by Isobel Bird
“It looks more like a museum than a house,” Kate said as they ascended the steps and knocked on the door. She was sure they were in the wrong place until the door opened and Cooper’s blue-haired head popped out.
“Hey, you found a Kate on your way over,” Cooper said to Annie. “Cool.”
Annie and Kate walked inside the house. In front of them, a wide staircase led to the second floor. The area they were standing in was filled with antiques. On the walls were portraits of serious-looking women and men in old-fashioned outfits. Everything looked freshly cleaned, and Kate noticed that there was absolutely no clutter anywhere: no mail on the hallway table, no shoes near the door, no books or magazines on any of the surfaces.
“Don’t let it scare you,” Cooper said, noticing that Kate and Annie were staring at the house.
“It’s so beautiful,” Annie said.
“It’s so clean,” Kate added.
Cooper snorted. “Welcome to the Welton House,” she said. “Officially listed on the Washington State register of historic places, all because some guy no one has ever heard of built it.”
“Welton,” Annie said. “What did he do?”
“Got the Native Americans who lived here to trade him their land for some beads,” Cooper said.
Kate and Annie looked at her skeptically.
“I’m serious,” Cooper said. “Frederick Welton was a trader who lived here in the eighteen hundreds. He made a pile of money trapping beavers and bears and selling their skins. Somewhere along the line he made friends with the local Indian tribes. And in 1853 he convinced them to give him this land in exchange for six bear skins, seventeen beaver pelts, a rifle, and two bags of very pretty glass beads.”
“You’re making that up,” Kate said.
“Not a word of it,” Cooper informed her. “This being a historic house and all, people sometimes come through demanding tours. I’ve got the whole spiel down pat. But you haven’t heard the best part.”
“Which is?” Annie asked.
“In 1857 Frederick Welton lost all the land in an all-night poker game to a Mr. Seymour Beecher.”
“As in Beecher Falls,” Kate guessed.
“Exactly,” said Cooper. “If it hadn’t been for four queens in Beecher’s hand and two pairs in Welton’s, you’d be going to Welton Falls High School. All Welton had left when it was over was this house. But that still isn’t the best part. That would be the ghost.”
“Ghost?” Annie and Kate said in unison.
“I thought you might like that,” said Cooper. “The tourists do too. See, after he lost the poker game, Welton decided he couldn’t stand to lose his land. He hanged himself in his bedroom.”
Kate grimaced as Cooper made a hanging gesture.
“Legend has it that Welton’s ghost still walks around here,” Cooper continued. “Carrying the two pairs of cards in his hand—one pair of threes and one pair of jacks. He’s looking for the game that lost him everything, hoping that maybe he can talk old Beecher into another round.”
“Have you ever seen him?” Kate asked.
Cooper shook her head. “Not that I remember,” she said. “But my mother says that once, when I was about three, I told her that a strange man had been coming into my room at night. She searched the place, and she found a lot of old cards under the bed—only threes and jacks. She threw them all out, made me sleep in her bed for a week, and the man never came back.”
“Hmmm,” Annie said. “And you live here why?”
“My parents think it’s very prestigious,” Cooper explained. “My father is a lawyer. He likes to tell his clients that he lives in the Welton House. Even when they don’t know what it is, they’re impressed. And my mother brings her classes here for tours every year. She teaches third grade.”
Cooper took them upstairs and showed them the rest of the house. Like the downstairs, most of the rooms were in immaculate condition, with antiques everywhere and not a spot of dust. Cooper’s room, however, was a different story. Although her bed, dresser, and night stand might have been straight out of the nineteenth century, the posters on her walls were anything but. She had covered just about every square inch with pictures of her favorite singers and flyers announcing concerts by local bands.
“There’s the first Limp Bizkit flyer ever,” she said, pointing to a scrap of paper with ragged edges and what looked like a coffee stain on it as Annie and Kate inspected everything carefully.
