R. L. Stine_Mostly Ghostly 06 by Let's Get This Party Haunted!

1
    J UGGLING DUCKPINS IS NOT as easy as it looks. The duckpins are very heavy on the bottom and light on the top. You have to remember this when you toss them up, and when you catch them.
    If you give them the wrong spin, they'll come down bottom first, which is wrong. You need to grab the top of the pin and toss it up again.
    I don't have a problem getting the spin right. I have two other problems. The first is that the ceiling in my bedroom is very low. So when I toss duckpins up, sometimes they hit the ceiling and then come crashing down on my head.
    The second problem is that my house is haunted. I am haunted by two ghosts —kids about my age —named Nicky and Tara Roland. And believe it or not, I am the only one in my family who can see or hear them.
    Why are Nicky and Tara a juggling problem?
    I'll tell you.
    There I was, practicing my juggling in my room. I always start with two duckpins. To get used to the weight. Then I add a third.
    I was working very hard because I wanted to be perfect. See, I was rehearsing for my birthday party. My new friend, Quentin, and I are magicians and jugglers. And we were going to perform at my twelfth birthday party.
    All the cool kids from school were coming to my party. I hadn't invited them yet. But I
hoped
they'd all come. I knew they would —
if
I could convince Traci Wayne to come.
    Traci is the coolest, hottest girl at Jefferson Elementary. I don't know if I'm in love with her or not. But every time I get in the same room with her, I start panting like a dog, my tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth, and all I can say is “Hunh hunh hunh.”
    Is that true love? I'm not sure. But I
was
sure that if Traci agreed to come to my birthday party, all her cool friends would follow her.
    When you're twelve, you're almost a teenager. Which means you're not a kid anymore. You're cool, and you have to act cool all the time.
    I couldn't wait to be twelve. Because so far, I hadn't been cool at all. I was not in the cool group at school. I was in the group known as Geek Patrol, the bottom of the food chain.
    Which is totally unfair. Just because my best friend, Aaron, and I wear
Battlestar Galactica
T-shirts and can recite whole
Buffy
episodes word for word —that doesn't make us geeks!
    Being a great magician isn't geeky either. That's what I hoped to prove at my birthday party.
    And that's what I was thinking about as I practiced my juggling. I wanted to put on a perfect show to impress Traci and all the other kids.
    So I was in my room, tossing up the duckpins, just starting to get the rhythm right. Thinking about Traci Wayne and how I had to invite her ASAP.
    And suddenly, all three pins froze in midair.
    They stuck up there, about a foot or two above my head, and didn't come down.
    Of course I knew why.
    “Nicky? Tara? Give me a break,” I said. “I don't have time to mess around. I'm rehearsing.”
    They both appeared in front of me. Nicky is eleven years old, two years older than Tara, but they look a lot alike. They're both tall and thin, with straight dark hair and serious dark eyes.
    Tara had a floppy red hat pulled down over her hair and red plastic earrings dangling from her ears. She held up two of the duckpins. Nicky had the third one raised high in the air.
    “We're not messing around,” Tara said. “We're protesting.”
    “Protesting what?” I asked. “Cruelty to duckpins?”
    Tara rolled her eyes. “Ha, ha. You're funny.”
    “We're protesting because you don't spend any time with us anymore,” Nicky said. “You spend all your time with that new kid, Quentin.”
    “Give me a break,” I said. “Quentin and I have to practice our act. My birthday is getting closer and closer. And we want to amaze everyone with our juggling and magic.”
    “But we're lonely, Max,” Tara started. “And we —”
    She stopped because the bedroom door swung open and my mom fluttered into the room.
    Mom couldn't see Nicky and Tara. All she could see were the three pins floating