The Haunting (12 page)

I knew it was no use trying to tell them what had happened. They'd think I was making it up.

Mom bent down to Sally's level. “What were you scared of, honey? Was it Bobby?”

Sally looked at me and pushed out her lower lip. “I'm not scared of Bobby,” she said stoutly. “Bobby is my friend.”

“She, ah, she had a nightmare,” I said. “I woke up and it was hot, so we decided to come out for a minute. I guess we fell asleep.”

Mom sighed and stood up. “Let's go in and have breakfast.”

“Nightmares are hungry business,” said Dad, scooping up Sally and putting her on his shoulders. She squealed with glee as he trotted toward the house, playing horse.

Now it was Mom's turn to look stern and serious. “It isn't more of this ghost business, is it, Jason? I don't want to be worrying about you while we're gone.”

I stopped in my tracks and stared at her. “Gone? Where are you going?”

“We got a call late last night,” said Mom. “Remember that firehouse we designed for Mayfield last spring? Apparently they're having some problems with construction and they need us to go take a look at the site and make some changes.”

“You have to leave?”

Mom nodded. “We'll be gone a week or so and we have to leave today—as soon as possible. But I don't want to leave you here if you're scared.”

“Scared? Of course I'm not scared.” That was partly true. I wasn't scared when I was outside the house, in broad daylight. “I'm just, ah, I'm worried about Sally and her invisible playmate.”

Mom smiled. “Then I can trust you to keep a close eye on her while we're gone?”

“Sure, Mom. Of course you can.”

“Good. Then let's eat before the baby-sitter gets here.”

“Baby-sitter?”

Mom gave me a look. “I know you're getting pretty big, Jason, but I still can't leave you to handle a five-year-old all by yourself. The babysitter's name is Katie. She's seventeen and she comes highly recommended.”

The last thing I wanted was a bossy baby-sitter, but as I followed Mom into the house I tried to convince myself that maybe it wasn't such a bad thing after all.

Mom and Dad would never let me and Sally camp out under the cherry tree every night. But maybe I could talk the baby-sitter into it.

Maybe
she'd
believe me.

35

The baby-sitter, Katie Lawrence, had kind of skinny legs but other than that she was pretty. Her hair was red and thick and came down to her shoulders. She had this little sprinkling of freckles on her nose and she smiled a lot.

She grinned at me when we were introduced and she didn't seem bothered by the fact that Sally was scowling at her.

I showed her around the house while my parents finished packing. Wouldn't you know, all the rooms looked sunny and pleasant in the late morning light. You'd never know what had happened the night before, or what was likely to happen again, as soon as the sun went down.

“What a neat old place,” said Katie as we came back downstairs. “I always wanted to see what this house looked like on the inside. It was shut up for so many years we used to dare each other to come here on Halloween.”

“Did anything ever happen?” I asked carefully. “On Halloween, I mean.”

Katie's laughter rang out. “Of course not, silly. Although we never did anything more than run up and peek in the windows. I thought I saw a light one time,” she added, winking at me. “Like a candle, flickering in the attic.”

Just then my dad called me upstairs to help with the suitcases.

We loaded the suitcases into the station wagon and when we got back to the house Mom was giving Sally a hug and going over instructions with Katie one last time.

“Don't hesitate to call us if there's any problem,” she said again.

Dad cocked an eyebrow at Katie. “You don't believe in ghosts, do you?” he asked with a smile.

Katie giggled. “No, of course not. There's no such thing as ghosts. Why? Is this house haunted?”

She laughed like it was a pretty good joke.

“Jason thinks so,” said Dad, giving me a look. “But maybe you can convince him.”

I felt my face going red.

I said good-bye to Mom and Dad and they climbed into the car. I held Sally's hand as they drove away.

A moment later the car turned the corner and they were gone.

Katie went back into the house, saying she wanted to unpack her things. “You know, there
is
something spooky about this house,” she called back. “I think I'm going to really like it here!”

I shivered at her carefree tone. We were on our own. Just me and Sally and a new baby-sitter who thought ghosts were cool.

And I was the only one who knew what was going on. Or did I, really?

I turned to Sally and smiled comfortingly. “You and me better keep an eye on that baby-sitter, make sure she doesn't get in any trouble she can't handle, right?”

That's when I noticed that something was wrong with Sally's face. Her expression was stiff and her eyes were blank. As if she was in a trance or something.

A chill ran through me.

“Sally?” My voice was shaky.

Sally's head jerked to one side and then the other, like a puppet. Her eyes smoldered and glowed.

I fought the urge to leap away from her.

Then she opened her mouth and spoke. “
I'm not Sally
.”

The voice that came out of her mouth was rough, as if it hadn't been used in a long time. And it had a hollow ring. As if it was coming from the inside of an empty tomb.

Sally's face scowled at me and the strange voice growled again. “My name is Bobby,” she said. “And I've been dead for a long time.”

I was paralyzed. I wanted to run. I wanted to scream.

My little sister was possessed.

Turn the page to continue reading from the House on Cherry Street series

1

The baby-sitter didn't believe in ghosts. “Don't be silly,” she said. “There's no such thing as a haunted house.”

Her name was Katie, and she was a teenager with red hair and an attitude—meaning she thought I was a total dweeb for trying to tell her about the ghosts in the house on Cherry Street.

“Don't say I didn't warn you,” I said stubbornly.

She smirked at me and then shaded her eyes, looking up at the decaying mansion my family had rented for the summer. “What a place!” she said. “It really is kind of spooky looking.”

