Spirits of Spring (The Haunting Ruby Series Book 4) (17 page)

“Dad, I’m sorry! Please let me explain everything!”

“There isn’t anything left to explain—Shelly already
told me everything. You can see ghosts. Big deal. The only one
left with some explaining to do is Lascher the Basher.”

What?! “You aren’t mad at me—for all the lies I told?”

“No. I’m mad that Principal Lascher isn’t doing
anything about you being bullied by that Landrum girl.
But
why should I expect a bully to take care of another bully? He
hasn’t changed since his days of pushing me around in high
school but
I
have. If he doesn’t take care of this situation once
and for all, I’ll have his job. I just wish that I hadn’t let Shelly
talk me out of it months ago when that video of you went viral.”

WTF?
There were so many shocking elements to this
conversation that my brain didn’t even know where to start
trying to comprehend it. My dad wasn’t mad at me? Principal
Lascher bullied
him
in high school? My dad knew the meaning
of the word “viral” when used outside of the medical context?
Clearly, I wasn’t the only one hiding secrets in this family.
Figuring that if my dad wasn’t mad at me, I shouldn’t push it, I
decided instead to focus on the shocking revelation that he was
bullied in high school.

“Lascher the Basher?” I queried. “Are you trying to tell
me that you—Mr. Personality himself—was bullied in school,
too? Prove it.” Even with all of the weird things I’d come to
accept in my life, I found
that
one hard to believe.

“Yes, I was bullied. Andy, too. Basher was a couple
years
older than us
and made our lives
a living
hell our
sophomore year. And as for proof, take one look at my year
book and you won’t doubt it one bit. Andy and I were total
dorks back then.”

Really? Andy was one of the coolest adults I knew and
my dad was, well, he was
my dad
. But everyone
else
seemed to
think he was awesome.

“Okay, where is it? I wanna see you and Andy as dorks.”

 

“Now? Can’t this wait until after I’ve ripped Lascher the
Basher a new you know what?”

 

No. No, it couldn’t. “I’m not leaving this house until
I
see proof.”

“Fine,” he said with a sigh. “Just be quick about it, will
you? I need to get back to the hospital before three for a board
meeting. My yearbooks are on the bookshelf in my Man Cave.
Sophomore year, remember? We got a hell of a lot cooler after
he graduated.”

Running shoes came in handy as I raced to uncover my
dad’s hidden days of dorkdom.
Quickly, I grabbed the correct
yearbook
off
the
shelf
and
leafed
through
its
pages
alphabetically.

I found Principal Lascher first and wasn’t surprised
with what I found—typical meathead jock.
When I got to
Andy’s photo, I lol’ed for real. The super cool veterinarian I had
come to know and love looked like nothing more than a stray
puppy himself. He was so tiny! And dorky. He had braces and
was sporting the worst hairstyle ever—a rattail.
After seeing
that
photo, I couldn’t wait to see what my dad’s looked like.
With sheer delight, I flipped to the M’s page. There he was in all
his geeky glory.

If there was an official hierarchy of nerdiness, my dad
was definitely near the pinnacle. I couldn’t believe my eyes. Or
his
hair
. Permed mullet. And if that wasn’t bad enough, he was
wearing thick glasses and a shirt buttoned up the whole way to
the top making him look like he had no neck. The only thing
missing was a pocket protector. I squinted closely at the photo
to make
sure
that it was missing. Whew, no pocket protector.
But he definitely still looked like the kind of boy who slept with
his calculator under his pillow. How was it possible that Mr.
Personality once looked this…dorky? If The Cougar had only
seen this photo, our first day in Charlotte’s Grove would have
been way less creepy—I think. I returned to the foyer, satisfied
that he really
was
telling me the truth.

“Satisfied?” my dad asked with an “I told you so” look
on his face.

 

“Oh yeah, I’m
more
than satisfied. Now let’s go take
care of those bullies!”

