The Haunting of Renegade X

by Chelsea M. Campbell

  “It’s called I Know How You Killed Me. It’s kind of cheesy, but me and Zach watch it every year. It’s about this guy who’s haunted by his dead best friend.”

  “Sounds boring.” And not like what happened to me yesterday. Not at all.

  “It’s actually his dead ex-best friend. They had a falling out before he died, and the main guy sort of killed him, and his ex-best friend’s ghost is out for revenge, but they don’t know that really what happened is— Well, I don’t want to spoil it. And it’s not boring.”

  “Let’s watch something else.” Not that I’m freaked out by the similarities between this stupid movie and what happened to me. I mean, what I think happened to me. Except I don’t even think that that happened to me because I know there’s no way I actually heard Pete’s voice. It’s impossible. And I’m not freaked out by it, or by this movie. It’s just obviously stupid is all.

  “What? No way. I know it’s campy and the special effects are ridiculous, because it’s from the 80s, but I swear you’ll like it. Just give it a chance, X.”

  Now the guy on the screen has fallen down into a pile of trash in the alley, and there are a bunch of flashing lights that I think are supposed to be the ghost. The guy’s screaming at it and begging it not to hurt him. And it is super cheesy, like Riley said, and there’s absolutely no reason to be afraid of it, since I’m not, like, five years old. But it’s also making me think of Pete, which wasn’t exactly my favorite subject before what, um, didn’t happen yesterday, and the last thing I want is to spend the next hour and a half—probably more like two hours, with commercials—thinking about my own dead ex-best friend. And whether or not he’s trying to haunt me, which he isn’t.

  “I’m your guest,” I tell Riley. “And the guest always chooses the movie.”

  He wrinkles his eyebrows. “Since when? And why can’t you just trust me for once and try it out? This is, like, my favorite Halloween movie.”

  The bathroom door opens, and Amelia comes out, a little red in the face but successfully changed into her pink dress. “That’s better,” she says, smoothing down her hair with her hands. “Where’s Zach?”

  “Uh, it’s been, like, two minutes,” I remind her. “It’s going to take him at least three to scrub all that face paint off.”

  “Zach!” she shouts in the direction of his mom’s room. “You’d better hurry up!” Then she leans against the back of the couch and peers at the TV. “Oh! I love this movie.”

  Riley gives me a pointed look. “See? It’s great.”

  “Yeah, I don’t think Amelia liking it proves your point.”

  “Hey!” she whines.

  “She’s a guest,” Riley says.

  “But she’s not your guest. And she’s only going to be here for a few more minutes.”

  He stares at me for a second, like he can’t figure out why I’m being like this. “It’s a good movie. I’m not changing it.”

  “Some host you are.” But I’m thinking maybe it won’t be so bad. Maybe if I actually pay attention, I’ll get so involved in the story that I won’t be thinking about Pete, anyway.

  Then a commercial comes on. It’s for one of the businesses in the Golden City Banking and Finances building, and there’s a shot of the outside of it. A shiver runs up my spine, and a sick feeling settles in my stomach.

  “You know what? Let’s not even watch TV.” I make a grab for the remote. “We could play a game.”

  Riley jerks it away. “We played a game at your house.”

  “We played Villains vs. Heroes. I haven’t kicked your ass at Aliens vs. Dinosaurs IV yet.”

  He scowls at me. “What the hell is wrong with you?”

  “Nothing. A better question is, what the hell is wrong with you? You’re the one forcing me to watch this.”

  Amelia gasps and puts a hand to her mouth. “Wait.”

  No. No, no, no. “You know what, Amelia? I think I hear Zach getting out of the shower. You should probably get ready to leave. As in, go stand out on the porch.”

  “Didn’t you have a friend that died?”

  “What?” Riley says, all the anger suddenly draining out of him.

  “And didn’t you kill him?”

  “What?! No.” I glare at her. “I didn’t kill anybody. And he wasn’t my friend. Not... not by then.”

  They’re both staring at me.

