The Ghost at the Fire Station Read online

  Sparky turned and charged right through Little John.

  Little John giggled.

  Sparky looked up at Kaz. “Woof! Woof!” he barked again, his tail wagging.

  “He must really like you, Claire,” RJ said. “He doesn’t normally run back and forth like that.”

  “That’s great,” Claire said uneasily. Sparky was obviously much more interested in Kaz and Little John than he was in Claire. But no one else could see that.

  “Don’t be such a scaredy ghost, Kaz,” Little John said. “Come down here so Sparky can sniff you.”

  Kaz slowly drifted down. As soon as he was low enough, Sparky dashed through him. It made Kaz feel a little bit skizzy.

  “I think Sparky likes ghosts,” Little John said.

  “Well, he likes us, anyway,” Kaz said. It didn’t sound as though he liked the other ghost at the fire station.

  “So, where’s the room that Sparky doesn’t like to go in?” Claire asked the twins.

  “We’ll show you,” they said at the same time.

  “Come on, Sparky.” Brynlee patted her leg, and Sparky trotted after her. She led everyone down the hallway, past a kitchen, past two rooms with small beds, all the way to the room at the end of the hall.

  Sparky stopped at the doorway, sat down, and began to howl. “Aroooooooooooooo!”

  Sparky lunged toward the room, but refused to step through the doorway. “Aroooooooooo!” he howled again.

  “See what I mean? He won’t come in here no matter what you do,” Brynlee said. She hopped over Sparky to get into the room. Claire and RJ did the same.

  “Ar-ar-aroooooooooo!” Sparky howled.

  Little John put his hands to his ears. “He’s loud!”

  Kaz agreed. He and Little John swam over Sparky and into the room. It looked like some sort of family room or activity room. There was a large TV on the wall in front of them. A couch and two chairs. A table with a green top and a bunch of balls on it. But if there were any other ghosts in here, they were hiding.

  “Mom? Pops? Finn?” Kaz called as he turned all around.

  “Come out, come out, wherever you are!” Little John added.

  No ghosts came out.

  The twins tried to get the dog to come into the room with them. “Sparky, come! Come here, boy!” They sounded happy and excited.

  “Woof! Woof!” Sparky barked as he raised his rear end in the air, put his paws down, and hopped around. He refused to enter the room.

  RJ pulled a dog treat out of his pocket and held it out to Sparky. “Here, boy! Come get the treat!”

  Sparky still wouldn’t come.

  “He has come in here before, right?” Claire said.

  “Yes. All the time,” Brynlee said.

  “But he doesn’t come in anymore,” RJ said. He turned to Claire. “Didn’t you say you have some sort of equipment for finding ghosts?”

  “Oh, yeah,” Claire said. She opened her bag and pulled out her ghost glass and her ghost catcher.

  “WOOF! WOOF!” Sparky barked. “Aroooooooooooooo!”

  Claire put her ghost glass to her eye and wandered around the room. When she came to a row of cabinets, she glanced at Kaz and Little John.

  “You think the ghost might be hiding in there?” Kaz asked.

  She nodded slightly.

  “You check these cabinets,” Little John told Kaz. “I’ll check the ones over there.” He swam across the room and through another cabinet door.

  Kaz took a deep breath. It was a good thing he could pass through solid objects now. He stepped into the door. First a foot, then his leg, then the rest of his body. He only felt a little skizzy this time.

  He rolled to his back. It was dark inside this cabinet. And even though he was fully inside the cabinet, it still felt like he was passing through something. Something heavy.

  Oh. Blankets. The cabinet was full of blankets.

  Kaz passed through the wall from one cabinet and into the next one. There were books in that one. And board games in the last one.

  No ghosts.

  Kaz returned to the TV room. Claire looked at him expectantly. He shook his head.

  “No ghosts in these cabinets, either,” Little John said. “I don’t think Mom, Pops, or Finn is here. They’d come out if they heard our voices.”

  Kaz agreed. So who was the ghost at the fire station? And where was he or she hiding?

