The Smoky Corridor

21

Fortunately, homeroom was only scheduled to last ten minutes.

Zack sat in the very last row of desks, closest to the window.

He needed to find a computer. Do an Internet search on zombies. He’d always thought they were mindless, unfeeling monsters like in those movies about the living dead. Davy made the zombie living (even though he was dead) near the school sound worse.

Zack’s homeroom teacher, Mrs. Kleinknecht, was up at the front of the classroom, trying to turn on a TV monitor she couldn’t reach because it was mounted to a wall bracket and she was four and a half feet tall. She dragged over an empty desk to use as a step stool and finally switched the TV on.

“Good morning, students,” said the principal, Mr. Smith, whose face filled the screen. “Welcome to an exciting new year at Horace P. Pettimore Middle School!”

Yeah, Zack thought, the resident zombie just woke up. Should make things real exciting.

Half the kids in the room were yawning. The first day of school was always a tough one. Hard to wake up when you’ve gotten used to sleeping in all summer.

Zack, already bored with the morning announcements, let his eyes wander around the room. He saw Malik. Benny. Tyler.

And a girl with extremely black hair. She was slumped in her seat and carving something into the denim cover of her three-ring binder with a ballpoint pen she held like a dagger. Zack had never seen anybody with such black black hair. Her fingernails were painted black, too.

The girl must’ve sensed Zack staring at her, because she whirled around to stare back at him.

Actually, to glare at him.

While she glared, Zack noticed that her lipstick was also black and that her eyes had been circled with some kind of black gunk, which made her whole face look extremely raccoonish.

The girl shot Zack a defiant “what are you looking at, dork?” look.

Zack dropped his eyes down to his desk.

“Do you know her?” Malik whispered from his seat next to Zack’s.

Zack shook his head. “No.”

“Me neither. She must be new, too.”

On the TV, the principal was droning on.

“It’s Mexican Fiesta Day in the cafeteria. Several clubs are scheduled to hold their first meetings of the year this afternoon. The Drama Club. The Chess Club. The Competitive Math Team …”

Zack was totally zoning out. His eyes drifted to the window.

Where he saw another ghost.

Outside. In the parking lot. His legs inside the hood of a car.

This one was mostly a wavering silhouette against the morning sun. All Zack could make out was the slender form of a tall man wearing a chauffeur’s cap.

The ghost drifted forward with a slight tremor to the rigid swing of his arms. Zack could tell that the ghost was, or had been, an old man.

He quickly glanced around the room.

The teacher was still beaming up at Principal Smith on the TV screen.

At the desks, most kids, Malik included, were obediently watching the monitor; others had their heads down, trying to catch a quick nap. Benny had a finger buried up his nose.

Zack turned back to see if the ghost had disappeared.

He hadn’t.

He had marched right up to the window.

Zack recognized the ghost immediately: Mr. Rodman Willoughby, wicked Gerda Spratling’s crotchety old chauffeur.

That summer, Zack had saved Mr. Willoughby’s life.

Looked like it hadn’t stuck.