Scream Site Read online

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Title 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

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-One

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Chapter Forty-Three

  Chapter Forty-Four

  About the Author

  Copyright

  Back Cover

  Chapter One

  “So, what do you think? Should I go with ‘Taco Tuesday Is a Day Made of Lies’ or ‘Football Team Organizes Book Drive for Local Library’? Those are my two best stories, and I’ve narrowed it down to them. I think. I’m actually not sure.”

  Sabrina Sebastian leaned back in her chair and waited for her best friend, Evelyn Chao, to respond. They sat in Lou’s Brews, the only coffee shop in Port Riverton. It was the hangout spot for everyone in town. From the wooden booths and red tables to the wood-paneled walls covered with pictures by local artists, Lou’s was one of Sabrina’s favorite places. No matter where she was in Port Riverton, it seemed she could smell Lou’s fresh bread baking, and there was nothing like Lou’s coffee. The shop served the best sandwiches, and it was known far and wide for its crab salad, a specialty in Maryland, where everything was crab something or other.

  Evelyn and Sabrina had a table reserved for them every day after school, if they wanted, on account of Sabrina’s older sister, Faith, working there as a barista. It was one of the few nice things Faith did for her these days. Most of the time, Faith just ignored Sabrina, but that wasn’t unexpected. Sabrina had learned that in high school, everyone had a habit of ignoring freshmen, especially juniors like Faith.

  Usually Sabrina and Evelyn pretended to do homework but spent more time watching the comings and goings of people than actually studying. Not today, though. Sabrina was working on her application packet for the Daily Sun summer internship program. It was something she’d wanted to do ever since she was small, and this was the first year Sabrina was old enough to apply. It was a huge deal when her mom agreed that she should go for it, and Sabrina would do everything in her power to make sure she didn’t waste such an opportunity.

  Sabrina tapped her pen against her lips and considered the two articles before her. “I think my exposé about the meat content in the school lunches shows that I’m the kind of reporter who can follow a lead to the end, even one that is kind of gross. But the charity drive story shows that I understand that even good news can be interesting. It doesn’t have to be all scandal and tragedy.” She’d cut the stories out of the school newspaper, the Mount Clare Chronicle, and was trying to decide which one to include with her packet. The application deadline for the Daily Sun summer internship program was just a few weeks away.

  Evelyn groaned. “Why exactly are you applying for an internship, Sabrina? We’re freshman. We’re supposed to be having fun and figuring stuff out, not planning our futures! I kind of think fourteen is too young for an internship. I mean, it’s bad enough my family makes me work at the store, and here you are volunteering for more work. Aren’t internships something that college kids do?”

  Sabrina tucked a strand of her curly brown hair behind her ear and leaned forward. Her brown cheeks were flushed, and her dark eyes sparkled with excitement. What Evelyn saw as work, Sabrina saw as a chance at something. “Maybe, but it doesn’t even seem like work to me. Just think how exciting it would be to spend all summer at the newspaper — shadowing reporters, reading the breaking news coming off the wire!”

  “Getting coffee for everyone and being stuck at the copy machine all day…,” Evelyn said and blew her straight bangs off her face. Usually she had a stripe of some color or other in her dark hair, but today the stripe was just bleached blond as she debated her next color option. Evelyn was just trying to figure out what would scandalize her grandparents the most. They had emigrated to the United States from China a long time ago and were very old fashioned in some ways. They owned Port Riverton’s only grocery store, and Evelyn spent most of her free time there, helping out, along with her parents and brother, Tony. The colored streak in Evelyn’s hair was one of many small rebellions. That rebellious “streak” was one of the reasons Sabrina adored her friend. She sometimes wished she could be as wild and carefree as Evelyn. But Sabrina was the cautious one, and even though that might not be exciting, it kept her out of trouble — and helped keep Evelyn out of trouble as well.

  “Look, Sabrina, no offense, but these stories are boring,” Evelyn continued. “No one wants to read about school lunches or charitable football players. You need a story that will get people to sit up and pay attention. Like this…” Evelyn scrolled through her phone before holding it up for Sabrina to see. On the screen was a story from one of the celebrity gossip websites Evelyn loved: HOTTEST COUPLE IN HOLLYWOOD BREAKS UP — DIVORCE NEXT? the headline screamed.

  Sabrina groaned. “That isn’t news.”

  Evelyn’s eyes widened. “Are you kidding? It most definitely is! This story has over two million clicks. Adam and Leatrice breaking up is the biggest thing to happen since that weird viral photo of Hayley Anderson eating the cake and crying.” Evelyn began to swipe through photos, muttering under her breath about Sabrina’s lack of interest in “current events.”

  Sabrina sighed. “I don’t want to write about Hollywood breakups. That just isn’t my thing. But you’re right, the stories I have here totally make me sound like a kid. I need something more adult, some sort of inside scoop into a real issue that’ll make me stand out.”

