Ghost?

My name is Kody Kavanough, catchy, I know. I live in this tiny little town, by a tiny little lake, so remote that it's not even on the map. All my life, I've seen things others couldn't; ghosts, spirits, dead people... whatever you call them. I used to be really pumped for helping ghosts, "If I help I'm a good person!" I thought. "This will make me cool!" I claimed. But now, they just get in the way. It's kinda hard to focus when there's one ghost wailing about their past life in the corner of the room and another nagging your whole class for not working out in a field. I try my best to ignore them, at least until I get home, but they rarely leave me alone. The one thing about today that makes my ghost problem worse is the full moon; ghosts come out more on days when the moon is full, whether it's dark or not. Normally I'd be going to a memorial for my aunt and grandpa, but I don't know if I can handle seeing a dead relative floating above their gravestone. I'd like to wait awhile before that happens.

I decided to go to my favorite hangout instead; the lake. That's the only place where I have no responsibilities, no quarrels, no elderly residents asking me to talk to their dead relatives. Aside from the occasional lost or lonely spirit, it's quiet. Sure, my only real hobby is skipping stones across the murky river water, or solving small town crimes. But that's the only thing there is to do anyway, and like I said, I'm not in the mood to meet a dead relative. So I skip the memorial today, in turn also skipping the only real chance I have to see my dad, but that doesn't matter right now.

I come up to the foggy banks of the river, if it wasn't for my hat my hair would frizz out. As if my "beautiful blonde hair" wasn't messy enough. I put down my backpack and scoop up some pebbles along the bank into the bottom of my sweater, picking out all the rocks that are too big or too small to skip. I threw the first pebble, watching it skip one- two- and three times. I threw a second rock, it almost skipped four times... but then, it skipped back??? Wait, how does that even work? I threw another pebble, making sure to watch it this time. After the third skip, it just reversed directions, almost like someone picked it up mid-air and skipped it back. There was only one possible explanation for this; it was the ghost girl. I've never seen a ghost pick something up, but I'm gonna take a wild guess and say that they don't need hands to lift stuff. I got another stone and skipped it, watching the ghost girl this time. If she skipped it back one more time, I was gonna skip a rock right into her face. Bad idea, I know, but I really don't like some ghost getting in the way of that satisfying plop of the pebble skipping across the surface of the water.

Low and behold, right before the pebble goes under, the rock skips back across. The ghost girl simply looked at me, probably noticing me staring at her, and giggled. That's it, I'm not gonna deal with this anymore. "Hey! You better not be the one messing with my pebbles!" I was pretty confident in myself, I mean, this little ghost girl couldn't really do much to me anyway. All that confidence was seeped out of my body the second I heard her voice, though. She sounded like an old man who smoked 30 packs a day, and that's not a pleasant sound, especially coming from a little kid. "And what if I am? You got a problem?" The ghost girl completely turned to face me, crossing her arms. If she had feet, she would be tapping them right now. "Yeah, I got a problem!" I stumbled over my words, but like the dumb teen I am, I puffed my chest out and tried to look big and tough, like I was scaring off a bear or something. The girl looked unimpressed. "Well too bad!" The little girl stuck out her tongue and blew a raspberry at me, something I never expected to happen. I decided to try and be the ,slightly, more mature one here, and just ignore her. I got another stone from my make-shift sweater pocket and chucked it at the river, watching it skip only twice before it stopped, floated for a second, and came straight for my face. That's what I get for even thinking about throwing a pebble at the ghost's face, huh? What is she, a mind reader? As I got caught up in thinking about what to do, I forgot to actually do. The pebble smacked me straight in the middle of my forehead. "AHG! What the heck!" I held my hand on my forehead to try and soothe the pain, but alas, it still gave me a headache. Why me? The little girl giggled away as she faded, there goes my chance to enjoy the river. Since my fun day at the river has been tainted, I decided to get my stuff and go back home instead. Maybe the memorial isn't over yet, and I can still redeem myself?