17 Spooktacular - My Sister the Vampire (4 page)

Olivia laughed. ‘I’ve kind of had my hands full. Literally! I’ve been hauling zombies around for Camilla’s Halloween party.’

‘Really?’ Jackson paused. ‘
You?
’

‘Don’t sound so surprised!’ Olivia said with mock-outrage. ‘I’m not a bu– I mean, I’m a tough girl now. Anyway – what email?’

‘Well . . .’ Jackson sighed. ‘All those scenes we’re shooting in Pine Wood in a couple of weeks have just been rewritten – again.’

‘Oh no!’ Squeezing her eyes shut, Olivia rubbed her temple with her free hand, trying to massage away a sudden headache. ‘So we have
new
dialogue to memorise now? I
was just getting the first pages down. I’ve practically been monologuing in my sleep!’

‘Oh, yeah?’ She heard a hint of amusement in Jackson’s voice. ‘So, how’s your Southern accent coming along?’

Olivia grinned as she turned back towards the Halloweenified Café Creative, where Camilla was still busy directing and the three vampire girls had their faces politely turned away from
Olivia and her conversation. Putting on her best Southern accent, she declared, ‘Ah think it’s gettin’ bettah, sugah!’

All three vamp girls swung towards her.

Ivy’s eyes were wide with horror. Sophia cringed, looking pained. Reiko only shook her head sadly.

Uh-oh.
Olivia winced.

Maybe she needed a little more practice after all!

Ivy was still yawning after school the next day as she sat at her computer, wearing her Halloween costume and cycling through the photos from last night’s Moonrise party.
It hadn’t started until they’d gotten back from Café Creative, and it hadn’t ended until well after midnight, but it had totally been worth the sleep loss.

Just look at Olivia going vamp-y!
In the first few photos, Olivia was holding up and then eating one of a dozen heart-shaped biscuits smothered in cranberry sauce, which Charles had
made especially for her. In the next four photos, Ivy had captured her twin making funny faces with the sauce dripping from both sides of her mouth, just like a movie vampire.

We really did vamp-i-fy her!

A thump from downstairs signalled the front door opening and closing. Her step-mom’s voice sounded a moment later, calling up the stairs.

‘Reiko’s on her way to see you, Ivy!’

Fangtastic!
Ivy jumped off her chair, straightening her costume with the help of the mirror that hung on her closet door.
When Reiko sees this, she is so totally going to freak
out!

The door burst open, and Reiko strode in . . . only to stop, staring, as the door slammed shut behind her. ‘Oh,
wow.
’ She looked Ivy up and down, shaking her head in wonder.
‘You are rocking that Sherlock Holmes costume!’

‘Thank you!’ Holding on to her deerstalker, Ivy gave a twirl so that her tweed cape swirled around her. ‘I thought it was perfect for an investigative-journalist-in-training.
Now . . . what are
you
?’ She studied Reiko, tilting her head to take in every detail of the neon-green dress that reached down almost to Reiko’s knees – but half of it
was completely hidden by the rest of her costume. Rusted metal covered Reiko’s left arm and leg, and half her chest; the left half of her hair had been dyed silver to match. ‘Some kind
of rusty droid, maybe? Or . . .’ Ivy frowned as she took in the other, jet-black half of Reiko’s hair, and her non-metallic right side. ‘ . . .
half
a rusty
droid?’

‘Exactly!’ Reiko swung an imaginary tennis racquet, then flung up her arm as if she’d scored a point. ‘I’m Kumiko!’

Ivy shook her head as she sank back down on to her chair in front of the computer. ‘Kumik-
who
?’

‘You know!’ Reiko rolled her eyes. ‘The half-robot, half-human main character from
Droid Town
? It’s one of the most popular manga comics in Japan!’

‘Um . . . OK.’ As the front door opened and closed again downstairs, Ivy sighed. ‘You look great,’ she told Reiko, ‘but you might want to prepare for a lot of
people at tonight’s party not knowing who you’ve come as.’

Reiko snorted, waving at her outfit. ‘Come on, Sherlock. Who else could I possibly be, when I’m dressed like this?’

Ivy shrugged. ‘They’ll probably think you’re something from
Star Wars.
’

Reiko’s mouth dropped open in outrage and Ivy giggled.

She realised that she was really going to miss Reiko when she went home, even with Sophia back now. It was a shame that Sophia wasn’t coming to the party, but Ivy understood that her
parents wanted a family Moonrise after their daughter had been away for so long.

‘OK, Kumiko, are your, uhm . . . batteries charged?’ Ivy asked, grinning.

Reiko closed her eyes and made a
whirring
noise. Then she spoke in a cute, robotic drone: ‘System analysis reports that battery is at one hundred percent capacity, Mr
Holmes!’

Half an hour later, Ivy gave Olivia’s hand a squeeze as they walked with Reiko up to the doorway to the museum. ‘I can tell you’re not worried about walking
this corridor again.’

Her twin smiled at her. ‘That doesn’t mean I’m
looking forward
to it, though.’

Ivy gave her a nudge, pointing at her pale pink witch costume. ‘Besides, you’ve got the scariest outfit!’

‘Ha ha.’ Olivia rolled her eyes, but her lips twitched. ‘Just because you have an unnatural fear of the colour pink . . .’ She squeezed Ivy’s hand and started
forwards.

