Dead Air by Michelle Schusterman (best books under 200 pages txt) 📕

in my chair, chewing my lip. I hadn’t been planning to post about Roland and the host curse—not yet, not without proof. Still, the idea that I couldn’t post anything without his approval was irritating. I glanced at Oscar again, but he refused to look up, which just increased my annoyance. What was his deal this morning?

“Kat, it’s your blog,” Lidia said. “If you want to keep writing whatever you like without us monitoring, you can set your blog to private and just give your friends and family access. But if your blog is going to be part of the show, then we have to treat it that way. We don’t air any footage without approval from everyone on the crew. Same applies to a behind-the-scenes blog.”

I swallowed. As much as I hated to admit it, that was fair. “Okay,” I said. “I’ll show you my posts before I publish them.”

“Thank you.” She was still twirling the necklace around her fingers. “So . . . you really thought I was Sonja, huh?”

I nodded, my mouth full of stale blueberry muffin.

“I’ve been trying so hard to remember what happened, but . . .” Trailing off, Lidia sighed. Then she smiled at me. “Starting to believe, are you?”

“Er . . . I guess I’m keeping an open mind.” I hesitated, watching as Lidia twisted the necklace tighter and tighter around her trembling fingers. Her face was flushed, her eyes shiny. “Lidia, are you feeling okay?”

“Hmm?” Lidia blinked a few times, her hand falling still. “Oh, I’m still just trying to kick this cold. Nothing to worry about.” Yawning, she pushed her chair back and stretched. “All right, back to work. I think the others are in the conference room.”

She touched Oscar’s arm lightly, but he didn’t look up. For a brief second, a strangely familiar expression flickered across Lidia’s face. She’d left the breakfast room before I realized where I’d seen that look before.

It was exactly how Dad looked at me this morning when he’d tried to ask about my phone call with Mom and I ignored him.

I crammed the last of the muffin into my mouth, eyeing Oscar. “We saw an arcade on the boardwalk yesterday,” I said at last. Oscar lifted a shoulder, still staring at his toast. “Want to go check it out?” Another shrug. I hesitated, then pressed forward. “I was thinking we could find Jamie and Hailey and—”

“No, thanks,” Oscar said shortly. Tossing his napkin on the table, he got to his feet. “See you later.” And with that, he walked back out into the lobby.

I stared after him, mouth open. I hated to admit it, but him blowing me off kind of hurt my feelings. Although on second thought what did I expect? Oscar had been a jerk since we’d first met. Just because he’d acted like a seminormal human being last night when we were all watching movies didn’t make him a nice guy all of a sudden.

Beep! Beep! Beep!

Frowning, I pushed aside the pile of napkins in the middle of the table. A smartphone’s screen was lit up with a message. Alarm: TAKE YOUR MEDS!

Lidia’s reminder about her heart medicine. I stood quickly, swiping the alarm off.

I was halfway to the conference room before I realized that the phone was still lit up. The alarm message had disappeared, leaving the screen open to whatever Lidia had been reading earlier. I was about to close it when Oscar’s name caught my eye.

Dear Ms. Bettencourt,

In regard to your brother, Oscar Bettencourt Sr., and his request for parole: After careful review during yesterday’s hearing, we regret to inform you parole has been denied. We will notify you when the date for his next annual hearing has been set.

Sincerely,

Grace Fletcher

Lafferty Federal Correctional Institution

For a few seconds, I just stared at the screen. Then guilt flooded through me as I realized I was reading what was obviously a very private e-mail. I pressed the button on the smartphone, and the screen went black. But I could still see the words in my mind, and with a slow, dawning horror, I realized what they meant.

Oscar’s father was in prison. And he apparently wasn’t getting out anytime soon.

Still staring at the screen, I walked around the corner and ran straight into Sam.

“Oh, sorry!” My voice was all high and weird. But Sam seemed preoccupied, as usual.

“Have you seen Lidia?” he asked, glancing around the lobby.

I tried to sound casual. “Conference room. She left her phone at breakfast. I was just bringing it to her.”

Sam faced me, his blue gaze suddenly intense. “You thought she was Sonja.”

My mouth went dry. “Oh . . . You saw my blog post?”

“Post?” Sam frowned. “Oh, yes—Lidia showed us. But when we were in the tunnels, you called her Sonja.”

“Yeah, but—”

“You weren’t hallucinating.”

I stared at Sam silently for a moment. “How do you know?” I whispered.

“People always doubt their first paranormal experience . . . and second, and third,” he said. “You think if you tell someone, they’ll think you’re crazy, so you convince yourself it was a trick of the light, or a concussion, or some other excuse. When you start to doubt—that’s the real trick. You convince yourself of some other explanation. You trick yourself out of believing. But your eyes didn’t lie.”

I just stood there, unable to look away. For the first time, I really, truly understood why people loved Sam Sumners, and it had nothing to do with his looks. His expression was open and earnest, and his airy, flaky demeanor had vanished—he spoke with such conviction, I found myself nodding along.

“I believe you, Kat,” Sam said simply. “You saw Sonja. You saw her leave Lidia’s body.”

Swallowing hard, I nodded again. “That other ghost helped her,” I said. “The one in the photo. A boy, I think.”

Sam’s lips curved up in a small smile. “Yes, him. He likes you, I think.”

“What?” I felt my face heat up. “Who is he?”

“A friend of the show.” Sam laughed when I rolled my eyes. “No, really. He’s always with us. But I’ve never been able to communicate with him—he doesn’t