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Chapter 1
Steve Richard just couldn’t sleep that night. It wasn’t the constant howling that kept him awake, no, it was his life. Steven John Richard was a freshman at Lincoln High. He lived in a small suburb in Westfield, New Jersey. He was just like any other kid, but different. He was average height, average build, and average looks. He had curly brown hair, and had just started shaving. He had glasses, and was kind of clumsy. But he still couldn’t understand why everyone picked on him.
Maybe it was because he wasn’t athletic like his older brother, Tim Richard. Tim was a senior, and he was massive. He was 6’6” and 280 pounds. He looked a little like Steve, but a lot more muscular and better looking. He was the star defensive player on the football team and he was popular. He wrestled and played basketball and everybody liked him. Steve first thought that having a brother like Tim would make things easy for him. Everybody would respect him, because if they didn’t, he’d tell Tim. But that’s not quite how things worked.
Tim stood up for Steve whenever he was around, but Tim wasn’t always around. Most of the time Steve was alone. Sure Steve had friends, but most of them got picked on just as much as he did. Steve’s best friends were Jim Lewis, Tony Hernandez, and Matt Andrews. Jim was short and stocky and had a pretty impressive build; he played football, and was a starter on the freshman team. Tony was tall and lanky with dark skin and black hair. He was in the chess club and was on the student council. Matt was tall, had blonde hair and good looks, but despite this, he was really weird. He played soccer and took honors chemistry. He was known for setting himself on fire and making lab mice explode. Jim was the funny one, Tony was the smart one, and Matt was just the weird one. Steve was the normal one.
Steve rolled around in his bed and went over the day’s events. Today, Bill Cassidy had locked him in his locker, and jammed Kleenex into the vents. Steve had to wait for fifteen minutes until Matt found him. But it got worse. At lunch Steve sat with his three friends and a couple other kids. As Bill walked by, he “accidentally” poured milk all over Steve’s head and then down his shirt. When Jim stood up to tell Bill to back off, he was rewarded by getting a face full of spaghetti. Jim then tackled Bill and began beating him in the face until some of Bill’s cronies hauled him off. By that time Matt and Tony had gotten into the fight and Steve had no choice but to follow. The fight was broken up by Mr. Jones who had lunch duty. They were all taken to the office and suspended for a day. No one got hurt, except for Bill who suffered a bloody nose and lip, and Matt who got a black eye. Normally seeing Bill getting punched in the face would be satisfying, but under the circumstances Steve found no consolation in it.
Steve had been grounded for a week because of the incident. The howling was starting to get to him. It seemed like once a month on some night there was always an awful howling. There usually was no problem with dogs and it always happened during a full moon. Steve thought it was just some strays barking at the moon, but the local animal refuge never found any.
After much tossing and turning, Steve finally managed to go to sleep. After all, it was Wednesday, and after his suspension was over, he only had one more day to go before he would get a brief respite from school.
It was nearing fourth hour and Steve had managed to make it past three classes without incident. He just had social studies and then it would be lunch. Social studies was probably Steve’s favorite class, because he had it with Jim, Tony, and Matt, and Mr. Smith was his nicest teacher.
He took his seat in the second row where he always sat next to Tony and Matt and in front of Jim. Tony was already there and had a worried look on his face. “What’s wrong?” Steve asked, hesitantly.
“Matt burned himself in chemistry again, and I think they might take him out of the class. If they take Matt out, I’m alone.” Tony replied quietly.
“That won’t be so bad, I mean a lot of those kids are smart like you and are in the chess club and on student council.” Steve said, trying to be reassuring.
“Yeah I guess, but I still hope they don’t take him out.”
Jim walked in and plopped noisily down in his seat, with his usual cheerful grin on his face. When he seen the grim look on Tony’s face he got serious and asked, “What’s wrong?”
“Matt might be taken out of honors chem., because he burned himself again.” Tony answered.
“Man, again? Did he burn himself bad?” Jim asked concerned.
“No, not that bad. He’s with the nurse right now and he probably won’t need to go home.” Tony replied.
We talked for a few more minutes and then the bell rang. Once everyone was in their seats Mr. Smith asked, “Where is Andrews?”
“With the nurse. He got burned.” Steve answered.
“Again? Well anyway,” Mr. Smith said with little concern, after all, this was about the fourth time Matt had caused some accident in chemistry, and many teachers had gotten used to it. “You have an assignment coming up. You will be doing a video documentary on a historical sight somewhere in Westfield. You will be in groups of four. The sheets that I am handing out contain the criteria you will need to earn a good grade. You will need to verify your choices with me next week. The final project is due October 29.”
The rest of the class was spent making suggestions on what they could do. The bell rang, and it was finally lunch. By that time Matt was back. He had a big bandage on his right arm and he had to eat with his left. “What did you do this time?” Bill asked.
“Forgot that air freshener is flammable.” Matt answered.
Jim took the time to explain the social studies project to Matt. Matt said, “We could do the Jones’ place.”
