Amelia Bedelia Scared Silly Read online

  Dedication

  For the real Nate the Great!—H. P.

  For Jane, the Queen of Halloween!

  Thanks for all your inspiration—L. A.

  Cover

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Chapter 1: Finally Fed Up

  Chapter 2: Hayride? Nayride!

  Chapter 3: Costumes R Us

  Chapter 4: Scaring Up a Ghost

  Chapter 5: Whooooo’s There?

  Chapter 6: See You Later, Regurgitator!

  Chapter 7: Candy Loves Candies

  Chapter 8: But the Tricker Is Quicker

  Chapter 9: An Apple a Day . . .

  Chapter 10: . . . Keeps the Ghosts Away

  Two Ways to Say It

  Monstrously Fun Bookmarks

  Amelia Bedelia’s Monster Molar Cookies

  Spider Pops

  About the Author and Illustrator

  Back Ads

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  .1.

  Finally Fed Up

  Amelia Bedelia draped a shiny blue cape over her shoulders and pulled a mask down over her eyes. “I was thinking that we could be superheroes for Halloween,” she told Finally, her dog. “I could make you a matching cape.”

  Finally yawned.

  “Not interested?” asked Amelia Bedelia. “I know! I think we have a pair of red shoes and a basket. How about Dorothy and Toto from The Wizard of Oz?”

  It was Saturday afternoon, and Amelia Bedelia’s bedroom was covered with craft supplies, hats, masks, scarves, and piles of dress-up clothes. There were only seven days until Halloween, and Amelia Bedelia still hadn’t figured out what she and Finally were going to be. This was their very first Halloween together, and she wanted to make sure she picked an extra-special costume.

  Finally jumped up onto the bed and flopped down.

  “Is that a no?” Amelia Bedelia asked. She scratched Finally’s ears, then noticed something with yellow-and-black stripes peeking out from a pile. She tugged at it and held it up. It was her old sweater from when she was little. “Hmmm . . . maybe a bumblebee and a beekeeper?” She thought for a moment. “I just need to find a big hat and some netting.”

  Amelia Bedelia slipped the sweater over Finally’s head and tugged the dog’s front legs through the armholes. The sweater was a little snug, but it looked great. Amelia Bedelia rooted around on her desk and found a pair of sparkly antennas. She placed them on Finally’s furry head.

  Finally had had enough. She jumped off the bed and ran downstairs.

  “Finally! Stop!” Amelia Bedelia called as she raced after her. When she got to the living room, she realized that her parents, who were out in the front yard, had left the door wide open. Amelia Bedelia was just in time to catch a glimpse of Finally’s tail disappearing outside.

  “Oh no!” Amelia Bedelia heard her mother cry, and she got to the doorway only to see Finally run straight into the big fake spiderweb her parents were holding. Finally was going so fast that the webbing was yanked right out of their hands!

  Amelia Bedelia and both her parents watched in shock as Finally raced down the front path and turned toward Maple Street. A giant fake spider was still attached to the webbing and bounced along the sidewalk. It looked like the spider was trying to catch its escaping meal.

  Amelia Bedelia raced down the sidewalk after Finally. She spotted her friend Candy turning the corner up ahead. “Stop that dog!” Amelia Bedelia cried. Candy looked confused for a split second, but then quickly grabbed Finally by the sweater.

  Amelia Bedelia ran to them, out of breath. “Thank you,” she managed to say.

  “I get to meet Finally, finally,” said Candy, giving the dog a pat.

  “Oh, her name’s just Finally,” said Amelia Bedelia. She smiled. She was very happy to see Candy, and not just because her friend had helped catch her dog. Candy had just moved to town and was still pretty new at school. After a rocky beginning, the two girls had become fast friends. Amelia Bedelia grabbed the spiderweb and rolled it up. Then she and Candy and Finally began walking back toward Amelia Bedelia’s house.

  “Awesome decorations!” said Candy, taking it all in.

  Amelia Bedelia smiled. She was proud that her parents were so enthusiastic about decorating their house each Halloween. She handed the web to her mother and introduced her parents to Candy.

  “Pleased to meet you, Candy,” said Amelia Bedelia’s father as he hung vampire bats from the maple tree.

  “Want to help with this spiderweb?” Amelia Bedelia’s mother asked Candy.

