You Can't Come in Here! (4 page)

“How was school today, honey?” Emily's mom asked as the family sat down for dinner that evening.

Emily glanced at the clock and saw that it was 7:55.
We're eating early tonight
, she thought as she dug into her dinner.
For us, anyway.

“It was okay,” she replied to her mom. “You know, the usual. Lunch with Hannah and Ethan, surrounded by a few classes.”

“Funny,” her dad said. “I guess I don't have to ask what your favorite subject is.”

Since they were on the topic of lunch and Ethan and Hannah, Emily thought this might be a good time to mention the plan they had cooked up. She didn't think it would be a problem, but after all, there could
be no party without her parents' permission.

“So, Hannah, Ethan and I were talking at lunch,” Emily began. “You know, about what to do for the end of the school year?”

“How about finish your schoolwork and get good grades?” her dad suggested.

“I mean,
after
we do all that, Dad,” she replied, smiling. There had been a time when her dad's dumb little jokes would have really bothered her. She took it as a sign of her ever-growing maturity that she could ignore them—like Mom always did.

“Another trip to Ride World?” her mom asked.

“Nah, we talked about that, but we wanted to do something different this year,” Emily explained.

“How about a thrilling outing to Miniature Golf Palace?” her dad chimed in. “They have eight different courses, and you haven't lived till you've played them all twice.”

Emily's mom gave her a look and smiled. “Here we go again.”

“I aced the clown-face course,” her dad continued. “Every hole is a different clown face. Put the ball in the last clown's mouth and his nose lights up!”

“Actually, we were thinking of having a party,” Emily said, cutting right to the chase before the entire evening slipped away. “A sleepover party.”

“Oh,” said her mom, thinking this over. “Where? Here?”

“Of course,” Emily said quickly. “You guys are the best. You know Hannah's parents are super uptight about everything, and Ethan's grandmother has an apartment in his basement so there's nowhere for us to hang out. Plus, everybody's so comfortable here.”

“Everybody except Drew and Vicky, it seems,” her mom said. “Will you be inviting them to the party?”

“Sure,” Emily said. “I really want all my other friends to meet them.”

“Well, that's fine, but I would really like to officially meet them and their parents, especially if they're going to be sleeping over in my house,” her mom said.

“Well, Vicky will,” Emily corrected her. “Drew and Ethan and any other boys who come will have to leave at some point, of course.”

“Well, yes,” her mom said.

“And you'll meet Drew and Vicky and their parents, I promise,” Emily said, hoping she could keep her word. “Speaking of which, I told them I would go hang
out tonight. See ya at nine thirty.”

“Have fun, honey,” her mom said as Emily got up from the table.

“I still think Miniature Golf Palace is a great idea!” her dad shouted as Emily slipped out the door.

A few minutes later Emily was in the Strigs' rec room, strumming on an electric guitar.

“Ready to rock out?” Drew asked, cranking up the volume on his amp.

“I'm just ready to try to keep up with you guys,” Emily said, tuning the final string on her guitar.

“All right, enough talk,” Vicky said. “Here we go. One-two-three-four!”

Counting off the tune, Vicky began bashing out power chords on her guitar. Emily, who was still a relative newcomer to the instrument, did her best to follow the chord changes as Vicky sped through the song.

Meanwhile, Drew played lead guitar, his fingers flashing up and down the fret board. He played a run of superfast notes, then bent some very high notes until it sounded as if the strings would pop right off.

As she struggled to keep up, Emily continued to be impressed by how well it seemed these two did
everything. The first song ended, and Emily felt good that she had at least known how to play all the chords that Vicky was strumming.

“Wow! You guys are really good,” Emily said, catching her breath. “I know it seems like I say that every time I come here, but it's true.”

“We do get to practice a lot,” Drew said.

“It comes with hanging out at home most of the time,” Vicky added.

Emily took this as an opening. “So, about that. What would you say about coming to a sleepover party at my house this Saturday?” she asked.

“We'd have to check with our mom,” Vicky replied. “She's a little weird about stuff like that.”

“Stuff like what?” Emily asked.

“Sleeping over other people's houses,” Vicky replied. “They like us being home.”

“Well, here's the thing,” Emily continued. “It's an end-of-the-school-year party and I really, really want you guys to come. My friends Hannah and Ethan will be there, and I'd love for you to get to know them so we can all hang out together this summer. Drew, all the boys have to go home around eleven, but Vicky, you can stay over.”

Drew and Vicky looked at each other. They seemed to be genuinely surprised by Emily's announcement. They also looked slightly confused.

“It's nice of you to ask us,” Drew finally said after an awkward few moments of silence.

“Of course,” Emily said. “But the thing is, my mom wants to meet you and your parents first, you know, like now, before you come for the party, so the sooner you can convince your parents to say yes, the better it will be.”

“I'll talk to them later,” Vicky said. “They're busy now.”

“How are they putting up with our loud guitar playing?” Emily asked, smiling.

“They love it,” said Drew. “Seriously. And speaking of which, let's play another tune.”

The trio broke into another song, and Emily was blown away by how Drew seemed to get better with each note he played.
He's better than half the musicians I hear on the radio
, she thought.
And he's only a kid. He has a chance to be a pro when he grows up.

Again, Emily pushed herself. She could almost feel her playing improve as she concentrated intently. The song ended, and Drew gave her a high five.

“Nice!” he said. “You are getting so much better, Emily. We should go on the road!”