On the drive to the school, Dad filled me in on the many
ways Lascher the Basher dished out torture to him and Andy.
Suddenly, there was a bond between he and I that I never knew
existed. I decided to share some of the ways that Lee and I got
picked on back in Trinity. While none of that even compared to
what Misty and Lucas had done to me, they still weren’t happy
memories.

“Why didn’t you tell me about this years ago?” Dad
looked as shocked as I did when I heard that he had once been
not so popular.

“Because I didn’t think that you would understand. I
guess I was wrong, huh? And before you even ask, I’ll just come
right out and tell you why I didn’t tell you about the whole
ghost thing. I figured that you would just think I was crazy. For
real, if it weren’t for the fact that I
knew
that I wasn’t crazy, I
would have thought I was, too.”
As I listened to the words
coming from my mouth, I realized that statement alone would
probably convince anyone that I truly
had
fallen off of my
rocker.

“Well, you were wrong again on that one. I know you’re
not crazy. You’re just so much like your mother.”

“Mom could see ghosts, too?” I practically shouted.
“Why didn’t you ever tell me that before?” Did Rita know that
ghost hunting was genetic or did I just discover something else
that the paranormal research community would be fascinated
to hear?

“No, that isn’t what I meant, Ruby. Your mother
couldn’t see ghosts—that I know of anyway. But she was very
spiritually in tune with the world. She was just as creative as
you are. She was a mysteriously fascinating woman. I wish you
could remember her.”

“Yeah, me too. We should talk about her more often.”

 

“Yes, we should,” he replied wistfully. Not another
word passed between us until we entered the principal’s office.

While I assumed that my dad wanted me to come along
on this mission so that I could tell my side of the story, I was
wrong again. No, he pretty much wanted me to sit there and
watch him rip Principal Lascher a new you know what.
Once
Dad calmed down, Lascher pulled him aside for what felt like a
private conversation that I wasn’t intended to hear.
I heard
every word that was spoken.

“Jason, my hands are tied here.
Ruby only needs to
survive a couple more months in this school. I’ll try to watch
her back for her but that’s all I can do. I would love nothing
more than
to give that
Landrum
girl the punishment
she
deserves but I can’t. Jack Wolfe owns this town, owns this
school, owns
me
.”

“So that’s what this is about? You’re afraid of the Big
Bad Wolfe? Well, I’m not.”

“You should be. He’s more powerful than you know.
I’m sorry about everything that happened back in high school—
I was a complete jerk and I realize that now. If I could help you
out here, I would. But I have a family to support—I can’t risk
losing my job.
Please
try to see this from my perspective!”

“Look, Rob, I’m not asking you to expel her from school
or anything.
A simple three day suspension will suffice.
It
won’t tarnish her reputation any more than she has already
done for herself.”

“I can’t! You just don’t understand! I won’t go up
against him again.
Trust me, I tried a few months ago when
Zach Mason went ballistic on Ryan Fetterhoff.
Jack threatened
my job if I didn’t put Zach up for expulsion. I didn’t
want
to do
it—especially after everything that family has already been
through. It didn’t even make any sense because in the end, he
was the one who voted for Zach to stay in school. But I’ve
learned over the years not to question anything that man says.
That’s a lesson that I hope you don’t have to learn the hard
way.”

“Sorry, but I refuse to let this drop.
My lawyer will get
in touch with you. Come on, Ruby, we’re going home now.”

Principal
Lascher
looked
panic
stricken
but
said
nothing more. The second we got in the car, I asked my dad the
one burning question in my mind.

“What did he mean when he said that he didn’t want to
expel Zach especially after everything
his
family
has
been
through?” Did the Masons have some grand tragedy in their
past that I was unaware of?

Dad shook his head and looked as confused as I felt.
“I’m not sure. The only thing
I
can think of is what happened to
Garrett back in high school.”

“Yeah, exactly what
did
happen to him? Zach has talked
about it here and there but never in detail. I’m not sure
he
even
knows all of the details.”

