Young Scrooge Read online

  I couldn’t look away from the glowing red eyes. They held me as if I were hypnotized.

  And then I suddenly realized what had happened. The closet was so warm. I had fallen asleep. I had drifted off to sleep, and now I was having a nightmare.

  “Am I dreaming this?” The words escaped my throat in a hoarse, trembling voice. “Can I wake up now?”

  “You’re not dreaming,” the old man replied. The words sounded as if they were coming from somewhere far away, not from this glowing yellow figure in front of me.

  I swallowed. My mouth was dry as sandpaper. I started to shake.

  I told you, there’s only one thing in this world that I’m afraid of, and that’s ghosts. And now I knew I was staring at a ghost. I was locked in this closet with a terrifying ghost.

  “Wh-who are you?” I cried in a tiny voice.

  “Don’t you recognize me?” he boomed. The bright, pulsing light billowed around him.

  “N-no,” I stammered. “Why should I recognize you?”

  A wave of heat washed over me. The old ghost’s eyes bulged. “I’m Marley’s ghost,” he shouted, his voice echoing in the tiny closet.

  My mouth dropped open. “Huh?”

  His eyes narrowed on me angrily. “I’m Marley’s ghost. I’ve come to warn you, William Delaney.”

  “Whoa.” I raised both hands, signaling him to back off. My brain spun with confusion. “William Delaney?” I choked out.

  The old ghost raised a bony finger and pointed. “You are William Delaney. Don’t try to escape your fate, William. You cannot run from your doom.”

  “But—But—” I sputtered. “I’m not William Delaney. I’m Rick Scroogeman.”

  A flash of light made me blink. The ghost appeared to fade for a moment. He slipped back in the darkness of the closet until he appeared dim and small. “Scroogeman?” he said. “You’re telling the truth?”

  I let out a long, shuddering breath. “The Delaneys live across the street,” I said. “The redbrick house on the corner. You got the wrong house.”

  Marley’s ghost nodded slowly. His eyes appeared to sink deep in their sockets. A low hum came from deep in his chest. “Sorry about that,” he said. He turned to the wall. “I’ll be gone now. I have to haunt William Delaney.”

  “Uh … wait,” I said. “Before you go, could you do me a favor? Could you open the closet door for me and let me out?”

  He had nearly disappeared. Only his face and one hand remained, floating in front of me.

  He floated closer, his ghostly face just inches away. “Your turn is coming, Scroogeman. You must remain in this closet. Your journey is about to begin.”

  “You won’t help me?”

  He didn’t answer. He lowered his head and began to vanish through the wall.

  “Don’t let the door hit you on your way out,” I said.

  He was gone. Marley’s ghost was gone. I sat there, still shaking, staring at the glowing darkness where he had floated.

  Then the darkness exploded into bursting red and yellow lights. And from the flash of light came a deep voice: “I’ve come for you, Scroogeman. I’ve come for you now.”

  10

  The bright colors faded. Blinking hard, I waited for my eyes to adjust to the dim light. And stared at a hooded figure. His long gray robe reached the floor, covering his whole body. It billowed like drapes at an open window, and I heard a sound like rushing wind.

  I couldn’t see his face. It was hidden under the hood. “I’ve come for you, Scroogeman,” he repeated in his deep bass drum of a voice.

  He turned toward me and I could see into the hood. I saw only blackness in there. No face. No face at all.

  “G-go away,” I stammered. “You have the wrong guy. You want Delaney across the street.”

  “I want you,” the ghost boomed. And again I heard the wind, as if a storm had blown up inside his empty hood.

  “Wh-what do you want?” I choked out. “This isn’t Halloween. You’re too late for the costume contest.”

  The wind became a roar, like a powerful burst of thunder. I fell back against the closet wall. My whole body shuddered.

  “I am the Ghost of Christmas Past!” the hooded figure screamed.

  “You don’t have to shout. I can hear you,” I said, rubbing my throbbing ears. I stared into the hood, into the solid blackness.

  “I am the Ghost of Christmas Past,” he repeated, a little softer.

