“I never sleep very well in new places,” he told me. “I never sleep very well in this house!” He let out an unhappy laugh. “I was wide-awake.”
“There’s no one in the attic,” I said, yawning. I tilted my ear to the ceiling. “Listen,” I instructed. “Silent up there. No voices.”
We both listened to the silence for a while.
Then Zane set down the stuffed bear. “Do you think I could have a bowl of cereal?” he asked.
“Huh?” I gaped at him.
“A bowl of cereal always helps calm me down,” he said. An embarrassed smile crossed his face. “Just a habit from when I was a kid.”
I squinted at my clock radio. It was a little after midnight. “You want a bowl of cereal now?”
He nodded. “Is that okay?” he asked shyly.
Poor guy, I thought. He’s really freaked out.
“Sure,” I said. “I’ll come down to the kitchen with you. Show you where everything is.”
I found my flip-flops and slipped my feet into them. I keep them under my bed. I don’t like walking barefoot on the floorboards in the hall. There are a lot of nails that poke up from the floor.
Mom and Dad keep saying they’re going to buy carpet. But money is tight. I don’t think carpet is tops on their list.
Zane appeared a little calmer. I smiled at him and led the way into the hall.
He’s not such a bad guy, I thought. He’s a little wimpy — but so what? I decided to have a serious talk with Dan first thing in the morning. I planned to make Dan promise he wouldn’t pull any more scares on Zane.
The long hall was so dark, Zane and I both held on to the wall as we made our way to the stairs. Mom and Dad used to keep a little night-light at the end of the hall. But the bulb burned out, and they never replaced it.
Holding on to the banister, we made our way slowly down the steps. Pale light from outside cast long blue shadows over the living room. In the dim light, our old furniture rose up like ghosts around the room.
“This house always creeps me out,” Zane whispered, staying close by my side as we crossed through the front room.
“I’ve lived here all my life, and sometimes I’m scared of it, too,” I confessed. “Old houses make so many strange sounds. Sometimes I think I hear the house groaning and moaning.”
“I really did hear voices,” Zane whispered.
We crept through the shadows to the kitchen. My flip-flops slapped on the linoleum. Silvery moonlight washed through the curtains over the kitchen window.
I started to fumble on the wall for the light switch.
But I stopped when I saw the dark figure slumped at the kitchen table.
Zane saw him, too. I heard Zane gasp. He jerked back into the doorway.
“Dad? Are you still up?” I called. “Why are you sitting in the dark?”
My hand found the light switch. I clicked on the kitchen light.
And Zane and I both let out a scream.
I recognized the red-and-white striped shirt. I didn’t even have to see the face.
Rocky leaned over the table, his wooden head propped in his hands.
Zane and I crept closer to the table. I moved to the other side. The dummy sneered at me. His glassy eyes were cold and cruel.
Such a nasty expression.
“How did he get down here?” Zane asked. He stared hard at the dummy, as if expecting the dummy to answer.
“Only one way,” I murmured. “He sure didn’t walk.”
Zane turned to me. “You mean Dan?”
I sighed. “Of course. Who else? Mister Dumb Jokes.”
“But how did your brother know we’d be coming down to the kitchen tonight?” Zane asked.
“Let’s go ask him,” I replied.
I knew Dan was awake. Probably sitting on the edge of his bed, waiting eagerly to hear us scream from the kitchen. Giggling to himself. So pleased with himself.
So pleased that he broke his promise to Dad. And gave Zane and me a little scare.
I balled both hands into tight fists. I could feel the anger rising in my chest.
When I get really furious like that, I usually go to the back room and pound the piano. I pound out a Sousa march or a hard, fast rock song. I pound the keys till I start to calm down.
Tonight, I decided, I would pound my brother instead.
“Come on,” I urged Zane. “Upstairs.”
I took one last glance at Rocky, slouched over the kitchen table. The dummy stared blankly back at me.
