I So Don't Do Spooky (16 page)

“Yes.” Junie sips. “I like holding hands with Nick.”

“Really? 'cause his hands look kind of dry.”

Junie rolls her eyes. “Nick's hands are not dry. The hand holding is way cool.”

I'm nodding like a guidance counselor. “Yeah, I get where you're coming from. I'd be blissfully happy if I did nothing all day except hold hands with Josh.” I consider the logistics of this for a sec. “Well, except when I'm hungry. For some foods, like a double burger, you just need two hands or it's messy.”

Junie looks kind of surprised, like she hasn't thought this through. Then she nods. “Gotcha.”

“How about hugging? Done that yet?”

Lips turned down, Junie says, “Almost, but we had bad timing. Our arms were out, then my parents walked in.”

“Hugging is so sick,” I say. “It's like the 3-D
Star Wars
puzzle you have. Where everything just fits together. Of course, there's also the warmth factor. All that body heat.”

“I can't wait.” With her straw, Junie stirs swirls in our smoothie.

Only I'm not sure it'll be such an excellent experience for Junie. Nick is basically bony with a caved-in chest.

“How tough is it to get the kissing right?” Junie leans forward, not wanting to miss even one syllable of my important message.

I give a little secret smile. I remember back when I
worried about such stuff. “With the right person, like Josh is for me, kissing just happens perfectly. No teeth crashing. No cut lips. No bad-breath issues.” I don't say it, but I can't imagine things will go so easily for Nick and Junie.

“What's it like?” If she leans any closer to me, her amethyst will dip into our drink.

“It's like all the things you, Junie Carter of Phoenix, Arizona, love: ice cream with sprinkles, quadratic equations, Latin club, dumb practical jokes. It's those things all rolled together in a big rubber-band ball that's bouncing around inside you with each kiss. And even when the kiss is over, the ball is still bouncing. Maybe for minutes. Maybe for hours.”

“Wow.” Junie's got the same look on her face she gets when she's gaping around the computer store at the mall.

“Hey, kiddos.” Amber sashays into Drinks & Stuff.

Every guy stares.

She poufs up her shoulder-length blond hair. “Where's my latte?”

I push back my chair. “It's probably ready.” Junie's better at talking Amber into stuff.

I grab her coffee, a straw and a java jacket. Amber has sensitive fingers. I hang back, holding on to her order, while she and Junie discuss. Amber pulls out her cell and texts. More discussion.

After several minutes, Junie gives me the nod to let
me know they've finished with business. I meander over.

Amber reaches for the cup. “Thanks. Light on the whipped, right?”

“Yuppers.” I know the drill.

“Cool.” She flashes me a pearly white smile.

“Amber, any tips on making my lips thicker?” I ask.

She regards me, one emerald eye closed. “There's this new lip liner from Paris. Pricey, but it has a plumping factor.”

As she's walking away, her hips swaying like a hula hoop, she turns and says, “Not that you really need it, Sherry. Your lips are good.”

I can't hold back a full-lipped grin. Then, I say to Junie, “So?”

“Ghost hunting. Tonight. Late. And Zane even said he'd bring his brand-new gaussmeter.”

I
t's dusk. The Ruler's in the kitchen whipping up a special organic birthday dinner, involving cabbage casserole. Sam's in the office, zoned out on the computer.

In other words, they're both überoccupied with activities they love and that will keep them busy and away from me. I zip outside to the pear tree and start waving around espresso beans.

I'm thinking Mom thoughts and windmilling my arms like I'm a little Dutch girl when suddenly it smells like the coffee aisle at the grocery store. My branch rattles. Grandpa glides in on Mom's java breeze and lands next to me.

He beak-pokes at my pocket. I pull out a few
sunflower seeds mixed with dust and lint, and he settles in for some palm pecking.

“Hi, Sherry,” Mom says. “Lots to catch up on.”

“Seriously,” I say, then spill about the meanie dead principal who didn't get along with The Ruler. “He could easily be a ghost with an agenda. Tonight, we're going with Zane, Amber's new, ghost-hunting boyfriend, back to Buren to see if the principal's there. Zane says unhappy ghosts usually hang out where they died.”

“True,” she says.