  “WOOF! WOOF! WOOF!” Sparky barked and danced around in the doorway.

  Claire turned to Brynlee and RJ. “This is very strange, but I’m not detecting any ghosts in this room,” she said.

  RJ scowled. “Does that stuff really work?” he asked. “Look at Sparky! There’s obviously a ghost in here.”

  There were two ghosts in here: Kaz and Little John. But Brynlee and RJ didn’t know that. And Sparky didn’t seem to mind being in the same room with them.

  “Of course it works,” Claire said. “Are there any other rooms here that Sparky won’t go into?”

  “No,” the twins said at the same time.

  “Can we take him into all the other rooms to be sure?” Claire asked.

  “If you want,” RJ said with a shrug. “Come on, Sparky.”

  The dog trotted happily after the solid kids. He glanced up at Kaz and Little John and let out a friendly woof, his tail swishing from side to side.

  Sparky walked right into the two bedrooms, the kitchen, the bathrooms, and the office area without any problem. But when they returned to the TV room, he dropped to his belly and refused to go inside.

  “Have you guys ever actually seen a ghost here?” Claire asked.

  The twins glanced at each other. “No,” they said together.

  “A couple of the firefighters have, though,” RJ said.

  “Can I talk to them?” Claire asked. She put her ghost-hunting equipment back in her bag and pulled out her notebook.

  “Sure,” Brynlee said, leading everyone back down the hall.

  “Hey, Dad?” RJ said when they got to the office. “Where’s Tom?”

  Dick looked up. “He and Janelle went out to the garage.”

  “Yay! We get to see the fire trucks again.” Little John rubbed his hands together as they wafted down the hall.

  Sparky let out a short woof when he saw Little John’s hands glowing.

  Kaz grabbed Little John’s hands. “Don’t do that,” he said. “Do you want everyone to see your hands glowing?”

  “I can’t help it. I’m excited,” Little John said.

  RJ pushed open the door to the garage, and Kaz got a quick peek inside as Claire, Sparky, and the twins hurried past him.

  “Oh no,” Kaz said, backing away from the garage. He grabbed his brother, and the door closed in front of them.

  “Why did you do that?” Little John asked.

  “The back door is open,” Kaz said.

  Little John groaned. An open door meant the ghosts could be sucked into the Outside and blown away.

  “But it’s a big garage,” Little John said. “And that back door is a small door. We’ll just stay away from it. Like we do at the library.”

  “Well . . . ,” Kaz said. He could tell Little John really wanted to see the fire trucks again. “Okay. Just promise me you’ll stay far away from the open door.”

  “I will,” Little John said. The ghosts passed through the closed door and glided along the ceiling of the fire station garage.

  “Woof! Woof!” Sparky ran below the ghosts.

  “Check out the inside of this fire truck!” Little John said. He darted through the driver’s side window and into the cab of the ladder truck.

  But Kaz was more interested in what the firefighters had to say.

  “What do you want to know about our ghost?” a man with glasses asked Claire. His name badge
said TOM.

  Claire opened her notebook and got ready to write. “Everything!” she said. “What does it look like? How many times have you seen it? What does it do?”

  “Well, I’ve never gotten a real good look at it,” Tom said. “I’ve just seen a shadowy figure wandering around during the night.”

  “Man or woman?” Claire asked.

  “I’m not really sure,” Tom said.

  “Definitely a man,” a lady firefighter said as she came around from the other side of the fire truck. She had a big hose in her hand, and her name badge read JANELLE. “An old man, it sounds like, by the way he moans and groans.”

  “I’ve never heard any moaning or groaning,” a heavyset, dark-haired firefighter said. His name badge said DAVID.

  “Really?” Janelle raised an eyebrow. “The ghost has never woken you up?”

  “It’s woken me up,” Tom said.

  “The moaning and groaning hasn’t woken me up,” David said. “But I’ll tell you what did wake me up last night. Someone or something pulled the covers off me!”

