Why I'm Not Afraid of Ghosts (7 page)

O
liver's mouth stretched opened even wider.

This was going to be some scream, Robbie thought hopelessly.

And Dora was going to be impossible to live with now!

Then . . .

Oliver sneezed!

“Bless you,” the girl to his right whispered.

“Oliver Bowen, explain your behavior!” Mr. Gerard demanded.

Oliver reached up and grabbed all four pencils from the ceiling tiles. Then he jumped down off the chair.

“I'm sorry,” he said.

“Sorry doesn't cut it, mister. What were you doing on that chair?”

“I was, uh, going to get my pencils off the ceiling,” Oliver explained, “but then I—I—well, I could feel myself about to sneeze. I mean a big one! And trying not to sneeze made me kind of jerk around, and then it got out of control somehow and, uh . . .”

Mr. Gerard glared at him.

“I—”

Mr. Gerard's eyes narrowed.

Robbie hovered over Oliver. What is he going to say?

“I won't do it again,” Oliver promised with a little smile.

“See that you don't. You have fifteen minutes to finish this test. I hope you do as well in math as you do in excuses. Class, get back to work!”

“You moron! You dunce! You idiot!” Dora yelled at Oliver, bouncing around him in total frustration. “Don't you even know when you've been haunted? How stupid can you be?”

Oliver didn't even look up.

Who
is
this kid? Robbie wondered. What is with him? He
knows
he didn't spin around like a whirlwind on purpose! Does he really think
he
threw those pencils at the ceiling?

No way! He
has
to know we're haunting him!

Why isn't he scared?

Dora swooped down and grabbed at Oliver's pencil, but her fingers went right through it.

She didn't have enough energy left to do anything!

It was almost sad to see her so low, Robbie thought. He didn't even feel like gloating over her failure.

“Why am I wasting all my talent on a dodo like you?” Dora screamed. “This is ridiculous! Let's go home, Robbie! Let's go home and plan something really big!”

“But I haven't tried anything here yet,” Robbie protested.

“What could you possibly do that would be better than what I did?” Dora demanded.

“You mean, what could I do that would be
worse?”
Robbie retorted.

He wished he knew!

He was starting to think there was
nothing
they could do to scare Oliver Bowen. The kid was a rock!

And Robbie sure didn't have enough energy yet to do the kind of fantastic tricks Dora had just done.

But then, even Dora's best tricks hadn't scared Oliver.

What Robbie needed was a totally
different
idea.

He didn't have one yet. But he planned to come up with one.

Very soon!

* * *

Robbie didn't have a big idea until science class, later in the day.

He spent the time in between studying Oliver.

Word about Oliver, the pencils, and the spinning
had spread quickly. Kids glanced at Oliver sideways and whispered about him everywhere he went.

Kids asked Oliver how he had done the pencil-in-the-ceiling trick. Others wanted to know how he spun in the chair without falling over. Oliver just shrugged and smiled.

“Can you show me?” a boy asked in the hallway. “I want to add it to my magic act!”

“Maybe later,” Oliver replied.

Robbie shook his head. Dora's haunting just gave Oliver something to talk about! It actually made Oliver popular.

Dora seemed stunned by her defeat. She drifted silently beside Robbie. Every now and then she would tug at Robbie's sailor shirt, whining, “Can we go home now?”

Robbie had never seen her so pathetic. Maybe this problem with Oliver had a good side!

Science was the last class of the day.

Oliver took the lab table farthest from the front.

Mr. Gosling, the science teacher, tapped his desk to get everyone's attention. “Okay, folks, find a lab partner,” Mr. Gosling instructed.

All the kids paired up. Except Oliver.

There was an odd number of kids in the class. Somebody had to be left out.

Did Oliver mind? Robbie didn't think so. Oliver just smiled.

“Today we're going to learn about Bunsen burners,” Mr. Gosling began. “Bunsen burners are ingenious devices, but they can be dangerous because they make a really hot flame. Which is also why they're so helpful. We're going to cook a lot of cool stuff over these little campfires!”

Sounds fun, Robbie thought wistfully.

When he was alive, they never did stuff like this in school!

Mr. Gosling glanced around the room, making sure the class was paying attention. “I want you kids to respect your Bunsen burners,” he continued. “Check your lab tables now. Anyone missing a Bunsen burner? Raise your hand if you are.”

No one raised a hand.

Robbie drifted closer to study the Bunsen burner.

“Anyone missing a spark striker? Or a pair of safety goggles?”

Again nobody raised a hand.

“Does everybody see that big red fire extinguisher on the wall over there?” Mr. Gosling pointed.

Everyone nodded.

“Okay,” Mr. Gosling said. “If things get out of hand, I'm going to grab that and spray you all with white foam. Now watch what I do. Don't do anything yet! Just watch!”

Mr. Gosling demonstrated how to light Bunsen burners.

Oliver squeezed the striker arm across the flint on his sparker. Sparks shot out.

Hmmm, Robbie thought. Looks as if Oliver's done this before.

“Ready?” Mr. Gosling asked the class.

“Yeah!” the kids shouted. Everybody wanted to light fires!

“All right! Everybody practice making sparks. Share your strikers. Switch back and forth.”

