Mystery #9: Kristy and the Haunted Mansion

[wildmagelet]

I discovered this community last week, after I ran out of new items to read on the Daily Mail and was in danger of having to actually return to my thesis. I have since had many hours of awesome, so thank you. I've been packing up to move house and have come across my box of BSC books, so thought I'd procrastinate even further by reading one. And I've never LJ snarked before (just, you know, whined multiple times a day in conversation), but why just read when you can read and bitch about it at the same time? :)

So, under the cut, we begin with Karen Brewer singing the playlist of The Sound of Music. Here, help yourself to a stiff whisky and a paintball gun. Karen is worth twenty points. All other Krushers are ten points each. But watch out for that Walking Disaster kid as he's likely to accidentally lock you in your car and flatten you with a grand piano as you bring him down...


The scene opens with small children singing and I immediately close the book and slam a large espresso. When my eye stops twitching, I resume, and Kristy informs me that she feels like she’s trapped in a small, hot space with singing children. Because…she is. The Krushers are heading out of town to embarrass themselves at another pity match for the athletically inept. And it feels hot because…the day is hot. Seriously, where do you sign up for a BSC ghostwriter position, because I feel like most literate people could spin out at least two of these during a Grey’s Anatomy ad break. The kids continue to butcher their kindergarten ditties for another paragraph before Kristy finally snaps and kills them all.

Perhaps realising that the massacre of Karen Brewer and Nicky Pike, while endearing Kristy to an entire community of jaded readers, will also mean an instant forfeit to the totally-did-not-exist-before-this-morning Redfield Raiders, she decides to introduce the radical concept of all kids singing the same song at the same time. Personally, I would have just set an example by hanging Karen out the window, but our valiant leader seizes any opportunity to brandish her baton and introduces the role of conductor. At which point, Bart “My Teenage Experiment with Heterosexuality” Taylor actually raises his hand to suggest a song choice. I’m pretty sure they once made fun of Mallory for pulling that submissive shit, even though you know Kristy’s balls swell a little more with every scrape and curtsy. In ten years time, Herr Thomas is so going to have a pair of knee high boots and a leather whip hidden in the back of her closet.

The kids wail tunelessly on in unison now, while Bart weeps in gratitude, Charlie wonders why in the name of Stacey’s loose panties he owns a BSC-sized van instead of a unicycle and a social life, and Kristy continues to gently stroke her own…ego. “Once again,” she says with enough smug self-congratulation to power the Charlie Bucket right down that highway, “I’d had an idea that saved the day. I don’t mean to sound conceited, but that happens to me a lot.” That, and all the random shooting pains from hundreds of needles stabbed into hundreds of tiny Kristy-shaped dolls. Apparently her stepfather, Watson, calls it “the eternal mystery of the creative process.” Maybe at home, when he’s all nicely hopped up on the blood thinners, he calls it that, Kristy. On Friday nights at the club, he calls it, “My wife’s kid is such a fuckwit.”

Kristy pauses in the middle of beaming creepily and silently around at the kids, struck by the realisation that a whole third of the twelve people in the van belong to her family. So, a whole four people, then. Including herself and the saddo at the wheel. Wow. A few more and they’d be able to form their own softball team. This is a subtle segue to many boring explanations of Kristy’s “complicated” family (father walks out, mother remarries, stepsister is spawn of Satan, Poor Relation grandma becomes unpaid drudge and expresses her displeasure by never clothing token adopted toddler: got it), and we are assured that fifteen-year-old Sam is not in the van that day. You know, just in case we thought he and Stacey were boinking under the front seat, or something. Also, importantly, Watson has a station wagon and a bald spot on his head. You know, just in case we thought he had a bald spot in a more distressing location, or something. Having all these kids (and bald stepfathers) about is just dandy, because Kristy loves to babysit, but ssh, she’ll have to tell us more about that later, because it’s not Chapter 2 yet. I, for one, feel the suspense.

“Almost there!” sings out Charlie, crushing my secret Charlie/Janine shipping in one fell musically theatrical swoop. Ten bucks says that Charlie and Logan “I went to a school dance as Rum Tum Tugger” Bruno have been making sweet music together in the back of that van. “Okay,” says Bart, “Kristy and I have worked out the line-up for today. I want you to listen up while she announces it and I look underneath this seat for my testicles.” Jesus, Bart, why don’t you just hand her the whip and bend over? “It was nice of him to get the kids’ attention for me,” Kristy condescends. “Not that I needed his help.” There’s going to be a very special Super Mystery one day, when Claudia eventually leaves home, her parents clear out her room, and Kristy’s skeleton is found under a pile of Twinkie wrappers with her Krushers whistle jammed in her jugular. It’s okay for now, though, because Bart isn’t intimidated by her. Sure, that’s lust, not fear in his eyes. We have been reliably informed in the past that Kristy wears the same turtleneck for seven weeks running. HAWT. Aww, Bart thinks she’s “special”. Claudia Kishi speshul or Ralph Wiggum-I-ate-the-paste-again special?

They arrive at the ballpark thirty miles from Stoneybrook, and Mary Anne creeps out of nowhere. Apparently all the rest of the club members have hauled arse to a kiddie game miles out of town, on a sunny day off from school, in order to avoid a flogging at the Monday meeting. This only makes the random appearance of Mary Anne marginally less frightening. Jake Kuhn, whom I’m pretty sure is one of AMM’s token pudgy kids, has also given up weekend cartoons in favour of designating himself a substitute. “Kristy, I’m here if you need me,” he bleats pathetically from the bleachers. These poor kids: trapped in the BSC time warp, never aging, never to know the sweet joys of hitting puberty and telling the neighbourhood Stalin to fuck off with her jolly festivals/marching bands/sports teams/ritual sacrifices.

