Chapter 1: The Dare

Billy's Story

I don't know what it was really called, we knew it as 'Harding's house', it has always been empty, and was thought of as haunted, not that we really believed in such things.

My name is Billy, I'm part of Brad's gang, there are five of us, Brad, Mike, Paul and Kate - she's okay for a girl, we tried to keep her out but she been able to beat us up since she was nine, we've let her stay!

But that was three years ago, and she's been cool about us, where the other girls are into dresses and dolls, she stays in jeans and rides with us, she's good at thinking of things to do, like The Dare.

"You know what you guys should do." She came out with one day, when we all looked at her she said, "You should prove that you don't believe in ghosts." She said this with a smile on her face.

Of course we weren't afraid of ghosts, and we all said so, she stood there with the smile still on her face.

"Okay then lets see you walk around 'Harding House', prove you're not scared." We just laughed at her, this made her slightly angry, "I dare you," She said, and then added, "No I double dare you!"

Well the gauntlet was down, and we didn't want her to think we were scared, so we agreed and rode to the gates of the house, I don't know when it was built, but it was overgrown with ivy on the walls, several of the windows were boarded up, after some of the older kids had a stone throwing contest.

Brad was in the lead and as we rode up to the front he was already off his bike and trying the front door, turning the handle and pushing against it, we watched him as he did this, finally after some fruitless minutes he gave up.

"It's no good," he said, "The door's locked, we'll never get in!" And so the three of us started to turn our bikes round with comments like, "Isn't that too bad, yeah I wanted to look in the place as well!" When we were stopped by Kate's voice.

"I know where we can get in!" It was a smug voice in a sort of 'you're not getting out of it that easily!' tone, and she started to walk to the side of the house. I suppose I'd better describe the place.

It's been called a Victorian Mansion, which means it was built hundreds of years ago, it's got four floors, there are turrets at each of the four corners, making it look like a castle, you can't see the roof from the ground, so I can't say what that's like.

There are three doors to the place, the front door which was locked, a side door, covered by panels of wood and padlocked, and the back door - which was also covered and padlocked. I mean kids have tried to get in before, but as far as I heard without success.

Anyhow we're following Kate as she goes to a low window, she pulls at it and it swings forward, I suppose the catch broke somewhen, and nobody else had noticed it. She climbed into the hole and entered the house.

A part of me thought 'good, let's leave her there and run off!' but was stopped by another part which said 'and let her think I'm a coward? NO WAY!' I could see the others were having similar thoughts and so we followed her into the house.

We waited in the darkness for our eyes to adjust to the light, and then Brad spoke up, "Well? We're in here, see we're not chicken!"

But Kate just giggled at us, "Oh no!" She said, "The dare was to walk in here, not just stand around waiting to leave, come on." And she ran further into the room, reaching into her backpack and bringing out a torch, which she turned on.

The beam hit an animal, teeth bared, crouched, waiting to spring, we all jumped back, to be greeted by another giggle from Kate, "Don't worry," She said in a sarcastic tone, "It's dead!" the word seemed to echo in the room 'dead, ead, ad, d.'

She moved the beam to show the full beast, it was part of a display, a lion about to pounce on a zebra. "There's quiet a few like that around the place." She said nonchalantly.

"You've been in here before?" asked Mike,

"Course I have," She said, "Lots of times, I don't spend all my time with you guys do I." She added, with a slight scornful sound in her voice, "Now come on there's more to see" again the echo sounded 'See, ee, ee'

She opened a door and entered a darkened corridor, we quickly followed her, for some reason not wanting to be too far away from the beam of light, not that we were scared of course, we just didn't want to trip over anyone (thing!) in the dark.

Kate's' voice came from ahead of us, "I think there's some candles in the kitchen, just down here, we managed to keep up with her as she entered the room, there was a slight smell of something? Couldn't make out what it was though, She waved the torch beam onto a large welsh dresser and on the top were some candles, as the beam moved away from them it fell on an old electricity meter with it's mains switch beside it, without thinking Paul reached for it and pulled it down.

There was a flash of lighting as the switch made a connection, and then the light in the hallway came on, Brad went for the switch by the door of the kitchen, turned it on and lit up the room.

"Goody," Said Kate, "I suppose they forgot to turn off the electric. At least we'll have lights now," and she ran to the door, "Come on, lets explore!" she said and we followed her down the hallway - we didn't notice the light going out in the kitchen and the door closing, or the small wind that blew down the hallway after us.

We got to the stairs and looked up, Kate then spoke up again, "Let's split up, we can find more stuff that way."

I spoke up, "We're not taking anything are we?"

