The Ghost of Lizard's Rock (19 page)

Allie looked at me with a
huge grin.

“Hey there Josh,” I said.
“Are you too big to give a girl a hug?”

Josh ran up to me, wrapped
his arms around my legs, and nearly knocked me off my
feet.

“Come on guys,” Allie took
the boys by their hands into the house. She stood in the doorway
talking to her dad, “I’ll be back on time.”

Allie walked up to me with
a big grin on her face, “Did you sleep last night?”

“Did you?” I was doing my
best to not answer the question and threw it right back at
her.

“Sure,” said Allie calmly
with a twinkle in her eye, “It was just the same as any night
around here.” Allie tried her best to contain her excitement. She
shoved me with her hand on my shoulder, “About as much as you
did.”

I had never seen the
teasing side of Allie and shoved her back while laughing out loud,
“You got it!”

Allie grabbed my free hand
and looked at my fingers.

“What’s wrong?” I tried to
see what she was looking at.

“I was looking for the
‘Troy’ marks on your fingers!” Allie’s eyes sparkled, “I figured
your hands grew together last night.” She started running down the
street backwards laughing at me.

“You…” I took off running
after her, “and what about Eric!”

Allie froze on the spot
and turned the brightest red, “I’ll stop if you stop. No more
teasing!”

“Okay,” I said calmly. I
waited for several seconds to pass. “He is kind of cute… isn’t
he?”

Allie looked at me and
cracked up laughing, “You’re such a pain…”

We continued down the
street reliving each wonderful moment of last night all over again.
Every once in a while we would stop for a second, look at each
other, and break out laughing all over again. It was such a great
feeling to share with my new best friend.

Ten minutes later, we
stopped at the front gate of the cemetery next to the forest and
just stared inside without saying a word. All the giggling in Allie
was gone. It never occurred to me how hard it would be for Allie to
walk into the cemetery.

“Is the secret hideout
here?” asked Allie quietly.

“No,” I said. “This is
where Josie is buried - the girl in the journal.”

“Oh,” replied
Allie.

I was concerned that the
cemetery might bring up some memories of her mother’s death. “You
okay?”

“Yeah,” answered Allie.
“I’ll be okay.”

I pulled out a map of the
cemetery folded up in my pocket that I had gotten from the
internet. The map showed the graves of everyone buried in there –
including Josie.

We followed the map to an
old part of the cemetery. Underneath a large oak tree, we read the
words ‘
Josephine Grace
Jones
’.

“Look,” said Allie
quietly, “she was born March 1, 1905 and died July 1, 1918.” Allie
stared at the grave marker quietly for several seconds without
saying a word. “She was our age.”

All I could say was,
“Yep.”

“See any ghosts yet?”
Oliver’s voice broke the silence. He was walking toward them with
Jacob and Dan.

One look from my face told
him that this was the wrong time to be joking.

“Have a seat guys,” I
opened the journal. “I’d like to read this to you before we go to
the hideout.”

Everyone sat down on the
grass in front of Josie’s grave and listened to me read all the
pages in the journal. After a short time, I closed the journal and
looked around the group. Everyone was staring over at Josie’s grave
marker in silence.

I broke the silence,
“Maggie tried to tell us something very important. Are we going to
be about revenge or…?”

“Or are we going to be
super heroes?” added Allie.

“What do you mean?” asked
Oliver.

“Super heroes aren’t about
revenge,” said Allie, “they are about protecting those who can’t
protect themselves.”

“We can’t be about revenge
or we’re no better than them,” said Jacob.

Dan started to reach for
his nose with his hand.

Allie looked across to Dan
and pointed her finger at him, “Un-huh.” She ended with a smile at
him.

Dan placed his hand back
in his lap and wrinkled his nose several times.

I looked at Allie and
tried not to laugh. Somehow, she had gained control over
Dan.

“Jacob,” I stood up,
“shall we take them to the hideout?”

“Come on guys,” answered
Jacob enthusiastically. “You’re going to love this.”

I looked back down at
Josie’s grave and thought, “We’ll do it right.” I looked at Allie.
It was as if she knew exactly what I was thinking.

Allie and I followed
behind the boys, as Jacob led us out of the cemetery and into the
nearby forest.

Oliver was talking
non-stop to the other boys. He was so excited!

It wasn’t long before the
gang was at the base of Lizard’s Rock and in front of the wet
cave.

Jacob turned to us and
said, “We’ll have to enter through this side today. Once we are in
the hideout, we’ll go out the other side, so everyone knows where
the entrances are.”

I nodded my head to Jacob.
That made perfect sense to me.

“Be careful of the wet
rocks in the cave,” added Jacob, “they are very
slippery.”

Each of us turned on our
flashlights one after another. The inside of the cave lit up even
brighter than the last time we were there.

“There’s no wind,” I
said.

Jacob continued to walk
across the cave to the secret entrance. “The wind is only in the
afternoon when the land begins cooling down.”

“He’s right,” whispered
Allie to me.

Jacob walked behind the
large rock and into the tunnel. The dirt under our feet was
dry.

“Welcome to the Cow Pie
Gang hideout!” Jacob moved to the side of the room for the rest to
get their first view of the hideout and flipped the switch on his
giant battery lantern. The entire cave was suddenly completely lit
by the bright light.

I leaned against the
outside wall of the cave next to Jacob and watched the others as
they looked around.

