Why I'm Not Afraid of Ghosts (2 page)

Robbie shuddered. He hated that noise. Except when
he
did it.

Dora laughed. Her skin rolled over her bones, and she turned back into herself. As she admired herself in the mirror, Robbie came up behind her.

“How come you're always staring at your ghost self?” Robbie asked. “Your face stays the same!”

“Yeah!” Dora replied. “I always look good!” She stuck her tongue out at him in the mirror. “And you always look dumb!” She ruffled his hair, making it stand straight up.

“Cut it out!” Robbie snapped. He smoothed down his blond hair. It was short on the sides and long on top. Then he straightened out his shirt. He wore a navy blue sailor suit with a wide square collar. He hated that suit. But he always appeared in it, because he was wearing it when he died.

That was one of the reasons he liked doing sound effects better than appearing in his natural form. Who could be scared of a ten-year-old kid in a sailor suit?

Dora turned and pushed him away. “Get out of my mirror before you crack it!” she ordered.

Robbie floated over to the desk. He perched on top of it. He
wished
he could crack mirrors! But no.

Dora drifted over to sit on the armchair.

“That Oliver kid is going to be tough,” she announced. “I don't want him up here in our attic.”

“Neither do I,” Robbie said, though he wasn't really sure. He kind of liked Oliver. He seemed fun. And he had lots of cool stuff in his room. Stuff Robbie had never seen before.

“Some dumb lifer getting in the way when we're fixing up a scare,” Dora grumbled. She called all
living creatures “lifers.” “We'd have to watch every move we made!”

“It
is
easier to haunt the house when we can hide in the attic between scares,” Robbie agreed. Ghosts didn't have to eat or sleep, but they needed rest sometimes. Especially if they did hard tricks, like moving things or touching people.

“And he's got some nerve,” Dora went on. She copied Oliver's tone. “‘Everyone knows there's no such thing as ghosts!' ”

Her blue eyes took on a nasty gleam. “Maybe we should show him just how wrong he is,” she suggested with a grin.

“Let's scare him,” Robbie suggested. “Let's scare him right out of the attic!”

Dora rubbed her hands together. “Better than that! Let's make him run to his parents and beg to move away!”

Move away? Robbie thought. How come she always wants everybody to move away? There's nothing to do around here unless someone is living in the house!

On the other hand, scaring people was what Robbie liked to do best. He couldn't resist a good scare session. “Bet I can scare him better than you can!”

“Bet you can't!” Dora retorted.

“Bet I can!”

“Oh, yeah?” Dora sneered. “Oh, yeah? Well, we'll just see about that! We'll take turns scaring him. The
one who makes him run to Mommy and Daddy first wins!”

What a great idea, Robbie thought. A contest!

“Deal. But it's my turn next,” he said. “You already tried that stupid sheet trick.”

“All right,” Dora grumbled. “Whatever you do, I'll top it!”

Stairs creaked behind them.

Robbie jumped. He and Dora whipped around.

Robbie clutched Dora's arm.

His mouth opened and closed.

He couldn't tear his eyes away from the horrible thing he saw!

O
liver's little sister, Nell, stood at the top of the stairs.

She stared straight at the ghosts!

Robbie stared back, frozen. Oh, no! he thought. She's not supposed to know about us yet.

This could wreck everything!

How did that kid sneak up on us? We aren't ready to be seen!

Did he and Dora lose their special power to choose when they wanted to appear and to whom?

Or—did this kid have the Sight?

People with the Sight can see ghosts—whether the ghosts want them to or not.

People with the Sight are a ghost's biggest fear. A ghost's worst nightmare!

Robbie stared at Nell. She was small for her age, like her brother. She had short, curly dark hair and dark brown eyes.

“Thunder!” Nell called. “Where are you, you bad cat?”

Whew!

She wasn't looking
at
them, Robbie realized with relief. She was looking
through
them. Looking for her cat!

He took a deep breath, even though he didn't need to breathe anymore. Sometimes it just felt right. He let out a faint sigh.

“Here, kitty kitty kitty,” Nell said.

She edged into the room. She chewed on her lower lip and glanced around. She seemed nervous.

Robbie bet
she
would be easy to scare!

“Kitty?” Nell murmured, venturing farther into the room. She studied the sheet on the chair, then the big mirror.

She peeked under the chair, lifting the sheet. “Kitty?”

She searched behind the mirror. “Kitty? Are you up here?”

Then she headed over to the carved wooden rolltop desk that used to be Robbie's when he was alive. The one he was sitting on right now!

Robbie jumped up and floated away from Nell. He hovered in the air above the desk.

Nell rolled up the top of the desk and started opening the little drawers in back of it.

Hey. What was she doing?

Just plain snooping!

No way could a cat fit in any of those drawers!

Now she was humming! She wasn't even calling the cat anymore.

Had she ever
really
been looking for it? Or was she just looking for an excuse to come up here?

Maybe Oliver was right about this kid being a brat.

Nell found Robbie's old magnifying glass and took it out of its drawer. She examined her fingertips through it. Then she stuck it in her pocket.

She's stealing it! Robbie thought, outraged.

What if she found the puzzle drawer where he hid his most excellent secret stuff? His lucky arrowhead, the bullet he found at a Civil War battle site, and the 1894 Liberty Head silver dollar his father gave him on his tenth birthday?

