Sister Spirit Read online

  Sister Spirit

  first published in 2005

  this edition published in 2011 by

  Hardie Grant Egmont

  Ground Floor, Building 1, 658 Church Street

  Richmond,Victoria 3121,Australia

  www.hardiegrantegmont.com.au

  EISBN 978 1 742736 60 0

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form by any means without the prior permission of the publishers and copyright owner.

  A CiP record for this title is available from the National Library of Australia

  Text copyright © 2005 Thalia Kalkipsakis

  Illustration and design copyright © 2011 Hardie Grant Egmont

  The moral rights of the author have been asserted

  Illustration by Aki Fukuoka

  Design by Michelle Mackintosh

  Text design and typesetting by Ektavo

  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  My big sister Hannah hates me and I know why. It’s because I was born after her.

  Hannah was three when I was born. Everyone said I was sooooooo cute! Mum says they stopped saying Hannah was cute so she threw all my baby clothes down the toilet.

  I look younger than I really am. I’m nine years old, but sometimes people think I look six or seven.

  Hannah calls me a baby doll, but she doesn’t mean it in a nice way. She says I should try to look my age, but it’s not my fault! I can’t change how I look.

  But now it’s even worse than ever. Hannah cut off my hair and Mum went crazy at her. Then Hannah stopped talking to me.

  Strange, isn’t it? Hannah cut off my hair and got into trouble, and she blames me for it!

  She must really hate me, that girl. Let me explain.

  We were watching TV and a show came on about hair. It said that a haircut can change the way you look. It can make you look older or younger.

  Hannah said, ‘Maybe if we cut your hair, people wouldn’t think you’re so cute anymore!’

  ‘Yeah,’ I said, not really listening.

  Hannah turned off the TV.‘Aren’t you sick of people saying how cute you look?’ she asked.

  ‘Yeah,’ I said again, but now I was listening.

  ‘So why don’t we cut your hair short, so you look your age?’ Hannah said.

  I wasn’t sure. It sounded exciting, cutting my hair. I liked the idea of doing something different and looking older. But it’s a big thing to cut off all your hair. And I’ve had long hair all my life.

  ‘But what would Mum say?’ I said.

  ‘Mum!’ Hannah rolled her eyes. Her hair is dark and shoulder-length. It kinks up around her ears.

  ‘Why do you always worry what Mum thinks? It’s not Mum’s hair, ’ she said.

  She had a point. It wasn’t Mum’s hair, it was my hair.

  ‘Come on, let’s do it.’ Hannah’s eyes looked bright with excitement.

  It was exciting to do something like this together, just her and me. It felt a bit like the stories you read about sisters going shopping and trying on clothes together. It felt good — like Hannah liked me.

  It also seemed a bit naughty to do something without Mum knowing.

  ‘OK,’ I said.‘Let’s do it.’

  Hannah smiled.

  I bet my eyes looked as bright and excited as Hannah’s.

  I’ll always remember the sound of the scissors cutting through my hair.

  It was a kind of a crunching sound. You’d probably expect a ‘snip snip’ kind of sound. But there was so much hair bunched together that the scissors made a sliding, crunching sound as Hannah cut.

  My hair was tied in two pigtails. Hannah said she would cut off each pigtail, and then tidy up my hair after that.

  When she had cut off the first pigtail, Hannah held up the hair for me to see.

  ‘Say goodbye to your hair, Cassie,’ she said.

  I was giggling and waving goodbye when Mum walked in.

  All of a sudden everything changed.

  Mum looked at the bunch of my hair in Hannah’s hand.

  ‘Hannah!’ she said. ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘Calm down, Mum.’ It sounded like Hannah knew Mum would yell. ‘Cassie’s not a little girl anymore.’

  ‘What?’ I could hear Mum breathing heavily as she pulled at the hair behind my ear.‘Apart from doing this without asking, haven’t you two heard of hairdressers?’

  Hannah shrugged. I didn’t say anything. I was surprised Mum was so angry.

  Mum was still fussing behind my ear.

  ‘I’m going to tidy it up,’ Hannah said, but her voice sounded unsure now.

  ‘Look how short it is here!’ Mum yelled in my ear.‘How on earth are you going to tidy up this bit?’

  Hannah leant in and started breathing heavily into my ear too.

  Then she said,‘How did that bit get so short?’

  Now I was worried.

  ‘When you cut hair in a pigtail,’ Mum said quietly, ‘you end up with different lengths. All the hair is pulled from different parts of the head, so you end up with some long bits and some REALLY SHORT BITS!’

  Hannah gasped.

  I jumped up and started yelling too.

  ‘Hannah, what did you do?’ I yelled. I suddenly felt scared and angry.

  ‘It’s OK,’ Hannah said, but her voice sounded wobbly.‘I can fix it.’

  As my mind raced, I felt the short hair behind my ear. In some places it was so short it felt prickly. Why had Hannah cut it like that?

  Then I realised what Hannah had done.

  ‘You tricked me!’ I yelled.‘You did this to me because you hate me looking cute!’

