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    The Haunted Garden
    The Haunted Garden
    The Haunted Garden
    Ebook134 pages2 hours

    The Haunted Garden

    By Noelene Jenkinson

    4.5/5

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    About this ebook

    THE HAUNTED GARDEN is a modern day fantasy adventure.

    A ghost.

    A school girl.

    A family secret.

    City girl, Evie Watson, hates that her family has moved to the small country town of Barralong away from her friends. Until she meets a ghostly being in the garden of a deserted old villa. Evie hears her sad tale and decides on a mission to help the dark soul and set her free.

    With her new friend, Cooper, they snoop around the villa grounds at the risk of being caught. But they can't finish the mission alone. How to convince their parents to believe in a ghost and help them achieve their goal?

    THE HAUNTED GARDEN is a story about dealing with change, the importance of family and believing that sometimes miracles do happen.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherNoelene Jenkinson
    Release dateDec 13, 2018
    ISBN9781386226567
    The Haunted Garden
    Author

    Noelene Jenkinson

    As a child, I was always creating and scribbling. The first typewriter I used was an old black Remington in an agricultural farming office where my father worked. I typed letters to my mother and took them home. These days, both my early planning and plotting, and my first drafts, I write sometimes by hand on A4 notepads or directly onto my laptop, constantly rewriting as I go. I have been fortunate enough to have extensively travelled but have lived my whole life in the Wimmera plains of Victoria, Australia. I live on acreage in a passive solar designed home, surrounded by an Australian native bush garden. When I'm not in my office writing (yes, I have a room to myself with a door - every author's dream), I love reading, crocheting rugs, watercolour painting and playing music on my electronic keyboard.

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      Book preview

      The Haunted Garden - Noelene Jenkinson

      Chapter 1 – Arriving

      How much longer? Evie whined from the back seat of their SUV.

      She was bored. And miserable at leaving all her friends from the private girls’ school back in the city. She wouldn’t know anyone here. This town was so small it didn’t even look big enough to have enough kids for a school.

      They had driven the whole length of the dumpy Main Street of Barralong. Looking out the car window, Evie could see it was more than quiet. It was dead. All small shops with verandas. No big stores and hardly any other people or cars. Only one old lady, a farmer in a truck and a kid on a bike. Where was everyone?

      They were slowing down! Evie grew hopeful and sat up straighter. They cruised past an avenue of huge old trees that shaded it like a tunnel. It looked mysterious. It would be cool to live in that street.

      Instead, Evie Watson’s mother turned and smiled at her two children. We’re here.

      More curious than she would show, Evie crossed her arms and glared out of the car window. About time, she grumbled.

      I know, her mother said with understanding. It has been a long drive.

      Evie’s step father, Freddy, turned into the paved driveway of a big white timber house. A veranda wrapped right around and three wide wooden steps led to the front door.

      Her three year old step brother, Mason, kicked his feet in the car seat beside her and pointed. House.

      Their mother laughed. It sure is, little man. Our new home.

      Both children had inherited their mother’s colouring so he was as blonde as his older half sister, Evie.

      The house looked okay, she guessed. From the outside. Big and old. It wasn’t new or anything. The timber front fence needed painting. Mason would love playing in the garden. A whole bunch of colourful plants were flowering now in early spring. Her mother would know all the names for sure.

      Evie’s mother climbed out of the car and stretched. Frowning, Evie slowly turned the door handle and slid out. She nearly fell over, her legs were so stiff from sitting for hours in the car. Although they had stopped. Once.

      Elizabeth Bailey gently regarded her daughter. What do you think, Evette?

      Evie nodded and pulled a tight smile without opening her mouth. Eventually she muttered, Nice.

      She didn’t want to hurt her mother’s feelings by saying it was horrid because actually that wasn’t true. She just didn’t want to be here. She had already grizzled to her mother a hundred times anyway.

      Who always replied with the same reasonable answer; Freddy’s been offered a great Project Manager’s job. Besides, it’s cheaper living in the country and a quieter life for a family.

      What if she didn’t want a quiet life? She loved the city. Evie’s thoughts drifted back there.

      Her mother had been through a sad time with Evie’s father, Richard Watson. He was never around. But he travelled a lot. When he was home, they argued. Then they divorced. Evie didn’t remember much except hearing her mother crying a lot in her bedroom. Maybe she didn’t want her daughter to see her wet face and red eyes.

      For a while, it was just Evie and her mother. At school she wasn’t so different. Other girls’ parents were divorced, too. Then Freddy Bailey entered their lives. Actually his name was Alfred but everyone called him Freddy.

