“Speak up, darling. I can’t hear you.”
The white curtain was flung back. “You can’t be in here!” yelled the nurse.
“One second,” I said.
“He needs to rest before his parents come and pick him up. Out!”
“He’s in the middle of a sentence,” I insisted.
Victor gave me a watery smile and closed his eyes.
“Kelly.”
I leaned close to hear him say softly, “Kelly Ferguson.”
I walked back to my locker, slumped with uncertainty.
Was he going to ask me to the dance, or was he delirious?
At my locker, Berna, Cassie, and Curtis quietly gathered around me. Their friendship felt like a force field.
“At least we got Kevin out,” Berna said.
I tried to open my locker, but it was stuck. “Victor’s hurt.”
“Nish guy, but I worry about him. Little nervoush in the shervishe,” said Cassie.
“Give him a chance, Cassie,” Berna said. “You kept tripping over your shoelaces when you first started.”
“They were too long for my shoe shize,” Cassie growled.
“Why couldn’t Kevin show us his drawing after school?” Berna asked. “Why did he have to come all the way here to talk to you, Kelly?”
I angrily forced open my locker.
A flood of cut-out hearts spilled from my locker in a wave of crimson construction paper. All the hearts from the hallway had been stuffed inside.
“Oooooh. Now I get it,” Berna said.
Curtis and Cassie giggled, standing ankle-deep in Valentine’s Day art.
“Monster Boy’s got a crush you,” Berna said.
6
“What did we agree on, Kelly?” my mother shouted, driving me away from school. “You can hunt your monsters and babysit and fight the forces of evil, but you need to stay in school and keep your grades up. That was the deal, was it not?”
She punctuated that last sentence by banging her hand against the steering wheel.
“Yes,” I said, hanging my head. “It was.”
After the events of the Spider Queen invasion this past Christmas, I told my parents the truth: I’m a monster-hunting babysitter. They took the news surprisingly well. Especially when they learned that I was the one who saved their lives. Points for that. They sat down with the Rhode Island chapter president, Mama Vee, who talked them through the job and told them that I had killed not one but two of the seven Boogeypeople. Mama Vee was once my babysitter, and my parents still trusted her opinion after all these years. I think it gave my folks a sense of pride that I was protecting kids.
Then I showed them how I handled a Bushido blade, and my mom actually gave me a standing ovation. Who knew she loved swordplay so much?
My dad just sat on the couch and said “wow” the whole time.
So we cut a deal. I could still hunt monsters as long as it didn’t affect my schoolwork. And I had to promise to always text and let them know I was okay. It was not easy, slaying and studying as hard as I did. But I did it.
“Given the circumstances, I would say your father and I have been rather understanding of your new lifestyle, wouldn’t you?”
“I would say yes.”
“I think I’m doing an excellent job of giving you your space. Your father’s a nervous wreck, but I told him you needed room to blossom and grow and find your own path.”
“And I appreciate that.”
“But when I have to leave work, to beg Mrs. Zellman, my boss, the mother of the boy who was abducted by some Boogeyman under your watch—”
“I got him back,” I added.
“Not the point! I cannot ask my boss to give me two hours so I can pick up my delinquent daughter from her school because she’s been suspended.”
“I didn’t mean to,” I said. “And I am so sorry.”
My mother shook her head in utter bewilderment. “Who eats three hundred chicken nuggets? Is there something wrong with you? Do you have a parasite in your stomach?”
“No.”
“Do you have an eating disorder?”
“No.”
“That is coming out of your babysitting fund, believe me. You need to learn the value of a dollar because your father and I cannot afford to flush money down the toilet.”
“Mom! I didn’t eat the nuggets.” I said, throwing up my hands. “It was Kevin!”
My mom knew all about Kevin. Except for the part where he maybe had a crush on me.
As we pulled into the driveway, my mother shook her head. “That poor, poor boy. Has anyone found a cure for him?”
