The Ghost of Slappy

by R. L. Stine

  It was a warm, clear night. But that didn’t keep me from shivering the whole way. I pulled up my hood and zipped my coat right to my chin as I approached the cemetery. Silvery moonlight washed over the rows of graves. There were still patches of snow all around.

  I pushed through the creaking gate and stepped up to the first row of gravestones. Where was it? Where was the hole where I had buried Slappy? It had been so dark that night, and I had been so afraid.

  I began to walk back and forth, moving from row to row. Finally, I found the spot halfway back and on the far side. The grave was only half filled in. The shovel was still where I left it.

  I jumped into the hole and began to scoop up dirt and toss it out. The snow had melted and the dirt was wet and muddy.

  I worked feverishly, frantically digging the shovel in, heaving the dirt up to the graveside. Sweat rolled down my forehead. My arms throbbed with pain. Again. Again. Dig and toss.

  Finally, I hit something. I bent to examine it. One of the dummy’s arms.

  I lowered both hands into the dirt. And began to shove the dirt away, pawing it like an animal.

  I was gasping for breath by the time I was able to reach down and lift the dummy from the grave. I shook it hard, forcing clumps of dirt to fall off.

  “I’ll clean you up when we get home,” I said, my voice hoarse and weak from my hard work.

  I raised the lifeless dummy to the ground. Climbed out of the hole. Brushed dirt off the front of my coat. Lifted Slappy. Flung him over my shoulder. And carried him home.

  My family was still out shopping. I didn’t want them to see me with the dummy. I carried it down to the basement and turned on all the lights. I set it down on my dad’s worktable and raised the head into the light so I could see it clearly.

  The back of Slappy’s head had a jagged cut. The cut was very narrow. Not wide at all.

  Could I bring the dummy back to life by repairing the cut? Filling in the crack? Maybe Krazy Glue would do the job?

  I had no way of knowing whether Krazy Glue would repair Slappy and bring him back. No clue. But it was my only idea.

  I pulled open the worktable drawer and fumbled through all the bottles and tubes and tools, screws and nails. My fingers wrapped around a tube of the glue.

  My hand trembled as I opened the cap. I held the dummy’s head firmly in one hand. And tilted the glue into the crack. I squeezed the tube until it was almost empty.

  The glue filled in the crack. A little glue ran down the back of his head to his neck. I waited for the glue to dry. Then I sat the dummy up on the worktable.

  “Please come to life,” I told it. “Please come back to life.”

  I stood there staring at the lifeless thing. Its arms hung limply at its sides. The eyes were closed. It didn’t move.

  “Please … Please. You’re back together now. Please come back to life.”

  I gasped as the dummy opened its eyes. The wide, grinning mouth moved up and down. Slappy slowly raised both hands. And wrapped them around my throat.

  “Let go!” I cried.

  The wooden fingers tightened their grip. The dummy’s eyes flashed with excitement. “I’m back, slave!” he rasped.

  With a hard tug, I struggled to free myself from his grasp. But he was too strong. “Can’t … breathe …” I choked out.

  A stirring behind me made me stop struggling.

  I wasn’t alone. “Mom? Dad? Patti? Are you back?”

  A pulsing white light made me spin around. And I stared at Annalee rising up behind me. Her hair fluttered behind her shoulders. Her eyes were cold blue, cold as ice.

  “Help me!” I gasped. “Annalee—please! Help me!”

  She floated closer. She raised a pale hand, and I saw a sheet of paper gripped tightly in it.

  “Annalee—”

  She narrowed her icy eyes at me. “These are the words,” she whispered, her voice light as air. “These are the words to put the dummy back to sleep—forever.”

  Slappy let go of my throat. He stabbed his hand forward. “Give me that paper!” he barked at Annalee.

  She swung it away from him. Her eyes were locked on me. “Shep, you always ran from me. You never stayed to talk to me, to learn my story.”

  “I … I …” I didn’t know what to say. My eyes were on the paper she waved in her hand.

  “Don’t you know why I had to haunt your house?” Annalee cried. “Don’t you know why ghosts linger on the earth?”

  “N-no,” I stammered. “No. Why?”

  “Ghosts linger because they have unfinished business,” Annalee said. “I can’t leave till I do a good deed.” She lowered her head. “I led a very selfish life. I owe one good deed. One good deed and I can go happily to the beyond.”

  “Yes. Please!” I cried. “Do your one good deed now. Rescue me, Annalee. Read the words. Put this evil dummy to sleep.”

  I pointed to the paper in her hand. “Please. Read the words. I’m sorry I never listened to you. I’m sorry I always ran away from you. But, please—do your one good deed now. This is your chance.”

  A smile crossed her pale face. “Yes. Yes, I will do it now,” she said. “One last good deed.”

  She raised the slip of paper in front of her.

  And ripped it into tiny pieces.

  I watched in horror as the tiny shreds of paper scattered on the basement floor. “But—but—” I sputtered.

  “I did my good deed,” Annalee told me. “Not for you, Shep. For Slappy!”

  “But—but—”

  “Slappy never ignored me. He never screamed at me to go away.” The white light began to pulse behind her. “And now that I’ve done my final good deed on earth … good-bye to you.”

  The light appeared to swallow her. It flashed brightly, so bright I had to cover my eyes. And when I uncovered them, Annalee was gone.

