The House Next Door (4 page)

She quickly grabbed her sister's elbow and steered her over to the snack table.

“Serve these,” she told Amanda, shoving into her sister's hands the plate of beautifully frosted, silver-sprinkled cupcakes Alyssa had baked earlier. Amanda looked at the cupcakes in surprise and then nodded, grabbed the plate, and headed directly over to Paul.

“Cupcake?” she offered to him.

“Don't mind if I do,” he replied, plucking two from the plate. “You know,” he continued, “when we drove up, my mom said ever since she's lived in Glory that house has been exactly the same.”

Alyssa rolled her eyes again. She wished that Paul would just let it go!

“The town tried to put it up for sale a few times,” Olivia added.

“It's in shambles,” Carrie said. “No wonder why nobody wants to buy it!”

“I heard that some married couple thought about buying it a few years ago,” Olivia said. “But when they went inside they heard footsteps, like someone pacing
back and forth, on the floor above them. They freaked out and rushed to the front door to leave, but when they reached it, it slammed shut and locked itself. They had to unlock three dead bolts to get the door open. I guess someone, or something, didn't want them to leave.”

“That's ridiculous!” Anne jumped in. “These are just stupid, made-up legends about some boring, old house. Nobody in Glory has anything better to talk about.”

“That's not what I heard,” Paul said. He spoke slowly, in a deeper-than-usual voice. Something about him seemed uncharacteristically serious. “It's true that the town did try to sell the house, but it wasn't to a couple. It was to a single woman. And it definitely didn't work out.”

Anne scoffed, not believing her ears—this story was actually a new one. She thought she had heard all the rumors by now.

Paul continued, “The woman had heard people whispering about rattling doors and windows, but she just chalked it up to the house being so old. It didn't bother her at all, not when she could buy the house for such a steal. When she was ready to sign on the dotted line, she stopped by the house for one final visit to snap some pictures to send to her family.

“Slowly, she checked each room. There was nothing suspicious. She made her way to the attic. The small room was once used as a bedroom. It struck her that it must've been a little kid's room because it still contained a tiny neatly made-up bed, a small desk, a single nightstand with a harmonica on it, and some old-timey wooden toys around the floor. She felt a little sad, looking at the room that once belonged to a child, but nothing was out of the ordinary, so she decided that all the rumors about the house being haunted were just that, rumors.

“She turned to leave when she heard a small knock coming from behind an old chest of drawers on the far side of the attic. It was a pattern of knocks, like a code. Tap, tap-tap, tap. Tap, tap-tap, tap.” Paul knocked his knuckles against a nearby table, mimicking his words.
Tap, tap-tap, tap.
“Over and over, like someone was there, trying to get her attention. She slowly made her way over to the dresser. It was dark, too dark to see anything. So she flicked on her flashlight, and a beam of light lit up the area. She was shocked by what she saw. . . .”

Paul stood silent in the middle of the room. Several pairs of eyes glared back at him.

“What?” Amanda asked. “What did she see?”

“Nothing,” Paul replied.

“You're so annoying, Paul,” Alyssa told him.

“All I said was that she didn't see anything in the attic,” Paul said defiantly. “But a few days later, on her way to the bank to finish signing the papers for the house, she swung by the drugstore to pick up the pictures she had developed. This was in the olden days before digital cameras were invented. She reviewed the photos of the house while she was still in the store. In each photo, the figure of a girl, a ghost, stood in the background.

“When she reached the end of the pack, she screamed and dropped all the pictures, leaving them on the floor of the drugstore when she ran out. The woman never showed up to the bank to sign the final papers and was never heard from again.”

The room was quiet. Alyssa was stunned and speechless.

“No way!” Anne shouted, breaking the silence. “That kind of thing happens all the time! Haven't any of you guys ever seen those ghost hunting shows? They always debunk the ghosts in pictures as being tricks of the light.”

“I wouldn't believe the story unless I trusted the person who told me about it,” Paul countered. “The woman who developed the photos was my aunt. She thought the same thing about tricky lighting, maybe the person was experimenting or something. But when my aunt saw the woman's face, she knew that the images terrified the woman. My aunt tore up the photos the woman dropped, and threw them away, never wanting to see them again.”

“I don't believe it,” was all that Alyssa could mutter.

“Neither do I!” Carrie agreed. She looped her arm through Alyssa's. “And besides, who cares about that dumb house? Halloween was two months ago, Paul. We're here tonight to have a rockin' New Year's Eve party. What do you guys want to do next? More dancing?”

Alyssa let out a small sigh of relief. Within a minute, Carrie was practically dragging Steve into the middle of the room, completely ignoring his resistance.

The Peterson sisters remained in a darkened corner of the room, watching their friends dance. Anne was getting into the music and was just about to join their guests on the dance floor when she heard Amanda whisper, “They're just rumors.”

Alyssa and Anne turned to look at their sister. She still had a phantomlike complexion.

“Of course they are,” Anne told her, and skipped off to the dance floor.

Amanda nodded, willing herself to believe her younger sister. Because after everything that she just heard about the house, there was one thing that she couldn't stop thinking about.
Could it have been the same little girl from the pictures who opened the shutters tonight?

“Listen up!” Carrie shouted over the music about a few hours later. “It's New Year's Eve and less than two hours till midnight. I think everyone knows what that means!”

Amanda's eyes lit up. She knew exactly what that meant, and she couldn't wait. Amanda had never been kissed. Even though the New Year's kisses at their previous parties were just on the cheek, the boys had always just ignored her. She had been thinking about this night for months now, and she was determined that this was her year to be kissed at midnight!