In the single most surprising moment thus far, Ma and Pa Pike are in the stands, actually taking an interest in one of their children. Of course, as there is no mention of their remaining ninety-six offspring and we’ve already ascertained that all of the babysitters are also present, that probably means that Adam and Jordan are at home performing science experiments on Margo and Claire right now, while Vanessa records the abuse in iambic pentameter and Byron weeps sensitively in the corner. Plus, you know the Pikes Senior are only stopping by for two minutes on the way to their tennis game (see: whichever book it is where the Pike kids come down with the Bubonic plague and their parents are all, “Whatever, got to practice my bitchin’ back hand.”). And by “tennis game”, I mean booty call at a motel, because you know it’s impossible to get any in that house. Claire sneaking up to the bed and whispering “Silly-billy-goo-goo” in her dad’s ear mid-coitus has got to be a mood-killer.

In a blatant lie, Kristy promises not to bore us with the details of the game, and then does. I, however, am not a sadist and will skip over any further sports-related content. I do briefly check to see if anyone “accidentally” brains Karen with a bat or the Pikes are caught dashing to their car, condoms in hand, but no joy. I’m just kidding. Pikes? Condoms? Bwahaha. A few drops of rain fall on Kristy, but she doesn’t mind because she’s “so hot”. That’s right. No amount of water could douse the fiery sex appeal of Kristin “My lunch looks like a dead cat’s sperm” Thomas. At least she has better self-esteem than Mallory “I’m basically a cold shower with bad hair” Pike. Bart and Kristy head off to “grab a burger” together or whatever the junior BDSM crowd are calling it these days. And then OH GOD, IT’S TIME FOR CHAPTER TWO.

Dues, Kid-Kits, blah blah…and my attempts to skip this section came to an abrupt halt as Kristy states: “I hate to tell you who had the idea for them, since you might think I’m starting to sound conceited, but I’ll admit that her initials are K.T.” Kristy, I have only one thing to say to you, since you might think I’m encouraging further conversation, and the initials are F.U.”

Blah Mary Anne is sensitive blah. Okay, I have to say this. I have a hard time picking my favourite BSC member. They all occupy their own little shelf in literature hell. Take Mary Anne, who is at least the wiliest bitch in the bunch. She has, for decades, managed to perpetrate the biggest con since Frank Abagnale Junior pinned on plastic flight wings by convincing her nearest and dearest that she is sensitive. She fucking isn’t. From calling Dawn fat to writing passive-aggressive hate notes to Stacey and Kristy, the Leaky Spier is responsible for some of the bitchiest moments in the books, which I could forgive if she didn’t freaking CRY when people justifiably call her on it. Mary Anne is that kid on the playground who steals your toys and pinches you when the teacher isn’t looking, then cries so that you’re the one who gets in trouble. Kristy is a borderline sociopath, Stacey is destined to be your husband’s trophy second wife (after he divorces you because your boobs are sagging and you’re not a permed sophisticate who knows her way around Bloomingdale’s), Mallory wants to be a fucking writer and doesn’t fucking understand the fucking concept of fucking fiction, and Jessi has no reason for existence except that they needed someone to entertain Mal in the corner so they didn’t have to speak to her during club meetings. Dawn continually contradicts every quality assigned to her, and is just fracking annoying all around. By sheer process of elimination, I was going to say that my least loathed BSC member must be Claudia, who doesn’t take herself too seriously most of the time and actually is something of an individual, unlike Spawn, but then Janine emerged blinking from behind her computer screen, and asked me, “Have you failed to ascertain that my juvenile sibling is somewhat impaired in neural cognitive development and dost treat me like shit?” Oh, right. Yeah, I don’t like any of them. My favourite BSC member is Shannon, then, because the only thing I remember about her is that she has blonde hair and a ski jump nose and pretty much excels at life better than anyone else ever. I have a feeling that there are many Mallory Pikes at Stoneybrook Academy who go home at night and cry into their pushdown socks because Mary Sue Kilbourne is a Mean Girl, but as long as she hides these defects from me, we’re good. And there’s always that other nice girl, Logan.

Ha. Apparently, “Stacey tries to please everyone and ends up pleasing nobody.” Let’s delete words two through five and make that even more true. And HA HA HA, apparently Stacey has diabetes, but hardly ever complains about it. Can I recommend a couple of books for your bedtime reading, Kristy? I suggest starting with the doozy that is “The Truth About Stacey” (and for the first time, that title might make some sense, if taken in the context of “Stacey never complains”) and going on to all of these other books that begin with the words “Stacey and…” It’s going to blow your mind.

Claudia could tell us “the ingredients and special properties (special properties? Why, can one of them levitate or something?) of every candy bar on the market. Maybe, but can she spell any of them? Just for kicks, how about Curly Wurly? (Anyone feel like a Kerrlee Werrlee? …I’m giving her way too much credit, aren’t I? Going on previous form, she would probably spell that Cahlxhkbal Waldhfl.) See, this is what I don’t get: Ma and Pa Kishi don’t approve of Claudia reading Nancy Drew, because they would rather see her reading books “that are a little more challenging.” *crickets* Er, their daughter doesn’t know how to spell the word “shoe”. I think War and Peace might be beyond her at this point. They should be bouncing off the walls with encouragement that she wants to read the labels of her candy bars. Reading at any level is the best way to improve your spelling and vocabulary. But it’s not like she has a parent who works with books or anything who should know that.

Kristy totally makes up for being an asshat in the previous chapter by bringing me the image of BFFs Mallory and Jessi at age eighty-five. Mal is sitting in her rocker, writing in her journal (Dear Diary, It’s been seventy years now since I had my braces removed and I’m still a virgin…what gives? Am I doomed to sit here forever with only my ghost cats and the fifty-three rotting corpses of older lady novelists in my basement for company?). Jessi is standing with her foot propped on the porch railing because six days ago Mallory goaded her with them fighting words that “nobody could do a decent grand jete over the age of eighty”, her hip broke mid-jump, and nobody will help her get her leg back down because she’s black.

