The Ghost In My Bedroom - By Heather Jones Page 0,25

is Ling there?"

"Hold on." I heard a lot of Chinese shouting back and forth before Ling finally answered the phone.

"Hello?"

"Hey, its Lucy."

"Lu, why don't you ever call my cell phone?" she shouted.

"Because I don't want to bother you at work or if you're alone with Alex." I called her cell phone once and I swear they were totally doing it. Why she didn't let it go to voicemail I will never understand. "So are you busy tonight, do you want to do something?"

"Yeah, you want to go mini golf? Alex is picking me up soon, we can swing by and get you on the way."

Oh great, back to the ole third wheel. "Sure, sounds good."

"Okay, we'll be there in half an hour or so."

"Great, see ya."

I went upstairs to get out of my drab work clothes and pulled on my old Siouxsie and the Banshees t-shirt, ripped up jeans and my favorite purple chucks. Ryan casually asked from the bed, "Going out?"

"Yeah, going golfing with Ling and Alex."

"No Jon huh?"

"No, but I did call him, he's coming over tomorrow. Stazi is going crazy with a big dinner for everyone."

"This dude must really like you to agree to come over for a family dinner."

"Yeah, I guess so. So are you planning on assaulting him in front of everyone? I mean, I don't want everyone to think he's crazy if he can see you."

"Why not?"

"Well, I don't want everyone knowing that our house is haunted for one. I mean you see how Natalie reacts to it. It can be upsetting for normal people."

"Okay, I see your point. I'll figure something out."

"I hope so." I heard Ling's voice downstairs. "See you later."

I headed downstairs to rescue Ling from Stazi, they both thought the other was a total spaz.

"Lu, Alex is waiting in the car, so let's go." I knew that was her excuse so she wouldn't have to stay and chat with my family.

"Later Stazi."

As we walked out to the car she asked if I ate dinner yet, because we could go get pizza.

"Nope and sounds good to me."

"Alex, let's get pizza okay? Lu says so."

"Oh well, if Lucy says so."

He drove us out to the pizza place. Of course Jon was working, I don't know why I forgot he was going to be there. Since it was a weeknight, the place was dead; it was just Jon and the counter girl. Jon looked at me from behind the counter with an odd expression I couldn't read as he was kneading dough. Ling and I hung behind Alex and he actually ordered and paid for a whole pizza to split. I felt totally awkward and waved at Jon and he nodded back, still with that strange expression.

We went to sit at a table and Alex turned to me. "So I hear things are going well with you and Jon?"

"Did he say that?"

"Yeah, a couple nights ago we were both working and he started talking about you and asking me all kinds of questions."

"Like what?"

"He was wondering where he should take you on your first date and was asking what I thought about different places. Where did you end up going?"

"Um, Eastern State Penitentiary."

"Really? That place is crazy, Ling remember when we went there for Halloween? What a strange place for a date though."

"It was interesting."

"So you had a good time then?" Ling asked.

"Yeah..."

"And?"

"And what?"

"Anything noteworthy to share?"

Oh boy was there ever, but nothing I wanted to talk about. "Nope, not really. We wandered around and got kind of lost. There was a tour. Hey did you know that it had flushing toilets before the White House?"

"Fascinating," Alex said. "Flushing toilets, will wonders never cease?"

Jon walked over with our pizza. "Hey guys, what's up?"

"We're going miniature golfing tonight," Ling explained. "I wish you could come out with us."

"Oh you know, got to work." He looked at me nervously and dashed away behind the counter. Ling gave me a questioning glance like what was that about. I shrugged and we ate our pizza.

Jon left us alone while we finished dinner and Ling kept asking why he wouldn't come sit with us since the place was so dead. Luckily Alex came to my rescue without even asking.

"Boss has us doing inventory and stupid shit like that when it's slow. He's probably busy with some dumb project like counting pizza boxes."

"Oh," I said pretending to understand some big mystery.

We finished up and I waved by at Jon, he barely nodded from over his counter. I wonder if