Below the Surface
()
About this ebook
A thirteen-year-old boy finds a pocket watch linked to a local legend about a lost treasure.
Theo is happy spending his summer searching the river for treasure. Even if he mostly just finds empty cans and fishing lures. But when he discovers a pocket watch in the waters beneath a bridge that's said to be haunted, he is sure his luck has changed. Theo soon learns that the pocket watch is linked to a local legend about a ghost and buried treasure. Theo is determined to solve this mystery and posts his progress online. Even after he receives an anonymous threat telling him to leave things alone, Theo continues to dig deeper. He learns that the death of a traveler decades earlier may not have been an accident. And that there’s someone out there who will stop at nothing to keep the truth buried.
Allison Finley
Allison Finley has a BFA in creative writing from the University of British Columbia. She works as a freelance writer and editor. Allison gratefully lives next to a river just outside of Vancouver, British Columbia, on the ancestral, traditional and unceded territory of the Kwikwetlem First Nation.
Related to Below the Surface
Related ebooks
Willpower Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAna Historic: A Novel Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Climate Change Revised Edition: A Groundwork Guide Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsI Have to Go! Early Reader Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTank & Fizz: The Case of the Slime Stampede Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Star Eaters Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Stilt Jack Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Fire Station Early Reader Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMeet Hedy Lamarr: Asha and Baz (Book 2) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSerpents and Other Spiritual Beings Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMin Hayati Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsIn Those Days: Shamans, Spirits, and Faith in the Inuit North Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5You Might Be Sorry You Read This Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Sipster's Pocket Guide to 50 Must-Try BC Wines: Volume 2 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsGood Morning, Sam Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Voices of Inuit Leadership and Self-Determination in Canada Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLike This: Stories Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Let Sleeping Dogs Lie: Dirk Daring, Secret Agent (Book 2) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDirk Daring, Secret Agent Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5No-Nonsense Guide to Human Rights Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Griffin Poetry Prize 2005 Anthology Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Griffin Poetry Prize 2008 Anthology Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLittle Wolf Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Thomas' Snowsuit Early Reader Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsGlobalization: Buying and selling the world Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBlue Portugal and Other Essays Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFamily Walks and Hikes in the Canadian Rockies - Volume 1: Bragg Creek - Kananaskis - Bow Valley - Banff National Park Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsNo-Nonsense Guide to Science Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Polemical Judo: Memes for Our Political Knife-Fight Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFamily Walks and Hikes of Vancouver Island — Volume 1: Victoria to Nanaimo: Streams, Lakes, and Hills from Victoria to Nanaimo Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Children's Ghost Stories For You
The Griffins of Castle Cary Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Terrifying Tales to Tell at Night: 10 Scary Stories to Give You Nightmares! Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Bridge to Terabithia Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Graveyard Book Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Ophie's Ghosts Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Scritch Scratch: A Ghost Story Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5What Lives in the Woods Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Ghost of the Bermuda Triangle Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Scary Stories 3 Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Bed Time Stories Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Ghost Collector Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Girl in the Locked Room: A Ghost Story Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Long Lost Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Spirit Hunters Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Major Monster Mess Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Nightmare Hour: Time for Terror Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Bubble Gum Blob Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSchool of the Dead Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Just South of Home Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Septimus Heap, Book Six: Darke Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Campfire Stories Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5A Dog Called Homeless Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Ghost Stories for Kids Age 9 - 12 Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Campfire Stories for Kids Part 3: A Scary Ghost, Witch, and Goblin Tales Collection to Tell in the Dark Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSandPeople: An Across Time Mystery, #1 Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Hide and Don't Seek: And Other Very Scary Stories Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Who Wants I Scream? Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsScary Stories for Young Foxes: The City Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Nightmare Hour TV Tie-in Edition Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5
Reviews for Below the Surface
0 ratings0 reviews
Book preview
Below the Surface - Allison Finley
Chapter One
Something bad happened in my town a long time ago.
I don’t believe in ghosts, but my best friend, Syd, swears that last September she spotted the one said to haunt Sawyer’s Bridge. She was walking home after dark when she saw a figure in a long coat crossing the bridge toward her. When the man got halfway across, Syd blinked and he was gone. Lots of people have seen him over the years, but no one can agree on why he’s on that bridge or what he’s waiting for.
The way I see it, if there is a ghost, we have something in common. We both haunt the bridge. There’s no need to get in each other’s way. He can have the night, and I’ll take the day.
Now that summer break has started, I’m out here almost every day, searching for treasure. There’s a boat-rental place upriver where people launch rafts and kayaks. Thing is, they aren’t too careful and tend to drop sunglasses and phones and even wedding rings into the water.
I find them in the silt and do my best to return them to their owners. Phones are easiest, as long as they still turn on. And for anything I can’t identify, Syd’s dad is always happy to help. He runs the local pawnshop and keeps a lost-and-found box for all the stuff I bring in.
Today, though, there aren’t any phones. The almost-noon sun bakes my bare shoulders, but it feels nice after the cold river. The empty cans and fishing lures are laid out on the wooden planks of the bridge. It’s the least impressive photo shoot ever. There isn’t even a cool lure in the bunch, just plain weights and hooks. But I log everything, even the boring stuff, on my social feed.
There are a bunch of us who look for lost things, but the serious ones are looking for old stuff. They take their metal detectors through fields, searching for history. Sometimes they go places where important things happened a hundred or more years ago. I’d like to try that someday, but I like my river. It’s familiar. It comes from the mountains and flows out to the sea. For this brief stretch under the bridge, all the possibilities it carries are mine…if I can catch them.
Except there hasn’t been anything interesting for a while. I’m starting to feel a little lost myself.
Just as I’m taking the first picture of my finds, I hear something that freezes the water on my skin.
A horrible laugh carries over the rush of the river.
Oh no.
My heart kicks into high gear. I sweep the cans and lures into my mesh bag, along with my phone in its waterproof case, and jump feet first into the river. My swimming goggles flap around my neck. It’s only fifteen feet to the water. I dive from the highest board at the pool, no problem. But the pool is deeper.
The water catches me, bouncing me up and down, and it takes me a second to find my place in the current. I kick to the surface and break into the air with barely a gasp. A dozen bike tires rumble over the uneven boards of the bridge. The boys on the bikes are still cackling like hyenas, but they don’t notice me. Only one of them glances at the puddle the cans and I left on the wood. He doesn’t look further.
They don’t see me this time.
I lie back, my toes catching the breeze above the surface, and let the river carry me away. My heart is still pounding at the near miss, and I need a moment to breathe. My mom says I’m conflict averse.
She doesn’t say it like it’s a bad thing, but it doesn’t feel good. I don’t like arguments or fights or any kind of confrontation. They make my heart beat fast when I’m standing still, and I can’t think straight.
What can I say? I’d rather go with the flow.
I manage to get my goggles back on without too much water inside them. I flip over to scan the riverbed drifting by under me. Among stones and tangling river plants, a half-crumpled can catches the sunlight. When I dive down and pluck it, a cloud of silt puffs up. I’m already moving on as I shove the can