Sleepover Club Vampires (7 page)

“Sure thing!” I nodded. “Come on, I bet we can find some signs of vampire activity last night.”

We got to the edge of the woods, then crept cautiously towards the chapel. It wasn’t as scary as it had been the night before, but there was still something a bit eerie about the place.

“Right everyone, look out for signs,” I hissed.

As we approached the chapel we all stooped close to the ground.

“What exactly are we looking for?” asked Fliss weakly.

“Footprints. Like this one!” I pointed excitedly to the ground.

There in the earth were footprints, enormous ones.

“Those weren’t made by Molly and Carli, were they?” Rosie looked scared.

“There are more,” Frankie pointed, “and they’re all leading to the chapel.”

We followed them right to the entrance of the building.

“Hey, what’s this?” Lyndz bent down and picked up something from among the weeds on the ground.

“It’s a c-cross!” she squealed, opening her palm so we could all see it.

A gold-coloured cross, streaked with mud, glinted faintly in the sunshine.

“You know what this means,” I told the others firmly. “Someone must have been trying to protect themselves against the vampires by holding this up – then they got scared and ran away.”

Fliss and Rosie made some weedy gulping noises. I moved further into the chapel to take a closer look. Frankie and Lyndz came with me, whilst Fliss and Rosie hung round the door.

“What’s that?” Lyndz whispered, pointing up to a dark shape hanging from the exposed beams of the ceiling.

“Dunno.” Frankie went to inspect further. Then she went kind of pale and started to back out of the chapel.

“Bats!” she shrieked when she was by the door. “Loads of them!”

We started screaming and running all at the same time.

When we were back at the house we collapsed in our bedroom. Thank goodness we could lock the door this time – the locksmith had sorted out the problem.

“Everything adds up,” I gasped. “The noises we heard, the cross, the bats. I reckon we did stumble upon some vampires the other night.”

“Shouldn’t we tell someone?” Fliss asked frantically.

“No way! Besides, I think Uncle Bob knows,” I told them. “Remember how he told us to go to the chapel? Maybe he’s testing us out. We’ve got to get ourselves prepared with crosses and stakes and go down there and slay ourselves some vampires!”

“Not tonight?” Rosie looked alarmed.

“Nope, tonight we’ve got another mission to accomplish,” I reminded them. “Tonight we’re going to scare Molly and Carli witless!”

You know when you’re really up for something but you’ve got to wait for the right time to do it? Well, it’s like time goes on strike, isn’t it? Every minute just stretches out in front of you. Even listening to Uncle Bob’s stories wasn’t so much fun because we were so keen to get on with some action of our own.

We went to bed ahead of everyone else and ran through our plan one last time. Then it was just a case of waiting until Molly and Carli came upstairs before we could sneak out to the attic.

“What if Ben and Spike wake up? Mum might rumble what we’re up to.” Lyndz looked anxious. “And she’s been so great since she’s been here, I don’t want her relapsing into one of her moods again.”

“Look Lyndz, that’s a chance we’ll have to take,” I said firmly. “We know where the boys’ bedroom is – we’ll just have to make extra sure that we don’t make any sound when we walk over it. Ready?”

The others nodded. “Ready.”

We wrapped ourselves in our dressing gowns and crept out into the passageway. The others crept towards the door leading to the attic and I went to Molly and Carli’s room.

“Mum says you’re to turn off your tape and go to sleep NOW!” I shouted through the door. “She’s still mad with you about our bedroom door. And if you don’t shut up she says you’ll have to miss out on the party.”

“You creep!” Molly yelled back, but within seconds she’d turned off her music and the lamps.

“We’d better do what the scumbag says,” I heard Molly whisper. “She’ll probably grass us up otherwise, and there’s no way I’m missing that party!”

I put my thumbs up to the others and crept to join them.

Now I’m glad that we have torches as part of our sleepover kit, because we certainly needed them up there in the attic. It was so dark you just couldn’t see anything in front of you. And cold too! Somehow it seemed so much bigger than it had done in the daytime.

“We must be there by now!” whispered Rosie. “Are you sure we haven’t passed the packing cases we used to mark out Molly’s room?”

“No way!”

“Listen!” Lyndz suddenly hissed. “Isn’t that Spike crying?”

We all held our breath. If Lyndz’s mum came to check on him, as sure as eggs is eggs she’d check on us too. Molly wasn’t the only one who might be missing the party!

“It’s OK, I think he must just be having a dream,” Lyndz sighed with relief when there was silence below us again.

“Well at least we know that Molly’s room isn’t too far away,” Frankie whispered. “Look, the cases are here.”

We tiptoed to the middle of them and grinned at each other.

“Let’s do it!”

Frankie and I took off our dressing gowns and started to drag them over the floor, making a loud swishing sound. Fliss and Rosie danced and stamped around whilst Lyndz moaned and groaned.

To begin with, we thought Molly and Carli must be asleep because there was no sound below us. Then we heard a low urgent murmuring. We stopped where we were, then started again – swishing, stamping and moaning. It was all going fantastically – until Lyndz’s moans were joined by loud “hic!”s. She’d got the dreaded hiccups!

“No Lyndz!” I almost shouted, running over to her and clamping my hand over her mouth. “You’ll give the game away.”

By that time we could hear anxious sobs below us.

“Time we were gone!” I whispered to the others.

We hurried to the stairway as quickly and quietly as we could. Turning to the others I laughed, “Go on, tell me that wasn’t our best yet!”

