up?” He opens a bag of popcorn and unhooks one side of his Charmander mask, letting it flap on the side of his face. Even from a six foot distance, seeing his bare mouth and chin in person feels weirdly inappropriate, like she’s walked in on her brother changing.

“Um…” Describing her life during a pandemic is impossible. What’s the most casual way to describe a daily mental breakdown? “Aside from band stuff, it’s mostly tutoring. Flynn and I watch a ton of TV and do pilates and doomscroll. I help my brother with his homework and I’m still trying to teach Dad how to use FaceTime. That’s basically everything.”

Reggie tosses some popcorn into his mouth. “And?”

“And what?”

“The guy you’re seeing!?”

Oh.

Alex and Reggie are watching her eagerly, and their posture throws her. In the past, they haven’t really asked questions about her love life or sex life. They both seemed very uncomfortable anytime it came up, and she’d always had to swallow that angry lump of irritation in her throat at the differences between how she and the guys were treated. But now that she thinks about it, Luke was always there for those conversations, wasn’t he? Maybe those reactions had nothing to do with who was speaking, and everything to do with who was listening. They seem downright thrilled by the conversation now.

“He’s…” Just the thought of her boyfriend makes a massive grin spill over her face. She doesn’t want to lie or tell the guys anything she wouldn’t tell them if they knew who she was talking about. Leaning back on her hands, she hides the wrist with the bond touch bracelet behind her back in case they recognize it, and taps a quick “thinking of you” to Luke. “He’s amazing.”

“Shit, your smile,” Alex whispers, eyes crinkling above his pink tie-dye mask. In all the time she’s known him, Julie has seen the drummer’s incredible potential for kindness, but he’s rarely soft in the way that Luke and Reggie are. Right now, the grin in his eyes wraps her in a down comforter of friendship. And when he takes off his mask and folds it neatly into his pocket, she’s hit with the full force of that warmth, like opening an oven door.

Her smile just gets wider, which must be saying something if it’s this visible to Alex around her mask. The joy actually aches in the muscles of her cheeks. “Yeah, I’m embarrassingly happy.”

Popping open a Tupperware of sliced carrots, he carefully selects one. “Not embarrassing. It’s really good to see you like this.” On autopilot, he holds the Tupperware in Julie’s direction. When his brain catches up with him, his shoulders slump.

Damn it, now she really wants a carrot.

“It’s going good then?” Reggie asks, throwing more popcorn in the direction of his mouth and accidentally tossing some on a disgusted Alex.

Julie’s fingers dig into the grass, longing for something to do to keep themselves busy. “The timing’s obviously weird, so I’m,” she makes pointed eye contact with Alex, “worrying about everything.” He laughs sympathetically. “But it’s going really well.”

Reggie bounces up and down, his mask swinging precariously from his ear. “When do we get to meet him?”

Fuck. There’s no way to answer that without lying.

Alex must read the stress on her face, because he rushes to add, “We just want to make sure he’s good enough for our sister. Not that we don’t trust your judgment, but-okay, you slept with Nick, so actually, I’m not sold on your judgment.”

“Hey!” she cries out in a defensive laugh, but he shrugs unrepentantly, a snarky smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth, and all she can do is roll her eyes back.

“And obviously we want to know if the sex is good,” Reggie jumps in.

Alex shoves a carrot into Reggie’s mouth to silence him. “Okay, we do not.”

But Reggie bites the carrot in half and keeps talking around it. “Because you deserve to have good sex for once.”

Normally Julie only talks about this stuff with Flynn, but Flynn’s too confident to really understand some of Julie’s insecurities, and sometimes Julie leaves conversations feeling heard but not seen. The words spill out before she can stop them. “Honestly, I’m more worried that I’ll be bad?” she confesses to her lap, before darting her eyes up to see if she’s made the guys uncomfortable. But Alex raises a surprisingly nonjudgmental eyebrow and Reggie tilts his head curiously, gesturing for her to go on. “He’s more experienced than me and I just feel like I’m… behind on how much sex I’m supposed to have had at this point in my life.”

“Okay, there’s no amount of sex you ever need to have had, so jot that down,” Alex cuts in. But then his voice softens. “I get it. Willie has a bunch of exes, and he’s my first boyfriend—you know how insecure I was about that in the beginning.”

It hasn’t come up in the years since, so looking back at the memory feels like peering through a thick layer of dust. But now that she’s actively looking at it, the outline looks so familiar: Alex’s insecurity and self-consciousness and spiraling and that one weekend he frantically read The Gay Man’s Kama Sutra like he was cramming for a test, even down to making flashcards for terminology. “Are you still?”