  The movie comes back on. Riley holds up the remote and turns off the TV.

  Now would be a great time for my phone to ring. Or for the house to catch on fire.

  “I didn’t know, X,” Riley says, all sincere and apologetic. Which I know I should be grateful for, but instead all I feel is resentful. He’s being a good friend, and all I can think about is how much I don’t want to be talking about this. Or for him to know about it. Either of them, really.

  “You could have just told me,” he adds. Not like he’s blaming me or anything. More like he really means it.

  I shrug and don’t look at him. “There’s nothing to tell.”

  Amelia snorts. “Yeah, right.”

  “Don’t you have somewhere to be? Like, laying out Zach’s clothes for him or something?”

  “No. Zach doesn’t need me to...” She hesitates, obviously tempted, but then resists. “I’m not missing this. You never told me what happened. Not really. I want to know how Keith died.”

  “Pete! His name was Pete. But it was a long time ago—”

  “Uh, like, six months ago?”

  “—and it doesn’t matter now!”

  Riley’s looking at me like he knows that’s not true. Like it not being true is the most obvious thing in the world.

  “Look, he was my ex-best friend.”

  “Just like in the movie,” Amelia says.

  “Uh-huh. Shouldn’t you go call whoever’s throwing the party and tell them you’re going to be late?”

  “It’s casual.”

  “But you had to put on a dress and make Zach change out of his costume? It doesn’t sound casual. It sounds like the kind of party it would be really rude to be late for. Especially without even calling.”

  “I’m not leaving. I want to hear this.”

  “There’s nothing to hear. And what if there are door prizes? Like, for cutest couple?”

  “Cutest couple?” Her ears perk up at that.

  “This could be your chance. But, as late as you’re going to be, they’ll probably assume you’re not coming and give the award to someone else. Oh, well.”

  “You think we have a chance at cutest couple?”

  “Well, Zach’s pretty cute. And showing him off to all your friends is kind of the point of going to this party. Winning an award for it is something you can treasure for the rest of your life. But just knowing you’re the cutest couple is its own reward, right? You don’t need anything to prove it. And if some other couple gets the award, and everyone spends the whole night telling them how cute they are, well, that won’t bother you, right?”

  “Um.”

  “Because you’ll know the truth. Deep down inside.”

  “I’m just going to go make a quick phone call. Don’t tell the story until I get back.” She points at me, then hurries into the kitchen to use the landline. Because, unlike everyone else in the world, Amelia doesn’t have a cell phone.

  A tiny part of me hopes that after all that, Riley will just forget what we were talking about and go back to watching TV, even though he already turned it off. But of course that doesn’t happen.

  “He was your ex-best friend?” Riley says, not even forgetting where I was in my explanation.

  “Emphasis on the ex part. We hadn’t been friends for a whole year before it happened. I mean, we were more like enemies. He tried to kill me. It wasn’t like what happened with your dad.” Riley and Zach’s dad died a few years ago during a bus bombing. He sacrificed himself to save a lot of people. A decision that, understandably, Riley’s still not okay with. But that was his dad. Someone he actually liked. This was differen
t.

  Riley’s shaking his head. “Grief doesn’t work that way. You can’t put rules on it.”

  “I’m not grieving.” I just don’t want to think about Pete or what happened when he died or what for sure didn’t happen yesterday.

  He tilts his head, giving me a skeptical look.

  “I’m not. I hadn’t really even been thinking about Pete until...”

  “Until the movie? I’m your friend, X. You could have just told me. I would have understood. I do, I mean.”

  “No. It’s not that.” And no matter how much he thinks he understands, will he still feel that way when I tell him I heard Pete talking to me and am apparently insane? “This is going to sound stupid, but I—”

  A shriek from the kitchen interrupts me. “Oh, no,” Amelia wails, running into the living room. “I just talked to Kim.”

  “And she got those photos of you in the bridesmaid dress I sent her, and you’re automatically disqualified for cutest couple?” I ask.

