Giving Up the Ghost (3 page)

“I-I'm fine,” I panted.

And then we heard the first bell. We hustled inside.

In social studies I
couldn't find my report about the gold rush. I was positive I'd put it into my binder the night before. But it wasn't there.

Even though I knew it was pointless, I conducted a frantic search through every inch of my backpack. Then inside my textbooks. It wasn't there.

I'm one of these semi-geeky types who never
doesn't
do my homework, so not being able to find my homework puts me in a state of panic.

“Problem, Sara?” Mr. Blake was suddenly looming over my desk.

I stopped frantically rummaging and gave him a helpless shrug. “I'm sorry. I can't find my report. I could have sworn I put it in there last night, but now it's missing.”

“Not to worry. Bring it in before first period tomorrow,” he said, and moved on to the next desk.

Oh, puh-leese. Can you say “teacher's pet”? If anyone else in the class had forgotten their report, Blake would have taken off ten points at least.

I jumped. It had been Miranda's voice. But not her spoken voice. Her thoughts-inside-her-head voice. I was learning to hear the difference.

I leaned forward to look at her. She was sitting two desks away, with Lily in between us. She just raised her eyebrows and grinned at me, friend to friend, as if to say,
Whew, that was a close one!
But now that I knew what she really thought, could I see a hint of dislike and phoniness behind her smile? I mustered a weak smile back at her. Inside I was stung.

I leaned back in my chair and stared straight ahead. I definitely wasn't liking this new skill of mine, the ability to read minds. Not one bit.

At lunch I plunked
down my tray just in time to hear Avery and Lily talking about a party.

The party.

“So, um, what time is this party for Jayden?” I asked.

“It's supposed to start at seven thirty, but you should come over to my house before,” said Lily. “Maybe you can help my mom with the baking, since you're so artistic? Oh, and it's not a surprise or anything. Jayden knows about it.”

“That's good,” I said. “He doesn't seem like the type who'd enjoy a surprise party.”

“Oh, and speaking of parties,” said Lily, leaning forward and addressing the whole table. “Did you guys know that it's Sara's birthday on Saturday?”

Some “ohs” and “reallys” chorused around the table. I nodded and shrugged, feeling a little awkward.

“So should we sing ‘Happy Birthday' to her on Saturday?” asked Avery. Being talked about like I wasn't sitting right there made me feel
really
awkward.

“No, no, no,” said Lily quickly. “Sara told me she doesn't want us to fuss
at all
about her birthday, right, Sara?”

I nodded almost imperceptibly. I was afraid to say something for fear of sounding like I really did mind. Because I wasn't sure
what
I thought. Was it silly that my feelings were hurt?

“And she knows that this party is all about Jayden, and she doesn't want to make it about her. So I was thinking maybe some of you guys might be able to get together at Scoops on Sunday afternoon? To celebrate Sara's birthday. Except we won't even mention that it
is
her birthday, right, Sara? We'll just get together again and hang out a little, totally unofficial. . . .”

This get-together was sounding lamer by the minute.

“Because she hates being the center of attention and all that,” Lily finished with a smile in my direction.

Avery's thoughts lasered into my mind.

As IF! And miss hanging out with my cousin and his dreamy friends for ice cream with a bunch of girls?

“I am soooo sorry, Sara,” Avery said, out loud this time. “But my family already switched our plans from Saturday to Sunday because of Jayden's party. I have to go visit my cousins on Sunday. I would so rather celebrate your birthday, but I promised my mom.”

Wow. Avery had just said practically the exact opposite of what she'd thought. How could she do that? I sat back and nodded, feeling numb. “That's fine,” I said. “I understand.”

I didn't want to have to hear other people's thoughts. What they really thought, that is. Did everyone do this? Say one thing and think another? Did
I
do that?

I pretended to drop my spoon on the floor so I could put up my clumsy blocking technique while I was under the table, where no one would see me. Below the edge of the table, I squeezed my eyes shut. Willed an invisible bubble to form around me, so others' thoughts would bounce off and not make their way inside my head.

