Ghoulfriends Just Want to Have Fun

  “Are you guys okay? You’re both trembling,” Venus whispered to Rochelle and Robecca.

  “Shhh, we’re just excited,” Robecca responded, determined not to miss a single word that Frankie and Draculaura uttered.

  “As copresidents of the Frightingale Society, Draculaura and I would like to welcome you to another great semester at Monster High,” Frankie announced while fidgeting with one of her silver neck bolts.

  “We are, as most of you know, a sorority dedicated to helping others and making lifelong ghoulfriends,” Draculaura added. “And so, with this in mind, I am making Project Scare and Care the first order of business. For those of you who don’t remember, this is one of our community-service programs.”

  “Now don’t freak out; we’re not talking about cleaning bathrooms or painting walls,” said Frankie with a smile.

  “Thank Ra!” Cleo interjected. “I spend a lot of time and money keeping my nails finely manicured.”

  “Project Scare and Care asks monsters to share one of their skills with the school,” Draculaura continued. “For example, I’m going to team up with Ms. Kindergrubber to offer vegetarian cooking lessons for anyone looking to go meat-free.”

  “And I’m partnering up with Clawdeen to help ghouls design and sew their own voltage outfits,” Frankie said cheerfully. “Does anyone have any ideas about what they’d like to do?”

  After a few seconds of hushed whispers, a hand went up very slowly at the back of the room. It was Ghoulia Yelps, who, as usual, was mumbling in Zombese.

  “The school’s smartest ghoul offering free tutoring? That’s amazing,” Frankie translated for those unable to understand Ghoulia’s native tongue.

  “Hey, mates, I’m thinking about doing something for the environment, maybe starting a recycling program,” Lagoona offered casually.

  “How about starting a compost pile with me instead?” Venus replied enthusiastically.

  “Absolutely! I’m in,” Lagoona agreed. “I always say we need to cut down on our trash, and a compost pile is the perfect way to do it.”

  “You would say that,” Toralei scoffed. “Well, I guess if I have to do something, I’ll allow one of the school’s starving artists to draw my purrfect face.”

  Frankie and Draculaura briefly exchanged amused looks before regaining their composure.

  “Actually, Toralei, we were hoping you might plan the Hex Factor Talon Show. It’s the new and improved version of the Talon Show, and organizing it will require someone with a…” Frankie paused, desperately racking her mind for a polite way to say “bossy.”

  “Strong personality,” Draculaura finished.

  “Excuse me?” Cleo cried as she jumped to her feet. “As one of the school’s most talented ghouls, don’t you think I should be in charge of the Hex Factor Talon Show? Plus, I’m royalty, so judging people comes naturally to me.”

  “Hold on a second,” Draculaura said, before whispering in Frankie’s ear for a moment.

  “After discussing the possibilities, we have come to realize that the best solution is for you ghouls to cochair the Hex Factor Talon Show. That way both of you get to participate, plus maybe it will help you ghouls improve your friendship,” Frankie announced apprehensively.

  “You mean you want me to partner with her?” Toralei snapped, glaring at Cleo. “A were-cat working with a second-rate royal? I don’t think so.”

  “Second in line to the throne but never second-rate. Not that I would expect a lowly alley cat like yourself to understand such a thing,” Cleo shot back angrily.

  As the school’s biggest divas exchanged grimaces, Frankie and Draculaura continued on with the meeting. Rochelle promptly offered to tutor trolls in English and hygiene, while Robecca agreed to teach Skultimate Roller Maze to the athletically challenged.

  By the time the gathering had finished, Robecca, Rochelle, and Venus were so tired, they could think of nothing they wanted to do more than climb into bed and pull the covers over their heads.

  “Penny better not be a bed hog tonight,” Robecca muttered as she entered the Chamber of Gore and Lore.

  “That’s one upside to having a pet plant; he doesn’t share the bed,” Venus said, stifling a yawn.

  “No, but he does eat jewelry and occasionally even fingers,” Robecca pointed out.

  “It’s not Chewy’s fault. He can’t see very well. He has no choice but to nibble first and ask questions later,” Venus grumbled while pulling off her pink boots.

