The Peculiar Incident on Shady Street Read online

  “Florida? What are you doing?” Andrew’s voice breaks through the quiet hall. He flips his cell phone from hand to hand and grins that crooked grin of his. “We were wondering where you were. Aren’t you eating?”

  Shaking my head, I try for a smile. “Nah. Not hungry.”

  In a few steps, Andrew is beside me. Today he’s got on a soccer jersey. It’s green and yellow and honestly . . . ugly. I stifle a laugh. Rachel and I used to make fun of the horrible tropical prints the old women back in Fort Myers wore, but this jersey is so much worse. It looks like a banana threw up green beans.

  “What are you laughing at?” He looks down at me suspiciously for a minute, then slides down the wall and settles onto the floor beside me.

  I shrug and try to keep myself from staring at his phone. Why can’t my parents just let me have one, too? Or even a laptop! Then I could talk to Rachel. I could research this stuff on my own.

  I could figure out what Graceland is.

  “Hey!” Andrew says, snapping his fingers in front of my face. “Anyone home?”

  “I’m fine. Just having a weird day.” Meeting his eyes, I add, “And if you insist on calling me Florida, or Surfer Girl, or any other nickname like that, I’m going to start calling you . . . well, I don’t know what yet, but you won’t like it!”

  “Seriously? What’s so wrong with me calling you Florida?” he asks, watching me intently. “You kind of are Florida. I mean, you’re so tan and you have that long rumpled-up hair.”

  By rumpled-up, I assume he means that my hair is wavy. Which is true. Occasionally back home I’d twist it into a bun so it didn’t get all knotted up by the sun and wind and sand. But not always. Sometimes it felt good to leave it loose, free to whip around my face and shield my eyes from the glare of the water.

  Something stirs inside me, dark and sad. “Whatever. Just . . . just don’t call me that.”

  Andrew’s face twists into a look of apology. “Hey, I’m sorry. I won’t call you that anymore if it actually upsets you. I thought you were kidding.” He goes quiet and looks thoughtful for a moment. “That nickname isn’t why you skipped lunch, is it?”

  I put all my energy into holding back the tears. I refuse to cry. “It’s not that. I’m just having a bad day.”

  “Is this a ‘girl problem’ like hair and stuff, or is it an actual problem?”

  His eyes skip over my sketchpad and I instinctively flip it closed. I shoot him a steely look. “For the record, saying ‘girl problem’ makes you sound like a jerk.”

  Andrew looks deflated for a moment. His mouth is hanging open like a fish gasping for breath on the shore.

  “Oh, come on! I make one little joke you don’t like and now I can’t look at your art?” His voice cracks a little, and even though he’s smiling again, I can tell he’s a little hurt. I feel bad. I’m not trying to shut him out and it definitely wasn’t the joke that made me close my sketchpad.

  Jeez. I’m hurting everyone today.

  “It’s not finished. I never show my work until it’s finished. Otherwise it just looks like a mess to people.” I tell myself this is only a half-lie. Not a whole one.

  “O-kay. That still doesn’t explain why you’re being such a creeper out here instead of with us at lunch. Today is Thursday . . . your fourth day here and you still don’t seem any more comfortable than on day one. Everything okay?”

  “Yeah . . . no. I don’t know.”

  Andrew tips his head to the side. “Spill it.”

  His eyes flick toward the large clock at the end of the hall before coming back to rest on mine. “We’ve got science in ten minutes and Ms. Geist isn’t going to start class late for your ‘girl problems.’ ” Andrew says this with a goofy smirk and I can tell how hard he’s trying to lighten my mood.

  I punch him in the arm, laughing. Andrew really does have a funny sense of humor. If it weren’t for all the stuff going on at home, this would actually be a decent day here. A good one. And in Chicago. Weird.

  I stuff my sketchpad into my backpack, taking a deep breath. I have two choices: tell Andrew what happened in my room last night and risk him thinking I really am batty, or keep it to myself and suffer silently. I really, really hate to suffer.

  “Okay, but I think we’re going to need Nina.”

  17

  SCHOOL ENDED OVER AN HOUR ago, and I’m still sitting on the front steps watching cars race by in a blur. People drove fast in Florida, but they didn’t drive this fast. And they didn’t honk this much, either.

