within a few weeks of julie and the phantom's performance at the orpheum the band was already getting loads of smaller bookings.
the rest of the group said that they wanted a break from performing (alex was still searching for willie, who had disappeared since the last time the group saw him, and reggie was trying to find his family again, wanting to see how his slightly younger sister had grown up in the last 25 years) but luke begged the rest of the band to do at least one of the gigs. it took about two days of him bothering them endlessly or ignoring them constantly before the band agreed to do one performance.

luke, being the ghost he is, decided they would need a new song to perform for this gig and set himself to the task of writing one while julie was at school. he's laid around almost every spot in the studio (in the 90s he'd dubbed them his "thinking spots" and the band knew not to bother him while he was laying in the weirdest positions in the most random areas) and still couldn't find any inspiration. then he remembered julie's dream box and how it was full of song lyrics. he knew julie would kill him (a second death for the musician spirit) for snooping in her room because of "boundaries" but he also knew if the song was good enough she wouldn't mind as much.

luke poofed into julie's room, right next to her dream box, and carefully opened the lid. right on top of everything else in the box (including some glitter and butterflies) there was a paper that definitely looked like lyrics. luke knew it was song lyrics because usually julie's poems were written in a more standard verse that the band had to modify- he knew this specifically from reworking flying solo with reggie- but this paper was written in the standard form of most songs he and julie had written together. luke immediately grabbed the paper and poofed back into the studio.
when he got back to the studio he sat down with his guitar. the song lyrics were messily scribbled, as if they were written down in a complete haze, but there music notation was written nicely in julie's normal swirly handwriting. luke noticed the song was definitely written for piano, which he could barely play, so he began transposing the chords to guitar and writing the chords and lyrics in his notebook. while he wrote in the lyrics luke started actually paying attention to what they were about, and this song was definitely about love, or more specifically a duet.
luke tried to figure out who exactly julie could've been writing the song about. when he came to the realization that it was probably for nick, jealousy began to consume him. luke took a moment to calm himself and decided that maybe he shouldn't have taken that song out of julie's box. he poofed back upstairs with the paper in hand, slipping it back in the box and disappearing from the singer's room, reappearing in the studio moments later.

about ten minutes after that julie walked into the studio, completely oblivious to what luke had been doing for the day, and threw her backpack on the ground by the studio doors.
"hey luke," julie sighed, exhausted but ready for rehearsal. "where are the guys?"

"i'm not sure. i actually wanted to uh... talk to you about something."

"oh yeah, sure, what about?" julie smiled and sat down next to luke, who had sat down on "his" couch.

"well i found-" as soon as he started the sentence reggie and alex appeared in front of them.

"sorry we're late!" reggie exclaimed, pausing and lowering his tone before continuing, "we were looking for willie."
julie and luke just nodded in response before luke stood up.

"we can uh... talk about it later, for now let's start rehearsing!"

~•~

rehearsal went pretty well aside from the fact that none of them had any ideas for a new song for their gig, which luke just brushed off saying they'd figure something out the next day (they still had until friday to have the song written and rehearsed so they could take a bit of a vocal rest saturday before their performance.)

ray had sent carlos to get julie for dinner after the band was done rehearsing, causing julie and luke to push back their conversation a bit longer. when julie left the room luke grabbed his acoustic and sat down on the couch. he still had the lyrics and chords to julie's song written in his notebook, but barely needed the chords written out for him. the song had gotten stuck in his head within the first moments of transposing it.
luke strummed the chords quietly as alex and reggie set near the couch with him, silently listening and nodding along. at some point luke had quietly started singing the lyrics that stuck most in his mind, not once glancing at the notebook.

"the truth is finally breaking through
two worlds collide when i'm with you
our voices rise and soar so high
we come to life when we're...
in perfect harmony"

luke finished strumming out the chords and looked up to see his best friends half starring at him in shock and half smiling with joy.

"luke," alex started, "you haven't written a love song in like... 26 years."

"yeah man you never write love songs," reggie replied.

luke sat for a moment, trying to decide whether he should tell the truth about stealing the song from julie or lie and say it was a random lyric he'd written down once and got the melody stuck in his head for. he ended up deciding on the former.

