Read My Friends Are Dead People for Free Online Page B

say both: trick and
treat.”
    “ Trick or
treat!”
    Still, there was no answer. Katie knocked a
few times, but she got nothing, too. Great, this was fun. I saw a
name painted on the pink wall.
     
    Witch Ridgway
     
    “ Trick – or – treat!” I
yelled again.
    At last, the doorknob was being jostled.
Katie and I opened up our pillowcases as an old lady, with matted
brown hair and a fake wart hanging halfway off her neck, opened the
screen door. She wore a plastic witch hat and long stick-on nails.
In the hallway behind her, there was a glass box of candy with no
hinge or lid. It was an unopenable box.
    “ You children want to come
in?” she asked and then pointed inside. “Look, it’s
candy.”
    She sensed something and looked behind us,
spotting Oz tying Duma to the mailbox. After a moment, she reached
into her pocket and pulled out two apples.
    “ Here you go, Jesse. And a
sweet red one for you, Katie.”
    We promptly stuffed the apples in our
pillowcases.
    “ Hello,” said Oz, making
herself known behind us. “I'm Becky. We live right next
door.”
    The hag cocked her head back, giving Oz a
prickly look, and gurgled the mucus in her mouth. All of us stepped
back.
    “ Katie, can you check that
apple for me?” said Oz.
    Katie took her apple out. Someone had
already taken a big chunk out of it.
    “ Oh, dear,” croaked the
hag. “I’m deeply sorry about that. Let me go inside and get
something else.” She turned to Oz. “Such dreadful timing. This is
your first time out, and you see me give a child a half-eaten
apple. How awful. I’ll be right back.”
    The hag rubbed the apple with her grubby
sweater, then carefully pocketed it and shuffled back into the
house, pushing her weight down the hallway like a slug.
    “ She’s a fast one,” I said
jokingly.
    “ Push her, I dare you,”
said Katie.
    “ What’s that?” mumbled the
hag, not turning around, already struggling as it was.
    Oz cleared her throat. “That’s enough, you
two.”
    The hag trudged back a few minutes later,
holding a fogged-up plastic bag, filled with warm carrots and runny
spaghetti, and in a separate bag a crispy brownie.
    “ Here you go, child. Now
you listen to me, Oz. You take Katie into your home. It would be
very wise of you.” As she handed me a bag of leftovers, she gurgled
at me.
    “ Do you know us?" asked
Oz, stepping in front of Katie and me.
    "Yeeees. I am your neighbor."
    The hag said nothing else.
    "Well, thank you . . .” Oz pushed us along,
her eyes never leaving the creepy old woman.
    “ Ridgway.”
    “ Thank you, Mrs. Ridgway.
We should be off. Maybe we'll have dinner some . . .”
    "Time," finished Mrs. Ridgway. "No. But
we'll talk again in four more years. I will see you then."
    The hag watched us leave.
    “ Katie, Jess, throw it in
the trash,” said Oz the second we were out of sight. “Apple too,
Jess.”
    I was happy to get rid of it. I wasn’t going
to eat fruit or vegetables on Halloween. That must have been the
weirdest lady in the whole world. What didn't make sense was how
did she know so much about us? She knew that I called my mom Oz. No
one knew that, but Katie. I was going to have to investigate that
later on.
    Katie and I ran over to the next house. The
door had a paper skeleton taped to it. No matter how many times we
knocked, no one came to the door. The lights were on inside, too.
They just weren’t answering. The same welcome awaited us at all the
rest of the houses on our street.
    “ Jess, no one will come
out while Duma is with us,” explained Oz. “Why don’t we drop him
off at Lisa’s. Jess, don’t give me that look. I’ll be back in a
minute. Stay right here.”
    I watched glumly as Oz took Duma across the
street. Lisa answered the door right away. She was short and
blonde. That was all you could say about her.
    “ Great,” I said as they
chatted their way inside. “Duma doesn’t even like Lisa’s
cat.”
    “ Let’s go wait inside,”
said Katie, suspiciously