Just to underline the point that Jessi has no personality, Kristy allots her a whole six lines: she has a family, she has “cocoa-coloured” skin, and she’s a dancer. “And, um, I’m really glad that she’s in the club… Mallory, too… Ooh, a rainbow!”

Meanwhile, back at the ballpark, “on that fateful day”, as Kristy imagines Mallory would write in one her stories (and I feel sure that she’s right, because that’s exactly the sort of crap cliché I can imagine Miss “I don’t understand fucking fiction” Pike would write in one of her autobiographical debacles), the weather is packing up and everyone wants to go home. Bet everyone but Kristy never wanted to leave home in the first place, but whatever. Heil, Thomas! The Pikes are back from their nooner and Nicky decides to ride home with them, sick of the sound effects in Charlie’s van. (You know: “We’re off to see the Wizard” interspersed with mysterious grunts of “Oh, Stacey” and “Watch the perm!” from under the front seat.) Soon everyone but Kristy, Charlie, Bart and the remaining Krashers have left, and I’m not even going to ask why all of the BSC had to come to this stupid game, even the Horny Pikes made a token appearance, yet despite the fact that a whole third of the people in the van sprang from either the vagina or sperm of Elizabeth and Watson, they can’t be arsed going. I can only assume that this “fateful day” refers to the detonating of the bomb under Charlie’s radiator in approximately ten miles. Watson felt that the Thomas kids were an acceptable sacrifice if it meant that “Two-two” Karen became “Two-two thousand” pieces of Karen, all over Connecticut.

The Basher kids are playing amongst themselves, to Kristy’s great surprise, because she’s only used to the BSC’s creepy android clients, who either sit at home like Gabby Perkins and work on their memoirs, or can’t function without adult intervention like the Pikes. For once, Kristy clapping her hands and barking out an order does not result in immediate obedience, and the world falls apart as she knows it. “Last one in the van is a rotten egg!” yells Bart, and Charlie squeals with anxiety, quick jazz hands, and jumps into the vehicle.

On the way back to Stoneybrook, the rain is getting heavier and there is thunder and lightning. DUN, DUN! (I hope all this water doesn’t defuse the bomb! At this rate, Karen might be back in time for a new Little Sister book.) The kids are scared of thunder and Kristy tries to reassure them, but is secretly scared of lightning herself. Which apparently no one knows, because they think don’t think Kristy is scared of anything. Except one of the cult showing any sign of outside interests, which we all know causes Kristy to drop to the ground and crap her pants. And HA, it seems she’s terrified of lightning because she reads about people being struck and having their “zippers welded shut and stuff”. Yeah, sometimes they actually die too. Breaking news at eleven: Jogger Struck By Lightning; Finds It Really, Really Inconvenient To Pee. Kristy tries to make casual conversation with Bart, but he’s “distracted” and ignores her to look out the window. While he mentally flagellates himself for choosing to spend his Saturday with Kristy Thomas, from whose working zipper he will obtain no benefit whatsoever, instead of Dorianne Wallingford, who gives hand jobs at the movies.

Uh oh, Charlie is less observant than Jackie Rodowsky and has missed their turn-off. Instead of turning the van around and driving back the short distance to their safe route home like a sane person, he decides to keep going “for a mile or so” in case there’s another turn-off. He asks Sam to back him up on this, but Little Bro has passed out from the fumes of Stacey’s hair. A few miles later, the rain is pissing down, they’re hopelessly lost and Charlie is hilariously hunched over the wheel, sounding “kind of tense”. And if I was writing this book, Karen would take this moment to ask him to play a round of “Let’s All Come In” with her (“You can play my bellhop’s puppy’s jock strap, Charlie!”) and moments later finds herself impaled on a lamppost.

Kristy inappropriately tries to start another sing-a-long to relieve the tension, but Jackie Rodowsky, proving himself yet again to be the most mature person in the van (despite the BSC’s constant shit-stirring about him) totally shoots her down and she subsides to “just sit quietly”. (At which point, Charlie and Bart realize that this really is the coming of the Apocalypse and start screaming hysterically.)

Bart suggests going back to a store they had passed (what? They’re passing shops? What else, a hotel? A restaurant? A five-star resort? Get the kids out of the cold and wait for the storm to pass, you freaks) and Charlie obligingly turns the van around (oh, yeah, NOW you know how to use the steering wheel.) Unfortunately, Bart is no Jackie Rodowsky when it comes to directions and they end up outside the Haunted Mansion (see the title) instead. And because this is written by Ellen Miles and not Stephen King, I suspect that Karen is not going to get her face chewed off in the night by ghouls, and I’m tempted to give up now and go to bed.

Jackie is duly horrified by the prospect of spending the night in the Haunted Mansion (and Karen has been so suspiciously quiet for a number of pages that I wonder if that bomb went off without my noticing). “What haunted house?” asks Clueless Thomas. “The only house on this whole road,” replies Jackie flatly. Yeah, Kristy. Duh. “Weren’t the lights on before?” asks Bart, as they walk up to the house. It was now “completely dark”. I suspect this happens a lot when people see Kristy pull up in her crime-fighting van. If Claudia knew how to work her light switch, she would probably try it before club meetings.

