Poltergeist Read Free Page B

electricity’s supposed to make sparks, I thought.”
    “Well, some does. Some just makes signals, though—they move through the air, and you can’t see ’em.”
    “Like ghosts?”
    “Sort of. Yeah. Friendly ghosts.”
    “Like Casper.”
    “I had a dream about ghosts,” said Carol Anne, with wide blue eyes.
    “Was it scary, Carol?” asked Dana.
    “Uh uh, they were friendly ghosts, too.”
    “What happened in the dream, sweetheart?” Diane nudged. She always encouraged her children to tell their dreams—dreams were the window to the soul, her mother used to tell her, and she believed it still.
    “I was walking in the park, and these people were floating through the trees, and they wanted to play with me, but they couldn’t see where I was, but I didn’t tell them, but they liked my new dress, but they were afraid of the ugly man, so I wanted to leave, but then I was falling.”
    “You know what Freud said about falling dreams, Mom,” commented Dana.
    “No, what did he say?”
    Dana just raised her eyebrows up and down.
    “That’s a very interesting dream, honey,” said Steve. “Were the people wearing sheets like ghosts, too?”
    “Uh uh, they had all kinds of funny clothes.”
    “You mean like a clown?”
    Robbie was suddenly jolted by this remark, remembering his incident with the clown in the bricks out back. Unconsciously, he rubbed his finger.
    “Uh uh, not like a clown.” Carol Anne shook her head. “Like the pictures in Gramma’s big book.”
    Steve furrowed his brow at Diane. “Your mother’s scrapbook?”
    “Uh huh,” Carol Anne nodded. “The crapbook.”
    Dana smirked; Robbie clapped his hand over his mouth. “All right, you two,” Diane muttered. Then, to Carol Anne: “That’s ‘ scrap book ,’ baby. Not crapbook. Scrapbook.”
    Dana fluttered her eyelids. “She’s just being scatological, Mother.”
    “And you can stop being so precocious; it’s very tedious. And you can clear the table, too.” Diane piled two plates in front of her elder daughter.
    “Yes, Mother.” Dana spoke in her most gracious voice, balanced four plates on her head, turned, said, “Perfect posture, stately elegance, and grace,” and walked into the kitchen without dropping a single leftover pea.
    Robbie jumped up and walked behind her a few steps, wiggling his rear in caricature.
    “Okay, that’s enough. Help your sister, Robbie,” Steve said. Robbie returned to the table and gathered silverware.
    Diane tipped her head toward Carol Anne. “Guess she was impressed with those old photos. Some of them are of my grandparents. A few great-grandparents, even, I think.”
    Steve smiled at Carol Anne. “Well, that was very interesting, sweetheart. And it just goes to show that ghosts aren’t always scary.”
    Carol Anne nodded, but she was more interested now in trying to pick up a pea off the table with her tongue.
    Diane scrunched up her face at Steve. “What did Freud say about falling dreams?”
    There was suddenly a major crash in the kitchen—the sound of dishes breaking on tile counter top.
    “That comes out of your allowance, young lady,” Diane called.
    “Aw, Mom, that’s not fair!”
    “Don’t you remember?” Steve boomed jovially. “Life’s not fair!” Then he leaned over and gave Diane a playful kiss. “How soon they forget,” he murmured.
    Diane showed up late at the PTA meeting, sat in the back row so she could leave early, and then spent the entire question-and-answer period arguing with the speaker about the reinstitution of corporal punishment in the school system.
    When it was all over, and they adjourned to the back of the auditorium for coffee and doughnuts, Diane ran into Doris Melnick. Doris’s son, Eddie, was in Robbie’s class at school; moreover, coincidentally, Doris and Diane had attended the same high school in Encino—though in different graduating classes—many years before. They’d never really been friends, exactly, and they didn’t keep in