First Impression (A Shadow Maven Paranormal)

by Pauline Creeden

  Ben and Matt exchange a look, and a wordless conversation passes between them. They both nod and continue to eat.

  I shake my head. “Wow.”

  “He just started yesterday. I think he’s gotten a bit protective since Donnie…” Matt says.

  They continue to eat in quiet while I watch Steve rise and fall again with the wind. The bright blue of the sky behind him makes him look nearly as white as the clouds he intermingles with.

  “Will you go to the memorial on Friday, Chira?” Matt asks.

  I wince. Both the Prices and the Sloanes had decided to hold a joint memorial session for their sons, and most of the students will be attending right after school lets out.

  “I’ve only ever been to one funeral,” I say, staring at the small stones in the asphalt on the roof. “And it was my dad’s.”

  Both boys are quiet for a moment. Matt scoots over to me so that he’s sitting on the other side of me from Ben. He puts an arm around my shoulder and pulls me against him. “Don’t worry. I’ll be there for you. You can cry on my shoulder if you want.”

  Ben grinds his teeth audibly and jumps to his feet. He marches about ten feet away from us and whistles. Steve falters in the air and glides back down for the roof, lighting upon the chain link. It rattles in response.

  I shrug off Matt’s arm and stand, too, brushing the gravel from my brown skirt. “I’m a pretty resilient girl. I haven’t had to rely on a man in my life since that funeral, in case you haven’t heard.”

  Matt joins us both on our feet. “Not that again, Chira. I know you’re not gay.”

  My gaze darts toward Ben, but he blinks at me innocently. I glower at Matt. “What do you mean?”

  “Jacob and Donnie started that rumor back when you and Tasha were freshmen. Don’t you remember? Donnie asked you out, and you crushed him by saying something about how you’d rather go out with Tasha than him. He got pissed and called you a dyke. Everyone picked up on it and kept it going. But you’re not gay, are you? Never have been, I bet.”

  Blood rushes to my cheeks. Donnie started this…and Jacob? I couldn’t remember that, and I only vaguely remember when Donnie asked me out. And now they are both gone. Dead. Their funeral is on Friday.

  “So you all knew…all this time?” I croaked.

  Matt’s voice softens and he steps closer. “Hey, I’m sorry that you’ve been picked on because of it. Those two were my best friends, and were both good guys, but they made mistakes, too.”

  Tears well in my eyes, and I swipe them away. I focus on my breathing so I won’t hyperventilate. I need to get out of here. I step toward the door, but Matt darts in front of me.

  “Hey, no hard feelings, right?” His eyes are sincere, but I just don’t care right now.

  I shake my head, nod, and say, “Fine, whatever.” And push his arm so I can get past.

  The first bell rings the moment I open the door to the stairwell. Five minutes. That’s how much time I have to get to the ladies room, get hold of myself, and get to class. I can do that.

  CLASSES GO ON AS USUAL, and at the end of the day, I sit on the bench in the locker room, slowly packing my things. This allows everyone to get out before I do. In movie theaters, it seems as if everyone jumps up to leave before the credits even really get started, because they want to be the first to the parking lot. But patience had taught me to wait until the idiots leave the theatre and avoid the crowd as much as possible.

  Once the sufficient amount of time has passed, I shoulder my bag and push open the locker room door. Outside the gym, Ben waits for me across the hall, with Matt standing next to him. I groan and tap Ben on the chest with the back of my hand. “What’s he doing here?”

  Ben watches my hand and smiles at me. “He wanted to come with us to the Old Schoolhouse.”

  I wince and my stomach drops. I’d forgotten completely about that. “Uh…I’ve got a lot of homework to do. Why don’t you two go on without me?”

  Matt steps up, his green eyes pleading. “You’re not mad at me are you?”

  I turn away and start down the hall. “No.”

  He skips to catch up to me. “You sound mad.”

  I roll my eyes. “So.”

  “So if you don’t want to go to the Old Schoolhouse because of me—”

  I stop, and my stomach flutters. “It has nothing to do with you. Like I said, I have a lot of homework.”

  Ben steps up from behind Matt. “If you’re going somewhere else, I need to come with you. I guess investigating this further will have to wait until next Tuesday.”

