Ghost Town (11 page)

I
so
didn't want to be the weird girl here.

This house isn't my problem, I decided abruptly. I couldn't let it ruin my new life. I took a deep breath. “I'm thinking raspberry chip. I'll race you!”

I ran halfway down the pier alongside Lily and Miranda. I didn't allow myself to look back. The August heat wrapped its familiar arms around me and the twinkling lights of the boardwalk brightened the night sky.

Nothing is going to happen
, I told myself. The darkness was gone.

Lily's Uncle Paul—who surprisingly wasn't related to her but was a close family friend, so she called him uncle too—found us a table in the corner of his shop, Scoops.

“Look, they left the whipped cream here,” I remarked, pointing to the silver can on our pink tabletop. “And sprinkles. And chips.”

“That's the cool thing about Scoops,” Lily explained. “All the toppings are on the table. You make your own sundae.”

“Amazing!” I reached for the bowl of caramel the waitress left for us. I actually like the toppings best. I just use the ice cream as an excuse. I began to pile on whipped cream and caramel. “I love do-it-yourself.”

“Ew, what's with the cherries?” Lily squealed. “Check out Miranda.”

I looked and my eyes briefly registered the bouquet of maraschino cherries Miranda created by knotting the stems together. I felt my gaze drawn behind her. There stood the old man with the cane. His eyes bore into me.

With a disgusted groan, I wrenched my gaze away.

“I'm not doing anything wrong, you know,” Miranda said.

“Huh?” I tried to focus on Miranda, but he kept pulling me toward him.

“I was just having fun.” Miranda pushed the cherry bundle onto her napkin. “You don't have to look so grossed-out.”

“I'm not.” My voice came out in a squeak. I wriggled in my chair, trying desperately to control my body. My fingers found their way into my pocket. The stone. I needed the pink stone.

Sara.

He wanted my attention. My full attention.

Sara . . .

He called to me. My stomach heaved, and the smell of the sugary caramel caused me to gag.

“Gross,” Miranda whispered to Lily.

I wanted to turn and see Lily. What was her reaction? But I couldn't. The old man's spirit had invaded my vision.

All I saw was him. His fear. His anguish. And then orange.

The aroma of acrid smoke invaded my nose.

The orange became red then yellow.

Sweat trickled down the back of my shirt as heat spread around me. Within me.

Flames danced before me.

I needed help. I tried to scream but couldn't.

My fingers clawed the cold linoleum of the table.

Suddenly I understood.

The fire was not here.

The fire I saw, I smelled, I felt, was happening now—at the haunted house!

I jumped up from the table, sending the bowl of colored sprinkles skittering across the table in a rainbow explosion.

I couldn't stop to clean it up. I darted around the other customers and bolted out the door.

“Sara!”

Lily's worried call rang out behind me, but I didn't turn back. My flip-flops smacked the boardwalk as I raced toward Midnight Manor.

Would I make it in time? Had the building already burned down?

I passed the fudge shop, and the purple house rose into view. No smell of smoke in the air. No flames. The house looked fine. Normal.

But I didn't stop. I couldn't.

I searched the area for David. Where was he?

Then I spotted him by the side door.

“Is—is there a fire?” My breath came out in ragged gasps. I bent over, hands on my knees as I struggled to calm my pounding heart.

“Say what?” David screwed up his face.

I quickly scanned the building again. I could see it wasn't burning. I could hear Lily and Miranda running up behind me. I knew the smart thing—the normal thing—would be to walk away or turn the whole thing into a joke. But the feeling—it was still with me.

Darkness.

The heat of the invisible flames.

The pull to the house.

I
wasn't
wrong.

I grabbed David's shoulder. I had to make him understand. “Listen, I know I sound all weird. I get that, but you've got to listen to me. Something bad is going to happen here.
Now.
I can't explain how I know it, I just do. Please! Trust me.”

David's eyes widened. I'd definitely gotten his attention.

For what felt like the longest minute ever, he stared
at me intently. He searched my face and looked deeply into my eyes. I guess he saw something that made him believe me.

