Is She for Real?
Authors: P.J. Night
Can History Repeat itself?
When Bethany Warren moves from New York City to the small town of Warwick, she's surprised at how quickly everything in her life seems to fall into place. She finds a great group of friends, and even has a new boyfriend, Nate Carlson, who lives next door and gives her a beautiful old ruby ring.
Everyone in Warwick is a little obsessed with the Legend of Lady Warwick, the town's namesake, who, according to the legend, was mistakenly buried alive and now haunts the people of Warwick. Bethany thinks it's just silly old town folklore, but then she starts acting strangely. Her new friends start to wonder: Is she for real? Will Bethany snap out of it, or is real life imitating legend a little too closely?
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GO TO SLEEP . . . IF YOU DARE!
THERE ARE MORE
CREEPY
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AT YOUR FAVORITE STORE!
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SPOOKY ACTIVITIES
FROM
P. J. NIGHT
SIMON SPOTLIGHT
Simon & Schuster, New York
Cover art by Aly Turner
This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real locales are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author's imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
SIMON SPOTLIGHT
An imprint of Simon & Schuster Children's Publishing Division
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Copyright © 2012 by Simon & Schuster, Inc.
All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.
SIMON SPOTLIGHT and colophon are registered trademarks of Simon & Schuster, Inc.
YOU'RE INVITED TO A CREEPOVER is a trademark of Simon & Schuster, Inc.
Text by Kama Einhorn
Designed by Nicholas Sciacca
First Edition
ISBN 978-1-4424-5056-1
ISBN 978-1-4424-5057-8 (eBook)
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 2012930111
A figure walked through the fog onto the sand. It was dark and visibility was poor, except for the thin beam of light shining on the ocean from the full moon above.
He crossed the beach, his fine leather shoes covered in sand up to the silver buckles, but he paid that no mind.
The man wore a thick woolen cloak. He stood in the dark in front of the roaring waves and spoke softly.
“I am sorry for all the days I spent at sea, my lady. I am sorry for every day that I did not spend with you.”
His voice grew louder, and he dug his hand into the pocket of his waistcoat to clutch the ring.
“I have burned all your things, milady, having kept only this ring to remember you by. This ring that I
slipped on your finger because I loved you so. But you were never the same after that.”
He paused, now overtaken by sobs.
Please believe me
, he thought.
After a moment, he gathered himself and held the ring above his head.
“This ring ⦠this ring is to blame â¦
I curse this ring!
”
He hurled it into the sea.
Nate Carlson was psyched to take his metal detector to the beach. The walk to the beach was a short one because the beach was right behind his house. “The beach is my backyard!” Nate used to tell his friends when he was little. He supposed he got that line from his parents, who said it all the time. It was true, anyway, and pretty awesome. There was a small lawn between his house and the beach, but that was it. Nate felt that wonderful familiar feeling of anticipation as he approached the sand. It was a cloudy, windy day, so he had the beach to himself.
Slipping off his shoes, Nate stepped onto the cool sand. He switched on the metal detector and started walking, scanning the sand back and forth.
A large black bird swooped near his head. As he ducked,
he thought of his twin sister, Lissa. That bird would have sent her running home. Birds totally creeped her out, especially when they flapped too close to her head. He looked up to see a few of them circling above. The others were dive-bombing the water, catching food. They would drop straight down out of the sky, beak forward, disappear into the water, then come up with a crab struggling in their beaks.
It was cool to watch. He had never noticed this type of bird before, but then again, he never paid much attention to birds.
Beep, beep, beep!
Nate's thoughts about birds were interrupted by the sound of the metal detector going off. Nate bent down and dug around a little. All he found was an old, crushed tin can. He left it there and kept walking, looking at the variety of shells along the tide line. His favorite were the jackknife clams, which were long and thin, and the jingle shells, which his mother called “angels' toenails” because of their golden shiny hue. Nate's mom said a lot of things that, in Nate's opinion, were pretty corny.