Chapter Four: The Zipline of Doom
I was blinded by someone's lantern. Now everyone was up. Greg held the light, casting a giant shadow version of himself against the cabin walls. “Parker! Stop yelling. Olah can’t hear you, remember?”
“Olah’s not here,” I said. His bed at the end of the cabin was empty. Perfectly made.
“What did you see?” Greg asked. “Raccoon?”
“It was a ghost,” said Parker.
“Hang on,” I had a hunch. I ran for the door.
“Don’t let it in!” Parker screeched.
But the only thing that crept though the doorway was the night air. I stepped outside, pretending to be brave. It’s funny no matter how many times you tell yourself that monsters and spooky things aren’t real, the moment when there’s even a hint of that supernatural stuff, your hair stands on end. At least mine did. But there were no ghosts, only the eight cabins. All the lights off. Peaceful and quiet. Not even the crickets were awake.
I checked my cell phone for the time. 3:34 a.m. The picture on my phone was one of my favorite beaches in San Diego, on a sunny day. Besides the half-moon and stars, my phone was the brightest thing around. I held my hand in front of its light, admiring the way the illumination changed my skin color. Greg and the others poked their heads out the doorway. I looked back at them, smiling. “I think I know what’s going on.”
* * *
Most of us stayed up the rest of the night, talking about what Parker may or may not have seen. I thought my phone theory was brilliant. I believed that someone had been up on the roof, playing a practical joke on us. Parker probably saw the jokester’s arms waving the phone back and forth, creating the blue glow that scared the heck out of him. “Who would do something like that?” Greg asked. I pointed out that Olah was suspiciously absent. But he wasn’t at the top of my list. My gut told me that the mean blond girl, Tasha, would pull something like this. Why? Maybe because she wanted to punish me. Or maybe she secretly liked me. But I didn’t tell anybody about this particular theory.
Greg thought it was an animal. Probably a raccoon. Maybe a possum.
Parker disagreed. “It was a person’s hand. A ghost’s hand.”
“How many fingers did it have?”
“Five, I think.”
“You don’t sound sure,” Greg pointed out.
“Well, maybe he was wearing a mitten.”
I laughed. “Do ghosts wear mittens?
“Did Dead Billy die in the winter?” the skinny kid named Eddie asked, very serious. “Maybe he froze to death and the ghost still wears winter clothes.”
Greg shook his head. “He died at summer camp, Eddie. Although, it would be fun to write a Christmas version of the Ballad of Dead Billy.”
I thought that was pretty funny, but most of the others weren’t amused. Parker and the other kids really believed that a phantom was haunting the campgrounds. Greg, Sheldon, and I were the only skeptical ones. “Maybe it was just a dream,” Sheldon contemplated as he smoothed the whiskers that would one day become a mustache. The twins were the only ones who didn’t join the conversation. They were snoring in the corner of the room. While Greg and the others debated about the existence of ghosts, I must have dozed off to sleep because the next thing I remember ---
WOOOOOOT!
We woke up to the screeching sound of a hand-carved flute. Olah was blowing it. I guess because he was deaf he didn’t realize how excruciatingly annoying it was to have a whistle rupture your ear drums at six in the morning.
