The House Next Door Read online

  “That’s ridiculous!” Anne jumped in. “These are just stupid, made-up legends about some boring, old house. Nobody in Glory has anything better to talk about.”

  “That’s not what I heard,” Paul said. He spoke slowly, in a deeper-than-usual voice. Something about him seemed uncharacteristically serious. “It’s true that the town did try to sell the house, but it wasn’t to a couple. It was to a single woman. And it definitely didn’t work out.”

  Anne scoffed, not believing her ears—this story was actually a new one. She thought she had heard all the rumors by now.

  Paul continued, “The woman had heard people whispering about rattling doors and windows, but she just chalked it up to the house being so old. It didn’t bother her at all, not when she could buy the house for such a steal. When she was ready to sign on the dotted line, she stopped by the house for one final visit to snap some pictures to send to her family.

  “Slowly, she checked each room. There was nothing suspicious. She made her way to the attic. The small room was once used as a bedroom. It struck her that it must’ve been a little kid’s room because it still contained a tiny neatly made-up bed, a small desk, a single nightstand with a harmonica on it, and some old-timey wooden toys around the floor. She felt a little sad, looking at the room that once belonged to a child, but nothing was out of the ordinary, so she decided that all the rumors about the house being haunted were just that, rumors.

  “She turned to leave when she heard a small knock coming from behind an old chest of drawers on the far side of the attic. It was a pattern of knocks, like a code. Tap, tap-tap, tap. Tap, tap-tap, tap.” Paul knocked his knuckles against a nearby table, mimicking his words. Tap, tap-tap, tap. “Over and over, like someone was there, trying to get her attention. She slowly made her way over to the dresser. It was dark, too dark to see anything. So she flicked on her flashlight, and a beam of light lit up the area. She was shocked by what she saw. . . .”

  Paul stood silent in the middle of the room. Several pairs of eyes glared back at him.

  “What?” Amanda asked. “What did she see?”

  “Nothing,” Paul replied.

  “You’re so annoying, Paul,” Alyssa told him.

  “All I said was that she didn’t see anything in the attic,” Paul said defiantly. “But a few days later, on her way to the bank to finish signing the papers for the house, she swung by the drugstore to pick up the pictures she had developed. This was in the olden days before digital cameras were invented. She reviewed the photos of the house while she was still in the store. In each photo, the figure of a girl, a ghost, stood in the background.

  “When she reached the end of the pack, she screamed and dropped all the pictures, leaving them on the floor of the drugstore when she ran out. The woman never showed up to the bank to sign the final papers and was never heard from again.”

  The room was quiet. Alyssa was stunned and speechless.

  “No way!” Anne shouted, breaking the silence. “That kind of thing happens all the time! Haven’t any of you guys ever seen those ghost hunting shows? They always debunk the ghosts in pictures as being tricks of the light.”

  “I wouldn’t believe the story unless I trusted the person who told me about it,” Paul countered. “The woman who developed the photos was my aunt. She thought the same thing about tricky lighting, maybe the person was experimenting or something. But when my aunt saw the woman’s face, she knew that the images terrified the woman. My aunt tore up the photos the woman dropped, and threw them away, never wanting to see them again.”

  “I don’t believe it,” was all that Alyssa could mutter.

  “Neither do I!” Carrie agreed. She looped her arm through Alyssa’s. “And besides, who cares about that dumb house? Halloween was two months ago, Paul. We’re here tonight to have a rockin’ New Year’s Eve party. What do you guys want to do next? More dancing?”

  Alyssa let out a small sigh of relief. Within a minute, Carrie was practically dragging Steve into the middle of the room, completely ignoring his resistance.

  The Peterson sisters remained in a darkened corner of the room, watching their friends dance. Anne was getting into the music and was just about to join their guests on the dance floor when she heard Amanda whisper, “They’re just rumors.”

  Alyssa and Anne turned to look at their sister. She still had a phantomlike complexion.

  “Of course they are,” Anne told her, and skipped off to the dance floor.