They knock on the door of a neighbouring cottage, and it is opened by a tall, stooped elderly man whose eyes, she is dissatisfied to note, do not “sparkle” (I bet if Edward freaking Cullen opened the door all fang-y and sparkly, she’d run screaming. There’s no pleasing this chick.). This poor old man has the effect of stunning Herr Thomas speechless, and I bet Charlie is wondering if he can somehow borrow him for special occasions. The man turns out to be the caretaker of the big house and I’m thinking it must be hard to find good help in the middle of Buttfuck, Connecticut, because when he sees that they have five dozen children hanging out the van windows, he suggests that they all run rampant and make themselves at home in his employer’s property. He doesn’t even go up to the place with them, just tosses over the keys to a seventeen-year-old with a van and a tiny dictator. Yeah, well, don’t be surprised when high school students start arriving for keg parties, Igor.

The kids are less than impressed with Igor’s generosity and Karen is suddenly vocal again. She wants her Ariel pajamas. Yes, well I would like all the minutes of my life back that I spent reading Little Sister books. We don’t always get what we want, KAREN. Charlie is turning out to be better with kids than Saint Kristy and her “Let’s hold hands and sing while the wee kiddies are sobbing with fear”, and makes a game of the sleepover, putting on the “silly accent” that he uses to seduce Logan. The Krashers and their dubious chaperones proceed to case the joint. Charlie notes the expensive paintings. Kristy checks out the expensive furnishings. Bart wonders what Dorianne Wallingford is doing right now, because she probably doesn’t smell of Damp Turtleneck. Two paragraphs later, and Kristy has unsurprisingly lost David Michael. Has there ever been a BSC book where they haven’t lost a child? (And why is it never Karen? You can’t give that kid away. Bet it was hard to hide that smirk, Watson, when the judge only granted visitation rights.) They find DM smoking cigars and shooting some pool in the billiards room. (Ooh, OOH! I see where this is going! May I suggest Karen Brewer, in the library, with the candlestick?) “It was going to be a long night,” concludes Kristy ominously. I check how many more pages there are in this book, and sadly agree with her.

Annnd we segue off to a sitting job at the Pikes. Of course. After the horrors of spending five seconds watching one of their children strike out in softball, the Pikes just about sit on Mary Anne in their haste to remind her that they’re going out that night and PLEASEGODTAKEOURCHILDRENWHYDIDN’TWE USECONTRACEPTIONWHY. Mary Anne gasps out that she needs to go home for a shower and change of clothes first, and leaves Ma Pike rocking back and forth, popping handfuls of Xanax. While the Leaky Spier is slipping into something more comfortable, Watson calls to find out if there’s been any news of a mysterious van explosion out in Buttfuck, because his darling is missing. Mary Anne, despite the fact that I distinctly remember her starting a suicide note because Kristy once come home about three minutes late from a family vacation, is not at all concerned. She’s too busy dressing herself in her father’s rain gear and chuckling at the spectacle she makes in the mirror. Here’s a spoon, Mary Anne. “Ooh, shiny!”

Mary Anne arrives at the Pikes, the triplets are speaking their words backwards, having got bored with torturing Margo and Claire in the attic, and Ma Pike is now in the corner with Byron, both weeping softly. The nameless narrator, who I assume is Kristy, briefly pausing over in the Haunted Mansion as she stuffs antique silverwear into her pockets, reminds us who Nicky is, in case we forgot that he wasn’t in the van on the ride home. I would suspect that there is some meaning to this, like Nicky had a deal going with Igor to provide the blood of eight children and one blushing virgin (and Kristy and Bart, heh, heh), but I can’t imagine how he could be involved, so mentioning him at all seems like unnecessary filler. By the end of this totally tedious chapter, the Pike children are playing twister (which has no interest for me at all unless it involves a bottle of vodka and the naked stars of True Blood), Watson has called the police, Ma and Pa Pike are still hanging outside in the middle of a thunderstorm just to avoid their children, and Mary Anne has stopped playing with her fingers long enough to feel a tiny pang of worry. And in a WTF? moment, Bart’s father called Claudia to find out if she knew anything. How would he even know Claudia? Is he a professor at the scholastically dubious Stoneybrook University? Has he been “tutoring” Janine on the sly?

Back to the Haunted Mansion and the kids are bawling because their parents are worried about them. Well, the sensitive kids are bawling because their families are worried. Karen is still mourning her Little Mermaid pjs. At least she’s smart enough to realize that Watson and Lisa are cracking open the champagne right about now. Jerry, a token Basher kid who is nothing but a name, asks if his mother will make him a cake when he gets home. “I bet she will,” replies Charlie. “I bet she’ll make you anything you want.” And I’m thinking there might be some real nice laxative brownies coming your way from Mama Jerry, Chuck. Kristy, Bart and Mr. False Promises divvy up the supper that they stole from Igor, giving the “big” pieces of bread to the little kids and going all martyr with the scraps for themselves. Don’t small children have small stomachs? Portion as to size, I say. Greedily.

The squatters then decide to roam all over the house, getting their sticky apple juice fingers on someone else’s valuables. Small Child Joey, who is apparently the Perkins prodigy of the Bashers, asks to play the piano and proceeds to play a “lovely, lilting” Moonlight Sonata. I’m surprised he doesn’t quickly compose it himself on a napkin. Karen is immediately impressed and wants in his pants. She decides to ask “Daddy” for piano lessons when she gets home (okay, (a) Watson is going to be too upset over the failure of his plot to care, and (b) God, was that a Little Sister book? Karen and the Piano Recital? Karen and the Tone-Deaf Crusher of Dreams? Karen and the Effing Plinking Plonking Piano Keys That Drove Nannie Into A Home?). David Michael and the other boys who aren’t Joey have been “playing with the draperies, trying to figure out how they opened and closed.” Well, we can’t all be musical geniuses. Bless. And Jackie Rodowsky, having been redeemed so far, is now stuck in a curtain. Jesus. Kristy, being the mature babysitter that she is, stands around laughing at him. Why do people leave their kids with these girls again? Charlie finally remembers that he’ll probably be legally responsible when Jackie accidentally burns the place down, and tells the kids to knock it off. They resume their exploring and discover a painting of a girl named Dorothy. I check the page count and wonder if this is finally the emergence of a plot. “I like her,” says Karen, gazing at the portrait. “I like wine,” I say, gazing longingly at the fridge. “This room is boring,” says Jackie. “This whole fucking book is boring,” says I.

