The Barking Ghost Page 7

  “For sure,” Cooper agreed.

  * * *

  “What happened?” I asked, rubbing my eyes.

  I watched my parents walking away from the shack, their arms around two kids.

  “Hey! Those kids!” I cried. “They’re not us!”

  The door to the shack opened, and two black Labs stumbled out in a daze. Their eyes met, then they bolted away, barking frantically.

  What’s their problem? I wondered.

  I watched the dogs disappear into the trees.

  What’s going on? I asked myself, totally confused.

  I’m not a kid — and I’m not a dog, either!

  “Hey, Fergie? Fergie?”

  Where was she?

  When she popped up next to me, we both gasped.

  “Oh, no! Please — no! No! No! Noooo!” she wailed.

  Her head cocked to one side, and her little brown nose twitched furiously.

  “Tell me we’re not!” I begged her. “Please, Fergie — tell me we’re not …”

  “We are!” Fergie squeaked. “We … we’re chipmunks!”

  We both squeaked and chittered our surprise.

  Fergie gazed down at her furry little body. “How did this happen, Cooper? How did this happen?”

  “The woods are filled with chipmunks,” I sighed. “Two of them must have wandered into the Changing Room. And we —”

  “We switched with the chipmunks — not the kids!” Fergie cried. Her bushy tail thumped furiously on the ground.

  I examined my tiny black paws. I moved my teeny little fingers. I twitched my button nose.

  Cute. I was so cute!

  “Now what?” Fergie wailed. “What do we do now?”

  “Uh … hunt for acorns?” I suggested.

  Fergie’s beady little eyes squinted into mine. “Excuse me?”

  “Let’s hunt for acorns!” I said. “I’m starving!”

  My sister, Brandy, asked for an egg hunt for her tenth birthday party. And Brandy always gets what she wants.

  She flashes her smile, the one that makes the dimples pop up in her cheeks. And she puts on her little baby face. Opens her green eyes wide and tugs at her curly red hair. “Please? Please? Can I have an egg hunt at my party?”

  No way Mom and Dad can ever say no to her.

  If Brandy asked for a red, white, and blue ostrich for her birthday, Dad would be out in the garage right now, painting an ostrich.

  Brandy is good at getting her way. Real good. I’m her older brother, Dana Johnson. And I admit it. Even I have trouble saying no to Brandy.

  I’m not little and cute like my sister. I have straight black hair that falls over my forehead. And I wear glasses. And I’m a little chubby. “Dana, don’t look so serious.” That’s what Mom is always telling me.

  “Dana has an old soul,” Grandma Evelyn always says.

  I don’t really know what that means. I guess she means I’m more serious than most twelve-year-olds.

  Maybe that’s true. I’m not really serious all the time. I’m just curious about a lot of things. I’m very interested in science. I like studying bugs and plants and animals. I have an ant farm in my room. And two tarantulas.

  And I have my own microscope. Last night I studied a toenail under the microscope. It was a lot more interesting than you might think.

  I want to be a research scientist when I’m older. I’ll have my own lab, and I’ll study anything I want to.

  Dad is a kind of chemist. He works for a perfume company. He mixes things together to make new smells. He calls them fragrances.

  Before Mom met Dad, she worked in a lab. She did things with white rats.

  So both of my parents are happy that I’m into science. They encourage me. But that doesn’t mean they give me whatever I ask for.

  If I asked Dad for a red, white, and blue ostrich for my birthday, do you know what he’d say? He’d say, “Go play with your sister’s!”

  Anyway, Brandy asked for an egg hunt for her birthday. Her birthday is a week before Easter, so it wasn’t a crazy idea.

  We have a very large backyard. It stretches all the way back to a small, trickling creek.

  The yard is filled with bushes and trees and flower beds. And there’s a big old doghouse, even though we don’t have a dog.

  Lots of good egg-hiding places.

  So Brandy got her egg hunt. She invited her entire class.

  You may not think that egg hunts are exciting.

  But Brandy’s was.

  * * *

  Brandy’s birthday came on a warm and sunny day. Only a few small cumulus clouds high in the sky. (I study clouds.)

  Mom hurried out to the backyard after breakfast, lugging a big bucket of eggs. “I’ll help you hide them,” I told her.

  “That wouldn’t be fair, Dana,” Mom replied. “You’re going to be in the egg hunt, too — remember?”

  I almost forgot. Brandy usually doesn’t want me hanging around when her friends come over. But today she said that I could be in the egg hunt. And so could my best friend, Anne Gravel.

  Anne lives in the house next door. My mom is best friends with Anne’s mom. Mrs. Gravel agreed to let Mom hide eggs all over their backyard, too. So it’s only fair that Anne gets to join in.