  Hannah rolled her eyes. ‘Yes, I hate you looking cute,’ she yelled back.‘You’re nine years old!’

  ‘You did this to me on purpose!’

  Now I was crying. Half of my hair was gone, and my big sister had done it to me because she hates me.

  ‘You want me to look ugly!’

  ‘Yeah, right,’ Hannah yelled. ‘I’m the EVIL BIG SISTER.’ She was yelling even louder than Mum or me.

  Then Hannah ran to her room and slammed the door.

  Mum looked at me and shook her head.

  ‘I’ll call the hairdresser,’ she said.

  When we came home from the hairdresser, Hannah was still in her bedroom. My room is next to Hannah’s, but I couldn’t hear any noise coming from next door.

  I looked in the mirror. A stranger with short hair stared back at me. My hair was so short it looked like it had been shaved in some places. I looked like a different person.

  What would Dad think?

  He calls me his beautiful little girl, but I didn’t feel beautiful or little anymore.

  We were going to see Dad and his girlfriend Felicity on the weekend. I wondered how much my hair would grow in three days.

  I still felt angry that Hannah had tricked me. She had planned it all along. She was so mean!

  I lay down on my bed, feeling bad. My long hair was gone and Hannah hated me more than ever.

  For dinner we had my favourite food of all time — pizza.

  Mum kept saying,‘Cheer up, Cassie. You look great!’ But she looked tired and sad.

  Hannah just stared at her plate. She loves pizza too, but she only ate one piece. Then she
went back to her bedroom.

  After dinner I turned on the TV. I sat in the best chair, even though it was Hannah’s turn. I wanted Hannah to walk in and tell me it was her turn in the chair. Then I would yell back at her, and ask her why she had cut my hair so short.

  But Hannah didn’t come in, so I turned off the TV.

  I went to bed and tried to sleep.

  I wanted the day to be over. But it was too early to sleep. I lay in the dark, feeling more and more angry.

  Then I noticed something.

  A tiny crack of light was coming from my wardrobe.

  My wardrobe was built into the wall, so it was strange to see light coming from it. I wondered where the light was coming from. A toy? A torch? Perhaps it was a magic door?

  It was pretty dark in my room, but I could see OK. I crept along the carpet to where my wardrobe meets the wall. Then I slid the door open, and waited.

  Nothing happened.

  The crack of light was coming from the side of the wardrobe, right in front of me. I leant in closer, trying to see better. The light seemed to get brighter.

  What could the light be?

  Suddenly, I understood. It made sense.

  The light wasn’t coming from inside my wardrobe — it was coming from Hannah’s room.

  Hannah and I both have wardrobes built into the same wall. Hannah’s wardrobe faces into her room and mine faces into my room.

  I peered further into my wardrobe. There was a gap between the edge of the wardrobe and the wall. I could just see the gap on Hannah’s side too.

  The light was coming from Hannah’s room and into her wardrobe. I could see her room through the gaps.

  How strange! The builder must have made a mistake and not bothered to fix it.

  Then I had an idea.

  The gap wasn’t very wide, but I’m not very wide either. I leant forward until my head slipped through the gap. Then I turned my shoulders to the side and carefully slid my whole body through.

  I was standing between the two wardrobes, in the wall. It felt a bit cramped and dusty. I barely had room to move. But it was exciting, like a tiny, secret room.

  I squeezed my head through the gap leading to Hannah’s wardrobe and peeked out through the hanging clothes.

  I felt like a secret spy.

  I hadn’t found a magic door but I had found something better — a secret door into Hannah’s room!

  Hannah was sitting on her bed and reading. I could just see part of Hannah’s head, but I couldn’t see what she was reading.

  Hannah just sat there, turning the pages and reading. Nothing was happening, but I didn’t feel bored. I felt good, like I had something really secret and useful.

  Hannah didn’t want to watch TV with me. She didn’t even want to talk to me. But I could still watch her.

  Than Hannah did something.

  She picked her nose!

  Then she wiped it on her bed. Yuk!

  I stayed in the secret spot for a long time, just watching.

  The next morning I was extra slow walking to school. Hannah is supposed to walk with me before she heads off to the high school. But today she walked ahead without even looking at me.

  I kicked at stones and shuffled my feet. I thought about telling Mum that Hannah hadn’t walked with me to school.

  I wanted Hannah to get into trouble for being so mean. But I knew she would hate me even more if I told Mum.

  When finally I made it to school, the bell had just rung.

  Perfect timing.

  I slipped into the end of the line, hoping no-one would notice my hair.

  My plan worked for about twenty seconds. That’s how long it took to walk into the classroom and sit down.

  Bec, who sits next to me, noticed straight away.

  ‘Cassie! Oh, look at your hair!’ she said sadly. ‘It’s all gone … your beautiful hair … ’

  I didn’t know what to say. I just wanted Bec to stop talking about it. But by now, the whole class was staring at me.

  Everyone was looking at me and talking about my hair.

  ‘You cut your hair, Cassie!’

  ‘Look at Cassie!’

  I could feel my face burning red.

