Chapter 2

Writing With My Feet

When I woke up again, I was lying on the sofa in the Silvers’ living room. Mrs. Silver had put an ice pack on my head and was sitting next to me with a worried look on her face.

“Are you okay, sweetheart?” she asked.

“I think so,” I said. “But I feel like I was hit by a bus!”

“Well, that’s what happens to you when you assault a poor, helpless old lady,” she said.

“A poor, helpless old lady?” I repeated. “That woman should be playing baseball, believe me. With a swing like that she could have hit a home run!”

“Oh, that poor woman,” Mrs. Silver said, shaking her head. “You scared her half to death. She just reacted.”

“Did you see that old lady’s face?” I asked, jumping to my feet on the couch. “She looked like a witch! Didn’t you see her eyes?”

“Oh, come on, Echo!” Mrs. Silver said. (By then, she was calling me by my first name, too.) “I think you should stop writing those scary stories of yours. They’ve turned you into a complete scaredy-bat. You see danger everywhere! She was just a poor old woman selling fruit.”

“You didn’t buy anything from her, did you?” I asked.

“Of course I did!” Mrs. Silver replied. “Those apples looked delicious, and the price was too good to pass up. Would you like one?” She pointed to the basket full of delicious-looking apples sitting on the kitchen table.

“No way!” I said. “And if I were you, I wouldn’t touch them either.”

“Why on earth not?” she asked.

I hesitated. I didn’t have any actual proof, just a feeling. But my feelings were rarely wrong. “Because something is wrong,” I said. “I can’t explain it. I just feel it.”

Mrs. Silver looked at me skeptically. My argument hadn’t exactly convinced her. “Echo, you’re imagining things,” she told me. “Look, I’ll prove there’s nothing wrong with these apples.”

Mrs. Silver stood up and went into the kitchen. She picked up an apple off the table and took a huge bite. Nothing happened.

“Are you convinced now?” she asked. I wasn’t, but I had to face the facts. I didn’t have any proof.

At five o’clock, Michael, Becca, and Tyler came home from school, and the house was once again full of activity. Finally! I had begun to miss it. I quickly flew over to the front door.

“Hey, Echo! How’s it going?” Tyler said, high-fiving me so hard that he sent me spinning. While I was still reeling from his greeting, Tyler hurried into the kitchen to fix himself an after-school snack.

Michael waved a brand-new book under my nose as he walked by. The cover showed an enormous white rabbit with glowing eyes. “Check this out, Echo!” he said. “I’ve been waiting for this for months!”

“What is it?” I asked.

“It’s the new book by Edgar Allan Poultry,” Michael explained. “It’s called The Revenge of the Giant Rabbit. I’ll let you borrow it as soon as I’m finished reading it!” With that, Michael ran upstairs and disappeared into his bedroom. I knew I wouldn’t be seeing him again for a while.

Becca was the only one who seemed to sense that something wasn’t quite right. She stopped and stared at me.

“Is everything okay?” she asked.

I hesitated for a moment. “Yeah, fine,” I said. “What about you? How was school today?”

“It was okay. Come on, Echo, I can tell something’s bugging you,” Becca said.

I wasn’t sure that telling her about my suspicions was such a good idea, but keeping something from Becca is like trying to hide an elephant behind a mouse. I gave in and told her what had happened that morning — every single detail.

Becca listened to my story without interruption. But when I told her my theory about the old woman and the apples, she burst out laughing.

“What’s so funny?” I asked, somewhat hurt.

“Nothing, nothing,” she replied. “It’s just a funny coincidence.”

“What’s the coincidence?” I asked.

“The principal announced a competition today at school,” she explained. “We have to write our own ending to Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. With your imagination, you should enter the contest.”

Becca giggled again. “I can see it already,” she continued. “‘The evil witch approached, offering an apple to the princess as a reward for her kindness, when a brave bat interfered and saved the day. The witch, brandishing a broom, chased the bat down and sent him soaring into a lamppost.’ How’s that?”

“Very funny!” I said. I was about to tell Becca to just forget it. Clearly, she wasn’t taking me seriously. But just then, Tyler appeared at the top of the stairs.

“Echo, come upstairs!” he called. “I got it!”

“Got what?” I asked, but Tyler had already disappeared.

We followed him to his bedroom. Michael was lying on his bed, so deep into his new book that he didn’t even realize we were there.

“I finally figured out how you can use the computer!” Tyler explained.

“Tyler, I already told you . . .” I began.

“I know, I know,” he said. “You have wings attached to your hands.”

“Exactly,” I agreed.

“But not to your feet, right?” Tyler asked. He leaned back in his desk chair and put his bare feet on the keyboard. To my surprise, he used his toes to type several error-free sentences. Even Michael stopped reading to watch.

“See?” Tyler said. “All it took was a couple of days of training. And with my hands free, I can keep eating my chips!” He stuck his hand back in the bag. “What do you think?”

“Well, someday, someone could say that my stories are so bad that it looks like I used my feet to write them,” I replied. “And they’d be right.” And with that, I went back up to the attic.