Super Freak (6 page)

Leo tiptoed around the shrubs to the front of the house, turning the corner as Diana and I crouched under the window. He returned a few minutes later and shrugged.

“No car in the garage. I guess we missed her.”

Next to me, I thought Diana’s sigh held a tinge of relief. I knew I certainly was. If we got caught, my parents would make me pick up trash all over town for weeks, or something equally tedious and humiliating. Dad always said my generation needed to learn more respect and manners. This would prove him right.

We trudged back to the bikes and climbed on, pedaling after Leo as he led the way down the street. His family lived a couple blocks over, and after him Diana, then me. We were almost to his house when he suddenly stopped in the middle of the sidewalk. I nearly ran him over.

He pointed, disbelief etched into his face. “That’s Ms. Widdershins’ car. At my house.” The rest slid out under his breath. “My parents don’t even like her.”

As we watched, his front door opened. We jerked the bikes behind the neighbor’s minivan and crouched down. Our teacher came out onto the porch with Leo’s parents, shaking their hands, nodding and smiling. In one hand, she held a large, yellowed book with red canvas binding that had seen better days.

Diana’s fingernails cut into my palms as she grabbed and squeezed my hand. “Omigod, look. That’s totally one of the reference books we wanted. She really did take them out.”

I glanced at Leo, but his attention remained on his parents. They stood on the porch and watched as Ms. Widdershins climbed into her car and pulled away. Panic leapt into my throat as she backed out of the driveway. We had nowhere to hide if she came this direction.

Luck was on our side when she pulled out and went the other way. Diana sagged against me with a whispered giggle. “Thank God.”

“Don’t get happy too soon. My parents know something’s up,” Leo said. “Get the bikes, and we’ll walk up. Pretend like nothing is weird.”

Like that was convincing.

Diana must have had the same thought. “Will that really work?”

Leo shook his head. “Probably not. But it’s better than being found hiding.”

He had a point. We tiptoed down the sidewalk, grabbed the bikes, and proceeded to walk to Leo’s house. I tried to smile, but I’m not sure I succeeded. Diana tittered at something Leo said, but by the time we got to the porch, I didn’t believe we fooled anyone.

“You’re late, young man,” his dad said, crossing his arms. He was huge–all muscles and serious expressions and dark hair–and made Dracula look like a wuss.

Leo latched on to the accusation like he could sink his fangs into it. Not that I could say much. My knees turned to jelly when I realized his parents had just provided us with a reason to look guilty.

“Sorry, Dad. We got caught up at the library.”

His mom smiled, her thin face lighting up, as she looked Diana and I over. “It’s so nice to see he’s found such studious friends. Isn’t it dear?”

Her husband grunted, keeping his eyes on Leo, who shifted from foot to foot. I wanted to reach over and smack him. We’d been doing pretty well until he decided to wilt under his dad’s look.

“Aren’t you going to introduce us, Leo?” his mom asked.

He jumped. “Oh, yeah. This is Diana and Caroline. They’re friends from school.”

I wanted to roll my eyes. This was a small town. I’m sure they knew who Diana was, but I pasted on a smile and shook the two hands offered to me. Leo’s dad looked me right in the eye as he shook my hand and said, “I’m Mr. Sanderston. Isn’t your father a historian?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Hmmm. Interesting.”

I didn’t understand the strange glint in his eye. He released my hand and I resisted the urge to turn around and run home. Something told me we hadn’t fooled him. Diana stepped closer to me, a nervous smile flickering on her lips.

“Well, we’d better get home. Don’t want to be caught outside after dark,” I said.

Diana nodded. “Yeah. I’ll be in big trouble.”

Mrs. Sanderston nodded and waved us on. We hopped on the bikes, and it took a lot of willpower for me not to pedal as fast as I could. After we’d gone several houses down the street, I pulled to a stop.

Laughter bubbled in my throat, and I giggled like a maniac. Relief made me giddy. Diana joined in until we were crying.

“Do you think he knows?” Diana asked, wiping her eyes.

“Yeah, Mr. Sanderston knows something is up. The question is whether or not Leo rats us out.”