  “And I’m the Easter Bunny,” I said. I don’t know where I got the courage. But my fear turned quickly to anger. “Get out of my closet. Let me go.”

  The ghost floated over me. “You’d better act more scared,” he warned. “I really am a ghost.”

  And now I started to shudder. Sitting on the floor with my legs outstretched, my knees began to knock. I couldn’t stop them.

  I told you before, I’ve been afraid of ghosts my whole life. Ghosts are the only thing I’m afraid of.

  And now here I was, locked in the attic closet, storm winds blowing, and a headless, hooded ghost come to haunt me.

  “What do you want? Where are you taking me?” I cried.

  But he didn’t answer my question.

  “Scroogeman, you have ruined Christmas for the kids in the school play,” he said. “You have frightened your classmates and made their lives unhappy. And now you have ruined Christmas for your mother and your brother by tearing up all the presents.”

  An invisible hand clamped onto my shoulder. I couldn’t see it, but it felt wet and cold. “Come with me. I’m going to take you to where you can see the error of your ways.”

  He tightened his hold on me until I gasped in pain. “Is this like the movie?” I cried. “That gross Christmas movie—?”

  “IT ISN’T A MOVIE!” he boomed, his voice rattling the closet door. “This is real, Scroogeman.”

  The wind picked up again. It quickly grew to a roar. And then a deafening explosion rocked the closet. I covered both ears with my hands as the blast sent me flying off the floor.

  Flying into a deep blackness.

  I could still feel the bone-hard grip of the ghost’s invisible hand pulling me. I couldn’t see him. I couldn’t see anything. But I felt him pulling me away … away from the closet … away from my home.

  Pulling me … away.

  11

  I shut my eyes tight. Swirling winds howled around me. I heard voices moaning as if in pain. I heard loud sobs. Someone groaned, “Help me … Hellllp me…”

  The cries made me open my eyes. No one there. I was still being pulled through total darkness. The skin tightened on my face. I couldn’t breathe. The wind was smothering me.

  Was that me screaming? Wailing at the top of my lungs without stop?

  My cries echoed as if I were in a huge cave. And then … I was on a street corner. The hooded ghost stood beside me, still squeezing my hand in his icy grip.

  Too dizzy to stand, I slumped onto my knees. My head felt like a spinning top. The ground tilted and swayed.

  Finally, I felt a little stronger. My heart pounding, I climbed to my feet. I was suddenly wearing a heavy overcoat and a fur hat I’d never seen before.

  I gazed around. A tall, dappled horse clopped past, pulling a small wooden carriage. No cars on the street.

  Two men walked past, wearing long black overcoats and wide-brimmed hats pulled down low over their heads. They stepped over snowdrifts, their leather boots nearly up to their knees. One of them carried a slender silver walking stick. He gestured with it in the air as he talked.

  Two men on horseback trotted past. And then another horse-drawn carriage.

  “Where am I?” I demanded. My voice came out faint and shrill, like a whistle. “Is this the past or something?”

  The ghost nodded. “You got that right.”

  Two women wearing big gray bonnets and fur-collared coats over long, pleated skirts walked past. One of them walked right through the ghost!

  That sent a chill down my back. He wasn’t kiddi
ng about the ghost part.

  That meant I’d been kidnapped. Kidnapped by a crazy invisible ghost and taken … taken who knows where!

  Were there police here? Could I report him to the police? Can you report a ghost to the police?

  I suddenly thought about Charlie. Mom was at the store. He was home all alone. What if I couldn’t get back home? Did that mean he’d get all of my presents, too?

  No way I’d let that happen!

  I tugged my hand free from the ghost’s cold grip. “You have to take me home,” I said.

  “No, I don’t,” he said. “I have taken you far from your home. To a distant time. Before you were born.”

  “But my mom will be waiting. She—”

  “Your mother hasn’t even been born yet,” he said. “Scroogeman, I brought you back to the distant past to show you a lot of things. You ruined Christmas for a lot of people. Now you need to learn the real meaning of the holiday.”

  “But I already know that,” I protested. “What do you think I was doing in that attic closet? I was discovering what’s important about Christmas—my presents.”

