Ghosts Don't Ride Bikes, Do They? Read online

  CONTENTS

  Chapter One: Thrills and Spills

  Chapter Two: Ghost Secrets

  Chapter Three: The Kicker

  Chapter Four: Cheddar Cheese Fish Fries

  Chapter Five: Kersville Elementary School

  Chapter Six: Game Over, Ghost!

  Chapter Seven: Ghost Tricks

  Chapter Eight: A New Case

  Chapter Nine: Desmond’s Daring Run

  Chapter Ten: Hal the Bike Healer

  About the Author and Illustrator

  CHAPTER ONE

  THRILLS AND SPILLS

  Let’s talk about the thrills and spills of riding a bike. Is there anything more thrilling than racing down the street with the wind in your face? Even the spills are cool. Trying to do a trick and falling off your bike, or coming home with a brand-new hole in your jeans—it’s the best! Thrills and spills. You can’t have one without the other. And I wouldn’t want it any other way.

  The thing is, nobody ever talks about the chills of riding a bike. At least not until I moved to Kersville. This town is made of chills!

  My bike is the coolest thing in the world. It’s black with red rims. The handlebars have a compass on one side, a light in the middle, and a horn on the other side. Not a bell. A horn!

  What I love about my bike is that it’s not shiny and new. This bike has been through a lot of spills. There are scratches on the paint and dents to prove it. The seat even has a piece of black electrical tape from when I crashed trying to ride backward—bad idea.

  The thing is, even though my bike isn’t perfect, it’s all mine. It’s moved to every new house we’ve moved to, and it feels the same no matter where I live. It’s basically been my best friend.

  I have a real friend now. His name is Desmond Cole. He never cared about bikes before. Why?

  Well, do you see that bike over there—the one with the compass, the light, and the horn? The one with the scratch on the frame and the electrical tape on the seat? The one that’s riding through the forest without anyone on it?

  Yep, that’s my bike.

  Why is the bike riding by itself?

  Well, that’s a strange story.

  CHAPTER TWO

  GHOST SECRETS

  Last week I introduced Desmond to my most prized possession in the whole world: my bike.

  I opened the garage, and my bike was right there in its own spot. The sun streamed into the garage, and the light made my bike glow.

  “What do you think?” I asked.

  “A bike?” Desmond said flatly. “I guess it’s cool.”

  “It’s cooler than cool,” I said. “Want to go riding?”

  “I don’t do bikes,” Desmond said.

  I was shocked. “Why not?”

  “Because I like ghosts,” he said.

  What do ghosts have to do with bikes? I wondered.

  Desmond must have been reading my mind. “Ghosts don’t ride bikes,” he said, like it was something everybody in the world already knew.

  That was when Zax floated through the wall. He’s a ghost, so it’s not as weird as it sounds. “Andres, I need a ratchet from the toolbox.”

  “Wait, Zax,” I said. “Let me ask you a question. Is it true that ghosts don’t ride bikes?”

  “Of course ghosts don’t ride bikes,” Zax said. Then he let out a hearty laugh that was almost as loud as his burps.

  “Why not?” I asked.

  “Birds don’t ride bikes, do they?” Zax replied.

  “Um, no,” I said.

  Desmond nodded. “See what I mean, Andres?”

  To be honest, I was still confused.

  Zax looked up from the toolbox. “Why would ghosts ride bikes when we can float everywhere?”

  “Um, because riding a bike is awesome!” I said. “Speaking of awesome, I hear the Kersville Bike Park has a crazy racetrack!”

  Desmond shrugged. “There won’t be any ghosts there, so count me out. Have fun, and I’ll see you later.”

  He waved good-bye and went next door into his own garage. That’s where he had his Ghost Patrol office. I guess Desmond liked ghosts as much as I liked my bike.

  “Found it!” Zax exclaimed, holding up the ratchet. He closed the toolbox and floated straight toward the wall. He almost made it through, but then I heard a loud CLANG. The ratchet dropped and smacked against the floor.

  “Oh yeah,” Zax said. He floated into the garage. “I keep forgetting not everything can go through walls. Can you carry this for me?”

  “Okay.” I kicked off my gear and took the tool. “What are you doing with this, anyway?”

  Zax smiled. “It’s a secret.”

  A secret? Something told me I wasn’t going to like ghost secrets. But I put it out of my mind. I had better things to do. I had a bike park to check out!

  CHAPTER THREE

  THE KICKER

  When my parents decided to move to Kersville, they told me the town had a bike park close to our new house. That made moving here a lot easier.

  The park turned out to be awesome. It had a huge dirt racetrack with way too many jumps to count.

  I was prepared, though. I was wearing my helmet, kneepads, elbow pads, and bike gloves.

  I rode over to the start of the track and waited behind a group of other kids.

  “Hey, you’re new here,” said the boy in front of me. He pointed to the end of the track. “Whatever you do, don’t ride that last jump. It’s called the Kicker. Nobody ever lands it.”

  “Nobody?” I gulped.

  “Watch and learn,” he said.