He shakes his head. “Partly because we’ve been together so long that it’s hard to remember before us. But even in the beginning, Willie was so loud about how much he didn’t care about it. All he wanted to do was help me figure out what I liked, and he was so curious that I kind of felt like we had the same level of knowledge.”

A shiver runs down Julie’s legs as her body viscerally relives the last time she and Luke hooked up. His insatiable curiosity as he catalogued every single thing she said and did to herself on camera. She wouldn’t be surprised if he has literal checklists in his notebook somewhere: things they both like to do, things they don’t like, things they’ll try. Now that she thinks about it, it’s the same way he handles career stuff when he gets nervous—he does a shit ton of research and prep so he can take full advantage of any opportunity the instant it comes up.

Is he nervous too? Fondness swims through her heart at the thought.

“Plus,” Reggie adds with all the authority of the person in the conversation who’s had sex with the most people: four. “Sex is so different with each person. Experience in general is less important than experience with that specific person.”

A reluctantly impressed smile wriggles at the corner of Alex’s mouth. “Surprisingly wise, Reg.”

“Thanks, I’ve been practicing dating advice soundbites for TikTok.”

“That’s-okay.”

“I just want it to be good,” Julie confesses, plucking a handful of grass from the ground. “At this point, it looks like it’s going to be a full year before we can be in the same room, and that’s such a long drum roll. There’s no way it won’t be anticlimactic. It’s too much time to think about it.”

“Which sounds like a nightmare, and I couldn’t handle that,” Alex starts, as if Julie isn’t already drowning. She flicks grass in his direction, and he ducks and quickly adds, “But it’s going to be exciting just getting to be in the same room. And the more you have sex, the better it’ll get. If you’re really invested in each other, some awkward sex the first time isn’t going to tank your relationship. Promise.”

It’s been easy to focus on Luke when she thinks about how much she misses the guys’ cozy, beloved apartment in Koreatown, but she misses all of them. Alex and Reggie are her brothers just as much as Carlos is and just being around them relaxes her. Her worries don’t feel soothed exactly, but Flynn’s approach has just been to tell Julie that she’s being ridiculous, which might be true but doesn’t always help. Alex’s slightly more sympathetic approach is harder to dismiss.

“Sooo, back to my question!” Reggie asks through another mouthful of popcorn. “When do we get to meet him!?”

Julie can’t hold back her grin at his enthusiasm, even as the question rattles in her gut. “You know how you don’t say you’re pitching a no-hitter until it’s done?”

Alex snorts. “I’ll have to take your word for it.”

“If you label it early, you jinx it.” It’s not the main reason she’s avoiding telling them, but as she puts words to it, she realizes it’s maybe a bigger motivation than she’s admitted to herself. She’s not normally a superstitious person, but she doesn’t have Luke to ground her. Every day that they’re apart, a new worry grows. Right now, the relationship feels like a ghost—it can’t be hurt because it’s not corporeal. What if telling the guys makes the relationship solid in a way that makes it easier to damage?

“Hey, there’s no pressure,” Reggie insists, uncharacteristically calm. “Introduce us whenever you want. We’re just really happy for you.”

Her heart swells with affection, and she’s overwhelmed by the memory of their spacious living room. Even though the room has three couches, when the band hangs out there, they’re usually all crammed into one. A pile of reassuring, tactile love. She’d give anything to be in that cozy pile of friendship again. Or even just to hug them.

But the pandemic is still raging on, so when their picnic comes to an end, she stands six feet away while they do a band circle, her empty palms hovering in the air.

When she gets back to her car, she rips off her mask, plops into the driver’s seat, and collapses her forehead on the steering wheel. Before she can really start to mope, her phone chirps with Luke’s text tone.

Luke: have fun?

She bites her lip, trying to figure out if there’s bitterness in the question. Months ago, when they all went to Runyon, he hadn’t looked overcome by lust or even all that affected by her presence. Maybe she’s alone in having no restraint in person, and he resents her for having to stay home.

Julie: I did!
Reggie was very focused on making sure my boyfriend will be good in bed when restrictions lift

Luke: your boyfriend’s got the same focus

A wave of heat blasts through her body at the thought. She taps her bracelet twice—one short, one long—and texts back:

Julie: I should be home in 20?

Luke: i’ll be on zoom

Julie’s been putting so much energy into not telling the guys about her relationship that it doesn’t occur to her that other people might care until she’s FaceTiming her dad the next morning, and he muses, in a painfully patient tone of voice, “You know, I’m a little hurt. Reggie said you’re dating someone, and I haven’t heard a word about it.”

Shit.

“Um…” Julie focuses on the bowl she’s washing, as if it might be able to suggest a plausible lie.