  “That’s not true. I know you didn’t take pictures of me, because you didn’t even have your phone out. You were too busy playing video games. And you don’t even have Kim’s number.”

  “I was joking. Obviously.”

  “Well, don’t! This is serious!”

  “What’s serious?” Zach asks, coming out of his mom’s room. His hair’s wet—and no longer silver—and he has a towel around his waist.

  “It’s a costume party!”

  He stops moving and blinks at her. “What?”

  Amelia covers her face with her hands. “According to Kim, dress up meant costume party. We’re supposed to be wearing costumes! And there’s even prizes for the best ones.”

  Zach’s mouth falls open. A strangled croak escapes his throat. “But... But I spent hours...”

  “I know,” Amelia squeaks, still hiding her face.

  Riley rolls his eyes at them. “Come on,” he says, jerking his head toward his room and getting up from the couch.

  I follow him. Once we’re inside, he shuts the door, muffling the sounds of Amelia and Zach’s costume drama.

  He sits down in his computer chair. “You want to tell me what’s going on? I mean, you don’t have to. If you don’t want to talk about it, but—”

  “I heard a ghost yesterday.”

  “You...” His forehead wrinkles up. “You saw a ghost?”

  “No, I heard a ghost. I was at the Golden City Banking and Finances building—me and Kat were—and I swear I heard Pete’s voice coming from an ATM.”

  There’s a long pause. Then Riley just says, “Oh.”

  “I’m not crazy, Perkins.” I pace back and forth in front of his bed. “Pete could broadcast signals. It was his superpower. And that was where he died. I hadn’t been back since. Neither had Kat.”

  “And she heard it, too?”

  “No. She wasn’t close enough. And I know how that sounds—how all of it sounds—but something happened.”

  “Huh.”

  “Don’t give me that.”

  “Don’t give you what?”

  “You can’t just say huh, like you think this is interesting. Like you don’t think I’m crazy.”

  “Well, I don’t.”

  “But you probably should. And for the record, I don’t believe in ghosts.”

  “Neither do I.”

  “Great. So which is it? You don’t believe in ghosts, or you don’t think I’m crazy? Because I don’t see how it can be both.”

  “We should go down there. To the Golden City Banking and Finances building.”

  I stop pacing. “Seriously?”

  “We’ve still got two hours before we can go over to Sarah’s.”

  “So you want to go ghost hunting? On Halloween?”

  He grins. “What better time for it? And anyway, we’re not ghost hunting. But whatever happened there is obviously bothering you, whether it was what happened yesterday or six months ago.”

  “It was seven months. Not that I’m counting.”

  “Until you figure out what you heard, and why, you’re not going to be able to let it go. We might as well check it out.”

  I consider that. “You’re the only person I’ve told about this. Not even Kat knows. And I don’t want her to.” It would just freak her out.

  “I won’t tell anyone, X.”

  “Okay.” I let out a deep breath. A part of me is actually relieved that we’re going to go down there. Because he’s right—I won’t be able to let go until I know what the hell’s going on. And if I imagined the whole thing because it turns out I’m not over my ex-best friend trying to kill me and then falling to his death, at least I’ll know.

  “Okay,” I say again, nodding this time. “Let’s do this.”

  Chapter 3

  “THIS IS IT?” RILEY asks, frowning at the ATM in front of the Banking and Finances building.

  “I don’t know what you were expecting, Perkins. Maybe some blood dripping out of the card slot? Some slime oozing down the side?”

  “No. It’s just...” He glances at the big glass doors. It’s dark inside, since the bank’s been closed for half an hour now, except for some low-level lighting that I guess is meant to scare away burglars. “It looks like an office building.”

  “It is an office building.”

  He stares up at it. It’s so tall, he has to lean his head back to take it all in. “Wow.” Then he looks at me, his eyebrows coming together in concern, though he doesn’t actually say anything.

  He doesn’t have to. I know what he’s thinking. I filled him in in the car on the way here, about what happened with Pete. Well, the gist of it, anyway, which included the part about me falling from the top of this place. “It wasn’t so bad,” I lie, because I can’t stand him looking at me like that. Like he feels sorry for me.

