Free Don't Stay Up Late by R. L. Stine

could barely breathe.
    â€œHarry! Harry! Harry!”
    I knew what I had to do. I had to call the police.
    My phone. Where was my phone?
    Downstairs. On the living room couch. I hurled myself down the stairs. I ran into the living room. Grabbed my bag off the couch. Frantically pawed through it for the phone.
    Where is it? Where?
    I heard a knocking sound. Very nearby. The bag fell from my hand. I heard scraping. Another knock. A soft thud.
    Someone is in the house.
    I could feel the panic tighten its grip on me. I couldn’t think. I couldn’t breathe.
    Someone was at the front of the house.
    The masked intruder had returned.

 
    22.
    Another soft thud.
    I stood frozen by the couch, my bag at my feet, and listened.
    It sounded like knocking. Someone knocking on the front door?
    Without thinking, I lurched to the entryway. No one there. No one in the house.
    The knocking sounds again.
    I turned. The coat closet! The sounds were coming from the coat closet! “Who’s there?” I tried to shout but the words came out in a choked whisper. “Who—?”
    I stepped to the closet, yanked open the door—and gasped. “Harry? What are you doing in here?” I cried.
    He stood huddled against the back wall, surrounded by coats. His whole body was trembling, and his face was as pale as flour. “I’m scared,” he said in a tiny voice.
    I reached for him with both hands, and he let me pull him from the closet. The poor little kid was shaking so hard. I lifted him up and held him close until the shivers seemed to end.
    â€œS-someone came into my room,” he stammered. “Someone scared me. So I ran … to the closet.”
    â€œIt’s okay,” I said, smoothing back his blond hair. His pale forehead was drenched with sweat. “It’s okay now.”
    I led him to the couch. He wanted to sit on my lap. I tugged him up and wrapped my arms around him. “Did you see the man?” I asked. “Did you see his face?”
    Harry shook his head. “It was too dark. I didn’t really see him. I … heard someone … in my room. So I ran. Downstairs. And I hid in the closet.”
    I suddenly had an idea, a way to calm Harry. “Maybe it was a nightmare,” I said. “Maybe it was just a bad dream you were having.”
    I was lying, of course. But if it would calm him down and make him feel safe …
    He looked up at me with those big blue eyes. “Really? You think I was dreaming?”
    I nodded. “Yes. We all have nightmares. I have nightmares a lot. But then I wake up and everything is fine.”
    He stared at me, thinking about it. “Maybe,” he said finally. “It felt kind of like a nightmare.”
    He nestled his head against my shoulder, and we sat there in silence for a while. I pictured the intruder again, with the ugly strip of fur down his misshapen head. Once again I pictured him leaping from Harry’s bedroom window and scrambling across the backyard. I saw his face in the moonlight as he turned and stared up at me. The wolfish snout. The twisted, hideous face.
    Was it a mask? Like that horror-movie mask Nate wore?
    No. No way.
    Why would someone put on a mask, break into the house, run upstairs, and leap out a window?
    It was totally crazy. It made no sense at all.
    I was glad I lied to Harry. I was glad that maybe I convinced him the whole thing was a bad dream.
    It felt like a bad dream to me, too. But I knew better.
    After a few minutes, I realized that Harry had fallen asleep on my lap. He was snoring gently, his head still pressed against me. My legs started to ache. He began to feel heavy. But I didn’t want to move him.
    I sat there holding onto him, and maybe I dozed off, too. Because the next thing I knew, I felt a gentle tap on my shoulder. I blinked. Turned my head. And saw Brenda gazing down on me.
    â€œOh. Hi,” I managed, trying to wake up.
    She had dark rings around