“Can you watch The Ruler tonight? No way you're going to Buren with all that ghost-hunting equipment. Right, Mom?” I shiver at the memory of the psychic fair when the meter tracked her.

“Right.” The branch shakes; she's probably shuddering at the thought too. “And I see you've got a new necklace.” The stone sways as Mom checks it out. “That's quite the amethyst. You couldn't find anything less gaudy?”

Gaudy? Am I the only person in Phoenix with a sense of jewelry fashion? “It's gorgeous, Mom. And, before you ask, yes, The Ruler will wear it.”

“Wilhelm, can you take tonight's shift?” Mom asks. “I want to finish up the ‘About Ghosts Who Don't Move On' tutorial.”

Grandpa croaks out a yes.

“The tutorial.” I slap my forehead. “Did you learn a bunch?”

“I did.” And she pauses. Really pauses. Which means totally bad news for me. “Uh, Sherry … the silver box is very light and about the size of a box of Band-Aids. I'm glad about that. I was worried it would be big and heavy.”

Grandpa squawks, “It's here,” and flies to the knothole above my head.

“I guess Mrs. Howard delivered it earlier today,” Mom says.

My eyes are glued to Grandpa's jiggling tail feathers; the rest of him is inside the knothole. Then he completely disappears into the trunk. He's squawking and cawing, all echoey.

I'm about to see and touch a powerful magic box, built for imprisoning an evil ghost. Yikes.

Finally, Grandpa scoots out backward, his yellow feet dangling, his wings bent and crooked. In his beak, he's grasping a slim dull-metal rectangular box.

I pick it up carefully. One side is kind of smushed in. As I turn it over in my palm, it begins to glimmer and gleam, like someone's polishing it. And it's warming up, the way Play-Doh does when you squeeze it.

My index finger traces the curlicue pattern that squiggles over both sides. The box isn't completely flat, but slightly curved across the middle.

And the strange thing is, I feel good and comfortable touching it. I've never seen the silver box before, but it somehow feels familiar and friendly, like an old stuffed animal from my childhood.

“Look, Wilhelm,” Mom whispers. “The box is shining.”

Grandpa hops up my leg and onto my shoulder.

It is shining more and more, almost looking brand-new. “I can't find a latch anywhere. How do you open it?”

“You don't,” Mom whispers again. “It opens itself when the time comes.”

A tremor snakes up my spine. “You mean, you just sort of wave the box around the stalker and it sucks him in?”

“No,” Mom says super slowly. “There are several conditions. First, it must happen at midnight. Second, in a cemetery. Third, and this is the one I don't understand, the ghost and the Keeper of the Box and the box meet and somehow a connection is forged among all three. The Keeper reaches an understanding of why the ghost won't move on. Then he or she helps the ghost reach an understanding of why it's time to move on. At this exact instant, the box opens, and the ghost, willingly, flies in.”

My mom doesn't get it. But on a deep gut level, it feels right to me. The box lifts half an inch off my palm and just hovers there.

Grandpa's little beady eyes ogle the box's movement. “Mrs. Howard.”

“She was right about Sherry,” Mom says in a hushed voice.

I tune them both out. I'm totally focused on the box, which is humming faintly, high-pitched like an all-boys church choir. It's as though a strong invisible fishing line links me with the box, and it's reeling me in ever so slowly and gently, letting me know that I'm the one.

I'm the one it'll team up with.

I'm the one it'll work with.

We're lopsided right now, with only two out of the three of us present.

But when the ghost-stalker arrives, my role will be Keeper of the Box.

M
om and Grandpa leave. I slide the box in my pocket, where it fits perfectly like it's meant to be there.

Ack. Eek. Ike.

I so do not want that responsibility. I so do not want to talk a scary, mean ghost-stalker into a box. It should be my mother's job. Or even Grandpa's. Ghosts should take care of their own problems. Not be dragging innocent teenagers into their business.

I'm getting ready to climb down when the back door opens. It's The Ruler. She's wearing her gardening apron with the big pockets. She's toting her little gardening kneeling pad and her little bucket of tools and plant vitamins.