“I don’t think so. He might have thought we were nuts before we went into the library, but he can’t think so now. He saw Ms. Widdershins leaving his house with the book. He has to believe us. Besides, going to her house was his idea.”

All we needed was for him to tell his parents what we were after. He may have thought his parents didn’t like our teacher, but they seemed pretty chummy to me. “We’ll see tomorrow, I guess.” I leaned on my handlebars. “You don’t think he’ll call our parents do you?”

Diana contemplated that for a moment and shrugged. “I don’t think so. Why would he? We weren’t spraying graffiti on a fence or something. We went to the library. Normal teenagers tell their parents they’re going there and then go smoke under a bridge or turn each other into revolting creatures out behind Harbor House. We went for a bike ride.” She flipped her hair over a shoulder. “They should be thanking their stars that they have such awesome kids.”

I laughed. She sounded so serious. With a wink, she pushed off from the concrete. “Come on, Caroline. The argument only works if we get home before we’re supposed to. Otherwise, it’s best to look sincere and apologize.”

***

My hopes sank into my tennis shoes as I pedaled the last few hundred feet up to my house. Mom stood on the front porch, hands on her hips, tiny leaves caught in the hair at the crown of her head. At least her shoes were still on. When she started sprouting roots I knew I was in for it.

“Caroline Sequoia Bennings, you are in serious trouble.”

I took my time putting my bike inside the open garage, and then trudged to the front porch, trying to look contrite. Judging by the scowl on Mom’s face, I wasn’t very good at it.

“What’s the matter, Mom?”

She shook a finger at me, a few more leaves popping from her hair. “Don’t you try that innocent act with me, young lady.”

Well, it had been worth a try, anyway.

“Do you have any idea what it’s like to get a phone call from your teacher telling me you’ve been snooping around her house? I thought you knew better than that.”

My mouth opened and closed, as I struggled to come up with something to say. How the heck did she find out? No one had been home. The only thing moving in that house was the cat.

Ms. Widdershins was a witch. She had a familiar.

“The cat told her?”

“That’s all you can say for yourself?” Her words were starting to get shrill, and in the small spattering of leaves gathering at her feet, I saw a root begin to poke through the laces of her sneakers.

Crap.

“We didn’t mean any harm. She’s the library president and we saw her leaving. We followed her home to see if she checked out a bunch of books we wanted to see, and if she’d let us go through them.”

“You couldn’t have waited until she returned them?” Mom demanded.

“They were reference books.” I told her.

Mom pinched the bridge of her nose. “Go inside and talk to your father. He’s the one who started your obsession with research and libraries. He can deal with you.”

I tried not to look relieved as I slid past her into the house. Dad was waiting in the foyer, and my relief fizzled at the frown on his face. He didn’t even speak, just pointed to the small study he’d claimed.

I dropped my book bag in the hall and followed him inside. Despite how much trouble I was in, I noticed papers, books, and leather-bound journals strewn about the room. Dad had been working on
the research
again.

“Caroline, are you listening to me?”

I pulled my attention away from the open box in the corner and sat down in the big wooden chair across from his desk.

“I can’t believe you would act like this. You know better.”

“But, Dad, it isn’t what you think. We weren’t out to get her or anything.” When he didn’t say anything, I added, “You know, it isn’t like we were out painting graffiti all over her fence or something.”

Diana’s argument didn’t work so well. Dad’s face turned bright red. “According to Ms. Widdershins, that’s exactly what you were doing.”

Shock jolted through me like an electric current. “What?”

“You left some rather rude drawings all over the side of her house.” Dad couldn’t seem to decide whether to be angry or sad.

“What are you talking about?” I said. “We went and looked in a window and we left. We didn’t even have any spray paint. Besides, she hates me as it is. I don’t need to encourage her!”

Dad held up a hand. Anger deepened the lines around his mouth. My dad didn’t get upset often, but when he did, I paid attention.

“I didn’t believe it either. But it was written in lavender paint. And the can of touch up paint for your room is missing.”

My jaw dropped. Someone set me up. They must have. But who? Diana and Leo were the only people I’d really made friends with, and even they had never been to my house yet. It didn’t make any sense. Unless Ms. Widdershins set me up herself.