I really hate that dummy, I thought. I’m going to ask Dad to put him away in a closet or a trunk.
I forced myself to turn away from the sneering, wooden face. Then I put both hands on Zane’s shoulders and guided him back to the stairs.
“I’m going to tell Dan that we’re both fed up with his dumb jokes,” I whispered to my cousin. “Enough is enough. We’ll make him promise to stop leaving that dummy everywhere we go.”
Zane didn’t reply. In the dim light, I could see the grim expression on his face.
I wondered what he was thinking about. Was he remembering his last visit to our house? Was he remembering how Dan and I terrified him then?
Maybe he doesn’t trust me, either, I told myself.
We climbed the stairs and crept down the dark hallway to my brother’s room.
The door was half open. I pushed it open the rest of the way and stepped inside. Zane kept close behind me.
I expected Dan to be sitting up, waiting for us. I expected to see him grinning, enjoying his little joke.
Silvery moonlight flooded in through his double windows. From the doorway, I could see him clearly. Lying on his side in bed. Covers up to his chin. Eyes tightly closed.
Was he faking? Was he really awake?
“Dan,” I whispered. “Da-an.”
He didn’t move. His eyes didn’t open.
“Dan — I’m coming to tickle you!” I whispered. He could never keep a straight face when I threatened him. Dan is very ticklish.
But he didn’t move.
Zane and I crept closer. Up to the bed. We both stood over my brother, staring hard at him, studying him in the silvery light.
He was breathing softly, in a steady rhythm. His mouth was open a little. He made short whistling sounds. Mouse sounds. With his pointy chin and upturned nose, he really did look like a little mouse.
I leaned over him. “Da-an, get ready to be tickled!” I whispered.
I leaned back, expecting him to leap out at me, to shout “Boo!” or something.
But he continued sleeping, whistling softly with each breath.
I turned to Zane, who hung back in the center of the room. “He’s really asleep,” I reported.
“Let’s go back to our rooms,” Zane replied in a soft whisper. He yawned.
I followed him to the bedroom door. “What about your cereal?” I asked.
“Forget it. I’m too sleepy now.”
We were nearly to the door when I heard someone move in the hall.
“Ohhh.” I let out a low moan as a face appeared in the doorway.
Rocky’s face.
He had followed us upstairs!
I grabbed Zane’s arm. We both shouted cries of surprise.
The dummy moved quickly into the room.
I cut my cry short as I saw that he wasn’t walking on his own. He was being carried.
Dad had the dummy by the back of the neck.
“Hey — what’s going on?” Dan called sleepily from behind us. He raised his head from the pillow and squinted at us. “Huh? What’s everybody doing in my room?”
“That’s what I’d like to know,” Dad said sharply. He gazed suspiciously from Zane to me.
“You — you woke me up,” Dan murmured. He cleared his throat. Then he propped himself up on one elbow. “Why are you carrying that dummy, Dad?”
“Perhaps one of you would like to answer that question,” Dad growled. He had pulled a robe over his pajamas. His hair was matted to his
forehead. He wasn’t wearing his glasses, so he squinted at us.
“What’s going on? I don’t understand,” Dan said sleepily. He rubbed his eyes.
Was he putting on an act? I wondered. His innocent-little-boy act?
“I heard noises downstairs,” Dad said, shifting Rocky to his other hand. “I went down to see what was going on. I found this dummy sitting at the kitchen table.”
“I didn’t put him there!” Dan cried, suddenly wide awake. “Really. I didn’t!”
“Neither did Zane or me!” I chimed in.
Dad turned to me. He sighed. “I’m really sleepy. I don’t like these jokes in the middle of the night.”
“But I didn’t do it!” I cried.
Dad squinted hard at me. He really couldn’t see at all without his glasses. “Do I have to punish you and your brother?” he demanded. “Do I have to ground you? Or keep you from going away to camp this summer?”