  “I told you I’m walking as fast as I can!” Nina appears in the doorway of the school, and Andrew is only a step behind her. She doesn’t look as shy this time. In fact, she looks annoyed.

  There’s something about Nina that reminds me a little of Rachel. It definitely isn’t her hair or her skin. Maybe it’s the way she walks or the way she talks. It’s something nice, though, and despite the fact that she’s still shooting lasers at Andrew with her eyes, I smile. “Hey.”

  “Hey yourself. Mr. Bossypants here dragged me out of Film Club. It only happens once a week—on Wednesdays—and Andrew here walked in right in the middle of it!” Nina punctuates the last few words with a jab to his ribs and he winces.

  “I’m sorry. I just needed to talk to you and he knew how to find you,” I say, suddenly feeling more guilty than worried. Maybe I shouldn’t have bothered her with this.

  “No, it’s fine. We were discussing The Watcher in the Woods and I’ve seen that a million times anyway.” She mumbles this last part. I can already feel her closing up on me again.

  I need to get her talking quick or I’ll lose her. “Have you ever heard of somewhere called Graceland?”

  Nina’s eyes pop wide and for a moment, her jaw is slack. “Graceland? Why?”

  I shoot a nervous glance at Andrew and he circles a hand in the air like I should keep going. “C’mon. Spit it out, Tessa. I didn’t nearly get torn to shreds pulling her out of Film Club for nothing.”

  Inhaling, I continue. “Remember how I told you there’s something going on in my house?”

  Nina nods, and the three of us take a seat on the steps. She shoves her backpack behind us and leans in closer to me. “I’m confused. How could the things going on in your house have anything to do with Graceland?”

  I toss my hands in the air. “I don’t know what in the heck Graceland is, so how can I answer that?”

  “Isn’t that where Elvis lived?” Andrew pipes up.

  “Shhhhhh!” Nina hisses, and looks around. I can’t be certain, but I think it’s to make sure no one is listening.

  Snatching up her backpack and unzipping it, Nina begins digging around for something. When her hands reappear, there’s a book in them: The Ghosts of Chicago.

  “Oh my god. Is Graceland a building? Did my parents buy a haunted house called Graceland?” I begin to panic, wondering if this might be why my dad kept saying our house was a “steal.” If someone died there, they’d probably lower the price . . . right?

  Nina waves me off. “No. Graceland is a cemetery just north of Wrigley Field. It’s one of the two cemeteries that took the bodies they dug up and relocated from Lincoln Park.”

  A cemetery. I think about this and a sudden chill washes over me. Nina is in some kind of crazy-excited mode where she’s talking a million miles a minute, but I really can’t focus. I just keep hearing that one word over and over again: cemetery. Whatever ghost is trapped in my house is sending me a message, and it has something to do with Graceland Cemetery.

  But why is it trying to reach me?

  Watching Nina chatter away, I suddenly realize something about her. She seems so quiet—so timid when she isn’t talking about ghosts. But the minute anything paranormal comes up . . . boom! Nina starts talking. Maybe that’s what reminds me of Rachel. Her sudden bursts of excitement. Nina’s excitement isn’t about soccer, like Rachel’s was, but about ghosts and graveyards and bodies lost underneath the ground. It might be odd, but it’s familiar and
I can’t help but like it.

  “So, you understand?” Nina finishes, and I realize I didn’t hear a word she just said.

  “She wasn’t listening.” Andrew groans.

  “How do you know that?” I ask.

  He snorts and exchanges a look with Nina. “When she’s tuning you out, she gets that spacey look in her eyes. I saw her do it at the park while she was drawing.”

  “You were spying on me?” I playfully drop both hands to my hips and wait for his answer. I thought Andrew went home with his dad that day. He even told me he did. Now I find out he was probably crouched down in a bush or something, watching me?

  “Not spying! I just watched for a minute. From a distance.” Andrew looks uncomfortable as he fidgets with the edges of his jersey. “You looked so happy and I wanted to come see what you were drawing, but—”

  “Yeah, yeah. You had to go. But not before you spied on me!” I fight the urge to smile. I really don’t like having my privacy invaded, but I’m discovering that it’s hard to actually be angry with Andrew. Especially when the sun is lighting up his ocean eyes again.