The Jones house was a huge manor just outside Oak Ridge, the suburb in which they all lived. It had been around since the early 1800’s. They had all heard stories about Kevin Jones, and how his ghost haunts the house, but they were in high school now, and didn’t have time to believe in that nonsense. About 20 years ago it had been made into a small museum, but after only a year, a fire had started in the house and destroyed all of the museum exhibits. The city didn’t want to spend the money to rebuild it, and both of the museum caretakers had died in the fire. They still don’t know what caused it. They were going to knock the house down, but some people at the historical society downtown had signed a petition to keep it up. The Jones’ place is what everyone calls it now, and it was just a broken-down old shack. For fun, sometimes the high school students used to throw rocks through the windows, but they had all been boarded up by now. No one ever went inside, and no one ever took care of it. One time when he was younger, Steve had rode his bike up the hill with Jim and they almost went inside, but something, some sense of foreboding caused them to turn away.
“Why would you want to do that?” Steve asked, a little surprised at the idea.
“Well, it’s a historical site, I mean it’s about the oldest standing building in Westfield.” Matt said.
“But it’s a pile of junk.” Jim stated.
“I know, but we could do some research on Kevin Jones. We could tour the house and stuff.” Matt said.
“But it’s a pile of junk.” Jim argued.
“I think it’s a good idea.” Tony said.
“You do?” Steve replied, a bit baffled.
“Yeah, I think it’s a great idea. We could do it on October 15. That’s the night of the full moon. With all that howling, we could make it a scary documentary, just in time for Halloween.” Tony answered.
“You want to do it at night?” Steve asked a little surprised.
“Yeah.” Tony answered.
“You mean like the Blair Witch Project?” Jim asked growing excited.
“Just like it.” Tony said.
After some hesitation we all agreed.
It turned out that Mr. Smith really liked the idea. He said it would be unique and interesting. Much of the next two weeks were spent researching the project. Steve found some books on Kevin Jones, his son, and the house.
Kevin Jones was a wealthy businessman in the early 1800’s. He made rifles and muskets and supplied them to the Union during the Civil War. He died in a hunting accident in Delaware. He had a son named Luke who inherited his father’s fortune. Luke didn’t own the house for long though, about a month after he had moved into the house he was found murdered in the basement. The reference book that they read it in didn’t give a very good description of how Luke had died, it just used the word “murdered.”
Around 1890, a family bought the house. They moved in, but after only a little time they quickly moved out, complaining of noises that they heard in the basement. Naturally this is where the idea came from that the house was haunted. The house slowly began to fall apart, until the historical society made it into a museum in 1979. The museum lasted for only a year before the fire broke out and ruined the house. The museum caretakers died in the house, and it hasn’t been used since.
Steve found a picture of Kevin Jones and showed the other three boys. In the picture he was standing by his son. Kevin Jones was an enormous man. They could tell from the picture. He must have been around seven feet tall. He had shaggy hair and long sideburns. He looked more like a beast than a man. He also carried a long elegant cane that had a handle shaped like the head of a wolf.
After looking at the picture Jim said, “I think he needs a haircut.”
At lunch they were talking when Sarah Foster walked past their table. Steve had had a crush on Sarah since the 5th grade, but she was Bill’s girlfriend. Out of all the things that annoyed Steve at Lincoln High, this was the most. To make matters worse, Bill knew how Steve felt about Sarah, and he rubbed it in as much as he could. Steve just couldn’t understand what Sarah saw in Bill. Steve practically worshipped her, and she didn’t even know he existed. It just wasn’t fair.
Bill saw Steve looking at her and walked over to his table. “I heard you guys were doing a documentary on the old Jones’ place.” Bill said.
“Yeah, we are.” Jim answered matter-of-factly.
“I bet you pansies wouldn’t last one night alone up there.” Bill said.
“We’re not spending the night.” Tony said, “We’re only going to be up there for a couple of hours.”
“Would you spend the night for a hundred bucks?” Bill asked.
“You’d never pay us, even if we did spend the night.” Steve answered.
“If you spend the whole night up in that house, I’ll pay you.” Bill said seriously, and then walked away.
“A hundred bucks, that ain’t bad, just to spend the night in a rickety old house.” Jim said.
“He’d never pay us.” Steve said.
“But even if he didn’t, think of the respect we’d get for spending the night up there.” Matt said.
“Yeah, come on Steve. It’ll be fun. It’ll be like camping.” Jim said.
“I don’t like camping.” Steve replied.
“Matt has a point, we would get a lot of respect.” Tony said, “Maybe we could negotiate for $200, that’s fifty each.”
Feeling peer pressure draw him in Steve finally said, “All right, whatever, I’ll do it.”
October 15 landed on a Friday, and it was Monday. The group would use Tony’s camera, because he could edit the film using his computer. They agreed to do it the night of the full moon so that the howling effect would help the horror theme of the documentary.
After some negotiation, Bill had agreed to pay them $200, and he had even shown them the money. But this wasn’t about the money, only one thing mattered to Steve now, he wanted to impress Sarah, the money was just an added bonus. He was tired of everyone at school thinking he was a nobody, and he was tired of living in his brother’s shadow. He wanted to gain some respect, and if sleeping in a broken-down old house was the only way to get it, then so be it.
Bill couldn’t wait until Friday when he was going to make those four losers look like scared little babies. He was on his way to the Jones’ house to meet Mike and Stan, his two best friends, to set up for the prank. Both played football, basketball, and baseball with him. Mike was the big one. He had short brown hair and was one of
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