  Janelle nodded. “That happened to me two nights ago. In fact, I found my blanket way out in the hallway! Our ghost steals blankets. Write that down,” she told Claire.

  Claire did. Then she asked Janelle, “Did you see the ghost?”

  “Not well enough to describe,” Janelle replied. “Like Tom said, it’s a shadowy figure.”

  “Where did you see him? In that TV room?” Claire asked.

  “Yes, there. And in the hallway and the kitchen—” Janelle started to say, but she was cut off by a loud alarm that rang out through the garage.

  “FIRE!”

  Sparky’s howls were loud, but the alarm was even louder! Kaz pressed his hands to his ears. It didn’t help.

  Firefighters rushed to the garage. Some burst through the door at the top of the stairs. Others slid down the pole. They hopped into boots, grabbed coats and helmets from the hooks, and ran to the trucks.

  The big garage doors started to rise.

  Kaz didn’t want to be sucked into the Outside. He swam back . . . back . . . back as hard as he could. But not too far back, because the back door was open, too! He swam up to the glass window where the lady sat in front of all those computer screens. The radio room, RJ called it. Kaz sailed through the window and into the room.

  Safe.

  “Little John?” Kaz said as he turned around. Where was Little John? Was he still inside the ladder truck?

  Kaz wafted back over to the window and looked down into the garage. He didn’t see Little John anywhere.

  The radio-room lady had something on her head that attached to a small microphone in front of her mouth. “You’re heading to 1024 Elm Street,” she said into the microphone.

  One by one, with lights flashing and sirens blaring, the trucks pulled out of the garage below and drove away.

  And before anyone knew what was happening, Sparky charged after them! Right into the street.

  Kaz couldn’t hear Brynlee and RJ over the sound of the alarm, but he saw them say something to each other as they waved their arms in the air. Then they hurried after Sparky.

  Claire glanced up at Kaz. She said something to him, but Kaz couldn’t make it out.

  “What . . . ?” Kaz wailed as Claire set her bag and water bottle on a bench. “What . . . did . . . you . . . say, . . . Claire?”

  “Who said that?” the radio lady asked, looking all around.

  Claire grabbed a rope from a hook above the bench and ran after the twins. Leaving Kaz behind.

  “CLAIRE . . . ,” Kaz wailed again. Louder this time.

  All of a sudden, he felt tired. Really tired. Like he had no energy.

  “Who’s Claire?” the radio lady asked, looking right at him.

  Kaz blinked. Was the radio lady talking to him? Could she see him?

  “What? Am I glowing?” he asked. Was that why he was suddenly so tired? He looked down at himself. No, he wasn’t glowing. The radio lady couldn’t see him. But she had definitely heard him say Claire’s name.

  “I was wailing, wasn’t I?” he cried in amazement. “You heard me wailing!”

  But the radio lady didn’t hear that because Kaz wasn’t wailing anymore.

  The alarm stopped. The big garage doors rumbled as they started to close. With a shrug, the lady turned her attention back to the screens in front of her.

  “Engine one is in service,” came a voice from a speaker in front of her.

  How did I do it? Kaz wondered. He didn’t know, because he hadn’t been trying to wail. The wail had just come out. But that was how it happened with most of his ghost skills. The first time he got a skill right, he did it without even thinking about it.

  Maybe wailing had something to do with how LOUD a ghost said something. It probably had something to do with stomach muscles, too, Kaz thought, because his stomach muscles ached.

  He tried tightening his stomach muscles. Tight! Tight! Tight! As tight as he could make them. Then he wailed, “Wooooooo . . .”

  The radio lady moved the microphone away from her mouth. “Who said that? Who’s there?” she asked, looking all around.

  It worked!

  “I-it’s . . . me . . . ,” Kaz wailed. “Kaz . . .” His stomach muscles gave out. He couldn’t wail anymore.

  “Kaz? Kaz who?” the radio lady asked. “Are you the fire station ghost?”