“Who’s this?” Kate asked, noticing a portrait hanging over Cooper’s dresser. Like the ones in the hallway, it was old. The man in it had a worn-looking face with sad brown eyes. He was wearing a fur hat, and the background showed a snowy landscape.
“That’s our friend Frederick himself,” Cooper said. “It creeped my mother out having it downstairs, so I asked to have it in here. I thought it was fitting, since this was his bedroom anyway.”
“This is where he hanged himself?” Annie asked.
“The very place,” Cooper said. “From that beam up there.”
Kate looked up at the thick beam that ran across the room’s ceiling. A shudder went through her as she imagined Welton hanging from it, his sad eyes staring out at nothing.
“Let’s change the subject,” she said.
“What? You don’t like my story?” Cooper said.
“Oh, I like it,” Kate said. “But I have a better one for you.”
Chapter 15
The rain wasn’t helping things. Cooper, Annie, and Kate had been walking around the downtown area for an hour, and all they had gotten was wet. Kate’s hair kept sticking to her cheeks, and she was tired of wiping it away. The rain kept running into her eyes, and inside her rubber rain jacket she was sweating like crazy, even though the temperature wasn’t much above freezing.
“Remind me to tell my father not to buy these for his store again,” she said, pulling futilely at the jacket. “It’s like walking around in an inner tube.”
Annie and Cooper weren’t faring any better. Cooper’s blue hair was plastered to her forehead, and Annie kept taking off her glasses, vainly trying to clean them with her fingers.
It was a gray, stormy Saturday morning. None of the stores were even open yet, and the streets were deserted. Kate had called the Summer House as soon as she thought someone might be there to answer the phone. Luckily, they had a counselor on duty in case any runaways needed help, and the woman had known who Sasha was as soon as Kate asked.
“She didn’t check in last night,” the woman had informed Kate. “But I wouldn’t worry. She’ll turn up. Sometimes she disappears for a night or two. But she comes back. Do you want me to leave a message?”
Kate hadn’t left a message. She knew that would only scare Sasha away. She didn’t want her to know that they knew about her situation. Not until they found her.
“I can’t believe they don’t turn her over to the cops,” Annie said as they huddled beneath a store awning. “Isn’t that what they’re supposed to do with runaways?”
“They can’t do anything if she won’t give them a real name and address,” Cooper said. “Sometimes it’s better to try to help them out first, and then to find out what they’re running from. Or who. My father has done some work with the charities in town, and I’ve heard him talking about it. Besides, some of the kids in the local music scene have spent time on the streets. It’s not pretty.”
“I just wish we could find her,” Kate said. “She’s got to be out there somewhere.”
“She could be long gone,” said Cooper. “If she thinks we’re on to her, she might have decided to skip town. This might just be a total waste of time.”
“I don’t think so,” Kate replied. “Something tells me that we’re going to find her if we just keep looking.”
The rain let up a little, and they started walking again. Some of the stores were opening and people were beginning to appear, running into coffee shops for muffins and something to drink, or picking up newspapers. Kate looked at their faces, hopin
g one of them would turn out to be Sasha.
They searched for another hour, looking everywhere they thought a girl trying to keep out of the rain might be, but there was no sign of Sasha anywhere. Cooper was right—they couldn’t look everywhere, and Sasha could be in any of a thousand places. Finally, Kate admitted defeat, and the three of them went to the bus stop to wait for a ride home.
When the bus pulled up, Kate stepped aside to let the passengers off. She was surprised to see that Sherrie was the first person to emerge. Jessica and Tara were right behind her, and following up the rear was Sasha.
“Well, what have we here?” Sherrie purred when she saw Kate, Cooper, and Annie standing there soaked to the skin. “You three look like you’ve been having a morning swim.” She opened an umbrella she was carrying and stood beneath it while Tara, Sasha, and Jessica tried to cram in around her to keep dry.
“What are you guys doing out?” Kate asked. She wanted to drag Sasha away and talk to her, but she knew she couldn’t do that or Sherrie would want to know what was going on.
