In Between (12 page)

This woman better not blow it for me.

“Do you think Katie’s been here long enough to let her go out with friends?”

“Maybe Millie and James have decided to trust me, Mrs. Simmons. And maybe they’ve decided not to pass judgment on Angel Nelson, too. What’s wrong with that? You don’t even know Angel.”

“Oh, pipe down. I’ve known Angel since she was in bloomers in my Sunday school class, kicking shins and pulling hair. Believe me, I know that child.”

“Forget it.”

I throw down my napkin and charge up the stairs. Millie calls out for me, but I keep going until I reach my bedroom, slamming the door behind me. A little dramatic, yes, but as a teenager, it’s my prerogative to slam doors. It’s one of the few perks. I’d give it up for clear skin any day.

Knock. Knock.

Sigh. I’m betting it’s not Maxine, ready to apologize.

“Katie—”

The door opens and James and Millie walk in. Millie sits beside me on the bed, where I’m flipping through a magazine with a lot of gusto. Page twenty-three, “Ten Things You Never Knew About Boys” . . .

“Katie, you just have to take Maxine in stride. You can’t let her get to you.”

“James is right.” Millie smiles. “And he would know.”

“She preys on weakness,” James says under his breath.

Millie clears her throat. “We’ve decided to let you spend the night with Angel and her friends.”

Page twenty-four, “Sassy Skirts for Dreamy Dates.” Page twenty-five—

Wait, what?

“I can go?” I drop the magazine.

“Yes. You can. But we’re giving you my cell phone, and you are to call us if you need anything or if you want us to pick you up. Do you understand?” Millie’s hand hesitates before she smoothes the bangs from my face, like she’s waiting for me to swat her hand away.

“I understand.”

James has his serious face on. “The reality is, Katie, we haven’t known you even a week yet. We are going to trust you to behave in a manner we would be proud of. But should something go wrong, you are to call. Got it?”

“Yes, sir.” This is so awesome. My first sleepover! My first friends at In Between High! “There’s not going to be any trouble. You’ll see. This is going to be so great!”

“P
ssst! Katie, wake
up.”

I am rudely jostled awake by Angel, who apparently doesn’t realize how much I value my beauty sleep. “What time is it?”

It’s pitch black in the Nelson living room, where Angel, Danielle, and few other girls and I are camped out.

“It’s 3:30. Come on, get up.”

“We just went to bed.” I roll over, desperate to get away from the little flashlight Angel so rudely shines in my face.

“Come on, Vincent will be here any minute. We’ve got to get dressed.”

What?

“Angel, what are you talking about?” I pull the sleeping bag over my head, give the zipper a yank, and cocoon myself in.

“Fun. That’s what I’m talking about. We’re gonna go out for a little bit. Come on, you don’t want to miss this.” Angel tugs on my sleeping bag.

“Yeah, actually I think I do.”

“Look, if you’re not mature enough to hang with us, then you shouldn’t have come.” This from Danielle.

“I’m not coming out of this sleeping bag until you tell me what we’re doing.” Or until I’m out of air. I think I’m in one of those sleeping bags you take with you when you’re sleeping in an igloo.

“We’re gonna visit a haunted theatre.”

“A haunted theatre? You woke me up to see a ghost who’s into show tunes?”

“What’s the matter, are you scared?”

“I’m not breaking into any theatre, Angel.”

“We wouldn’t be breaking in. It’s an abandoned building. Girls, I think she’s scared.”

“I am not scared.”

“Really? Then maybe you’re just too good for us then, huh? I thought you were one of us.”

I unzip my sleeping bag and sit straight up. “Look, I don’t think I’m too good for anybody, and I’m not scared.”

“Then get dressed. We’ll just be out an hour or so. We’ll be back before our sleeping bags get cold.” Angel, I notice, is already dressed. She’s wearing jeans and a black T-shirt.

“Look, this doesn’t sound good. I promised the Scotts I wouldn’t get in any trouble.” And nothing good can come from going out with the kind of bed head I get.

“There isn’t going to be any trouble.” Angel tosses my jacket at me. “Everyone in town visits the old haunted theatre. It’s like a rite of passage. You should be grateful that we’re showing it to you. But maybe you don’t belong here. Maybe you don’t belong with us.”

“Everyone does this?”

“Everyone.” Danielle pulls on her jeans. “I don’t know what you’re afraid of. We’ll go, we’ll check it out, and we’ll come back. No big deal.”

I catch the sting in her voice, and it rankles. No one has ever accused me of being a baby. “And you’re sure this is a well-known thing to do in town? Nobody is gonna think anything of us being in the theatre?”

Angel hands me my jeans and shirt. “I can’t believe you haven’t heard of it yet, Katie. Just get dressed. It’s totally cool.”

“Well, if it’s so cool then why are we sneaking out of your house at 3:30 in the morning to see it?”

“Because supposedly this ghost guy only comes out after dark, that’s why. And my mom doesn’t care if we go or not, as long as we leave her alone.”

I believe Angel about the last part. Coach Nelson had been upstairs in her room during the entire sleepover. I saw her maybe once, and all she did was yell at us to turn down the TV during our horror movie marathon. She didn’t seem too interested in anything Angel had going on.

“Katie, we’re going. You can stay here or you can go with us. We thought you’d feel grateful we included you, but whatever.” And with that, Angel, Danielle, and three other girls I had met that night file out the door, leaving me standing in the middle of the living room.

“I guess this is what we get for trying to be your friend,” Danielle says in parting, pulling the door shut.

