The Peculiar Incident on Shady Street Read online

  “Maybe. Yeah, that might be a good idea. You coming?” Richie looks at Andrew expectantly.

  “Nah. Coach thinks I’m sick, so you can do me a favor and back me up. Tell him I’m puking or something,” Andrew says, following up with an obviously fake cough and a wicked little grin.

  Richie gives him a look, something I’d love to decode, and then tosses me a smile. Guy isn’t bad-looking when he’s not scowling. Or terrified. “All right, then. I’ll catch you guys later. Sorry I can’t stay and help, Tessa. The soccer thing . . .” He trails off and I nod as if I’m disappointed but understand. Hopefully he buys it.

  He disappears through my door and even though there’s a storm raging, I feel warm inside. It’s like my mom said . . . sometimes people won’t let themselves off the hook and you need to do it for them. I’m glad I did that for Richie.

  29

  “THAT WAS NICE OF YOU, Florida,” Andrew says, winking. It’s my favorite thing he does, that wink, but right now I’m grateful he doesn’t know that.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I say, fighting off a smile.

  Nina lifts the camera off her head and looks down at the floor for a moment. “He’s scared of this stuff. He’ll never admit it, but he is. That’s why I try not to get mad at him for making fun of my cemetery and ghost research. I think he does it because it makes him nervous.”

  “Well, it makes me nervous, too. The only difference is that I don’t have a choice.” My reading lamp flickers again and the small hairs on the back of my neck rise. The electricity Inez creates is pulsing just under my skin again. She’s trying to tell me something. I just don’t know what.

  I reach back and rub my neck, trying to ease the feeling. If Andrew and Nina can feel it, too, they sure don’t show it.

  Nina gasps and we turn to look at her. Her face is tilted down toward the screen of her camera. “Oh . . . holy . . . what in the . . .”

  This can’t be good. Andrew and I crowd around her, craning our necks to see the small screen. She hits the pause button and turns to look back at us, her eyes wild and frightened.

  “I’m going to rewind this so you can see it. But . . . Tessa, I don’t want you to panic, okay?”

  Panic? Why would I panic? It’s not like a ghost has made a ventriloquist dummy cry actual tears, and left mysterious drawings hidden inside my wall, and held my hand in a graveyard, or anything.

  “Pffft. I’m fine. Show me.”

  With a few more taps, she’s rewound the video she just took and begins playing it back in slow motion. It begins with me crouching down and searching underneath my bed. Yes, I remember doing that. The footage rolls by slowly. I watch myself straighten back up, and in that instant, a flash of lightning brightens the entire room.

  “There!” Nina screams, her index finger jabbing frantically at the mirror over my dresser in the video. I squint hard and gasp as I finally see what got her so wound up.

  It’s a face. A small . . . very young . . . very little-girlish face is reflected in the mirror. I bring a hand to my mouth to keep horrible four-letter words from spilling out. Unlike the soft smile on the statue of Inez Clarke, this face is dark. Frightening. Pitch-black eyes like the night are set against porcelain skin, and her lips are pale. She doesn’t look happy. She doesn’t look alive.

  “Oh my god,” I say, pushing the camera away. I don’t want to see it anymore. I don’t need to see it anymore because the image of that ghostly face is going to be forever burned into my mind. My entire body trembles with the thought that she was in here with me. With us.

  Andrew scrunches up his face and sits down on my bed. “I don’t get it. There was no one in this room with us. No one.”

  “There was no one in the cemetery with us, either. Remember? The footprints?” I remind him.

  “Footprints?” Nina asks. “What are you talking about?”

  “Right before the statue disappeared, there was this strong breeze. It blew my hood up over my face so I couldn’t see, but when I pulled it back off and looked around, there were footprints in the ground. Little footprints. They weren’t there before, Nina. We would have seen them.”

  Nina scribbles frantically in her journal. “I can’t believe you guys forgot to tell me this!”

  “They could have been there before we arrived,” Andrew asserts. But this time he doesn’t sound convinced. “And about this—” He waves his hand at Nina’s camera. “A reflection doesn’t happen unless there’s someone in front of the mirror to create it.”

