Free Moonlight Mile by Catherine Hapka Page B

feeling a little better—at least until she thought about Brett, and the expression on his face as he’d stared at her lucky underwear.
    Oh well, she thought as she flopped onto her bed, too tired to bother pulling her bead drapes closed to dampen the moonlight shining in her window. Silver lining? I won’t have to face him first thing tomorrow morning, since he goes to a different school. I’ll just have to do my best to avoid him until he forgets about what happened. She grimaced. That should only take, oh, about a million years. . . .

    Nina wasn’t sure what time it was when she woke out of a restless sleep with her sheets tangled around her legs.She sat up and pushed a sweaty strand of hair off her forehead, glancing out the window at the almost-full moon. For a second the window frame and the darkened shapes of her furniture looked odd and unfamiliar, as if she were expecting to be somewhere else entirely. . . .
    She’d been dreaming; she knew that much. Dredging a few wisps of memory out of her fuzzy mind, she recalled running and running, crashing through sheets of Spanish moss and cobwebs but not daring to stop. Who or what had been chasing her?
    Serena, she realized with a shiver.
    Yes, she was pretty sure that was right—she’d known it was her ghostly ancestor, even though she’d never actually seen her. She hadn’t wanted to see her, because she knew that if she did . . . something . . . what? What was she expecting to happen?
    A yawn split her face, and more of the details of her dream slipped away. Still, Nina wasn’t quite ready to lie down and close her eyes again. She stared at the moon, her tired mind producing an uneasy thought: What if the stories are true?

    By the time she pushed through the school’s heavy front door on Monday morning, Nina had nearly forgotten about her dream and the midnight musings it had produced. She was focused on that day’s math quiz, which she’d barely studied for over the weekend.
    â€œNina! You’re here! I thought you’d be too embarrassed to show your face after what happened.”
    Nina glanced up. Her friend Keisha was standing in a doorway nearby, grinning at her, her brown eyes twinkling with mischief.
    â€œHuh?” Nina said, still mostly thinking about the quiz.
    â€œYou know— rrrip ?” Keisha’s grin widened. “I mean, I thought it was bad when I put my shirt on backward after gym class and didn’t notice for like half the day. But this takes the prize!”
    Nina forced a smile in return. Keisha was a good friend, and Nina knew she was only teasing. Why shouldn’t she? Normally Nina was first in line to make fun of herself when she did something embarrassing or boneheaded.
    â€œYeah, totally embarrassing.” Nina wondered howKeisha had heard about the incident, since she hadn’t attended the show.
    Then again, maybe she didn’t need to wonder. Plenty of people had been there, including her friend Livi, an inveterate gossip. The news was probably all over school by now.
    She forced a grin as Keisha ducked past her, obviously staring at her backside. “Don’t worry—all clear,” Keisha said. “Your pants are still in one piece.” She grinned at Nina, clearly expecting a joking response in return.
    â€œThanks for checking,” Nina said as lightly as she could. “But it’s cool—I wore an extra pair of pants under these just in case.”
    Keisha laughed and raised her hand for a high five. “Wish I’d been at that show,” she said. “It must’ve been hilarious. Too bad nobody got video!”
    â€œYeah.” Nina swallowed a sigh, hoping this would blow over soon. “Too bad.”

    â€œ. . . so I spent all day yesterday dealing with everyone at school wanting to know if I was wearing my lucky underwear again,” Nina said, jiggling Breezy’s lead rope to stophim from eating a