But her dad takes pity on her. Or decides to torture her more—it’s unclear. “He mentioned that you’ve been very secretive about the whole thing. So my hope is that you’re dating someone we know, and you didn’t mention it because you would have felt too guilty lying to me.”

“I’m not lying-”

“So you’re not dating Luke?”

She can’t stop the smile that explodes across her face at her boyfriend’s name. “How did you know?”

“Mija,” he sighs, simultaneously fond and exasperated, “Whenever Emily, Mitch, Rose, and I talked about your hangouts, we called you the bride and groom. Neither of you was ever subtle, but I thought it might take the end of the world for either of you to do something about it. And it turns out I was right.”

“Dad.”

“Also, while I’m not going to pretend to understand youth culture, I do know what that watermelon song is about.”

The soap-slick bowl slips out of Julie’s hands and lands in the sink, splashing water all over her face. Maybe she should just hang up this call. This is an absolute nightmare.

He’s a good dad, so he lets her hide behind a dish towel as she dries herself off before he asks, firmly and kindly, “How is it going? You started seeing each other in lockdown, right? The timing can’t have been easy.”

Almost as if Luke can hear them, the bond touch bracelet buzzes three times—long-long-short. I want to write with you.

“It’s going really well,” she says, trying to keep her voice from being too gushy. She wants her dad to think that she’s an adult woman in a serious relationship, not a giggling fifteen year old. But she can still hear her exhausted mother’s voice ringing in her head from all those years ago. “Do you think long distance is a relationship killer?” she asks casually as she sets the bowl on the drying rack and grabs a dirty plate to wash.

The corner of her dad’s face that’s actually in the frame gives her a small smile, understanding in a way that pokes the sore bruise of her heart. “No.”

“Really?”

“Your mother and I knew a lot of couples who did long distance, and a lot of them broke up, sure. But it was never because of the distance. Long distance rarely creates problems—it just exploits existing ones.”

“You and Mom made it look so easy.”

“It wasn’t always. Especially in the beginning, we were terrible at communicating. We had fights about…” He breaks off in a laugh, smiling off in the distance at something that doesn’t exist anymore. “… gosh, fights about how we were on the same page, but hadn’t told each other that. My main advice? Communicate, even when you think something is obvious, or when it makes you feel vulnerable. Especially then.”

Through the depths of the sink, her bond touch bracelet winks at her, distorted by the refraction of the overhead light on the dirty water. She gives the bracelet one long tap, and lets herself picture Luke, surrounded by the guys in a pile on the couch, smiling down at the touch.

“It’s scary,” she mumbles.

“I know. But it’s worth it.” Her dad tilts his head, sending it off-screen entirely. “Are you really worried?”

She scrubs at the dried sauce on the plate, but it stays stubborn. Letting the plate sink into the water to soak, she turns her full focus to her dad. The familiar yellow of the Molina house kitchen that fills the whole screen soothes her, as does her professional photographer father’s complete inability to use a camera phone. “Like you said, it’s an awkward time for a new relationship.”

“It’s hardly new. You two have been friends for a long time, and it’s been a while since that friendship was platonic.”

“Yeah, apparently tenth grade on his end?”

He snorts. “Earlier than that. At least since the incident with Bobby Wilson.”

“With Bobby?”

The phone jerks as her dad readjusts the frame—still putting himself off-center, but visible. He holds up a conciliatory hand. “Now I don’t know the details, but when Emily called to tell us that the boys wouldn’t need the studio for Sunset Swerve anymore, she said Luke unstrung Bobby’s guitar as ‘an act of chivalry.’”

Holy shit.

“Luke unstrung his guitar?”

“And as your mother pointed out, guitars are sacred for that boy, so he must have felt very protective of you.”

But… she barely even knew Bobby. He’d never been welcoming, so they’d never really interacted and she’d tended to leave Sunset Curve rehearsals when he arrived. He’d been one of those people who was always around without feeling like he was very important, until he suddenly vanished under mysterious circumstances and she’d been left with only speculation. Bigger in his absence than in his presence. But what if it was never about the band? What if it’s not something that could happen to her? What if-

No. The Sunset Curve recording—of course it can happen to her.

But what if-

No.

Realizing her dad is watching her with a patient but confused expression, Julie grasps for the first question she can think of that isn’t about Bobby. One that’s been passively sitting in the back of her mind since March. “What did Mom think of him?” she asks as she starts scrubbing the plate again, the sauce sliding off more easily.

