Boy Meets Ghoul Read online

  ‘And I still don’t know why you’re not staking out their room like you’re MI5 and they’re Britain’s most wanted,’ I continued, stopping outside the room we’d seen Antoni Deathsplash emerge from to see if I could tell whether the lights were on in there. ‘Any of the other fans outside would be.’

  The huge crowd of people from our first day was gone, since the hotel had taken to sending security guards out to disperse it, but there were usually still a few hopefuls loitering around.

  Kayla made a strange, strangled sort of sound and dragged on my shirt to try and get me to move away from the door. ‘That’s just it. I don’t want to be “any other fan”. If I can win this contest, I’ll have proved my talent and commitment. I’ll be meeting them as an equal, not just some fangirl who snuck into the hotel.’

  Lots of people were trying to do that. We’d been woken up by loud shrieks as security tried to remove a girl who’d packed herself in a box addressed to Rick Deathsplash and had it delivered to reception by a bike courier. Unfortunately the porter had dropped her on the way out of the lift and realized something was up when his parcel started swearing at him.

  I heard it had been Alfie, the same porter who thought he’d seen a rat. He was looking like he might have to take early retirement soon on account of his nerves.

  ‘All right, all right – I suppose that’s a reasonable point.’ I let Kayla drag me along by the back of my shirt, still trying to see if there were any signs of life down the hallway. ‘But for the record, I don’t think you could come across as an average fan even if you tried. You’re not an average anything.’

  I also wasn’t sure exactly how knowing she’d taken the best photo of a chicken-eating ghost would mean one of the world’s most famous rock bands would see her as an equal, but I wasn’t going to say that. Arguing with Kayla and losing an argument with Kayla were basically the same thing. There was no point starting one unless you were prepared to do the other.

  ‘That’s very sweet, Dylan,’ Kayla told me, patting me down for the key card to the room.

  ‘Yeah, well. I mean you’re not an average height, for a start.’

  She glared (up) at me.

  ‘Quit while you’re ahead.’

  Letting go of my shirt, she opened the door to the suite, and I sighed. Dad had obviously been doing some unpacking. The once pristine, glamorous room now looked like the terraces of Woking FC. There was even a banner with my name on it hung over the window.

  Kayla looked back at me. ‘At least he doesn’t have a load of spare footballs.’

  I thought of Freddie’s mum, and the competitive look Dad got in his eyes whenever she was around. ‘He doesn’t yet.’

  ‘Well, at least we’ve still got the big-screen TV.’ Kayla headed over to grab the remote while I rummaged around for some of the crisps Mum had bought to keep us from raiding the minibar. ‘What about having a movie night of our own?’

  ‘We could. It’s nearly Halloween – I think I’m in the mood for a horror.’

  Kayla was flicking through listings already. The horror section was huge. ‘What kind?’

  ‘How about something with an evil football coach? One who forces his team to run laps around the pitch until their legs fall off.’

  She looked at me curiously. ‘Interesting plot. Does it have a happy ending?’

  ‘Sort of,’ I told her. ‘Just when he thinks he’s won, his tortured players pick up their lost limbs and come after him to beat him to death with them. The film ends with him trapped in the storage cupboard, with the ominous sound of hopping just outside.’

  ‘Uh-huh.’ Kayla abruptly flicked off the Halloween-film selection and started scrolling through cartoons for under-tens instead.

  ‘On second thoughts, I think we should watch something with a more positive message. And you should tell me exactly what’s going on at Feet of the Future.’

  TWENTY

  I tossed a packet of spicy tomato Snaps into Kayla’s outstretched hand, then slouched down on to the massive white couch beside her. It was amazing how quickly you could get used to things. When we first walked into the room, I’d thought this sofa was the most incredible thing ever – too big to even fit in our living room at home. Now I was thinking about how impractical it was to have a white couch when you liked bright orange crisps.

  ‘What do you mean, “What’s going on at Feet of the Future?”’ I asked. ‘It’s a football camp. Football’s going on. Well, some football. A bit of football. Mostly played by other people.’

