The clearest was Anna speaking after Jackie and Elizabeth left the room with her father.
"Calling Jackie stupid!" Anna huffed. "I'll show her!" Static filled the recorder for a moment and then Anna spoke again. "I wonder how she'd like to be a big warty toad?"
Elizabeth told her uncle she was amazed the small recorder captured every sound, even the slightest spooky comment. She decided it sounded like there were more than twelve ghosts, when it was just Anna ranting after they left.
Elizabeth's uncle told her, "Start taking notes and we'll be by soon to help."
"We?" she asked.
"Yes, me and my ghost hunting partner, Sully. That's his nickname. His real name is Kevel Stutters."
Elizabeth ended the call and with pen in hand, she began taking notes for her book report.
Sunday I finally met spook girl who lives in the haunted manor next door. She was rude and couldn't speak like normal kids do. She mumbled like a ranting, demented idiot. While meeting her, the dead woke and spoke to me and a cry for help screamed out loud to me. I was hushed by the spook girl. Her red eyes met mine and she said for me to shush and that if I told a soul I would go blind.
I was told I must leave or I might be murdered by the spook girl and that she held the dead captive in the basement. The young spook girl showed me to the door, pressing her demon eyes on me while she watched my every move. I felt like the dead were calling my name for help, but they were trapped in the walls, forgotten in time in a tomb and held against their will, not getting a chance to continue on into the afterworld.
Reading her work so far, she smiled at how great all those lies sounded. No one threatened to murder her, and certainly no dead people called to her for help. The truth didn't matter though. Who could prove her wrong?
Oh, boy, Elizabeth thought to herself, I'll get an A for sure on this book report.
***
Warm rays of red and orange blanketed the vast landscape. Anna, Tomfoolery and Boo waited until nightfall to begin their haunting next door. Anna made plans of revenge. She would do something about the girl who upset Jackie. Jackie lay down to rest before night came and tonight's adventure began at Elizabeth's home.
Jackie's parents enjoyed the peace and quiet. They sat downstairs in their matching recliners, reading the newspaper and absorbed the beauty of the sunset. The huge front window cast beautiful vista views of the country. All was so serene no one knew at that moment Elizabeth was sneaking under the outside window ledge to the back door of the manor.
The darkness of the doomed prophet had stepped into my life and taken a good look around, Elizabeth jotted down on her note pad.
Cobwebs and dust had occupied the spook girl's room for years, maybe even centuries. It seemed someone had left this room and the spirits that she spoke to nightly using a crystal ball stolen long ago from a witch.
When I was forced to leave the spook girl's room, I could see claw marks on the floorboards where the family dragged out their latest victims. There was a dark and eerie feeling like centuries of dead victims might be buried in the manor or in the backyard, left like forgotten souls that were once so full of life. Centuries ago the manor was probably a fine home until the demons took over and possessed the family against their will.
Elizabeth made her way to the back door and jiggled the knob, but found it locked. Shrugging, she turned to go back home.
Downstairs, raiding the fridge, Boo heard her. He unlocked the backdoor. Elizabeth saw it crack open on its own. She jotted down the dead souls allowed me entrance to solve the mystery of what became of them in this manor of hell.
Boo hovered just above Elizabeth with his ice cream carton in hand and large wooden spoon in his mouth. Elizabeth crept around the kitchen and continued taking notes.
Boo stayed quiet as a mouse, but he forgot about his ice cream and melted drops of it fell from his wooden spoon and hit the tablet Elizabeth was writing on.
Elizabeth saw it and said, "Awe, yuck." She looked up to see where the mess was coming from and jumped back in fright when she saw the silhouette of a ghost against the wall. It made him look ten feet tall.
Elizabeth fell, knocking over pots and pans in the kitchen. She began screaming and blazed out the back door.
Boo slammed the door shut behind her, locking it twice; once with the deadbolt and second with the chain. He put the wooden spoon in the cabinet, licking it clean first, then shoved the large gallon tub of ice cream into the freezer and flew up to the attic before Jackie's father ran into the kitchen.
"Darn ghost screams," Steve said. "I'll never get use to them."
Amanda ran into the kitchen behind him. "What's the matter, dear?"