  Anne is tall and skinny, and has long red-brown hair. She’s nearly a head taller than me. So everyone thinks she’s older. But she’s twelve, too.

  Anne is very funny. She’s always cracking jokes. She makes fun of me because I’m so serious. But I don’t mind. I know she’s only joking.

  That afternoon Anne and I stood on the driveway and watched the kids from Brandy’s class arrive at the party. Brandy handed each one of them a little straw basket.

  They were really excited when Brandy told them about the egg hunt. And the girls got even more excited when Brandy told them the grand prize — one of those expensive American Girl dolls.

  Of course the boys started to grumble. Brandy should have had a prize a boy might like. Some of the boys started using their baskets as Frisbees. And others began wrestling in the grass.

  “I was a lot more sophisticated when I was ten,” I muttered to Anne.

  “When you were ten, you liked Ninja Turtles,” Anne replied, rolling her eyes.

  “I did not!” I protested.

  “Yes, you did,” Anne insisted. “You wore a Ninja Turtle T-shirt to school every day.”

  I kicked some gravel across the driveway. “Just because I wore the shirt doesn’t mean I liked them,” I replied.

  Anne flung back her long hair. She sneered at me. I hate it when Anne sneers at me. “You had Ninja Turtle cups and plates at your tenth birthday party, Dana. And a Ninja Turtle tablecloth. And we played some kind of Ninja Turtle Pizza Pie–throwing game.”

  “But that doesn’t mean I liked them!” I declared.

  Three more girls from Brandy’s class came running across the lawn. I recognized them. They were the girls I call the Hair Sisters. They’re not sisters. But they spend all their time in Brandy’s room after school doing each other’s hair.

  Dad moved slowly across the grass toward them. He had his camera up to his face. The three Hair Sisters waved to the camera and yelled, “Happy Birthday, Brandy!”

  Dad tapes all our birthdays and vacations and big events. He keeps the tapes on a shelf in the den. We never watch them.

  The sun beamed down. The grass smelled sweet and fresh. The spring leaves on the trees were just starting to unfurl.

  “Okay — everyone follow me to the back!” Brandy ordered.

  The kids lined up in twos and threes, carrying their baskets. Anne and I followed behind them. Dad walked backwards, busily recording everything.

  Brandy led the way to the backyard. Mom was waiting there. “The eggs are hidden everywhere,” Mom announced, sweeping her hand in the air. “Everywhere you can imagine.”

  “Okay, everyone!” Brandy cried. “At the count of three, the egg hunt begins! One —”

  Anne lean
ed down and whispered in my ear. “Bet you five dollars I collect more eggs than you.”

  I smiled. Anne always knows how to make things more interesting.

  “Two —”

  “You’ve got a bet!” I told her.

  “Three!” Brandy called.

  The kids all cheered. The hunt for hidden eggs was on.

  They all began hurrying through the backyard, bending down to pick up eggs. Some of them moved on hands and knees through the grass. Some worked in groups. Some searched through the yard on their own.

  I turned and saw Anne stooping down, moving quickly along the side of the garage. She already had three eggs in her basket.

  I can’t let her win! I told myself. I sprang into action.

  I ran past a cluster of girls around the old doghouse. And I kept moving.

  I wanted to find an area of my own. A place where I could grab up a bunch of eggs without having to compete with the others.

  I jogged across the tall grass, making my way to the back. I was all alone, nearly to the creek, when I started my search.

  I spotted an egg hidden behind a small rock. I had to move fast. I wanted to win the bet.

  I bent down, picked it up, and quickly dropped it into my basket.

  Then I knelt down, set my basket on the ground, and started to search for more eggs.

  But I jumped up when I heard a scream.

  R.L. Stine’s books are read all over the world. So far, his books have sold more than 300 million copies, making him one of the most popular children’s authors in history. Besides Goosebumps, R.L. Stine has written the teen series Fear Street and the funny series Rotten School, as well as the Mostly Ghostly series, The Nightmare Room series, and the two-book thriller Dangerous Girls. R.L. Stine lives in New York with his wife, Jane, and Minnie, his King Charles spaniel. You can learn more about him at www.RLStine.com.

  Goosebumps book series created by Parachute Press, Inc.

  Copyright © 1995 by Scholastic Inc.

  All rights reserved. Published by Scholastic Inc., Publishers since 1920. SCHOLASTIC, GOOSEBUMPS, GOOSEBUMPS HORRORLAND, and associated logos are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Scholastic Inc.

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  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  First edition, June 1995

  e-ISBN 978-0-545-91042-2

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