“He likes being what he is,” I said with a shrug. “He’s pretty cool when he’s not causing trouble.”
“He must be very lonely,” my mother said. “It’s good that you’re his friend. But that doesn’t change the fact that you’re grounded for the week of your suspension.”
She parked. I didn’t get out. The seat belt twisted in my tightening grip. I was really going to have to thread the needle on this one.
“So, Mom, the Valentine’s Day dance is in five days, and, look, I totally get that I’m grounded, but . . .” The seat belt groaned in my fist. “I may or may not be going with Victor and . . .”
“You should have thought of that before you got yourself suspended.”
She turned off the car and headed into the house. I felt the wind get knocked out of me.
“Wait, Mom, please! This is the Valentine’s Day dance.” I followed after her. “It wasn’t even my fault. It was Kevin! I—”
“You want to be this big grown-up girl who slays dragons and whatnot, then you need to take more responsibility for your actions and understand they have consequences,” she said, unlocking the front door. “Don’t blame monsters for your problems.”
After we shook off our coats inside, Mom held out her hand. I stared at it.
“Phone,” she said.
“Can I give you my kidney instead?” I pleaded.
“Hand it over. And I want to see homework. And chores. Laundry. Studying. De-icing the driveway.”
My jaw dropped. This was a new level of cruelty.
“I saved you from the Spider Queen,” I said.
“And I’m forever grateful, but you messed up big-time. Phone.”
I exhaled the heaviest of breaths, locked eyes with the woman who claimed to love me, and handed her my entire electric life. She slid my phone into her purse. I flopped dramatically onto the couch.
“I have to babysit for the Renfield twins tonight,” I muttered to the ceiling.
“You’ll just have to cancel.”
“I can’t cancel. That’s unprofessional.”
“That Liz girl does it to you all the time.”
“I’m not Liz. And the Renfields booked this appointment a month ago, Mom. It’s their anniversary or something. Canceling a few hours before a job makes me look flakey.”
My mother pinched the bridge of her nose.
“Why couldn’t you have taken up piano or soccer? Why did it have to be babysitting? I’d like to see the kitchen windows cleaned by the time I’m back from work at seven.” My mom grabbed her bag to head back to her office. “Good-bye.”
It was only one thirty. Normally, I would be in American history. Instead, I was strolling through my house feeling an odd, guilt-ridden freedom.
My house phone was huge and plastic and nailed to the wall. Its twisted, sinewy cord tugged when I took it from the cradle. The giant buttons clicked with each number I entered. So what if I knew Victor’s number by heart backward and forward?
“Victor, hi!” I said trying to sound chipper. “Are you okay? I’m so, so, sorry. How’s your head?”
“¿Quien es esto?” I cringed. His dad had answered Victor’s phone. I could hear Victor’s mom crying in the background. “Kelly F?”
“Hola, padre de Victor. It’s me, Kelly Ferguson! Amiga de Victor. ¿Cómo está Victor?”
“My son could have b
roken his head because of you,” said Victor’s father. His voice was low and grim.
Oh no, no. His family hates me!
“I’m so sorry. I feel so bad, sir,” I said. “Is there anything I can do?”
“You can stay away from my son.”
My stomach wrenched.
“You have brought pain and suffering to our family!” Victor’s mother wailed in the background.
“Our family cannot make waves. Not now. This is our home. You understand? I will not have you endanger my family.”
And then there was silence. His father had hung up on me.
I swallowed the lump in my throat.
“Let the punishment begin,” I sighed.
7
I did a little math homework. I read about the Battle of the Monitor and the Merrimack during the Civil War in my American history textbook. I chilled on the couch and pretended to check Instagram on my invisible phone. I read a chapter of Little Women for English class.
“‘For love casts out fear, and gratitude can conquer pride,’” I said, reading aloud to no one.