Then he sprang into action.

He opened the mansion door and hit the main light switch. “Out! Everybody out!” he screamed. He left me to walk through the house.

My brain was spinning.
Fire.
If the house wasn't burning now, would it start soon? Had the old man's spirit been giving me a clue?

I needed to do something, but what? How could I stop a fire?

“Wait, I'm not following,” Miranda said. “Why did you make David get those kids out?” She pointed toward the six grumbling kids who were exiting.

“It's not safe,” I replied, still trying to untangle the puzzle in my mind.

“What gives you the right to say that?” Miranda challenged.

“Just a feeling,” I mumbled.

“What—?”

“Back off, okay?” Lily interrupted Miranda. I could feel her watching me. She didn't seem skeptical, though.

David appeared at my side. “Kids are all out. But seriously, Sara, I'm not seeing anything bad inside. I don't know what you want me to do.”

I didn't either. Was someone going to set a fire? Or was something inside the house going to ignite?

I reached into my pocket for the stone. Protection from evil. I needed it now more than ever. My hand touched my camera. I pulled it out, an idea slowly forming. Shading the digital screen with my hand, I scrolled through all the photos I had taken inside Midnight Manor. There had to be something we missed.

Lightbulbs. Dusty window ledges. The chandelier's pulley system. A fake skeleton hand. Mahogany stairs. Mirrors.

The photos revealed nothing out of the ordinary.

And then . . .

I gasped, then pressed the wide-angle button to enlarge the next shot.

“David.” My voice came out in a whisper.

A vision of flames flashed before me. The crackling of embers reverberated in my ears. Had I found what I was looking for?

“David,” I began again. I raised the screen so he
could see it too. “See all the candles?” The panoramic shot revealed a room filled with dozens of electric candelabras. “How do they light up?”

“Electricity. They're plugged in. Why?”

I could hear my dad. Cautioning me. Telling me the dangers of old houses and their out-of-date wiring. “Are there a lot of sockets?” I asked.

“No, just one. There's an extension cord behind that sofa there that's loaded up.”

Now. Help now.

The voice. The old man shimmered to my right. He raised his cane and pointed inside the house.

“Let's look there.” I hurried inside with David. He expertly wound his way through the maze-like rooms until we reached the candelabra room. I could feel the old man with us. His fear mixed with mine. My fingers clutched the pink stone.

David heaved the brocade sofa from the wall, exposing a network of tangled extension cords piled with plugs. “Seems okay,” he murmured. Then he put his hand to the wall by the lone outlet and let out a quick yelp. “The wall is burning hot!”

He whipped out his cell and dialed 911.

“We need to get out of here now,” he said. “Fire trucks are on their way.”

Once outside, we heard the approaching sirens. In minutes, firefighters and police officers rushed the building and pushed the growing crowd back.

My cell phone buzzed from my back pocket. A text from Dad.

Where are u kiddo? Time to be home.

Sorry. On my way.

Want me to walk u?

No. Im good.

I tucked the phone in my pocket, then slid the gemstone, still warm from my grasp, next to it.

I gazed at the house, now alive with activity. Word filtered through the onlookers. The wall had been opened, and the wires inside were smoldering. They were only moments away from sparking into a blaze.

The disaster of a fire had been stopped.

I noticed that the dark feeling had lifted. A calmness came over me. I felt light, free, and remarkably alone. The old man's spirit was nowhere in sight.

Neither was Lily, Miranda, or David. They were lost in the crowd.

I did it, I realized. I stopped a really bad thing.

My knees wobbled as I thought about it. I needed to be away from the noise to wrap my mind around what just happened. I turned to leave. I'd text Lily later.

“Wait. Sara, Wait!” David jogged over to me.

I stopped several yards from the house.

“How did you know?” he asked, looking me straight in the eye.

I looked away and focused my eyes on his worn black canvas sneakers.

“How did you know about the fire?” he asked again.

I raised my gaze to meet his. Should I tell him everything?

