I didn't see anything or hear anything either.
But that didn't keep the hair on the back of my neck from rising as I pulled off my shirt and stuffed it into the plastic compartment in my suitcase.
I scoured my hands until they were mostly clean and brushed the dirt out of my hair and rebraided it.
And all the while I could feel someone watching me.
Maybe it was only the power of suggestion.
But I cleaned up as fast as I could anyway.
No ghostly writing appeared on the walls, no one appeared in the mirror or moved stuff around.
I opened the bathroom door and found Amber waiting impatiently right in front of the door.
She didn't notice that she'd startled me.
"I have to take Chad to softball practice, then do some shopping for dinner tonight.
Do you want to come?" "Why not?" I said with a casual shrug.
Staying in that house alone didn't appeal to me--some ghost hunter I was.
Nothing had happened, and I was already jumpy.
I took shotgun.
Chad frowned at me, but sat in back.
I didn't think I impressed him much.
No one said anything until we dropped Chad off.
He didn't look happy about going.
Amber proved that she was tougher than me because she ignored the puppy-dog eyes and abandoned Chad to his coach's indifferent care.
"So you decided not to become a history teacher," Amber said as she pulled away from the curb.
Her voice was tight with nerves.
The stress was coming from her end, I thought--but then she'd never been relaxing company.
"Decided isn't quite the word," I told her.
"I took a job as a mechanic to support myself until a teaching position opened ...
and one day I realized that even if someone offered me a job, I'd rather turn a wrench." And then, because she'd given me the opening, "I thought you were going to be a vet." "Yes, well, life happened." She paused.
"Chad happened." That was too much honesty for her though, and she subsided into silence.
In the grocery store, I wandered away while she was testing tomatoes--they all looked good to me.
I bought a candy bar, just to see how much she'd changed.
Not that much.
By the time she'd finished lecturing me on the evils of refined sugar, we were almost back to the house.