Read Online Possessions by Nancy Holder - Free Book Online

me arrange pillows on my bed to look like I was sleeping. She was so excited and nervous that she was shaking.
    We tiptoed past our housemother’s door. Ms. Krige was not very motherly. Her TV was on, and I hoped for the best. We opened the front door very, very slowly . . . then we flared out into the bitterly cold night. In sweaters and coats, me in my high-tops and shredded jeans, we crossed our quad, darting past Jessel’s privet hedge, and dashed into the woods.
    Lara was waiting for us. She was dressed all in black and carrying a black hood. She said, “Just you two, right?” and craned her neck around us. I was willing to bet Claire and Ida were back there, probably Elvis and Marica, too. They weren’t allowed to show up until later. We two were the only Grose-ites privileged to see things up close and personal. But I let Julie do the nodding, and Lara seemed satisfied. She turned and walked us into a thick stand of redwood trees. Leaves rustled. I heard organ music.
    Then we stepped out of the shadows into a moonlit clearing. The hair on the back of my neck rose as I stared through a chain-link fence with a large sign that read DANGER! KEEP OUT! CONDEMNED. Veils of mist shifted and trailed over a decayed two-story building with a jagged rooftop of chimneys and gables jutting over the upper floor. Ivy trailed down the brick exterior, and at least half of the structure had collapsed into piles of rubble. Cobwebs stretched over mounds of broken bricks and rusted metal. I spotted an eyeless baby doll and a rotted satin slipper.
    Lights flashed on in the arched windows, revealing faces in the broken glass—blurry white circles with blackened eyes and mouths opened in silent screams.
    “Wow. This is pretty incredible,” I said.
    “Isn’t it cool?” Julie nudged me. “Can you believe they did all this and Ehrlenbach doesn’t have a clue?”
    No, I couldn’t, actually.
    In front of the house, the mist thickened. I heard a scream, and then the whole house went dark and silent.
    “Okay, good.” Mandy’s voice blared over a PA system. “Take a break.”
    Then the rotted front door creaked open, and Mandy stood in the frame, wearing a white robe that covered her straight shoulders and plunged to the ground. The Bride of Frankenstein.
    “You’re la-ate,” she said to Julie in a singsong voice. “Lara will have to cut off your head for that.” She smiled at me. “Hey, Linz.”
    “Are we really late?” Julie fretted.
    Lara rolled her eyes and dropped her black hood over her head. Then she scooted past Mandy and went inside.
    “That’s a good look for you,” I told Mandy, trying to sound cool and unfazed. But seriously, all this for a prank ? What was the other, “official” haunted house going to be like?
    She raised a brow as if giving me points for trying. “Just think, all this could be yours.” She smiled lazily and gestured for both of us to follow her in.
    “So what was this building?” Julie asked her, as we went inside.
    “Library,” Mandy said.
    “Oh. I thought it was an insane asylum.”
    “Nope,” Mandy replied. A beat. “The entire campus was an insane asylum.” She grinned over her shoulder at Julie.
    “Rock,” Julie enthused. “Cool.” I wondered if what Mandy was saying was true.
    “Where’s the electricity coming from?” I asked. “I’d think they’d be worried about the whole thing burning down.”
    “That’s where the fifty grand went,” Mandy said, looking mildly impressed that I’d think of such a thing. “We’re using special effects lighting. Lots of batteries.”
    “I’ll bet,” Julie said, and Mandy chuckled affectionately. The floor was littered with dirt, paper, a crushed Coors can, some broken glass. Some girls I didn’t recognize stepped from the shadows. They wore white. They had on white Latex gloves.
    “This place is gross,” said the middle one.
    “Some of our ghosts,” Mandy told Julie and me. “It’s so hard to get good ghosts these