“No!” Dan and I both cried at once. Dan and I were both going to summer camp for the first time this year. It’s all we’ve talked about since Christmas.
“Dad, I was asleep. Really,” Dan insisted.
“No more stories,” Dad replied wearily. “The next time one of my dummies is somewhere he shouldn’t be, you’re both in major trouble.”
“But, Dad —” I started.
“One last chance,” Dad said. “I mean it. If I see Rocky out of the attic again, you’ve both had it!” He waved Zane and me to the door. “Get to your rooms. Now. Not another word.”
“Do you believe me or not?” Dan demanded.
“I don’t believe that Rocky has been moving around the house on his own,” Dad replied. “Now lie down and get back to sleep, Dan. I’m giving you one last chance. Don’t blow it.”
Dad followed Zane and me into the hall. “See you in the morning,” he murmured. He made his way to the attic stairs to take Rocky back up to the Dummy Museum. I heard him muttering to himself all the way up the stairs.
I said good night to Zane and headed to my room. I felt sleepy and upset and worried and confused — all at once.
I knew that Dan had to be the one who kept springing Rocky on Zane. But why was he doing it? And would he quit now — before Dad grounded us or totally ruined our summer?
I fell asleep, still asking myself question after question.
The next morning, I woke up early. I pulled on jeans and a sweatshirt and hurried downstairs for breakfast.
And there sat Rocky at the kitchen table.
I peered around the kitchen. No one else around.
How lucky that I was the first one downstairs!
I grabbed Rocky up by the back of the neck. Then I tucked him under one arm and dragged him up to the attic as fast as I could.
When I returned to the kitchen a few moments later, Mom had already started breakfast.
Whew! A close call.
“Trina — you’re up early,” Mom said, filling the coffee maker with water. “Are you okay?”
I glanced at the table. I had the sick feeling that Rocky would be sitting there sneering at me.
But of course he was upstairs in the attic. I had just carried him up there.
The table stood empty.
“I’m fine,” I told her. “Just fine.”
* * *
It was definitely Be Kind to Zane Day.
After breakfast, Dad hurried off to the camera store. A short while later, Mom and Uncle Cal left for the mall to do some shopping.
It was a bright morning. Yellow sunlight streamed in through the windows. The sky stretched clear and cloudless.
Zane brought down his camera. He decided it was a perfect day to take some photographs.
Dan and I expected him to go outside. But our cousin wanted to stay indoors and shoot photos.
“I’m very interested in moldings,” he told us.
We followed him around the house. Dan and I had made a solemn vow to be nice to Zane and not to scare him.
After breakfast, when Zane was upstairs getting his camera, I grabbed my brother. I pinned him against the wall. “No tricks,” I told him.
Dan tried to wriggle away. But I’m stronger than he is. I kept him pinned against the wall. “Raise your right hand and swear,” I instructed him.
“Okay, okay.” He gave in easily. He raised his right hand, and he repeated the vow I recited. “No tricks against Zane. No making fun of Zane. No dummies — anywhere!”
I let him go as Zane returned with his camera. “You have some awesome moldings,” Zane said, gazing up at the living room ceiling.
“Really?” I replied, trying to sound interested.
What could be interesting about a molding?
Zane tilted up his camera. He focused for what seemed like hours. Then he clicked a photo of the molding above the living room curtains.
“Do you have a ladder?” he asked Dan. “I’d really like to get a closer shot. I’m afraid my zoom lens will distort it.”
And so Dan hurried off to the basement to get Zane a ladder.
I was proud of my brother. He didn’t complain about having to go get the ladder. And he’d lasted a whole ten minutes without cracking any molding jokes or making fun of Zane.
Which wasn’t easy.
I mean, what kind of a nerd thinks it’s cool to take photos of ceilings and walls?
Meanwhile, we had no school, and it was the sunniest, warmest, most beautiful day of March outside. Almost like spring. And Dan and I were stuck holding the ladder for Zane so he could use his macro lens and get a really tight molding shot.