“We had a sleepover at Jess’s last night,” Tara said. “We tried to invite you, but your mother said you were doing something else.”
“And now we’re going to do a little shopping,” Sherrie said. “We’d ask you to come, but I don’t think you’d want to drip all over the store.”
The whole time they were talking, Kate was trying to steal glances at Sasha. She needed to figure out a way to talk to her without Sherrie and the others interfering. But how could she do it?
“You know,” Annie said suddenly, “Sasha could really use a makeover. It might be fun to go buy some new clothes and some makeup. You know, glam her up a little.”
Sherrie turned her head and looked at Sasha. “Crandall might be right,” she said. “I bet there’s a real knockout underneath that flannel. What do you say, Sash? Are you up for it?”
“I mean really, how much can it cost?” Annie said. “Thirty, forty bucks?”
“Where do you shop?” Sherrie said dismissively. “If we’re doing this, we’re going to do it right.”
Sasha was looking very uncomfortable. At first, Kate had no idea what Annie was doing. Why would she suggest a makeover? Then, as she watched Sasha waver, she got it. Annie knew that Sasha didn’t have any money. And if she thought that hanging out with Sherrie and the gang meant that she had to spend some, she would find a way out.
“Oh, it would be great!” Tara said to Sasha. “I know this place that has the best shoes.”
“And we could get your hair done,” Jessica suggested. “I think the place I go is having a special—thirty-five dollars for the whole works.”
“I don’t know,” Sasha said.
“If it’s about the money . . .” Sherrie said, inadvertently falling right into Annie’s trap.
“Oh, no,” Sasha said. “It’s not that. It’s just that I promised my mother I would help her look at houses today. She thinks she found one that she likes. In fact, I should probably go meet her. Why don’t you guys go on, and we’ll do this another day.”
“It’s not every day we offer to turn someone into a princess,” Sherrie said. “But fine, we can do it next weekend.”
“Sure,” Sasha said. “You’re on.”
“Well, we should get going, girls,” Sherrie said to Jessica and Tara. “If we stand here much longer, we’ll end up looking like these three.”
The three of them ran off, still huddled under Sherrie’s umbrella. As soon as they were gone, Kate turned to Sasha.
“We need to talk,” she said.
“What about?” asked Sasha. “I thought you wanted me to stay out of your way.”
Kate looked down, noticing for the first time how old and ragged Sasha’s sneakers were.
“I’m sorry about that,” Kate said. “Scott told me what you said to him at the Frozen Cow.”
“He did?” Sasha said, as if she couldn’t believe it. “So you know that I wasn’t trying to get him to go out with me?”
Kate nodded. She didn’t know how to say what she needed to say next. “Want to get some breakfast?” she asked.
“Well, I’m supposed to meet my mother,” Sasha said. “The house and all.”
“It’s on me,” Kate said.
“I guess I can be a little late,” Sasha answered.
The four of them ran through the rain to a coffee shop. They went to a booth in the back and sat down. Little rivers of water ran from their clothes onto the floor, but Kate didn’t even notice. She was too busy trying to think of how to best handle the situation.
“Thanks for saving me from the makeover,” Sasha said to Annie as they looked over the menus.
“I had an idea that wasn’t exactly your thing,” Annie said kindly.
“I like those girls,” Sasha said. “But sometimes it’s hard to keep up.”
“Tell me about it,” Kate said, closing her menu as the waitress came over and took their orders.
While they waited for their food to arrive, they talked about things like music and movies. Sasha was very animated, telling stories about her life in Los Angeles. As Kate listened, she wondered how much of what Sasha said—if anything—was true and what was made up.
When the food came, Sasha dove into her stack of pancakes while the others ate more slowly. She had finished nearly all of her breakfast while they were still working on the first halves of theirs.
“Do you want my bacon?” Cooper asked her. “I don’t eat meat.”
After Sasha had slowed down a little bit, Kate decided to test the waters. “Sasha, I want you to know that I didn’t say anything to Rowan or the others,” she said.
