“You should go,” said Sally, making a pruny face. “Bobby doesn’t like baby-sitters.”
“That does it.” Katie finally noticed the towel dripping down her wrist. She threw it in the sink. “I’ve seen kids get up to a lot of tricks but you two are something else. Dreaming up this elaborate story just to scare me. Well, it won’t work!”
As she flounced out of the kitchen I knew we were on our own. And it didn’t make me feel strong or grown-up or anything like that. Not at all. It made me feel alone.
Sally got down from her chair, ready to start playing again. She didn’t seem to be worried about anything—maybe she didn’t even realize she’d been possessed!
“Sally, wait.”
She looked at me, her eyes full of trust.
I put my hand on her shoulder and looked into her face. “Did you let Bobby take you over before? Did you give him permission or did he just do it?”
Sally shrugged off my hand. “I want Winky,” she said. Winky was her stuffed bunny.
“Sally, wait a minute. Do you think Bobby will do that to you again?”
“Bobby is my friend,” Sally said, acting stubborn and not wanting to look at me. She started for the door.
“I know he’s your friend,” I said desperately. “But Sally, could you keep him out if you wanted to?”
Sally hunched her shoulders up around her neck and didn’t answer.
The door swung closed behind her, leaving me alone.
A faint chill tickled the back of my neck. As if something was watching me from the shadows.
I turned but there was nothing there.
Then it happened.
Softly at first, then louder, weird, cackling old-lady laughter rose up inside the walls.
Very faint, but I could hear it. Ghost laughter. And the joke was on me.
6
I decided not to let Sally out of my sight the rest of the day. She wanted to play outside under the cherry tree, so I hung around, watching her do make-believe stuff with Winky and her other dolls and stuffed animals.
It was boring but to tell you the truth, I was glad to be out of the house. Glad to be away from the noises in the walls and the cackling laughter that only happened when I was alone.
After a while Katie came outside to check up on us.
“What a lovely cherry tree,” she said, shading her eyes against the sun. “It looks really old.”
A gust of wind came up and scattered the last of the tree’s blossoms.
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen a cherry tree with blooms so late. It’s nearly the end of June,” said Katie.
I didn’t tell her what I suspected—that the ghost had played in that weird old cherry tree when he was still alive. And that he still haunted it now that he was a ghost.
“Hey, think quick!”
I ducked as a baseball went whipping by my head, just missing me. It was Steve, my friend from next door. “Come on,” he said. “Let’s go down to the ball field and practice.”
Steve was an awesome pitcher and I was okay on third base—a pretty good hitter, if I do say so myself. I wanted to play ball so badly I could taste it. It would be great to get away for a while and leave this spooky place behind. But I couldn’t.
“I’ve got to keep an eye on my sister,” I told Steve.
“Go ahead,” Katie encouraged me. “I’ll watch Sally.”
“I don’t really feel like it,” I said, scuffing my sneakered toe in the grass.
“Come on,” said Katie tauntingly. “You’re not scared Sally will be possessed again while you’re gone, are you?”
“Possessed?” echoed Steve, wide-eyed. He was a little bigger than I, built solid. Ghost talk made him look round all over—round eyes and round mouth in a round face.
Katie laughed. “Jason’s got quite an imagination. He tried to scare me this morning pretending Sally was possessed by a ghost.”
“Wow!” said Steve, looking at me. “The little boy ghost or the old lady ghost?”
Katie’s eyes blazed. “Not you, too!” She tossed her head, swinging her shoulder-length, red hair, and stalked off into the house.
Steve raised his eyebrows at me. “I guess she doesn’t believe in spooks, huh?”
“Not yet,” I said, glancing back up at the house.
Steve and I played catch for a while, right there in the yard. He kept rearing back and throwing hard and it was all I could do to get the glove in front of the ball.
“Definitely big league material,” Steve said, very pleased with himself. “Don’t worry, you can still be my friend when I get voted best pitcher in the bigs.”
“Thanks a bunch,” I said. “You’ll probably charge for autographs.”
While we practiced, Sally kept busy by herself, holding up Winky and talking to that dumb stuffed rabbit.
“Winky,” I heard her say. “Tell Bobby to come out and play.”
Great! I was trying to get rid of the ghost and she wanted to play with him!
Just then Steve’s mother called him.
“Gotta go,” he said, picking up the ball. “See you later, alligator.”
“In a while, crocodile.”
Steve was barely out of sight when Sally announced that she was going inside. “Bobby’s lonesome,” she explained, picking up her dolls.
I was left alone, standing under the cherry tree, looking up at the house. The old building seemed to loom over me, and the windows were like eyes.
Blank eyes, hiding terrible secrets.
I shuddered. What was wrong with me—it was still broad daylight, and bad things never happened until after dark, right?
That’s what I told myself. But as I stared up at those blank windows, suddenly something moved. At first it was blurry, and then it came into sharp focus.
A small, pale-looking boy was up there in the attic, looking down at me. He was dressed in old-fashioned clothes, and as I stared up at him he raised his little hand and waved at me.
Bobby. The dead boy.
7
“Spaghetti anyone?” said Katie, holding up a ladle like a tennis racket.
“Don’t mind if I do,” I
