Chapter 5

I was used to the occasional weird experience, but usually they were over

quickly. This twenty-four/seven hallucination was more than I could handle.

For the rest of the school year, the entire campus seemed to be playing some

kind of trick on me. The students acted as if they were completely and totally

convinced that Mrs. Kerr—a perky blond woman whom I’d never seen in my

life until she got on our bus at the end of the field trip—had been our pre-

algebra teacher since Christmas.

Every so often I would spring a Mrs. Dodds reference on somebody, just

to see if I could trip them up, but they would stare at me like I was psycho.

It got so I almost believed them—Mrs. Dodds had never existed.

Almost.

But Grover couldn’t fool me. When I mentioned the name Dodds to him,

he would hesitate, then claim she didn’t exist. But I knew he was lying.

Something was going on. Something had happened at the museum.

I didn’t have much time to think about it during the days, but at night,

visions of Mrs. Dodds with talons and leathery wings would wake me up in a

cold sweat.

The freak weather continued, which didn’t help my mood. One night, a

thunderstorm blew out the windows in my dorm room. A few days later, the biggest tornado ever spotted in the Hudson Valley touched down only fifty

miles from Yancy Academy. One of the current events we studied in social

studies class was the unusual number of small planes that had gone down in

sudden squalls in the Atlantic that year.

I started feeling cranky and irritable most of the time. My grades slipped

from Ds to Fs. I got into more fights with Nancy Bobofit and her friends. I

was sent out into the hallway in almost every class.

Finally, when our English teacher, Mr. Nicoll, asked me for the millionth

time why I was too lazy to study for spelling tests, I snapped. I called him an

old sot. I wasn’t even sure what it meant, but it sounded good.

The headmaster sent my mom a letter the following week, making it

official: I would not be invited back next year to Yancy Academy.

Fine, I told myself. Just fine.

I was homesick.

I wanted to be with my mom in our little apartment on the Upper East

Side, even if I had to go to public school and put up with my obnoxious

stepfather and his stupid poker parties.

And yet…there were things I’d miss at Yancy. The view of the woods out

my dorm window, the Hudson River in the distance, the smell of pine trees.

I’d miss Grover, who’d been a good friend, even if he was a little strange. I

worried how he’d survive next year without me.

I’d miss Latin class, too—Mr. Brunner’s crazy tournament days and his

faith that I could do well.

As exam week got closer, Latin was the only test I studied for. I hadn’t

forgotten what Mr. Brunner had told me about this subject being life-and-

death for me. I wasn’t sure why, but I’d started to believe him.

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