“Neither do I—Garrett wasn’t even exactly sure what
happened that night. It happened the summer before my junior
year, the last weekend before school started.
All of the cool
kids were at a party up at Silver Lake—“

“So, you and Andy weren’t there that night then? Home
playing Dungeons and Dragons?” I couldn’t resist. Finding out
that my dad was once a nerd was akin to discovering the Holy
Grail in
my
book. Did Shelly know about this deep dark secret?
If not, she soon would!

I may have taken more after my mother, but I soon saw
that my dad and I shared another common trait—the super
dramatic eye roll. And boy was he good at it.

“You’re never going to let me live my geek days down,
are you?” He knew very well the answer to that question and
didn’t even pause long enough to give me time to come up with
a witty response. “Anyway, as I was saying, the cool kids—
minus me and Andy—had a party at Silver Lake that weekend.
Garrett will swear even to this day that he only had one beer
that night.
He said that he started feeling dizzy and went
outside for some air.
The next thing he remembers is waking
up in the woods, face down in the dirt with a searing pain in
both of his knees.
He heard the sound of someone running
away but never got a look at his attacker. Both of his kneecaps
were shattered with the baseball bat they found lying next to
him.”

“They never found out who did it? There must have
been tons of people at that party—somebody
had
to have seen
something.”

“Everyone swore that they didn’t hear or see a thing.
Since Garrett’s wallet was missing too, police blamed it on a
drifter that had been seen in the area around that same time.
They never caught that guy but they closed the case anyway.
Personally, I never bought into the drifter theory. It never quite
made sense to me—or to Garrett.
His chance for a football
scholarship was shot, of course. He was never the same after
that.”

For such a small town, Charlotte’s Grove sure held a lot
of mysteries—two very big ones at Silver Lake alone. Part of
me was tempted to dig around in the distant past and see if I
could find any information regarding what happened to Zach’s
dad. Who was I kidding? I wasn’t a detective—I was a ghost
hunter. No, scratch that—I
used
to be a ghost hunter and a very
reluctant one at that. The only ghost I ever really cared to help
was Clay and he was…gone. Clay was gone. Even if I couldn’t
help him move on, I at least wanted to apologize to him face to
face. I had to find him—I simply had to.

I spent the rest of the afternoon discussing everything
with Shelly. And this time I
do
mean everything. I even shared
with her my fantasy of pushing Misty into a shark tank.
As
always, Shelly had what turned out to be an even better idea.

“No good will ever come from wishing harm on your
enemies. That only makes you just as bad as she is. Don’t let
her drag you down. Instead, you need to find a way to let her
nastiness lift you up. How about the next time you see her, you
picture her
as
a shark? Think about it—picture it in your mind
for just a minute and tell me what happens.
Put that vivid
imagination of yours to work for you.”

I closed my eyes and did exactly what Shelly told me to
do. In my mind, I pictured Misty’s body with a shark head
perched on its shoulders.
A big, ugly shark face framed by
blonde extensions and reeking of chum.
A giant great white
with breast implants and designer clothes. I didn’t have to tell
Shelly what happened once that image was firmly seared into
my mind—she heard it for herself.

I laughed. “I have to hand it to you,” I said between
giggles, “what I imagined just now was priceless. Now it’s
my
turn to make
you
laugh.”

I pulled a Rachel and dragged Shelly into the Man Cave
with me and deposited her on one of the recliners before
grabbing Dad’s yearbook and joining her. My shark-inspired
laughter was nothing compared to her reaction to the permed
mullet. Once we had satisfactorily made enough fun of my dad,
we flipped through the pages in search of anyone else we might
know. When I saw Garrett’s photo, I literally gasped.

It was like looking at a time warped photo of Zach. The
clothing
and
hairstyle were super retro,
but the
face—the
smile—were exactly
the same.
I
suddenly
found myself
wondering what my mom looked like at my age.
I knew that
Dad didn’t have any pictures of her prior to when they started
dating and by that time, she was well into her twenties.
Even
those photos I hadn’t seen in years. As Shelly droned on about
how much she loved looking at old photos, I sat there sadly
thinking about all of the ones I would never get to see.
Time
flew by so quickly that I didn’t realize school was over until I
got simultaneous texts from both Zach and Rachel.