"Now we get the ghostly encounters in the daylight."
"Oh, is that all? Come back and finish your paper. I'll make your favorite pot roast tonight. That will calm your fears," she said, patting her husband on the back.
***
Mysterious eerie figures swathed in the darkness of the attic lurked around hidden corners. The ghostly inhabitants of Waverly Manor prepared for their visit next door. The walls echoed with Anna's wicked laughter.
"Elizabeth, you will get yours tonight," she said.
Tomfoolery set the clock. It was time for the witching hour to begin.
CHAPTER 14
Boo was with Tomfoolery in the storage closet in the attic, getting ready to do some spooking at Elizabeth's house. Anna would not tell them what her plan was to scare the young girl, but she said it would beat out everything she had done in the past.
Tomfoolery got his chains ready to rattle, and Boo's horn was fitted with a shoulder strap so he could carry it when he flew. When they first headed next door to Elizabeth's house, they lost track of Anna, figuring she was checking on Jackie downstairs.
Elizabeth read her beloved paper and thought it would be too scary for her teacher to believe come Monday morning when school started. She decided to add a calmer tone to her story and began to write, not knowing two ghosts stood by the window, watching her every move.
I was almost changed into a cat. The family gave a witch's chant and cursed the wind, but I fought it hard to avoid the evil magic and keep myself human. The magic spells echoed out from afar and chased after me. I hid in the basement.
Boo looked to Tomfoolery. "She goes on and on with lies, doesn't she?"
"I dare say. Anna better get here soon and put a stop to these lies," Tomfoolery answered.
Anna stepped up behind Boo and Tomfoolery and whisked her open hand toward the window. Elizabeth sat for a moment longer and then heard a buzzing sound next to her ear. She flinched and then waved the buzzing sound away. Without warning, a thousand buzzing flies let loose in her bedroom. Elizabeth jumped around and screamed until her mom rushed in.
Anna zapped the flies away by closing her fist.
Elizabeth shook her head and shook her hair. "Mom, they've come to get me. Help, they're all over me!"
"Who's all over you, baby?" Elizabeth's mother tried to comfort her. "What is it?"
"The flies, they are all over me. Help me, Mom!"
"Honey," her mom shook both of her shoulders, "there are no flies in here. You must be overly tired. Earlier, at the McCaulou place, you said you heard a ghost and you're upset. Calm down and get ready for bed. You've had quite a day of imaginary fits. I'll have to call Dr. Hostetler tomorrow and have him examine you. I'll call the school and tell them you will be arriving late after the doctor's appointment."
Elizabeth got ready for bed and a few of the flies fell out of her hair. Her eyes widened, still imaging the swarm that was just there, but she did as her mother told her to and pulled back the top cover, not hearing Boo and Tomfoolery snickering behind Anna.
Not done, Anna's green eyes narrowed and her jaw tightened. From the tip of her wand, she cast a spell through the window and sent a large bubble drifting into the room. When it landed on the bed, it popped open and spiders by the dozens crawled out from under Eliz
abeth's bed sheets. Elizabeth turned around and jumped up and down, screaming.
"Spiders, spiders!" she yelled at the top of her lungs.
Her mother and father both flung the door of her bedroom open, grabbed her and dragged her into the living room to calm her down, but she was in hysterics.
"Spiders came to eat me!"
Tomfoolery, Boo and Anna had themselves a great big laugh outside Elizabeth's window.
"Aww," Boo said, "Jackie would have loved this."
"Drat!" Anna said. "I forget to wake Jackie to come with us. I told her I would too! Drat, double drat, granny's old farts. Dang."
Tomfoolery gave Anna a funny look. "Chill, okay?"
"Oh well," Anna said. "We'll come back and see what she's up to later. Come on; let's get back to the manor. We'll have to tell Jackie what happened when she comes up to the attic."
***
Back at the attic, Anna poked her bottom lip with a straight pin. She spit the blood out of her mouth on to the dirty attic floorboards and watched with interest as the glossy beads soaked into the wood.
"Good," she said.