  My stomach sinks and guilt bristles along my shoulders. But I grit my teeth and take a defensive posture. “Why do we have to do this at all? Can’t Matt just tell his dad about all this and have him investigate it without us?”

  “We tried already.” Matt laughs and his voice deepens. “The police department doesn’t take ghost sightings seriously, and curses are not considered a modus operandi worth investigation.”

  Ben’s eyes meet mine, and his expression softens. “We need to do this. But if you don’t feel up to it today, we could try—”

  “Fine! I’ll go.” I fold my arms across my chest. I guess this is entirely up to me. I need to see for myself if what we saw before was real or just my imagination. Is it possible that there really is a curse, or maybe this whole thing is a case of possession, like Ben explained? And if it is possession, would that require a priest or something to do an exorcism?

  Matt smiles and offers up a hand for his cousin to give him a high five. When Ben only glowers at him, Matt offers me the hand. When I leave him hanging with a glare, he lowers it and offers me his fist. “Bump it. At least you can do that.”

  Just so he’ll leave me alone, I bump his fist.

  He beams and stands a little taller. Ben pushes past and leads us to the back doors of the building. He holds the door open for me, and Matt follows, patting him on the shoulder as he passes. I stifle a laugh.

  The three of us walk down Old Schoolhouse Road, behind a group of young guys who veer off at the trail to the bus stop. No wonder that path is wide and well worn. A second path to our right heads for the river, and I glance at a third, less distinct path as we continue to the front of the house. Around the side of the building, the crunch of leaves and a shushing sweep sound draw us over to take a look.

  One of the custodians is raking leaves. He wears a grey jump suit that’s several shades darker than the streaks in his slicked back hair. I stiffen as I realize who it is before he turns around. Rob.

  The wrinkles in my stepfather’s forehead deepen when he sees us approach. How could I have not known he had this job? Not that I cared what Rob did for a living…but Mom and I need to have a serious talk.

  Ben reaches into his back pack and pulls out a neatly folded brown lunch sack. “Hi, I’m Ben Oscuro, and this is Matt and Chira. Joan from the Administrator’s office said that I should come see you about letting us into the Old Schoolhouse?”

  Rob examines the three of us while leaning on his rake. His piercing blue eyes fix on me. “What for?”

  “We’re doing a study on the ghost sighting that occurred here last week. With it being Halloween and all today, it seems that it might be our best chance to find out if it is true.”

  Rob shakes his head and sneers. “It ain’t true. I’ve been in and out of that building every week for the past four years. If there was something there, I’d have seen it.”

  “We don’t doubt your perceptive abilities, but we were hoping that—”

  “Without a direct order from the administrator’s office in person or on the phone, I won’t let you in.” His gaze is drawn to the sack in Ben’s hand. “Notes can be forged.”

  Rob sneers at me again, his eyes searching me up and down. Why did it have to be him? If it had been someone else, maybe this could have been manageable. My shoulders slump in defeat, and I’m ready to run. I don’t like being this close to my stepdad, much less asking him for a favor.


  Matt fidgets where he stands, rocking from heel to toe and back again. The wind picks up, and more leaves fall around us like snow.

  “Your astute adherence to your duties is commendable, sir. But could you not make an exception, for just a moment? I promise we will not take more than fifteen minutes of your time, and would be happy to remunerate you.” Ben says, replacing the sack in his backpack.

  “Are you bribing me, boy?” Rob stiffens.

  “No, sir. I would not insult you in such a manner.”

  Rob huffs. “You kids get. Unless one of them people from the office call me on my cell phone, you’re not getting in today.” His eyes fix on me. “You should all be home, cleaning, or studying…something productive.”

  “Yes, sir. Thank you for your time.” Ben lowers his head and starts back around the front of the building.

  Matt jogs to catch up with him. He whisper-shouts. “That’s it? We’re just going to leave?”

  Ben shakes his head. “What else can we do?”

  “We should try harder. Talk him into this. Wait until he leaves and break in. Something.” Matt scrubs his hair with his hand.

  “I don’t think it would work,” I say, but no one seems to hear me.