Homework finally done, I took my framed special edition Beauty and the Beast movie poster off my bedroom wall and stared at the collection of Kevin’s drawings. There were lots of sketches of rides and roller coasters, and a huge dark pit filled with glimmering eyes. Kevin had even managed to draw us a rough map of Monster Island.
I taped Kevin’s latest master piece of the ELL building to the wall and stood back to take it all in. It looked terrifying.
I opened my babysitter’s guide to a new page and wrote down everything we knew.
NAME: Monster Island
LOCATION: Unknown (thanks to Kevin LeRue, we know it’s somewhere off the coast of Maine)
ORIGIN: The island’s existence has been known but never found
INHABITANTS: Baron Von Eisenvult (aka Boogeyperson #7), sea snakes, gremlins, man-eating fauna
TERRAIN: Not much is known. Treacherous. Heavy forestation.
BUILDINGS: Unknown (thanks to Kevin LeRue, we know a few more things)—Professor Gonzalo’s laboratory (Gonzalo, the fifth Boogeyman, is working for the Baron). This is where kids are transformed into monsters. For details of the laboratory see Kevin’s drawings. According to Kevin there is a mine/rock quarry where imprisoned monster kids dig for . . . diamonds? Gold? Unknown. There is a small prison/stables where the monster kids are kept.
Under the Buildings section of the guide, I carefully wrote: “Ell” building en route to island?
As the Boogeypeople’s prisoner, Kevin was allowed to see very little of the island, and there were a lot of gaps in his maps. His only memory of getting to the island was by a boat. He had seen an oil rig through the boat’s window, and so we located all the oil rig routes off the New England coast, and that narrowed down our search area to fifty possible sections.
I brought my handbook to our family computer in the hallway.
Hey, Mom didn’t say I couldn’t Google stuff about mysterious monster islands while I was grounded. This isn’t for the likes; this is for the greater good.
“ELL.” There were millions of possibilities.
“ELL” could have been the middle of a word, the beginning of it, or the end.
I called my smartest, fastest friend. It took me a few times to remember her number.
“Hello? Who is this?” Berna said on the other end.
“It’s me! Kellymundo. Your valentine,” I said.
“Are you calling me from jail?”
“This is my house phone.”
“Your what?”
“It’s horrible. It smells like my mom’s morning breath. Let’s not talk about it.”
I told her how I thought if we could locate a building with “ELL” on the side, we might be able to find Monster Island.
Shhh-POP! She blew a bubble into the phone. I could tell when she was thinking hard because her gum chewing grew louder.
“Bell Labs for Disease Control,” Berna said. “It’s the only thing I can find that fits within our search parameters.” I looked up Bell Labs, and as always, Berna was right.
There was an island with a Bell Labs for Disease Control on it off the coast of Maine.
“Looks like they’re a private chemical company that specializes in disease control.”
“Like they make diseases? Gross,” I said.
“More like they store them and test them. Wow. They have everything at Bell Labs. Chicken pox. Mumps. Purple Bulinga. The bubonic plague.”
“Yikes.”
I scrolled through sites about Bell Labs. There were all sorts of kooky conspiracy theories about the place. Nutty people thought Bell Labs was hired by the government to create a superflu to wipe out all humankind in the name of population control. Other conspiracy theorists claimed Bell Labs was testing humans and building creatures. People on a nearby island said a hideous being that had washed up on their shores had been created in the Bell Labs. On one conspiracy site there was a photograph of the building taken from a boat. It matched Kevin’s drawing.
On the map I tracked where the Bell Labs was located and saw the only piece of land close to it was a small, remote speck in the middle of nowhere.
“What about this place? Sunshine Island?” I asked.
“The only info I can find about it says it’s remote and uninhabited.” I could hear Berna clacking away on her keyboard at lightning speed. “With the exception of a few shipwrecks in the surrounding waters, Sunshine Island is a forgotten crumb unworthy of mention. A nowhere place that no one has ever visited.”
“Sunshine Island,” I said. “It’s the perfect hiding place.”
Shhh-POP! Berna sharply snapped a bubble in agreement.