Boo and Tomfoolery watched like they were being sucked in by an unseen underground force. The temperature of the room plummeted. Ice formed on the curtains and crusted around the lights in the ceiling. The glowing filaments in each bulb shrank and dimmed while the darkened room filled with a yellow, choking cloud of brimstone in which indistinct black shadows writhed and roiled. Her spell was almost complete.
From far away came the sound of many voices screaming. Pressure was suddenly applied to the door that led to the landing. It bulged inward, the timbers groaning. Footsteps from invisible feet pattered across the floorboards, and invisible mouths whispered wicked things from behind the bed Anna slept in and under the old writing desk that sat by the oval stained glass window.
The sounds became louder, prompting Tomfoolery and Boo to hide. Anna floated around a few feet off the floorboards and waited, hoping her spell wasn't going to take too long. She wanted to cast the dismissing spell later on Elizabeth.
"When the spell is finished, what will it do?" Boo asked.
"Next time anyone comes to visit Elizabeth, the walls will run with streaks of blood."
"That's kinda harsh, Anna," Boo said.
"Maybe, we'll see!"
***
Later that day, Boo was practicing his new card tricks in front of the wall mirror, waiting for Jackie to come upstairs.
"Why are you learning card tricks?" Anna asked.
"I want to show Jackie. She's been asking me for some."
"Aww, that's sweet of you to work so hard for a friend."
Downstairs the McCaulou's were having their late night supper. Jackie was telling them that she didn't want the girl from next door to come over again. Steve and Amanda said they had been talking about that and they agreed. Jackie was happy for that.
She could hardly wait until dessert was over so she could go tell Anna, Boo and Tomfoolery the good news — no more Elizabeth.
Jackie's parents laughed and said the poor girl needed to get her head examined. Her mother called and said she may have gone overboard with the move to a new home and school.
They finished dinner, and after watching T.V. with her parents in the living room, Jackie said goodnight and hurried off to bed, forcing her eyes to stay awake. In spite of her effort, she fell asleep waiting for Anna to come get her.
CHAPTER 15
"Graveyards are inhabited by all sorts of creatures," Anna said to Tomfoolery and Boo the next day. "Spooky creatures like werewolves, skeletons, vampires, and zombies. But the creatures that we most frequently associate with graveyards are ghosts. Some consider ghosts to be the souls of the ones who already died. Sorry, guys, but that's how it is."
"Like us, right?" Tomfoolery asked.
Anna nodded. "But the story you're about to hear is not about one of those ghosts we've heard of or met. In fact, you could say this ghost is a special one. A most unusual ghost indeed and friendly to all he encounters. Yes, my friends, I'm talking about Casper, the Friendly Ghost."
Tomfoolery asked, "Who is Casper?"
Anna pulled a comic book from her lap and said, "It's all in here."
"Where'd you find it?" Boo asked.
"In the den. I snuck it out. I wanted to show you guys because I'm amazed they think of us as friendly. This must be a handbook to the living so they all think we are sweet and kind ghosts."
"We are," Boo interrupted.
"No we aren't." Tomfoolery elbowed Boo in the ribs.
"Shush," Anna said. "Now this story starts off in the middle of the graveyard. Casper is reading a book about how to make friends, like a ghost-to-human handbook for the living. I looked in my spell book all morning and saw nothing leading to a charm or spell, so it must be a theory."
Boo gasped and Tomfoolery blinked rapidly in disbelief.
"We are going to go out and make friends in our own cemetery," Anna stated with an enthusiastic voice, "Tonight! It has all sorts of advice to improve friendships. I'm sure that I'll be able to make new friends tonight and have more than just three of us go out haunting with the dearly departed.
"But," Boo asked, "aren’t Tomfoolery and I the dearly departed, too?"
"Yes, we are. Why ask that?"
"Oh, just checking!
"Silly!!" Tomfoolery thumped Boo on the head. "Let me see that handbook." He took it out of Anna's hand.
"What a horrifying ghost this Casper is. Look at the front cover. His head is huge!"
Boo took away the comic from Tomfoolery. "Really? Let me see. He looks timid. Is this how we look?"
"Yeah sure." Anna grabbed the comic book back.
Tomfoolery turned to Anna. "We've been in the graveyard and haven't seen a dead soul once!"