  “It’s an awfully long way to fall.”

  “No one said it wasn’t.”

  “I just mean, I’d be really freaked out. If I fell from there.”

  “If you fell from there, you’d be dead.” Just like Pete.

  “I can see how you’d be traumatized. How anyone would, even if they weren’t afraid of heights. That’s all.”

  I wish he didn’t know about that. I thought I was okay with it—with him knowing—but now I’m not so sure. “So, according to you, I’m just messed up. Is that it?”

  He looks almost hurt by that. “Come on, X. You know that’s not what I’m saying.”

  “Do I? Because it sounds like that’s exactly what you’re saying.”

  He sighs. “From what you’ve told me, some really bad things happened to you here. Probably some of the worst moments of your life. So it’s understandable if you... you know.”

  “If I’m messed up. Yeah, I got that.”

  “If it’s hard for you to be here.”

  “Well, that’s where you’re wrong, because it’s not.” I shrug, just to show how much I don’t care, even if it’s a lie.

  “You almost died here. Kat and Sarah almost died here. And your friend actually did die here.”

  “I told you, he wasn’t my friend. He tried to kill me. I was under mind control, and he ordered me to jump off the ledge! And that was before he knew I could fly. He had no idea I was going to survive that, but he made me do it anyway, and he didn’t even flinch.”

  “You’re upset about it.” It’s not a question.

  I want to tell him it’s none of his business, and it’s not, but I stop myself, because it seems mean to say that when he came all the way down here with me. “Yep. I’m upset about it, and there are no signs of any ghosts here, so I think we can all draw our conclusions about that.” Maybe the reason Kat didn’t hear Pete’s voice wasn’t because she was too far away, but because she’s not as messed up about what happened as I am. Maybe she’s moved on, or it wasn’t as traumatic for her, or her mom didn’t also betray her and disown her on the same night. Who knows.

  Riley glances over at the ATM, looking kind of disappointed. May
be a ghost would have been more exciting than the more realistic answer—that I’m completely losing it. “Do you want to talk about it?”

  “We talked about it on the way here.”

  “You told me an outline of what happened. You didn’t tell me why it happened, or, like, how you felt?”

  A drop of rain lands on my nose. It’s just one drop at first, but then another hits my hand. “We should go.”

  “Okay, but it might help to—”

  “It won’t. So just drop it.” He wants to know how I felt about it? Awful, that’s how. Which should be obvious enough already. And as for why it happened... Pete was a jerk. And he was probably never really my friend. Nothing that Riley can’t guess. He doesn’t need to hear how Kat cheated on me with my supposed best friend and how much that hurt.

  The rain’s coming down harder, but Riley doesn’t move to leave. “You can trust me. You know that, right? We’re friends.”

  “Yeah, well, I trusted Pete, too, and look how that turned out. Being friends obviously doesn’t mean that much.” I didn’t know I was going to say that. As soon as the words leave my mouth, I wish I could take them back. Riley’s nothing like Pete. More like his exact opposite.

  Shock spreads across Riley’s face, just for a second, and then changes to sadness. He moves to leave.

  “Perkins, wait. I didn’t mean—”

  “You’re right—we should go. It’s raining.”

  “But—”

  “You made it pretty clear that you don’t have anything to say to me. So just don’t, okay?”

  “We hardly even looked for the ghost. We came all the way down here.”

  “You’re the one who said we should leave. And that there weren’t any signs of any ghosts.”

  I swallow. He hasn’t said he’s pissed at me, or that I screwed up, but I still feel like the worst friend in the world. “But—”

  “Let’s just go home.”

  I suck in a deep breath, taking that in. “Yeah, okay. If that’s what you—”

  But before I can finish that sentence, all the lights in the Banking and Finances building suddenly shut off. So does the ATM. Except, unlike the lights inside, it immediately flashes back on.

  Giant letters fill the screen that say, HAPPY BIRTHDAY.