“Great,” Sam said. “We’re going to get rabies.”
Syd laughed. “Are you afraid, college boy?”
The back door crept open. “All clear,” Alex said. “Come on in.”
Ella hesitated at the threshold. She wore a lavender T-shirt, cutoff shorts. The muscles in her legs were already changing, getting stronger, from running with us. And then she went through the door, Syd and me following.
“This way,” Alex said, once we were all inside.
Scaffolding and plastic lined the walls and most of the windows, shifting in ghostly patterns as we moved through the building. The air was hot and close, and the floor was littered with plastic cups and mouse droppings.
Alex led us down the stairs, Syd right behind. Sam went after her, holding my hand, and I grabbed for Ella’s. “Be careful,” I warned her.
Linked, we came to the bottom of the stairs. Alex led us down the hallway, past a room that looked like a small kitchen, a bathroom, a laundry room, and into a long basement room. The carpet had been pulled up, revealing pockmarked concrete underneath. A couple of couches, a bunch of chairs, and some long wooden tables were stacked against the back wall. Two banners with Alpha Kappa Sigma’s coat of arms emblazoned on them hung at the front of the room.
“This has to be the chapter room,” Sam said. I hadn’t dropped his hand, or Ella’s.
“What’s that?” she asked.
“It’s where they do their meetings and have their secret ceremonies or whatever.”
“The acoustics are creepy.” I shivered in spite of the heat. “The whole room is creepy.” With only the lights from our phones and everything shrouded, the entire place felt sinister.
I shot a glance over at Ella, feeling worried again about bringing her here. But she looked thrilled.
There were enormous pictures along the walls, propped up and covered in plastic. I knelt down to look more closely at them. The name of the fraternity—Alpha Kappa Sigma—then the name of the university, followed by the years the photos were taken. Rows and rows of guys wearing suits and ties. Faces looked back, teeth and hair and eyes bleary and blurred through the plastic.
“Do you think anyone’sdieddown here?” Syd asked behind me. “Like, some kind of hazing thing gone wrong?”
“Could be,” Alex said. “I feel like there are always stories going around about that. And they swear each other to secrecy or whatever.”
“What exactly is our plan?” Sam asked. I could tell he wasn’t as into this as the others were. He was about to start college. If he wanted to find out a fraternity’s secrets, he could do that before too long.
But Syd and Alex and I were still more than a year away, and sometimes it felt like forever.
“We just want to look around,” I said.
“Maybe have a ceremony,” Syd said.
“Like what kind of ceremony?” Alex asked.
“We could summon a ghost,” Ella suggested. We all turned to her in surprise. “Um, or not.”
“That’s a great idea,” Syd said.
“I think we should probably sit in a circle,” Alex said. “I don’t know.”
“We can use some of the chairs,” Syd said, looking at the plastic-shrouded furniture. “Do you think there’s, like, a fraternity throne or something?”
“Let’s sit on the floor.” Sam sounded very, very resigned.
“Relax, college boy,” Syd said. “We’re not going to ruin your chances of being a Big Brother in the frat of your choice someday.”
We sat down on the floor in a circle and stared at each other.
“Um...” I began.
“Ah ooh wah ee a oh-oh-oh,” Alex intoned.
