Chapter One

“Hurry up Grant; we’re going to be late!” Henry had hustled far ahead of Grant in fear of being late. The boys had become best friends in second grade. Both of them were walking to school on a chilly morning.

Grant simply replied “Chill out bud, we are fine on time”. “Why do you always freak out about school?”

Henry and Grant were both 8th grade jail mates, they believed that their school, Cloud City Middle School, was also a prison. Henry was the kid that you would see sprinting down the hall like LaDainian Tomlinson, with half of his locker in his hands. Henry was a straight A student, with a four point zero grade point average since sixth grade. Grant on the other hand, wasn’t exactly the sharpest crayon in the box. Arriving to class wasn’t really a biggy for him. He thought that everyone ran on his clock, and that they would wait for him. Grant was also the star basketball player on his small town team, so what ever he did, he always got away with. Teachers on the other hand, were not as big of fans as all of Grant’s peers.

The number one teacher that despised Grant was Mr. Whitfield. He taught science, which meant all sorts of pranks could happen during experiments, or after. One of the infamous pranks pulled by Grant was actually from a learning experience. Mr. Whitfield had shown the class what chemicals to mix so that you could make your own glow stick. This was one of the few days that Grant actually paid attention during class, and got something out of it. That night though, Mr. Whitfield was awarded with his enlightening experiment, as his car was glowing lime green.

Chapter Two

Henry and Grant were late to school again, as usual. Class had started five minutes ago, so they hadn’t missed too much. Their teacher took a conduct point from both of them, and resumed with the class.

“Now class, please remember that, even though tonight is Halloween, please don’t bring candy to school,” snorted Mrs. Williams, the boy’s first hour teacher. “I don’t want to have to clean up all of the candy wrappers.”

Grant had completely forgotten that tonight was Halloween, his favorite holiday. He had always worn the most gruesome costume. Last year, he had been a hideous clown with blood dripping out of his mask. Henry, of course, had been Harry Potter for the fourth year in a row.

“I’ve really got to step it up this year, since it’s my last year of middle school. I hope Carl has some ideas.”

Carl was Grant’s older brother, and a sophomore. Everyone knew him, whether it was for a foul prank, or for just simply having class with him. Grant was basically a sequel to his brother except for the creativity of the pranks. Carl was an urban genius. He was able to build and attach a giant slingshot to the top of their house on Halloween night, and launch eggs and toilet paper into neighbor’s yards. Grant looked up to Carl, so he figured he would have some brilliantly frightening costume ideas.

“Sorry little bro, I got nothing.” Grant was awe struck. He had never heard Carl mutter those words. Now he would have to come up with something completely by himself, since he knew that Henry wouldn’t know a thing about scary costumes. All of a sudden, Carl thought up his costume idea, and called Henry to tell him where to meet before they venture into the haunted house that they had discussed about at school.

Chapter Three

“Hurry up Grant, I’m getting scared,” shivered Henry to himself in his Harry Potter costume, which had now officially gone through five years of Halloween. He was standing in the middle of the park, right by the humongous statue of their town’s founder, Charles Cloud.

“AAAAUUUGGGHH,” Someone screamed as they jumped out from behind a bush. Henry nearly wet his pants as he turned to run, but had been tripped by a tree. As Henry wiped the dirt off of his face he saw Mr. Whitfield, or was it Grant. He couldn’t tell.

“Man you should have seen your face,” howled Grant as he fell to the ground, clutching his stomach from laughing so hard.

“Not funny dude. I might need to go change my robes now. Thanks a lot,” cried Henry

“Don’t talk to me like that you stupid pupil. I’m your teacher, remember? You have to respect me,” said Grant with his best impersonation of Mr. Whitfield.

After finally recovering from the joke, Grant and Henry began marching to the haunted house. The park was about two blocks away from the house, but it seemed longer in the dark.

“Carl told me about this house. He said that in 1970 a married couple and their baby had just bought the house, when they were murdered by a serial killer. They say their ghosts still roam the house, waiting till the descendent of their murderer returns,” whispered Grant in his spookiest ghost voice. The pair continued to walk to the house, even more afraid than they were at the park.