“Oh, she loved him. Those two were kindred spirits. And she knew you two were… But you were sixteen. I’d like to say that she gave a blessing for your marriage or some such, but she took it as seriously as you can take two sixteen-year-olds who can’t even be honest with each other about how they feel.” He shoots her a pointed look that she can only return with an awkward smile. The night Nick had picked her up for prom, her dad had tutted to himself under his breath while taking pictures. At the time, his annoyance hadn’t made sense—some puritanical dad bullshit she wouldn’t have expected from Ray Molina. Now, it clicks into place. Her dad’s face turns thoughtful. “Now that I think of it, your mom did say that she hoped you would date someone who treats you exactly how Luke treats you. So maybe she did give her blessing.”

“We’re not getting married,” she splutters, scrubbing the plate too hard. The water sloshes around the sink and whips back at her, drenching her shirt in dirty water.

“Ever?” her dad asks slyly.

“Papi!” He shrugs innocently. And she wants to give him crap for it, but more importantly, she wants to know what he thinks about their relationship. She can’t ask her mother, and Luke doesn’t speak to his parents anymore. Her dad is the only parent who can weigh in. Patting herself down with the dish towel, she asks casually, “What about you? I’m not asking for your blessing, because that’s bullshit, but do you… like him? For me?”

A soft smile sits on his lips for several seconds before he answers. “The way he is around you has always reminded me of how I feel about your mother.” He puts his hand over his heart, basking in the swell of those feelings. Julie looks at her feet, giving him a private moment with her mother. “If my children want romance in their lives, my dearest wish is for them to be loved the way I love her. And I’ve never doubted that Luke would give you that.” Moisture prickles around Julie’s eyes and she can’t manage words around the lump in her throat. When she smiles, a happy sob coughs out of her. “So please try not to worry too much about the distance and the timing. Just be in your relationship, mija.”

And there’s something about the way her dad says that—as if he’s got the answer key to life and he’s told her the answer to the question is “c” with unshakable confidence—that finally makes those words sink into her heart.

She’s had so many panicked conversations with everyone in her life, trying to get them to reassure her about her relationship. Maybe it’s time to finally have it with the only person who can.

At the afternoon’s writing session, Luke barely gets his hello out before Julie asks desperately, “Why did you unstring Bobby’s guitar?”

Her boyfriend stares at her, mouth flopping around like a fish. “What?”

“Bobby Wilson? In seventh grade?”

“Jesus.” He huffs out a humorless laugh as he runs his hand over his face, getting settled in his desk chair. “Haven’t thought about that in ages.”

“Luke,” she stresses, voice warbling with desperation.

Clocking how serious she is, he scoots his chair closer to his laptop, urgently leaning forward like he can reach her through the screen. “Everything okay?”

Trying to create a professional distance, she sits back in her own desk chair. “You never told me why you kicked him out of Sunset Curve.”

Luke blinks, his face closing down into a smooth mask as he shrugs. “Creative differences.”

“You unstrung his guitar.”

“One of the differences is that he’s a piece of shit and we aren’t.”

She crosses her arms, grounding herself. No matter what the answer is, she can handle this. She will handle this. “Did he say something about me?”

Luke heaves a sigh and slumps back in his chair, biting his fist. After a very long silence, he finally mumbles around his hand, “Yeah.”

“What did he say?”

A long breath hisses out between Luke’s teeth. “Jules-”

“It was seventh grade. It couldn’t have been that bad.”

But Luke winces, bouncing one of his fists off the other like a Newton’s cradle. “He didn’t like that I took your suggestions on Curve songs and ignored his. So he lost his temper and said…” Luke twists his mouth up, like he’s angry at himself for even thinking the words he didn’t say, and the punch of his fists gets faster and angrier. His voice turns stilted and formal. “He insulted your musical talent, your writing, and your appearance. Which would have been bullshit enough, but that was when his older cousin Trevor was staying with him, and Bobby’d picked up a lot of shitty words.” Luke’s jaw ticks, and she knows he’s replaying the specific words in his head and getting angrier all over again. “I told him he was wrong and needed to shut up. He tried to start a whole ‘ooh, Luke has a crush on Julie’ thing and I told him I was just stating facts. But he kept being a dick until Alex said, ‘well, I’m gay and I think she’s incredible and beautiful, and I won’t be in a band with someone who doesn’t know that.’”

Julie’s heart softens for her bandmates, which only gets softer when she pictures their indignant, pudgy, acne-ridden seventh-grade faces defending her. “Wait, is that how Alex came out?”

“To Bobby, yeah. He’d already come out to me and Reg, but it was still pretty epic.”

“And then you unstrung his guitar?”

Letting his fists come together, Luke interlocks his fingers and tucks them under his chin. “He left it there after insulting you. Brought it on himself. Why are you asking about this?”