  I rammed a handful of crisps into my mouth, a crunchy way of indicating that that was all I had to say on the matter. Meanwhile, Kayla folded her arms across her chest and stared at me with an eyebrow raised – it was only a matter of time before I caved.

  ‘I don’t think Jez Dutton likes me very much.’

  ‘Oh, Dylan.’ Kayla tutted. ‘What have you done to make the Korma Calamity take against you?’

  I couldn’t help looking indignant. That was the problem: I didn’t have an answer to give. ‘I don’t know. I haven’t really done anything wrong, but I can’t get anything right, either. I’m pretty sure he had me running laps just for breathing in a way he didn’t like this morning. He’ll be giving them out for existing soon.’

  I’d told myself I didn’t care what Jez thought and didn’t care what position he gave me for the match, either. But looking up at the homemade banner with my name on it that Dad had draped over the curtains, I suddenly didn’t think I could bear to be stuck at the back of the pitch at the end of the week, when we both knew I played best up front. He’d be so disappointed.

  And I did love football. Even if it wasn’t what I wanted to be doing this week – even if the way I loved football was really different to the way I thought I might be starting to love Leo – I still loved it. I was good at it too. Jez would have known that if he’d only let me have a proper chance to play.

  Kayla looked sympathetic. ‘That’s terrible. And I thought your biggest athletic problem was going to be tripping over your own tongue every time Freddie Alton arrived on the pitch.’

  I almost choked on a spicy Snap. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Dylan, you’ve fancied him for forever. And your voice went up three octaves when we were talking to him in the storage cupboard today.’

  ‘It did not.’

  She nodded sadly. ‘It did. It was like you’d been possessed by Miss Piggy.’

  I let my head drop, slowly, into my tomatoey palms.

  Great. I’d finally managed to have an almost normal conversation with Freddie Alton and had probably sounded like I’d been smacked between the legs by somebody’s spiked boot. That’s probably why he’d called me cute: cute like a Muppet.

  Kayla reached across to ruffle my hair. ‘It could be worse. You could have a crush on that awful Chortlefoy.’

  ‘Fauntleroy,’ I corrected. ‘And he goes by Ler—’

  ‘He’s terrible,’ she went on loudly. ‘I’ve never met anyone so pedantic, so consumed by rules and facts. I don’t know how you can bear him, honestly.’

  I looked at her for a moment. This morning, she’d given the whole breakfast buffet a lecture about how most cereals that claimed to be ‘heart healthy’ actually removed all the nutrition from their food during the manufacturing process, only to shove in a load of vitamins and minerals that shouldn’t naturally be there. She asked us to tweet cereal companies asking why they didn’t cite scientific sources for their claims on the front of the box.

  ‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘Who knows. Anyway, maybe it’s better if Freddie thinks I’ve wandered off the set of the next Muppets movie.’

  ‘Why would that be better?’ Kayla asked.

  I thought that was stupidly obvious. ‘Well. Because Leo.’

  She looked blank. ‘What does your Muppet voice have to do with Leo? You don’t sound like that with him – you never have.’

  ‘No, but . . . I think my voice gets like that because I fancy Freddie. It’s like yo
ur pop-star paralysis. Fit boys fry my vocal chords.’

  ‘And?’

  I couldn’t understand how she was missing the issue here. She wanted to be a lawyer; they were supposed to be smart. ‘And if I want to be with Leo, I can’t just go around fancying other people, can I?’

  ‘Oh,’ Kayla said, blinking. ‘Yes you can.’

  ‘Exactly, it’s a total betrayal – what?’

  ‘I said, yes you can. People don’t develop a blind spot for everyone else with a nice-looking face just because they’ve started dating someone. You’ve fancied Freddie forever. Being with Leo doesn’t mean you get a switch to turn all that off. You can like someone and still like other people. Deciding to date someone just means you like them most.’

  I was pretty new to dating anybody, but this wasn’t something I’d thought about before. And I spent loads of time thinking about my relationship – I couldn’t figure out how I’d missed it. ‘Isn’t it a bit like cheating, though?’