  First Venus, then Robecca, and finally Rochelle flopped onto their beds and sighed loudly. But then the trio of ghouls heard two more sighs. Alarmed by the sounds, Rochelle jumped out of bed to inspect the room. She very quickly discovered one of the Van Sangre sisters (though she couldn’t tell which) sleeping under her bed.

  “Quelle horreur! What are you doing under here?” Rochelle gasped.

  “Taking a nap. Vat are you doing vaking me up?” Blanche muttered in response.

  “No way, you two,” Venus snapped, having just discovered Rose under her bed. “Get out of here!”

  “Vhy must you guys be so difficult? Ve are just a couple of gypsy vampires looking for a place to rest,” Rose whined.

  “You do realize that the school has provided an appropriate place for you to sleep. It’s called your room,” Rochelle explained.

  “Gypsy vampires do not like to stay put,” Rose said as she and Blanche climbed out from under the beds.

  Both dressed in polka-dot nightdresses and long velvet robes, the two slowly began stretching as if to wake themselves up.

  “Ghouls, calisthenics class is going to have to wait. We’re going to bed,” Venus said as her vines tightened around her arms.

  “I zink you owe us an apology,” Blanche demanded seriously.

  “For what?” Venus asked, utterly apoplectic.

  “Zat plant ate my ring,” Rose snapped. “And zat one ripped Blanche’s stockings while jumping at her feet,” she continued, pointing to Roux. “But the vorst vas the metal bird staring at us…. Zat zing is plain creepy!”

  The three ghoulfriends instantly burst out laughing, amazed by how well the Van Sangre sisters already knew their pets. Believing that Robecca, Rochelle, and Venus were laughing at them, Blanche and Rose turned up their noses and stormed angrily out of the room.

  The sun had barely crested over the scattering of clouds when Robecca flung back her comforter, grabbed Penny, and dashed out of her dorm room without so much as a word to her sleeping roommates.

  “I’m late! I’m late! Why am I always so late?” Robecca mumbled to herself as she stormed down the dormitory hall, taking out the silky spider curtain in the process.

  It wasn’t until the time-challenged ghoul found the Creepateria door locked that it occurred to her that she might not be late, but really, really early instead.

  “Oh, Penny! I was so sure I was late; I didn’t even think to see if Rochelle and Venus were still in the room. Why is it that time is never on my side?”

  Later that morning Rochelle and Venus sat in the Libury researching the school’s floor plan in an attempt to see how Miss Flapper’s visitor might have accessed the crawl space between the attic and the dormitory’s ceiling. With both of their heads buried in blueprints, they heard a familiar screeching sound reverberate throughout the quiet, dust-filled room.

  “Looking for us?” Venus asked, flinging her pink-and-green hair over her shoulder.

  “Boo-la-la, Robecca! Where have you been? It’s most disconcerting to start the day with a missing roommate,” Rochelle huffed, “especially in light of our new neighbor.”

  “Relax, Rochelle,” said Venus. “Robecca disappearing is as normal as the sun rising in the east and setting in the west. To be honest, if she didn’t disappear occasionally, I’d start to worry.”

  “Ghouls! We haven’t time for this,” Robecca muttered nervously. “Oh, just thinking about what I saw makes me want to steam clean my memory!”

  “What did you see? Was it Miss
Flapper? Did you find out who came to see her?” Venus asked animatedly.

  “Or something worse? Has she brought a new plague to Monster High? S’il ghoul plaît! I can’t take it! You must tell us!” Rochelle pleaded.

  “Okay,” Robecca said as she slowly sat down at the table and began pulling twigs from her hair.

  “Seriously, what happened? It looks like you were attacked by an elm tree or something,” Venus said as she inspected Robecca closely.

  “Actually, I kind of was….”

  “This is starting to sound très bizarre,” Rochelle squawked anxiously.

  “After I realized that I hadn’t overslept and had actually woken up really early, I decided to go ahead and post flyers for my Skultimate Roller Maze lessons,” Robecca stated apprehensively. “Only, while Penny and I were jetting around campus… I saw…”

  “Saw what?” Venus screeched impatiently.

