Myra’s hand flew back. The knife was poised for another strike.
And then she heard it.
They all heard it, spirits and fleshbound alike. Every one of them looked up, straining to see where it was coming from.
It was the high, piping voice of a child. “Mommy? Mommy, where are you?”
Lisa cried out in joy as she saw a light above her, a beautiful light. The voice came from somewhere within it.
One by one Myra Halston’s fingers opened. She dropped the knife. “Carrie? Carrie, is that you?”
“Mommy, where are you? I’ve been waiting for you!”
A look of rapture transformed Myra Halston’s face. She threw out her arms and cried in joy, “I’m coming, Carrie! I’m coming!”
There was a flash of light.
And then she was gone.
Lisa looked up into a pair of remarkably blue eyes.
“Brian!”
He had his hand on the side of his face. Blood trickled between his fingers. “I’m glad you’re all right,” he said. “I was worried—”
That was as far as he got. His legs buckled, and he collapsed. Lisa sat up and looked around. Carrie and her grandmother stood a few feet away, looking dazed.
“Help me!” cried Lisa. “We’ve got to get him to the hospital.”
As if waking from a trance, they walked slowly toward Lisa.
“Lisa?” asked Carrie tentatively. “Is it really you?”
“Of course it’s me!” she snapped in exasperation. Then she realized why Carrie might well wonder, and said more softly. “Yes, it’s really me. Myra is gone for good now, sweetie. Now come on. I need your help.”
They walked hesitantly forward. Lisa felt a piercing sorrow. How long would it be before her sister trusted her again? She looked at her grandmother. “What’s wrong with your arm, Gramma?”
Dr. Miles scowled. “It’s broken, I think. You threw me against Brian’s car.”
“It wasn’t me!” cried Lisa. “Can’t you see that?”
Dr. Miles frowned. “Yes. I’m sorry. that was a terrible thing to say.” She looked around, as if noticing where they were for the first time. “Carrie, give your sister a hand! We’ve got to help Brian.”
Carrie took Brian’s feet. Lisa put her hands under his arms. Working together, they dragged him around the corner of the house. Brian’s car was blocking theirs, so rather than move his car and then have to hunt for the keys to their own car, Lisa decided to use his. She searched in his pants pockets and found the keys. Then they managed to get Brian into the back seat.
They squeezed Dr. Miles in back, too. She clutched her useless arm, pain glazing her eyes. Lisa closed the door for her. “It’ll be all right, Gramma,” she whispered. “We’ll get it taken care of soon.”
Lisa walked around the car and closed the other door. It turned her stomach to see the gaping wound on Brian’s handsome face. Myra’s knife had done its work well. Lisa shuddered. She wondered how many stitches he would require.
She glanced across at her grandmother. Dr. Miles nodded weakly.
Lisa went to the front of the car and slid in behind the steering wheel. She only had a learner’s permit. But she had a feeling there would be no problem with the police if they should stop her. She had plenty of reason to be heading for the hospital.
She looked beside her and felt tears spring out in her eyes. Carrie was cowering against the passenger door, her face twisted by a look of terror.
“Hey, Carrie, it’s all over,” she said, reaching out to her sister.
Carrie began to scream. “Don’t touch me!” she cried. “Don’t touch me! Don’t touch me! Don’t touch me!”
Tears streaming down her face, Lisa headed for the hospital.
Epilogue
Lisa stamped the snow off her feet.
“Mail call!” she cried, throwing her hat onto the brass rack in the foyer.
“Anything for me?” asked her mother. She was sitting at the kitchen table, studying the textbook for her computer-programming course.
“Two bills,” said Lisa. “And an advertisement wanting you to subscribe to Modern Motorcycling.”
Mrs. Burton made a face. “Thanks a lot. Next time don’t bother.”
“I don’t write ‘em, I just deliver ‘em,” said Lisa with a smile.
“How about me?” asked Carrie.
“Not a thing.”
“Look at her grinning!” said Carrie. “You and I didn’t make out so well, Mom, but I bet I can tell you one letter that’s in that pile.”
“That doesn’t take a mental giant,” said Mrs. Burton. “She gets one every day. Like clockwork.”
