Mischief Night

by Phoebe Rivers

  Seconds later he was heading out the door. “See ya, Sara,” he called over his shoulder. Marco followed him. I stood dazed. What had just happened?

  That woman. That sad, nervous woman. I suddenly knew exactly who she was.

  Jayden’s mom. Marco’s mom too.

  I had been in Jayden’s kitchen. I was sure of it. I had been watching his mom worry about him. Feeling his mom worry about him.

  I tried to swallow, but couldn’t. My mouth was painfully dry.

  I didn’t understand. How did I do that? Why did I do that?

  I glanced down at the box of toothpaste still in my hand. It seemed so silly. So insignificant. Who cared if teeth were white? The unbearable ache of loss still filled me, made me want to run home and pull the covers over my head. And the fear. The fear of not knowing whether it was going to happen again.

  Marco was trying to make sure it didn’t happen again. He was protecting Jayden to protect his mother.

  Suddenly I understood. Marco had touched me and showed me the pain he fought so hard to keep away from his family.

  I understood. Mrs. Mendes had suffered. She still suffered.

  I shuffled down the cosmetics aisle toward the spices, my thoughts fixated on Marco.

  Marco wanted to protect his brother from danger.

  But what did that have to do with me?

  Was I dangerous?

  Chapter 6

  I couldn’t move my arms to peel my orange.

  I glanced up and down the long, skinny cafeteria table. We were wedged together so tightly. Apples were the way to go. Just lift and bite. The key was to eat food that needed minimal movement. That’s probably why the sandwich was invented.

  Lily pushed up against one side of me. Avery was jammed against the other. Miranda, Tamara, and Marlee sat across from us. There were tables scattered throughout with more room, but they were mostly populated by singles—kids here purely to consume food. Squishing together showed that you were part of a group. In my old school, I was a single.

  “Did you get the invite?” Miranda asked the group.

  “I love the silver writing on the black,” Lily said. “Very Halloween but still very classy.”

  “I couldn’t believe she sent me one,” Tamara remarked. “I barely know Dina. Her mom must have made her. She’s in a book club with my mom.”

  I studied the sparkly blue polish on my nails. I’d done them last night, but already my thumb had chipped. I hadn’t gotten an invite.

  “Dina takes Contemporary Jazz with us,” Miranda explained. “She’s been in our dance class for a couple of years, right, Lily?”

  Lily rolled her eyes. “Doesn’t make her any nicer to us.”

  “You shouldn’t go,” Avery piped in. “I have a gymnastics meet in Pennsylvania on Halloween weekend anyway. Dina’s nasty.”

  “Everyone will be there,” Miranda pointed out. “Lots of the cute boys. Lots of eighth graders.”

  “I won’t be there,” Avery reminded her.

  “Me either,” I add softly. Would Jayden? I wondered.

  Lily turned. “Really? She didn’t invite you?”

  “Dina will never get over that the new girl in seventh grade beat her out for Harvest Queen. Ever.” Avery smiled at me, revealing the pink rubber bands that now covered her braces.

  “I don’t care,” I said. I didn’t really. The only thing I knew about Dina Martino was the evil eye she flashed me in the hallway.

  “We see Dina at dance this afternoon,” Lily said. “I bet she just forgot to put you on the list because you’re new. I’ll ask her about it.”

  “You don’t have to,” I said.

  “But we want you there with us.” Lily tried to wrap her arm around me, but she couldn’t maneuver it, so she settled for a bump of our shoulders.

  “Definitely,” Tamara chimed in.

  Being part of this group is worth the citrus sacrifice, I thought. I tossed my uneaten orange in my lunch bag and smiled at my friends.

  Island. Archipelago. I tucked my legs under me and flipped through the pile of index cards. I had written landforms in different shades of green marker. Bodies of water were in blue. I always made color-coded flash cards.

  I leaned against the pillows on my teal and raspberry comforter, trying to find a comfortable study position. There wasn’t one.

  “Hey, kiddo. How’s it going?” Dad appeared in my bedroom doorway.