Allie moved around lightly
and sure-footedly in the bright light. Her movement was fairy-like
as she flitted here and there to look at the various things that
had been left undisturbed for almost 100 years. Allie let her
fingers trail lightly over the chairs and table, and spun around in
delight as she felt their history on her hands.

Oliver and Dan were a bit
more hesitant and quickly sat down in a chair at the table. Their
eyes kept looking back and forth around the cave.

Allie suddenly realized
that we were all watching her. “Sorry,” she said. “I just never
expected a place like this.” Allie walked over to the last empty
chair and sat down. “This is a place just for us. It’s all
ours.”

“It’s pretty cool,” agreed
Oliver. He repeated the words, “Pretty cool.”

Dan sat quietly looking at
everything around the cave. “It’s as if Josie and the others were
just here.”

I walked over to the
table, “They were.”

Oliver noticed the old
wool blanket on the rocky ledge. It was still perfectly preserved
as Wesley had left it. He took down the blanket, gently shook off
the dust, and placed it back on the ledge. Oliver carefully climbed
up on the ledge and lay down on the blanket.

“Ah,” said Oliver as he
wiggled back and forth to get comfortable.

A mischievous grin crossed
Oliver’s face. There was a twinkle in his eye as he looked at the
rest of us and cleared his throat, “The Cow Pie Gang rides
again!”

I sat back in my chair,
“Who are we going to target first?”

“Maddison,” said Jacob
quickly. “Last night wasn’t enough.”

“How about the two eighth
graders that tripped Jacob in the cafeteria?” added Dan.

“Robert,” said Allie
confidently. “He will continue to pick on little kids if we don’t
stop him.”

Everyone nodded his or her
head in agreement. Robert would be the first target of the Cow Pie
Gang.

“Starting now, each of us
will gather all the information we can possibly find on Robert. We
will need to know where he lives, what his family life is like,
what’s his favorite food is, what his habits are, who his friends
are… we want to know what he’s thinking even before he thinks it.
We will meet here next Saturday at 10 o’clock and put all our
information together.” I looked into their eyes one at a time. “You
have to understand that this is no game. Remember what happened to
Josie.”

“And then can we finally
nuke’em?” said Allie casually. “I’ve been really thinking about how
to build a giant microwave.”

“I hope that I never tick
you off!” said Oliver to Allie. “That would be one big mistake.”
Jacob and Dan nodded their heads in agreement.

I said to the group, “Come
here!” I opened the old leather journal to a new page after
Maggie’s secret message and began writing a new entry:

September 6,
2012

Cow Pie
Gang

Kati
O’Donnell

Allie Davis

Oliver Jackson

Jacob Sumner

Dan Wright

My name is Katherine Marie
O’Donnell. My friends call me Kati. I am the third writer of the
journal. We’re here to protect those that need
protecting.

“Sign your names at the
end.” I took the pen and signed my name first.

Allie gently placed her
hand on my shoulder, “I love it!” She took the pen out of my hand
and signed her name below mine.

Each of the boys signed
their name in turn. Dan handed the pen back to me after he finished
writing his name at the very end.

I set the pen down on the
desk and placed my hand on top of the page I had just written on,
“Hands in!”

One by one each of our
friends placed their hands one on top of the other - except Dan! He
stood awkwardly with both his hands in his pockets.

Dan cautiously pulled his
hands from his pockets and acted as if he was going to scratch his
nose. He stopped about an inch from his nose and looked into each
of our faces ready to gag, “Gotcha!” He laughed loudly and placed
his hand on top of ours. Allie took her free hand and popped him on
the back of the head.

We gathered up our things
and headed out the dry tunnel to the hidden entrance under Lizard’s
Rock. Jacob explained how the rock should be placed in front of the
entrance to stop the wind and keep the entrance hidden.

The boys took off, ready
to begin the super sleuthing.

“Come,” I said to
Allie.

I began crawling up the
trail to the top of Lizard’s Rock. Everything was just as Josie and
Maggie had described it. Within a few minutes Allie and I stood on
the top looking out over the forest below.

“Look!” pointed Allie out
through the forest. “There are the guys!” We could see the three of
them walking through the forest back to Tiny.

I looked over the edge to
the rocks below. “This must be where Josie fell.”

Allie peeked over the
ledge and quickly stepped back.

I stepped back toward
Allie, “Need some help with the twins this afternoon?”

Super Sleuth

Monday morning couldn’t
have come any faster. I couldn’t wait to get to class and sit
beside Troy, and then it hit me, “What if Troy didn’t enjoy being
with me at the dance?”

I don’t know where that
thought came from, but everything in my head seemed upside down and
scrambled this morning – was I going nuts or was this
love?

Fifteen minutes later, I
was on the bus and heading to school. I was anxious for Allie to
join me.

Allie was so sweet! She
sat there quietly with a smile on her face listening to me going
back and forth with my conversation – never allowing her to get a
word in. At some points, I would ask a question and answer it in
the same breath. I finally stopped talking and just stared at
her.

“I think…” said
Allie.

But before she could
answer, I had thought of another question and started to answer it,
as I had been doing for several minutes. I stopped talking again
and looked at her.

Allie sat with the same
smile on her face, never saying a word.

“Well,” I said, “What do
you think?”

Allie looked at me, “Could
you repeat the question?” Her smile changed into a huge
grin.

“You’re no
help.”

Allie laughed, “Have you
noticed that Oliver, Dan, and Jacob are not on the bus?”