“Ha!” said Lisa. “You’re just jealous. Both of you.”
She headed up the stairs to her room. She had just settled into the chair at her desk when she heard Carrie say, “Will you read me some of it? Not the mushy parts. Just any news.”
Lisa turned around. Carrie was standing in her doorway. Though Lisa didn’t say a thing she felt a surge of elation. This was the first time Carrie had come into her room since they had returned from Sayers Island more than six months ago.
The first two months had been awful. Carrie would hardly go near Lisa. And the first time their parents had left the sisters alone together, Carrie had begun to scream as if she were being attacked. Mrs. Burton had rushed back to find Carrie in a corner, huddling in terror, and Lisa standing helplessly in the center of the room, tears streaming down her face.
It had taken months of patient talking and careful overtures to get Carrie out of her state of constant fear. Lisa knew she would carry the effects of what had happened on the island for the rest of her life.
But she was making progress. That was good.
“I said, will you read me part of it?” repeated Carrie.
Lisa smiled. “Sure. Have a seat, squirt.”
Carrie walked over to Lisa’s desk. Lisa could sense her sister’s nervousness. It hurt to see her that way. But she knew she had to be patient.
She opened the envelope and scanned the front side of the letter.
“Well, everything’s fine,” she said. “Is that what you wanted to know?”
“Lisa!”
Lisa smiled. “Okay, I’ll give you some details. ‘Dear Lisa. I miss you more than…’ Well, you don’t need to hear that. Let’s see. Second paragraph. ‘Every night before I go to sleep…’ No, that’s not really news either. Hmm. There must be something here that would be of interest to you.”
She glanced in her sister’s direction. Carrie was grinning. But she was also beginning to look quite exasperated.
Lisa turned the letter over and let out a shriek of delight.
“What is it?” cried Carrie. “What does it say?”
“Oh, nothing much,” said Lisa, a grin splitting her face. “I’ll read it to you. Ahem. ‘I got an interesting piece of mail the other day. It was a letter from Burnham College. My application has been accepted, and they’ve granted me a scholarship that will just about cover what my parents and I aren’t able to come up with. Do you think you can stand it if I spend the next four years in your neighborhood?’ It’s signed, ‘Love, Scarface.’”
Carrie sighed. “Gosh, that’s so romantic.”
Lisa laughed. “Come on, twerp. I’ll play you a game of Monopoly.”
Thank you for reading Waiting Spirits. If you enjoyed it (and I hope you did!) please take a moment to review it… I would truly appreciate it.
If you’d like to know more about me and my work, you can find me on the web at www.brucecoville.com. You can also order autographed copies of print versions of most of my books there.
A Personal History by Bruce Coville
I arrived in the world on May 16, 1950. Though I was born in the city of Syracuse, New York, I grew up as a country boy. This was because my family lived about twenty miles outside the city, and even three miles outside the little village of Phoenix, where I went to school from kindergarten through twelfth grade.
Our house was around the corner from my grandparents’ dairy farm, where I spent a great deal of time playing when I was young, then helping with chores when I was older. Yep, I was a tractor-ridin’, hay-bale-haulin’, garden-weedin’ kid.
I was also a reader.
It started with my parents, who read to me (which is the best way to make a reader)—a gift for which I am eternally grateful. In particular it was my father reading me Tom Swift in the City of Gold that turned me on to “big” books. I was particularly a fan of the Doctor Dolittle books, and I can remember getting up ahead of everyone else in the family so that I could huddle in a chair and read The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle.
I also read lots of things that people consider junk: Nancy Drew, the Hardy Boys, and zillions of comic books. In regard to the comics, I had a great deal going for me. My uncle ran a country store just up the road, and one of the things he sold was coverless comic books. (The covers had been stripped off and sent back to the publishers for credit. After that, the coverless books were sent to little country stores, where they were sold for a nickel apiece.) I was allowed to borrow them in stacks of thirty, read them, buy the ones I wanted to keep, and put the rest back in the bins for someone else to buy. It was heaven for a ten-year-old!
My only real regret from those years is the time I spent watching television, when I could have been reading instead. After all, the mind is a terrible thing to waste!
