As some of you know it has been awhile due from losing inspiration and life happened but now I really want to continue this story and as same as always ALotMoreGinger helped me with editing. so please check her out she has a amazing story on her account. this chapter is long as a sorry for making you wait this long.

It had been a week after Melody’s funeral and there was some chaos from the night before. It was a normal day in the city; at least for some people, it was. Sam was skateboarding towards the Hawkins house. A place she used to call her home when she was younger. But eventually she moved in with one of Sinbad’s close friends, Kale, who became a makeshift father-figure. Back when  Tulio, Miguel, and him used to be in a gang when they were younger and dumber. Kale was one of the strongest men they had ever met and really understood people when things got hard.

For example, Kale understood what was going through the kids when they were being exceptionally troublesome. Eventually they got out of that bad headspace and started their adult lives. They started having families after they finished college. All  except Kale. He wanted a family of his own, but struggled to  find the right woman for him. In all honesty, he doesn’t think he doesn't have much time to pursue those sorts of relationships. But he was envious of his friends when he saw their wives and children every time they visited him. Then one day that changed when Sam came into his life. Little did he know, she felt the same exact way. Sinbad knew how Kale always wanted to be a parent, and Sam was in desperate need of a parent since her father had been abusing her. It was difficult for her to become comfortable being around adult men at first  but eventually Sam and Kale started acting like a typical father and daughter taking small steps.

Sam could very easily be the last one standing after a fight, or how she's always the mediator. When she and Jim had a fight from Melody's funeral and eventually he was the one to  give in. Finally arriving at their house, the pale blonde hopped off her board, knocked her closed fist on the door expecting Sarah. Instead Jim came out, and just from the way he held himself, she knew it  would take quite a long time for him to get over Melody’s death. Maybe he never would. It's hard to say this early on. There was a long and peaceful silence between them. Neither sure what to say exactly. One thought Sam had was that if she brought up the subject of Melody’s passing it'd make him upset. Jim just kept trying to rationalize that it was a dream, simply a nightmare and that he'll wake up and see Melody next to him smiling and healthy next to him, but sadly, he knew the reality was far more grim.It made him yearn to see any part of her that was left. He wanted to see the plaque by the beach with her name on it. “Should we use the car or walk over there?” He asked, his voice soft and sad, breaking the awkward silence between them.

His moody friend thought about it, telling him that they should use the car, since it would be faster for them to get there than walking would be. She's well aware he wants to see it, but she didn’t have much of a choice, she knew he wished his girlfriend was there, still waiting for him. They got into the car and drove off to the beach. On the way there they didn't pay much notice to the whirlpools in the water, thinking it was simply lightning when something flashed and burst out. It calmed down rather quickly, however. There was a figure wading in the water floating in the direction where Melody had been buried. As they came up  to the beach and parked the car, the teen boy was gazing off at the place where the grave was, while Sam looked down thinking to herself. “He isn’t ready for this. It’s been a long enough week as it is.” Eventually she stood beside him, hesitantly asking him. “Do you want me to come with you?” He shook his head, and grabbed the one unique seashell he had found with Melody while they were still alive. He told her she could come if she wants , but to watch from afar since he just wanted to be alone. Sam just nodded, understanding and accepting his words.

“Alright fine, don’t be afraid to take your time okay?” Jim nodded then started off towards the stone. While his friend sighs, leaning against his car, hoping he’ll be fine.

As the teen arrived at her grave, he just stared at it for a long while, before placing the small purple shell atop the front of her grave. Flashbacks to her death still haunt him. He keeps pleading, wishing it was a nightmare, wishing he could just go back in time to at least give her his final gift. But it's the past, it’s impossible to do such a thing now. His thoughts were interrupted after he heard a splash, turning around to see a female in the sand wearing a rather odd, vintage dress. He went up to her to see if she’s still breathing.

“Are you alright, Miss?” he asked as he  turned her head to make sure she could still breathe.

He felt his throat become dry after seeing her face clearly staring up at him.

“M-Mel?” his body was shaking, wondering if this was just another terrible flashback, another dream, but another part of him hoped it wasn't. He hugged the girl tightly, not caring how wet she was, or how strange the situation felt. All he cared about in that moment was having Melody back to his life.

It was too good to be true, way too good. The girl shifted a bit groaning, looking around as she found herself in Jim’s tight and loving arms. She looked up at him to see his face clearly. She was confused and not sure why he was crying into her hair.

“Who are you..?” her voice croaks.

Jim felt as though his heart was shot head on, he leaned back a bit to look at her, confused.

