Scaredy Kat (4 page)

My room was teeming with spirit orbs. Great.

I faked an upset stomach that night. I didn’t feel good about these multiple episodes of being dishonest with my mother, but
I had to have a reason to go to bed. She had a way of getting me to talk when I was upset about something. This time, I was
determined to keep my fears to myself. I needed a convenient, noncontagious ailment that would explain my odd mood and my
need to retreat from the world into the safe cocoon of my pillow and blanket. Stomach troubles covered all the bases, and
required practically no further explanation.

My mom tucked me in, put a beeswax candle and a mug of peppermint tea by my bed, and lit a stick of Lord Buddha incense. Usually
the familiar, heady scent instantly relaxed me, but at the moment I felt overwhelmingly anxious, as if something bad was going
to happen.

“Is there anything else I can do for you, sweetie? Maybe a foot rub would help.”

I shook my head and tried to smile.

“I just need to sleep, Mom,” I said.

“Okay,” she replied. “Try to drink some of the tea. It will help.”

“I will,” I told her.

She had to leave. If she didn’t, if she stood looking down at me for one more minute with that concerned expression on her
face, I was going to burst into tears. All those spirit orbs that had appeared in the photograph in my room—did she already
know about them? Did they cluster around her, too? Why was I the only medium in the world who was scared of ghosts? I closed
my eyes tightly, and tried to shoo the thoughts away.

“Sleep well, sweetie. Give a shout if you need anything.”

I nodded, keeping my eyes closed. The telltale creak of the floorboards told me when she had walked out of my room. I lay
absolutely still. I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was being watched. That all those spirit orbs contained souls of people
who were following me, trying to get my attention like a herd of celebrity-chasing paparazzi calling my name with the hope
I would look their way.

“Leave me alone,” I whispered.

I opened my eyes and stared at the candle by my bed. There was a golden halo of light around the flame—a hallmark of beeswax
candles, so I’m told. On my chest of drawers, the tip of the incense glowed red. Downstairs I could hear quiet music. Everything
was normal. Everything was safe.

So why was I still in such a state of panic?

There’s a lake that I envision when I need to distract myself, or if I can’t sleep. My happy place, if you want to call it
that. It’s a small lake surrounded by mountains and framed by pine trees. The water is astonishingly clear and warm. The sunlight
there is more than warm and bright; it is alive somehow. It is intelligent and compassionate. The lake is a place of complete
safety.

Even tonight, my lake worked its magic on me. My heart stopped pounding and the feeling of dread started to fade. One moment
I was feeling the relaxing warmth of the imagined sun, and the next I had drifted off to sleep.

That’s when the dreams started.

First I was in a concert hall. Jac was onstage, playing some kind of cello sonata. It was a difficult and emotional piece.
Jac had long hair which flew about her head as she played. It almost looked like she was wrestling with the cello. I noticed
someone standing in the wings and realized it was Jac’s mother. Jac continued to play, but I noticed that her hands had begun
to bleed. The cello seemed to be growing larger—so big that Jac could barely support it. I was afraid the weight of it was
going to crush her.

I wanted to call out to Jac to stop playing, but I was afraid. The concert hall was full of people, and Jac’s mother was right
up there, urging her on. Someone sitting behind me started laughing meanly. I turned around and recognized Brooklyn Bigelow.
She was one of the “popular” girls from school—the one who had found out my mother was a medium earlier in the school year
and used the information to try to humiliate me. Your classic mean girl. Brooklyn was pointing at Jac and snickering.

“She can’t do it,” Brooklyn was saying. “Look at her. She’s going to pieces up there.”

“Leave her alone,” I hissed. “Just leave her alone!”

Brooklyn ran a hand through her highlighted hair and laughed. I was afraid to look back on the stage. I was afraid that Brooklyn
was right, that Jac was literally coming apart onstage. I couldn’t stand to see it happen. I got up and ran up the aisle and
out of the auditorium. The dream changed.

I was at my lake. I could smell the pine trees and feel the gentle lake breeze on my face. A hummingbird flew past me, hovered
nearby for a moment, then whizzed away. The lake itself was luminescent and peaceful. I walked closer to the water’s edge
and saw a boat in the water, tethered to a tree on the shore by a single white cord. There was someone in the boat. A small
figure with soot-colored hair.

It was Tank.

I waded into the water, trying to get closer to him. The lake seemed to be expanding behind him. It was transforming itself
into something huge, like an ocean. As the lake grew, the white cord stretched taut. The little boat rose and sank on waves
that were growing increasingly larger.

I waded deeper. Somehow in the dream I knew I had to get to Tank before the cord broke and he was swept away from the shore.
I had to get to him soon, or it would be too late. I struggled through the water. The sand fell away from beneath my feet.
I was in over my head.

I heard something snap. The cord had broken, and the waves were carrying the boat away.

“Tank!” I called.

But I couldn’t get to him. The boat grew smaller and smaller. I was treading water, and the waves were beginning to wash over
my head. I had to swim back. I turned toward the shore. It was gone. There was nothing but water in every direction.

I woke up kicking and breathless, but I was safe in my own bed. The room had grown dark while I was asleep.

The candle, for some reason, had gone out.

Jac called the next morning.

“You’re back!” I exclaimed. “You have no idea how happy that makes me. I’m going off my nut around this house. You need to
rescue me.”

There was a pause.

“So what’s going on?” I asked.

“I need to get out of here,” Jac said. “I need to go somewhere where there are no musicians and no parents, and there are
plenty of sweet, caffeinated drinks, and brownies the size of phone books.”

“Can you get out of the house now?”