  Amanda nodded, willing herself to believe her younger sister. Because after everything that she just heard about the house, there was one thing that she couldn’t stop thinking about. Could it have been the same little girl from the pictures who opened the shutters tonight?

  CHAPTER 4

  “Listen up!” Carrie shouted over the music about a few hours later. “It’s New Year’s Eve and less than two hours till midnight. I think everyone knows what that means!”

  Amanda’s eyes lit up. She knew exactly what that meant, and she couldn’t wait. Amanda had never been kissed. Even though the New Year’s kisses at their previous parties were just on the cheek, the boys had always just ignored her. She had been thinking about this night for months now, and she was determined that this was her year to be kissed at midnight!

  At this point, everyone was hot from dancing inside, and they had grabbed their jackets and wandered out to the porch to cool off. The sky was filled with clouds blocking out the stars, but the tea lights twinkled in the dark night. Everyone milled around in small groups. Alyssa had brought some of the snacks outside, and the table overflowed with cupcakes, brownies, and the Petersons’ famous snack mix. She had even set up a mix-it-yourself fruit juice and soda bar—complete with mini scoops of ice cream and tiny umbrellas. A few of Anne’s friends sat in the large wooden Adirondack chairs, sipping punch out of plastic champagne flutes and whispering to one another. Every so often they would point to the huddle of guys and giggle.

  Fifth graders, Amanda thought and smiled.

  Amanda searched through the crowd until she found Paul. The new kid, Steve, was cute, but she’d had a crush on Paul for forever. He had always treated her like a younger sister, but Amanda wasn’t a little kid anymore.

  “We should start thinking about who we’d like to kiss when the clock strikes twelve!” Carrie finished her announcement.

  At the mention of being kissed, the fifth-grade girls squealed with delight. Anne’s best friend, Jenna Lee, covered her eyes as her cheeks burned bright red. Carrie clapped excitedly while the boys let out groans in shock and horror. Daniel Garrity plunged an imaginary dagger into his heart and then dropped to the floor. And Matt Weber pretended to puke uncontrollably.

  “You’re all so immature!” Carrie chided.

  The more the girls tried to hold it together, the harder it was not to crack. When Steve started blowing kisses and batting his eyelashes at a squirrel that ran across the yard, everyone finally broke into a fit of hysterical giggles.

  While everyone was distracted, Amanda grabbed a box of sparklers from the table and pulled out two of them. She touched the end of one to a nearby candle’s flame, and it burst into a shower of sparks. It lit up her face and cast a pretty glow around her. She walked over to Paul and held the unlit sparkler out to him.

  But Paul’s attention was far away. He was staring across the yard and out into the darkness. Amanda could tell that he didn’t even know that she was standing next to him.

  Suddenly, Paul pointed toward the old neighboring house. Amanda followed his gaze. The house was barely visible. A thick blanket of clouds hid the moon. She simply saw a dark silhouette against the backdrop of the night. She glanced back at Paul and watched his expression.

  Paul was sort of smiling, deep in thought, but then all of a sudden he frowned.

  “What?” Amanda asked.

  “Did you see that?” Paul whispered. “A light flickered in the top window.”

  Amanda turned toward the house, but it all look
ed dark.

  “I don’t see anything,” she replied.

  Paul didn’t seem to be paying attention. He was still looking into the night, distracted. “Someone is inside that house,” he said.

  Again, Amanda looked across the field. The old house remained as dark and lifeless as ever. For an instant, she thought that Paul was pulling her leg, playing one of his famous practical jokes on her. She was about to call him on it when she saw a flash of alarm in his eyes. Amanda panicked, seeing that Paul was seriously freaked. What exactly did he see?

  “So who are you going to kiss at midnight?” she asked, desperately trying to change the subject. She nudged his arm and handed him the unlit sparkler. He absentmindedly took it from her. Amanda leaned in to light it with her own sparkler, but it was too late. The one she had been holding fizzled out with a final hiss and a slowly rising wisp of smoke.

  Paul ignored her question. Amanda was about to urge him to rejoin the group when Anne walked over. He didn’t even notice her standing beside him on his other side.

  “I want to know what’s going on in that house,” he continued. “Someone’s in there—playing with the electricity or candlelight or something.”

