Silent Night 3(4)

Reva sighed. Why had she invited Grace home for the holiday? Holidays were supposed to be fun and relaxing. The last thing she wanted was trouble from somebody’s freaked-out ex-boyfriend!

Of course, Grace had been afraid to go home. Afraid of Rory. That’s why Reva had invited her.

Reva smiled tightly as Grace finally hung up the phone. Maybe I’ll get a Humanitarian Award for this, she thought. “So, did you tell him where to get off?” she asked.

“I tried.” Grace’s brown eyes were huge in her pale face, and her voice shook. “He’s worse than ever, Reva! He’s still so bitter and furious. I’m so scared, I don’t know what to do!”

Go home, Reva thought coldly.

Now there was an idea. Maybe she could make up some kind of excuse—a ski-trip she’d forgotten about or some last-minute guests who’d take up every spare room. Or she could come down with a horrible case of the flu. Anything to get Grace and her problem out of here.

The ski-trip, Reva decided. So sorry, Grace, but I can’t pass up a chance to go to Aspen! I know you understand.

The phone rang, and Reva rose from the chair to answer it. Maybe she could pretend it was someone calling to remind her about the ski trip.

Reva reached for the receiver.

“No!” Grace slammed her hand over the telephone. “Don’t answer it!”

“What do you mean?” Reva cried.

“Don’t answer it!” Grace repeated, fear in her eyes. She tightened her hand over the ringing phone. “It’s Rory again! I know it is!”





Chapter 3





A “MISUNDERSTANDING”


“Come on, Reva, pick up!” Pam Dalby, Reva’s cousin, sat across town in her family’s ramshackle house on Fear Street and listened to the ringing telephone. “Come on!”

“Maybe she isn’t there,” Pam’s friend, Willow Sorenson, suggested.

“She’s there,” Pam said grimly. “I know she got home today. Why won’t she pick up the stupid phone?”

Willow shrugged and popped open a can of diet soda. “Doesn’t she have a servant or something that could pick up for her?” she asked.

“No way,” Pam answered. “No one but Reva’s allowed to pick up the phone when she’s home. The servants would get their heads handed to them if they tried.”

“Maybe you dialed the wrong number,” Willow offered. “Hang up and try again.”

Pam shook her head. She knew she hadn’t dialed wrong. Her cousin Reva just wasn’t answering.

It’s like she knows it’s me and she’s getting her kicks by pretending not to be there, Pam thought angrily. Well, two can play this game. I’ll just let it ring until Reva goes nuts and finally picks up just to stop it.

Leaning back in the lumpy easy chair, Pam tucked the phone against her shoulder. She picked up a long, cherry-red scarf that was draped over the chair’s arm.

Reva owes me a favor, she thought, running the scarf through her hands. She has got to come through this time.

Pam glanced around the living room. It needed painting, the furniture was all worn, and patches of floor showed through the threadbare rug. But fixing up the house was a luxury her family couldn’t afford.

So was college.

Pam sighed. Why couldn’t her side of the Dalby family be the rich ones?

She’d been accepted to a couple of colleges. But her grades weren’t good enough for a scholarship. To earn tuition money, she had taken a job in the Acme Insurance Company, typing and filing. Willow worked there, too, and they became friends.

“Hey!” Willow broke into Pam’s thoughts. “How long are you going to let that thing ring, anyway?”

“As long as it takes.”

Willow shook her head, then unwrapped a stick of gum and folded it into her mouth. The tiny gold hoop in her left nostril wiggled and glinted as she chewed.

Willow kept urging Pam to get her nose pierced, too. But Pam wasn’t sure she wanted to. It was okay for Willow. It seemed to go with her short, brassy blond hair and the tiny orange lightning bolt tattooed above her right collarbone.

Pam glanced at her own reflection in the mirror over the fireplace. Bright green eyes. Long blond hair pulled into a ponytail. A round, friendly face. The kind you saw in an ad for down-home cooking or handmade quilts. A nose-ring just didn’t seem to fit.

The phone kept ringing. “Pick up!” Pam urged. She twisted the red scarf around her hands. “I’ll strangle you with this if you don’t pick up, Reva!”

“This is getting ridiculous,” Willow muttered, snapping her gum impatiently. “Why don’t you—”

“Wait, I think somebody’s answering!” Pam interrupted, sitting up in the chair. First she heard a muffled whisper. Then finally, Reva said hello, sounding annoyed.