The road?
Emily thought.
This guy isn't even allowed to leave his house!

“Just kidding!” Drew said quickly. “Want to do another?”

“Sure, but first I need to use your bathroom,” Emily announced. She pulled the guitar over her head and placed it on its stand. Then she headed for a door on the far side of the rec room.

Emily reached out to open the door.

“Don't open that!” Vicky cried out in panic.

Emily jumped in fright, pulling back her hand as if she had just received an electric jolt. “I'm sorry!” she said automatically, her heart still pounding in her chest, though she couldn't figure out what she had done wrong.

“No,
I'm
the one who should apologize, Emily,” Vicky said, looking more pale than usual. “I didn't mean to have such an extreme reaction, and I didn't mean to scare you. It's just that that bathroom is broken and it has to be fixed. The last time someone went in there and used it, water went everywhere and the whole house was flooded for a week.”

“You could go outside and pee in the woods behind our house,” Drew suggested, flashing a big smile. “That's what I do.”

Emily grimaced. “Gross! You sound like my friend Ethan. I'll just wait until I get home.”

“So, Ping-Pong?” Vicky asked brightly. “I owe you a chance to get revenge for the foosball games on Friday night.”

“Sure, why not?” Emily said.

The two picked up paddles from the Ping-Pong table set up in the corner of the room and began to volley back and forth. Drew continued to pluck out riffs on his guitar while the two girls smacked the ball over the net.

Emily held her own for a while. But then Vicky seemed to shift her game into a higher gear and put her away, winning easily.

“It's a good thing I really like you guys,” Emily said, tossing her paddle onto the table. “Otherwise I would hate you for being so good at everything.”

“You'll get there,” Vicky said.

“Nice of you to say,” Emily sighed. Glancing at her phone, she noticed that it was 9:20. “I think I'll head home a couple of minutes early and shock my mom
when she sees me without having to text me to tell me what time it is. And I also gotta . . . well, you know.” She gestured toward the door to the broken bathroom.

“Okay, so your homework, young lady, young man, is to work on your parents,” Emily said, doing her best impression of a grown-up voice. “Then you all have to come over and meet mine. And then you can come for the sleepover and meet my friends. It'll be a great start to an awesome summer! See ya.”

Emily headed over to her house. She hoped that maybe her little jokey encouragement would get Drew and Vicky to convince their parents to let them come over. Just before she reached her own front door, she heard a faint sound coming from across the street.

A-hooooo!
Ow-ow-w!

She stopped short, the blood seeming to freeze in her veins.

“The wolf!” she whispered to herself. “That's the same howl I heard the other night. And now I know I'm awake.”

A-hooooo!
Ow-ow-w!

The sound came again, and this time Emily could pinpoint where it was coming from: the woods behind the Strigs' house.

“I've got to find out if I'm imagining things or figure out what in the world is going on here.” She hurried back across the street, slipping past the Strigs' front porch, then circled around behind their house. Pausing for a moment at the edge of the thick grove of trees, she plunged into the dark woods.

“What am I doing here?” Emily wondered aloud as she picked her way past craggy branches, her feet crunching on fallen leaves and dried-out twigs.

Deeper she went, feeling the darkness close in all around her.

Something ran right past her. She actually heard the sound of something tearing through the woods a split second before she saw the streak.

“Yah!” she screamed, backing up and crashing into a tree.

Whatever it was flashed past her again, then disappeared, swallowed up by the darkness and silence.

Was it the wolf? Where did it go?

Deciding not to wait around to find out, Emily turned and ran. The woods were not very big, but panic made her doubt her usually reliable sense of direction. No. She was not about to get lost in the tiny woods she
had been playing in since she was a little kid.

“Ah, there's the exit,” she said to herself, breathing a sigh of relief. “And I can see streetlights between the leaves.”

Just before she stepped out of the woods, Emily caught sight of something fluttering in the breeze up ahead.

“What is that?” she wondered aloud. When she got close enough to see, Emily gasped in horror. She was staring at a tuft of fur dangling from a tree branch—wolf fur—covered with blood.

Emily put her head down and ran, her legs pumping, her arms shoving branches out of the way. She crashed through the last bit of woods that stood between that tuft of fur and safety, bursting out onto the sidewalk.

Glancing back over her shoulder toward the Strigs' house, she wondered if Drew and Vicky had heard the howling this time. Maybe they even had seen her running in fear from the woods she knew so well. Or maybe they saw whatever she had spotted running through the woods. But their house was dark. There was no sign of her two friends.

Emily dashed across the street to her front door and then paused.

Gotta catch my breath
, she thought.
Can't let Mom
and Dad see me all freaked out like this.

She wiped the sweat from her forehead with her sleeve and pushed her hair back into some sort of order. Then she took a deep breath and reached for the front door.

“Everything's fine. Everything's fine,” she whispered, hoping this mantra would calm her down. “Everything's—YAH!”

She was startled by the text message alert coming from her cell phone—her mother's curfew reminder. She opened the door and stepped into her house.

“I almost beat your text tonight,” she said, forcing a big smile—maybe a bit too big. “I was right outside the door when I got it.”

“Everything okay, honey?” her mom asked. “You look . . . Did something happen tonight at Drew and Vicky's?”

“Nothing out of the ordinary,” Emily replied, trying hard to pull herself together. “You know, we, uh, played guitar, then Vicky whipped me at Ping-Pong. The usual.”