  “That can’t be true. I just showed you evidence that it isn’t,” Nina responds flatly. Instead of being afraid, she sounds determined. “Was that the first time you’ve seen her, Tessa?”

  I nod numbly. I’ve seen signs of her, but I’ve never seen Inez herself. Until today.

  Andrew laughs nervously. “Well, I’m a believer now. And I think she’s starting to get impatient with us.”

  “Paranormal activity can become extreme,” Nina says. “There are documented cases of fires starting on their own and houses caving in on themselves.”

  Houses caving in on themselves? I’ve never gotten the feeling that the ghost haunting me is that angry, but maybe I’m wrong. Either way, I don’t want to test her.

  The front door slams, sucking the air right out of my lungs. Mom and Dad are back, and my computer-napping chance is gone.

  “Ugh. Oh, no.” I press the heels of my palms into my eyes until I see spots. “They’re back. My parents are back.”

  Nina pats my shoulder. “Hey—it’s all good. I was kinda excited to meet them anyway.”

  “Her dad’s cool,” Andrew says. “Covered in pizza sauce, but cool.”

  I’d laugh if I weren’t so frustrated. “It’s not that. It’s just—” The deep, somber notes of my dad’s violin drift up the stairwell, interrupting me. For the first time I can remember, it isn’t calming.

  “Are you going to tell them about this?” Andrew says, nudging my door open a bit farther with his foot. The sound of the strings intensifies and my head is suddenly killing me.

  “Tessa? Is something wrong?” Nina asks, unzipping her GoPro case to put the camera away. Thank goodness. If I’m about to have some kind of weird nervous breakdown, I don’t want it to be caught on video.

  “No. Well, maybe. But you have to promise you guys won’t think I’m weird or anything if I tell you,” I say. They have to understand this. I need them to.

  Andrew snorts loudly and jabs a finger out toward her. “She’s got a camera strapped to her head, Tessa. And you’re worried that you might look weird?”

  Nina reaches to slap him, but he slides away quickly, laughing. I wish I could laugh with them. It’s just too difficult right now. I swallow hard and get ready to tell them how backward the Woodward family really is.

  “I can’t tell my parents about this because they’re a little . . . ahh . . . laid-back about stuff. They won’t take it very seriously.”

  “Have you tried?” Andrew asks.

  I shake my head. “No. They just have a lot of other stuff going on and . . .” I trail off, trying to decide how exactly I want to explain this to them. “I guess I want to solve this myself. With you guys. For some reason, I just feel like that’s what’s supposed to happen.”

  “Then trust your heart,” Nina says quietly. “We won’t tell them anything yet, but if things get worse or the ghost starts hurting you . . .”

  “You’ll have to tell them. No questions asked,” Andrew finishes for her. His expression is pained, and I can’t help but wonder if he’s worried for me.

  I close my eyes and let Dad’s violin fill my ears. It’s time to get to the bottom of things, but there’s no way to do it unless I’m honest with them. And they deserve it.

  “One more thing—I don’t have a laptop. Or a phone,” I blurt out. Embarrassment floods me and I look down at the worn rug on my floor. It’s got gnarled edges and is losing its color.

  “O-kay. So why did yo
u say we could come up here to use the computer?” Andrew asks. His tone isn’t sarcastic or mean. It’s just . . . Andrew.

  I sigh. “We do have a family computer, but it’s only used for paying bills and homework and stuff like that. And now that my parents are back, I don’t have a chance of using it without them noticing. I’m sorry, guys.”

  “What are you sorry about?” Andrew asks. “That you don’t have your own computer, or that you tried to hide it from us?”

  “I wasn’t hiding it. Not exactly.”

  Nina waggles her eyebrows at me. “Right. And Andrew doesn’t like Doritos.”

  “Fine,” I laugh. “I’m sorry I don’t have my own computer, and I’m sorry I tried to hide it. I should have known I can’t hide anything from you lunatics.”

  “No, you should have known you don’t need to hide anything from us lunatics,” Andrew corrects, a sympathetic smile on his face. “Got it?”

  “Got it.”

