by R. L. Stine
I wasn’t happy. The whole thing was scary to me. What would the kids be like? What would the teachers be like? What would the food be like?
So many things to worry about.
The car rolled past empty pastures and fields. The crops had all been harvested. Nothing left but dirt and dead plants. Like gigantic graveyards.
“Just a few more miles,” Dad said.
I sighed. “Why do I have to go to boarding school? There’s probably a crazed maniac loose in the halls at night,” I said. “Waiting in a corner with an axe.”
“Matt, you’ll be the only maniac there,” Jamie said.
“Did you bring your axe?” Dad asked. Always ready to join in the Tease Matt For Fun contest.
“Give Matt a break,” Mom said. “He’s going to a boarding school for the first time, and he’s nervous.”
“I’m not nervous,” I said. “I just know what goes on in these schools. There are always crazed maniacs in the halls at night.”
“Too many horror movies,” Jamie muttered. “They’ve rotted his brain.”
“Romero Academy,” I said. “What kind of a name is that?”
“It’s supposed to be a good school,” Mom said. “They have a soccer team. You’ll like that, Matt.”
“Only weird kids go to boarding school,” I grumbled.
Jamie laughed. She poked me hard in the ribs. “You said it — we didn’t.”
“Don’t touch me,” I said, scooting away from her. “You spread disease.”
Her mouth dropped open. “Disease? What disease?”
“The Jamie Disease,” I said.
She dug her bony fingers into my ribs and started tickling me. She knows I hate it.
I twisted away from her. Easy for her to be happy. Her new school is two blocks from our house.
I pulled out a horror comic. I thought it would take my mind off Romero Academy. I studied the cover. It had a woman with green, decaying skin and deep gashes on her face. Blood ran from her empty eye sockets.
“Oh, yuck. That’s sick,” Jamie said. “Why are you reading that?”
“It’s your life story,” I said.
“There’s your school up there,” Dad called from the driver’s seat. He pointed out the open window. “On the top of the hill. See it?”
I peered out the window. I started to answer — but I stopped.
Whoa. Wait.
Something was wrong. Something was terribly wrong. I saw it immediately.
The school stood at the top of a grassy hill. No trees nearby. It was a bright, sunny day. Sunshine made the grass sparkle all around.
But the school was dark, totally hidden in shadow.
How could that be?
“Wh-why is the school dark?” I stammered. I tapped Dad on the shoulder. “Look. No way there can be shade up there.”
“It’s bigger than I thought it would be,” Mom said.
“It’s very old,” Dad said. “Built of stone. Looks like a castle.”
“But — don’t you see?” I cried. “It’s under a big shadow. But there’s nothing to make the shadow!”
“Looks totally normal to me,” Jamie said. She leaned over the front seat. “See what I’m saying? It’s all the horror he watches and reads. It rotted his brain.”
She chuckled. “Matt thinks he lives in a horror movie.”
For once, Jamie was right.
2
An asphalt driveway curved around the hill. Dad followed it up to the top. He pulled the car into a small parking lot at the side of the building.
“Go take a walk and look around,” he said. “Mom and I will deal with your suitcases.”
I climbed out of the back seat and stretched my arms over my head. My legs felt stiff. It had been at least a three-hour drive.
“Want me to walk with you?” Jamie called.
“Yeah. Like I’d want a second head,” I said.
She made a face at me. “Matt, you’re about as funny as a runny nose.”
“If your nose is running, you should chase after it,” I said.
It’s a family joke. I thought it was a riot when I was three.
I turned and walked along the asphalt drive toward the school building. It was gray stone with ivy growing down one shadowy wall. I counted four stories, with a slanting black tile roof at the top.
Tiny windows poked out of the top floor. I wondered if that’s where the students’ rooms were.
A red-and-black pennant flapped in the breeze at the top of a tall flagpole. At least a dozen crows cawed and bobbed on the phone lines that fed into one wall of the school. Their cries grew louder as I walked closer.
It was a warm day for late fall. Many of the classroom windows were open, and I heard voices from inside.
From the far end of the building, I heard a band practicing a march. The band was awful. Squeaking and squawking. The crows sounded better than the band. I wanted to cover my ears.