Tucking her knees under her chin and hugging her shins, she nibbles at her lip, trying to find the courage to do what her father said and be honest. Her bond touch bracelet lights up and gives her wrist a reassuring squeeze. A soft smile slips over her face as she looks up at Luke. He watches her with a glowing fondness that’s only slightly tempered by undeniable worry.

“I’ve been waiting to get the Bobby treatment since ninth grade,” she admits before she can second-guess herself, slotting her chin between her knees.

“The Bobby treatment?” he asks, baffled.

“To get kicked out of the band one day whenever you decide you’re done with me.”

“What?” Luke spits out, reeling backwards.

“You guys never said why Bobby left, so I thought…”

“Julie.”

No, he doesn’t get to act like she’s being ridiculous. “Look at what’s happening right now!”

He looks over his shoulder as if he’s expecting something to pop up and attack him. Finding nothing, he turns back to her, rumpling his forehead in exaggerated confusion and shrugging blankly.

“You’re recording without me?” she continues.

His nostrils flare. “No, we’re not.”

“You’re planning to.”

His eyes narrow and his tongue swipes slowly over his lips. Her heart clenches at the sudden realization that, whatever he says next, her whole life is about to change. “You never looked at Bright?” he asks softly.

“Not my band. I didn’t think I had to,” she replies defensively.

“Look at Bright.”

She grabs her phone and scrolls down through her emails to find the file he sent. As the sheet music loads, she reads the opening—a transposed piano part and a lead vocal line that-

Oh.

Luke ticks up the side of his mouth in a sad smile. “I told you I wasn’t recording shit without you.”

“But how-”

“We’ll record temp tracks and send you the equipment, you record your parts and send the gear back, we’ll use your part to dictate what we do.” She mouths a silent oh. But his face collapses. “I-I thought that was obvious. The whole time we’ve been talking about Curve songs, you actually thought I’d cut you out like that?”

The guitarist is always so much larger than life and overflowing with energy that she forgets how small and shriveled he can look when he’s hurt, and her fingers ache to reach out for the pitiful boy with the slumped shoulders. She taps the bracelet once, but that’s nowhere near the same as an actual hug. “It’s just stuff I’m going through. It’s got nothing to do with you, honest.” But he doesn’t look any better, and she doesn’t feel any better. “I’m sorry,” she sighs heavily.

“Why are you sorry?” he asks miserably, pressing his fists against his temples. “I’m the one who made you feel-”

“No,” she cuts him off firmly, lifting her chin off of her knees. “You didn’t do anything. The Sunset Curve thing is something I’ve been insecure about for ages, and I never told you about it, so you couldn’t have known-”

He groans. “I knew.”

“What?”

His hand gestures frantically—a clear give-me-some-credit. “But I didn’t know it was this big of a thing. I should have-fuck, I should’ve seen this coming.”

“Luke, no. You don’t get to be mad at yourself over my mistake.”

“But-”

Holding up both of her fists to the camera, she snaps, “I’ll fight you, Patterson.” He eyes her miserably, but his lips finally break into a bitter, unamused smile. And as his words soak into her, she lets out a strained laugh. “It’s always been there, but it’s not normally a big deal. My dad was saying earlier that that’s what long distance does. It takes whatever issues you have and exploits it.”

Luke slowly drags his hands down his face. “So what’s the issue? Cause I can’t erase Sunset Curve, or having longer friendships with Alex and Reg, and I wouldn’t even if I could.”

“And I wouldn’t ask you to. It’s just… the Carrie Thing. I don’t want to just be your girlfriend.”

His head is shaking before she finishes speaking. “You’re the star. It’s your band, Jules. If something ever went so wrong with us that we couldn’t both stay, I’m the one who goes. That’s not even a question.”

Tears—grateful, relieved, loved tears—pool in her eyes, and she wipes them away with the sleeve of her sweatshirt.

But there’s no relief on his face. “Do you believe that? Cause this,” he waves a hand between them, “won’t work if you don’t believe me.”

Panic flutters in her heart. Of course he’s right, but it hadn’t occurred to her that those were the stakes of the mountain of insecurities in her heart. Does she believe him? On everything else, absolutely. But on this?

“What would you do instead? If you left the band?” It’s one thing to promise to leave, and another to have seriously considered it enough to know what that would look like.

His shoulders hike up as he stares around the room she can’t see. “Honestly,” he croaks out, “no fucking clue. If things between us get that messed up…” The deep bite he sinks into his lower lip looks like it draws blood. “That’s my whole life gone. ‘Leave the state, restart everything about myself’ territory. I can’t tell you what the next steps would be. All I can do is promise I’d take them.”

“Leave the state?” It’s a fictional scenario and she hasn’t seen him in person in months, but the thought of him not being in her city still tears at her heart like a fist pulling up grass.

