Zero to Hero Read Free Page B

he appeared!

CHAPTER 3
    The ghost was a boy about fourteen years old, wearing blousy brown pants that stopped at the knee. As he pulled off the jersey, Billy could see that his pants were held up by faded red suspenders, and on his head was a plaid wool newsboy cap with a button on top and a brim that he wore jauntily off to the side. His socks were covered with a pattern of alternating beige and white diamond shapes. On his feet, he wore lace-up work boots of dark brown leather that came up to the middle of his shin. They were laced up only halfway, which instead of looking sloppy gave him a casual, self-assured look.
    “I … I can see you!” Billy whispered in amazement.
    “Consider yourself lucky. This is a rare occurrence. Very few people have had the opportunity.”
    Billy tried to answer, but once again, no words came out. He was looking at a ghost, a real live ghost. Or more accurately, a real dead ghost.
    “Because you seem like a nice kid — short but nice — I’m going to introduce myself,” the ghost said. “You are in the presence of Hoover Porterhouse the Third. How exciting is that?”
    “I’m Billy Everett Broccoli the First. Nice to meet you.”
    Billy and Hoover went to shake hands, but although Billy’s hand was pumping up and down, he could feel only cold air surrounding his fingers.
    “This is so weird,” he said. “I’m shaking your hand, but I can’t feel anything. Just cold air.”
    “That’s the way we ghosts roll. Let me tell you, Billy Boy, it can be pretty frustrating when you dance with a pretty girl and she has no idea you’re there. All she does is put on a sweater.”
    “Wait a minute,” Billy asked. “You dance?”
    “Not so much anymore. But before I died, I could turkey trot with such flair that girls thought there was an actual bird in the room.”
    With that, Hoover Porterhouse III put his hands under his armpits, folded his arms like turkey wings, and started high-stepping around the room. He didn’t stop at Billy’s desk or his bed, but danced right through the middle of them.
    Before Billy could absorb what he was witnessing, he was tossed up in the air by a massive tremble that felt like an earthquake knocking the house right off its foundation. The tremble was accompanied by what sounded like a freight train charging out of the center of the earth. If seeing a ghost hadn’t been frightening enough, Billy was now officially out of his mind with fear.
    From down the hall, he heard Breeze scream, “What is happening here, people? Inform me!” Farther down the hall, he heard his parents’ footsteps and then their voices calling, “Billy! Breeze! Outside! Immediately!”
    “Earthquake!” Billy yelled.
    “Trust me. It’s not an earthquake,” Hoover Porterhouse said to him.
    “Oh yeah? What would you call it?”
    “Report card day.”
    Hoover pointed to the wall next to Billy’s bed. There, lit up in glowing blue type that seemed to pulsate with the shaking of the house, Billy saw a series of five letters … C, C, A, F, F. What could those letters mean? And how did they get on the wall of his room?
    “This is not fair!” Hoover complained, shaking his fist at the wall. “What do you guys want from me? Well, forget it. I give up. Go ahead and give me two F’s. See if I care.”
    With that, there was another rumble from underground and a huge jolt shook the entire house. It felt like the roof was about to cave in.
    “I’m out of here!” Billy shouted to the ghost, who was pacing back and forth and letting out a stream of words that any regular kid would have gotten ten years’ detention for saying. Billy flung the door open and bolted out into the hall. His feet barely touched the floor as he barreled past Breeze’s room and met up with hisparents, who were waiting to escort them both out to the front yard.
    “This feels like a seven point five on the Richter earthquake scale,” Bennett said.
    “Whatever the number is, it’s totally