R. L. Stine_Mostly Ghostly 03 by One Night in Doom House

on the ice. Mrs. Murray, our neighbor, drove by, moving slowly on the slippery road.
    My breath puffed up in front of me as I trotted down Bleek Street. With the gray sky above me and the white snow all around, I suddenly felt as if I was running through an unreal world. A distant planet where everything was black and white. And cold … chillingly cold.
    I was wishing I was somewhere else. Not running through my snowy neighborhood to Traci's house. Not running in terror from a ghost who could melt a cute bunny rabbit and not even care.
    Running from a ghost who could melt a
human
.
    I’ll get those pendants back, I told myself.
    Did Morgo call them
life pods
?
    I’ll get the pods back from Traci. I’ll returnthem to Morgo. And then in fifty or sixty years, I’ll be able to forget how frightened I am right now!
    That's what I was thinking when I saw a group of kids at the top of Miller Hill, a block from Traci's house. Some were pulling sleds. Others had plastic disks. Four or five kids were perched on the snow mountain made by the plows, tossing snowballs at kids across the street.
    And was that blond girl in the red down jacket Traci? The one carrying the red snow disk?
    Yes.
    Traci! Thank goodness!
    Gasping for breath, I ran as fast as I could, slipping and stumbling in the deep, slick snow. I reached the top of the hill just as Traci went sliding down.
    Miller Hill is steep and a mile long. You just keep going down forever.
    I watched Traci raise both hands in the air as her sled picked up speed. Her blond hair flew out from under her ski cap, and she screamed all the way to the bottom.
    “Traci!” I shouted.
    The snowball fight grew bigger. Kids were laughing and screaming. Two little boys went down the hill sharing a Flexible Flyer.
    I cupped my hands and shouted again. “Traci! Up here! It's me! Traci—I need those metal things back!”
    She didn’t look up. She was talking to some girls at the bottom of the hill. They had to dodge out of the way as the two little boys came shooting down the hill.
    “Traci—hi!” I screamed at the top of my lungs. “Traci—come up here!”
    Finally, she heard me. She turned and shouted, “Stay away from me, Max. You’re too weird!”
    Oh, wow. She was still upset about the cookies and milk flying through the air.
    How could I tell her she had a
lot more
to be upset about?
    “Traci—I have to talk to you! I—I’m coming down!”
    My shouts were cut off by a hard shove at my side. I spun around and saw the Wilbur brothers looming over me.
    Willy had a pair of ice skates dangling around his neck. Billy dropped the plastic garbage bag he was using as a sled and shoved me again. “Get lost, Maxie. You’re ruining our race.”
    “Huh? Race?” I sneered at him. “What race? You two aren’t even in the
human
race.”
    Why do I always make bad jokes when I’m about to be pounded to a pulp?
    “You’re in the way,” Billy said. He bumped me hard with his chest.
    “Hey, give me a break just once,” I pleaded. “This is important.”
    I turned and called to Traci again. But she was gone. She and the other girls had completely vanished. Did they go to Traci's house?
    A loud hissing sound made me gasp. Morgo!
    No. Just two cats chasing each other through the snow.
    “You want a break? We’ll give you a break, Maxie,” Willy Wilbur said. He pulled back the collar of my coat. Billy scooped up a massive pile of snow—and dropped it down my back.
    The two of them laughed and slapped high fives. They think they’re riots.
    I don’t have time for this, I thought. Any second now, Traci will be a melted puddle, and it will be all my fault.
    I turned and gazed down to the bottom of the hill. To my horror, I saw Traci walking away with two other girls.
    “No! Come back! Traci—come back!” I screamed.
    She didn’t hear me.
    Now what? Now what?
    Suddenly, I had an idea.

19
    THE DRIVEWAY TO TRACI'S house had been shoveled, but her mom's SUV still had snow on the roof