“Maybe move to Nashville, turn country, pump out a double album about how heartbroken I am.”

“That’d probably dominate the charts.”

The corner of his mouth ticks up humorlessly. “Reg’d kill me if I went country.” He huffs out a long exhale and raises his eyebrows, a clear “so? is that enough?” in his eyes.

It has to be. She won’t sacrifice this, him, to the worry of how this might end. “I’d stay, you’d go,” she tries out, the words fitting uncomfortably on her tongue. He nods, some of the tension easing out of his shoulders. “Let’s not let it get to that.”

This time, when he nods, his whole body relaxes, eyes swooping over her like something precious. She finally slips her legs out from under her chin, letting go of her protective shell.

“What about you?” she asks. “Is there something on your end that’s getting exploited by the distance?”

He pops his jaw and looks down at his fists, nervously banging together in the Newton’s cradle move again.

Fuck. “Tell me,” she whispers.

Swallowing painfully, he confesses to his fists, “I feel like I mean less to you than you mean to me. And maybe that’s okay, cause you mean so much to me that it leaves a lot of headroom. But I’m worried you won’t want me out there.” He jerks his head toward the light streaming through his window, looking every inch the boy who basically lived in her studio for all of high school because he didn’t feel like anyone in his house cared about him.

Her heart rips through her ribs.

“Luke, I’ve wanted you out there since I first met you. And…” How on earth is she supposed to unpack the first thing he said when it’s just so wildly incorrect? “You’re my person. You’re the love of my life.” His mouth jolts open, staring at her like he’s just been smacked in the chest with lightning. As if the fact that she loves him is somehow news to him, instead of a very obvious fact that everyone she’s ever met seems to have guessed. It’s enough to push her to add, “For fuck’s sake, I love you.”

“I-I thought we were waiting on that,” he whispers hoarsely.

“Because I thought you knew, and we could save saying the words for in-person! I didn’t realize you didn’t know. I love you,” she repeats, putting more feeling on it until her voice trembles under the weight of it.

Tears shimmering in his eyes, his whole face glows around his awed smile. “I love you,” he rasps instantly. “I love you so goddamn much.”

Even though she knew it already, the words sound incredible coming from his lips, the particular warm way the vowels leave his mouth. She scrubs her face with the sleeve of her sweatshirt.

“Fuck, I wanna kiss you so bad,” he groans.

She laughs wetly. “See, this is why I wanted to wait.”

Reaching off camera, Luke’s hand returns with a fistful of tissues, making her laugh again. He winks at her and mops his face, taking a moment to steady his breathing and compose himself. Picking up an unused tissue, he offers it to her ruefully. When she smiles sadly back, he chucks it to the side and leans back in his chair.

“Ray gave you advice?” he asks. “You, uh, told him about us?”

Of course Luke picked up on that. “He guessed. But yeah.”

“He have any thoughts?” Luke asks lightly. But she can hear the weight of the question. How important her dad’s approval is to him.

“He’s really happy about it. And, um, he said my mom would approve too.”

The smile on Luke’s face is so bright that she can’t stop herself from fumbling for the bond touch bracelet and sending three short taps in a row. He lifts his wrist. “What’s that mean?”

“I love you.”

His whole face rumples up with bright dimples. God, it’s violently unfair that she can’t trace her fingers over every crevasse of his joy and kiss it. He bites his lip to calm the smile a bit, and the corner of his mouth rucks up before he admits, “My folks would be happy too. It was, like, the one thing my mom and I still agreed on.”

But even as he says it, she realizes they both feel apathetic about that knowledge. He hasn’t spoken to his parents in five years. Their approval doesn’t matter. If she wants his family’s support, she needs to tell the guys.

Maybe she’s finally ready.

The group hangout the next night starts with very low energy. There’s bad political news, bad Covid news, and even if all of that wasn’t happening, everyone's had a meh day, even down to the underwhelming Chinese takeout they all got from the same place to pretend they were having dinner together. The only good thing about the day is this moment here: all of them sharing the frustration and pain through the screen, making it less lonely.

Willie drapes his legs over Alex’s lap and rests his dispirited head on his boyfriend’s shoulder. “Does anyone have any good news to share? Literally anything?”

And finally, with the storm of the week settling into her heart, Julie feels ready enough to say, “I do.”

Flynn’s confusion traces the side of her face, and Luke raises an eyebrow, trying to figure out what she could possibly be talking about.

“At least, it’s good news for me. I hope it’s good for other people,” she rushes to add, focusing her attention on the part of the laptop screen where Reggie and Alex bookend Luke on the couch.

“What is it?” Reggie asks with his customary enthusiasm.