Well.

This is awkward.

Grabbing my shoes and the phone the Scotts gave me, I run out the door and race to the waiting car.

“Come on, Katie! Get in!” Vincent is holding open the door to his Honda Civic. The spinners on the wheels reflect the streetlights.

Here goes nothing.

We drive for about five minutes. Five very uncomfortable minutes. Vincent is a smoker. A generous one—he shares his lit cigarette with nearly everyone in the car. I decline. There are a lot of ways I don’t fit the poor-orphaned-girl stereotype, and this is definitely one of them. Don’t these people ever listen in health class? Don’t they know what’s in those things? I’m not inhaling asbestos and antifreeze, thank you very much. Well, actually right now, I am inhaling them, but not by choice.

Besides the air being contaminated in here, my rear end is asleep. The Civic is one small car, and somehow there are seven of us in here. We’re all packed in like sardines, completely disregarding the seat-belt laws. In fact, I’m pretty sure one of the seat belts is wedged tightly in my nether-regions.

The car slows and Vincent turns his headlights off. “We’re here. Everybody out.”

Vincent directs everyone out of the car and toward the structure I assume is the theatre. I’m already a little creeped out.

While everyone runs around to the back of the building, I stand out front, rooted to the spot. I shine the flashlight I was given, illuminating large wooden doors, a glass box office trimmed in brass, and an old-time marquis at the tip top that says “Valiant” in Art Deco letters. I don’t want to look away; it’s so pretty. I run my hands over the glass panes of the box office and imagine someone taking money from a flapper or a dude in a fancy hat. This theatre has seen a lot of years. I wonder if anybody famous has ever been here.

“Katie!”

I heave a sigh. I guess I can admire the architecture later. Maybe in the daylight like a normal person.

“Come on, we don’t have all night.”

Angel grabs me by the jacket sleeve, and we run around the building to where the others disappeared. Angel points to a window above us. “Come on, give me a boost, then me and Vinnie’ll pull you in.”

“What? I thought we weren’t breaking in?”

“Would you relax? Quit making this a big deal. This is just the easiest way to get in. Now put your hands like this so you can lift me up.” Angel interlocks her fingers and motions for me to do the same.

Fine. The sooner we do this, the sooner we can get back to the house.

Angel goes up and over with no problem. Now it’s my turn. Vincent and Angel both appear in the window. I jump up, arms raised; they each grab an arm (a little roughly I might add), and I’m jerked through the window, my knees scraping and bumping the wall.

Inside, I see the glow of seven other flashlights as the others have already gotten to the business of looking for this legendary spirit.

It’s like I’ve stepped back in time. Old velvet curtains drape from the ceiling over the stage area. Accents of brass line the stage and the trim above it. There are seating boxes suspended off the far walls, a few on either side of the stage, and I imagine that’s where the wealthy or the town dignitaries would have watched the performances. Old lights hang from the top of the stage, many of them rusty and broken. “So. . . how do we find this ghost?”

Vincent comes to stand by me. “What are you talking about? What ghost?”

I look at Vincent.

Vincent looks at Angel.

“I told Katie about how everyone comes to see the ghost who haunts this place. You know, it’s like a tradition. And we didn’t want Katie to miss out on it. I knew it would make her feel like she’s really part of In Between.”

Vincent and Angel continue to talk, their voices becoming inaudible as I walk toward center stage and discover the orchestra pit. A real orchestra pit. Like in
Phantom of the Opera
.

“You can go down there, you know.” Angel’s voice startles me as I peer down into the pit.

“You scared me.”

“There’s a door off to the left of the stage. It will take you to some stairs that go underneath the stage to the pit. It’s pretty cool.”

“Want to go with me?”

“Nah, I’ve seen it hundreds of times. You should go check it out.”

“Yeah, maybe later.”

“Scared?” Angel’s taunts are getting a little old.

“No, I’m not scared. I’ll go down there. It’s no big deal. You go find your ghost.” I stomp off toward the stage and find the door that must lead to the orchestra pit.

The sign on it that said
Orchestra Pit
was a big help.

The door creaks open, and I shine my light down a set of stairs. I ease onto the first one and let go of the door, and the spring slams it shut. I check my pocket for the cell phone just in case Vincent’s gang decides to get cute and lock me in here, then carefully make my way down the wooden steps. Turning a corner, I find the opening to the pit and go in.

There’s not much down here. A few old chairs, some yellowed sheet music, dated 1946, and a couple of beat-up music stands.

I move in closer to see if I can find anything else when I hear it. A sound that doesn’t belong. And it’s definitely not a ghostly sound.

A hammer.

I yell out the pit opening. “Hey, what’s going on?”

Nothing. Just more hammering. Then laughing.

Maybe they
did
find the ghost, and they’re doing some arts and crafts projects with him.

At the sound of breaking glass, I go into full panic mode. This is definitely not good. Now I hear a symphony above of shattering glass, curtains being ripped, the unmistakable hiss of spray paint, and the crash of unidentifiable things being thrown.

My heart pounding, I race up the steps and pull on the door. It won’t budge.

Propping my foot on the door, I put my whole body weight into pushing on it. I bang and shove, yelling for someone, anyone to let me out. A thought skitters through my brain: What would Frances Vega do? And then I remember the cell phone in my pocket. I’ll call the Scotts.

It’ll be okay. It’ll be okay—
oomph!

The door. It’s open! I fly through the doorway and out into the theatre in time to see blue lights flashing outside and four police officers inside.

Staring right at me.