The first time I can remember thinking that I would like to be a writer came in sixth grade, when our teacher, Mrs. Crandall, gave us an extended period of time to write a long story. I had been doing poorly at writing all year long because we always had to write on a topic Mrs. Crandall chose. But this time, when I was free to write whatever I wanted, I loved doing it.
Of course, you think about doing many different things when you’re a kid, but I kept coming back to the thought of being a writer. For a long time my dream job was to write for Marvel Comics.
I began working seriously at writing when I was seventeen and started what became my first novel. It was a terrible book, but I had a good time writing it and learned a great deal in the process.
In 1969, when I was nineteen, I married Katherine Dietz, who lived around the corner from me. Kathy was (and is) a wonderful artist, and we began trying to create books together, me writing and Kathy doing the art.
Like most people, I was not able to start selling my stories right away. So I had many other jobs along the way, including toymaker, gravedigger, cookware salesman, and assembly line worker. Eventually I became an elementary school teacher and worked with second and fourth graders, which I loved.
It was not until 1977 that Kathy and I sold our first work, a picture book called The Foolish Giant. We have done many books together since, including Goblins in the Castle, Aliens Ate My Homework, and The World’s Worst Fairy Godmother, all novels for which Kathy provided illustrations.
Along the way we also managed to have three children: a son, Orion, born in 1970; a daughter, Cara, born in 1975; and another son, Adam, born in 1981. They are all grown and on their own now, leaving us to share the house with a varying assortment of cats.
A surprising side effect of becoming a successful writer was that I began to be called on to make presentations at schools and conferences. Though I had no intention of becoming a public speaker, I now spend a few months out of every year traveling to make speeches and have presented in almost every state, as well as such far-flung places as Brazil, China, Ethiopia, and Bangladesh.
Having discovered that I love performing and also that I love audiobooks, in 1990 I started my own audiobook company, Full Cast Audio, where we record books using multiple actors (sometimes as many as fifty in one book!) rather than a single voice artist. We have recorded over one hundred books, by such notable authors as Tamora Pierce, Shannon Hale, and James Howe. In addition to being the producer, I often direct and usually perform in the recordings.
So there you go. I consider myself a very lucky person. From the time I was young, I had a dream of becoming a writer. With a lot of hard work, that dream has come true, and I am blessed to be able to make my living doing something that I really love.
Hey, baby! You looking at me? I was born on May 16, 1950, in Syracuse, New York. In this picture I’m one year old.
As a farm boy, I learned to drive a tractor when I was quite young.
Reading was always important to me—anytime, anywhere.
I planned to be a cowboy …
But I ended up a boy scout. (From the look on my face, I think I just got away with something …)
In 1969 I married Kathy. She lived right around the corner from me. She’s an artist and has illustrated twenty of my books. We have three children—Orion, Cara, and Adam.
Here’s me at Buckshot Lake. Apparently no one told me I was supposed to sit in the boat.
As a young father, I often functioned as a piece of furniture.
Here’s me with my daughter. I swear I did not steal her candy!
A rare sighting of my half-mad brother Igor (on the right), star of Goblins in the Castle. When I was an elementary school teacher, Igor would visit my classroom every Halloween to celebrate his birthday. For some reason the two of us were never seen together. It was a puzzling mystery. This is a picture of Igor posing with my wife’s little brother.
Something has clearly gone very, very right!
Often I give speeches about reading and writing. But sometimes I get a little carried away.
No, seriously, I meant it when I said I get carried away …
I not only write books, I read them aloud, too. Here I am recording an audiobook for my company, Full Cast Audio. Whatever I just read has clearly surprised me!
I love my books … they make me happy! I hope they do the same for you. Photo courtesy of Charles Wainwright.
All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Originally published by Bantam Books as part of the Dark Forces series
Revised version published by Archway Books as part of the Bruce Coville’s Chamber of Horrors series
Copyright © 1984, 1996, 2013 by Bruce Coville
Cover design by Connie Gabbert
ISBN: 978-1-4976-6853-9
This edition published in 2014 by Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.
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Bruce Coville, Waiting Spirits
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