  “It wasn’t spying!” Andrew yells out.

  Just then, the door to the school opens and Cassidy walks out. She’s wearing skinny jeans and a black jacket, making her blue streak stand out even more.

  “Cass!” Andrew shouts, catching her attention. “You gotta go home?”

  She glances at me hesitantly. “Not until four thirty. Why?”

  “Sweet. We’re gonna hang out here for a little while. Maybe you could stay?”

  For the first time since I’ve met her, something other than a frown settles on Cassidy’s face. It’s not quite a smile, but she doesn’t look like she just swallowed a toad, either.

  Finally shrugging her backpack off her shoulders, she sets it on the ground. “Um. Yeah. I think I can do that.”

  “Awesome! Pull up a step.” Andrew sweeps his arms out over the stairs.

  I stare at the ground, suddenly understanding what it means to feel like a third wheel. Andrew is so happy that Cassidy is staying, but all I can think about is how I’m going to survive the next hour with her around. Maybe she is actually a nice person. Maybe she can be super-fun to be around. Maybe there are tons of reasons why Andrew, Nina, and Richie hang out with her. But if any of that is true, Cassidy has a lot of work to do for me to believe it.

  Sitting down, Cassidy pulls her knees up to her chest. “So. What are we going to do? There isn’t time to bowl or anything like that, but we could go to Yoberri.”

  “Actually, we’re going to help Tessa not be the star of the next Paranormal Activity movie.” Andrew chuckles. “Got any suggestions?”

  Cassidy’s shoulders stiffen. “Help Tessa,” she repeats.

  “Her house is haunted,” Nina says matter-of-factly. She’s digging through a book, marking different pages with bright orange Post-it notes. “Clue number one is Graceland Cemetery.”

  “Of course,” Cass quips. “I forgot about her haunted house.”

  She looks from Andrew to Nina, then finally to me. Her blue eyes are icy, angry as she gathers her backpack up off the steps. “You know, I think I do have to go home. Sorry. Orthodontist appointment.”

  Andrew scoffs. “Orthodontist? What are you talking about? You don’t even have braces!”

  “Well, I might someday and I want to be prepared,” she responds, staring at Andrew pointedly. I notice that she doesn’t sound guilty this time. She sounds mad.

  Nina flips her book closed. I half expect her to shrink back, fade into the bushes rather than facing Cassidy’s anger, but she doesn’t. Instead she slowly shakes her head.

  “What is that?” Cassidy demands. “Why are you shaking your head at me like that?”

  “Because you’re kind of throwing a fit,” Nina retorts.

  Cassidy’s mouth goes slack.

  Nina clears her throat, her expression softening. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that. It’s just that you’re acting so . . . so . . .”

  “So what?” Cass asks.

  “So un-Cassidy! Where is that crazy hyena laugh of yours? Where are all the fun new lipstick samples? Where are all your cool stories about the cities you’ve visited and the wristbands you bought?” Nina pauses, her pale face growing more worried by the second. “Where is Cassidy?”

  Hyena laugh? Lipstick samples? Cool stories? Holy cow. I have a great imagination, but those things don’t match up with the Cassidy I know at all.

  “Tell us what’s going on,” Nina begs. “Please.”

  Cassidy takes a deep breath, looking pained. For a minute I think she might finally volunteer something. But then her eyes jump back to me again.

  “No. I’m going home.”

  18

  WE’RE ALL SILENT. NINA IS watching Cassidy disappear around the bend in the road. Andrew’s mouth is gaping open.

  Time to talk about the elephant in the room, or so my dad would say. “So. She really hates me. Not just a little hate, either . . . a full-on, wish-you’d-fall-off-the-edge-of-a-cliff hate.”

  Andrew shoots me an apologetic look. “I’m sorry, Tessa. Cass isn’t being fair.”

  “Don’t apologize.” I feel bad for Andrew. It isn’t his fault that Cassidy would obviously rather fall into a tank of electric eels than hang out with me, but based on the way she steamed past him like she just robbed a bank, I think she blames him anyway.

  “I don’t get it,” Nina says. “I keep thinking things are going to go back to normal any day now. But they seem worse.”

