And lastly, to my most cherished treasures, my precious daughters, Lily Belle and Poet Eve: it is the greatest joy of my life to watch you gaze upon the world with wonder and tell us what you see. May stories always enchant you, and may you tell your own stories someday.
Excerpt from Monsterstreet #2: The Halloweeners
KEEP READING FOR A SNEAK PEEK AT ANOTHER CHILLING MONSTERSTREET ADVENTURE
1
The House at the End of Maple Street
Fisher gripped the straps of his backpack as he trudged down Maple Street, gazing in each window at the silhouettes of boys and girls putting on homemade costumes and nibbling on fresh-baked treats. Jack-o’-lanterns grinned at him from cobwebbed porches. Blow-up monsters and plastic gravestones loomed on leaf-covered lawns. And the sugary scent of candy wafted through the crisp autumn air, enchanting his nostrils. It seemed every house on the block was decorated for Halloween.
All except one.
The house at the end of Maple Street looked just as ordinary as it did on any other day of the year. There wasn’t a single pumpkin, not one fake spider, not even a sign that greeted guests with Happy Halloween!
Fisher walked up to the door of the house, turned the brass knob, and stepped inside. He reached down to pet his cat, and heard his mom’s voice echoing from the kitchen. . . .
“. . . Yes, I accept the position. We’ll be there before Thanksgiving. I’m very much looking forward to this opportunity.”
Fisher peeked around the corner just as his mom hung up the phone. She was wearing jeans and a sweater, and her short brown hair looked darker in the shadows where she sat.
“Who was that?” Fisher asked.
His mom winced, startled. “No one.”
“It had to be someone,” Fisher pried.
His mom sighed.
“If you must know, I was offered a vice principal position in that town on the coast I was telling you about.”
“We’re moving . . . again?” Fisher’s voice reeked of disappointment.
“You know how much I don’t like being here,” his mom said. “I lived in this town, and in this house, long enough while I was growing up. I told you when we moved this summer that it was only a temporary stop for you and me after the divorce—until we could get settled somewhere better.”
“But I’m just starting to get used to this place,” Fisher said. “Some guys at school even asked me to go trick-or-treating with them tonight. Do you know how hard it is to get invited to something at a new school? Everyone’s had the same friends since kindergarten.”
“You can make new friends after we move,” his mom replied.
“That’s what you said last time, and so that’s what I’m trying to do,” Fisher pointed out.
“There’s no negotiating on this,” his mom said.
Fisher felt the hot fire of anger burning in his chest, and he tried to push it down deep where he kept all his feelings. But it was too much to hold in.
“If you and Dad hadn’t gotten a divorce, I never would have had to leave my friends in the first place!” he erupted like a volcano.
His mom was silent. Fisher knew mentioning the divorce was a powerful weapon, and he only used it when he felt he had no other choice.
“You’re entitled to your own feelings about it. And so am I,” his mom said, but her words felt cold. Like she wasn’t listening to him. Ever since the divorce, he felt like he and his mom were living on two different planets with nothing in common but their last name.
“Why do you have to be so selfish?” Fisher mumbled.
“What did you say?”
Fisher debated whether to say it again. Instead, he said something worse.
“Dad wouldn’t make me move again.”
He saw the color of anger fill his mom’s face.
“Well, your dad isn’t here, is he? And as long as you’re living under my roof, you’ll live by my rules.”
“I hate your rules!” Fisher shouted, still unable to control his temper.
“That’s it, young man. You’re grounded,” she said in her principal-like voice.
“But what about Halloween?”
“Doesn’t make any difference to me what day it is,” she returned. “You know I don’t care for Halloween anyway.”
“But Mom!”
“With that attitude, you can stay in your room for the entire weekend. I’ve already put some moving boxes upstairs, so you can get an early start on packing.”
“That’s not fair!”
“Okay. The next month! Keep it up and you’ll be grounded for the rest of sixth grade.”
He stared at her for a long moment, then decided arguing would only make things worse. He turned and walked up the stairs to his bedroom and lay down in his reading tent, where he kept his stash of comic books and monster figurines.
He heard his mom shout from downstairs, “By the way, I have to chaperone the Halloween dance at the high school later, so I’ll bring your dinner up before I leave. And no TV while I’m gone—I don’t want you having nightmares from all those monster movies that will be on tonight!”
Fisher glanced across the room to the pile of cardboard boxes waiting to be filled. He had just unpacked everything a few months before, and now his mom was making him do it all again.
Why can’t Mom just listen to me for once? And why can’t she just let me go trick-or-treating?
Right then, a staticky sound buzzed over the walkie-talkie in his backpack.
A boy’s raspy voice came through. “The meeting’s about to start. You coming or what?”
2
Secret Hideout
Fisher ripped the white sheet from his bed and used his pocketknife to cut out two oval holes for his eyes.
“This will have to do for my costume,” he whispered, tucking the ghost sheet into his backpack and climbing out the window.
As soon as his feet hit the ground, he ran to his bike. Then he pedaled as fast as he could into the forest at the edge of the neighborhood, just as the boy on the walkie-talkie had told him to do.
The afternoon sun beamed through the skeleton trees, bathing the woods with an eerie autumn glow. Red and brown leaves crunched beneath his tires as he passed an old graveyard, running his fingers over the spikes of the rusted iron fence. A hundred yards up, he arrived at a giant oak tree three times the size of any others in sight. Its limbs were gnarled, twisted, and full of knots. A deep hollow stared out from its trunk like the eye socket of a skull.
Fisher saw three other bikes lying on the ground near the base of the tree, and he knew he was in the right place.
High above, a tree house was cradled within its limbs, hidden in camouflage.
A handmade wooden sign hung on its side:
THE HALLOWEENERS
Est. 1955
About the Author
Courtesy J. H. Reynolds
J. H. REYNOLDS asked for a typewriter for his eleventh birthday and has been writing stories ever since. He spent his youth traveling the world and meeting lots of interesting people. After exploring all seven continents, he returned home to Texas to start a family and work through the files of his imagination. He now lives in a cottage by a creek with his wife and kids. You can visit him at www.jhreynolds.com.
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Copyright
Katherine Tegen Books is an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.
MONSTERSTREET #1: THE BOY WHO CRIED WEREWOLF. Copyright © 2019 by J. H. Reynolds. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express writ
ten permission of HarperCollins e-books.
www.harpercollinschildrens.com
Cover art © 2019 by Chris Fenoglio
Cover design by David Curtis
* * *
Library of Congress Control Number: 2018965101
ISBN 978-0-06-286935-7 (trade bdg.)
Digital Edition JULY 2019 ISBN: 978-0-06-286936-4
Print ISBN: 978-0-06-286934-0 (pbk.)
* * *
1920212223PC/BRR10987654321
FIRST EDITION
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