But no-one spoke. They looked terrified. I spun round to see what the problem was – only to be met by the shadowy figure of a man looming up the stairs towards us.

I took one look at the lumbering form and started to scream. I wanted to run back up to the attic, but my legs had turned to jelly.

“Away with your screaming,” chuckled the figure, emerging out of the shadows. “Anyone would think you’d seen a ghost!”

“Uncle Bob!” we gasped in unison.

“You see!” sobbed Fliss. “He keeps appearing without us hearing anything.”

“Fliss!”

“Well it’s weird! And scary!”

But there was something much scarier coming up the main stairs – MUM! She was on the warpath, wanting to find out what all the commotion was about. Molly and Carli were outside their bedroom weeping and wailing about spooky sounds in the attic. Mum was bound to see us and put two and two together – she’s very good at that kind of maths.

Uncle Bob motioned for us to hurry along the landing and closed the attic door behind us. As Mum rounded the corner, we were almost back outside our own bedroom.

“Ah, there you are, Valerie,” he greeted Mum warmly. “I found these wee lassies terrified out of their wits. They say something has been making a proper din up there.” He pointed to the attic. “It must be Headless Eric doing his rounds again. He’s the house ghost; a noisy wee thing but he’s harmless enough. Wouldn’ae hurt a flea.”

Mum looked at us suspiciously so we tried to look as terrified as possible.

“D-did you hear it too?” Frankie stammered as Molly and Carli appeared, trembling and shaking. “Wasn’t it gruesome?”

They both nodded, and it took me all my time not to burst out laughing. Respect to Frankie, she played an absolute blinder. They were totally convinced that we really
had
been scared by Headless Eric!

“I’ll hear no more talk of ghosts!” said Mum sternly, ushering us back to our rooms. “There must be a perfectly sensible explanation for the noises.”

She stared hard at Uncle Bob as she spoke. He just carried on smiling, but as soon as her back was turned he gave me a great big wink and the cheekiest grin!

When Mum had finally gone back downstairs I nearly exploded.

“Isn’t Uncle Bob just the most fun?” I grinned, tossing a handful of fizzy fish at the others. “I mean, how many other adults would have got us out of that mess?”

“He certainly is one barmy old dude!” agreed Lyndz, whose hiccups had disappeared in the excitement.

Fliss didn’t say anything, she just sat on her bed chewing her sweet thoughtfully.

“But you were pretty awesome too, Frankie,” Rosie reminded us. “Talk about thinking on your feet!”

Frankie stood up on her bed.

“I thank you all, my humble servants!” She bowed elaborately.

“No need to get carried away!” I said, thwacking her with my pillow.

We hadn’t had a pillow fight for ages so the others joined in. Wicked!

Afterwards, as we lay exhausted on our beds, I told the others, “If we put as much energy into our vampire-slaying, those demons won’t stand a chance!”

“Aw man, can’t we have a break from all that?” Rosie moaned. “This holiday is turning out to be pretty exhausting.”

“Look Rosie-Posie, we’re on a mission,” I told her firmly. “And we cannot fail.”

I had intended to go on our vampire patrol the very next night, but we set out in the morning to do the touristy sightseeing thing and it was dark when we arrived back. However much we pleaded, there was no way that Mum was going to let us “roam about outside”, as she put it.

The next day, party-frenzy hit town. We had to help tidy up this room and help trim up that. And just when we thought it was safe to go outside, Uncle Bob got us to help move all the furniture around. Typical!

The same thing happened the following day too. As soon as the light was beginning to fade and we were about to head out of the door, Uncle Bob called us back.

“Ah there you are now,” he chuckled. “I was hoping you’d be able to help me with these.”

He produced a bag containing about a million balloons.

“We want the place looking nice and cheerful for the party, don’t we now?”

“Couldn’t we do that tomorrow, Uncle Bob?” I pleaded. “The party isn’t until Saturday. We’ve still got two days left.”

“Ah now, there’s all the cooking to do tomorrow, Kenny,” he told me with a gleam in his eye. “And you don’t want to miss out on the haggis-making, do you?”

He handed over the balloons.

“Kenny’s the right one for that job!” Molly called out snidely as she and Carli walked past. “She’s full of hot air!”

I could have strangled her. But Uncle Bob went one better – he made them dust all the books in his library! Classic!

“It’s almost like your uncle doesn’t want us to go outside, isn’t it?” Rosie said, taking a breather from blowing up balloons. “Do you think he’s got something to hide?”

“I don’t know,” I replied, thoughtfully. “But we’re definitely going to find out tomorrow night.”

In preparation for our vampire-slaying mission we went to bed early and made crosses from pieces of wood which we’d found in a box next to the fireplace in the lounge.

“Do you think these are going to work?” Fliss asked, holding up a very wonky-looking cross held together with Sellotape.

“Deffo,” I assured her. “It’s the
symbol
of the cross that vampires are scared of, it doesn’t matter what they’re made of.”

I sharpened a few sticks as best I could with the help of Fliss’s nail file.

“Look, I’ve got myself some stakes too! Bring on the vampires!”

But that night it wasn’t vampires we had to deal with, but Headless Eric again. Or at least, that’s what Molly and Carli would have liked us to believe. At about two o’clock in the morning I felt someone shaking me.

“Wassup!” I mumbled crossly. “Leave me alone will you?”

I looked up to see Fliss and Rosie staring at me.