Rules for Ghosting by A. J. Paquette Page A

regroup, take time answering some miserable questions, and maybe—if they were lucky—come up with some solutions that would magically solve all of their problems.
    If only it could be that easy.

Chapter 13
    Silverton Manor was enormous. Dahlia had always known this, and had spent years wafting around the various rooms to no particular purpose. But when it came to actually going through it for information, like a prospector panning for gold in one of those ancient television shows she’d used to watch with her mother—well, for the first time she understood how big it really was.
    â€œWe should begin on the ground floor,” Dahlia said at last. “It’s where my mother spent just about all her time. It’s the most likely spot for us to find clues about my Anchor.”
    â€œI suppose,” Mrs. Tibbs murmured, just as Mrs. Day burst down at the far end of the hall, a pile of bedding teetering in her arms.
    It was clear that if they didn’t get busy soon, any potential clues would be buried under the stampede of progress and reorganization. Dahlia and Mrs. Tibbs ghosted through thewooden door into the living room. Of the surfaces she passed through every day, wood was Dahlia’s favorite. Plastic was so slight she hardly noticed it. Brick was a little rough and scratchy to her insides. But wood was spongy and velvety, and tickled every time she passed through it. Maybe because it had once been alive, like her.
    After all that, though, investigating the first floor went remarkably quickly. The guest room and mudroom had been fully taken over by Wiley’s paraphernalia, which Dahlia found utterly distasteful. And she hated to go into the sunroom now, for being reminded of her lost cubby. Despite all this, over their next days of searching they quickly saw that the downstairs held no surprises. Dahlia had spent most of her time ghosting around on this floor, and knew every hidden nook and cranny. The kitchen might bear a closer look—there were several secret drawers and hidey holes that Dahlia knew of but had never bothered to examine in great detail, with their unexpired goods that she had never been able to handle—but the ghosts didn’t dare poke around there while the living folks were zipping in and out. They resolved to come back under cover of darkness, when the house was quiet and the Day family asleep.
    On the second floor Mr. and Mrs. Day had settled into the master bedroom, and the twins into a room across the hall. There was also a bathroom, a laundry room, and an endlessly long hallway that looked down over the huge living room and ended in a curved staircase leading to the front foyer. To Dahlia,everything appeared just as it always had—with the exception of all the newly moved-into areas, and she had to admit that most of the setup and decor was a huge improvement.
    But as hard as both she and Mrs. Tibbs looked, there was not a leading clue nor a meaningful scrap of paper to be found.
    Then they entered the library. Dahlia had never been much of a reader when she was alive—that she remembered, anyway—but there was nothing like being dead for fifty-eight years to give you an appetite for literature. Many times over her ghostly years she’d eyed those volumes, lined up all unread and tempting. Every time she’d tried to pick one up, her hands had shot right through its unexpired covers. But now … the idea that with a little more practice she might be able to pick up any book off the shelf and simply start to read was thrilling.
    Dahlia gave herself a little shake. She wasn’t here to read; she was here for action. Still, where to begin looking? Three wide walls were lined with floor-to-ceiling bookshelves, and heavy curtains closed off the fourth wall. The whole room was dim and dull and dingy.
    â€œHow are we going to search this place for clues?” she asked despairingly. It seemed so vast!
    Mrs. Tibbs drifted across the