Scary Mary (9 page)

“
Mary, how does someone get rid of a
ghost?”

She rolled her head over to look at her. She’d
never gone into real detail about her ‘condition’. Rachel had asked
her about it, but she’d always fobbed her off with only vague
details. The fact was she thought Rachel might reject her if she
knew how real ghosts were.

“
I only know how I get rid of
them.”

“
And how’s that?” she
persisted.

Mary straightened in her seat and stared out the
windshield as she thought how to answer. She’d never explained how
it worked to someone before. “Every ghost I’ve come across is
always tied to something. I think of them as anchors. If the anchor
is destroyed, the ghost disappears. Anchors are usually something
that was close to the deceased. Something treasured like a
doll.”

“
A doll?”

She nodded. The doll had been real porcelain and
a Christmas gift from Gran. She was the prettiest doll Mary had
ever seen. Becca had thought so too, and Becca had never learned
how to share. She’d told Gran that the scratches and bruises were
from clumsy accidents, but she couldn’t think up lies for the bite
marks.

“
Yeah, Gran never got me secondhand toys
after that.”

“
Oh, Mary.”

She shrugged. “Gran burned the doll, and the
ghost left.”

“
Did she go to Heaven?”

She shrugged again. “I don’t know where ghosts
go when they leave. I just know they don’t come back.”

“
So we need to find Ricky’s anchor and
destroy it,” Rachel said getting back to the matter at
hand.

“
Yeah, and we know that it’s in the
basement.”

Chapter 8

Ghost Hunting

It was TAB, and Rachel and Mary were hunkered
down at a table in the cafeteria. This was an unusual locale for
them. They didn’t go near the caf, unless it was absolutely
necessary. It was the hub for all the cliques and wannabes. Girls
preened and strutted while guys leaned against the walls and tried
to look cool. Being there gave Mary a headache, but the two girls
were on a mission. They were going to find Cy. Well, Rachel was
determined to find him. Mary was pretending to look. She still
wasn’t sure about telling him what they’d found out.

She really did want him to like her again, but
telling him his house was haunted wasn’t the way to do it. It was
funny how saving a boy from danger didn’t guarantee him liking the
girl. It always worked for the guy in the fairytales. The damsel
always married the hero, and they lived happily ever after.
Fairytales were sexist, and the real world was unfair.

Rachel grabbed Mary’s arm, jerking her out of
her gloomy thoughts. “There’s Cy,” she whispered and pointed. Mary
followed her finger.

She groaned when she spotted him. “He’s with
Vicky.”

“
So? Go talk to him.”

“
But Vicky’s with him."

“
Are you a coward?”

She slouched down further and crossed her arms.
“No, but I’m not a glutton for punishment either.”

“
Fine, I’ll handle it,” Rachel said and
got up. Mary tried to pull her back, but Rachel shook her hand off
and marched across the lunchroom. The din in the cafeteria drowned
out any chance of hearing what was said, but Mary could read the
body language loud and clear. Vicky tried to block Cy from Rachel,
but Rachel was persistent. She reached around Vicky and tugged his
shirt. He stepped away from Vicky reluctantly to let her speak to
him. He wasn’t happy to see her, but he listened. His eyes flicked
once to Mary. He was scowling. Mary turned away in alarm. When she
looked again, Rachel was coming back.

“
He’ll see us at lunch.”

~~ ~~ ~~

The girls sat in their usual spot outside and
waited. And waited. “Maybe he didn’t mean today,” Rachel said. It
was a quarter to one, and lunch was almost over.

Mary shrugged. “Vicky’s probably keeping him
away.” She’d been nervous right before lunch. She’d been nervous
since Rachel told her that he would meet with them, but as the time
ticked by, and Cy didn’t show, she grew eerily calm. It felt like a
reprieve. She began to hope the bell would ring early for fourth
period.

Rachel sighed in relief and nodded toward the
school. “Finally, here he comes.”

Mary turned to watch his approach. Her calmness
fell away, and her anxiety returned. He walked toward them with his
head down. To anyone watching, it didn’t look like he was coming to
them but just going in their direction. He didn’t look at them,
even when he was standing over them.