“Melody, you don't...remember me…?”

she shook her head, then said “No… To be completely honest, I’m not sure where I am...I don't think I met you either... I have to go home, sir, if my mom finds out I'm gone, she’ll-”

“Melody… You died…” Jim interrupts her, heartbroken.

“What…? no I wasn’t I was just swimming and then...” She trails off, rubbing the top of her head.

“I saw you, you were on the bed and then…” he didn't want to finish the sentence because he didn't want to remember how she died. Well, now he’s not sure she even died since she's right here in front of him.

Melody, or so he thinks she is, was very clearly confused and tried to remember the event of her death but she doesn't remember any of that at all.

“Hold on, how do you know my name?” she asked, finally coming to her senses fully.

He sighed, relieved she was alive, though still confused as to  why she was wearing a puffy dress. It looked like she was from olden times. Jim couldn't help but think that maybe, just maybe, she could’ve-’ He didn’t dare finish his thoughts. Melody spoke up again.

“I asked you a question Mister… um...”

“Jim… My name is Jim… I’m sorry, you just…  you look a lot like someone I know… and she's gone now…”

Melody couldn't help but to see his eyes how sad he looked after he spoke about someone. She felt bad for him but mostly she's too confused and worried to do.

“Listen, sir, I'm the princess of Denma- ” Jim immediately cuts her off after saying she was a  princess. That made Jim more shocked.

“A princess..?" Jim repeated. She nodded in response.

“Yes I am, and what's wrong with it?"

“What year do you think it is?"

She blinked but spoke “um…1636....why?”

"Melody, it’s 2020"

"What?" She screamed, her shaking hands pressed to her head, wondering  how this possibly happened to her, just while swimming in the ocean.

Jim on the other hand had some mixed feelings for this.

First he lost his girlfriend, secondly, there's now this girl from the past who resembled the love of his life, here by complete accident.

He tried to bury his feelings since the girl in front of him might now be having a mental breakdown from just learning it was a new year.

Melody wasn't sure how to really feel; sad, angry, confused, shockied? she didn't know. All she knew is that she might not be able to go back home from the mess she made in that castle.

All she did was swim in the ocean, away from her problems and now she's stuck in a completely different time.

"How am I going to get home?" She whimpered, while looking down at her lap, looking like she’s about to cry. "My parents are going to be furious if I don't get back. And then the castle is gonna be crazy, my grandfather will make a storm and-"

"Hey, wait a minute. I need you to listen to me Melody, okay?” He reassured her. “First you need to calm down a little. I know this is probably really shocking, and believe me, I am just as freaked out. But freaking out and dwelling on it isn't gonna help the situation." Jim said, holding her shoulders gently, trying to calm the princess down, looking into her fear filled eyes.

As much it pains him to see her when she isn't his Melody. He can't help but try to help her even if he knows it's bad for him. Though he knows better. No one can't ever replace Melody. The only problem now is, how is he going to explain all of this to Sam?

"Jim is everything ok I heard something stra-" Sam halted, unable to keep speaking after noticing who looks to be Melody.

Jim looked at her, clearly seeing Sam with her blank expression, knowing that wasn't good.

"Jim can you come over for a second?" She asked, trying to stay calm.

"Yeah"

He turned to Melody who had calmed, but is still clearly scared and confused, like a wounded animal.

"Look just stay here and I'll come back. We'll figure this out ok?" He smiled at her, trying to reassure her as best as he could.

"O-okay, yeah," she stuttered a bit, still uneasy.

Jim stood up and walked with Sam away from where the girl sat, so that she wouldn't hear their private conversation.

After he had walked far enough away, Melody finally noticed the large stone that had engraved her name into it, a beautiful purple shell resting on top of it. Well, the Melody that was from this time.

She could read some of the sand covered words that read "An adventurous daughter, A miracle to the world, and A loving friend. She will be missed." Melody also noticed there were some  letters haphazardly etched into the stone as if someone wrote it on their own with another rock.

‘JxM’ with a heart around it.

She understood a bit better why this Jim probably looked so broken when she told him the year and asked him who he was.

"Please tell me she doesn't look like someone who is 10 feet underground." Sam whispered, trying not to let anyone hear what's going on. It's obvious that she isn't taking this very well, taking it about as well as Melody seems to be.

"Listen, Sam, I know you're probably really confused, and believe me I'm this close to thinking I’ve gone absolutely insane" Jim said, holding his two fingers as close together as possible without touching.

