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tilted once so the ceiling and floor were now
walls and two of the walls were the ceiling and floor. The ground
was covered with bookshelves and doorways that looked more like
endless pits.
    “ Sorry about the lights,”
apologized Oz, carefully stepping across the fiction section. “I
haven’t gotten the electricity running yet. Don't worry about the
doors. They'll only send you back to Jess' room. Pick out whatever
you want. The witch gowns and robes are over there.”
    Oz pointed to a rack of vintage garments
hovering perfectly above the ground.
    “ Hurry along. I don’t want
to be in here after the sun sets. Katie, what time is
it?”
    “ Almost four. Jesse, I
brought the glue. But if you want to be a warlock, I–”
    “ No, I still want to be a
dead boy,” I said.
    “ Good,” she said happily.
She walked over to me and started spreading glue on my face. “Tilt
your head back.”
    “ Don’t get it on my
clothes,” I winced. “And don’t put too much dirt on me.”
    Oz handed me a pair of giant pants and a
ripped shirt. “I think these should fit.”
    Oz, Katie, and I helped
each other get dressed. We soon started a glue fight, smudging glue
all over each other. I had never had so much fun. What I couldn’t
believe was that Oz was joking around with us the entire time. She
was never liked this. Never. When we were done, the three of us
walked into a red room, decorated with portraits of scowling
vampires dressed in red suits. Oz pushed a dial that read: House Floor , just as
Duma scurried in after us. This place was so cool.
    “ I thought you didn't have
that much money,” said Katie as the floor shook and the room
started going up.
    Oz thought about this for a moment as the
room clanked and made a humming sound. “Uhmm . . . Jess’s father
might have been rich.”
    Might have been? What did that mean? And he
couldn't be. He was a hotel manager in Hawaii. How could he
possibly be this rich? Was she lying? Even now, Oz didn’t know that
I had figured out that the hotel manager I ran into two years ago
was my father.
    One of the walls slid open, and we were back
in the kitchen.
    “ What do you use to
collect candy these days?” inquired Oz.
    “ Pillowcases,” answered
Katie. “You get more candy that way.”
    “ Check the guestroom.
There should be some extra pillowcases in the cabinet.”
    Oz waited in the kitchen as we hurried into
the guestroom, running back out seconds later.
    “ Come on, Oz!” I said
excitedly as I dashed out of the house with Katie and
Duma.
    “ You have Duma’s
leash?”
    “ Yes!”

CHAPTER FIVE
    THE NIGHT
WATCHER
     
    Oz made us wait for her on the sidewalk
before we could knock on the first door. Not many houses were
decorated, and even those weren’t much to look at. I didn’t think
it would be so quiet on Halloween.
    “ Where is everyone?” I
said, my excitement starting to wane.
    “ It’s always dead,” said
Katie, unfazed.
    “ Oh. Oz, come
on!”
    “ Okay, go ahead,” said Oz,
shutting the front gate.
    I handed Duma’s leash to Oz, and Katie and I
ran to our first house; our next door neighbors who none of us had
seen before. The pink house didn’t have any decorations, just three
pumpkins and some brooms on the front porch. A mat on the doorstep
bore a friendly message:
     
    WELCOME,
CHILDREN
     
    “ Thanks for the welcome,”
said Katie, wiping her dirty witch boots on it.
    I wasn’t sure what to do next. I remembered
kids coming to the door asking if I wanted a trick or treat, and
every time I had said, ‘I don’t want either. Go away!’
    “ Give me candy!” I shouted
at a white screen door. “We’re your neighbors! I live two houses
down! We’re thirteen years old and we live with our single
mothers!”
    Katie laughed. “You’re supposed to say trick
or treat. And that’s after you knock.”
    I knocked hard on the screen door. Bang.
Bang. Bang.
    “ Treat!”
    “ No,” said Katie, still
laughing. “What are you, five? You have to