Ivy wasn’t about to be taken off guard again the way she had been last night.
No more bunny hops for me!
Still, she couldn’t help but be impressed by Camilla’s skill
as the girls had to dodge shuffling zombies, groaning ghosts and bandaged mummies. Luckily, the models were all on just the right side of “too scary” . . .

Well, except for those five! Models don’t breathe . . . or stink. Camilla definitely didn’t put these ones here!

Ivy narrowed her eyes, using her vampire super-sight to pick out the five boys huddled together in the shadows of the next room, still as statues, obviously waiting to jump out and scare
them.

‘Come on, Josh,’ she yelled. She would have recognised the closest as the meanest boy in their high school by his repulsive stench, even if she hadn’t had vamp-vision.
‘Don’t you have anything better to do? You’re not even in costume!’

‘Oh, yeah?’ Shaking back his lank hair, Josh stalked forwards, his long, leather trenchcoat swishing around him. From the smirk on his face, he wasn’t even the slightest bit
put out by being recognised. And he wasn’t ready to back down, either.

Ivy crossed her arms, giving him a death-squint.
Unbelievable.
His hair had somehow managed to achieve an even greater state of “greasy” than it ever had before.

‘What do you think, guys?’ Josh asked his cronies as they emerged from the shadows behind him. ‘Do we have somewhere better to be? Or would we rather stay . . . right . . .
here?’

The boy just behind him gave a snort of laughter, and Ivy’s eyes widened.

Uh-oh.
This, she hadn’t expected. It looked like Josh’s new main henchman was Garrick Stephens. She hadn’t seen him since he’d started at the other high school
in town, but he had been the head “Beast” at Franklin Grove Middle School, his gang of vamp boys all doing their best to make every other kid in school miserable.

‘I’ve been hearing stories about you from my crew,’ Josh told Ivy, his smirk widening. He looked her up and down, then said to Garrick, ‘So, this was the girl you kissed
in the school play last semester?’

‘Nope.’ Garrick gave a goofy grin as he pointed straight to Olivia. ‘It was the other one.’

‘
Int-er-est-ing
,’ Josh drawled. His eyes gleamed dangerously as he turned to Olivia.

‘Hey!’ Ivy sidestepped to stand protectively in front of her twin, but Olivia quickly stepped around her, face scrunched up in outrage.

‘I did
not
kiss Garrick!’ she declared. ‘Camilla’s script for
Romezog and Julietron
said I was
supposed
to kiss him as part of the play, but .
. .’ She glared at Garrick, who was still grinning at her. ‘ . . . thankfully he had to run offstage early in the performance because he’d gone off-script!’

‘That’s right,’ Ivy said. ‘Plus, he was itching all through the whole show!’ She gave Josh a smirk, hoping that it looked just as rude as the one he’d been
aiming at her sister. ‘But then, you probably get that, too, don’t you? You seem to have the same lax approach to personal hygiene.’

‘Ha!’ Josh snickered, turning to Garrick. ‘You got put in your place, dude.’

‘Aw, Josh . . .’

Seriously?
Ivy stared at the head of the greasy gang.
You didn’t even notice that I was insulting you
,
too?

‘Come on.’ Josh jerked his head towards the South Wing of the museum, where the party was waiting. ‘We’ve got cooler places to be. But you . . .’ His gaze landed on
Ivy, and his face hardened. Suddenly, Ivy was very certain that he
had
noticed her insult . . . and would remember it. ‘Don’t worry . . . I’ll be seeing
you
again.’

He started for the café, his dirty leather coat crackling with every movement.

Ivy let her held breath out in a whoosh of relief as the four other boys followed after him and finally disappeared from view, leaving the three girls alone in the darkened corridor. As she
turned back to her friends, though, they shared a long look. She knew they were all thinking the same thing:

Garrick the Beast has found a buddy even meaner than him. We should probably steer clear . . . Which is not going to be a problem.

Oh my darkness, do they smell terrible!

‘U
gh!’ Olivia cringed as the zombie mannequin at her table fell against her
again,
knocking her candy apple into her chest
before she could take a bite. Caramel smeared all over the front of her dress as she heaved the bulky mannequin back into place, its yellowish-grey eyes staring sightlessly at her.

‘You’re not even gross any more,’ she muttered, giving the mannequin one last shove. ‘You’re just irritating! You ruined my outfit!’

Then she looked up and gave a start of surprise as she saw a girl sitting opposite her at the small table, wearing a fabulous, deep-red Victorian-style dress that put Olivia’s pink
caramel-smeared witch costume to shame.
I must have been more distracted than I’d realised. I didn’t even hear her arrive!
Instead of facing Olivia, the girl sat sideways on
her seat, her wide hooped skirts spread around her and her eyes darting around the crowded dance floor, watching the rest of the party guests moving and mingling through Café Creative. Her
hands were clenched around something in her lap.

‘Hi!’ Olivia said. Then she winced as she realised that the new girl must have heard her talking to the zombie mannequin. ‘Sorry, my, uh, “boyfriend” is being a
little annoying tonight,’ she joked.

The other girl turned away without a word, angling herself towards the dance floor so that all Olivia could see was her back.

Ouch.
Olivia gave up.
She’s obviously waiting for someone . . . but seriously, would it hurt for her to just be a little friendly in the meantime?