  “Worse since I showed up?”

  The look on their faces is all the answer I need. I sigh. As if it isn’t bad enough to have a ghost waiting for me at home, now I have this to worry about. Cassidy. As long as I’m around, Andrew, Nina, and Richie are losing their friend. It isn’t right, but I don’t know how to fix it.

  Nina looks down at her phone and groans. “Guys, I know no one wants to hear this right now, but we’re running out of time.”

  “Right. Back to Graceland,” Andrew says quickly. He tries to sound cheerful, but it’s impossible to miss the sadness in his tone. This thing with Cassidy is really bothering him.

  “Back to Graceland,” I say halfheartedly.

  Nina jumps up from her spot on the steps. “Let’s walk somewhere. I don’t want to talk about this stuff here. Too many people around.”

  Agreed. The kids here probably already think I’m weird because of what I said about my house being haunted. I don’t need to make it worse. And Nina . . . I’m beginning to understand why she’s so quiet most of the time. Ghosts aren’t a hobby for many twelve-year-olds.

  “Where do you guys want to go?” Andrew asks.

  I think about it for a minute. We can’t go to my house, not unless I want my friends to be scared away before we can even start researching. And I have no clue where the library is. “How about North Pond?”

  “Perfect,” he says, pulling a jacket on and zipping up. “There’s always a few artists there with their canvases, but there’s never anyone from our school.”

  Something tugs at my heart and I almost stop walking. I’d love nothing more than to curl up at North Pond with my pastels and draw. Maybe finish my water lilies. Or start something new, like the fountain I passed on my way to the pond the first time I was there. But none of that can happen until I get rid of this ghost!

  I haven’t realized how close North Pond actually is to our school until I see the fiery-colored trees and small walking trails. I steer us toward the dock again, hoping it’s empty and we can just chill there.

  “The dock?” Nina asks as we take our first few steps onto it. “It’s a little dirty, don’t you think?” She skirts around a pile of what I assume is goose poop and grimaces.

  “She likes the water,” Andrew chimes in.

  I stop walking and stare at him. “Why do you keep answering questions about me?”

  A faint blush creeps into Andrew’s cheeks and he looks away.
“I don’t know. You’re different.”

  “Great. Different. Something every new girl wants to hear,” I grumble.

  “No! I don’t mean it that way. I mean you’re interesting. I’ve never known anyone from Florida and I definitely don’t know any real artists.”

  Real artists? His words echo in my ears, filling me with excitement. Andrew thinks I’m a real artist. No one my own age has ever said that before. Then again, I guess I haven’t really given them the chance. Back in Florida I didn’t share my artwork with anyone other than Mom and Dad.

  Nina clears her throat, pulling me from my thoughts. She’s settled down at the end of the dock and is sitting cross-legged with the book in her hands. I follow her, sweeping several feathers into the water with the toe of my shoe before plunking down.

  “So. You need to tell me everything. I mean everything,” Nina says.

  “I asked about Graceland because last night, something woke me up. It was crying. Then there were footsteps and my doorknob was rattling.”

  My heart is hammering against my ribs as I remember it. The darkness and the sounds. The feeling that something was in that hallway, trying to get to me. It was horrible.

  Nina and Andrew look unfazed. They sit silently, waiting for me to continue.

  “Then my little brother’s doll looked like it was crying. It said ‘Graceland’ over and over again.”

  Andrew flinches. “The doll was crying? And talking? You mean you saw it or you heard it? Were your eyes open?”

  The questions are coming so fast I hold my hand up to stop him. “Yes to all of those. I heard it and saw it. And before you ask, yes, I was awake.”

  “Was that the end of it?” Nina asks quietly. She’s flipping through the book now and doesn’t stop until she lands on the chapter titled “Graceland Cemetery.”

  I shake my head. “The next morning, there was an addition to the pastel drawing that keeps showing up in my sketchpad. It’s the outline of a girl. I’m positive. Underneath, it says ‘Inez.’ ”

  I take a deep breath and watch for their reactions. Andrew looks concerned but blank. Like he doesn’t have a clue who or what Inez is. Nina, however, looks petrified. Her face is even more ashen than it usually is and her eyes are dark. Scared.