  “No, I’m just Kaz. I’m a different ghost,” he said. It came out as words, not wails, so the lady couldn’t hear him. And Kaz didn’t have the energy to try wailing again.

  “Ladder one is arriving on the scene,” came a voice through the speaker.

  “Engine one is two minutes out,” came another voice.

  “Well, whoever you are, I can’t talk to you right now,” the lady said. “I’m working.” She scooted closer to the microphone and turned her attention to the screens in front of her.

  Kaz didn’t want to bother the lady. Or keep her from important work. But he wanted to know what was happening. Was Sparky okay? Would Claire, Brynlee, and RJ come back soon? And where was Little John?

  Kaz passed through the glass window and into the garage. While the big doors at the front of the garage were down, the back door still stood wide open. Kaz stayed far away from that door.

  “Little John?” he called as he swam along the ceiling. “Are you still here?”

  No response.

  Kaz didn’t really expect a response. He didn’t think Little John was in the fire station. He hoped his little brother was still safe inside the ladder truck. Maybe that was why Sparky ran after the fire truck? Because he knew Little John was inside?

  Or . . . maybe Sparky saw Little John blow into the Outside.

  Kaz drifted down along one of the big garage doors and peered through the small windows at the top of the door. He didn’t see Little John drifting around in the Outside. He didn’t see Claire, Brynlee, RJ, or Sparky, either.

  Kaz sighed as he swam away from the garage door. How long would it be before anyone came back?

  He swam back up to the glass window and passed through into the radio room again.

  “No sign of smoke or fire yet,” came a voice from the speaker.

  Then he swam out into the hallway and all through the rest of the fire station. The radio lady was the only solid person in the whole building.

  Kaz wafted through the room with all the desks and over to a window. Now he could see Claire, Brynlee, and RJ running back toward the station.

  Hooray! Sparky was with them! He had a rope tied to his collar. Brynlee held the other end of the rope as they ran.

  Kaz backstroked away from the door just in time before Brynlee shoved it open. Sparky charged in ahead of everyone.

  “Don’t ever run away like that again, Sparky,” Brynlee
scolded.

  With his tail wagging, Sparky ran right to Kaz. Kaz gritted his teeth as Sparky passed through him, then turned around and passed through him again.

  “Woof! Woof!” Sparky barked, like this was a fun game. Then he ran around the whole station, sniffing . . . sniffing . . . sniffing like he was looking for something.

  “What’s he looking for?” Brynlee asked.

  “Maybe his ball?” RJ said. He crawled under a desk, pulled out a green ball, and tossed it to Sparky. “Here, boy. Is this what you’re looking for?”

  Sparky ignored the ball and ran back to Kaz. “Woof! Woof!”

  Kaz had a feeling Sparky was looking for Little John.

  “I don’t know where he is,” Kaz told the dog. “I was hoping you knew.”

  Just then, they all heard a garage door going up.

  “The fire trucks are back,” Brynlee said.

  “Already?” Claire said.

  “It was probably a false alarm,” RJ said. “Most fire calls are.”

  Kaz wondered if Little John was back, too. He swam into the radio room and watched the trucks pull into the garage. As soon as the garage doors were down, he passed through the glass window and paddled over to the ladder truck. He peered through the windshield.

  Little John was not inside.

  Kaz swam back through the fire station. “We have to go!” he told Claire. “Little John is missing. We have to find him!”

  Claire nodded slightly to Kaz, then turned to Brynlee and RJ. “I’m sorry we didn’t find your ghost today. I’ll come back tomorrow and search some more.”

  “Let’s . . . go . . . ,” Kaz wailed.

  Brynlee gasped. RJ’s mouth fell open. Claire had a funny look on her face. She was the only one who could actually see Kaz. But everyone else had just heard him.

  “That was the ghost!” the twins said at the same time.

  Uh-oh. Kaz hadn’t meant to wail. Once again, it had just come out.

  “Do you see it?” Brynlee grabbed Claire’s arm.

  “No,” Claire lied as she looked straight at Kaz.