“Not even an act of God could stop me,” Jac said. I noticed she was speaking very quietly, like she didn’t want anyone to
hear her. I imagined that Jac’s mother trying to block the front door might be considered an act of God.

“I could meet you downtown. At the Bean Factory?” I asked, referring to our local version of Starbucks. I wanted to get away
from my house, too.

“I can be there by ten thirty,” Jac said. Now she was really whispering. “And promise me something, Voodoo Mama. For the first
sixty minutes at the very least, swear you will not ask me about the conference, or mention the cello, or any stringed instrument.”

“I swear,” I said.

“Gotta hop,” Jac whispered.

The line went dead.

Whatever was going on with Jac, it sounded serious. But I couldn’t help feeling a sense of overwhelming relief. This was exactly
the distraction I needed—and a reason to get out of the house and away from messages on windowpanes and clusters of spirit
orbs.

I dressed quickly, dragged a brush through my dark tangles, and stared at myself in the mirror. There were circles under my
eyes, not surprising since I’d had trouble getting back to sleep after my dreamfest. I put on a pair of my biggest, most dangly
silver earrings to divert attention from the puffy circles. Makeup just wasn’t an option. My mother never wore it, and the
few times I’d tried it on, I’d felt like a clown.

The kitchen was empty, though my mother had left some freshly baked muffins out for me. I stuck my head around the door and
could see that her office door was closed, meaning she had a client in for a spirit reading. Occasionally, my mother’s sessions
caused strange things to happen in the rest of the house—a sort of paranormal ripple effect. This was one morning that I categorically
did not one to see one speck of supernatural activity, so I scrawled a note telling my mom where I was going and grabbed a
muffin for the bus ride. I stopped in the living room to kiss Max, promised I’d take him for a long walk later, and presented
him with a chunk of muffin.

I closed the front door quietly, the unfamiliar car in the driveway reminding me that my mother had someone in a session.
I was on the sidewalk heading in the direction of the bus stop when I noticed that the man with the shaggy black and gray
hair was back. He was standing in the same place I’d seen him the day before. A bike was leaning against the fence behind
him.

I felt self-conscious, though he couldn’t possibly know I’d spied on him through my camera’s zoom lens. I walked down the
sidewalk, trying to appear extremely interested in my muffin. But I sensed that the man was watching me from across the street.
My curiosity got the better of me and I glanced over in his direction. He was looking at me. He raised his hand and waved,
and I gave a little wave in response, but I quickened my pace. In a minute or so I’d reached the end of the block, and I turned
right, the bus stop now in sight.

The bus was just pulling in. I sent silent thanks to the Universe for the convenience, as my mother had always taught me to
do, and grabbed a seat near the back by a window. As the bus pulled out, I felt another wave of relief. For now, at least,
I was leaving all my troubles behind.

When I got off the bus a block from the Bean Factory, I could see that Jac had already snagged a prime table outside. A hefty
brownie, a chocolate milk, and a selection of little cookies were arranged on a plate in front of her. She was deeply engrossed
in a magazine when I walked up to her.

“Maestra!” I called.

Jac looked up and squealed.

“Guess who’s going to
jail
?”

My mouth dropped open. Things were apparently worse than I’d realized.

“Not . . . Jac . . . you don’t mean . . . you?”

Jac looked momentarily enraged, then cracked up and swatted me with her
Star
magazine.

“Kat, please. Even my utterly disastrous life does not involve incarceration. No, it’s Houston! Houston Ramada?”

Though I don’t watch
Entertainment Tonight
or E! Television like Jac does, for once I actually knew who she was talking about. Houston Ramada was the poster child for
celebrities famous for doing nothing but existing, serving no purpose but to annoy the rest of us. She was the main attraction
in most of the glossy gossip mags, and Jac was addicted to celebrity gossip. It was an aspect of her personality that fit
neither her position as a cello genius nor her preppy, conservative appearance. Hence, I loved it about her.

“I got you a frozen Mocha-Cho and a brownie. Sit down and listen to what this moron DID!”

Ah, yes. We had agreed to pretend that nothing was going on with Jac, and I had decided to pretend that nothing was going
on with me, for the next hour. I was more than happy to oblige.

“So she got her driver’s license suspended, right? Remember, back in De-cember?”

Jac was staring at me with the wide-eyed expression she reserved for the recounting of celebrity mishaps. Her red hair had
been recently cut, exposing her tiny ears, and making her look even more pixielike than she usually did.

“And she got pulled over for speeding in January, and she claimed that she didn’t realize that having your license suspended
meant you couldn’t drive!”

Jac paused to take a bite of a gigantic brownie, and I took a long, brain-freezing sip of my frozen Mocha-Cho.

“So then she gets pulled over again—
again
—in February, and this time she says her publicist told her that she
was
allowed to drive again. So they make her sign this paper, right? This paper that says that she understands and accepts that
she is
not
allowed to drive until her license is reinstated. Right?”

I nodded emphatically, enjoying Jac’s increasingly frenzied delivery of the story.

“So last week, Houston goes to this Celebrity Car Wash event
driving
her Hum-mer! And is totally surprised when she gets busted!”

Jac paused here, waiting for me to say something.

“Un-be-flipping-
lievable
!” I exclaimed. This seemed to satisfy Jac, because she immediately continued.

“So now she’s having this petition circulated, addressed to—and I’m not making this up—the Governor of California, saying
that she was unfairly persecuted because of her celebrity status, and that sending her to jail is like this scandalous abuse
of the justice system.”

I nodded and made an outraged face, secretly delighted at Jac’s moral fury.

“So apparently she really is going to jail for a couple weeks. She’ll have to eat bologna sandwiches and wear an orange jumpsuit.”