"Come along and quit dawdling!"

Quick and light on her feet, RaRa fluttered from one random box to another with Gill starting to open random boxes, curiosity flaring bright.

"Hey RaRa, remember this Jack in the Box that you tried to scare me with and you ended up getting your finger caught in? Your finger really turned many shades of black and blue… and that sickly shade of purple, blue and yellow after."

"Hurmph" she replied in mock grumpiness.

"But those were really good times, huh?"

"The best."

They started shoving each other about. There was a pause when Gill accidentally knocked over a box which fell open with a crash. The umbrella was at the bottom of the mess.

"Attaboy! You found it!"

"Oops! Luckily no one's home or we would…"

Gill paused mid sentence, for suddenly he realised that there was the sound of footsteps coming from the floor above.

No one should have been home. But then someone was.

It couldn't be a ghost could it?!

Gill shook his head, unable to take in the possibility of yet another ghost, despite the evidence of the existence of ghosts with one, large as life (ahem, death), standing right next to him.

The sound of footsteps started to move towards what would have been the door of the room upstairs.

Slowly. Haltingly. Step by step.

Plus. Ghosts don't walk right? They glide? Silently? The books say so!

Gill decided in a flash that this wasn't the time to linger and contemplate what ghosts could or could not not do. His concern lay in other areas. Such as… not getting caught, by a ghost or human.

He tried to shove its contents back into the box.

Lightning flashed. And thunder boomed.

The creak of the door knob turning upstairs, sounded loud in the silence of the house, between loud, ear splitting booms of thunder.

Step. Step. Step.

"RaRa! We gotta go!" Gill whispered urgently.

Step. Step. Step. Step. Step.

He reached blindly behind him to try to grab RaRa’s hand. Only to find her couched down and cowering in fear.

"No. Please."

"RaRa! We can't stay here. RaRa!"

"No, don't…"

Gill tried to get RaRa to move, but was unsuccessful. He looked frantically around, trying to find an exit. But boxes stacked against the window, blocking their only other means of escape.

Step. Creak. Creak. Step.

That someone was coming down the stairs.

"Hello?" Aunty's voice rang out in fear. "Is anyone there?"

Gill heaved a sigh of relief. It was only Aunty. Maybe, if he explained that he missed RaRa so much that he crept back here, she might forgive him for the intrusion.

Step. Step. Creak. Step.

A light rain had started pattering against the glass window panes.

"Anybody there?" Came Aunty's timid voice again.

He stood up and brushed dust off his sleeves, all ready to throw himself at the mercy of Aunty.

Step. Step. Pause.

He felt a tug and saw RaRa frantically shaking her head at him. Scared out of her wits.

"No," she whispered. "No..."

RaRa was usually fearless. But this RaRa was so scared, trembling and seemed stuck, unable to move.

Something was seriously wrong.

Gill's brain kicked into overdrive and he quickly scanned the room. The only solution left to him was to hide and hope that Aunty would find nothing amiss and go away.

Step. Step. Step. Creak.

"Hello?" Aunty's voice sounded worried.

Lightning stuck again and thunder boomed.

Gill took the opportunity lent by the brightness of the lightning to scan the room again.

Step. Step. Pause.

It seemed like Aunty had reached the first floor.

"Is someone there?" grew a little sharper and a little less timid.

There!

At one of the dark corners he spotted a gap between the boxes that looked like a small tunnel.

He frantically dragged RaRa and shoved her before him through the tunnel. He tried his best not to collapse the tower of boxes while frantically trying to shift the front most box to hide the entrance to their hiding space.