"We'll go out tonight, explore the graves and sees who's haunting around out there, okay?" Anna said.
* * *
When darkness came and cloaked the backyard, Anna and the rest of the gang got ready to explore the graveyard. Well almost. The two ghosts were nervous, and Anna had to push them out the backdoor. Courage wasn't one of their best charms.
In the graveyard at the end of the manor's property, the owl hooted only once. There was silence everywhere while Jackie waited for her signal to come up to the attic, but that night there was none to hear.
Anna and Boo walked ahead. “But I already told you, Boo," Anna said gruffly, "I don't want to scare people to their death. I just want to have fun, and the more ghosts we can get, the bigger the reaction I'll get out of the living we haunt."
Boo replied as they got farther into the cemetery, "I understand. Tomfoolery and I are just happy haunting the manor now. Anna, don’t get me wrong or get upset. We enjoy our broom rides out into the country with you. Boy, oh boy." Boo remembered back to the last one. "It was a fun time. The living will never forget our ghostly encounter, especially with your charm of double trouble you cast that night."
Anna and Boo stopped to see how far they'd come.
"I’ve never been out here before. I feel as blind as a cross-eyed bat would," Anna said to Boo, then spoke over her shoulder. "Come on, Tomfoolery. Hurry up. No one will pop out and grab at you. Come on now and don't be a scaredy cat."
Tomfoolery shook with much fear. "I'm no scaredy cat. This place is spooky."
"Aren't you from the manor cemetery?" Anna asked.
"No, Tomfoolery said. "I'm not. Aren't you, Anna?"
"No. When I...died, Boo was standing right there and was the first ghost to meet me. We searched for a long time until we found the Waverly house empty, so we just moved in. Then, when I found you one day, out in the rain, cold and with no home to haunt, I invited you to live with us. I have no idea where I'm buried."
"Oh," he said. "It seems strange to look back. I keep on asking myself, why on earth did I pick this way of life...er, of death? You know what I mean."
"Yes," Anna commented. "Different people hel
p you along the way, but you should choose the best way for you. Your mind should be open so you can learn and be guided by your own feelings."
Anna placed her arm over Boo's shoulder and said, "I do hope every person will decide for themselves and try to make the world a better place. Do to others as you would have done to yourself. I know, I wish it was such a world. The manor’s been my home as long as it’s been a home for you and Tomfoolery. I know and remember no other place."
Boo smiled. "I've been thinking."
"Yes?" Anna looked out into the darkness and didn't see Tomfoolery. "Where has he gone off to?"
"I like Jackie and her folks," Boo said.
"Yeah, me too," Anna agreed. "They are so nice. I feel right at home. It's a lot better than when it was empty."
"Truly?" Boo asked.
Anna nodded.
"I'm happy to hear that."
"The couple who lived in the manor before was too easy to scare off, and they hated us from the get-go. We sure caused them a lot of grief. I guess it was too much for them."
"Yeah," Boo said. "The old man had a heart attack, but he survived."
"Remember when they brought in a medium to get us to speak to the living? What a nightmare! I think we found a family who will stay for a while which ensures us a home."
"Yes," Boo said, twiddling his thumbs, "it surely does."
***
The ticking clock counted down how long Jackie had been standing at the window or peering up through her ceiling. Jackie thought about sneaking out. She didn't want to be caught in the hallway by her parents after bedtime, but the entrance to the attic wasn't too far from her room.
Jackie took her chance when her parents were downstairs watching T.V. She crept into the hallway and walked down the long walkway without making a sound. There were two squeaking points on the floor she had to watch out for. She pressed her back against the wall to sidestep past the squeaky floorboards and felt proud of herself. She was nearly there, looking to the last hallway to the attic.
CHAPTER 16
In the cemetery Anna saw the first name on the headstone in the old neglected part of the graveyard. The stone was over a hundred years old. The graveyard looked frightening at night. Dancing shadows thumped around the place and unkempt hedges rose jaggedly in the moonlight shadows toward the inky night sky. Bare skeletons, remaining untouched, laid below in their grave, thin fingers never able to open up their casket lid on their own. Moss covered the tiny cherubs, and the muddy water felt icy to the touch in the old bird bath.