Page 24 of School Spirits
“How did you know that?” Romy asked. “You’ve lived here, what, a week?”
It had been less than that, but that wasn’t how I knew this particular ghost story. There were versions of it all over the place. It didn’t mean the story wasn’t necessarilytrue; it was just…kind of boring.
I wasn’t sure if I was disappointed or relieved. I’d told Mom this would be an easy case, but I hadn’t expected it to be quitethiseasy. This had to be the ghost we were dealing with.
I realized Dex and Romy were staring at me, waiting for an answer. “Oh, right. The Mary Evans thing. It was, uh, in the brochure they gave my mom about the school.”
Dex frowned. “We have a brochure? And it mentions the local ghost story?”
“Do you still have it?” Romy asked. “It would be a good thing to add to my file on Mary Evans.”
“I think we threw it out,” I said quickly, before trying to change the subject. “So you think that the ghost of Mary Evans is pissed at teachers or—”
Romy chewed her lower lip. “That’s what we thought at first. But if the Barbie is a warning for Beth like the frog was a warning for Mr. Snyder, what does that—”
Suddenly, Dex stopped, pressing a hand against his chest. He made a kind of wheezing sound, and at first I thought he was joking. But then Romy grabbed his arm. “Dex?”
He fumbled in his pocket, getting out his inhaler. He took two deep pulls on it, and the wheeze slowly started to fade. One more pull and his breathing sounded normal, if kind of fast. “Sorry,” he said. “Wasn’t trying to be a drama queen.”
“You shouldn’t have been running,” Romy chastised him, and he rolled his eyes.
“I was just walking quickly. And I’m fine now.” He raised his head, and while his face was a little pale, he didn’t seem to be in danger of keeling over. “Anyway, why don’t you go inform Anderson of this littleahamoment? I think he has yearbook this period.”
When Romy hesitated, Dex waved her on. “Don’t worry. If Coach Lewis decides to grace us with his presence, I’ll tell him you went to the ladies’ room. That ought to scare him to death.”
“You’re sick, Dex,” Romy told him.
“Which is why you like me. Now go.”
Once Romy had dashed off, Dex turned to me. “Alone at last. So how’s your second day stacking up against your first?”
“They’ve both been full of peril, but since today involved less maiming, I’m gonna give it the edge.”
Dex laughed, but he still sounded out of breath. “I’m glad you decided to join our little ghost-busting gang.”
Shrugging out of his jacket, I handed it back to him and tried to sound casual as I asked, “Yeah, what’s with that? You don’t strike me as the ghost-busting type.”
Dex gave me a little half-smile, taking his coat. “I’m just full of mysteries, Miss Brannick,” he said. “And now, if you’ll excuse me, I think I’m going to head back to my bleachers and my book. But I’ll see you on the bus.”
I watched his retreating back, wondering just what Dex’s mysteries might be.
CHAPTER 12
I’d hoped to get right to my first meeting of the Paranormal Management Society, but on the way home that afternoon, Romy informed me that for “budgetary reasons,” they could only meet every other week, which meant there wouldn’t be another meeting until the next Thursday. That gave me nearly ten days to wait, which was a lot longer than I’d wanted—the sooner I got this case over with, the better—but in the end, I was kind of grateful for the time.
For one thing, school was tougher than I’d expected. English was good. We were readingMacbeth, and while I’d never read Shakespeare before, any story that involved witches, ghosts, and a bunch of violence seemed right up my alley. History was also okay, and I was holding my own in chemistry, but geometry was one of the more evil foes I’d ever faced. I hadn’t really thought much about balancing ghost busting with math problems, so it was nice to let the case take a backseat for a little bit.
In addition to giving me time to figure out homework, those ten days let me get closer to Romy and Dex. I still hadn’t met the mysterious Anderson. He drove to school himself, and since he was a junior, we didn’t have any of the same classes. But I sat with Romy and Dex on the bus every day, and by the time the first PMS meeting had rolled around, I felt like I was already one of the group. I wondered if all kids made friends this quickly, or if this was just unique to Dex and Romy.
PMS was holding its meeting in one of the portable classrooms behind the school, and when the last bell rang on Thursday afternoon, Romy and I made our way out there. “The state outlawed these like a million years ago,” Romy told me as we walked into what was basically a trailer, “but a few schools keep them around for art classrooms or yearbook offices.” She snorted. “You know, classes that don’t really matter, according to the fine state of Mississippi.”
This particular trailer wasn’t being used this year. It smelled like erasers and damp carpet, but it had a big whiteboard and a few desks that weren’t covered in scratched obscenities, so it met all of Romy’s requirements. “We used to meet in the lunchroom, but the janitors were always rushing us.” Romy turned to the whiteboard, picked up a blue dry-erase marker, and scrawled1st point: Izzy.
“So how long have you been running this thing?” I asked her as she wrote,2nd point:Gym Weirdness/Beth/Doll.
“I tried to start a chapter back in junior high, but a couple of parents complained. Apparently, investigating the paranormal is the first step on the road to devil worship or something. But when we got to high school I was ready.”
Once she’d written3rd point: Tonight?Romy turned to me with a broad smile. “I explained to Mr. Owens—he’s our principal—that it wasn’t, like, an occult thing.” She raised her thumb, ticking off. “It’s science. They study parapsychology at Duke, for heaven’s sake. And”—she raised her index finger—“a few years back, Mary Evans High had a forensics club that studied old-timey murders. That is way more twisted than ghost hunting. And last but not least”—a third finger went up—“investigating popular ghost stories from this area increases our knowledge of local folklore and regionalism.”