“Um.” Julie sits up straight and folds her hands on her knee. “Things have been going really well with the guy I’m seeing, and it’s gotten really serious. Or, it was always serious, but now it’s…” She trails off, because Luke’s face is starting to glow as he realizes where she’s going with this. Asking for his permission, she tilts her head, and he gives a tiny, almost invisible nod. Okay, enough drumroll. “I would introduce you guys to him, but I don’t have to. My boyfriend is Luke.”

Reggie’s mouth drops open and he spins his head to stare at Luke with a growing smile. Significantly less delighted, Alex wheels on the guitarist. “How long?”

“Uh.” Luke cuts his eyes to her. There isn’t a clear answer to that—they really should pick a date for their anniversary and come up with a “how we got together” story that doesn’t involve Zoom masturbation. “Basically since lockdown started?”

“You didn’t tell us?” The hurt in Alex’s voice is so sharp that Julie’s struck by yet another a wave of guilt.

“That was my fault,” she jumps in. “I got all up in my head about some stuff.”

“But how-”

“You’re finally dating???” Reggie squeals, cutting Alex off completely.

Luke bites his lip and grins at the camera, a gentle, private smile that’s just for her even though there are four other people on the call. “Yeah,” he replies softly, awe shining off of him.

Throwing his arms around Luke, Reggie squeezes him tight. “Oh thank god. I’ve wanted you two to date for forever, but she smiles so much when she talks about her boyfriend that I was starting to ship them, and I felt like a bad friend!”

“That’s-okay.”

Beaming, Luke rests his head on top of Reggie’s, basking in the touch that Julie desperately wishes she could give him. Almost like she senses the ache in Julie’s heart, Flynn wraps an arm around Julie and tugs her in tight.

Alex is the only one who doesn’t look happy. Poking his boyfriend’s face, he asks flatly, “Why don’t you look surprised?”

With a sheepish grin, Willie nods in Luke’s direction. “Cause Luke is terrible at controlling his face. No offense, dude.”

“Nah, that’s true,” Luke concedes, proving the point by flashing Julie another heart-stopping grin.

Willie ruffles his fingers through Alex’s hair affectionately. “I don’t know how you didn’t notice when Julie told us she was seeing someone. It was so obvious.”

“I’ve been a little distracted by the end of the world. And the start of lockdown was just…” Alex tries to count on his fingers. “It’s still March, right?”

“Hotdog, it’s almost October.”

Alex whips toward Luke again, re-outraged, but Reggie starts giggling. “If he’s dating the frontwoman, does that mean Luke is a groupie for his own band?”

“Very on-brand, Patterson,” Flynn hums.

Narrowing his eyes, Luke opens his mouth to argue, but then he pauses to think it over and shrugs. “Yeah, that’s fair.”

“Alex,” Flynn observes sharply. “You haven’t shared your thoughts.”

Alex leans away from Luke so he can run appraising eyes over the guitarist. Luke’s Adam’s apple bobs nervously and Julie’s stomach clenches, prepping for rejection. What if Alex doesn’t approve? What will that mean for them? For the band? What if-

Sticking a threatening chopstick under Luke’s nose, Alex says calmly, “Fuck this up, Patterson, and you’re out of the band, got that?”

Maybe it shouldn’t make Julie glow, but it absolutely does. Dead serious, Luke bobs a nod. “I know.”

Julie sends him three quick taps through the bond touch. The serious mask breaks as Luke beams at his wrist, his smile taking up his whole face. Alex grins at the sight and engulfs Reggie and Luke in a rare hug. “I’m so fucking happy for you guys.”

Tugging Julie into a tighter hug, Flynn squeals, “Fucking finally!”

“Fucking finally!” Reggie, Alex, and Willie echo.

After years of pining and months of anxiety, Julie’s heart giggles in her chest. Surrounded by the love of her friends, her band, and her boyfriend, it finally feels like things might settle down. Luke sends a triple tap through the bracelet, underlining the moment—good things can happen. And with these people by her side, how could they not?

So naturally, once Julie and Flynn hang up the call, a new wrench gets thrown into the relationship.

As Flynn packs away their leftovers into Tupperware, she says casually, “I’m thinking of moving back home when our lease is up.”

“What?” Julie asks, almost dropping the plate she’s washing. She saves it at the last second—she’s not getting splashed with sink water a third time this week.

Flynn fiddles with the lid, putting too much focus on snapping it shut. “I love living with you, but I miss my family and I’m going stir crazy in this tiny apartment and the economy’s absolutely fucked so I want to save money. A lot of reasons.”