“I'll try to make it,” said Marlee vaguely.

“I don't know if I can,” said Tamara. “I might have to babysit for my little brother.”

I had to sit back up sometime. “That's fine, you guys. I know the Saturday party is a lot of effort and stuff,” I mumbled.
Don't cry. Don't cry.
That was the voice inside my own head. I swallowed the huge lump that had risen in the back of my throat.

Lily looked at me, concern written all over her face. “You okay, Sar?” she asked in a soft voice.

“I'm great!” I said as cheerfully as I possibly could. I knew I was being a big baby. I was definitely feeling extra emotional because Jayden was leaving. Or maybe I was just extremely immature about the fact that no one seemed to care that it was my birthday. What did I expect? The days of princess dresses and pink frosted cakes and balloons and pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey were past me. It was time to grow up. And last year, in California, I didn't have one friend to wish me a happy birthday. This year I had a table full of friends making excuses about why they couldn't hang out for my birthday. That was an improvement of sorts, right?

Suddenly Jayden appeared at the table.

“Hey, dudes!” he said cheerfully to everyone at my table. “Talking about the par-tay?”

“Yep,” said Lily. “We're trying to decide between throwing your party at the Ritz or jetting everyone to the Riviera.”

He grinned. “Cool. Both sound awesome. So, can you come on Saturday?” he asked me.

“Well, I had something way more important to do, but I canceled. I wouldn't miss it for the world,” I said, making my voice come out a lot more lighthearted and cheerful than I was actually feeling at that moment.

His smile widened. Then he moved along to the next table, where most of the boys from the basketball team usually sat together.

As if I needed more problems at that moment, I suddenly heard a loud voice bellow my name from across the cafeteria.

“Collins! I need to talk to you pronto!”

I stifled a groan and looked around for an escape route. Now was not the time for me to have a conversation with the long-dead spirit of a school gym teacher.

“Right now! On the double! Move it, Collins!”

My number one life goal at my new school was to fit in. To look normal. Having the entire school see me talking to thin air was probably not the best way to look normal. Now would definitely be a good time to leave the cafeteria.

I stood up. “Got to get to the library to print something before English,” I said.

I bussed my tray, then hurried for the door, ignoring the gym teacher as he continued to bellow my name from across the noisy room.

Chapter 4

I rushed home from school, anxious to talk to Lady Azura. I was so over this mind-reading stuff. I wanted her to teach me a way to turn it off for good. I was sure she would know how. She always seemed to have the answers to questions I had. Sometimes she even knew the answer before I'd figured out what the question would be. I often had trouble understanding what she actually meant, though. She tended to speak in riddles.

The first thing I saw when I opened the front door was my history report. Sitting right on the front-hall table. Before I could react to why it was there, and how it had gotten there, I smelled something very wrong.

It smelled like smoke.

Well, not exactly like smoke from a fire that was burning. It wasn't the same sort of smoke I'd smelled that awful night a few weeks ago, when there had been an actual fire, upstairs, in the pink bedroom. This was a
smoky
smell. Like from an old campfire or something.

Still, even if nothing was actively burning, this smell couldn't be a good thing. Something
had
been burning.

There was no sign of Lady Azura. But the door to her summoning room was closed. That meant she most likely had a client. And the smoky smell was coming from the sitting room across the hall. I strode over and stopped short in the doorway, surveying the room. My mouth dropped open in horror, then immediately closed again, because I began coughing uncontrollably.

It wasn't smoke. It was soot. Dirty clouds of soot. Soot billowed out of the chimney. It coated every surface in the room. It looked as though a downdraft was blowing the ashes in the wrong direction. Rather than going up the chimney, they were coming down, through the open damper, and ashes were shooting into the room.

I dashed into the room, trying not to breathe, and stooped down to try to jimmy the damper closed. I got a face full of soot for my efforts. But after some jiggling and shifting around, I managed to get the thing closed. Black soot completely covered my hand.