Kate shook her head, "No way, that's stealing! No we're looking only." She said which was a relief; we didn't need to prove that we'd been here, we all knew that anyway.

Brad and Mike ran towards another door, Paul went up to the first floor, I was going to follow him, but Kate held me back, "Lets go to the top first and work our way down," She said, I just nodded.

We ran up the stairs to start with but had to slow down when we neared the top, I was starting to get a stitch in my side, but Kate didn't seem to be slowing down, she ran to a door opened it and entered the room, the door shut behind her, I went to open it, but the knob seemed to slide in my hand, I banged on the door but could only get a muffled sound from it. Behind me a door creaked open.

"Billy, I'm in here," came Kate's voice, I spun round - how could she have gotten behind me, "I've found some cool stuff here." She said, - I suppose I could have mistaken the door, so I turned around and went into the room.

"Kate?" I asked, as the room appeared to be empty, "Where are you?"

"I'm over here," She replied, "behind the screen, quick come and see this!" I went to the large screen, really a movable wooden affair which was about 6 foot high and 8 foot across. Kate being only 4ft. 8 inches was hidden by this.

I ran behind the screen, not noticing that the door to the room was closing, when it did the room was completely dark.

"Kate," I said, slightly high pitched, "Where about are you?"

"Shush," She said softly, "I'm over here, keep quiet." I slowly felt my way to her and touched her leg, just by the knee, the warmth of her flesh on my hand surprised me at first, but I didn't say anything.

"We're playing hide and seek," She said to me I tried to look in the direction of her voice,

"You mean we're hiding from Brad and the others?" I asked

"Yes," she replied, "get down on the floor, that way they won't notice us." I quickly laid down and found my head touching the dress she was wearing, then I realised something.

"Kate, how did you change your clothes? What happened to your jeans?" I felt her fingers on my lips.

"Keep quiet; you don't want them to find you. Do you?" she said, "I've found these clothes here, some of them are still wearable, what's the matter? Doesn't it feel nice?" and I felt my hand being rubbed against the material, the flesh within was soft.

"It feels very nice, but you tummy is also nice as well." She laughed at me

"Silly, that's not my tummy," she said, I went to move my hand away when she said, "No, don't, it's all right I like it." And she pulled my hand closer to her, and then I could feel her undoing buttons on the dress, "Why don't you touch here." She said and moved my unresisting hand inside, I could feel her flesh and then a rising mound and she gave a smothered hiss as I touched it.

"Oh yes that feels so nice, I'm glad you were the one Billy, I think you're going to be very good." She said,

This puzzled me, I mean touching a girl's chest was something a 12 year old boy dreams of, but this was Kate, she wasn't some girl, she was one of us! But I did like the way she felt.

Then a scream sounded from outside the room, it was Kate's voice "BILLY WHERE ARE YOU?" she shouted. All of a sudden my hand was empty! - I tried to find Kate but she wasn't there, her voice sounded from the hallway again, "BILLY! WHERE ARE YOU?"

I shouted back, "I'M IN HERE." And scrambled to my feet, I felt my way to the door and opened it, Kate was outside, her hair was mussed up and she looked slightly scared.

"Where were you!" she said, "I've been locked inside that room for hours, I banged and banged but you didn't answer." And she held onto me, she must have been really scared, but then a thought struck me, I lowered my hands and lightly felt her jeans.

"Kate." I began, "Were you with me in that room?" she pulled back slightly and shook her head.

"Of course I wasn't, didn't you hear I've been stuck in that room," and she pointed to the door I couldn't open, I was going to ask her why she'd changed back into jeans, but stopped myself. But I couldn't help but wonder what she felt like under the tee-shirt she was wearing.

Kate's Side of the Story

Boys are so easy to manipulate, that's what mum says and she seems to know, I'd found my way in to the Harding House a couple of days ago, I'm not sure how I found the broken window, but I did. Anyway I crept into the house and started to feel around.

I'd almost got to the door when I felt a cold hard thing, covered with fur, at first I thought it was a dead cat, but as my eyes began to get used to the gloom, I made out that it was a stuffed animal, very large, but quite harmless.

I opened the door, although the house was dark I wasn't afraid, it was as if something was stopping me from feeling fear! I walked towards the kitchen, how I knew it was the kitchen I couldn't say. The door was slightly ajar and I entered it. In the gloom was a large welsh dresser with candles on it and a box of matches, I took one candle and lit it with a match, the room seemed to brighten up, but the next time I come here I'm going to bring a torch. I could see a fuse box and a switch which was off, but I didn't want to try it, just in case.