In a rush of information, we discover that this is Sawyer House, on Sawyer Road, previously owned by Mr. Sawyer. Now if only there was a Sawyer telephone, they could call a taxi and this book would be over. Apparently Shea has been telling Jackie ghost stories, probably in an attempt to distract him before he runs with scissors and accidentally decapitates Archie, and the Haunted House is Haunted. Kristy is spooked. I delicately smother a yawn.

Kristy, Karen and Female Basher Plot Device Patty take refuge in Dorothy’s pretty pink sanctuary and start poking through her book collection and jewellery box. And if Ghost Dorothy emerges from a drainpipe any time soon, I hope she smites the nosy little shits. Karen, falling to new lows, dives headfirst into the bookcase and comes up with a book stamped with the words “My Diary” (gee, do you think it could be a diary?). As they open it, there’s a mysterious banging sound from upstairs, and if this was a Stephen King novel or at least a marginally exciting story, that was the sound of Charlie’s head slowly rolling down the staircase. The girls ignore the screams of the boys being massacred in the conservatory and continue to read the dead girl’s private thoughts. (Although if she was anything like Mallory, I wouldn’t get your hopes up.) Kristy knows it’s wrong to snoop through someone else’s private writing, but too late, she’s hooked (Jesus, these girls are bitching role models) and lamely tries to justify herself by thinking that the exercise will function as a history lesson. I’m planning to try the same defense myself before the jury when I’m convicted of accidentally dosing Kristy’s morning protein shake with arsenic. “Hello? Crippen? It was a history lesson.” She feels a bit better about her heinously intrusive behaviour because the portrait of Dorothy appears to be smiling at her. Bet Igor’s hovering behind the peepholes of that portrait, polishing his axe. Have none of these kids seen a horror movie? Get your sticky fingers out of Dorothy’s unmentionables and run, you fools.

Dorothy, it appears, was very sympathetic toward those who got all poor and stuff in the Depression, but thank God, her father kept all his money and their standard of living hasn’t changed at all. But - BUT - she would give it all up to run away with the mysterious W and wash the socks of their fifteen children. Money isn’t everything. Thanks for that, rich chick. Let’s see how blasé you are about Daddy’s cash when you and W are living in a hatbox under a bridge. Dotty thought he might propose at the New Year’s Ball, but alas, he’s really just not that into her. “I know he loves me, I know it!” Anyone else starting to get the feeling that Dotty spends a lot of her time up a tree with a pair of binoculars? WAIT. Kristy hushes us all and holds up a finger. FEAR THE FINGER OF AUTHORITY, KIDS. Does she hear someone crying? No, it’s just the wind. Or David Michael, weeping over Charlie’s severed head. You want to check on these other kids any time, Master Babysitter?

“W” becomes “Will” (why bother being all mysterious if you’re just going to give up and name him two pages later, Dotty? Geez.) and proposes on Valentine’s Day. Out of total fear, after he comes home to find Dotty boiling his pet spaniel in a soup pot. It seems Dotty has a deceased mother and daddy issues; Kristy somewhat hilariously compares her to Mary Anne. After haranguing this poor man into proposing to her, Dotty releases that marriage will mean an instant transition from being some dude’s daughter to being some dude’s wife, which might put the kibosh on her plans to backpack around Europe. Presumably on her father’s dime. Not so high and mighty about the cash situation now, are we, Dot? Despite the fact that she’s clearly planning to cut and run at the first opportunity, she and Will go on planning their nuptials. “She sounds pretty neat,” says Karen, who finds all of this super duper romantic and will one day trick Jeff Schafer into marrying her by pretending to be pregnant. She feels sorry for Dotty, and has the grand realization that if you wanted to leave your father’s house back in the olden days, one of the only ways was marriage. Which she thinks is sad, but fortunately will not affect her in any way - don’t worry, Watson, Karen’s never leaving. Ooh, watch your blood pressure there with the dicky heart.

We all freeze again, as a mysterious tapping noise fills the room. “What’s that?” Kristy whispers, dropping into fight position. “It’s me,” says Bart, coming into the room. And completely killing any sense of suspense. “Tapping noise”, my fuck, Kristy. It was someone knocking on the door. Don’t be so melodramatic. Bart and Charlie suggest going out and looking for help, or a phone, or a brothel, but Kristy wisely puts her foot down because she knows an escape attempt when she hears one. We end on a strangely ominous note despite the fact that absolutely nothing has happened so far to warrant it.

New chapter and it begins with a notebook entry poorly spelled by Claudia. I’m so not reading that. Having heard about Kristy going missing, Claudia briefly considers cancelling her sitting job with about two seconds warning in order to celebrate with a Mars bar binge. Then she realizes that Kristy might reappear at one of the BSC’s regular séances and graveyard jaunts, and kick her ass for being unprofessional. “I thought you might even yell at me,” she tells Kristy later with a grin. Er, she phrases that possibility like it’s a joke, but is it even under question? Of course she would yell at you, Claudia. You would be subjected to mental torture and hazing rituals, and I wouldn’t rule out physical violence either. Janine makes a brief appearance and tries to comfort Claudia by pointing out that Kristy is intelligent and resourceful. Claudia, as usual, is a total bitch in response to a genuinely nice gesture. “Janine seems to think that intelligence can solve any problem,” the Kishi snarks, rolling her eyes. Because being as thick as two short planks is far better in emergency situations. After this total fail at sisterly bonding, Claud gets caught in the storm on her way to the Newtons and has the balls to demand that her sister come over with a change of clothing. Janine, because she has manners but no spine, does so, and then Claudia points and laughs because she’s awkward around the babies. Look, CLAUDIA, not all people think other people’s babies are without exception adorable. Some of them are butt ugly and most of them have disconcerting blank stares. I’m so with Janine on this. Don’t leave me here with these people, Janine. While Claudia is babysitting, the Leaky Spier rings up sobbing, because she’s worried. She has no news of any kind to impart, however. FYI, Mary Anne, when people are waiting by the phone for news of missing loved ones, don’t tie up the lines and don’t ring up fucking crying because people might logically assume that Charlie’s van has been found in the backwoods with Kristy hanging from a tree and a serial killer slowly scratching through the roof. Stacey and Dawn proceed to do the exact same thing. There is no news. Well, there won’t be, will there, if you don’t get off the phone.