  A rider sped around the last turn toward the Kicker. Suddenly, her front tire lifted up into a wheelie and the girl fell off her bike. But her bike kept going! It flew up the ramp and crash-landed on the other side.

  The girl got up and brushed herself off.

  “The Kicker strikes again,” the boy told me.

  While I waited my turn, one rider after another wiped out on the Kicker. It was weird. I mean, everybody fell! Sometimes they fell to the left. Sometimes they fell to the right. One kid ended up doing a backflip into the dirt. Each time, the bike still took the jump and crashed.

  I was nervous. I was a good bike rider, but I had never tried anything like the Kicker before.

  Finally, it was my turn. I pedaled down the first hill fast. The track felt good as I whipped around the first turn. I hit the first jump, held on tight, and launched into the air. It was amazing!

  I landed jump after jump, and pretty soon the other kids started cheering. For me!

  Until I came to the Kicker. At first, everything was normal. Then I felt a wave of electricity sizzle through my body. My bike started to wobble. I gripped my handlebars as the bike jerked from side to side.

  Next, my pedals began to speed up and slow down. It felt like the gears were shifting on their own!

  Still, I kept my bike under control and zoomed up the Kicker. I couldn’t believe it. I was going to ace the track. All I had to do was land the jump.

  I flew into the air, and, man, it was exciting! I was going to do it. I was going to—

  SCREECH!

  My bike froze in midair. I mean, it just stopped.

  Unfortunately I kept on going, right over my handlebars into a mud puddle.

  My bike crashed down a second later.

  I had no idea what was going on, but I knew one thing for sure. The Kicker lived up to its name.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHEDDAR CHEESE FISH FRIES

  Desmond came by my house that night, and he looked really scared.

  “Please help me, Andres,” he said. “There is a cooking experiment at my house tonight.”
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  “What’s a cooking experiment?” I asked.

  Desmond shivered. “That’s when my parents use all of our leftovers to make a new meal. They are making cheddar cheese fish fries with a marshmallow dipping sauce.”

  My family was just having homemade chicken nuggets, corn on the cob, and salad for dinner. All of a sudden it totally sounded like the best dinner in the world.

  I could see that Desmond was in trouble. I invited him inside, and we walked to the kitchen. “Mom, can Desmond eat with us tonight?”

  She was washing her hands in the sink. “Okay, as long as you kids set the table.”

  Desmond sniffed the air and smiled. “That’s a small price to pay for saving my stomach . . . and my life!”

  Mom and I laughed.

  As we grabbed the plates, Dad came into the kitchen from the basement.

  “Is something wrong with the water heater?” Mom asked him. “The water isn’t getting hot.”

  “Oh yeah,” I said. “I had the same problem when I took my shower.”

  Let me tell you, cold showers aren’t fun.

  Dad nodded. “Yeah, it’s acting up. I can fix it, but some of my tools are missing. They must be in one of the boxes we haven’t unpacked.”

  Desmond and I looked at each other. We didn’t say a word, but I knew we were both thinking the same thing: Zax.

  Desmond changed the subject. “How was the bike park?”

  “Good,” I said, and I wanted to tell him about it, but not in front of my parents. The whole thing was too weird. So instead I said, “You should come next time. It’s scary fun, if you catch my drift.”

  Desmond’s eyes lit up. “For real?”

  I nodded, and we finished setting the table. Then I grabbed Desmond, and we went into the garage. I filled him in on the strange way my bike had acted at the track.

  He inspected my bike closely. “Was it only your bike that went wild?”

  “Nope,” I told him. “Everyone’s bike did.”

  Desmond’s eyes sparked with excitement. “Let’s check it out tomorrow,” he said. “But first, let’s eat. I’m starving!”

  CHAPTER FIVE

  KERSVILLE ELEMENTARY SCHOOL

  The next day, I rode my bike to Kersville Elementary. Hmm, how do I describe this school?

  For starters, a long, long time ago, it was a mansion where the founder of the town lived. Then it was a hospital. Finally, it became a school.

  But it still didn’t feel like a school. Some of the classrooms used to be bedrooms, and the cafeteria used to be the ballroom in the mansion. It had round tables and creaky old chairs. Plus, it had huge chandeliers hanging from the ceiling. Who puts fancy crystal lights in a school?

  The gym used to be the mansion’s barn. You could still smell the horse stalls, which meant the gym smelled pee-yew gross.

  The first time I saw the school, I was too scared to get out of the car. My parents had to practically carry me inside!

  I don’t think it’s totally scary anymore, just a little creepy. There had to be ghosts in that building. But this story is about bikes . . . kind of.

  Desmond was waiting for me at the bike rack. “Were any of these bikes at the park yesterday?”

  Most of the bikes weren’t the kind you’d ride at the track. Some had curved handlebars. Some had tassels and baskets. A few even had training wheels.

  Finally, I noticed two from the track. One belonged to the girl who I saw wipe out. The other belonged to the boy who’d warned me about the Kicker.

  “Those two bikes were at the park,” I told Desmond.