It’s not that Julie doesn’t share a lot of the same reasons. But moving back home, no matter how much she loves her family, feels stifling. She likes building her own life, deciding which pieces of her childhood still work for Adult Julie and which she wants to do differently. Flynn’s never had any trouble doing her own thing no matter who’s around and Julie really envies that, but she’s nowhere near that level of confidence yet. “That makes sense,” she says, trying to inject more enthusiasm in her voice than she feels. What does that mean for her? Can she afford to rent a studio apartment in LA?

“I won’t do it if you want to stay here,” Flynn adds quickly. “But I’m mentioning this now because maybe there’s somewhere else you want to live.”

All the calm and love and confidence Julie was feeling five minutes ago drains out of her in a second. “What, with Luke? I can’t—it’s way too soon.”

Flynn shrugs, leaning against the counter to put herself in Julie’s eyeline. “Our lease isn’t up for several months. You guys will have been together for over a year by that point.” The easy confidence with which she predicts that they’ll still be together makes Julie’s stomach lurch. Don’t call it a no-hitter yet.

“But we haven’t really been together! We haven’t even kissed since sixth grade.” What if when they’re in person, it’s Runyon all over again—awkward and stilted, with none of the easy chemistry they have online?

“Plenty of people go from long distance to living together. It’s not like this time doesn’t count.”

This isn’t normal long distance, Julie wants to shout. It’s not like she and Luke have been visiting each other and confirming that they work together in the real world. Maybe they only worked in person when they could flirt with the idea of being together without actually trying to be. Or maybe they will work in person, and as soon as they’re in the same room again, everything will be normal and amazing and perfect. She has no way of knowing where they’ll be on that spectrum until it happens, and she’s not gambling them on a guess.

“It’s just too soon,” Julie insists, scrubbing the plate in earnest and trying to focus all of her energy on it. “But you should move back home if you want to. I’ll move in with my dad or something.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.” Flynn shoves the Tupperware into the fridge. “You should move in with the guys. We both know Luke would say yes in a heartbeat. Just give it a-”

“Flynn,” Julie cuts in, abandoning the plate in the soapy water so she can turn her full, serious attention on her best friend. “I love you so much, but I’m getting kind of tired of people who aren’t in the relationship I’m in telling me to just trust that it’s all going to be okay.”

Resting her head against the fridge, Flynn studies Julie for a long moment. Finally huffing out a long breath and nodding, she apologetically offers, “I’m not trying to push.”

“You are,” Julie says fondly. “It’s in your DNA.”

Puffing up her cheeks in a guilty smile, Flynn shrugs. “I know Runyon really spooked you-”

“-Flynn, seriously-”

“-and I’m sorry. It sucks. The whole thing sucks.”

Half-heartedly starting to scrub the plate again, Julie eyes Flynn warily. “It does suck.”

She braces herself for a “but,” but Flynn lets the validation sit there without a caveat, just watching Julie.

The silence is worse than the pushing. Without Flynn’s words, all that’s left is the slosh of water and the jumpy beat of Julie’s heart and the images of that K-town apartment. The homey living room and the beautiful kitchen that she knows like the back of her hand, and the cozy bedroom that she’s memorized from the small glimpses she’s seen on Zoom and is desperate to know the full layout of. It’s too easy to picture herself there, her everyday stitched into Luke’s. Doing the dishes together. Grocery shopping together. Cuddling on the couch silently scrolling on their phones. Showering together—not to hook up, but just to spend a little extra time together. God, she could commute to band practice by walking into the living room, instead of creating a Zoom meeting or driving thirty minutes (fifty with traffic) and trawling for a parking spot for twenty minutes (forty on a street cleaning day). Her heart tugs toward the daydream like a magnet.

“I don’t even know if he has space for me,” Julie says hesitantly, trying to steady her heart.

“I would bet my stimulus check if you told Luke you were maybe kinda thinking about moving in, he would immediately burn half of his belongings to make room.”

Julie snorts and rolls her eyes at the hyperbole. But the magnet yanks in her chest again. Rinsing off the plate, she puts it in the drying rack and leans her back against the counter. “If things go okay when we’re in person again,” she says finally. “I’ll think about it.”

Flynn’s face lights up and she dances in place, socks slipping dangerously on the kitchen tile.

“I said think about it!” Julie repeats.

Still dancing, Flynn struts out of the kitchen toward her bedroom. “That’s all I’m asking,” she sings smugly, like “think about it” means “do it.”

If only Julie had Flynn’s certainty. Tapping her feet impatiently on the foor, Julie glances at her phone, as if there will be some alert saying that lockdown restrictions are lifted and she can drive to K-town right now and see whether her relationship is for keeps.

But there’s nothing.

That’s fine.

This is fine.

She’s waited this long; she can wait a little more.

… how much longer can lockdown last?