“Excuse me. Pardon me. Press,” a pretty blond woman called, pushing through the small crowd. A bearded man with a handheld video camera trailed her. “Anyone here have a comment?”

People eagerly gathered in front of the camera, all sudden experts on building safety.

I examined David's sneakers yet again. If I told him—anyone—I'd be the freaky girl on the evening news. There was no way I was doing that.

“I have no idea,” I told him, my voice incredulous. “I can't explain it. I just had a really weird feeling.”

“You just had a really weird feeling?” David repeated, clearly unsure if he should believe me.

“Yeah.” I shrugged. “It's crazy, right?”

“Totally crazy!” Lily bounded over. Her eyes
twinkled with the excitement of the scene. “It's so cool that you had that feeling. I've had feelings like that before too.”

“You have?” My heart skipped a beat.

“Oh, totally. I had the strongest feeling in April when our family was together at Easter that my cousin Izzy's boyfriend was going to propose. I got this feeling just by the way he would look at her, you know? And guess what? A month later he did.” Lily beamed. “My feeling was so spot-on. Just like yours, Sara.”

I was so happy that she had absolutely no idea how I knew about the fire—and didn't seem to care that I did. “Exactly,” I said.

David still stared at me.

“Oh, there's my mom and Cammie.” Lily motioned somewhere in the distance. “She's probably looking for me. Be right back.” She hurried off.

I gnawed my bottom lip, waiting for David to say something. Not sure what to say when he did.

He adjusted the brim of his baseball cap. “Okay,” he said slowly. “Whatever.” He seemed willing to accept my story. For now.

“My dad's waiting for me,” I said, backing away. “I've got to go.”

“Hey,” he said suddenly, “thanks.”

“For?”

“For making me get those kids out. For making me listen to your . . . feeling.”

“You're welcome.” I smiled widely. I wondered what he'd think if he knew my feeling had a face, a body, could speak . . . and had been dead almost fifty years!

I sifted through a handful of sea glass from the pile beside me. Sitting cross-legged on the front porch, I arranged them carefully around the photos of the pier, the lighthouse, and the beach I'd decoupaged onto the wooden tray.

“That boy at Midnight Manor is certainly a hero,” my dad remarked. His face was hidden behind the local paper.

“It says that?”

“Yep. Big article.” He paused for a gulp of coffee, quickly reading to the end. “He evacuated the haunted house and summoned the fire department,
all before any flames broke out. Amazing, really. I mean, think about the property damage he avoided, not to mention the lives he saved.”

From his white wicker chair, he peered over the paper at me. “It was an overloaded circuit. A wiring issue. Didn't I tell you about that?”

“You did.”

“Good morning, all.” Lady Azura glided onto the front porch in a swirl of ivory chiffon.

I was surprised to see her this early. She usually took hours “putting on her face,” as she called it. I rarely saw her before noon. Today she was already made-up.

“Big doings at the pier last night, I hear,” she remarked. She perched on the swing, giving the knitting spirit plenty of room. “Wonderful when things work out as they should.” Her red lips raised in the slightest smile.

“You're friends with that boy, aren't you?” Dad asked me. He stood, put down his coffee mug and paper, and got ready to leave for the office.

“Kind of, I guess.”

“Well, you should be very proud of him. Not
many kids get involved today. It's good to see someone do something good.”

“I am proud,” I said quietly. I was proud of David. And, I realized, I was proud of me.

That was because of me
, I thought. The old man came to me for help. I was the one who could hear him. I was the one who figured it out. Maybe this was what it was all about. Helping people.

Maybe seeing spirits was okay.

“So what's the plan today, kiddo?” Dad asked. “Back to the pier?”

I shook my head. “Lily invited me over. She and her mom have this plan to teach themselves to make a blueberry pie. I'm going to help.”

“Sounds tasty. Lily and you are getting to be friends?” His voice had that hopeful ring.

“Yeah. I think we are.” Lily and I had texted for a long time last night. She didn't press me about what happened at Midnight Manor. She'd just gone with it. I had the feeling that was the way she was.