Graveyard Slot by Michelle Schusterman (classic children's novels .TXT) 📕

Oscar and I exchanged a glance. “I don’t know about that,” Oscar said slowly. “I mean, it’s a ghost-hunting show. Half the fans don’t even believe most of it.”

“Some of them think we fake stuff,” I added. Abril’s eyes widened.

“Do you?”

“No,” I said quickly. “The viewers are kind of on the lookout for it, you know? If they thought we were trying to trick them, I think a lot would just stop watching. The network’s already warned us about it.”

Abril’s mouth was set in a thin line, but she said nothing. After a few seconds of fidgeting, Thiago turned to his sister.

“¡Díles que Guzmán es mentiroso!” he told her, his voice low and urgent. Grimacing, Abril started to respond, but Oscar beat her to it.

“Professor Guzmán’s lying?” he said, looking back and forth between them. “About what?”

Thiago’s eyes widened. “¿Hablas español?” He sounded delighted, but Oscar shook his head.

“Not really. I mean, I understand some. But I can’t, um . . .”

“He speaks Portuguese,” I told Thiago, because Oscar looked all flustered again. “What’s Guzmán lying about?”

“The table . . .” Thiago lifted his hands like a puppeteer. “Flotando. Floating.”

“And everything else that happens during the séances. But we can’t prove it.” Abril cast another nervous glance at the entrance. “We went into the catacombs with the tour group, then I stayed down there when they left. Thiago waited up here to tell me when you all were coming. I searched all over, looking for evidence that he’s faking it, but . . . nothing.”

“Why do you think he’s faking?” Jamie asked.

“Inés thinks he is,” Abril said. “She said it started out fine, but in the last month they’ve been reading the final entries in Brunilda’s journal, the entries about her possession. That’s when things got . . . violent.” She waved her hands. “Not violent. But . . . objects flying, chairs and tables lifting, cold temperatures. That was also around the time the university told Professor Guzmán he had two months left before they stopped funding his research.”

“But that doesn’t mean he’s faking it,” Jamie said. “Maybe Inés doesn’t believe in ghosts, but we’ve seen plenty of—”

“She does, though,” Abril interrupted. “She believes in ghosts. But she says what’s been happening during the séances . . .” She glanced at Thiago, who shrugged. “She says it’s obviously fake. You’ll see for yourself on Friday.”

I let out a long, slow breath. “Yeah, when we film it. And show it on TV.”

I could tell the others were thinking the same thing. The show’s fans would always argue about whether little things, like our Ouija board experience, were real. But if we aired a whole episode about Guzmán’s séance and the entire thing turned out to be fake, it would be disastrous for Passport to Paranormal.

CHAPTER NINE THE GIRL IN THE MIRROR

To: [email protected]

From: [email protected]

Subject: ARE YOU STILL ALIVE OR WHAT?!

um. hello?? haven’t heard from you in like three days!!! D:

TELLING the rest of the cast the news about Guzmán didn’t quite get the reactions Oscar and I were expecting.

“He’s not faking anything,” Lidia said immediately. “That’s just what skeptics say when they face true paranormal activity.”

Sam nodded in agreement. “There was a presence in the catacombs with us. I sensed her.”

“Sorry, Sam, but sensing a presence won’t mean squat to Thomas Cooper,” Jess replied, massaging her temples with her fingers. Dad watched her, his brow furrowed.

“You think we should back out?” he asked.

“No.” Jess hesitated. “In fact, if none of Guzmán’s students have found any evidence, maybe we should just . . . ignore this.”

Lidia’s brows shot up. “What?”

“It’s too late to find another place to investigate.” Jess crossed her arms. “We can’t back out. If he’s faking it, he’s clearly doing a great job, so . . .”

“So you think we should air it regardless.” Lidia laughed dryly. “As long as it’s entertaining, who cares if it’s real, right?”

Oscar and I glanced nervously at one another. Jess believed in ghosts just as much as Lidia, but she’d always been more concerned with putting together a good show. Like the trick lightbulb in the pilot episode—I was willing to bet Jess and Roland had planned that without telling Lidia or Sam.

“I do care,” Jess told Lidia. “I also care about getting canceled. Our ratings are getting better, but we’re still on shaky ground with Fright TV. Look, you just said you believe Guzmán, so what’s the problem? We’re in agreement here.”

“But for different reasons,” Lidia muttered. An uncomfortable silence descended, broken by Dad.

“We do need to consider how we’re going to handle it if it does turn out Guzmán is faking it,” he pointed out. “I want to believe him, too, but just in case . . .”

Roland, who’d been silent since Oscar and I had finished telling everyone what we’d learned, finally spoke up.

“If it’s real, great,” he said flatly. “And if he’s faking it, we just expose him during filming. Either way, it’ll be one hell of an episode.”

It was a fair point, I thought. Our more skeptical fans would probably love an episode where we exposed a fake haunting. So long as it didn’t look like we were the ones faking it.

The meeting ended quickly after that. Even though everyone agreed with Roland, the atmosphere was still pretty tense. I holed myself up in Dad’s and my room with his laptop and logged into my e-mail account.

To: [email protected], [email protected]

From: [email protected]

Subject: Re: ARE YOU STILL ALIVE OR WHAT?!

I’M SORRY I’M SORRY I’M SORRY! It’s been a weird couple of days. How’s winter break going? Trish, are you in Florida for the holidays? Mark, is your mom baking those peppermint brownies? And can you mail a hundred or so to Buenos Aires?

Lots to catch you guys up on. Long story, but I found out today that the professor we’re featuring on the next episode—the one I mentioned in my blog post who says he’s been contacting Brunilda Cano’s ghost—might be faking it. One of his students thinks he is, anyway. And her brother and sister have been digging around for weeks trying to prove it