Back to the Haunted Mansion. Everyone is still alive, and this book continues to fail to produce a plot. Any time now, book. In a desperate attempt at filler dialogue and giving some dimension to the plot device characters, Kristy decides to get everyone talking about themselves. It’s dull. She hates squirrels, numerous kids have pets, Buddy has an aunt, Jerry has a friend, SNOOZE. Bart smarms that one of his favourite things to do is “be with Kristy”. (a) I don’t buy a thirteen-year-old boy saying that to a girl at all, let alone in front of two of her brothers, and (b) she’s still not letting you near her zipper, Bart. Nice try. Later, alone at the table, Bart pulls out another couple of pick-up lines that he heard on late night TV and pulls his chair closer. As he fake yawns and goes in for the old arm stretch and boob grab, Kristy gathers up her flashlight and virginity and high tails it out of there. None of this kinky shit, Bart; we has clues to find!

The nosy small children have been poking around again and unearth an old book of newspaper clippings. We discover that Dotty went missing the night she was supposed to elope with Will. It was a dark and stormy night. Much like this one, in fact. Can you smell the cliché from here? The police conduct a half-assed search, look under her bed (“Nope, she isn’t there!”) and in the coal bucket (“Not here, either. Oh. She must have drowned in the river. …Home for a pint, then?”), and then declare her legally dead. More newspaper clippings. Dotty’s dad died six months later “of a broken heart”. More likely rampant alcoholism, but still. Sad. And I have a horrible feeling that I know where this is going and that Dorothy is a bitch of Leaky Spier proportions. David Michael suddenly screams with glee as he finds a bunch of old photographs. “David Michael, you shouldn’t go snooping in people’s desks,” says Kristy, and the God of Hypocrisy finally blows his load and shanks her. They decide that the photo of Will looks vaguely familiar, but he would be an “old, old man” now and they just.can’t.figure.it.out. Personally, I am also stumped. This is would all fit together so well if only there was a mysterious, unfriendly senior citizen clumping about the property, giving out house keys willy-nilly.

And, in a totally unrelated incident, Igor takes this moment to appear to check on them. I’d like to think he’s also unearthed a copy of his job description and is checking that they haven’t pocketed the silver and set fire to the library. The kids scream in his face, and the poor old crock hastens back home. Everyone else bunks down in front of the fire, and the kids take turns going to the bathroom. I’m finding it kind of unlikely that an empty house with no electricity has active plumbing, but ew, and moving on. David Michael is upset because he can’t brush his teeth and “you know what Watson says,” he finishes ominously. “I do,” agrees Kristy solemnly. Erm, is it along the lines of “It’s good to get all the crap out of your teeth?” What a dictator. Kristy reassures DM that Watson will be so happy to see them when they get home that tooth-brushing will be the last thing on his mind. Happy. Okay, we’ll go with that. Patty pitches a shit fit because she doesn’t have her Little Mermaid washcloth - what is with these kids and the Ariel accessories? Did the Little Mermaid come out the day before the ghostwriter wrote this book over breakfast or something? Baby Mozart then needs to go to the bathroom about fifteen times, and this is seriously as exciting as this book gets. OH PLOT WHEREFORE ART THOU? The kids (okay, Karen, which incites the rest of the mob) complain about their lack of pillows and Charlie tells them all how to improvise a good pillow, by rolling up their sneakers in their dirty t-shirts. I do not see how that could be in any way comfortable or sanitary. Everyone but Kristy finally goes to sleep, their little heads nestled softly on their sweaty Reeboks, and she goes to snoop some more. Bart appears and scares the crap out of her, before popping her cherry on top of the baby Grand. Or they read some more dusty papers and figure out that Will bought the mansion after Dotty’s long-suffering father drowned in a vat of grappa. Pardon me for trying to spice things up a little.

Babysitting segue. Dawn is supposed to be sitting for the Barretts, who are understandably upset that Buddy is missing. (Again.) And then the world spins crazily on its axis as Natalie Barrett, the Sexiest MILF in Stoneybrook, actually cancels her date to stay home with her remaining children. Could it be…a responsible parent? (I like to use unnecessary ellipses whenever possible around Dawn… it seems to be the done thing…) All dressed up with nowhere to go, Dawn and Mary Anne hang around and interrupt their parents “reading the paper” in the lounge. Strangely they don’t question the smudged lipstick around Richie’s mouth or Sharon’s bra hanging from the ceiling fan. Finally Sharon, in a burst of sexual frustration, goes to make them a cup of tea. And… absolutely nothing happens for the rest of this chapter, except the club gathering in Claudia’s room, which is only going to make Kristy flip her shit that they dared to have a meeting without her. And OH GOD, all six of them write her love notes in the club notebook, which means that I probably have to READ them. Fine. Mary Anne waxes poetic, Dawn cracks an inappropriate joke, followed by a quick “Ha ha, no, really, we miss ya” (Dawn fucking hates Kristy, seriously), and Stacey writes a total token greeting, probably too busy flicking through her mental little black book to see which Stoneybrook stud is getting lucky on Saturday night. Claudia writes something about popcorn in really poor handwriting, spells “much” wrong, - and really, she’s not even trying here, so I don’t see why I should strain my brain either. “All Mal can say is ditto to what everybody else said”, because Mal is a follower with no imagination of her own, and thank God she doesn’t want to be an author or something. Jessi can’t wait to “read what Kristy writes in the club notebook”, because there’s no way Kristy is going to come home and just TELL them what happened. And I, because it cannot be said enough, yank the notebook away and add in totally incomprehensible cursive: WHERE THE FUCK IS THE PLOT. Kristy and Token Children Stuck in House For Night. No Untoward Events Occur. Previous Owners Deceased. Children Steal Dinner From Lonely Old Man. Babysitters Spend A Lot Of Time On Phone. Mary Anne Cries. Man, I so should have gone with that one about the egg babies. At least that has Fruity Logan moments to perk things up.