  Evelyn nodded along to Sabrina’s words, but her eyes never left her phone. She just kept scrolling through articles, a slight frown on her face. Sabrina waited a moment before smacking her hand down on the table. “Ev, are you even listening to me?”

  “I am! I was looking for something. Here.” Evelyn held up her phone again so that Sabrina could read the screen. It was a different story from the same site, and the picture was of a woman screaming, her eyes wide with fright. SCREAM SITE WORTH SCREAMING ABOUT? the headline read.

  “I can send it to you. This is what you should write about,” Evelyn said, thumbs moving as she scrolled through the story. “It’s this trending website, Scream Site. It was created by Hollywood types who make horror movies, and they’re giving out a huge prize for the video that has the most likes and shares — the most ‘screams’ — at the end of the year. Here, look,” Evelyn said, showing Sabrina a website landing page.

  Sabrina stuck out her tongue. “A website? That’s hardly news,” she said. She’d barely go
tten a glimpse of a page covered in shades of black and red before Evelyn pulled her phone back.

  “No, but what makes it weird is that there are rumors that girls have actually gone missing after posting videos on there. Creepy, right?”

  Sabrina shrugged. “I guess. But Internet rumors aren’t exactly news.”

  “Not usually, but one of the girls who went missing was supposed to be from around here. See, you could take sort of a local angle on a national story.”

  “National rumor,” Sabrina corrected her.

  “Just check out the story. It might be worth your while.”

  Sabrina sighed. “I don’t know. I doubt Mrs. Wembley would be interested in it. She thinks that journalism should be serious, not sensational.”

  “Ugh, that woman is harsh. Did I tell you she gave me a B on my Romeo and Juliet assignment? Just because I called the play depressing. Which it totally is!” Mid-complaint, Evelyn suddenly froze, her eyes locked on the door of Lou’s Brews. “Oh my god,” she breathed.

  “What? What’s happening?” Sabrina asked, turning around in her seat.

  “It’s Asher Grey. Light of my life, most beauteous of boys,” Evelyn said, pretending to swoon.

  Sabrina rolled her eyes and turned back around. “I’m having a crisis here, and you’re staring at unachievable junior boys.”

  “Oh, Asher totally isn’t my type. But that doesn’t mean I can’t appreciate his physical qualities. Look at that golden hair, those eyes as blue as a storm-tossed sea.”

  “Would a storm-tossed sea be blue?” Sabrina asked.

  Evelyn shrugged. “I don’t know, it just sounded good. Anyway, he’s gone now. OK, I sent you the link for that Scream Site story. Check it out. Since one of the girls was from around here, it’d be good for the Daily Sun thing, I think.” Evelyn stood and started to pack up her stuff. “I have to get going, it’s almost five. Tony isn’t home this week so I have to cover for him at the store.”

  Sabrina stood as well. “Yeah, I should get going too. I have a paper to write for history and a new article due to Mrs. Wembley soon. I need to find something to pitch to her.”

  “Write about Scream Site,” Evelyn said, standing up from the table and pushing in her chair. “Seriously, it’s all anyone can talk about right now. Maybe you can use it for both Wembley’s assignment and the internship application. And you can write about something that isn’t serious for a change. Try bold and crazy for once!” Evelyn waved and made her way out of Lou’s Brews.

  Sabrina picked up her almost empty smoothie and drank the rest of it. The café was beginning to fill as the early dinner crowd came in, mothers with strollers and harried-looking career people grabbing a quick bite to eat. Faith caught Sabrina’s eye as she was ringing up a customer. Faith made a quick head motion, almost as though she was trying to get her attention. Sabrina smiled at her sister, but Faith didn’t return the expression. Instead, she frowned.

  After she had finished with her customer, Faith beelined over to the table, a dish rag and bottle of spray cleaner in her hand. Faith had the same dark brown skin as Sabrina, but she was taller and wore her hair in a sleek, chin-length bob. Sabrina’s own hair was a wild mass of curls that hung past her shoulders. She sometimes imagined what it would be like to style her hair like her sister’s. She’d tried straightening it once, but the hours of work just hadn’t seemed worth it.

  As Faith approached, she wore the same half frown that had seemed pinned to her face ever since their father’s death from a heart attack last year. Sabrina sat up a little straighter. “Hey, is something wrong?”

  “Are you going to be much longer? It’s getting close to dinnertime,” Faith said, pulling at her silver necklace and eyeing the leftover plates and cups from Sabrina and Evelyn’s snack.

  “Oh no, I’m done. Why? Did you want to go grab something to eat?”

  “No, I have another two hours on my shift. But if you’re done, you should get going. Lou doesn’t like for kids to hang out too long, and if he finds out I save you and Evelyn a table every day, I could get in trouble.”

  Sabrina tried not to let her disappointment show as she stood. “Oh. Sorry. Yeah, I’m heading out now. I guess I’ll see you at home?”

  “Sure,” Faith said, but she was already focused on the table, clearing the dishes and wiping it down, erasing any trace of Sabrina and Evelyn’s visit.