Chapter Four

Grant and Henry had finally arrived at the haunted house. It was a two story building with very few windows and a wide open door that kept creaking back and forth. The two looked at each other, almost as if to make sure that they were still going on with it. Grant took the first step up to the porch, and then turned around to wait for Henry. He looked a little weary, but eventually staggered up the steps to the porch. When they entered through the door with their flash lights, Grant and Henry were in a surprisingly large entry room. Grant eyed a staircase, and shuffled over to investigate.

“Come on scaredy cat, we’re going up the staircase,” chattered Grant.
While ascending the stairs, they came upon many broken or cracked ones. Henry made note of it and kept following Grant. Once upstairs, the boys saw only two dusty, decrepit old rooms. They decided that they might as well search both of them.

The first room was obviously the baby’s room. There was still a baby crib, with sky blue blankets and tiny pillows to match. On the opposite wall were multiple baby toys from the 70’s. A rag doll, a rattle, and what looked like a blanket lay scattered among the other toys. In the closet were many baby clothes and washable diapers held up by hangers with cobwebs in them. The cobwebs were everywhere in the babies room, and presumably in the other one. Grant got bored of this room and quickly moved to the next, which was the couple’s.


Chapter Five

This room was rather clean for being abandoned for thirty years. Grant had automatically connected his brother’s story about the ghosts staying in the house till the murderer came back. He figured that the ghosts had kept their room nice and tidy. Henry, on the other hand, hadn’t believed the story about the ghost staying there, but was now beginning to reconsider. All that Grant and Henry saw was a regular size bed, a closet full of clothes and what looked like a ghost sweeping the floor.

“W-w-w-wait, d-do you see that?” stuttered Grant as he stumbled over a chair. The ghost swung its head around and starred at the boys with her big blue eyes. She was the wife in the couple that had moved in those years ago.

After a good minute or two of staring, she finally said “Hello boys. You might want to leave before my husband gets home. He really gets frustrated when living people just barge into our house.”

The boys, jaws dropped, just stood there for a while before finally stumbling out the bedroom door. Once outside, they stared at each other, and then went for a dead sprint down the hallway to the stairs. While hustling down the stairs, Henry had remembered about the missing stairs and easily evaded them. Grant, not ever paying attention, had about them, forgotten, tripped and tumbled down the whole set of stairs.

Grant had been knocked out from the fall. Henry arrived downstairs and saw Grant, but he wasn’t near strong enough the lift him off of the floor to carry him. He was forced to drag Grant out of the entry room, down the porch steps and onto the sidewalk. As Henry was huffing and puffing from pulling Grant from the house, he looked down and saw that Grant was beginning to come to. Grant picked himself up off the sidewalk, looked back at the house, and then what had just happened came rushing back to his memory. At this he took off at another dead sprint, leaving Henry to eat his dust. Henry took off after him so that he knew where he was going. All that Henry saw was Grant wheeling in to the park.

Chapter Six

Henry finally caught up with Grant at the statue in the park where they met earlier. The boys stood there catching there breath for about a minute before Grant exploded.

“Can you believe we actually saw a real live ghost? Well actually I guess it was more like a real dead ghost, but you get the point,” screamed Grant.
“And did you hear her voice? Talk about spooky.”

“Yea, I just want to go home for the night, okay? I’ve had enough excitement for the next five years,” replied Henry.

“Okay. I guess I’ll see you tomorrow then. Good night.”

Henry and Grant both went in their separate directions to their houses, so that they could lie in bed for hours before finally going to sleep, with that horrifying stare from the ghost placed in their nightmares that they had all through the night. Henry and Grant came to school the next day and told everyone they knew about their encounter with the undead. Mr. Whitfield on the other hand wasn’t at school and was later reported murdered. Little did Grant and Henry know was that the only reason that the dead husband wasn’t at his home last night was because he had to deal with some unfinished business with the Whitfield family.