Robbie watched the kids working with their strikers. Mr. Gosling checked each table for problems. He helped a girl who was scared of her sparker, and showed a boy how to, scrape the striker arm against the flint fester.

“Okay, now comes the fun part!” Mr. Gosling declared. “One partner grips the sparker in his or her right hand. The other turns the stopcock at the bottom of the Bunsen burner a half turn. Gas will come out! Be careful and ignite it with your sparker.”

Whooshing noises sounded all over the room. The air smelled of gas. Blue flames sprang up everywhere.

Oliver's flame burned fine.

That was when Robbie got an idea. A totally great idea.

He glanced around. Dora floated in an upper corner of the room. She looked bored and tired. Robbie had managed to ignore her whining, so she stopped.

“Hey!” Robbie muttered to his sister. “Watch this!”

He set himself to become visible and audible to Oliver at just the moment he wanted.

Then he jumped into the flame.

His presence made the flame whoosh almost to the ceiling. It sparkled with all kinds of extra colors.

Vwoom!
Robbie made himself visible to Oliver.

He stretched first tall and then wide and let his face melt into a skull.

He lifted his arms and waved them at Oliver. His arms were bright gas-flame blue. He could feel his eyeballs glowing.

He mustered his best deep, spooky laugh.

“MOO-HOO WHA-HA HA-HA!” he laughed, looming over Oliver. Blue flames flared over him, flickered up from his fingers.

“OLIVER BOWEN,” Robbie bellowed. “I HAVE YOU NOW!”

R
obbie leaned toward Oliver, eagerly waiting for his terrified shriek.

Oliver frowned.

Not screamed, frowned!

Robbie reached toward him, twitching blue-flame fingers and roaring with evil laughter.

Oliver backed up half a step.

It was the most response Robbie had ever gotten out of him. Maybe, just maybe, the scare was working!

“JUST YOU WAIT, OLIVER BOWEN!” Robbie yelled in his deep, scary voice. He clacked his jaw-bone.

Oliver yawned.

Yawned!

Any normal kid would have run screaming in terror!

Robbie looked around. None of the other kids seemed scared either. Maybe they couldn't see him.

By this time Robbie was feeling pretty feeble—all his energy was going up in smoke!

Oliver raised his hand. “Mr. Gosling?”

“Yes, Oliver?” Mr. Gosling asked.

“Could you help me? My flame is way too high.”

Mr. Gosling came and turned down Oliver's Bunsen burner.

Feeling weak and discouraged, Robbie drifted to the floor. He was so tired, he could hardly hold up his head.

“Can we go home
now?”
Dora demanded.

What? She wasn't going to nag him for failing again? She
really
must be sick!

He peered at her. Even for a ghost, she looked thin and transparent.

He gazed down at his own hands. He could see through them.

Neither of them had enough energy to yell boo!

“Later,” Robbie mumbled. “I'm too pooped to move.”

* * *

What an exhausting, weird day, Oliver thought as he stood at his locker. He sorted through his books, figuring out which ones to take home and which to leave at school.

Pencils in the ceiling. Spinning in class. Kids talking about him. And then science class.

Oliver's lammed his locker shut. He didn't even want
to think about everything that had happened. He just wanted to go home and forget all about this day.

It was late. Most of the kids had already left. Oliver headed for the exit.

That was when he got the weird feeling that someone was watching him.

It felt like a tingle between his shoulder blades. And an itch on his scalp, as if his hair were trying to stand on end.

He turned quickly to look over his shoulder.

There was no one there.

Cut it out, Oliver scolded himself. You're being a jerk.

Maybe all the strange things at school had set him on edge. Because, no doubt about it, he felt very nervous.

Nervous enough to pick up his pace. He clutched his science book and darted through the empty halls.

He hated feeling jumpy. But he couldn't stop the feeling.

There it was, that tingle again in his back!

A wave of prickles over his head.

His stomach rumbled. Not from hunger.

His chest began to tighten. He tucked his book under his arm and prepared to sprint out the door.

Something cold brushed the back of his neck.

Icy cold!

Frigid fingers crept around his neck!

O
liver almost leapt out of his skin!

He whirled, his heart pounding, his breath coming in gasps. His science book fell to the floor.

Shawn stood in front of him, blinking through his glasses. He looked surprised.

It was only Shawn!

Oliver felt like an idiot.

“Don't
do
that!” he snapped, rubbing his neck.

“Sorry. I—I didn't mean to scare you.”

“Scare me? You didn't scare me,” Oliver bluffed. “It's just that your hands are freezing cold!”

“Sorry,” Shawn said again. He tucked his hands into his jeans pockets.

Oliver's heartbeat finally slowed down to normal. “What are you doing here anyway?” he asked as he
picked up his book. “You don't go to Shadyside Middle School.”

“I was looking for you,” Shawn explained. “I need to talk to you.”

“You need to talk to me? About what?” Oliver asked.

Shawn studied the ground. Then he glanced up at Oliver again. He blinked faster now.

“Ghosts,” he mumbled at last.

“Ghosts? Man!” Oliver pushed the glass front door open. They stepped out into a dark, blustery afternoon. A few cold raindrops spattered on Oliver's windbreaker.

“Anybody ever tell you you have a one-track mind?” he asked.

“No,” Shawn said, trailing after him.