  Sabrina put on her backpack, looked one last time at her sister, then headed home.

  Chapter Two

  Port Riverton was a small town with a main street and not much else. Lou’s Brews sat next to an insurance office and across the street from Evelyn’s family’s store. The library and police station were just a few blocks down from Lou’s. A few blocks beyond that, through a neighborhood of matching houses, were the high school and middle school. Most everyone Sabrina knew lived in town, but not her family. They lived in a development a couple of miles away, which felt like a hundred miles when it was cold and dark.

  After she had made her way down the country road to her house, Sabrina parked her bike in the garage, feeling a bit trepidatious and a little lonely. Dark windows greeted her like vacant eye sockets. This wasn’t unusual, but just because it was expected didn’t stop her from feeling kind of scared.

  When her father was alive, she would come home to a brightly lit house, with him watching television or making dinner or preparing for the night shift as a detective with the Port Riverton Police Department. But now that he was gone, there wasn’t anyone around when Sabrina got home. Faith was rarely home because she seemed to take as many hours at Lou’s Brews as she could. And if she wasn’t at Lou’s, she was hanging out with her friends or practicing for the dance team. It was like Faith kept herself super busy to keep her mind off other things. And their mom was a nurse who worked extra hours to pay the bills, often pulling back-to-back shifts. Tonight she wouldn’t be home until seven. So it was just Sabrina all by herself, as usual.

  She didn’t normally mind too much, but tonight it felt eerie to enter the quiet house. Maybe she was still thinking about what Evelyn had said about the website. What was it again? Terror Site? No, Scream Site. Girls going missing after using a website sounded like every dumb cautionary tale she’d ever been told. Yet the thought of it made Sabrina feel nervous, like there were murderers around every corner.

  She gave herself a mental shake and laughed at her silliness. There was no way any of this was true. This was what she got for listening to Evelyn’s wild stories.

  And yet, Sabrina still felt unsettled, a chill running down her spine as she crossed the threshold from the garage into the kitchen. Right away she noticed that the stove-top clock was out. She always checked the time as soon as she walked in. The sight of the blank clock stopped her in the doorway.

  Was the power out again?

  She stood in the kitchen and flipped the light switch, but it did nothing. The breaker needed to be flipped, which meant a trip to the basement. Sabrina sighed out loud into the growing darkness. She hated the basement. It wasn’t actually all that creepy, but it was definitely dark. When her dad was still alive, he was usually in charge of resetting the breaker whenever it tripped. With him gone, it was left to whoever discovered the power outage.

  And unfortunately, today that was Sabrina.

  She gave her eyes a moment to adjust to the inky interior before journeying toward the closet and grabbing the flashlight. The stairs to the basement were near the foyer, and even with the flashlight on, Sabrina’s heart pounded in her chest. She hated the dark, and especially hated being alone in the dark.

  She ran down the stairs and quickly reset the breaker like her mother had taught her. Then she ran back up the stairs and through the living room, flipping light switches as she went. She turned on every single one, hoping the golden light would banish the unsettled feeling that had taken her over. It didn’t.


  “Stop being ridiculous, Sebastian,” she muttered to herself. Still, her heart was in her ears, loud as a bass drum as she ran up to her room, grabbed her laptop, and sprinted back downstairs to the living room.

  Sabrina opened her laptop and checked her email. Evelyn had said she would send her a link, and even though Sabrina could’ve read the email on her phone, she liked working on her laptop better. It would be easier to research whether whatever Evelyn had sent her was true. Evelyn loved conspiracies, and she was always sending Sabrina things like “Shark Boy Captured by Fishing Boat” or “Thirty-Two Pictures that Prove the Earth Is Flat.” Sabrina wasn’t sure how many of these things her friend believed, but Sabrina secretly enjoyed getting to the truth behind each story and debunking it. It was why she wanted to be an investigative journalist: Looking for answers was a challenge.

  Sabrina found the email and opened the link. She quickly scanned the article:

  IS SCREAM SITE TOO REAL?

  Parents have complained recently about a new website known as Scream Site. Hosted and founded by the Scarapelli Brothers, directors of such horror movies as Your Blood Is Mine and Hotel of Death 1-4, the Scarapellis state that they founded the site in order to find “the next generation of horror movie directors and talent.” Users are asked to post their own videos as well as vote on their favorites, with the daily top ten posted on the main landing page of the site. The competition is scheduled to run on an annual basis, and the user with the most votes each year wins an all-expenses paid trip to California as well as the chance to have their idea made into a movie by the Scarapellis.

  But some have complained that the site is too real, showing footage of what appear to be actual kidnappings, assault, and torture.

  “My sister is missing and the police refuse to investigate the video that was posted around that time. But I know what my sister looks like — and I think the girl on the video is her,” stated one user, who wished to remain anonymous.

  “The videos are just too much for my kiddos to handle,” said Dhonielle Lee, a mother of four. “They watched one of the videos, and they had nightmares for months! Some of them look incredibly real. It gives me the creeps.”