Even more frights to keep you awake
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STAY OUT OF THE BASEMENT
Another classic Goosebumps adventure
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1
“Hey, Dad — catch!”
Casey tossed the Frisbee across the smooth, green lawn. Casey’s dad made a face, squinting into the sun. The Frisbee hit the ground and skipped a few times before landing under the hedge at the back of the house.
“Not today. I’m busy,” Dr. Brewer said, and abruptly turned and loped into the house. The screen door slammed behind him.
Casey brushed his straight blond hair back off his forehead. “What’s his problem?” he called to Margaret, his sister, who had watched the whole scene from the side of the redwood garage.
“You know,” Margaret said quietly. She wiped her hands on the legs of her jeans and held them both up, inviting a toss. “I’ll play Frisbee with you for a little while,” she said.
“Okay,” Casey said without enthusiasm. He walked slowly over to retrieve the Frisbee from under the hedge.
Margaret moved closer. She felt sorry for Casey. He and their dad were really close, always playing ball or Frisbee or Nintendo together. But Dr. Brewer didn’t seem to have time for that anymore.
Jumping up to catch the Frisbee, Margaret realized she felt sorry for herself, too. Dad hadn’t been the same to her, either. In fact, he spent so much time down in the basement, he barely said a word to her.
He doesn’t even call me Princess anymore, Margaret thought. It was a nickname she hated. But at least it was a nickname, a sign of closeness.
She tossed the red Frisbee back. A bad toss. Casey chased after it, but it sailed away from him. Margaret looked up to the golden hills beyond their backyard.
California, she thought.
It’s so weird out here. Here it is, the middle of winter, and there isn’t a cloud in the sky, and Casey and I are out in jeans and T-shirts as if it were the middle of summer.
She made a diving catch for a wild toss, rolling over on the manicured lawn and raising the Frisbee above her head triumphantly.
“Show-off,” Casey muttered, unimpressed.
“You’re the hot dog in the family,” Margaret called.
“Well, you’re a dork.”
“Hey, Casey — you want me to play with you or not?”
He shrugged.
Everyone was so edgy these days, Margaret realized.
It was easy to figure out why.
She made a high toss. The Frisbee sailed over Casey’s head. “You chase it!” he cried angrily, putting his hands on his hips.
“No, you!” she cried.
“You!”
“Casey — you’re eleven years old. Don’t act like a two-year-old,” she snapped.
“Well, you act like a one-year-old,” was his reply as he grudgingly went after the Frisbee.
It was all Dad’s fault, Margaret realized. Things had been so tense ever since he started working at home. Down in the basement
with his plants and weird machines. He hardly ever came up for air.
And when he did, he wouldn’t even catch a Frisbee.
Or spend two minutes with either of them.
Mom had noticed it, too, Margaret thought, running full-out and making another grandstand catch just before colliding with the side of the garage.
Having Dad home has made Mom really tense, too. She pretends every thing is fine. But I can tell she’s worried about him.
“Lucky catch, Fatso!” Casey called.
Margaret hated the name Fatso even more than she hated Princess. People in her family jokingly called her Fatso because she was so thin, like her father. She also was tall like him, but she had her mother’s straight brown hair, brown eyes, and dark coloring.
“Don’t call me that.” She heaved the red disc at him. He caught it at his knees and flipped it back to her.
They tossed it back and forth without saying much for another ten or fifteen minutes. “I’m getting hot,” Margaret said, shielding her eyes from the afternoon sun with her hand. “Let’s go in.”
Casey tossed the Frisbee against the garage wall. It dropped onto the grass. He came trotting over to her. “Dad always plays longer,” he said peevishly. “And he throws better. You throw like a girl.”
“Give me a break,” Margaret groaned, giving him a playful shove as she jogged to the back door. “You throw like a chimpanzee.”
“How come Dad got fired?” he asked.
She blinked. And stopped running. The question had caught her by surprise. “Huh?”
His pale, freckled face turned serious. “You know. I mean, why?” he asked, obviously uncomfortable.
She and Casey had never discussed this in the four weeks since Dad had been home. Which was unusual since they were pretty close, being only a year apart.
“I mean, we came all the way out here so he could work at PolyTech, right?” Casey asked.