  Ben stops and glares at Matt. “We’d have to break a window; they have all been nailed shut. So breaking in is out of the question right now.”

  I clear my throat and raise my voice. It still cracks. “Besides, you can’t talk Rob into this. He’s my stepdad, and I doubt he’d cut us any slack, just to spite me.”

  Matt’s jaw has dropped somewhere in the middle of what I said, but it firmly snaps shut. “I didn’t know…”

  I shrug and turn away. “It’s fine.”

  We head back down Old Schoolhouse Road.

  “What’s that?” Ben steps toward the animal trail I’d seen earlier on our way up the path. But at this angle, I can see a flash of light reflecting as if off a mirror.

  “Was that a reflection?” I ask.

  Ben eyes me and nods. “Let’s find out.”

  We walk a few feet into the forest, pushing the branches out of the way to keep them from hitting us in the face. When Ben reaches the reflection I saw, a small, round mirror is half buried under some leaves just to the right of the path. He pulls out the brown sack again and unfolds it. After removing a rubber glove, he snaps it on his fingers.

  “What’s that for?” Matt asks.

  Ben pushes aside some of the leaves and digs around the mirror. “I don’t want to taint any evidence.”

  As the leaves and dirt layer are pushed away from the reflective circle, my breath catches. “It’s a compact.”

  I kneel down to get a closer look. A hairbrush sits next to it. With more digging, Ben exposes a stack of credit cards and IDs.

  Matt curses. “Why would someone bury this here?”

  Ben stands and pulls his glove from his hand. “I have a theory but nothing concrete. Call your dad.”

  “What?” Matt puts his hands on his hips. “Why would I call him?”

  Ben frowns. “Because I think we just found a major clue in the missing teen cases in Fairfax.”

  MATT AND I MEET MR. Benson at the front of the school when he pulls up. He wears his white shirt and blue tie without a jacket, and slams the door to his Dodge Charger once he’s out. “What’s going on, Junior?”

  After a deep breath, Matt explains—everything—while we walk together down Old Schoolhouse Road. Ben stands just outside the animal trail when we walk up. He didn’t want to leave the items alone and allow someone or something to move them while we waited for Mr. Benson.

  Long shadows stretch across the road, and the sunlight has dappled. The crunching sound of leaves from the back of the Old Schoolhouse lets us know that Rob is still hard at work. I shiver.

  When we near the tree line, Mr. Benson snaps on a pair of rubber gloves, similar to the ones Ben had worn earlier. He inspects the items we found in the hole, pushing them around with a pen he pulls from his pocket. After a few long moments, he stands.

  He tosses his keys to Matt. “Go get me the duffle bag on the floor of the passenger side of the Charger. I wasn’t sure if you kids had actually found something worth it, but I’m going to bag this stuff and take it in.”

  With a quick nod, Matt jogs off. Mr. Benson scratches his chin with his gloved hand. “How did you kids find this stuff?”

  Ben looks at me.

  I clear my throat. “Like Matt said, we were walking back after talking to…the custodian, and Ben saw a flicker of light in the woods. A mirrored compact was sticking about an inch from the ground.”

  Mr. Benson nods, his jaw tightening. His boxy build makes it evident that he’s Matt’s father, but his height and strong square jaw look like Ben’s. Mr. Benson puts up a finger and dials a number on his cell. He steps away to talk.

  I frown at Ben. “Did you know we’d find something like this? Were you looking for it?”

  He shrugs. “I told you before that the two types of haunting are impression and possession. If this is an impression, then the ghost you described to me would have to have died in this place in a traumatic manner for the impression to be made. And since it took on such a distinct form, the trauma may have been somewhat recent. When I theorized that it might be so, I came here today to look for clues. Once we were turned away, I began to give up on that possibility.”

  “Then you saw the reflection.”

  “Yes.” He quirks a half smile. “But we still don’t know if these items are new or old. They could be a few years old. Someone might have stolen a purse and dumped it here. Or an animal may have collected shiny objects and buried their stash here. We don’t know that my theory is correct, but we had to show our hand in order to find out. We needed to introduce the possibility to my uncle so that he would take this seriously.”

  I nod.