The longer I thought about that, the more right it sounded. One look at Dad’s expression told me to keep it to myself. Somehow, I didn’t think he’d see things my way. I sank into the seat. “Honest, Dad, I didn’t do anything. I know we shouldn’t have been sneaking around her house, but we wouldn’t be nasty.”

He didn’t believe me. I could see he wanted to, but he decided we were guilty before I ever got home. My nose burned with unexpected tears. I’d been in trouble plenty of times. But I’d never gotten into serious trouble, and never had my dad refuse to hear my side of the story.

As I sat there, listening to Dad lecture me about personal property, respect, and the horrible situation I’d put everyone in, I focused on what I knew. Whoever did this knew I was looking for information about the curse and my house. And they didn’t want me snooping around. But they didn’t know me very well if they thought this would stop me.

I would find out who set me up, and I’d prove to everyone I was innocent. And in the process, I was determined to find out about the curse as well.

Sleep didn’t come easy. I’d been grounded within an inch of my life, and told if I screwed up again, Mom would probably turn into a tree with grief. Her words, not mine. I thought it was a little over dramatic but whatever. Now I was trapped here, whether I liked it or not. At least I still had my cell phone. No contact with the outside world might have killed me.

My parents had already called and arranged for Leo, Diana, and me to head to Ms. Widdershins’ house tomorrow. Being a weekend, we were now contracted out as her slaves for a day. Once we apologized and spent our time scrubbing and repainting the entire house, we were then, assuming we had any energy or daylight left, to do whatever she asked us to do. Not my idea of a fun weekend.

No one told me yet what the supposed graffiti said. When I asked Dad, he just crossed his arms and glared. I guess he thought I was being smart since I instigated the entire thing. How exactly everyone came to that conclusion, I’ll never know. I doubt Diana pointed fingers at me. Couldn’t say for sure about Leo, but he didn’t seem like he’d be that big of a pain.

I’d spent all evening, after choking down dinner at a silent and angry table, racking my brains to come up with some explanation for how we’d been framed. It just didn’t make sense. Especially how they’d managed to get the paint out of my house. My parents worked from home. If a stranger walked into the house, they’d have ended up hanging from the ceiling, wrapped up in a million layers of roots.

My parents might look like hippies, but they were never pushovers. Nothing looked broken into, at least nothing I had seen yet, but I hadn’t exactly been allowed to wander the house in search of answers after dinner. I was supposed to be doing my homework. Math sat at the desk, waiting. I groaned and plopped down in front of the open book. Mind-numbing algebra equations didn’t really seem like much fun at the moment.

I spent five minutes solving and un-solving my Rubik’s cube, which normally helped me think and calm down, but even the familiar feeling of warm plastic and the flash of the primary colors weren’t comforting. At last, I pulled out the diary page and gently unrolled it on the desk again, my fingers tracing over the script. Someone wrote this. The curse existed, and I wanted some information. A little paint and punishment wouldn’t stop me. Whoever was behind this had no idea who they were dealing with.

I had always been one of the kids that, when told they couldn’t or shouldn’t do something, would do it just to prove everyone wrong. Within reason, of course. I wasn’t stupid. The only exception had been the magic tests. I couldn’t help those, and somehow it made this all the more important. If I could solve a mystery the town had been hiding for decades, it would prove to everyone, even to me, that magic wasn’t the answer to everything. That someone without any talent for magic or potions or prophecy could do something they couldn’t.

Every test administrator and teacher I’d ever known, from the ones who thought I was pretending to the ones who thought I was an idiot, flashed through my mind. My hands fisted on the desktop. I would solve this. I was good at puzzles, and this was the biggest one I’d ever come across.

So intent on my decision, I jumped out of my seat when my phone buzzed across the papers on my desk. I flipped it open quickly, afraid my parents would hear and remember they wanted to take that away too.

“Hello?”

“Oh thank God, you’ve still got your phone.” Diana said, her relief evident, even through the phone. “It took me two hours of whining and wheedling to get mine back from Dad.”

I stole a glance at the door. Mom and Dad were downstairs, and I doubted they’d be up anytime soon. “What happened, Diana? I don’t understand what’s going on.”