  “You don’t need to ask me twice,” said Candy, grabbing an end.

  “She didn’t,” said Amelia Bedelia.

  Candy turned to Amelia Bedelia. “I just love Halloween. It’s my absolute favorite holiday.” She sighed. “Back in Chicago there were so many fun, scary things to do. Haunted houses, midnight movie screenings, cemetery tours, an all-you-can-eat gummy-creature buffet. It was totally amazing.”

  “There’s a lot to do here as well,” said Amelia Bedelia’s mother as she attached the spiderweb to the porch railing. “Everyone decorates their houses and stores. There’s a costume parade and a pumpkin-carving contest. Then when it gets dark, everyone goes trick-or-treating. It’s a lot of fun.”

  Candy smiled politely. “That sounds nice,” she said. “For the little kids. But is there anything scary for kids our age? I love to be scared on Halloween.”

  Amelia Bedelia racked her brain. “There is!” she said. “We totally forgot about the haunted hayride at Seven Gables Farm.”

  “That’s right,” said Amelia Bedelia’s mother. “After trick-or-treating, everyone heads over to this really old farm.”

  “And there’s a wagon full of hay bales that’s pulled by horses. Everyone piles on and goes for a ride through the woods,” explained Amelia Bedelia. “It’s super creepy.”

  Her father climbed down from the ladder and joined them. “There’s spooky music and ghosts and goblins and witches and monsters that jump out and scare you,” he said.

  “And then afterward there’s a big bonfire. It’s really great,” finished Amelia Bedelia.

  Candy nodded. “Now that’s what I’m talking about,” she said.

  Amelia Bedelia laughed. “You mean that’s what we’re talking about.”

  “Yeah,” said Candy. “I mean, it’s just what the doctor ordered.”

  Amelia Bedelia looked at her friend. “Are you sick?”

  Candy shook her head. “Nope, I feel fine. This might be my most spooktacular Halloween ever!”

  .2.

  Hayride? Nayride!

  The next morning, Amelia Bedelia, her parents, and Finally were on their way to Seven Gables Farm to go pumpkin picking. The farm was run by the Hawthorne family, and had been for many generations.

  “Mmmmm, I can taste apple-cider doughnuts already!” said Amelia Bedelia’s mother.

  “Hey, no fair!” said Amelia Bedelia. “Did you get a doughnut earlier?”

  “I didn’t,” said her mother. “I don’t mess with family tradition. We always get doughnuts after we pick out our pumpkins.” She smiled. “I can’t wait to hear Mrs. Hawthorne’s silly puns!”

  “We should get more doughnuts this time,” said Amelia Bedelia’s father. “One measly dozen wasn’t enough last year.”

  “You sure do have a sweet tooth,” said her mother.

  “What does it taste like?” asked Amelia Bedelia. “Chocolate?”

  “If I did, I’d eat it,” answered her father as he made the turn into the parking lot.

  “Let’s go to the corn maze first!” suggested Amelia Bedelia. She loved getting lost in the tall rows of corn. It was fun
figuring out how to escape.

  “I think you mean the maize maze,” said her father.

  “Oh, Daddy,” said Amelia Bedelia. “There’s only one maze.”

  Her father laughed. “Maize comes from the word for corn in the language of the indigenous people of the Caribbean. It’s spelled M-A-I-Z-E.”

  “That’s amazing,” said Amelia Bedelia’s mother. “Utterly a-maizing!”

  They arrived at the maze. Amelia Bedelia and Finally led the way in, running ahead to scope things out and then doubling back to get her parents, who moved much more slowly. But then she and Finally raced ahead a bit too far. When she turned back, she couldn’t find her parents anywhere.

  “They must have gone the wrong way,” she said to Finally. The two of them forged ahead, but turn after turn, there were no parents to be found.

  She stopped in her tracks. “Mommy?” she called out.

  “Amelia Bedelia?” replied her mother. Her voice sounded close, yet far away.

  “Where are you?” Amelia Bedelia hollered. “How can I get to you?”

  “We somehow lost you and now we’re outside the maze,” said her mother. “Are you still in there, sweetie?”

  “I am!” yelled Amelia Bedelia. “How can I find my way out?”

  She saw a flash of red on the ground—a lost glove. She was about to pick it up when Finally yanked her forward.