“
So Rachel said you had something to tell
me.”

“
Yeah, you should probably sit down,” she
said.

“
What? You going say something that’ll
make me keel over? Like apologize?” He finally lifted his head and
looked at her. Mary gulped.

“
I am sorry about what happened,” she
said.

“
It’s not her fault. It’s Vicky’s,” Rachel
said.

“
No, it’s partly my fault,” she said. “But
I didn’t actually do that stuff with the Ouija board or the
vase.”

“
Oh, come on.”

“
Let her explain, Cy."

He grimaced but finally sat down.

She took a deep breath. This was the going to be
the tough part: Explaining what she was to him. “I hear stuff that
you can’t hear. Do you know what a clairaudient is?"

“
No.”

“
Well, clairaudients can hear ghosts and
talk to them. I’m a clairaudient.” She’d never just come out and
said it to anyone. Sure, she knew the word, but to come out and
just tell someone that she was a clairaudient had never happened.
She’d never even used the word with Rachel. All her life, she’d
been trying to deny it, but she couldn’t change who she was. She
heard ghosts. No amount of humming and sticking her fingers in her
ears was going to stop it. She had to accept what she was. She
waited for his reaction.

“
You hear dead people,” he said in a flat
voice.

She twisted her hands in her lap. “Yeah.”

“
As opposed to seeing dead
people?”

“
Yeah.”

“
How about smelling dead people? Are there
people who can do that?”

She winced and stared at her hands.

“
You’re really starting to piss me off,”
Rachel said to him.

He ignored her. “So you hear dead people, what
about the Ouija board?”

“
It worked. I mean those things are meant
to talk to ghosts. Well, congratulations.”

“
So my house is haunted?”

“
Yeah.”

He got up. “Where are you going?” she asked in
alarm.

“
I’m going to get ready for
class.”

“
What? Don’t you want to know the rest of
it?” Rachel demanded.

He choked on a laugh. “There’s more?”

“
Your house is haunted and not in Casper,
the Friendly Ghost kind of way,” Rachel said.

“
Of course.” He turned to go.

Mary decided it was time to lay it all out. “Cy,
this ghost will hurt you if it can. It has hurt others who’ve lived
there.”

He stopped and turned back. “Now I get why they
call you Scary Mary.”

Her eyes widened.

Rachel jumped up. “Hey, if you don’t want to
believe this, that’s your prerogative. It’s a stupid prerogative,
but you’re welcome to it. Mary told you this to help you. She
doesn’t get her laughs from stuff like this. She’s a good person,
and she felt she had to tell you. Now she has, it’ll be your fault
if something happens.”

He threw his hands up. “Will you two listen to
yourselves? My house is not haunted. I don’t know why you’re trying
to make me think it is, but you’re both sick. I can’t believe I
liked either of you. Vicky was right. You’re both psycho.” He
turned and stormed away.

Mary felt two inches tall. She wrapped her arms
around her knees and tucked her head behind them. He was right. She
was sick. Who told people that their homes were haunted?

“
Are you sure you like him, Mary? Because
I’m ready to toilet paper his house and leave flaming bags of dog
poop at his front door.”

A watery laugh burst from her. “No, no
pranking.”

She sat back down beside her. “Then what should
we do?”

Mary didn’t answer. She had her eyes closed so
she wouldn’t cry.

“
Mary?” Rachel touched her
shoulder.

“
He’s never going to like me
again.”

“
So what?”

She jerked her head up to look at her friend.
“What do you mean so what? I really like him.”

“
What, you can’t like him if he doesn’t
like you?”

“
It hurts if he doesn’t like
me.”

She put her arm around Mary’s shoulders and gave
her a hug. “I know, but just because he doesn’t like you, doesn’t
change who you are. You’re still the most awesome girl in this
school.”

She wiped the corners of her eyes. “Thanks, but
I’m not the most awesome girl. She’s sitting next to me.”

Rachel pushed her over. “Where? I wanna meet
her.”