"Oh no shit you don't, I don't want to lose you buddy. I ain't having this B.S." she patted his cheek hard enough to just snap him out of his strange psychosis.

Melody watched those two friends bickering from a distance, clearly upset by this whole confusing situation.

She can't help but feel like she caused this, unintentionally so. Coming into the exact wrong place at the exact wrong time. She truly felt like a princess of disaster.

"She must've been precious to them"  she thought

After Jim snapped back to his normal self, he finally explained to Sam the situation. She nodded along until he finished.

“So she's not our Melody?" she asked.

"Yes" Jim rubbed the red spot on his cheek.

"She’s a princess from a completely different time period." Sam begins pacing back and forth in front of him, somehow becoming more irate with an answer.

"Yep"

"And she doesn't know how to get back home."

"Bingo"

"How in the hell are we gonna do with her? People are gonna freak the eff out!" The blonde friend said. She peeked over at the girl. It still sent cold shivers down her spine to see someone who looked so similar to their dead friend, knowing she wasn’t really their friend.

"Well she can't just live at the beach or hide in the car forever, and there's absolutely no way people would believe that she's from the past," Jim said calmly, but inside he was still painfully overwhelmed.

"You think?" Sam tried not to yell. She still can't help but feel upset at Jim’s suggestions. She knows this wouldn't help Jim's healing process whatsoever since that girl came completely out of nowhere.

"Maybe,” Jim thinks out loud to himself. “She could stay at the beach house, just for right now since you, have the keys to it, right?"

Now Sam was infuriated. That was the stupidest idea that she had ever heard come out of his mouth.

"Are you kidding me?" She blew up  at him. "That place is only to be used when us five go there for vacation, and I'm pretty sure it’s too soon to be used after you know who was there last," she explained with her attitude very clearly showing.

"But we won't be using it only her" Jim spoke up, albeit very quietly . He doesn't even like the idea of it but it's the only place she could hide at this point. If only she could’ve lived in the ocean. Sam sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose with her thumb and forefinger now finally giving in.

"Fine. But I do the work, you stay by the car. No argument" Sam said, watching him open his mouth as if he was about to argue, but he acquiesced to her decision, knowing arguing with her would solve nothing.

Luckily they're just starting summer vacation so school won't be coming anytime soon. Jim stayed quiet but was clearly irritated.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

After Sam finally spoke to this Melody, she introduced herself, explaining the current situation to her, to quite a bit of awkward banter. They drove Melody to the beach house that their friend Melody’s parents used to own, dedicated to her. It was a safehouse for her until her passing. She wrote in her  will that the beachhouse would go to some of her most trusted friends in case something were to happen to her, like her condition worsening.

Sam hated the fact they were hiding someone here, and disregarded the hundreds of memories she had made with all of her friends. And now it's being used for this Melody’s hideaway, completely disregarding the sanctity of this place.

“This is stupid,” Sam thought to herself.

Once she opened the door to the lovely, isolated casida, she just looked straight ahead, looking away at the things of memories. She tried to show past Melody around the place and had to explain some few things of what she wasn't familiar with.

For an example: The princess didn't know anything about television. Which shouldn't be surprising but Sam wanted to leave this place as soon as possible.

Melody looks at the remote quizzically in Sam's hands. Sam  pressed one of the buttons on the remote, turning it on and switching between channels to show Melody how it worked. She watched the television with childish glee, curious as to how it worked.

"So, it's like moving paintings in a large mirror, and can move whatever it shows? Even people?" Melody asked, amazed by the sheer idea. She had seen people making paintings and sketches on each paper in different movements and when they flip the pages they move like people do, but nothing nearly as complex as this.

When a mermaid appeared on one of the channels, Melody was taken aback that people still remembered those things since most people in her time  didn't know about their existence. All except her kingdom.

Samalmost felt envious of Melody’s ignorance to their world.

Meanwhile in the background of it all, she couldn't help but grin a bit at her curiosity. Completely caught up in  the girl’s face when she saw that mermaid, completely enamored in the mere sight of it.

She really was like Melody. Painfully close to her.

The tomboy spoke up. "Yeah, I guess you could say that.” She takes the remote and shows her some of the other buttons. “And you can change the volumes with this one. It might get a little loud for you, but since no one plans on coming up here anytime soon, I guess it doesn't matter a whole lot."

"What do you mean by that?" she asked curiously, though soon she would regret it.

Sam answered without much hesitation, though the question stung in her mind.