  “That house is spooky. We get it!” Anne cried. “It’s just your eyes playing tricks on you. It’s probably a camera flash bouncing off the windows from our parents taking pictures upstairs.”

  Paul now looked at Anne. He lifted his head and puffed his chest a little. “Yeah, of course,” he said. “I wasn’t scared or anything.”

  “So, you agree?” Anne asked. “Everything people say about that house is just plain silly?”

  “We totally agree!” Amanda said, answering for the both of them while shooting her little sister a secret smile. “Besides, I think Alyssa has some games planned. Let’s go back to the group.”

  The corner of Paul’s mouth lifted slightly. He flipped his hair and nodded.

  Amanda found Alyssa refilling the bowl of pretzels.

  “We need a game to distract everyone. Pronto!” Amanda told her.

  Alyssa looked at her, but she didn’t ask any questions. She disappeared inside for a minute, and came back onto the porch with a dusty, old hat filled with folded slips of papers. Earlier that day, Anne and Alyssa had spent a good hour coming up with the craziest things their friends would have to act out for a game of Charades. They thought of everything from scuba diving to some of their favorite movies. They wrote each prompt down on tiny strips of paper, and put them into the hat. They even had a prize for the winner: a plastic gold trophy they found at the dollar store.

  “Who’s up for a game of Charades?” Alyssa asked. A large circle of kids had gathered around her.

  “Great idea!” Carrie cheered.

  Steve agreed. “I’ll go first.”

  “I don’t think so,” Alyssa cut in. “We need to pick teams.”

  Olivia’s eyes crinkled as a mischievous smile spread across her face. She had an idea. “Girls against boys?”

  “Perfect,” Paul agreed. “Prepare to be defeated.” He pulled a quarter out of his pocket and balanced it on his thumb. “Heads or tails?”

  “Heads!” Carrie, Anne, and Amanda called out together.

  Paul flicked the coin into the air, and everyone took one step back as it plunked down in the center of the circle. The girls groaned. Tails.

  “Steve,” Paul announced. “You’re up.” He bent down to pick up the quarter and then shoved it back into his pocket.

  Alyssa lifted the hat high enough so that Steve could pick out a piece of paper without seeing what was written on it. But instead of reaching his hand into the hat, he grabbed it away from Alyssa.

  “Hey, where’d you get this old hat?” he asked.

  “Give it back, Steve,” Alyssa said. “You’re ruining the game.”

  “It’s really cool,” Steve replied. Alyssa tried to grab it, but Steve was too fast. They were tugging the hat back and forth until finally Steve let go and Alyssa faltered backward. As she tried to regain her balance, she let go of the old hat, and it fell to the ground, spilling and revealing the prompts. Alyssa looked at them scattered around on the porch, and her cheeks grew red with embarrassment.

  “Are you happy now?” Alyssa asked.

  Steve looked sheepish as he bent over and started collecting the paper slips. “Sorry,” he said. “You’re not mad at me, are you?”

  Amanda jumped in. “It’s okay,” she told him. “Anyone have another game?”

  “I do,” Paul blurted out.

  “What is it?” Amanda asked, desperate to move attention away from her sister, knowing that Alyssa would die of embarrassment if any of her friends saw her so upset.

  “Truth or Dare,” Paul said.

  Amanda glanced at Alyssa to see what her older sister thought of Paul’s suggestion. Alyssa nodded. They’d all played Truth or Dare a million times in the past—what was the worst that could happen?

  “Okay,” Amanda agreed. “But nothing crazy.”

  “Crazy?” Paul replied. “Me? Do something crazy?” He stood silent for a minute. “Who will be the first victim?”

  He clasped his hands behind his back and slowly walked up to each of the guests. One by one, he bent down and peered into his or her eyes, and then he stood up and moved on to the next person. Nervous giggles followed him around the porch.

  Amanda held her breath, hoping Paul wouldn’t choose her. She didn’t want to pick Truth. What if Paul asked her who she liked? And she definitely didn’t want to have to choose one of his crazy dares.

