Possessions Read Free Page B

were dark brown, and in the dim red light, they reminded me of Mandy’s eyes, back at the hedge.
    “I think these are student paintings,” Julie said. She made a face. “Not exactly the best advertising for the art department, is it?”
    “The eyes follow you.” I experimentally moved my head back and forth. Sure enough, Wide Forehead’s gaze shifted as I moved. I knew that was a painter’s trick. The Mona Lisa did the same thing. But it was still creepy.
    We passed several half-open doors—people were trusting there—a couple doors revealing dark, ornately carved beds, each with a different bedspread: sky-blue satin with metallic stars, silky black, hippie swirls of raspberry and yellow. A pair of leather riding boots gleamed dully on a hardwood floor.
    “Jessel and Grose are two of the oldest buildings on campus,” Julie informed me. “We’re Academy Quad. We’re the only dorms that have full kitchens. And we have the weirdest bathroom. It’s got, like, five bathtubs. Huge ones.” She wrinkled her nose. “And ghosts. We’re supposed to be haunted.”
    “Eek,” I mocked, ignoring the teeny little shiver that zinged up my spine.
    She held up a finger. “Don’t be so quick to make fun. This place is bizarre at night. I swear someone keeps walking up and down the hall, but when I go and look, there’s no one there.”
    “Double eek.” I didn’t mean to sound sarcastic. I just didn’t know what else to say.
    She huffed but she was still smiling. “Anyway, I’m so glad you’re going to share my room. I haven’t had a decent night’s sleep since I got here.”
    “Oh.” I was a little crestfallen. It hadn’t dawned on me that she might have had an ulterior motive for wanting a roommate.
    “If you stare at the tiles in the bathroom and say ‘Come to me’ five times in a row, you’re supposed to be able to see a ghost,” she went on, scrunching up her face.
    “Have you tried it?” I asked her.
    “Are you nuts?” she shot back, grabbing her ponytail and making as if to smack me with it. “Jessel’s even more haunted,” she went on. “It’s the most haunted dorm on campus. Also, it’s the coolest one. With the turrets. One of them is locked and no one is allowed in.”
    “That’s where Ehrlenbach keeps her coffin,” I said.
    We both grinned at each other; then she stopped at a door that looked like all the other doors, except that it was closed. She put her hand on the latch.
    “Grose has a very strange layout,” she said. “The rooms on our side of the hall have two windows, but the rooms on the other side have no windows at all. They are hideous caves; mushrooms are probably growing in their closets.”
    “Cool,” I replied, and she clicked open the door.
    Wow. There was a circular tapestry on the floor, of fat roses and leaves, and a larger version of the chandelier light fixtures gleaming above it. The light bulbs in it were shaped like flames.
    Beneath two narrow rectangular windows, two larger-than-twin-sized beds of carved black wood were placed on either side of a common large nightstand made of dark wood inlaid with what looked like mother-of-pearl. Each bed had another, smaller stand on the other side; these were a little plainer, as if they hadn’t been part of the original grouping. One bed was covered with a very thick pink satin quilted bedspread with fist-sized ivory tassels. I could tell just by looking at it that it had been very expensive. If my family had ever hoped to have things like that, the hope was gone. My dad was still paying off my mom’s medical bills.
    A stuffed unicorn sat on top of a stylish trio of velvet pillows in three different shades of pink bordered with soft gray fringes. The unicorn was lavender with metallic silver hooves and a matching silver horn, and its black curled eyelashes were very long. It looked amazingly cheap, compared to the bedspread and pillows.
    Julie saw me looking at it. Her cheeks went pink as she crossed to the bed,