  Still blinking, I turned to Slappy, sitting on the worktable, swinging his legs, his grin wide. “Nice girl,” he rasped. “Sorry I didn’t get a chance to know her better.”

  He leaned forward, his big, glassy eyes on me. “Now, slave … where were we? Hahahahahaha.”

  Hahahahaha!

  I LOVE a story with a happy ending—don’t you?

  Maybe it wasn’t a happy ending for Shep, my awesome new slave. But I thought Annalee showed a lot of good taste. Smart girl.

  Maybe I’ll do a good deed someday.

  Hahaha. Just kidding.

  Why do a good deed when it’s so much more fun to be scary and evil?

  Speaking of scary, I’ll be back before you know it with another Goosebumps story.

  Remember, this is SlappyWorld.

  You only scream in it!

  “I dreamed our robot came alive and went berserk,” I told Jayden. We were walking home from school, and of course, we were talking about robotics. Because we are obsessed.

  A yellow school bus rolled by, and some kids shouted at us from the windows. I waved at them, but I didn’t bother to see who they were. I was busy telling Jayden about my dream.

  My name is Livvy Jones. I’m twelve, and I have very real, very exciting dreams, and in the morning, I remember every single one of them. I think it’s good to tell people your dreams because they can help you figure out what they mean.

  So I told Jayden my dream. “The robot ran away, and I chased after it. But it was too fast for me. It ran to a big parking lot and it began picking up cars. It lifted them high in the air, then smashed them to the pavement.”

  Jayden had a thoughtful look on his face. Of course, he always has a thoughtful look on his face. That’s Jayden's thing. He’s quiet and he’s thoughtful. His dark eyes gazed straight ahead, and he kept nodding his head thoughtfully as he listened to me.

  “The robot smashed one car after another. It was a very noisy dream,” I said. “I think all the crashing and smashing is what woke me up. I sat straight up in bed and I was shaking. The dream was so real.”

  We crossed the street. Jayden continued to look
thoughtful.

  “So? What do you think it means?” I said.

  He scratched his head. He has curly black hair that pops straight up. He can’t keep it down. It’s like it’s alive, some kind of sponge life.

  We turned and cut through the Murphys’ backyard. They probably wouldn’t like our shortcut through their yard every afternoon, but they’re never home. My house is three doors down.

  “I think it means that we shouldn’t have made our robot look so human,” Jayden said finally.

  “Huh? What do you mean?”

  “Everyone else is building robots that look like machines,” he continued. “But we built ours to look like a girl. And I think maybe that’s what is freaking you out. We built a girl. It’s too real.”

  “But I love Francine,” I said.

  Jayden rolled his eyes. “We can't call a robot Francine. No way.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because you can’t. You just can’t have a robot named Francine.”

  I gave him a playful shove. “She is my idea and I get to name her.”

  “No way, Livvy,” Jayden whined. “Francine. Francine the Robot. It’s too … embarrassing.” He crossed his arms in front of his chest. “I’m going to talk to Harrison about it. Seriously.”

  Harrison Teague is the coach of our Robotics team. He is a good guy. And he keeps us psyched. He’s keeping us pumped up and eager to beat Swanson Academy in the Springdale Robotics Meet this year. Swanson Academy is where all the rich kids go. They’re our rival, our enemy school. In football, in basketball—in everything.

  Harrison doesn’t know that much about robotics. He admits it himself. I mean, he’s the girls’ basketball coach, and the school gave him the Robotics team to coach in his spare time. They sort of forced it on him.

  I stopped outside my family’s garage. I lowered my backpack to the driveway. “Listen, Jayden, we can’t argue about the robot’s name now. We are so close to finishing her. We just have a few tweaks to make on the programming. This is no time to fight.”

  He shrugged. “You’re right. I think she's ready for us to test some of her skills this afternoon.” He pumped a fist above his head. “This is exciting, Livvy.”

  It was exciting. Jayden and I had been building the robot in my garage for months. Programming her computer brain took weeks and weeks.

  And now we were finally about to see what she could do.

  My family has a white-shingled, two-car garage. But my parents never put their cars in the garage. They always park them in the driveway. That gave Jayden and me the perfect workshop to build Francine.

  I bent down and grabbed the door on the left. Jayden helped me, and we both pushed the door up.

  “Let's see what we have here,” Jayden said, rubbing his hands together like a mad scientist in a horror movie. “How is our little experiment?”

  We both stopped. We both stared. We both uttered startled cries.

  “The robot …” I murmured. “She’s GONE!”

  R.L. Stine’s books are read all over the world. So far, his books have sold more than 300 million copies, making him one of the most popular children’s authors in history. Besides Goosebumps, R.L. Stine has written the teen series Fear Street and the funny series Rotten School, as well as the Mostly Ghostly series, The Nightmare Room series, and the two-book thriller Dangerous Girls. R.L. Stine lives in New York with his wife, Jane, and Minnie, his King Charles spaniel. You can learn more about him at RLStine.com.

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  Goosebumps book series created by Parachute Press, Inc.

  Copyright © 2018 by Scholastic Inc.

  All rights reserved. Published by Scholastic Inc., Publishers since 1920. SCHOLASTIC, GOOSEBUMPS, GOOSEBUMPS HORRORLAND, and associated logos are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Scholastic Inc.

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  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  First printing 2018

  Cover design by Maeve Norton

  Cover art by Brandon Dorman

  e-ISBN 978-1-338-22302-6

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