بگو سیب و بمیر فصل 24

Say Cheese and Die! - Chapter 24

“This is impossible !” Greg cried aloud, gaping at the snapshot in his trembling hand.

How had Shari gotten into the photo?

It had been taken a few minutes before, in front of the bleachers on the playground.

But there was Shari, standing close beside Greg.

His hand trembling, his mouth hanging open in disbelief, Greg goggled at the photo.

It was very clear, very sharp. There they were on the playground. He could see the baseball diamond in the background.

And there they were. Greg and Shari.

Shari standing so clear, so sharp—right next to him.

And they were both staring straight ahead, their eyes wide, their mouths open, their expressions frozen in horror as a large shadow covered them both.

“Shari?” Greg cried, lowering the snapshot and darting his eyes over the front yard. “Are you here? Can you hear me?”

He listened.

Silence.

He tried again.

“Shari? Are you here?”

“Greg!” a voice called.

Uttering a startled cry, Greg spun around. “Huh?”

“Greg!” the voice repeated. It took him a while to realize that it was his mother, calling to him from the front door.

“Oh. Hi, Mom.” Feeling dazed, he slid the snapshot back into his jeans pocket.

“Where’ve you been?” his mother asked as he made his way to the door. “I heard about Shari. I’ve been so upset. I didn’t know where you were.”

“Sorry, Mom,” Greg said, kissing her on the cheek. “I—I should’ve left a note.”

He stepped into the house, feeling strange and out of sorts, sad and confused and frightened, all at the same time.

Two days later, on a day of high gray clouds, the air hot and smoggy, Greg paced back and forth in his room after school.

The house was empty except for him. Terry had gone off a few hours before to his after-school job at the Dairy Freeze. Mrs. Banks had driven to the hospital to pick up Greg’s dad, who was finally coming home.

Greg knew he should be happy about his dad’s return. But there were still too many things troubling him, tugging at his mind.

Frightening him.

For one thing, Shari still hadn’t been found.

The police were completely baffled. Their new theory was that she’d been kidnapped.

Her frantic, grieving parents waited home by the phone. But no kidnappers called to demand a ransom.

There were no clues of any kind.

Nothing to do but wait. And hope.

As time passed, Greg felt more and more guilty. He was sure Shari hadn’t been kidnapped. He knew that somehow, the camera had made her disappear.

But he couldn’t tell anyone else what he believed.

No one would believe him. Anyone he tried to tell the story to would think he was crazy.

Cameras can’t be evil, after all.

Cameras can’t make people fall down stairs. Or crash their cars.

Or vanish from sight.

Cameras can only record what they see.

Greg stared out of his window, pressing his forehead against the glass, looking down on Shari’s backyard. “Shari—where are you?” he asked aloud, staring at the tree where she had posed.

The camera was still hidden in the secret compartment in his headboard. Neither Bird nor Michael would agree to help Greg return it to the Coffman house.

Besides, Greg had decided to hold on to it a while longer, in case he needed it as proof.

In case he decided to confide his fears about it to someone.

In case…

His other fear was that Spidey would come back, back to Greg’s room, back for the camera.

So much to be frightened about.

He pushed himself away from the window. He had spent so much time in the past couple of days staring down at Shari’s empty backyard.

Thinking. Thinking.

With a sigh, he reached into the headboard and pulled out two of the snapshots he had hidden in there along with the camera.

The two snapshots were the ones taken the past Saturday at Shari’s birthday party. Holding one in each hand, Greg stared at them, hoping he could see something new, something he hadn’t noticed before.

But the photos hadn’t changed. They still showed her tree, her backyard, green in the sunlight. And no Shari. No one where Shari had been standing. As if the lens had penetrated right through her.

Staring at the photos, Greg let out a cry of anguish.

If only he had never gone into the Coffman house.

If only he had never stolen the camera.

If only he had never taken any photos with it.

If only… if only… if only…

Before he realized what he was doing, he was ripping the two snapshots into tiny pieces.

Panting loudly, his chest heaving, he tore up the snapshots and let the pieces fall to the floor.

When he had ripped them both into tiny shards of paper, he flung himself facedown on his bed and closed his eyes, waiting for his heart to stop pounding, waiting for the heavy feeling of guilt and horror to lift.

Two hours later, the phone by his bed rang.

It was Shari.