  “A white cat! I was so terrified that I slammed into a tree! And, even worse, I lost Penny in the crash! Do you think the white cat has done something to her?”

  “No, of course not. Knowing Penny, she probably scared the cat off with her stink eye,” Venus tried to reassure Robecca, albeit not very convincingly.

  “It’s a sign. Whatever Miss Flapper is planning to do is going to be very, very bad,” Robecca babbled, rife with fear.

  “A white cat is not good… not good at all,” Venus seconded as she pulled at her vines. “Is it me or is it starting to feel like a greenhouse in here?”

  “It’s you,” Rochelle replied curtly as she shook her head and sighed, clearly dismayed by the conversation. “White cats are no more a threat to us than black cats are to normies. This is nothing more than a silly monster superstition—”

  “But I’ve heard stories,” Venus interrupted.

  “About them being bad omens? Oh, what nonsense! I thought you ghouls were smarter than this,” the levelheaded gargoyle snapped, packing up her book bag.

  “You’ve got to admit, Rochelle, in light of what we just heard, it could mean something,” Robecca said softly, almost reticently.

  “It means you two are more susceptible to silly stories than I previously thought. Now that is not to say that we aren’t in danger; we very well might be, but it has nothing to do with a white cat,” Rochelle replied, before looking directly at Robecca. “And please comb your hair before class. It looks like a forest, there are so many twigs in there!”

  “Where are you going?” Venus called out as Rochelle made her way toward the door.

  “I have my first session with Trick and Treat this morning.”

  “The trolls from Catacombing class?” Robecca asked.

  “Yes, they were the first ones to sign up. They are clearly very eager to improve their English and learn about hygiene,” Rochelle explained as she waved good-bye.

  Rochelle chose the Study Howl for her first trolltutoring session for two very good reasons: one, it was quiet; and two, there wasn’t any food available. Having previously seen trolls eat, she knew it was wise to avoid experiencing it up close. Unfortunately, she hadn’t realized that, even without food, seeing trolls up close was a rather memorable occurrence.

  Seated two feet away from the trolls’ greasy, grimy, and gritty faces, Rochelle was able to see a myriad of small bumps and pimples she had not noticed before. And while her syllabus currently did not contain a section on dermatology, she recognized the need to amend it.

  “After squeezing a pea-size portion of antibacterial soap into your hand…” Rochelle trailed off, distracted by the sight of Trick using her pen as a toothbrush. “Trick, putting other monsters’ belongings in your mouth without their permission is considered très rude.”

  “Rude!” Treat repeated, before wiping his nose on Rochelle’s yellow Scaremès scarf.

  “You may consider that an early birthday present,” Rochelle said as she recoiled at the sound of Treat’s mucus flowing into the fine silk fabric. “Now then, after applying a pea-size quantity of antibacterial soap…”

  “Pea-size! Pea-size!” Trick chanted.

  “Yes,” Rochelle said through gritted teeth while tapping her claws impatiently on the tabletop. “You then place your hands under the water…”

  “Under table! Under table!” Treat grunted and then lowered himself beneath the table.

  “No, Treat! No! I said under the water, as in you place your soapy hands under the water! Not under the table!” Rochelle moaned with frustration as she continued to click her claws harshly against the desktop.

  “Hey, what’d that table ever do to you?” a smooth voice called out to Rochelle.

  Instantly pumped with adrenaline, having recognized the voice as Deuce’s, Rochelle quickly looked away with embarrassment.

  “Zut! Sometimes I forget how strong I am,” Rochelle lamented as she looked down at the cracked table.

  “Hey, Trick. Hey, Treat,” Deuce said to the trolls while offering a friendly head nod.

  Both Trick and Treat immediately calmed down, clearly intimidated by Deuce—and with good reason. The story of Deuce accidentally turning one of their colleagues to stone the previous semester had quickly spread through the troll community.

  “I’ve got to say, I’m a little surprised to see you hanging out with trolls. Did you have a fight with Robecca and Venus?” Deuce asked while fiddling with his snake-filled Mohawk.