Sasha nodded, chewing on her bacon. “I know,” she said. “I talked to them later on. They said that they just don’t think I’m ready yet. Whatever. I don’t really care. I was in a coven back in LA, so I don’t need any year of dedication. I was just doing it because you guys seemed into it.”
“I just wanted you to know that I didn’t have anything to do with that,” Kate repeated.
“Man, I wish my mom made breakfasts like this,” Sasha said, taking another bite of pancakes. “It’s usually just cold cereal.”
“Sasha, we know where you live,” Kate said gently.
Sasha stopped eating and looked at her. “You mean with my parents’ friends?” she said hesitantly.
“No,” Kate said. “At the Summer House.”
Sasha laughed. “I don’t live there,” she said. “I told you—I volunteer there.”
“I went there,” Kate said. “I was looking for you to tell you that I was sorry about the misunderstanding over Scott. I thought they might have your address. The woman there told me that you stay there.”
“Patrice?” Sasha said. “She was just fooling with you. She does that all the time. I don’t live at that dump. My parents are about to move into a big, new house.”
Kate looked at Annie and Cooper for help. She didn’t know what to say to Sasha.
“Sasha, it’s okay if you’re not what you told us you are,” Annie said. “If you’re—“ She stopped as Sasha glared at her.
“If I’m what?” she said angrily. “Look, I don’t know what you guys think, but you’re wrong. I thought you were supposed to be my friends.”
“We are,” Cooper said. “That’s why we’re trying to talk to you.”
“I don’t hear any talking,” Sasha said, putting her fork down. “I just hear you accusing me of being a liar. Just like Kate did before. Well, she was wrong about that, and she’s wrong about this. She just heard wrong. I don’t live at the Summer House.”
“They told me that you’ve been there for three weeks,” Kate said. “And that you told them you’re from Denver, not LA.”
“What did you do?” Sasha asked. “Run a police report on me or something? Who are you going to believe, some woman you’ve never met or me?”
“It’s okay,” Kate said, trying to soothe Sasha, who was becoming more and more agitated.
“We just want to help you.”
“I don’t need any help!” Sasha said. “And I definitely don’t need you three nosing around in my business.”
She stood up, knocking over a glass of milk. As Kate scrambled to find some napkins and wipe up the flowing liquid, Sasha grabbed her backpack.
“You were right, Kate,” she said. “I should have stayed out of your way.”
“Sasha,” Kate begged. “Sit down. We just want to talk.”
But Sasha was already headed for the door.
Chapter 16
“You did the right thing,” Sophia said as Kate sat across from her in the back room of Crones’ Circle.
Kate held a steaming mug of tea in her hands. Cooper and Annie, seated on the couch, were also drinking tea. Their wet coats and shoes were scattered over the floor and the backs of chairs, drying.
They’d gone there after Sasha ran out of the coffee shop. Kate didn’t know who else to turn to. She felt as if she’d made the biggest mistake yet.
“But what if something happens to her?” she asked Sophia. “It will be all my fault. I should have just kept my mouth shut.”
“No,” said Sophia. “You needed to tell her that you know about her situation. It would have come out sometime anyway. She couldn’t maintain a lie that big for much longer.”
“What do you think she’ll do now?” Annie asked.
Sophia shook her head. “That I can’t say. I don’t think she’ll go very far, especially if she doesn’t have any money.”
Archer came into the room from the store’s office. “I just talked to a friend of mine who works at the Summer House,” she said. “He promised to call us if Sasha goes back there. I also called Thea.”
“Who’s Thea?” Kate asked.
“She’s a member of our coven,” Sophia explained. “She works with the children’s services department of the city.”
“Not the police!” Kate exclaimed.
“No,” said Sophia. “Not the police. Thea helps kids who are in trouble—runaways, homeless kids, kids in bad situations. If we find Sasha, Thea may be able to help her.”
“What can she do?” Cooper asked.