  He shook his head. Two tall dark-hatted men in long overcoats walked past, both rubbing their beards and talking at once. One of them walked through the ghost as if he were made of air. The ghost didn’t seem to mind.

  I’m the only one who can see him, I realized.

  No way I could report him to the police.

  “Wh-why did you do this to me?” I stammered. “Why did you bring me so far back in the past?”

  He lowered his hood close to my face. I could still see only darkness inside. “Because I knew you wouldn’t like it,” he whispered.

  The answer sent a chill down my back. “But … in the movie, the Ghost of Christmas Past makes Scrooge revisit his childhood,” I said.

  “This isn’t a movie,” he snapped. “You have many lessons to learn, Scroogeman. You need to learn how to treat the people you know. Have you ever heard of the Golden Rule?”

  “Sure,” I said. “Do it to others before they do it to you.”

  He remained silent for a long time. “Okay,” he said finally. The gray hood bobbed up and down. “Okay. That’s the Golden Rule. I have brought you back in time to a place where they practice your Golden Rule.”

  “Good,” I said. My head was spinning. I didn’t really know how to reply.

  “‘Do it to others before they do it to you,’” the ghost repeated. “Let’s see how you like that, Scroogeman.”

  The long robe swirled around him as he turned away from me. He floated into the street as a horse and carriage clattered by.

  “Hey, wait!” I called. “Where are you going? You can’t just leave me here. Where are you going?”

  He turned, and again I saw the empty blackness inside the hood. “Time for you to start school, Scroogeman. Follow me.”

  12

  Everything went black. When I could see again, we were standing in a dimly lit hall. Torches along the wooden wall provided a flickering light. Christmas wreaths were hung at the windows. Weird-looking, old-fashioned-type kids carrying leather book bags by their straps strode past us.

  “This is your new school, Scroogeman,” the Ghost of Christmas Past said. “The Bleak Academy.”

  I stared at the kids walking past. Some of the boys must have been farmers. They wore dark denim overalls to school. Flannel shirts and bib overalls with straps like suspenders.

  Totally weird.

  The girls had hair down to their shoulders, tied back in colored ribbons. They all wore long skirts, gray or black, that came down to their heavy leather shoes.

  Everyone talked quietly, like they were afraid to make any noise. The loudest sound was the clump of their heavy shoes on the wooden floor.

  “I don’t want to go to this weirdo school. I want to go to my own school,” I told the ghost.

  “Your mean nature has brought you here, Scrooge,” the ghost said. His robe shimmered in the flickering torchlight. “Let us see how you enjoy being in a school where everyone treats you the way you treat others.”

  “‘Mean nature’?” I cried. “Who says I’m mean? Tell me. Who said it? I’ll punch out his lights.”

  He didn’t reply.

  “Take me home!” I demanded. “I don’t belong here.” I grabbed for his arm, but my hand went right through the sleeve of his robe. “You can’t do this to me. I’m not going to move until you take me home. Do you hear me?”

  “Good luck in your new school, Scroogeman,” he said softly. “You’ll need it.”

  Then he vanished in an explosion of cold air.

  And I was left standing there in that dark hall, in my jeans and blue polo shirt, the only kid not dressed in gray or black. The only guy in the school with short hair. The only guy here who didn’t know anyone at all.

  “I DON’T BELONG HERE!” I wanted to scream at the top of my lungs.

  Would anyone care?

  A tall, skinny boy in a wrinkled gray shirt tucked into his overalls stepped beside me. He swept back the straight brown hair that had fallen over his forehead. He had little round brown eyes and a long nose that came down almost to his lips.

  He looked a lot like a bird. If I’d been back home, I’d have offered him a worm. Ha-ha.

  He squinted at me for a long moment. “Are you the new boy?”

  I nodded. “I guess.”

  “You’re Scroogeman?” he asked, still studying me.

  I nodded again. “I guess.”

  “I’m Benjamin Cooke,” he said. “Mr. Dulwich asked me to watch for you.”

  “Who is Mr. Dulwich?” I asked.