Mary’s laughter surprised her. She looked up at
Rachel and gave her a big smile. “Are we done with the mush?”

“
Oh man, I hope so, ‘cause I don’t know if
I can do much more of it.”

Mary sat back up and reconsidered the situation
with Cy. She was determined to help him. She just had to figure out
how.

The plan came to her like a cartoon bulb
lighting up over her head. It was a crazy idea. Certifiably insane.
Rachel would love it. She turned her head to peek at Rachel. “What
do you think of a little B&E?”

Mary had the pleasure of watching Rachel’s jaw
drop. “You want to sneak into his house?” she squawked.

“
Don’t announce it.”

“
Are you serious?” she
whispered.

“
Still want to play Robin to my
Batman?”

Rachel stared at her as she thought about the
idea. Her face broke into a grin. “Just call me the Girl Wonder. Uh
but, do you know how to break into a house?”

“
Breaking into houses is easy. Not getting
caught is the tricky part.”

“
Well, if we do get caught, my dad will
represent you.”

Mary quirked an eyebrow. “What about you?”

She shook her head. “Uh, no. Remember the
protest thing?”

“
The animal rights thing?”

“
Yeah, having to bail your daughter out
for throwing rancid hamburger meat on upscale business men, who
happen to be clients of your firm, didn’t sit well with him. He
said if I ever wound up in jail again, he’d leave me
there.”

“
Um, that’s kind of harsh. I’m sure he
didn’t mean it.”

Rachel shook her head. “You didn’t see the
purple vein throbbing in his forehead. If I do wind up in jail, I’d
demand to stay rather than be released into his custody.”

Mary shook her head. She knew Rachel’s dad. He
was a man people instinctively called sir and minded their manners
around. He was not a man anyone wanted to make angry, but he wasn’t
hard on his daughter. He didn’t demand she be a certain way and
would not let anyone else tell her to be a certain way either. Mary
remembered the hoopla that Rachel’s Grateful Dead t-shirt had
stirred in the school their freshman year. Some uptight teacher
thought she was endorsing drug use by wearing the shirt, though it
didn’t have a marijuana symbol on it, just the Grateful Dead logo.
The administration had tried to make Rachel change her shirt. She
wouldn’t, so they sent her home. She called her dad and told him
what had happened. He stormed into school, gathered the
administration in one room, and in no uncertain terms, told them
that if they did not let his daughter wear her T-shirt at school,
they would see him in court. Rachel got to wear her T-shirt at
school.

“
Your dad’s cooler than you give him
credit for.”

She shrugged. “So how are we going to break
in?”

“
We’ll have to skip school.”

“
Not a problem.”

“
Stake out the house, wait for everyone to
leave, hope they left something unlocked, if not, we’ll have to
break a window, go to the basement, find Ricky’s anchor, destroy
it, and leave.”

“
Let’s do it tomorrow.”

“
But tomorrow I have my next appointment
with Mr. Landa.”

They shared a grin. No, neither of them would
have a problem skipping school tomorrow.

~~ ~~ ~~

They watched Cy’s house from Rachel’s mom’s car.
It was a tan station wagon. She’d asked her parents if she could
borrow it to drive Mary to school. She’d told them that Mary had
twisted her ankle, and her grandma’s car was in the shop. Mary
would have to remember to limp if she saw them.

A half-empty box of glazed doughnuts sat between
them, only one of which Mary had eaten. Rachel sat in the driver’s
seat with a pair of binoculars trained on the house. They’d watched
Kyle and Cy leave five minutes ago. The parents had already gone
before they arrived. No one else was in the house.

“
I think it’s safe,” Mary said and opened
her door.

“
Let’s wait another minute,” Rachel said.
She trained her binoculars down the street and grabbed another
doughnut. She kept the binoculars up to her face as she
ate.

Mary rolled her eyes and climbed out of the car.
She wanted to get the exorcism done and over with. The waiting was
killing her nerves. Rachel’s consumption of six doughnuts wasn’t
easing her worries either. Rachel on a sugar high could be
dangerous. Rachel scrambled out of the car to follow.