  “No, of course not. They’re my best ghoulfriends. As part of my Frightingale duties, I’ve volunteered to tutor trolls in hygiene and English. However, getting them to listen to me is harder than getting Robecca to class on time.”

  “Really? They always seem to listen to me. I can help you out if you’d like,” Deuce proposed generously.

  “You would do that for me?” Rochelle blathered as she blushed.

  “After what you did for the school last semester? Of course!”

  “You’re the first monster to even bring that up. It’s like everyone else has forgotten. They’re not even worried that it might happen again,” Rochelle said while shaking her head, clearly confused by her classmates’ lack of concern.

  “It’s not that everyone has forgotten. It’s that when we look around, we don’t see any reason for concern. Everything looks pretty normal. And as we all know, there’s no use worrying about something that might not even happen,” Deuce explained, breaking into a smile.

  “That’s easy for you to say; you’re not a gargoyle.”

  the scent of cheese casketdillas wafted through the Creepateria as students swapped tales about the start of school, discussing everything from their teachers’ clothes to the new captain of the Skultimate Roller Maze team. Positioned conspicuously among the young monsters were the lunch monitors, Mr. D’eath and Miss Sue Nami. Seated in bone-cold silence, Mr. D’eath mentally reviewed his regret list while Miss Sue Nami considered how best to handle the increasing amount of lip she was receiving from the trolls.

  Two tables away, engrossed in a most serious conversation about cleaning up the environment, were Lagoona and Venus.

  “I just don’t get it, mate. We only have one planet. Why are we trashing it? And I mean that literally: Why are we stashing trash inside mountains?” Lagoona asked as she lifted her cheese casketdilla to her mouth.

  “Don’t even get me started on landfills; just the thought of them makes my pollen go crazy! How could anyone think stuffing a mountain with trash is a good idea? How is that a viable long-term solution to our waste problem? I mean, is anyone in graverment even paying attention?” Venus asked with palpable frustration.

  “Sometimes it doesn’t feel like it, but there must be other monsters concerned about the oceans and forests and—”

  “Excuse me, ghouls,” a velvety voice interrupted.

  Standing before Lagoona and Venus, dressed in a leopard-print jumpsuit and a bedazzled red belt, was none other than Toralei Stripe. As the werecat rarely graced her classmates with her presence in the Creepateria, the two environmentalists were mo
re than a little taken aback.

  “I hate to bother you ghouls while you’re chowing, but I was wondering if you could sign my petition. It’s super important,” Toralei said as she batted her long feline eyelashes.

  “You started a petition? For what? To put milk in the drinking fountains?” Venus said with a giggle.

  “A cat joke? How lame. But then again, what else should I expect from a lowly house plant?” Toralei responded harshly.

  “Always such a pleasure,” Venus mumbled sarcastically to herself.

  “So what’s the petition about, mate?” Lagoona asked curiously.

  “There are these two super weird ghouls trying to turn Monster High’s back field into a trash dump. It’s just not right, so I’m going to stop them,” Toralei explained.

  “A trash dump? Don’t you mean a compost pile?” Lagoona inquired with a perplexed expression.

  “Same thing. So can I get your signature or what?” Toralei demanded with a self-satisfied smirk.

  “Toralei, we’re trying to save the planet by recycling things that are biodegradable. How could you possibly have a problem with that? Don’t you want the planet to be clean for your children and grandchildren?” Venus expounded passionately.

  “Listen up, ghouls, it’s super simple. I don’t like to be surrounded by trash,” Toralei said cuttingly, twitching her ears, before sashaying away from the table.

  “I just don’t get her,” Venus stated honestly. “She’s such a mully.”

  “A what?” Lagoona asked as she cocked her head to the side.

  “A monster plus a bully equals a mully,” Venus enlightened Lagoona, much to the sea creature’s amusement.

  “Did you just make that up?” Lagoona asked, breaking into a smile.

  “Of course. I’m more than just an environmentalist; I’m also a wordsmith,” Venus proclaimed as Lagoona stood up. “Hey, where are you going?”

  “I’m meeting Gil at the pool. I’ll catch you later, mate,” she said, before offering Venus a hang-ten sign and walking away.