Hidden by leaves, I watch, my eyes all squinty to
make out what she's doing. She drops her foam kneeling pad on the grass and sets the bucket next to it. She takes a spray bottle from one of the front apron pockets and drenches her precious tomato plants. I don't even need to be close to recognize the bottle's contents: dish soap and water. The Ruler's method for encouraging pests to leave her tomatoes alone. She won't use insecticide because she's all about nature and being natural.

After pushing the bottle back in her pocket, she pulls out a little mesh bag full of ladybugs. The Ruler uses them in her garden to munch the bad bugs. Strange thing about ladybugs, they don't fly too far from home.

A smell of honey + dirty socks breezes by me.

I stiffen.

The Ruler unties the mesh bag and starts gently tipping ladybugs onto the tallest tomato plant. Suddenly, the bag is ripped from her hand. Hanging upside down above her head, it shakes violently. Lady-bugs topple out. The empty mesh bag plops to the ground.

A wave of wind whooshes through our backyard, scattering the ladybugs.

The Ruler is still on her knees, her mouth open.

Finally, I get it together and jump down from the tree. Yanking off my necklace, I swing it wildly above my head.

The air clears and goes back to smelling like, well, like our backyard. The ladybugs are all long gone, up and over our fence, away from the friendly tomato plants.

I reach out a hand to The Ruler, who's looking pretty dazed. I pull her to her feet and into a hug. I don't hug her much, but I think she really needs it today. We both do.

“Okay, that was a weird wind,” I say, stepping back. “Good thing ladybugs are so cheap.”

“I think I'll brew a cup of chamomile tea.” She picks up her kneeling pad.

Before grabbing the bucket, I push the necklace into my pocket. Arm in arm, the two of us trudge to the porch, where we dump the gardening things, then head into the kitchen.

I immediately plug my nose. Cabbage. Smells. Bad. Very. Bad.

“I need something stronger than tea,” The Ruler announces, her face all scrunched up, thinking. “Liquid vitamins.”

While she's marching from cupboard to cupboard, snapping up junk like the blender and mysterious bags of powder and nonfat plain yogurt, I mess with my amethyst necklace. The clasp is bent from where I yanked it off, but I manage to get it to stay closed.

“Paula! Sherry!” Sam shouts from the office. “You gotta see this!”

We hurtle down the hall. Sam's leaning back in the office chair, pointing to the computer screen. “You will not believe this YouTube.” He clicks on the arrow to play.

Gladiator music blares from our computer speakers. The camera zeroes in on a robot. It's Donner's bot. Close shot. Makes the robot look strong and superior. The camera shifts to another robot. Saguaro's bot. It's crying. “Don't make me fight. I'm too wimpy. And I'm not put together right,” the bot whines.

Big masculine drums thumping in the background, Donner's robot totally annihilates ours. Until it's a puddle of parts. Then their robot, a victory fist in the air, stands on ours.

It's when I see the last frame of the video that another piece of the mystery falls into place.

“I
know what plan B is!” I say to Junie on the phone. “Check out this YouTube.” I tell her the URL.

I'm in my room, hanging with my fish, waiting while Junie checks out the video.

“So a violent video of their robot beating up our robot was plan B?” she says.

“Pretty lame-o, isn't it?” I say.

“Kind of,” Junie says, “but it's kind of smart too. It gets them in this winner mind-set. Which they need after we whomped them so badly last year. And freaking us out only helps their cause. I bet they were planning to make sure we saw it before an actual competition.”

“Ya don't think plan B could've been more
substantial?” Cindy flits to the side of the tank and gapes at me.

“You know, Sherry, there's a lot more to robotics than just robotics. There's major mind games too.”

“Uh-huh.” Sometimes you just gotta let Junie drone. Cindy opens her mouth again. “Tonight's a go, right?”

“Absolutely. Be on your curb at ten. Bring a flashlight and an open mind. Orders from Zane via Amber.”

“You wanna sleep over?” I ask. “We can sneak in and out together.”

“Sounds good.” Junie checks with her mom, who gives her the parental okay because tomorrow is Professional Development Day for teachers and there's no school.

My phone beeps. “Gotta go, it's Josh.” I click over.

“Hi, Sherry,” he says. “What're ya doing tonight? Coach just canceled the six a.m. polo practice.”