  “Stay cool,” called her father.

  Just then a chilly breeze blew through, rustling the cornstalks and making Amelia Bedelia shiver. “That’s easy. I am very cool!” she shouted.

  Amelia Bedelia and Finally made a couple more turns. “I think I’m almost there,” she called out. But then she glanced down. There was the same red glove. She must have gone around in a circle! “Never mind,” she hollered. “I’m still really lost!”

  “Hold on a minute,” called her mother. “Just listen to me. You know your right from your left, right?”

  Amelia Bedelia stopped. She was studying her watch and began counting down the seconds. “Fifty-nine, fifty-eight, fifty-seven.” Then she asked, “Is my left right different from my regular left?”

  “Nope,” said her mother. “They are the same. Now I am going to teach you a trick that will get you out of any maze. Take one of your hands—right or left—and hold it against the wall of corn as you walk. Always keep that same hand on the wall. Even if you reach a dead end, just keep going with that hand on the wall. You will eventually reach the exit. Okay?”

  “Okay!” Amelia Bedelia called back. “Three, two, one. Your minute is up!” She was getting worried that all the good pumpkins were going to be picked by the time she found her way out of the maze. Her stomach rumbled. She also hoped that there would be some doughnuts left. She kept her hand against the corn wall. Even when she was tempted to go another way, she remembered her mother’s words. And before she knew it, she could see the exit!

  “There’s my girl!” said her father happily when she emerged.

  “Hurry! Let’s go pick the perfect pumpkin!” yelled Amelia Bedelia, taking off for the field. It felt great to be out in the open with the wide blue sky above and pumpkins as far as the eye could see. She looked around at the bright orange pumpkins nestled among the vines, in all shapes and sizes. She wasn’t sure where to start.

  But by the time her parents caught up to her, she had already found a pumpkin she loved, with a sturdy stem and a broad face, perfect for carving. While she helped her parents choose three more for the front of their house, she spotted the cutest little round one sitting by itself at the edge of the field. It looked lonely, so she added it to their pile. Then they headed over to the farm stand.

  “Hey, Mrs. Hawthorne!” Amelia Bedelia called out.

  “Why, hello there, Amelia Bedelia!” Mrs. Hawthorne said, a smile spreading across her face. “Hope you guys had a gourd time at the farm today!” She wiped her hands on her apron and plunked their pumpkins onto a large scale. The arrow bounced back and forth for a bit until it finally came to a stop.

  “Fifty-two pounds,” Mrs. Hawthorne said. “A very nice haul. Will that be all?” she asked, a twinkle in her eye.

  “Of course not!” said Amelia Bedelia. “We’ll take two . . . no, make that three dozen doughnuts.”

  Mrs. Hawthorne laughed. “Let’s hope your eyes aren’t bigger than your stomach, Amelia Bedelia,” she said.

  “That would make a scary costume,” Amelia Bedelia said.

  Mrs. Hawthorne placed three bags of warm doughnuts on the counter. “I’ve been serving your mother my apple-cider doughnuts since she was a wee one!” Mrs. Hawthorne nodded, remembering. “I’m so glad that you are continuing the family tradition,” she said. “It’s fab-boo-lous.”

  Amelia Bedelia’s mother paid Mrs. Hawthorne for the doughnuts and pumpkins, and some cider too. “Speaking of tradition, when will you begin the haunted hayrides this year?” she asked.

  “I wish I had better news,” said Mrs. Hawthorne, handing back the change. “But we had to cancel it this year.”

  Amelia Bedelia couldn’t believe it. “Wait—no haunted hayride? Why not?”

  Mrs. Hawthorne sighed. “Well, it’s quite a lot of work, as I’m sure you can imagine.”

  Amelia Bedelia nodded. “I can.”

  “It got to be too much for Mr. Hawthorne and me, so fortunately, my grandson Sean took it over a couple of years ago,” she continued. “But this year he’s away at college, so that means no hayride.”

  “That’s too bad,” said Amelia Bedelia’s father. “He did a great job.”

  “He really did,” said Mrs. Hawthorne. “But he takes his studies seriously. Though I did tell him that all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy!”

  “I thought his name was Sean,” said Amelia Bedelia.