  “Our teacher,” he said. He squeezed the sleeve of my polo shirt. “Your shirt is the color of the sky,” he said softly.

  “So what?” I said.

  “Did your mother dye it that color when she wove it for you?” he asked.

  I started to tell him my mom bought it at Walmart. But another boy walked up to us. He was big and red-faced and blond and bounced as he walked. He had a black tie knotted at the stiff white collar of his white dress shirt. He grinned at me. “New boy?”

  “Watch out for Prescott,” Benjamin whispered in my ear. He took a step back.

  “Yeah. I’m new,” I said. “You’re Prescott?”

  “We don’t like new kids,” he said. “I already don’t like you. Why are you wearing a circus costume?”

  “Why are you wearing that?” I said, pointing to his heavy brown suit jacket and vest. “Do you have a monkey at home waiting to get his suit back?”

  I thought it was pretty funny, but Benjamin and Prescott didn’t laugh. Prescott’s face turned red and he clenched his fists. “No one makes a monkey out of me,” he said through gritted teeth.

  I decided I’d better not get him steamed. It was my first day, after all. “I was making a joke,” I said.

  “Your mother made a joke,” Prescott said. “I’m staring at it.”

  Benjamin laughed at that one. I decided to play it cool. I didn’t say anything about his mother.

  Some kids had gathered across the hall to watch us. I spotted a very hot-looking girl with long, wavy blond hair down the back of her gray dress. I flashed her a thumbs-up. She turned her head away.

  “What are those?” Prescott asked. I realized he was staring down at my sneakers. “Why are you wearing cloth on your feet? Are you an elf who lives in the forest?”

  “Those are Air Jordans,” I said.

  He scowled at me. “Elf Jordans? You think you’re a forest elf?”

  “No. Air Jordans,” I repeated.

  “What kind of cobbler would make shoes out of cloth?” Prescott asked Benjamin.

  Benjamin shrugged. “Maybe a blind cobbler?”

  They both thought that was a riot. They tossed back their heads and laughed.

  “That’s not funny,” I said. “These sneakers cost my mom a lot of money.”

  “I’ll show you what’s funny,” Prescott said, winking at
Benjamin. “Let me test those elf shoes.”

  He raised his big boot and tromped his heel down as hard as he could on the top of my right sneaker.

  “Whooooa.” I let out a howl of pain.

  “That’s funny!” Prescott exclaimed. He slammed his heel down hard again on the same spot.

  “I see … what … you’re doing,” I choked out as pain shot up my leg, up my entire body. “You’re … giving me … a dance lesson.”

  The pain was unbearable. I shut my eyes and started to dance.

  13

  Mr. Dulwich was tall and skinny as a spaghetti noodle. He had straight black hair parted in the middle of his head. And he wore round eyeglasses perched on the end of his long nose.

  His shirt collar was stiff and stuck out like wings. It wasn’t even attached to his starched white shirt. A black string tie hung down from his neck. His suit was black. The jacket was tight against his waist, and the pants were baggy.

  I’m not the one dressed like a clown, I thought. Put a red nose on Mr. Dulwich and he could perform in any circus.

  He greeted me with a short hello. Then, with a wave of his hand, he sent me to an empty desk-chair at the back of the room. I had to squeeze into it. The chair was pretty small.

  I turned and saw the blond girl from the hall sitting next to me. She had awesome blue-gray eyes and a few freckles on her cheeks. She didn’t say hello or anything. She was busy arranging black pencils in a wooden pencil box.

  “Hey,” I said. “How’s it going?”

  She finally looked at me. “How’s what going?” she asked.

  I flashed her my best smile. “How you doing?”

  “How am I doing what?” she demanded.

  “Just saying hi,” I said. “What’s your name?”

  She tossed back her hair. “Emily-Ann. May I ask a question? Why are you wearing such funny clothes?”

  “Because I come from the future,” I said.

  She laughed and turned back to her pencil box.

  “We have a new student, class,” Mr. Dulwich announced. He stood at the front of the room, leaning on an enormous globe of the world. “Stand up and introduce yourself,” he said, motioning to me with both hands.