"ok ok i stole it from julie's dream box."

"dude!" reggie cried out, "you know we aren't supposed to touch the box! if she finds out she'll kill you, a second time!"

"i know, i know. i was running out of ideas and we need something new to play this weekend."

just then julie burst into the studio, "alright i know one of you was in my room!"

alex and reggie immediately slowly went from turned facing julie to facing the opposite direction at luke, simultaneously with raised eyebrows and crossed arms. luke went to hold his hands up in defense and come up with an excuse, but he didn't know what he was excusing in julie's mind just yet.

"luke... were you messing with my dream box?"

"what?" his voiced raised at least a pitch, "no! no i wasn't even in your room today."

"mhm... then why does my song have tapped out lines on them?" julie shoved the paper in luke's hands and luke realized what she was talking about.

it was almost a nervous habit for luke to tap his paper subconsciously while writing music. he's never noticed until julie pointed it out recently. of course it was a habit reggie and alex had picked up from luke while working on music. julie recognized that the drummer tapped his paper with the pencil between his pointer and middle finger, shaking it between the fingers until it hit the paper. reggie would tap his pencil straight up and down, almost letting it fall onto the paper while it remained upright. luke would slant his pencil as if he was about to writing with it but instead would be tapping away at the margins.

"jules..." luke sighed, he was gonna get yelled at so much for this, "julie i'm so so sorry for going through your dream box without permission. i know we've talked about boundaries but i just couldn't come up with any lyrics and i know you always have really good ones in your dream box."

julie sat down next to the phantom, sighing heavily and pushing her hair back slightly. she half turned to luke and started, "this song is really personal to me. i've been working on getting the lyrics out of my head and back on the page since before our performance at the party here." julie stopped and looked over to alex and reggie, who seemed to have poofed out already. "i wanted to show you these lyrics when i was sure they were ready. when i was sure i was ready. luke, i wrote this song about you." julie grabbed luke's had softly and looked into the phantoms' eyes, searching for any sign that he felt the same as she did.

"you wrote a love song?" luke asked, julie nodded. "and you wrote it for me?" julie nodded again in response, both trying to maintain eye contact and also completely avoid the guitarists eyes so he couldn't see her blush. what julie didn't notice was that the ghost had a blush similar to her own.
luke scooted slightly closer to julie, tightening his grip on her hand and laughing. "this is an interesting relationship we have here," he quoted himself from a few weeks earlier. both the singer and guitarist laughed.

julie's laugh never ceased to make luke smile, and quickly he was starring at julie as her nosed scrunched up and she barely contained giggles. she was laughing just enough to barely notice the closeness between her and the phantom until she stopped to breathe. she noticed how close luke's hand was to cupping her face and smiled, looking deep into the boy's eyes again. when luke's hand finally did brush julie's cheek the girl smiled and leaned into his touch, placing her own hand over luke's.

"julie?" luke questioned, which prompted julie to look back into his eyes and smile. her eyes floated between his eyes a lips for a few moments before refocusing on his eyes. "i don't want to take anything to quickly if you don't want to..." the phantom's gaze shifted between julie's eyes and mouth before setting back on her eyes, "but could i kiss you?"

julie smiled and moved her hand from over luke's hand to his cheek, her other hand finding the other side of his face. luke's now free hand pushed some of julie's loose hairs behind her ear and his hand stayed in the general area of the base of the girl's neck. they sat like that for at least a minute and luke cleared his throat a bit. julie laughed, "what?"

"you didn't uh... you didn't say anything."

julie shook her head and smiled, leaning slightly more into luke's arms, "of course you can kiss me you dingus." this time luke smiled and leaned forward. their noses were just millimeters apart when julie stifled a giggle and leaned in all the way and kiss luke.

(A/N
1790 words
hey everyone! this was actually really fun for me to write. it's taken a while but i like the concept and idk it felt right to work on tonight so it's finally done!!! would any of you guys be interested in me writing a part two to "coffee and acoustic guitar"? the second chapter would be like their first date and other fluffy stuff like that.
also, i didn't read over this a second time before posting soooo sorry for spelling and grammar problems 😂)