  “It is,” said Mrs. Hawthorne. “Sean Nathaniel Hawthorne.”

  “Not Jack?” asked Amelia Bedelia.

  “No, it’s definitely Sean,” she said with a laugh.

  “Well, it’s too bad he has so much homework,” said Amelia Bedelia. “My friend Candy was really looking forward to the haunted hayride. She loves Halloween.”

  “It’s too bad our town doesn’t have a haunted house,” said Mrs. Hawthorne. “Now that would really scare your friend silly!”

  “No, that would scare her seriously!” said Amelia Bedelia. She sighed. Why couldn’t their town have a real haunted house? That would make Candy happy, for sure.

  .3.

  Costumes R Us

  “Are you totally, positively sure there aren’t any haunted houses in town?” Amelia Bedelia asked her mother on Monday morning before school.

  “Sorry, cupcake,” said her mother, handing Amelia Bedelia her lunch box and kissing her on the cheek. “But if I’ve told you once this weekend, I’ve told you a thousand times, I’ve lived here my whole life and I’ve never heard a peep from a ghost.”

  “That’s nine hundred and ninety-seven more times than I asked,” Amelia Bedelia protested. “Besides, no self-respecting ghost would peep. A real ghost sounds like this:

  “MMMMMooohWAHhannnnnn!” wailed Amelia Bedelia.

  Her mother shuddered. “That’s the creepiest cry I ever heard,” she said.

  “Let me know if you hear that sound,” said Amelia Bedelia, slinging her backpack over her shoulder and heading out the front door.

  “If I hear a howl like that, you can find me under my bed,” said Amelia Bedelia’s mother.

  Reaching the sidewalk, Amelia Bedelia turned around to wave goodbye to her mom standing in the doorway. Amelia Bedelia smiled at the sight of her own haunted house. Spooky spiderwebs stretched from the bushes up the steps to the front door, where a giant spider perched overhead. Vampire bats hung from the maple branches, ready to swoop down. The pumpkins that she and her parents had carved grinned at her ghoulishly.

  Amelia Bedelia had one more pumpkin to carve, but she wouldn’t carve that one until the competition on Halloween. Each year there were prizes aw
arded for the silliest, the funniest, the scariest, and the most original pumpkins. Amelia Bedelia had never won. She hoped this would be her year.

  A gust of wind set the bats’ wings flapping. Amelia Bedelia shivered, zipped up her hoodie, and headed to school. Maybe she’d carve a bat into her pumpkin. That would be very scary indeed.

  Mrs. Shauk stood in front of the class, writing on the whiteboard. “If Heather has thirteen pumpkins, and Pat gives her eighteen more, but then I accidentally knock over six of them, what do we have?”

  Joy raised her hand, but Cliff blurted out his answer first. “Pumpkin soup!”

  Everyone laughed.

  “Good one,” said Clay. “Hey, how do you fix a broken jack-o’-lantern?”

  Mrs. Shauk sighed. “I give up, Clay. How do you fix a broken jack-o’-lantern?”

  “With a pumpkin patch!” Clay said.

  The class laughed, even louder this time.

  Mrs. Shauk put her finger to her lips. “I know you’re excited because it’s almost Halloween, but you need to settle down. You’re loud enough to wake the dead!”

  Amelia Bedelia shook her head. “That’s impossible, Mrs. Shauk. Plus, the cemetery is way on the other side of town.”

  Mrs. Shauk threw up her hands. “See! You’re all obsessed with Halloween!” She glanced at the clock on the classroom wall. “I give up,” she said.

  “Again?” said Amelia Bedelia.

  Mrs. Shauk sighed. “Tell me about your costumes.”

  “All right!” said Clay. “I’ll give you a clue.” He jumped out of his seat, stretched out his arms, and began to shuffle around the classroom, groaning.

  “A mummy?” guessed Holly.

  “Someone with a bad stomachache who ate too much candy corn?” guessed Skip.

  “Don’t go as a zombie,” said Candy. “Because that’s what I’m going to be.”

  Clay stopped in his tracks, looking disgruntled. “I’m Frankenstein!” he said huffily.

  Mrs. Shauk corrected him. “I think you mean Frankenstein’s monster. Frankenstein is the name of the doctor who built the creature. It’s from a book written by Mary Shelley in 1818.”