"This used to be our Melody's little hideaway from her parents and stuff. It was just a place for the five of us to hang out.” Sam sits on one of the comfortable chairs, watching the dust rise from the cushion. “Though now that she's gone, I don't think anyone would complain if you stayed here… I didn't really want to let you stay here, if I’m honest, but I couldn't let Jim be around you much longer. He’s going into a grief fueled psychosis from seeing you, it seems."

Melody didn't know what to say after the pale blonde girl's honestly really straightforward response, but she did know that she was guilty for asking about it even, fidgeting her fingers together.

"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have ask-"

"Don't hesitate to ask something like this or be sorry for it. It's better to say it than keep it to yourself" Sam said, looking towards Melody, her eyebrows furrowed. She wasn’t exactly pleased to be staring at someone who should have been dead..

"But do me a favor. Never ask Jim anything about Melody… Not until he's healed at least."

The girl nodded, understanding clearly why.

~~~~~~~

After settling in the place, with Sam having given her clothes and showing her of how other minor household amenities she took for granted worked, she strode back out to the car to see Jim leaning against the side of the red, run-down car, looking out into the ocean.

"Oh for Christ sake," Sam groans to herself, knowing he's still moping about her. Jim turned to see his friend Sam, a meek smile crossing his lips.

"How did it go?" Trying to make it civil and swift, Sam answered quickly while getting back in the car.

"It went fine. She just needed to learn about some basic things that she had never seen before today." She clicks on her seatbelt.

Jim followed suit, looking back at her.

"We got her into hiding... What happens next? What do we do now?" he asked, hands shaking and trying to pace his breathing.

"For right now Jim, let's just head back. Especially since this day was too much for you." Jim started speaking, but Sam quickly stopped him, hand on the ignition. "No Jim. Look," she glared at him, finally lashing out at him. "It’s been three months since her passing and you have been visiting her grave every day since.  I get it. You want to see her again but she's not our Melody! Not your Melody…"

Jim kept his eyes  on her, keeping completely quiet, but she could tell just how much she hurt him.

He hesitantly spoke up, looking out the window in front of him as they started driving.

"I can't help it...but Sam...what if it's possible that she came back? What if this is fate and this is what was meant to-!"

He heard a loud slam on the wheel, the horn blaring as they halt a short ways away from the beach house. Sam turned quickly to Jim, seeing that she had slammed on the brakes and her fist tightly balled on the center of the wheel.

Jim, scared to death that she may have hurt herself but stopped himself when he saw her desperate composure, tears starting to run down her pink cheeks.

"No one comes back from the dead!" Sam said through gritted teeth. "Don't you think I have wished that was a possibility? For people to come back to life? Don't you think I have wanted to stop feeling this burning pain and have things go back to normal? To make things happier again..?" Her voice cracking, desperately trying to hold her breath, to stop the tears from stinging her eyes. Jim let her continue.

"You can't just keep doing this to yourself. I don't want you to get hurt over some girl you found in the ocean, and I get it. I understand you're still in pain… A lot of pain. But please,don't think there's even a sliver of a possibility that she is our Melody, Jim… No one comes back after they’ve died."

Jim was silent through the whole ordeal,  just staring at his friend  breaking down in front of him, her forehead pressed to the top of the steering wheel.

Jim internalized this, believing he hurt his closest friend. Reminding her of the trauma she suffered. Reminding her  of the pain when her mother died and how it started her father's abuse.

He has to remember that isn't only one who's in pain. He isn’t the only one who suffers.

Everyone is, his family, his friends. And now they had a much larger problem on their hands.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Melody was looking through some of the randomly assorted boxes and stuff around after she showered and had clean clothes which were much more comfortable than her dress.

Inside the abandoned house, Melody felt the need to explore around. In her minor expeditions, she found some interesting things, including strange rocks, beautiful shells, and some colored photographs bound together into a set of photo albums. Some of the people in the pictures looked familiar to her as she flipped through the pages.

Her eyes landed on the brown haired boy she met on the beach today. A photo of her doppelganger being given a piggy back ride by this boy, looking like they're laughing and having fun with one another, in each other company. She could tell that their love for each other was truly pure. She wanted that sort of magical feeling, something like what they seemed to have..

Her head buzzed a bit, rubbing her temple.  It felt like it was hissing.

"I should probably go to sleep," she muttered to herself tiredly, heading into the bedroom that Sam had shown her.
As she closed her eyes, her body drifted off. Dreaming about being given a piggy back ride by someone who loved her, someone who was laughing with her and enjoying the moment.

But she couldn’t see his face. She didn't know who he was at all. But it was still comforting to be like this with them.