Sigh. And we’re back at the Haunted Mansion, where it is now a bright and sunny morning. Kristy wakes up, thinks she looks and smells like ass (and I don’t disagree; how many weeks has she been wearing those clothes, again?) and brains Bart with a loaf of stale bread on the way to the bathroom. You know, in case he catches sight of her stubbly jaw and morning erection, and has a much-needed epiphany. During breakfast hour at the asylum, Kristy catches sight of Will/Igor striding towards the house and hisses that, “The caretaker’s about to knock at the front door!” There is a brief pause, followed by a knock at the door, just, quote, as Kristy predicted. What else would he do? Pause for some Tai Chi on the lawn? I like (and for “like”, read: “am supremely annoyed by”) the way Kristy has to react to everything as if it was her own Great Idea. Will/Igor politely asks after their night and offers to help them pack. Kristy is instantly “suspicious. Was he trying to get rid of us for some reason?” Let’s see. The man was having a quiet night in front of the fire, listening to the rain on the roof and watching The Bachelor on TV, when a teenaged boy arrives with a van full of children, who proceeded to spend in an unsupervised night in what we have deduced is now his house, poking through his underwear drawer and reading his ex’s diary. Of course he doesn’t want you to leave.

Everyone begins to pack up and it takes small child Buddy to point out to Kristy why the photograph of Will looked familiar. See, Claudia? This is an example of the link between intelligence and problem-solving. Kristy’s response? “You know,” she said to Buddy. “I think you’ve got something there.” And “All of a sudden I knew, just knew that the caretaker and Will were one and the same person.” Actually, genius, you didn’t know that. Buddy just told you that. He pretty much had to mock up a powerpoint presentation with charts and forensic photographs before you caught on. Not pausing to in any way think before she speaks or consider other people’s feelings and privacy, Kristy charges outside and is all, “Hey! You’re Will! You’re Dotty’s boyfriend! Your fiancee is totally DEAD!” Will/Igor splutters a bit, then instead of telling her to mind your own fucking business, you ill-mannered child, we get the “sad tale” of a man and his lost love. And then, oh God, this is actually really tragic. And by “tragic”, I mean FUCKING CREEPY. After Dotty (it seems he called her Dot; I say Dotty is more applicable in every way) “apparently” (I don’t want to spoil this for you, but I suspect there’s a huge BUT and a dramatic Dawn ellipsis coming up there) drowned in the river, Will “So Poor I Have To Wash My Own Socks” Blackburn suddenly found enough money to buy her father’s huge mansion just six months later. Right-o. I’m too tired to question these things. So for the last fifty odd years, Will has just been wandering around Dotty’s room, weeping quietly and smelling her undergarments. Jesus, Will. Take some time to grieve, then go out, get drunk, find a hooker, and realize that Dotty was a selfish brat who rated you fractionally above her inheritance but way down the list from a European contiki tour (8 countries, 12 days, 1 hell of a good time). “What about the haunting?” Kristy asks in hushed tones. “Haunting?” he snorted. “There is no haunting. Those stories are just tales made up by ignorant people looking for amusement.” Ha. BURN, Thomas.

(God. In the immortal and slightly butchered (see what I did there?) words of Lamb Chop, “This is the book that neeeeever eeeends…”)

I seriously think that this whole story was just an excuse to slip in another of those amusing “Oh noes!” incidents where Kristy freaks at the prospect of Bart seeing her with a face like a dropped pie in the cruel light of dawn. Because all of the “action” - and I use the term extremely loosely - takes place in the last few chapters. Although there’s still only a bare whiff of this “Mystery” that I was promised on the cover.

The kids have to wait for the bridges to be fixed, so they have an impromptu game of softball with Will/Igor. Then they all hold hands and frolic through the meadows while eating fresh-baked cookies, I’m guessing. Must have been a pretty long damn game if a work crew managed to get out and fix the bridge in that space of time. Oops, what am I doing? The BSC and logical passing of time are not phrases that go together. They stop for directions, Kristy calls home and assures Watson that they’re okay. His voice sounds strange and teary. Because he’s just realized that yet another of attempts have been foiled and damn it, that blonde spectacled menace (or “the ripped condom of ‘85”, as Watson and Lisa affectionately refer to her) is coming home again.

“IT GOES ON AND ON, MY FRIIIEENDS…”

Less than an hour later, they’re back home again, having been missing for about, what, fifteen hours? And pretty much the entire town is camped out in Kristy’s backyard, sobbing and waving white hankies. The club has even found time to make one of their shitty “Wellcome home” banners (and why do they get Claudia to letter these things every fucking time? Emily Michelle is two years old, can’t write and doesn’t understand English. I maintain that she would still do a better job.) Am I just a horribly disconnected person that I honestly would have no idea if my friends were missing for fifteen hours (unless someone created a Facebook group about it or something)? It would have to be someone actually living in my house before I would notice in that short amount of time and even then I wouldn’t set up a phone tree and inform every other person that I’ve ever spoken to.

