بگو سیب و بمیر فصل 6

Say Cheese and Die! - Chapter 6

“Now what?” Michael whined.

“Try again,” Bird urged Greg. “Maybe they’re just stuck.” He slid out from under Michael’s arm. “Here. I’ll help you.”

Greg moved over to give Bird room to step up beside him. “Ready?” he asked. “One, two, three— push !”

Both boys pushed against the heavy wooden doors with all their might.

And the doors swung open.

“Okay! Now we’re outta here!” Shari declared happily.

Picking up the camera, Greg led the way out. The backyard, he saw, was as weed-choked and overgrown as the front. An enormous limb had fallen off an old oak tree, probably during a storm, and was lying half in the tree, half on the ground.

Somehow, Bird and Shari managed to drag Michael up the steps and onto the grass. “Can you walk? Try it,” Bird said.

Still leaning against the two of them, Michael reluctantly pushed his foot down on the ground. He lifted it. Then pushed it again. “Hey, it feels a little better,” he said, surprised.

“Then let’s go,” Bird said.

They ran to the overgrown hedge that edged along the side of the yard, Michael on his own now, stepping gingerly on the bad ankle, doing his best to keep up. Then, staying in the shadow of the hedge, they made their way around the house to the front.

“All right !” Bird cried happily as they reached the street. “We made it!”

Gasping for breath, Greg stopped at the curb and turned back toward the house. “Look!” he cried, pointing up to the living room window.

A dark figure stood in the window, hands pressed against the glass.

“It’s Spidey,” Shari said.

“He’s just—staring at us,” Michael cried.

“Weird,” Greg said. “Let’s go.”

They didn’t stop till they got to Michael’s house, a sprawling redwood ranch-style house behind a shady front lawn.

“How’s the ankle?” Greg asked.

“It’s loosened up a lot. It doesn’t even hurt that much,” Michael said.

“Man, you could’ve been killed !” Bird declared, wiping sweat off his forehead with the sleeve of his T-shirt.

“Thanks for reminding me,” Michael said drily.

“Lucky thing you’ve got all that extra padding,” Bird teased.

“Shut up,” Michael muttered.

“Well, you guys wanted adventure,” Shari said, leaning back against the trunk of a tree.

“That guy Spidey is definitely weird,” Bird said, shaking his head.

“You see the way he was staring at us?” Michael asked. “All dressed in black and everything? He looked like some kind of zombie or something.”

“He saw us,” Greg said softly, suddenly feeling a chill of dread. “He saw us very clearly. We’d better stay away from there.”

“What for?” Michael demanded. “It isn’t his house. He’s just sleeping there. We could call the police on him.”

“But if he’s really crazy or something, there’s no telling what he might do,” Greg replied thoughtfully.

“Aw, he’s not going to do anything,” Shari said quietly. “Spidey doesn’t want trouble. He just wants to be left alone.”

“Yeah,” Michael agreed quickly. “He didn’t want us messing with his stuff. That’s why he yelled like that and came after us.”

Michael was leaning over, rubbing his ankle. “Hey, where’s my picture?” he demanded, straightening up and turning to Greg.

“Huh?”

“You know. The picture you snapped. With the camera.”

“Oh. Right.” Greg suddenly realized he still had the camera gripped tightly in his hand. He set it down carefully on the grass and reached into his back pocket. “I put it in here when we started to run,” he explained.

“Well? Did it come out?” Michael demanded.

The three of them huddled around Greg to get a view of the snapshot.

“Whoa—hold on a minute!” Greg cried, staring hard at the small, square photo. “Something’s wrong. What’s going on here?”