Robbie puffed up. He was going to scare Nell right out of her pink pom-pommed socks!

“Boo!” Dora shouted behind him.

Robbie jumped. He totally lost his concentration.

Nell gasped. She ran downstairs.

“What are you doing?” Robbie yelled at Dora. He hated it when she startled him! “
I
was going to scare her.”

“It didn't take much,” Dora commented.

Robbie glared at her. “I'm going down to check out
Oliver's room now. You better not scare him before I do, or
you automatically lose the contest!”

* * *

Robbie lurked in the doorway of Oliver's room.

Shawn perched on the desk chair, leafing through some comic books. Oliver sat on his bed, playing a weird-looking guitar.

It didn't look like any of the guitars Robbie remembered seeing while he was alive. It was flat instead of hollow, and it was made out of some shiny red stuff that didn't look like wood. It had black knobs on it. Also, it made hardly any sound.

Robbie remembered seeing guitars like Oliver's on televisions that had been in the house before. The families who owned the televisions never stayed in the house long, which frustrated Robbie. He loved TV.

Dora always wanted people to move out pretty soon after they moved in. Lifers irritated her.

Robbie thought that was stupid. The rules of haunting said you could haunt only people who lived under your roof. Or people who were
connected
to people who lived under your roof. So when nobody lived here, who was there to haunt?

People were much more fun to play with than spiders and bats and rats.

Wait a second! What's wrong with me? Robbie scolded himself. I should be coming up with a really good scare!

Back to business. What can I use here in Oliver's room to scare Oliver into believing in ghosts?

Robbie scanned the room. A big black three-ring binder decorated with green lightning bolts sat on the desk. A zip pouch full of sharp new pencils and a package of filler paper lay next to it. There was a stack of textbooks on the desk too.

A computer sat on the desk. The monitor had fish swimming across it.

A glass-sided tank sat by the window. Dirt, a geranium plant, and a bowl of water were inside.

Robbie drifted closer. He peered through the glass.

Yikes! A giant hairy red-legged spider stared back at him!

A tarantula!

What kind of kid had a tarantula for a pet?

Robbie hated spiders.

“So—do you play any instruments, Shawn?” Oliver asked.

Robbie jumped. Did Oliver have to talk so loud?

Shawn shook his head. “Nope. Mom made me take piano lessons when I was nine, but I hated them.”

“Too bad. I want to start a band.” Oliver carefully placed the guitar on the floor.

Robbie wished the old piano were still downstairs. He used to take piano lessons too, and he liked to play.

He bet Oliver wouldn't know any of the songs he knew though.

Robbie hadn't had many opportunities to listen to current music. People moved out of the house way too fast, and they took their radios and TVs and CD players with them.

Still, he was sure he could learn a new song easily. He was sick of the old ones he knew. And it would be cool to be in a band.

I'm doing it again! Robbie thought. Thinking about making friends with some dumb lifer! Being a traitor to ghosts!

If the piano were still here, I could use it to scare Oliver, Robbie told himself. That's what I
should
be thinking about!

He peeked over Shawn's shoulder to check out the comic book. All he saw were lots of people in weird masks and underwear.

Funny papers sure had changed since Robbie was alive.

Just as Robbie leaned in for a closer look, Shawn clapped the comic book shut and put it on the floor. Frustrated, Robbie drifted toward the door.

“Got any bright ideas, little brother?” Dora asked, appearing right in front of him. “Or are you just mooning around as usual?”

Robbie narrowed his eyes and glared at his sister. He wished he had an idea, but Oliver's room hadn't inspired him.

Aside from the tarantula and some dirty clothes, there wasn't anything scary in Oliver's room.

“Woof! Woof woof woof!”

At the sudden noise, Robbie shrieked and jumped two feet in the air.

He whirled to see a huge black Doberman pinscher leap up from under a pile of dirty laundry.

“Ruff ruff
ruff!”
The dog stood, head forward It growled low and deep in its throat. Its teeth were huge and white, glistening with saliva.

It stared straight at Robbie!

If Robbie's heart still worked, it would have been pounding.

Before Robbie could even think to move, Spooky lunged right at him!

“N
o!” Robbie shrieked. He shut his eyes in terror.

Then the dog jumped right
through
Robbie, barking like crazy.

Robbie yelled and clutched his stomach.

“Ohh! Oooch!” he groaned. Yuck! A lifer going through a ghost really made the ghost sick. The ghost's energy got all churned up.

“Spooky, cut it out!” Oliver yelled at the dog.

But Spooky ignored him.

“Woof! Ruff! Rrrrr!” The dog hit the hall running, his nails clicking on the wood floor.

Still gasping, Robbie turned to watch the dog.

“Meorrow!” A big fluffy orange-and-white cat tore down the hall Spooky charged after it.

“Thunder!” Nell wailed, popping out of her room. “Oliver, you better make Spooky stop!”

“Thunder?” Robbie murmured.

Of course. The dog was after Nell's cat. Not the ghosts.

I'd get lost again quick if I were that cat, Robbie thought. As big as the cat was, the dog was
huge!
And fast.

Robbie groaned. His stomach hurt so much, he wished he could just hurl and get it over with. If only ghosts could throw up.