  Kayla popped a crisp into her mouth and kept her lips sealed until it had melted, before replying. ‘Not unless you actually cheat. You can’t help noticing when other people have nice faces, Dylan. Everybody does it. Even Leo.’

  Even Leo.

  I thought about the line-up of imaginary other dancers I’d spent most of last night creating in my head, and instead of feeling better about what Kayla was telling me, I felt much, much worse.

  She finally pressed play on the cartoon she’d picked out – something pastel and syrupy, with a gang of bears who apparently really, really cared about each other. I shook my head though, hauling myself off the couch for more snack supplies.

  ‘I think we should go back to the horror section. I don’t want to spend the whole cartoon wondering which bear I sounded most like today.’

  ‘OK, so maybe Miss Piggy was a slight exaggeration . . .’ Kayla twisted round to look at me.

  ‘No, trust me, I want to be completely terrified tonight.’ I leaned against a stool.

  And then leaped right over it, and almost out of my skin, as the door slammed open right behind me.

  Mum was in the doorway, looking like she’d seen—

  ‘A GHOST! Dylan! Kayla! Quick! Bring your cameras! I’ve spotted something horrific just down the hall.’

  ‘We’re on the same floor as the Deathsplash Nightmares,’ I reminded her. ‘Are you sure it wasn’t just a rock star wearing too much eyeliner?’

  Kayla looked worried for a moment, but as Mum waved her hands and hissed, ‘It’s nothing like that. Quick! Quick!’ we both got out our phones and followed her into the dimly lit hallway.

  That’s when, ahead of us, I spotted a small, white runaway napkin careering at breakneck speed towards the lifts.

  ‘There – see? A poltergeist!’ Mum exclaimed, grabbing my phone to take a video. ‘An undeniable spiritual entity!’

  ‘It’s that flipping hamster,’ Kayla whispered to me. She stretched out a leg and tapped her foot on the edge of the napkin as it flew past.

  Fluffy bolted into the lift, while the white cloth fluttered gently and then wilted to the floor.

  I looked up to find Mum tapping furiously at my phone. ‘What’s wrong with this? There’s something blocking the image. Spiritual interference?’

  ‘I think it’s more likely to be your finger,’ I said gently, reaching to change the way she held the phone. ‘Did you just miss all that?’

  ‘All what?’ she asked, pressing record on the camera and holding it up now it just showing her some vague pinkish darkness. ‘Now, where did the spirit go?’

  ‘Um—’ Kayla started.

  ‘It—’ I cut in.

  ‘Oh, it changed forms,’ Mum interrupted, bending down to pick up the napkin.

  ‘Worse than that – it changed floors,’ I whispered bleakly to Kayla. ‘We’ll never find Fluffy now.’

  TWENTY-ONE

  Thankfully Kayla told Jude about our strange encounter of the Fluffy kind after breakfast the next morning, otherwise all Mum’s talk about pet ghosts might have put him right off his Coco Pops.

  She was still going on about it when she and Dad dropped us off at Feet of the Future the next morning.

  ‘And on top of that, I heard strange splashing noises in our suite last night,’ she announced theatrically.

  ‘Dad flooded the shower last night,’ I pointed out. ‘The splashing noises were him trying to wring out his pants.’

  Mum just grinned and winked at me. Then she blinked, pointing out of the window on my side. ‘Goodness, that boy’s got a lot of balls.’

  Kayla and I looked round to see what she meant, assuming someone must have been doing something really confident, or dangerous. Which would have been unusual for eight thirty in the morning, when most people are just dragging themselves to wherever they need to be, like zombies running low on brains.

  But it was Freddie Alton, busily dragging a huge net of footballs across the car park. He was wearing a hoody in a shade of Superman-blue that made his hair gleam gold in the early morning light. I swallowed hard and willed my voice out of Muppet territory.

  ‘We’d better go and help him,’ I growled.

  ‘Do you need a cough sweet?’ Mum asked, rustling in her bag. But I was already halfway out of the car.

  ‘You might want to aim for somewhere between Mickey Mouse and Darth Vader,’ Kayla commented, catching me up. ‘Swinging from one to the other gets a bit confusing.’