Coughing and sputtering, I ran out of the room and closed the French doors we never closed. I was grateful they were there.

I was still standing there, my back to the door, my elbow raised to my face, coughing and wheezing, when the door to Lady Azura's room opened, and a large woman with red hair emerged. She barely glanced my way. She did not look very pleased.

“My new blouse is ruined!” she said over her shoulder.

I noticed a brown, blotchy stain down the front of her blouse.

Lady Azura stood and leaned in the doorway, her arms crossed. She tossed her head haughtily but did not respond until the woman had slammed the front door behind her.

“I did you a favor!” Lady Azura called after the woman, although of course the woman couldn't possibly have heard. “That blouse was hideous!” She tipped her chin up and shrugged and then spoke, as if to herself. “She didn't like what I had to tell her. Sometimes the truth hurts.” Suddenly she sniffed. Looked my way. She seemed to notice me for the first time, standing with my back to the doors of the sitting room.

“The tea leaves spilled down her blouse. I did nothing. They simply leaped from the cup.” She furrowed her brow. “What is that dreadful smell? Why on earth are you standing there? And what is smeared all over your face?”

“Ashes,” I said. “There seems to be a problem with the chimney in the sitting room.”

I opened the doors and gestured toward the room. A small puff of soot unfurled from the room as I did so.

She stared into the room. Her brown eyes, heavily ringed with black eyeliner and thick black eyelashes, widened with surprise and dismay.

“What a state the room is in! We must clean it up, Sara. Why don't you fetch the broom and vacuum? I'll go change.”

Ten minutes later, she reappeared. My eyes widened at the sight of her wearing velvet sweatpants and a T-shirt advertising an old Broadway show I'd never heard of. Her hair was tucked up into a pink turban. I suppressed a smile. Lady Azura in leisure wear. I wished for a moment that Lily was here to see this.

For the next hour and a half, we dusted, swept, and vacuumed. We pounded a couple of small throw rugs on the clothesline outside.

Coughing, opening windows, setting up fans to try to get rid of the worst of the sooty smell, we didn't say much.

After we finally finished, the room looked a lot better. It seemed to smell better too, but by that time our noses were so used to it they were probably immune. Luckily, both of the couches had washable slipcovers, which meant we could have them cleaned to get rid of the smell and stuff. I balled them up and stuffed them into large yard bags so my dad could take them to the dry cleaner.

“I believe the next step is for both of us to bathe,” said Lady Azura, staring at me with a glimmer of amusement in her eyes. She was right. Much of the soot seemed to have transferred from the room to ourselves. It was funny to see her in a state of disarray, when she was always so beautifully dressed and groomed.

“Go. Have a luxurious bath or shower, my dear,” commanded Lady Azura. “I will do the same. Then we'll talk.”

In the shower, I scrubbed my body with a washcloth. I had to wash my hair three times before the water that swirled down the drain ran clear. And I thought the smell of soot would never leave my nose. But an hour later, Lady Azura and I sat down to a quiet dinner of spinach salad together. Knowing that a salad would not be enough for me, Lady Azura thoughtfully placed a platter of warm cornbread in front of me.

“Your father is working late,” she told me. “Perhaps now might be a good time for us to compare notes. About the house. The negative energy that we both feel.” She locked eyes with me.

Did she think I knew something she didn't? I paused in the middle of buttering a big slab of cornbread. “It does seem like weird stuff has been happening,” I ventured finally, when it was clear she was going to make me speak first. “Like my dad and those pictures crashing down. The chair on the porch. The teacup that spilled by itself on that lady. And now the chimney thing in the front room.” I shrugged.

“Yes. I believe that most of those events are outside of the ordinary.”

“And also we're both having weird dreams.”

She looked at me sharply. “Are
you
having weird dreams as well, Sara?”

“Well, sort of. This morning when I woke up I thought it was still dark out, but then I thought there was this dark cloud over my bed. Maybe I dreamed it, I don't know.”