“It would explain all the weird stuff happening near Bell Labs,” she said.
“Like, what if the monsters washing up on the shores near Bell Labs are actually coming from Sunshine Island?” I said.
“Bingo,” she said.
The small spot on Kevin’s map was the shape of an upside-down heart, adrift in the endless sea. Something tightened in my chest. Had we finally found the island where Kevin and so many other kids had been taken and imprisoned by monsters? Was this really the home of the Baron, the deadliest Boogeyperson on the planet? And was I really going to risk my life to go there to rescue a bunch of kids I didn’t even know?
An answer to these questions arose that made my insides shudder.
That answer was a determined yes.
8
My dad got home from work, brushed the grease off his nails, and chugged a soda.
“Let’s go, kiddo!” He grabbed his keys and waved warily for me to follow him. “I talked with your mother. You can look after these kids tonight, Kells, but after that no more for a while.”
“Yes. You’re the best.”
“I know,” he grumbled as we got into his car.
On the way to my babysitting job, it was his turn to lecture me about responsibility, thinking clearly, and the importance of getting a good education. But he didn’t sound angry. Ever since he found out I hunt monsters I think he’s been a little scared of me.
Is it bad that I’m okay with that?
“Yes, Dad,” I said. “You’re so right.”
My overly nice voice made me cringe. I was playing the sad-but-sweet-daughter card. If I could get my dad on my side, maybe he could get my mom to lighten my sentence.
“I appreciate you not screaming at me,” I said, pretending to get choked up. “Victor’s parents yelled at me earlier.”
“Victor’s parents did what?” A vein in his neck popped. “No one yells at my kid but me.”
We drove across the giant Newport Pell Bridge. Far down below, February winds raked the waves white.
Beyond the sparse main street shops of Jamestown, we passed a real working windmill and then turned onto a long, empty street. The house where I would be babysitting stood out against the sky with pristine pride. It looked like a giant, two-story
dollhouse with a gingerbread roof. It was the cleanest, neatest house I had ever seen. And it totally gave me the creeps. I studied the sculpted thickets in the front yard for any lurking ghouls.
“Are there going to be, y’know, things here?” my dad said.
“Hasn’t been much activity for the past few weeks,” I said, trying to sound like all this monster hunting and sitting was no big deal. “No need to worry, Dad.”
“I’m your pop. I worry. It’s my job.” He grabbed my shoulder and locked eyes with me. “If any creepers come round, you call me or your mother or the police,” he said.
“Mom took my phone away,” I said.
He flipped me my phone.
I caught it. My phone!
“For emergencies only,” he said.
I yelped gratefully and kissed him on the cheek.
“If one of those whatevers pops up, you call me, I got something for them in the trunk. I’m your father. I’ll whup any six-eyed sloth thing—”
“Sleeknatch, Dad,” I gently corrected.
“Right. Whatever. Anything like that, you call me and I’ll come. No questions. I got your back. I mean it. I’m right around the corner. Meeting a buddy for a beer five minutes away.”
“Dad!”
“What? He lives in the area.”
“You can’t spy on me.”
“I’m seeing a friend.”
“You don’t have any friends.”
“I’ve got you. You’re my friend.”
“Love you, Dad.”
“No apps or face-chats or whatever. I’ll be back at ten o’clock,” he called after me as I darted up the red brick pathway. “It’s a school night.”
“I don’t have school tomorrow, remember?” I said over my shoulder.
“That’s not a good thing! Don’t push your luck.”
“Could be later. Depends on the parents, Dad!”
“I don’t care. I’ll be here at ten either way.”
His car clunked down the street, leaving an icy trail of exhaust. I pressed the power button on my phone.
“Dang it!” I said.
The battery was dead.
“Rawk! Rawk!”
A crow hopped on the walkway in front of me, watching me with cold, dark curiosity. I flapped my arm, but it didn’t move. I had to walk around it on my way to the front door.
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