  ‘Very funny. Just . . . kick me if I get too squeaky, all right?’ I held up a hand, waving to Freddie as we approached. Something about seeing him still made my heart start battering against my ribcage, as if it wanted to get out and flutter round Freddie’s head like a cartoon bluebird.

  And whatever Kayla said, I couldn’t help feeling guilty about that.

  Maybe there was a big difference between having a crush on someone and doing anything about it . . . but didn’t the crush mean that you sort of wanted to?

  ‘Need any—’

  Kayla kicked me, and I abruptly coughed the squeak out of my voice.

  ‘Need any help?’ I said gruffly.

  ‘Is your throat still giving you trouble?’ Freddie asked. ‘I’m fine – just tell me where you want these? If we’re late in for training, Jez will have you running laps until lunchtime. Probably only you though, Dylan.’

  I blinked at Freddie, surprised he’d noticed how unfair the treatment I was getting was. I made a mental note to ask him if he knew what it was all about.

  Kayla pointed through the doors to one of the arrow signs. ‘Just follow those. I’ve been using one of the offices at the back of the building. It seems like all the admin staff have a break during the holiday. And I hope you’re free at lunch, because that’s when we’re going to enact my plan.’

  As we dragged the footballs down to the office, she described the set-up she’d be using for her video. She wanted my help, and Freddie’s too, which he agreed to surprisingly easily, considering what she was asking us to do sounded insane.

  ‘And then I’ll release the last net and let all the balls loose while I get the reaction shot,’ Kayla finished.

  ‘Both at once?’ I asked.

  She frowned. ‘What do you mean, both at once?’

  ‘I mean, how are you going to set off the haunted footballs and film what’s happening at the same time? Won’t it make it obvious it’s a set-up if you’re filming what you’re doing?’

  Kayla stopped still in the office doorway, her expression frozen in horror. ‘You’re right. I’d forgotten I was filming it too. But if I’m in the corridor, I won’t have anyone to set off the traps!’

  ‘I can do it,’ came a voice from the black chair behind the office desk.

  Leroy spun around and smiled at us.

  Kayla’s eyes went wide. ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘Let’s see,’ Leroy said, looking exactly like he should have been stroking a white cat and cackling as he unveiled his evil plan. ‘I noticed you ke
pt looking in this direction when you were talking about your video last night. That unconscious body language gave me the first hint. So I tried a few of the doors down here until I found an open one, with a copy of Rock Lobster magazine open on the desk. It was obvious, really. And I’m here to check none of those are Feet of the Future balls.’

  He stood up and paced over to the netting. Freddie raised an eyebrow as Leroy made his inspection. The balls were all made of plastic, and some of them had Congratulations! written on them in glitter glue (Kayla didn’t think that would show up on film). Leroy still took the time to look at every single one.

  ‘Well?’ Kayla growled, after what felt like an hour. ‘Do we pass, or are you turning me into the football fuzz?’

  Leroy straightened up, leaving the kind of silence game-show presenters do when they’re about to tell somebody they’ve just lost their prize money.

  ‘They’re fine,’ he said, finally. ‘And I’ll help you with the video if you like. I have some performing experience: I played ‘young’ St David in a Visit Wales video when I was five.’

  Kayla’s face was still stony. I stepped in before she snapped hard enough to break him.

  ‘That would be great, Leroy. But no acting required – we just need you to drop some balls,’ I said.

  ‘If that’s all sorted, has anybody noticed we’re running late?’ Freddie said from the doorway.

  I looked at the clock. Two minutes past nine.

  At five past, me, Freddie and Leroy burst on to the training centre’s indoor pitch. If nothing else, all the laps had really been good for building up my speed.

  Chidi had been given the job of taking the register, and by some actual miracle, he hadn’t even started yet, too busy doing a comedy routine for the rest of the team. He shot a wink at us as we ran across to line up with the rest.

  ‘Here we go, then: Frederick Alton.’

  ‘Yes, Chid,’ Freddie called out, slipping into his spot at the front of the line, not quite too out of breath to laugh.