  Good! Because we’ve got work to do!” Andrew spins me toward my mirrored closet door. My startled reflection stares back at me. “Look there. That’s the face of a girl who’s going to solve the biggest ghost mystery Chicago has ever seen—computer or no computer!” He claps me on the shoulder and scoops up his backpack.

  “Where are we going?” I ask, scrambling for my shoes and jacket.

  Andrew smirks. “You’ll see.”

  I snatch a sheet of paper out of my drawer and scribble out a note to Mom about her supplies. Knowing her, she’s probably taking Jonah to his room to get him changed into dry clothes after the rain. I’ll just drop this on the counter when she’s not looking so she’ll find it later and stop worrying. Doing it now might get us stuck here—with the adventure jar and Reno—for the night, and I can’t afford that. Not when it feels like we’re so close to some answers.

  30

  “WE HAVE TO BE FAST here. My parents . . . they think I’m at my neighbor’s house, and once it gets dark, they’ll expect me home,” Nina pants out. She brushes a string of damp brown hair out of her eyes.

  Andrew scowls. “It’s only two o’clock, Nina. How long do you think this is going to take?”

  “I don’t know!” She huffs. “I kind of lose track of time when I’m researching this kind of stuff.”

  Because she loves it. Andrew and me? Yeah, we’re just hoping to survive.

  “If everything goes according to plan, we’ll find what we need and get out of here in less than an hour,” Andrew says, snaking a lock around his bike.

  I don’t say it, but the idea of an entire hour of ghost research makes my stomach churn. I wish I could be more like Nina right now. She’s curious, not petrified. “Richie is still at practice, right?”

  “Yup. This will be easier without him,” Nina says, smirking as she lifts off her bike helmet. “It’s called coimetrophobia, in case you’re wondering.”

  “Coimetro-what?” Andrew asks.

  “Coimetrophobia. Fear of cemeteries. I think Richie has it.” She pauses thoughtfully for a moment. “He hates graveyards and talk about dead people and ghosts . . . but mostly the graveyards.”

  If Nina is right and her brother is afraid of cemeteries, he definitely wouldn’t have liked our trip to Graceland. It still bothers me. The way the wind and rain picked up like that, flying into our eyes so we couldn’t find the way out. The lightning and the crinkle of wet leaves under our feet as we raced to escape. The empty glass box.

  If the ghost of Inez Clarke is following me, she was definitely there with us. And I don’t think she wanted me to leave.

  “Hey! Florida! Get with it.” Andrew is holding the door open for me. I love libraries most of the time, but today I’m nervous. Once we get access to their computers and start digging around, there’s no telling what we might find.

  * * *

  We’ve read every single page of this website on Graceland ghosts and have found nothing new. Nothing different. All the same old ghost legend. And absolutely none of it seems right.

  Inez Clarke died from a lightning strike. Inez Clarke never existed. A little boy is buried under the statue. Amos Briggs. Lightning strike. Disappearing statue. Crying in the graveyard. Amos Briggs. Never existed.

  The words blur into a blackened mess in front of me. I let my head fall back in exhaustion, wishing I could get just one good night’s sleep. We have to be missing something.

  Nina puffs the bangs out of her eyes. “I don’t get it. This article claims that Inez never existed and that the statue was just an advertisement for a local sculptor. Andrew Gagel.”

  “Of course. Because why shouldn’t things get even weirder? His name just had to be Andrew, didn’t it?” Andrew groans.

  The connections are a bit creepy, but I don’t tell him that. “Just a coincidence. And I don’t buy into that theory at all. That would have been a really complicated advertisement. The guy had to use a ton of materials to make that thing. And a lot of time!”

  “I’m just telling you what this says. Maybe with no television and Internet there wasn’t any other way for him to get new clients or something?”

  Andrew is shaking his head. “That would explain why neither Inez Clarke nor Amos Briggs shows up in the census at the time, though. If he made them up for his ad—”

  “Nope, there’s still a problem,” I say, pointing to the article up on my screen. I bring the cursor across a chunk of text to highlight it for them. “Mary Clarke existed. She was a real person in the Chicago census at that time and her name is listed just below Inez’s on the gravestone, remember?”