  Matt jogs up, crunching leaves in his hurry. Mr. Benson hangs up his phone with a snap and accepts the duffle bag from his son with a nod. He pulls out a couple of large freezer bags and tucks them into his elbow. “Now, kids. Don’t jump to conclusions. I know you think this stuff might be related to the missing teens in Fairfax, but we can’t know that until we run fingerprints and DNA samples. This will go to our forensics lab, and I’ll let you know what I find. In the meantime, keep this under your hats, okay? I don’t need any rumors going around.”

  “Yes, sir,” all three of us say in a discord unison.

  Once he’s placed the items in the bag, he zips it shut and stuffs it in the duffel. We walk back toward his car. Before he gets in, he eyes me. “I know how girls like to talk. Are you sure we can trust you? The boys I have complete control over, but if I hear stuff is running around the rumor mill—”

  “Dad!” Matt steps between me and his father. “You can trust Chira. Ben and I are with her all the time—she’s not going to blab.”

  Mr. Benson steps back, scrutinizes his son, and nods. “Fine. I’ll trust her—all three of you on this. But I am dead serious. Don’t talk about it.”

  With another quick eye to the three of us, he hops in his Charger and starts the engine. The shushing of leaves from the Old Schoolhouse Road makes us all jump and watch for what’s coming. Rob steps around the curve, and I rub my arms to settle the hairs that all stood on end at the sound of his approach.

  He does a double take when he sees us. “What are you kids still doing here?”

  Ben says, “We were just leaving.” And ushers us both toward the driveway.

  ON WEDNESDAY MORNING, I HAVE not one boy waiting outside my door, but two. Matt sits on my stoop while Ben stands near the light post, with his arms folded across his chest. I huff. “So now I have a double escort? Do you boys really think this is necessary?”

  Matt jumps up with a serious, sad expression. His gaze barely brushes across mine. “I guess you haven’t heard.”

  My stomach does a somersault. “Heard what?”

  Ben steps forward and sets a hand on the wr
ought iron railing and rests a foot on the first step. “Stacy is missing.”

  The world spins around me like I’m on an out of control merry-go-round. My knees buckle. Matt catches me, and I blink hard, staring into Ben’s very worried eyes. I’m still light headed and hope to God that I hadn’t just fainted.

  “What? How?”

  Matt nods. “It’s true Chira. Stacy went out last night to take her little brother trick-or-treating. When her brother went up to a door to knock, she stayed behind on the sidewalk. When he turned back around, she was gone. The police won’t call it a missing persons, yet, but my father is about to pull his hair out. The compact we found yesterday already came back from the forensics lab with a fingerprint that is a positive match for one of the missing girls in Fairfax.”

  I push away from Matt and stand again, but I grip the railing as tight as I can. “How…how on earth did we get mixed up in all of this? Stacy?”

  Ben nods, his eyes pleading with mine. “It’s all true. Please don’t go anywhere alone, okay? Just stay with us.”

  “But this can’t have anything to do with the ghost, right? And Donnie, Tasha, Jacob…how could they possibly have anything to do with the missing girls?” I ask. My chest is tight when I think about all the disasters that have struck us since the night we went in the Old Schoolhouse.

  Ben doesn’t say anything, but he chews his bottom lip.

  “I bet you have a theory, but you’re not ready to share it yet,” I say, my voice barely above a whisper.

  He looks up at me in surprise, his eyes holding an expression I haven’t seen in any man’s eyes since my dad’s. Admiration, respect, and a little bit of something else—something that tells me I’m special. I shake my head and straighten up. “We should get going, or we’re going to be late.”

  AT THE BEGINNING OF FIRST period, Mr. Scott stands at the front of our homeroom class with a somber expression. “Now class, I know that you all have heard about Stacy Brine this morning. The rumor mill is churning throughout the school, and the wake of tragedy overcoming us is extreme. But we cannot think that all of these bad things are related. Our school is not cursed. I’m certain Stacy will show up unharmed, and we’ll all be happy to welcome her back. And though we’re not sure of the details of Jacob’s accident, it was just that—an accident. Regardless, as you go throughout your day and leave for home tonight, be cautious and be safe. Understood?”