“Yeah. Well … he got fired,” Margaret said, half-whispering in case her dad might be able to hear.
“But why? Did he blow up the lab or something?” Casey grinned. The idea of his dad blowing up a huge campus science lab appealed to him.
“No, he didn’t blow anything up,” Margaret said, tugging a strand of dark hair. “Botanists work with plants, you know. They don’t get much of a chance to blow things up.”
They both laughed.
Casey followed her into the narrow strip of shade cast by the low ranch-style house.
“I’m not sure exactly what happened,” Margaret continued, still half-whispering. “But I overheard Dad on the phone. I think he was talking to Mr. Martinez. His department head. Remember? The quiet little man who came to dinner that night the barbecue grill caught fire?”
Casey nodded. “Martinez fired Dad?”
“Probably,” Margaret whispered. “From what I overheard, it had something to do with the plants Dad was growing, some experiments that had gone wrong or something.”
“But Dad’s real smart,” Casey insisted, as if Margaret were arguing with him. “If his experiments went wrong, he’d know how to fix them.”
Margaret shrugged. “That’s all I know,” she said. “Come on, Casey. Let’s go inside. I’m dying of thirst!” She stuck her tongue out and moaned, demonstrating her dire need of liquid.
“You’re gross,” Casey said. He pulled open the screen door, then dodged in front of her so he could get inside first.
“Who’s gross?” Mrs. Brewer asked from the sink. She turned to greet the two of them. “Don’t answer that.”
Mom looks very tired today, Margaret thought, noticing the crisscross of fine lines at the corners of her mother’s eyes and the first strands of gray in her mother’s shoulder-length brown hair. “I hate this job,” Mrs. Brewer said, turning back to the sink.
“What are you doing?” Casey asked, pulling open the refrigerator and removing a box of juice.
“I’m deveining shrimp.”
“Yuck!” Margaret exclaimed.
“Thanks for the support,” Mrs. Brewer said dryly. The phone rang. Wiping her shrimpy hands with a dish towel, she hurried across the room to pick up the phone.
Margaret got a box of juice from the fridge, popped the straw into the top, and followed Casey into the front hallway. The basement door, usually shut tight when Dr. Brewer was working down there, was slightly ajar.
Casey started to close it, then stopped. “Let’s go down and see what Dad is doing,” he suggested.
Margaret sucked the last drops of juice through the straw and squeezed the empty box flat in her hand. “Okay.”
She knew they probably shouldn’t disturb their father, but her curiosity got the better of her. He had been working down there for four weeks now. All kinds of interesting equipment, lights, and plants had been delivered. Most days he spent at least eight or nine hours down there, doing whatever it was he was doing. And he hadn’t shown it to them once.
“Yeah. Let’s go,” Margaret said. It was their house, too, after all.
Besides, maybe their dad was just waiting for them to show some interest. Maybe he was hurt that they hadn’t bothered to come downstairs in all this time.
She pulled the door open the rest of the way, and they stepped onto the narrow stairway. “Hey, Dad —” Casey called excitedly. “Dad — can we see?”
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#5 DR. MANIAC VS. ROBBY SCHWARTZ
#6 WHO’S YOUR MUMMY?
#7 MY FRIENDS CALL ME MONSTER
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ONE DAY AT HORRORLAND
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BE CAREFUL WHAT YOU WISH FOR
SAY CHEESE AND DIE!
THE HORROR AT CAMP JELLYJAM
HOW I GOT MY SHRUNKEN HEAD
THE WEREWOLF OF FEVER SWAMP
A NIGHT IN TERROR TOWER
WELCOME TO DEAD HOUSE
WELCOME TO CAMP NIGHTMARE
GHOST BEACH
THE SCARECROW WALKS AT MIDNIGHT
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Goosebumps book series created by Parachute Press, Inc.
Copyright © 1996 by Scholastic Inc.
Cover design by Steve Scott
Cover art by Brandon Dorman
All rights reserved. Published by Scholastic Inc., Publishers since 1920. SCHOLASTIC, GOOSEBUMPS, GOOSEBUMPS HORRORLAND, and associated logos are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Scholastic Inc.
First printing, August 2011
“Behind the Screams” bonus material by Gabrielle S. Balkan
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eISBN: 978-0-545-34882-9