  Desmond pulled a weird camera from his backpack. I had never seen a camera like this one. It looked like a video-game controller. I watched as Desmond popped up the flash and took a picture of the two bikes. But the flash created a shadow on the bikes instead of making everything bright. Desmond looked at the screen and whistled. “Totally ghostly.”

  He turned the camera around so I could see the screen. In the picture, the two bikes were covered in glowing dust.

  “Does my bike look like that too?” I asked.

  “Probably,” Desmond said. “But you live with a ghost. Everything in your house looks like this in the right light.”

  He put the camera away, and we walked toward the school. “I’m sure about one thing,” Desmond said. “Something is definitely haunting the racetrack.”

  CHAPTER SIX

  GAME OVER, GHOST!

  After school, Desmond and I went to the bike park. The Ghost Patrol needed to figure out what was going on at the track.

  The girl and the boy were riding and practicing tricks. They weren’t going near the Kicker.

  I whispered to Desmond, “I hope they ride the track so you can see how haunted it is.”

  “The track might not be haunted,” Desmond said. “Their bikes might be haunted. That’s why we have to watch them, to see if the bikes do strange things on their own.” He nodded at the girl. “Like that!”

  I looked over and saw the girl’s bike hop into the air a few times. Both tires came off the ground at the same time. “She’s doing a bunny hop,” I told Desmond. “It’s a bike trick.”

  “Hey! What about that?” Desmond asked. The boy was balancing on his front tire. The back tire was up in the air.

  “That’s called a stoppie,” I said. “It’s another trick. Wow, you really don’t ride bikes, do you?”

  Desmond shrugged. “I do not.”

  “Well, I ride bikes, and those bikes aren’t haunted,” I said.

  After an hour of watching the boy and girl, Desmond couldn’t take it anymore. He yelled, “Hey, how come you two aren’t riding the Kicker today?”

  “Ask your friend,” the boy replied, pointing to me. “He fell so hard yesterday that no one else wants to ride it.”

  My face flushed hot. It was not cool being the kid everybody saw wipe out.

  So in a flash, I hopped on my bike and put on my helmet. There was only one way to prove the Kicker was haunted. I needed to ride the track again. But I had a plan this time.

  I went to the top of the track and pedaled down the hill as fast as I could. I picked up speed with each turn and each jump.

  “Go, Andres!” Desmond screamed. Everyone at the bike park clapped and cheered too.

  Then, right before I reached the Kicker, I put my plan into action. I jumped off my bike.

  As I crash-landed in the mud, all those cheers stopped.

  My bike, on the other hand, kept going.

  It jumped the Kicker, flew into a front flip, then landed perfectly and skidded to a stop. It was the craziest, coolest, creepiest thing ever! If I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes, I wouldn’t have believed it.

  Thankfully, Desmond was right there. He knew what to do.

  Desmond snapped a picture of my bike with his special camera. “Game over, ghost!” he announced. He ran over and showed me the screen.

  What I saw made my heart do a front flip in my chest.

  There was a ghost sitting on my bike, smiling from one ghostly ear to the other. And why wouldn’t he be happy?

  That ghost just landed the Kicker.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  GHOST TRICKS

  Slowly, the ghost appeared in real life. Everyone gasped. I gasped too, because that’s what normal people do when they see a ghost.

  “Did you see that trick?” the ghost asked excitedly and floated over to us. “It was awesome!”

  I stood up from the mud. “Yeah, but you can’t kick kids off bikes like that.”

  “It’s not cool,” added Desmond. “Not cool at all.”

  The ghost looked from Desmond to me to the other kids, who stood with their eyes wide open. Then he stopped smiling.

  “Oh, I am so sorry,” the ghost said. “I didn’t mean to bother anyone. I just love this track. I’ve been flying around here for a long time, but I could never jump the Kicker. I’m a ghost, so I just pass right through the ramp every time.”

  I remem
bered Zax trying to pass through the wall with the ratchet. “You needed a real bike to jump the ramp.”

  The ghost nodded. “I only wanted to borrow one for a second.”

  “Maybe you could have asked first,” I suggested.

  “Yeah, I tried that once and scared a kid pretty bad,” admitted the ghost. “But thanks to you, I finally landed the jump!”

  “And you nailed it!” I cheered and high-fived the ghost.

  “I know, right?” The ghost beamed.

  Desmond was really excited. I could tell because he always asked questions when he was excited. “How did you hold on to a moving bike? If you go up, do you have to come back down? Is riding a bike as a ghost easier than riding a bike as a not-ghost?”

  “Those are ghost secrets, my friend,” the ghost replied.

  Now I’m positive that I don’t like ghost secrets.

  The ghost grabbed my bike and floated it back to me. “Here. Thank you for helping my dream come true.”

  I took the handlebars and nodded to the ghost. “Hey, do you have a name?”

  “You can call me Kicker,” he said. Then Kicker faded away.

  Desmond patted me on the back. “Congratulations, Andres. You just solved your first case!”

  Now I was the one smiling. I have to admit, it felt great.