The Spooky Surprise

By Guest Writer Adley Hunt

“I don’t wanna move!!” my little sister Ava wailed. 

“I know, but we have to because the house is getting too expensive without Dad to help, even with Jack,” Mom told her. A hint of sadness floated into Mom’s eyes. My dad died when I was three. My mom was pregnant with Ava then, and I don’t remember him much. But, now that he’s gone, I have to be the man of the house. I didn’t want to move either, but I didn’t say anything because I didn’t want to cause Mom more worry. I liked our house with its slippery staircase and sliding doors that went out to the spacious swimming pool. But now we have to move to a weird neighborhood that I have never heard of before. It is called Dreadful Drive. It sounds spooky and I don’t know if this is a coincidence or not but we are moving the week before Halloween. I hope that I can find some friends there because I will also have to move schools. 

Bang! The box slammed against the floor of our new house. “That’s the last one, Jack!” Mom told me. Ava was still in her carseat pouting. She really did not want to move. I hope she doesn’t mope because we might have left her toy boat. It was her favorite toy but we can probably get her a new one without her noticing. I had to help carry in boxes but after I finished Mom said I could look around. There wasn’t much to look at though. The house was small with only two bedrooms and one bathroom. It had a small kitchen and living room, but that was it. It wasn’t too bad with just the three of us I guess. The weird thing was the house next door. It was big, black and it looked barren. It looked like a haunted house from a movie. I did not want to go in there. Eventually Ava stopped pouting and went inside. First we set up me and Ava’s room. We have to share even though we are eight years apart (I am twelve and she is four). We each got half of the room. Her half was pink (of course) and my half was blue. It looked cool with the pink and blue paint. We managed to get the whole house done in a week. I think it looks really good even though it is really small. 

It’s finally Halloween. I am going to dress up as a pirate and Ava is going to hand out candy with Mom. I get all ready to go trick or treating. I am going with some boys I met at school. Their names are Michael and Lucas. My mom has to drive me to Michael’s house because she says I’m not old enough to walk by myself. When I get there Michael and Lucas are all ready to go. We go around their neighborhood and I get a pretty good amount of candy. They walk me home and when we get to my neighborhood it suddenly gets really cold. Woosh! The wind gusts past us. “Umm do you think you can get yourself home from here?” Michael asks.

“Yeah I have to… go home,” Lucas stutters. Before I can respond they run off and leave me alone. “Well,” I say to no one in particular, “I guess I’m alone now.” I am almost to my house when I hear a noise. Clank! Something bangs inside of the creepy mansion. Ava and I call it Frankenstein’s house because it reminds us of it. The house keeps creaking and I can’t help squeaking. I’m starting to get really freaked out when suddenly the door to Frankenstein’s house flings open. I scream like a girl and run toward my house.  Unfortunately to get to my house I have to pass Frankenstein’s house. I slowly walk toward my house as quietly as a mouse. I look toward Frankenstein’s house and inside of the open doorway I see something that makes me stop dead in my tracks. “What the heck?” I say as I slowly walk toward the door. Suddenly I start laughing so hard that my stomach hurts. “It’s just a cat!” The whole time the thing that was making the creaking noises was a cat! I think that it was trying to get out of the house and when it finally opened the door I got scared because I thought the door opened by itself. I slowly walk towards the cat and pick her up. She didn’t have a collar or anything so I took her home to my family. 

Now, a week later we love our little kitten so much. We named her Shadow because she is all gray. The house is still abandoned but not creepy anymore now that we know what the noises were. My little sister absolutely loves the cat and plays with her all the time. We love our kitten and are a happy family of four again.