  “Fine. I think I know half,” I mumbled, motioning to my flash cards.

  Dad frowned. “Half is fifty percent. That’s failing.”

  “I know, I know. It’s only seven o’clock. I have plenty of time to learn the rest.”

  “So you’ve got it under control?” His eyes danced as he smiled at me.

  “Yes, Daddy-o. I’ve got it under control!”

  He walked the few steps over to my bed and sat down. He seemed nervous as he thumbed through my flash cards. He cleared his throat. “So . . . I’m going out tonight,” he said finally.

  “Now?” I studied his outfit. Khakis, blue button-down shirt. Nothing alarming, except they’d been ironed. Or pressed by a dry cleaner. Dad was the wrinkle king. Even his work suits usually looked napped in. “Where are you going?”

  “Dinner. Dinner with a friend from work.”

  I looked up and realized that his hair was neatly combed, his unruly waves smoothed down with a little gel.

  He was going on a date, I realized. And he was nervous about telling me.

  For some reason, my dad always gets nervous about telling me when he starts dating someone new. I don’t know why. I don’t mind that he has girlfriends sometimes. I don’t always like them, but none of them have been very long term anyway. And I just want him to be happy.

  He looked at me as if he was waiting for me to say something else, but I just nodded. “Okay, have fun.”

  Dad put my flash cards down. “I won’t be home late. Lady Azura’s downstairs if you need anything. Maybe she could test you on social studies.”

  I raised my eyebrows. I couldn’t see that happening. She regarded homework as silly. She was always saying it robbed us of a childhood of exploration. That our generation’s minds were so clogged with useless facts and figures and music lyrics that we’d become closed off to the forces of nature.

  Dad laughed. His blue eyes crinkled at the corners. “Okay, maybe that wasn’t the best suggestion. Actually, she said something about this being facial night, but you can pop in if you want.”

  I doubted that. Beautifying was a sacred ritual to her.

  “Love you, kiddo.” Dad waved and headed down the stairs and out the front door.

  I wondered who she was. I hoped she was nice. I knew he’d tell me more if things got “serious.”

  Dad had been dating someone in California, but they broke up before we moved here. Moving here had come out of the blue. One day he just announced that he’d gotten a new job and we were moving to a small town on the New Jersey shore. And then we left. He still hadn’t given me a good reason why we came here. I didn’t buy that it was his job. I was pretty sure there were lots of jobs at insurance companies in California. Or at least at insurance companies closer to home in California than New Jersey was.

  I lay back on my bed and stared at the pictures on my wall. My mom’s photographs. My eyes settled on the photo of the little angel figurine.

  The creak of the rocking chair filled my head. The woman in the pink bedroom, rocking away her sorrow. Her sobs filled the dusty corners of the house. Her grief kept her here, I realized. I didn’t know why she was sad. I knew nothing about her. Except that she was dead.

  Secrets. Even the dead had them.

  Not just me. Not just Dad.

  Everyone.

  I bolted up. If I lay here, I wouldn’t study, I knew. I’d be listening. To the spirit who paced our family room. To the spirit in the sailor’s hat who tapped the windowpane as he stared out across the bay. Searching. Waiting. I didn’t know what for.


  My bare feet hurried along the cold wooden boards and up to the third floor. I flicked on the light, bathing my craft room in a soft yellow glow. Slipping into my desk chair, I inserted my camera’s memory card into the computer.

  The room was back in order, or at least as much order as it ever had. The closet door was slightly ajar, but everything was quiet. It had been since that day with Lily.

  I scrolled through my photos. Lady Azura cleaning her crystal ball. I liked how I’d caught her reflection in the glass and the faraway look in her eyes. I’d brought my camera to school, too, and taken a lot of pictures: Lily clowning around in front of her locker, Avery walking on her hands, and a boy I didn’t know balancing under a pile of binders.

  All the people in my photos were doing something, so that made them action shots. Yet they weren’t active. There was no spark.