At this point, everyone was hot from dancing inside, and they had grabbed their jackets and wandered out to the porch to cool off. The sky was filled with clouds
blocking out the stars, but the tea lights twinkled in the dark night. Everyone milled around in small groups. Alyssa had brought some of the snacks outside, and the table overflowed with cupcakes, brownies, and the Petersons' famous snack mix. She had even set up a mix-it-yourself fruit juice and soda bar—complete with mini scoops of ice cream and tiny umbrellas. A few of Anne's friends sat in the large wooden Adirondack chairs, sipping punch out of plastic champagne flutes and whispering to one another. Every so often they would point to the huddle of guys and giggle.

Fifth graders,
Amanda thought and smiled.

Amanda searched through the crowd until she found Paul. The new kid, Steve, was cute, but she'd had a crush on Paul for forever. He had always treated her like a younger sister, but Amanda wasn't a little kid anymore.

“We should start thinking about who we'd like to kiss when the clock strikes twelve!” Carrie finished her announcement.

At the mention of being kissed, the fifth-grade girls squealed with delight. Anne's best friend, Jenna Lee, covered her eyes as her cheeks burned bright red. Carrie clapped excitedly while the boys let out groans in shock
and horror. Daniel Garrity plunged an imaginary dagger into his heart and then dropped to the floor. And Matt Weber pretended to puke uncontrollably.

“You're all so immature!” Carrie chided.

The more the girls tried to hold it together, the harder it was not to crack. When Steve started blowing kisses and batting his eyelashes at a squirrel that ran across the yard, everyone finally broke into a fit of hysterical giggles.

While everyone was distracted, Amanda grabbed a box of sparklers from the table and pulled out two of them. She touched the end of one to a nearby candle's flame, and it burst into a shower of sparks. It lit up her face and cast a pretty glow around her. She walked over to Paul and held the unlit sparkler out to him.

But Paul's attention was far away. He was staring across the yard and out into the darkness. Amanda could tell that he didn't even know that she was standing next to him.

Suddenly, Paul pointed toward the old neighboring house. Amanda followed his gaze. The house was barely visible. A thick blanket of clouds hid the moon. She simply saw a dark silhouette against the backdrop
of the night. She glanced back at Paul and watched his expression.

Paul was sort of smiling, deep in thought, but then all of a sudden he frowned.

“What?” Amanda asked.

“Did you see that?” Paul whispered. “A light flickered in the top window.”

Amanda turned toward the house, but it all looked dark.

“I don't see anything,” she replied.

Paul didn't seem to be paying attention. He was still looking into the night, distracted. “Someone is inside that house,” he said.

Again, Amanda looked across the field. The old house remained as dark and lifeless as ever. For an instant, she thought that Paul was pulling her leg, playing one of his famous practical jokes on her. She was about to call him on it when she saw a flash of alarm in his eyes. Amanda panicked, seeing that Paul was seriously freaked. What exactly did he see?

“So who are you going to kiss at midnight?” she asked, desperately trying to change the subject. She nudged his arm and handed him the unlit sparkler. He
absentmindedly took it from her. Amanda leaned in to light it with her own sparkler, but it was too late. The one she had been holding fizzled out with a final hiss and a slowly rising wisp of smoke.

Paul ignored her question. Amanda was about to urge him to rejoin the group when Anne walked over. He didn't even notice her standing beside him on his other side.

“I want to know what's going on in that house,” he continued. “Someone's in there—playing with the electricity or candlelight or something.”

“That house is spooky. We get it!” Anne cried. “It's just your eyes playing tricks on you. It's probably a camera flash bouncing off the windows from our parents taking pictures upstairs.”

Paul now looked at Anne. He lifted his head and puffed his chest a little. “Yeah, of course,” he said. “I wasn't scared or anything.”

“So, you agree?” Anne asked. “Everything people say about that house is just plain silly?”

“We totally agree!” Amanda said, answering for the both of them while shooting her little sister a secret smile. “Besides, I think Alyssa has some games planned. Let's go back to the group.”

The corner of Paul's mouth lifted slightly. He flipped his hair and nodded.

Amanda found Alyssa refilling the bowl of pretzels.

“We need a game to distract everyone.
Pronto!
” Amanda told her.

Alyssa looked at her, but she didn't ask any questions. She disappeared inside for a minute, and came back onto the porch with a dusty, old hat filled with folded slips of papers. Earlier that day, Anne and Alyssa had spent a good hour coming up with the craziest things their friends would have to act out for a game of Charades. They thought of everything from scuba diving to some of their favorite movies. They wrote each prompt down on tiny strips of paper, and put them into the hat. They even had a prize for the winner: a plastic gold trophy they found at the dollar store.

“Who's up for a game of Charades?” Alyssa asked. A large circle of kids had gathered around her.

“Great idea!” Carrie cheered.

Steve agreed. “I'll go first.”

“I don't think so,” Alyssa cut in. “We need to pick teams.”

Olivia's eyes crinkled as a mischievous smile spread
across her face. She had an idea. “Girls against boys?”

“Perfect,” Paul agreed. “Prepare to be defeated.” He pulled a quarter out of his pocket and balanced it on his thumb. “Heads or tails?”

“Heads!” Carrie, Anne, and Amanda called out together.

Paul flicked the coin into the air, and everyone took one step back as it plunked down in the center of the circle. The girls groaned. Tails.

“Steve,” Paul announced. “You're up.” He bent down to pick up the quarter and then shoved it back into his pocket.

Alyssa lifted the hat high enough so that Steve could pick out a piece of paper without seeing what was written on it. But instead of reaching his hand into the hat, he grabbed it away from Alyssa.