      Ever since, Evie’s mother’s face lit up. She smiled a lot and Freddy was always around. He held her mother’s hand and kissed her. When they married, Evie got to be a flower girl and dress up in any colour she wanted. Naturally she chose pink.

      Evie’s attention returned to the present. While her mother unbuckled Mason from his car seat, Freddy strode to the house. He leapt up onto the veranda and unlocked the front door. Wishing she didn’t feel so curious, Evie followed. Inside, he drew back curtains and pulled up blinds, letting the late afternoon sunlight flood across the floor in a wide golden band.

      She gaped. This room alone was way bigger than their entire flat back in the city. But then it was empty. The furniture van had left before them early this morning but they had passed it along the way.

      Evie reluctantly felt a light hope in her chest. Maybe all the rooms were like this. Behind her back, she crossed her fingers on both hands.

      Freddy smiled and glanced around the room. Isn’t this something? Elizabeth and I loved it at first sight.

      His voice echoed around the bare space and his footsteps clumped on the timber floorboards as he disappeared through the door and into the hall.

      Freddy and her mother had been away some weekends house hunting for a new family home. Evie and Mason stayed behind in the city with their mother’s sister, Aunt Angela.

      She was pretty cool. She took Evie and Mason for long walks in parks. They ate ice cream and were allowed to spend ages on swings and in the playgrounds. Their aunt had long thick blonde hair piled up into a ponytail that she pulled through the hole in the back of her sports cap.

      She wasn’t married and lived on the fourth floor of an apartment building. It had a great view across the city but there wasn’t much to do. Aunt Angela was a teacher and loved kids but she loved food more and she sure could cook. She let Evie make as much mess as she liked helping in the kitchen.

      Last year they had sliced up lots of vegetables and bought fresh tiger prawns from the local fish market to make a big wok full of stir fry after aunt Angela had travelled to Asia for a cookery school. Then she taught them how to eat it with chopsticks. It ended up with lots of laughter and dropped food until Evie gave up and used a fork. Mason just stuck in his fingers and ate with his hands.

      Next trip overseas, their aunt was going to Paris in Europe for another cooking school. So, recently, they made pizzas and pasta. For afters, they made thin circles of crepes that were so thin that when you held them up to the light you could nearly see right through them. They sprinkled them with cinnamon sugar and squeezed lemon juice then folded them up into small triangles to eat.

      Evie had complained about having to move away from her school and friends. Aunt Angela just said, Well I’m not too happy about my only sister living hundreds of kilometres away either.

      It made Evie stop and think that other people would be affected when the Bailey-Watsons shifted to the country.

      Now, on this day of their arrival, Evie finished daydreaming of all she had left behind and trailed after Freddy, feeling lost in this strange house. A long wide hallway ran from the front door right through the middle. She peered into the rooms either side.

      These are all our bedrooms. Her mother strolled up alongside, carrying Mason indoors. She set him down to scamper and gabble with delight.

      Evie smiled at him. Probably glad to be set free after being trapped in a car seat for hours. She knew how that felt.

      Do I have to share with Mason again?

      Elizabeth Bailey shook her head. Apart from one of these two front rooms with the bay windows that Freddy and I want, you can have any other one you like.

      Suddenly the new house inspection grew a whole lot more interesting.

      In the city, when her Mum and Dad were still married, she remembered her pretty pink bedroom. In a big two storey house with stairs, two cars and a housemaid. Her mother worked in a legal office and did stuff for lawyers but only while Evie was in school. She always picked her up in the Mercedes at the tall private school gates with its motto written in scrolled wrought iron letters on them.

      Freddy’s two bedroom apartment where they lived after he and her mother married had been teeny tiny small. It was all right at first. Evie had a room all to herself.

      After Mason was born, he slept in a bassinette in her mother and Freddy’s room but he was soon big enough for a shiny new white timber cot that appeared in Evie’s room without warning one day. He often woke during the night either needing his nappy changed or being fed or burped. As a result, Evie often had a broken sleep, disturbed when her mother shuffled into the room to tend him.

      Mason finally slept through and Evie sighed with relief. Until he learnt to stand up and rattle the side of his cot every morning. Early. Yabbering Mum Mum Mum or Dad Dad Dad. One of them usually staggered in sleepy, yawning, and whisked him away into their big bed.

      Evie loved it then. The room was silent and hers alone. At least for a while. Now she was to have one all to herself. All the time.

      How to choose? She thoroughly checked out all three with much more interest. The front rooms with their big half moon shaped bay windows and open fireplaces were okay but overlooked the street. She didn’t want a fireplace and both bedrooms further back had huge windows and views out over the garden.

      "I’d like the one on the

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