  ‘Looks like you had a fight with a lawn mower,’ Adrian said. I don’t like Adrian. He has dirty fingernails.

  After that, nothing bad really happened. Mrs Bonacci chose me to be lunch monitor.

  That was good.

  At lunchtime, the girls were all really nice, too. They all said my hair looked good. They tried to make me feel better. Everyone kept touching it and saying how soft it felt.

  At the end of the day, even Sam talked to me.

  ‘See you tomorrow, funky girl,’ he said and smiled.

  I quite like Sam, but that’s a secret.

  After school, walking with Mum through the shops was different, too. When I had long hair, old ladies would smile at me. Some would even try to talk to me. But none of them did that today. It was like they didn’t notice me anymore.

  The lady with lots of make-up who works at the deli always used to give me a piece of chicken loaf to eat.

  But not today. She didn’t even recognise me!

  The TV show was right — I really do look different with short hair. But more than that, people think I’m a different sort of person. They don’t treat me like a little girl anymore.

  I started to feel glad that people weren’t treating me like a doll anymore. I didn’t have to be the good little girl — I could just be myself.

  Now I could start to grow up.

  When we got home from shopping, I was still feeling bad about Hannah. She was at band practice, so while Mum was putting the shopping away I got changed, then sneaked into Hannah’s room. I wanted to see what she had been reading last night.

  Hannah’s room is always really messy. She has clothes all over the floor, and books and magazines all over her desk. But she has some good pictures on her wall. One of the pictures is of Robert Pattinson. Hannah says he’s the most gorgeous guy in the world, but I’m not sure what’s so good about him.

  There was only a clock radio on Hannah’s bedside table. I searched around her desk and bookshelf. But none of the books there looked like the one that Hannah had been reading last night.

  Then I looked under Hannah’s bed.

  There it was — the book from last night. Hannah had slipped it under her bed as though she didn’t want Mum to know what she was reading.

  I pulled the book out.

  The cover said Ghosts and Spirits — Real Life Sightings. There was a picture of an old-fashioned room with big windows and a fuzzy white splodge in the middle. I stared at the splodge, but it didn’t look like a ghost to me.

  I flicked through the book. It showed lots of splodges. I read about someone who used to hear ghosts walking down the hall.

  Suddenly, I heard something.

  I held my breath and listened.

  There it was again. Voices.

  Ghost voices?

  No. Hannah must have come home and was talking to Mum in the kitchen.

  I slipped the ghost book back under Hannah’s bed and tiptoed to her door.

  I was just about to sneak out when I heard the hall door open.

  Oh no! Hannah would see me if I opened her door now.

  I was trapped in her room!

  I stumbled back from Hannah’s bedroom door, almost tripping on a pair of jeans. She was about to catch me sneaking around in her room.

  Then I remembered my secret place.

  There was a gap in the side of Hannah’s wardrobe too. That’s how I could see into her room last night.

  I could hear Hannah walking down the hall. Quickly I squeezed into Hannah’s wardrobe. I stepped on something that snapped under one foot, and crushed a box under the other, but I had no time to be careful.

  I slipped into the secret space in the wall just as Hannah opened her door.

  I held my breath and froze. If I could see through the gap
, then Hannah could too — if she looked carefully.

  I pressed my back into the wall, trying to be as small and quiet as possible.

  I couldn’t see Hannah now, but I could hear some clothes rustling as though she was taking off her school uniform.

  Would she come and look in the wardrobe to choose some clothes?

  I saw a flick of dark hair as Hannah leant down to pick up some jeans from the floor. Lucky she was so messy.

  I breathed as quietly as I could.

  Hannah pulled something out of her bag. I realised she had no idea that I was there, hiding. Watching her.

  This was amazing. I had already found out about the ghost book. What else could I learn about Hannah?

  I felt as though the ghost book was important, but I couldn’t think why.

  I needed to watch Hannah some more.

  At dinner, I told Mum about being lunch monitor. I felt happy, and Mum seemed happy too. Hannah just looked down at her fried rice without smiling.

  ‘How was band practice?’ I asked Hannah.

  She glanced over at me. For a moment, I thought she wasn’t going to answer at all. Then she looked back down at her rice.

  ‘Fine,’ she said.

  Mum sighed. She started looking sad again. I felt angry that Hannah could make us all feel bad.

  ‘Pass the soy sauce, please,’ I said. I didn’t really want any soy sauce, but it was right in front of Hannah. I wanted to see what she would do.

  Hannah just kept eating.

  Rude, hey?

  Being ignored by Hannah was almost worse than when she cut my hair.

  Mum shook her head and reached over to give me the soy sauce.

  ‘Hannah’s been chosen for the band concert,’ Mum said.‘Isn’t that good?’

  Hannah would be really pleased with that. She loves playing the flute. But she kept on staring at her rice and eating.

  Mum sighed again.

  Normally I would have been happy for Hannah. But now things were different. I wasn’t cute anymore, and I didn’t want to be nice.

  So I just shrugged and stared down at my rice like Hannah.

  I couldn’t see poor Mum because I was staring at my rice, but I could tell she wasn’t smiling.