  I can’t imagine anyone in their right mind letting someone put their name on a realistic-looking gravestone no matter how much that dude needed the business. It’s spooky. And morbid.

  Nina looks perplexed. “Why would he make up two names and then randomly choose one real person to etch into that tombstone?” She rubs her temples for a moment and then refocuses on me. “I mean, that would be like me making a gravestone and putting Andrew’s name on it.”

  “Hey!” Andrew yelps. “Stop using me for examples if they’re going to be all freaky and stuff.” He looks back at his screen, muttering something under his breath about death not being funny.

  I’d laugh at him, but I kinda agree. Until I figure out what the ghost in my house wants, you won’t catch me joking around about it. The face in the mirror surfaces in my mind and I tremble again. How am I ever going to sleep knowing she’s there? Watching me?

  Andrew’s phone vibrates against the wooden table. He slides it toward him and reads the text. A deep sigh follows.

  “Everything okay?” I ask. Hopefully it isn’t his mom or something. I’ve seen the free-range half of him, but it would be a bad time for the “you’re grounded” half to make an appearance.

  “Yeah. It’s all good. That was Cass. She was wondering where we are.”

  Nina makes a face, then buries her nose in the computer screen. I would, too, if I were her, because something tells me this conversation isn’t going to be fun.

  “By ‘we’ she meant you and Nina, though, right?” I ask.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Yes, you do.”

  Andrew’s eyes find mine. They’re apologetic. “I’m going to figure out what’s going on with her, Florida. I promise.”

  I’ve had enough. Enough of this girl and her drama. “Maybe I don’t want you to. Maybe I don’t even want to be her friend at this point.”

  I know I sound petty and childish, but I don’t care. I’m mad. Cassidy is ruining her friendship with them but somehow making me feel like I’m to blame.

  “I think you do, though. You’re nice, Tessa. Nice people want to be friends with everyone.”

  He’s not wrong. Other than Billy Neimeyer—a boy who poured glue into a Dixie cup and tried to convince me it was milk in second grade—I can’t remember ever having a real enemy. Is that what Cassidy is? An enemy? The thought makes me queasy.

  “Plus, you and Cass have a lot in com
mon.”

  “We have nothing in common, Andrew. Nothing.”

  He holds a hand up. “Before you go looking for a sharp object, just listen. Cassidy is really creative. She’s got such a good imagination that the drama teacher at school lets her tell all the spooky stories to the younger kids at Halloween. She’s thoughtful, too.”

  I shoot him a skeptical look.

  “Well, she’s usually thoughtful, anyway.”

  I fold my arms over my chest, hoping I look unimpressed. I want Andrew to believe that hearing him say nice things about Cassidy doesn’t bother me, but it does. I remember the hate in her eyes the last time we saw each other, the way she looked directly at me and then walked away even though Nina was begging her to stay. It made me feel terrible.

  “If she’s so great, why is she treating you guys like this? Is it just because she doesn’t like me?” I ask.

  Andrew shakes his head grimly. “Nah. I don’t think so. Cassidy is great, but she’s kind of private sometimes. Like this one time in fifth grade she didn’t show up for school three days in a row. Me, Nina, and Richie all called her—a bunch—but her mom just kept saying she was in bed, recovering, and that she’d call us when she was ready.”

  “Recovering from what?”

  “Surgery. We found out a week later that she had her appendix taken out.”

  I think about this for a minute, confused. If I needed to have surgery, I’d definitely tell my friends. Especially if I was going to miss school. “I don’t understand why she kept it from you guys.”

  Andrew shrugs. “Like I said . . . private.”

  Huh. I don’t want to admit that I know someone like this, but I do. Rachel. Rachel is my best friend in the world, but she’s also the most private person I know. Probably why she wasn’t impressed that I told my dentist about her crush on Warner Higgins.

  “Wow,” Nina whispers. “I know you guys are in the middle of, um . . . something, but you gotta look at this.”

  I swivel around to face her. Talking about anything other than Cassidy—graveyards included—sounds great. I blink at Nina’s computer screen, hoping my brain can switch gears. “What? Did you find something about Inez?”