The BSC have a group hug, because that’s a BSC tradition, you know. That, and displaying the heads of all dissenting members on a sharp stick outside Claudia’s room, as an example against forming outside relationships or showing up for meetings at 5:31. Aren’t these girls just too sweet? Kristy tells the non-story of nothing happening at the not-haunted mansion, and Dawn orgasms with envy.

SOME WOMAN STARTING READING IT, NOT KNOWING HOW LONG IT WAS…

In another BSC tradition, the girls get together for a sleepover. It then takes two pages for them to order pizza, Stacey discovers that Sam actually likes anchovies and screams with disgust, as all mature young sophisticates would. Kristy “had the feeling that Stacey was rethinking her relationship with Sam.” I have a feeling that Sam, eavesdropping outside the door (no really, he was), is suffering similar sentiments.

Apparently all week Dawn has been stirring shit all over school about Kristy being tied down with clanking chains and anal-probed by ghosts in the Haunted Mansion. Because this is a school of eleven to thirteen-year-old children and Stoneybrook sucks, this is the gossip of the week and everyone is incredibly impressed. Well, these are the deprived kiddies who get their jollies riding the escalator at the mall, so… Cokie apparently gushes all over Kristy that, “I hate to admit it, but you are really awesome!” On which, I say BULL SHIT Cokie Mason said that without a gun to her head and a bottle of Jack Daniels in her bloodstream. And I’m pretty sure Cokie is too busy hanging around the football team’s locker room at the high school to care that Kristy Thomas and a car of babies thought they saw ghosties. Instead of bitch-slapping Dawn into next week, Kristy is all “Yays, I’m popular,” and totally enables her in her lies.

There is a knock on the door (and Kristy doesn’t crap her pants this time, even though I’m pretty sure Watson’s house is also supposed to be haunted). It’s the pizza guy, paid by Sam to torment the babysitters with the two second belief that their pizzas contain tiny fish. I know I’m shaking in my pushdown socks. (I’m actually more disturbed that Kristy opens her BEDROOM door to find a stranger and is all “Oh hai. You come bearing food.” The correct response is: “Why the fuck did you come upstairs, strange man?”) Stacey muses on the philosophies of foodstuffs and snarks, “That is, if you can call Doritos ‘food’.” Claudia reacts as if she’d said, “That is, if you can call Asians ‘people’.” This is tearing at the very fundamentals of her existence, people.

There is yet another knock at the door and this time it is Karen.

AUUUUUUUUUUUGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH.

You’re right, blurb, this book IS scary.

And oh my God, Karen is holding a tiny photo of Dotty. It actually takes me a second to realize that she stole it from the not-haunted house, and be duly appalled (and strangely unsurprised at the lows to which Karen will stoop), and my initial reaction is along the lines of: “Jesus, ghostwriters, I know the final clues to these things are usually written on a post-it, labeled CLUE (or “CLOO” if it’s a Claudia mystery, so she knows what it means) and stuck to the babysitter’s foreheads, but even I think it’s pushing it too far that Karen found that in her bedroom.”

The photo reminds Karen of someone, because she’s seven and this is all totally realistic. Kristy’s all, Nuh uh, Karen, Dotty’s totally pushing up daisies and I want to get back to my pizza toast. But wait! “They never found her body,” says Dawn. “Her cheeks were pink, and her eyes sparkled.”

CREEPY.

I’ll give you a moment to get that image out of your head.

They pass the photograph around and I wait for someone to recognize her youthful features in the face of some old lady around Stoneybrook.

Wait for it.

Mary Anne gasps.

Yep.

“She’s the woman who runs the sewing store downtown.”

Everyone is excited. Claudia stress eats her way through a bag of M & Ms. I flip over to You Tube and watch a video about a talking husky to try and regain my sense of joy in life.

When I steel myself to return, the babysitters are on their way downtown to Sew Fine, Karen in tow, to spy on an old woman. In the hope of exposing a secret life that she’s maintained for half a century until those darn crazy kids came along. They confront her, she instantly caves and reveals what Kristy calls “an awesome story” and what I call the MOST SELFISH PIECE OF FUCKERY THAT EVER WENT DOWN IN THIS WHOLE FUCKING SERIES. Because she felt a bit smothered by her father and anticipated feeling a bit smothered by her fiancé - and instead of just discussing this fact with them or at least leaving a bloody note when she snuck out in the middle of the night - this heinous excuse for a human being faked her own death. Letting her father die a miserable lonely death and her fiancé to cry himself to sleep every night for fifty years, thinking she’d drowned. She couldn’t have sent a postcard at some point? “Hey Will. I’m not dead. Having dibbly time in Europe. Totes trashed my hotel room in Venice. Lolz. How fresh. Don’t creepily pine after me for decades, k? P.S. Plz tell Dad I’m alive and need more booze money. Love Dot.”

I think Will can stop weeping over her portrait now. And start planning a drive-by on her store.

So, the woman who wrote snotty diatribes against the duties of a housewife and wanted to trek around Africa in her bare feet and stuff, ended up opening a sewing store about three meters down the road from her old house.

Kristy has the nerve to suggest that Dotty and Will get together. And Dotty has the FUCKING BALLS to reply: “Do you know, I think I’ll do just that! It’ll give old Will a turn, but you’re right. Now that I know where he is, I think it would be grand to see him.”

Will, I’ll tie her to the tracks, you start the train.

SERIOUSLY.

The babysitters leave Dotty happily chortling to herself, imagining Will’s heart attack from shock as the culmination of a life of grief and loneliness, and walk out into the sunshine. Happy days. “Everything had worked out just fine.”

JESUS, KRISTY.

Where is Watson’s heart medication when you need it?