Goosebumps: Revenge of the Invisible Boy

Hannah's Return

FIVE DAYS LATER:

R.L. Stine took off his glasses and looked at his masterpiece.

He had done it. He had finally done it. It was beautiful.

Two hundred and forty-eight pages of perfect, gorgeous print. Not a single smudge, nor a single crease, could be found in that book. Every letter was perfect, exactly where it needed to be. Every word was carefully thought out, every sentence was planned out to perfection.

It was his longest book yet, but for good reason.

Because this book would do the impossible. It would bring a monster out of a different book, and release her to this world, all while keeping the other monsters locked up.

That is, in theory.

It had taken Stine the better part of a week to finish this book. He had worked from dawn till dusk, only sleeping a few hours here and there when it was absolutely necessary. Mostly though, he had relied on coffee and energy drinks to keep him awake.

That, and his motivation.

The book was perfection, Stine was a mess.

His hands shook, both with nerves and loss of sleep, as he put the pages in the binding. He hadn't shaved in 5 days, and his glasses were lopsided on his face.

"But if I'm a mess," Stine thought to himself. "Zach's a train wreck."

He had seen the young Cooper several time that week, and with each passing time he looked worse.

Hopeless, that was the word. He looked hopeless, like every chance he had once had at happiness had been taken from him.

He put on a happy face for his mom, Stine had noticed. But as soon as his mom turned her back, the hopelessness was back again.

The last place Stine had seen Zach was at the school that very morning. Stine had been offered a job at the school teaching English, and had accepted on the spot. His days of running and hiding were over.

It wasn't as if he needed the money. He was worth over $250 Million, and gaining even more money every month from book sales, which had gone up in the past week. No, he took the job because he wanted it.

When Stine had seen Zach at the school, he had greeted the boy, but Zach had appeared not to notice, instead staring at the massive hole in the gym wall that repair crews were cleaning up. He had eventually waved in Stine's direction, but then walked away before Stine could get a word in.

Stine accepted it. The boy needed time. He understood that perfectly.

But if all went well with this book, and it did what it was supposed to do, then he wouldn't need that time.

What perfect timing too, tomorrow was the day the school reopened, and the first day of Stine's teaching job.

He put the final page in the binding and set to work making them bond. It didn't take long, he had done this many times before.

This book had to be perfect.

He had written in it everything that had come to mind when he thought of Hannah. The times she begged him to let her go to driving classes, the times she argued with him about wanting a normal life, the times they had just sat down and watched movies together.

Heck, he even included the time he had caught her sneaking into the house after a night of exploration.

He included the little things, too. How she loved to read and watch scary movies. How she snored just a tad bit when she slept. How she had grown so attached to that denim jacket he had given her on her fourth Sweet Sixteen.