Oh my ghoul, an epilogue?!

Author's Notes at the end. Happy reading!

Epilogue: "Knock 'Em Dead!"

"What do you want to do when you grow up?" Jackson asked a week later. He sat on the floor of Frankie's bedroom, absentmindedly rifling through one of her many, many magazines. Why did she have so many magazines for human teenagers in her room? Was this normal? "No Holt, we're not buying a new leather wardrobe. I don't care how good the model looks or how you'd look in it, we're not doing it."

His ghoulfriend laughed at their antics, moving across her bed so that she was laying on her stomach, peering over his shoulder. "But you totally should. He looks hot!"

"No. No leather." His eyes widened as he turned the page. "Oh my Grim Reaper – Frankie, what kind of magazine is this?!"

Her eyes, on the other hand, perked up. "We should all get matching-"

"NO!"

Aside from Frankie's giggling filling his ears, Jackson's head was also filled with Holt's laughter.

"... You two have weird taste." It wasn't like Jackson could really fault either of them. Holt and Frankie, despite any borrowed or leftover memories of experiences that were already residing in their minds and bodies when they were created, were actually quite young. They had a natural curiosity and a need to explore new places and try new things.

He couldn't decide if the problem was that they were too free with everything or that he was too closed about everything.

His stitched-together ghoulfriend stopped laughing after a few seconds, her mind roaming back to his earlier question. "What do I want to do...?"

"Yeah. I mean, I know you said you wanted to work in monster-human relations, but, like, where do you want to live, do you want to raise kids, that sort of thing?"

"Hmmm... I'm not sure yet." Climbing down from where she lay on her bed, she moved to sit on the floor beside him. "I haven't really given it a lot of thought."

She fixed him with a look, as though she were trying to read his mind. "Have either of you?"

"Well, Holt wants to be a DJ and a musician, and I want to go to school to get a mad science degree. Seems like there's always an opening in the field of mad science." Abandoning the magazine, he leaned back against the bed. "I'm thinking of attending Oxblood University."

"That's in Fangland, right? The monster corner of England?"

"Yeah. I have relatives that live there and I still somewhat know my way around, so it would be convenient."

The trio fell into a comfortable silence, broken only when Frankie gave her boyfriends an impulsive kiss.

Jackson's lips tingled from the faint electric surge she put off. "What was that for?"

"I just think it's exciting, y'know?" She made something of a grand gesture. "We have our whole unlives ahead of us. Some of us have dreams about the future, and some of us are still working on figuring out the present, but who cares? We have time, we'll figure it out."

She flashed a 100-volt smile. "And whatever we end up doing, I know we're gonna knock 'em dead!"

Now it was Jackson's turn to smile, as much as he tried not to. "Heh. You sure know how to give a good pep talk, don't you?"

"Hey, I get lots of practice on the fear squad!"

Before he could stop her, she punctuated her sentence with another kiss. She'd taken to kissing him a lot recently.

Of course, he didn't really have any real problems with that...

MH

"What sort of political science degrees can you get from Oxblood?"

Nearly an hour had passed since Jackson's conversation with Frankie. It had been getting late and he'd had to go home, where he was now rummaging through the fridge, searching for food. Apparently, Holt decided that he had something to say now.

Jackson glanced up from the dish of hot wings he placed in the microwave, his eyes blinking owlishly in surprise. "... Where did this come from? I thought you wanted to study music and other arts."

"Well, sure, but I was wondering about the degree Frankie's after. Wouldn't it be cool if she went to school with us?"

"Mmmm..." The Jekyll tilted his head to the side, deep in thought. "I guess. But that's probably something you need to talk over with Frankie herself. You can't go planning out a future involving a body without asking her first."

"Yeah, that's probably true... Hey!"

The sudden outcry caused Jackson to falter in his step, suddenly frozen to the spot he stood on. "Don't 'hey' me like that! Now what is it?"

His eyes were directed to a picture hanging on the wall. It was a relatively simple black frame with flames etched into the wood, encasing a photograph from a few years ago. Two smiling faces peered out from the photo, one a small black-haired boy with glasses too big for his face, and the other a grinning little matchstick with hair all aflame.

"I've never noticed that photo before," Holt's voice came in something of a whisper. "Is that you and Heath?"

"Yeah, back when we were twelve." The half-monster huffed a bit. "... I thought I'd buried it too deep for Mother to find this time..."

He could feel Holt grinning against the inside of his skull. "I like it. It's proof that even the stuck-up Jackson Jekyll was a kid, too, once upon a time.

"Hey," he came back after a minute. "Jacky, what's it like? Being a kid an' growing up, I mean?"

It was questions like this that made Jackson pause. How do you explain childhood to someone who was never born, never grew up – just appeared out of thin air one night?

He shrugged. "Does it matter? Who cares about what was or what might have been. Probably better to focus on here and now, and better ourselves for the future."

Holt let out an odd humming sound, sounding somewhere between frustrated and placated. "I'd still like to know what it felt like..."

"... I know."

MH

Holt fell silent as Jackson went back to feeding himself, but he spoke up again later on, just as Jackson was brushing his teeth.

"Frankie's right, y'know?"

"Hm?"

He received an impression of a wide grin, as though a pair of stretched out lips were pressed against his temple. "We've got our whole unlives ahead of us... And we're gonna totally slay everyone! Between my creativity and your intelligence, we can't lose!"

"You're still thinking about that?" Jackson mused in response. His own lips pulled into a bit of a smile, thinking about the words that Frankie had said to them earlier. "But yeah. Between you and Frankie, I don't know how I could ever have any doubts left in me."

"Because you're a loser."

"Shut up!" Angry words aside, Jackson placed his hand on the mirror, high-fiving his own reflection. "Well, what do you say, then, Holt? Shell we 'knock 'em dead?'"

As if in answer, he saw his reflection in the mirror change, his blue eyes glinting with red and flames.

"You know it!"

After all, their life was only just beginning, and who knew where it would take them?

The End

Well, this has been a long, exciting journey. I can't believe it's been two years since I first published the prologue, and I really can't believe that the story reached a conclusion. I've never finished a multi-chapter fic before, so, on that note... *throws confetti* Good job, me.

Special thanks to all you readers who stuck with the story 'til the end along with me. I'm glad you all enjoyed it so much! ^_^

Having said that, I'm probably not going to be writing anymore Monster High fics in the near future. It doesn't interest me as much to write about these days as it used to. But I'm glad I finished this one.

Again, thank you guys for sticking with me and these Jekyll-Hyde boys for the past two years. It's been fun!

Be seein' you!