  When Paul reached Steve, he stopped and pointed. Steve pretended to be shocked that Paul chose him. “Steve,” Paul began, “truth or dare?”

  “Easy,” Steve replied. “Dare.”

  “I dare you,” Paul continued, “to sit in that abandoned house for ten minutes. Alone. In total darkness.

  CHAPTER 5

  “No. Way,” Alyssa said sternly. “No one is going to set foot off this porch. My parents would be so angry!”

  “Yeah,” Steve agreed.

  Paul tilted his head in Steve’s direction. His eyes crinkled as the corner of his mouth lifted into a lopsided grin.

  “It sounds like you’re scared, Steve,” Paul said, ignoring Alyssa. “Are you too chicken to accept my dare?”

  Steve ran fingers through his dark, wavy hair. “I didn’t say that,” he said good-naturedly.

  Alyssa stood as straight as she could muster—pulling her shoulders in just like she had been taught in dance class—in an attempt to look taller than she really was. She looked back and forth between the two boys. “Nobody is going anywhere,” she said. “And that’s that.”

  Amanda watched her sister start to lose her temper. Alyssa looked more upset than she’d ever seen her before. Amanda had to act fast—the thought of the boys disregarding Alyssa and going inside the old house alone in the dark, filled her with dread.

  She grabbed Alyssa’s elbow and steered her away from the table. “Just a sec,” she told their friends. “We’ll be right back.”

  As soon as they were out of earshot, Alyssa looked extremely worried. “What are we going to do?” she whispered with the intensity of a yell. “We’re not allowed to get too close to the house. Remember what Mom and Dad told us? We’re responsible for our friends during the party. We have to do something!”

  Amanda took a deep breath and put one of her hands on her head. She looked over at their friends. “I know,” she replied, remembering their parents’ warning.

  Alyssa lowered her voice a few octaves and mimicked their father’s sing-song southern twang. “If you’re old enough to host your own New Year’s Eve party, then you’re old enough to keep the party in line.”

  Amanda smiled, and she also mocked their dad. “Don’t let your mother and me down.” She wagged a finger at Amanda. “And don’t you forget it!”

  “We have to get everyone back inside,” Alyssa replied. “The outdoor portion of our party is over. Follow m
y lead.”

  Alyssa immediately started blowing out the candles that glowed around the porch, hoping everyone would get the hint that it was time to head back in. Amanda followed, blowing out a few more tea lights on the opposite side of the porch. “Game over,” she told the group. The light filling the porch dimmed with each extinguished flame. It was almost pitch black, except for the inside lights that cast a faint glow over the porch.

  “But we’ve hardly started,” Paul complained.

  “I don’t think anyone really wants to play Truth or Dare anyway,” countered Alyssa.

  Paul sighed and walked over to the wooden box where Amanda kept some of her sports gear. He picked up her basketball and then balanced it on his middle finger. He gave it a swift spin. Amanda watched it spiral round and round. Steve and Matt walked over, and started chatting with Paul, who kept the ball twirling. A few years ago, Paul tried to teach Amanda how to do the trick, but she never got the hang of it.

  Just then a jagged bolt of lightning splintered through the sky, illuminating the fields around them. The lightning’s glow cast wiry shadows of tree branches onto the fields. An ear-shattering crack followed, barely muffling the high-pitched shriek that filled the air.

  “Whoa!” Steve said, looking up at the sky. “Lightning. A thunderstorm in winter. I’m still not used to that.”

  Alyssa nodded absentmindedly. While her friends were staring at the light show in the sky, she searched for the person who had let out that scream. She quickly spotted Jenna slumped down in a wooden chair with her knees pulled up against her chest and her arms wrapped tightly around them. Anne had squatted down on the arm of the chair next to her. Alyssa rushed over to them. She knew that Jenna could sometimes be a little dramatic, but Alyssa could see that Jenna’s trembling was real. Jenna pulled her cardigan around her legs, like she was trying to become invisible or protect herself from something.

  “Jenna?” Alyssa asked. “What’s wrong?”

  “That house,” Jenna replied, pointing a finger into the darkness. “The door. It just flew wide open!”