Haunting

Chapter Six

Chapter Six

Shannon ran to her car, ignoring the workers in the kitchen, and shoved her feet in her converse on the way out the door.

As Shannon drove towards Northwood High School, she was practically bouncing in her seat. Shannon took the same route as she did the day before, left at Marilyn and the penis and the third door on the right. She pulled out her phone and text Joanie.

Joanie was sitting in her French class, staring at the work sheet she was supposed to be completing. She was meant to be correcting grammatical errors in the text. It was boring as hell. She took this class so she could flirt with cute French boys, not so that she could construct a proper sentence about the weather in Nice.

Joanie felt a vibrating in her pocket and opened it up to find a message from Shannon, the same one she received yesterday, to be exact.

She looked toward the door and saw a hand flipping off the class. The hand was tiny and had wicked witch of the west green varnish on her nails. Joanie had no doubt it was Shannon. She raised her hand to get a bathroom pass and slipped out the door.

Shannon grinned from her hiding spot when Joanie stepped out the door. She was the perfect person to help.

“You need to come with me.” Shannon told Joanie.

“So you’re kidnapping me?” Joanie asked her new friend, wondering if it was even worth the trouble of arguing. She had known Shannon less than a week, but she knew that glint in her eye better than anybody. She saw it every time she looked in the mirror. Joanie had no doubt in her mind that her and Shannon were two peas in a pod, she just wasn’t sure if she would be able to deal with any more intra-pod squabbling. She had done it before, with Ben in fact, and it had only ended with heart break.

“If that’s the way you choose to look at it then yes I am.” Shannon said, “Because I have a mission and I need your help.”

“What kind of mission?” Joanie asked her dubiously. She would not be surprised if said mission was not entirely legal.

“A secret room.”

“What?” Joanie asked in confusion.

“A secret room,” Shannon said slowly. “In my house. I have found one and I need help opening it.”

“Seriously?” Joanie asked, and Shannon nodded. “How?”

“The research you gave me.” Shannon said. “There were house plans in there.”

“Really?”

Shannon was speechless. Almost. “Did you not even look at any of that stuff?”

“Technically no,” Joanie began. “We got the zero after the teacher found out about the P.I. and we never got around to reading it. At least I didn’t, Ben may have.”

“Jeez woman,” Shannon said with a laugh. “So are you in?”

“Of course.” Joanie said, coming to a decision. Better to regret doing something than regretting not doing something. Or something similar to that effect only far more eloquent.

Shannon dragged Joanie down the halls and towards the front door.

“What about my stuff?” Joanie said, pointing in the direction of her French class.

“It’ll still be there tomorrow.”

Just before they made it to the front entrance, a door swung open right in front of Shannon’s face. Luckily for Shannon she was able to slam it closed before she broke her nose, unluckily for the person who opened it; the door smacked him in the side of the head and knocked him on his butt.