But if the Bird Lady didn't like people, she did like kids and would almost smile to toddlers and teenagers for generations. Thing was, when they got old enough for their first date, she seemed to forget who they were.

"So remember?" Pandora recounts to the kids gathered around a table in in Sweet Slop's Shop. But the kids all look like they don't want to remember. They just stare at their ice cream. "We were bringing things out from the basement and putting them on the curb!" she goes on, her eyes widening to obsidian moons.

"Yeah!" gushes Nikki, "and you brought out that funny little box!" She stops to remember how it looked. "And we started to turn it over and over, and as we kept looking at it, the box seemed like it got brighter!"

"Don't you open 'a dat box!" booms Red coming over to them with a giant milk shake. "It's gonna be all kinda trouble iffa you doooo!" he chants.

"That's right! That's exactly how she said it!" gushes Nikki.

Pandora nods, startled.

"That's right! I remember," shouts Sissy.

Ah yes, the Bird Lady's mansion. It would have been grand if the Bird Lady ever let her son paint it. But for some strange reason in her strange reasons, she wouldn't. So the old house had no paint, or blistered and chipped paint, to make the whole place dreary up all the three stories, and more. Dreary, ancient, and spooky. It had weathered wood panels and boards rough to the touch. Tall knarled pepper trees and maples threw vaults of shade over the big yard. The yard itself was dappled and laced with slices of sun filtering through.

And the basement was reached from the outside by some stairs at one corner of the back porch. The Bird Lady's son had set a couple piles of musty old books, papers, and clutter just inside the door. The basement itself was huge; as big as the whole house. The kids couldn't even see the end of it.

"It's too creepy down here," said Coach, that fateful day, and pulled his ball cap visor so low over his forehead that he had to tilt his head up to see out. "Let's hurry up and finish this inning so we can go play some real ball!"

"Yeah, it's spooky down here," Nikki said in a whisper. I wonder if there's any ghosts."