  I had a stack of my mom’s old pictures in a drawer, and I pulled them out. I chose a few from the top of the pile and spread them out before me: a field of flowers, a mailbox on a dirt road, a scattering of crumbs outside a ceramic cookie jar. I printed my four best shots onto glossy photo paper and taped them to the wall beside my mom’s shots.

  I stepped back for a better look and groaned. Each of Mom’s photos was more alive and told more of a story than my photos of humans. I took another step back, trying to understand why. What was her secret? I wished she were still alive. I wished I could talk to her.

  My photo of Lily fluttered to the ground. I scooped it up and pressed the tape harder to the yellow wall.

  Then I stepped back to look again.

  There’s got to be a better shot I missed, I thought. I turned back to the computer and heard the slight slap of paper hitting the wood floor.

  Lily’s photo again.

  I checked the window. The little Christmas lights were dark, and the window was closed. No breeze.

  I hung the photo again with a fresh piece of tape. Then I sat in front of the screen, running through my choices. Lily’s photo slipped. Again? I thought, annoyed. Then the photo next to it fell. And the one next to that one. The fine hairs on my arms rose as the fourth photo dropped.

  I narrowed my eyes at the photos now resting on the floor. My hands clamped my thighs through my flannel pajama bottoms. Every nerve jumped to action, sensing a presence in the room.

  The tape wasn’t the problem. The photos hadn’t dropped on their own. Someone was pulling them down.

  I took a deep breath.

  The spirit from the closet was back.

  I twisted about, searching. Nothing.

  Who was it? Before I had only been able to make out a hand. What did it look like?

  I wanted to stand but couldn’t will my limbs to move. Spots of light danced before me, causing my head to throb.

  Then I saw him.

  He was not what I’d expected.

  He was so small. A young boy. Short, dark hair and dark eyes. In shorts and a cap. He reminded me of Lily’s little brother.

  He undulated before me. Shimmering. Pulsing in the speckled light.

  He was bent over, laughing. Giggling. Slapping his skinny leg.

  I stared back at him, wide-eyed. Frozen in place.

  He reached for a bucket of foam craft pieces on the book shelf. With a mischievous glint in his eyes, he raised the plastic bucket and flipped it over. Pastel stars and hearts rained down, covering the floor.

  He laughed, and I heard myself giggle.

  As if I were elsewhere, listening to myself.

  The spirit grabbed a container of red glitter. Dancing in place, he flung the glitter into the air with unrestrained delight.

  I followed the arc of crimson sparkles, and I suddenly felt a surge of uncontrollable energy. I needed to be part of this mayhem. I needed to throw things too. To make a mess with him.

  I grasped a handful of paper clips and swung my arm over my head. The silver clips scattered everywhere. Laughter bubbled inside me and escaped through my mouth with volcanic force. Not my usual laugh, but the laughter of someone crazy.

  The sound of my own crazy laughter made me snap out of it. Then my body convulsed, shaking with fear.

  What was I doing?

  Chapter 7

  Out of control.

  No thinking. Just moving. I had to break away.

  I reached toward the spirit. The shimmery outline of the boy fell back toward the wide-open closet door. As fast as I could, I reached for the door, slamming it shut, returning him to the closet’s depths. My eyes flitted about the room. Searching, searching. I dragged the small bookcase across the floor and wedged it against the door. Would that hold a ghost in? Would anything?

  I didn’t know. My feet pounded down the stairs. My brain felt scrambled. I had to get away.

  Away from the spirit.

  Away from myself.

  I burst into the kitchen. The single light burning above the sink silhouetted Lady Azura’s slight frame. She turned, and I screamed.

  Green slime dripped from her cheeks. Her pupils were so dilated her eyes seemed solid black in the shadows. Had the spirit done this to her?

  I began to back out of the kitchen, unable to stop staring.

  Her face. Oh, her horrible face!

  “What’s wrong, Sara?” Her lips barely moved.

  “Y-you—your face—upstairs—I—” My mouth couldn’t form the words.

  “Oh yes.” She patted her rotting cheeks with her hands. “Avocado oatmeal face mask. Quite ugly, yes, but it brings about such beauty.” She turned back to the sink and simultaneously washed and scraped the gunk from her face while I concentrated on calming my breathing. In. Out. Just part of her facial, I told myself. She’s fine. The spirit did not do anything to her.

