Ghost Stories

You'd think I lived in Australia. Both my best friends are named Sydney, and usually I just have to call them M. and S., for their last names.

We're obsessed with Twilight, the three of us, so we made it a point to go to the midnight showing of New Moon. Afterwards, we were too excited to sleep, so we went back to my house and pulled out the princess coloring books.

All at once, S. started to cry. M. and I exchanged a worried look. "What's wrong?" I asked S.

"I saw something...something scary," she managed through her tears.

We shrugged it off, the first time. But ten minutes later, she was scrabbling to get away from her coloring book, and sure enough, I saw the Beast from the fairy tale moving ominously. My teeth began to chatter, and M. and S. clung to each other.

Then we heard the screaming girl. It was as if a young child was in extreme pain, and it freaked us out. S. finally couldn't take it anymore, and went home.

The moment she closed the door behind her, a ghostly shape floated through the closet's back wall. M. and I put on brave faces.

"Are you a girl or a boy ghost?" I asked.

"A boy," the ghost said in a wispy voice.

"How old are you?" M. asked.

"Six. This was my room." He was running his ethereal fingers along the wall.

I felt surprise on my face. "How long ago did you live here?"

"Over a hundred years before you," he said. "My name's Eric."

"Why are you here?" This, from M.

"My family's dead," he said simply. He didn't seem too worried.

I blinked surprise. "Did...someone kill you?"

"I don't know."

"You can stay with us as long as you need to," I said, in a gush of sympathy.

"No...I need to find my family," Eric said, looking a little sad.

"Where are they?" M. asked.

"My mom was a drug addict," he said, almost crying now. "My dad killed himself. My mom killed my sister and herself. And then someone killed me. I just want to find them."

"We'll do anything we can," M. said.

Eric smiled. "Believe in ghosts," he said.

And then he disappeared.

We solemnly sat in my room without speaking for a long time, and when the birds started serenading the morning, we swore in low voices that we would always believe in ghosts.