My parents didn't believe in ghosts, either, and they'd left Katie in charge while they went away on a business trip. Not that I needed a babysitter or anything. At twelve I can pretty much look after myself. But my little sister Sally was only four and the ghosts were
very
interested in her.

“I better go inside,” Katie announced cheerfully. “Check things out.”

And then she marched up the steps and walked right through the door of that creepy old house as if nothing could possibly hurt her.

Maybe it couldn't. Maybe the haunting would be as invisible to her as it had been to my parents, who blamed everything on my “overactive” imagination.

Maybe. But I didn't think so.

As the door shut behind Katie the glass in the windows shivered. And so did I.

“Sally?” I said, calling to my little sister. “We better go in, too.”

That's when I noticed that something was wrong with Sally's face. Her expression was stiff and her eyes were blank. As if she was in a trance or something.

A chill zapped me.

“Sally?” My voice was shaky.

Sally's head jerked to one side and then the other, like a puppet. Her eyes smoldered and glowed.

I fought the urge to leap away from her.

Then she opened her mouth and spoke. “I'm not Sally.”

The voice that came out of her mouth was rough, as if it hadn't been used in a long time. And it had a hollow ring. As if it was coming from the inside of an empty tomb.

Sally's face scowled at me and the strange voice growled again. “My name is Bobby and I'm dead,” she said.

I was paralyzed. I wanted to run. I wanted to scream.

My little sister was possessed!

2

Her face was like a mask. A mask that looked just like my little sister. Except for the eyes.

“Sally?” I said. “Please talk to me.”

Her face scowled at me. Out of her mouth came that strange rough voice again. “I'm not Sally. My name is Bobby and I'm dead, dead, dead!”

She danced away, taunting me.

“Where's my sister?” I demanded.

I recognized the voice coming from Sally. I'd heard it night after night, crying in the hallway outside my room. It was the voice of a child ghost and I had never figured out what it wanted.

But lately I suspected what it wanted was Sally. And now it had her.

“My name is Bobby,” it repeated, and Sally danced farther away from me.

I shivered, remembering when I'd first seen the ghost. It was the first day we arrived. We were driving up the long driveway under the tall whispery pines and I saw his pale, sad face.

A little boy peering at us from the attic windows. Little Bobby, who'd been dead for years and years.

Of course, no one believed me then.

They still didn't believe me. And the ghost had been careful to make sure they wouldn't. Now he had taken possession of my sister.

“Let me talk to Sally,” I demanded, my voice cracking with fright.

Bobby wasn't an evil ghost, I told myself. At least Sally never thought so. She thought he was just a sad little boy who wanted to be her invisible friend. So what if he'd been dead for years?

So what if nobody else could see him? She could.

Maybe if I could keep him talking I could make him realize what a bad thing he was doing. “I want to talk to Sally, Bobby, where is she?”

Sally pressed her lips together tight. Or Bobby pressed her lips together. I was getting nowhere.

My head was spinning with a million different thoughts.

Bobby must have heard my parents talking about going away to Mayfield on a job and leaving me and Sally alone with a baby-sitter. A seventeen-year-old, red-haired girl who giggled at the idea of ghosts.

He must have been waiting for this chance.

Maybe he'd made friends with Sally just so she'd get to trust him. Then when the moment was right he seized her body and took it over.

Maybe he'd moved in permanently! The idea of this dead thing speaking from inside my sister made me feel like I'd swallowed a chunk of roadkill.

“Look, Bobby, tell me what you want,” I said, inching closer. “I can help you if I know what you want.”

“Hey, Jason! Sally!”

It was our baby-sitter Katie. She was supposed to be upstairs unpacking. Instead here she was leaning out the front door, grinning at us like she wanted to be friends. Her thick red hair fanned across her shoulders like a halo.

“Come on in and have a snack or something,” Katie suggested.

“Uh, in a minute,” I started to say. How could I tell her what had happened to my little sister?

Just then a ferocious scowl came over Sally's face. Blood rushed to her cheeks and her eyes seemed to glow with fire.

Something terrible was about to happen.

I reached out to grab Sally, but she was too fast for me.

She let out a scream of rage and charged straight at the baby-sitter.

3

The thing that ran up the steps after the babysitter wasn't my sister, it was a small demon.

“Look out!” I shouted.

But Katie just stood there. Her friendly smile went kind of limp, like she couldn't believe what was happening as Sally's hard little fists smacked her in the knees.

“Hey!” Katie cried out. “Hey, what are you doing?”

Sally was punching and kicking and scratching like a fierce little animal, and the poor baby-sitter didn't know what to do.

I had to save her—and Sally, too. I ran up the porch steps and grabbed my little sister from behind. Not so rough that I hurt her, but strong enough to pin her arms.

See, I didn't want to hurt her. After all, Sally was just a little kid. So I just tried to stop her from hitting the baby-sitter.

That's when she turned around and smacked me, hard, right in the stomach.

Ooof
, the air went out of me and I sat down, holding my stomach. Sally ran off, disappearing inside the house.

“Hey, are you okay?” Katie knelt down, checking me out.

I nodded, struggling to get my breath back.

“What's wrong with your sister?” she asked.

“You don't want to know,” I panted.

“Of course I do,” she said. “I'm supposed to be in charge of you two until your parents get back.”

Just then I heard Sally's little feet running across the kitchen floor. She was heading for the back door!