  I sank into one of the chairs around the kitchen table.

  “Mix that yogurt with the honey, please,” Lady Azura called from the sink.

  I mechanically dumped the yogurt and honey into a bowl already sitting on the table. My hand still trembled as I stirred them with a wooden spoon. “What are you cooking?”

  “Do I ever cook?” Her sharp laugh was like a bark. “We’re making a moisturizing facial cream. Natural hydration. Now add the ground almonds.” She sat across from me as I continued to stir. Her clean face had a pinkish glow. “Who caused you to fling yourself down the stairs like that?”

  “How did you know it was a who?” I asked tentatively.

  She grinned. “My child, with us, it’s always a who. And then we must endeavor to discover the why.”

  I told her about the spirit of the young boy in the cap.

  “Ahh, Henry’s at it again.” She shook her head in amazement. “I forgot all about him. Imagine that.”

  “Who’s Henry?”

  “Henry is a very mischievous little boy, though I gather you’ve deduced that for yourself. As I recall, Henry met his end at the age of eight, back in 1920-something. It’s hard for me to keep all the dates around here straight. I probably should write them down.”

  “You’ve seen Henry too?”

  “Henry and I are very well acquainted. Or at least we used to be, when I could climb those steep stairs. It’s been years since I’ve been on the second or third floors of this house. As you know, I have never even seen your room or craft room!” She reached for the bowl and began to stir. “Henry made life interesting. Always throwing things, causing havoc. Why, once he even draped himself in a bedsheet and paraded through the halls while we were having a party. I had a tricky time explaining that to my guests.”

  “Is he dangerous?” My mind kept returning to what he’d done to me. How he’d made me act and feel so out of control. How he’d made me not me.

  “I never used to think so, but danger sniffs out young mischief makers. Years ago Henry found a box of matches lying around. He lit them. He almost burned down this house. Obviously, I had to put an end to that kind of behavior. I’m not one for unruly children.”

  “How did you stop him?”

  “I locke
d him in the closet on the third floor.” Lady Azura continued to stir.

  “You locked a ghost in a closet?” I repeated in disbelief.

  “Exactly. I told him to leave and he refused, so I locked him away. Worked so well, I forgot about him. Completely. Until he came out.” She squinted at me. Her eyes seemed much smaller without her fake lashes. “He can leave anytime, you know. He chooses not to. So I choose to keep him locked away.” The spoon made scraping noises against the side of the bowl. “He appeared the other day with Lily, right?”

  “How’d you know?”

  “Makes sense.” She placed her finger into the bowl, then licked it. “Perfect. Shall I put some on your face too? Even someone as lovely as you can benefit from natural beauty remedies. You won’t be young forever, you know.”

  “Maybe later.” I leaned across the table, my elbows resting on the pale pink tablecloth. “Makes sense how?”

  “Henry is a Randazzo. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but that family has more relatives than the TV has channels.” She propped up a round magnifying mirror and, with the back of the spoon, spread the thick, ivory-colored glop on her forehead. “Lily’s presence in the room must have drawn him out somehow. A family bond is very powerful. Connection through the blood.”

  That’s why he reminded me of Lily’s brother. “Why is he still here?” I asked.

  “Henry is different from other spirits trapped in this realm.” Lady Azura tried to speak without disturbing the concoction on her face. It reminded me of something I’d once dipped vegetables into at a party. “Henry has no agenda. He likes it here. He’s just here to amuse himself.”

  “Well, he’s not amusing me,” I grumbled. I flaked the blue polish off my pinkie nail, fumbling to explain what had happened upstairs. How his emotions had become mine. As I tried, Lady Azura’s eyes grew wide even under the layer of yogurt.

  “Sara, you need to listen carefully. Three things. One is Henry. I don’t know what he is capable of. I haven’t seen him in many years, but the boy can and will certainly wreak havoc if not contained.”

  “Contained?”