“Awesome!” Zane declared, snapping a few more. “Awesome!”
He climbed down the ladder. He adjusted the lens. Fiddled with some other dials on the camera.
“Want to go outside or something?” I suggested.
He didn’t seem to hear me. “I’d like to get a few more banister shots,” he announced. “See the way the sunlight is pouring through the wooden bars? It makes a really interesting pattern on the wall.”
I started to say something rude. But Dan caught my eye. He shook a finger at me. A warning.
I bit my lip and didn’t say anything.
This is sooooo boring, I thought. But at least we’re keeping out of trouble.
We stood beside Zane as he photographed the banister from all angles. After about the tenth shot, his camera began to hum and whir.
“End of the roll,” he announced. His eyes lit up. “Know what would be really cool? To go down into the basement to the darkroom and develop these right now.”
“Cool,” I replied. I tried to sound sincere. Dan and I were both trying so hard to be nice to this kid!
“Uncle Danny said I could use his darkroom downstairs,” Zane said, watching the camera as it rewound the film roll. “That would be awesome.”
“Awesome,” I repeated.
Dan and I exchanged glances. The most beautiful day of the century — and we were heading down to a dark closet in the basement.
“I’ve never watched pictures get developed,” Dan told our cousin. “Can you show me how to do it?”
“It’s pretty easy,” Zane replied, following us down the basement stairs. “Once you get the timing down.”
We made our way through the laundry room, past the furnace, to the darkroom against the far wall. We slipped inside, and I clicked on the special red light.
“Close the door tightly,” Zane instructed. “We can’t let in any light at all.”
I double-checked the darkroom door. Then Zane set to work. He arranged the developing pans. He poured bottles of chemicals into the pans. He unspooled the film roll and began to develop.
I’d watched Dad do it a hundred times before. It really was kind of interesting. And it was cool when the image began to appear and then darken on the developing paper.
Dan and I stood close to Zane, watching him work.
“I think I got some very good angles on the living room moldings,” Zane said. He dipped the large sh
eet of paper in one pan. Then he pulled it up, let it drip for a few seconds, and lowered it into the pan beside it.
A grin spread over his face. “Let’s take a look.”
He leaned over the table. Raised the sheet of paper. Held it up to the red light.
His grin faded quickly. “Hey — who shot this?” he demanded angrily.
Dan and I moved closer to see the photo.
“Who shot this?” Zane repeated. He furiously picked up another sheet from the developing pan. Another one. Another one.
“How did these get on the roll?” he cried. He shoved them all toward Dan and me.
Photos of Rocky.
Close-up portraits.
Photo after photo of the sneering dummy.
“Who shot them? Who?” Zane demanded angrily, shoving the wet photos in our faces.
“I didn’t!” Dan declared, pulling back.
“I didn’t either!” I protested.
But then, who did? I asked myself, staring hard at the ugly, sneering face on each sheet.
Who did?
“What’s going on up here, guys?”
The dummies stared back at me blankly. None of them replied.
“What’s the story?” I demanded. My eyes moved from one dummy to the next. “Come on, guys. Speak up or I’ll come back here with a buzz saw and give you all haircuts!”
Silence.
I paced back and forth in front of them, gazing at them sternly, my arms crossed in front of my chest.
It was late in the afternoon. The sun had begun to lower itself behind the trees. Orange light washed in through the dusty attic windows.
I had crept up to the attic to search for clues. Something weird was going on.
How did all those photos of Rocky get onto Zane’s roll of film? Who took those photos?
The same person who kept carrying Rocky downstairs and sitting him where he would frighten Zane.
“It was Dan — right, guys?” I asked the wide-eyed dummies. “Dan came up here — right?”
I searched the floor. The couch. Under all the chairs.
I didn’t find a single clue.
Now I was questioning the dummies. But of course they weren’t being very helpful.
Stop wasting time and get back downstairs, I told myself.