They were both shaking in terror as the glistening droplets of water fell from the rungs of the telegraph pole, and sent echoes reverberating loudly around the alleyway, but the two girls carried on with their frightening walk. The pouring rain carried on, filling their minds with dread.

Steph Toms and Louise Badaway were romping through the pouring buckets of water booming down from the ferocious sky. Suddenly, a crying crow swooped down threateningly behind them. The two jumped.

Steph Toms was a boastful girl, with light brown hair, and piercing blue eyes. She was also rather a tomboy, but secretly liked ballet more than her friend, Louise. Louise Badaway was a tall and skinny girl, and her short, deep brown hair was always swept back into a stubby, tight ponytail, which made her forehead look rather large.

The two children felt as if the moon was glaring down at them.

“I don’t like it” admitted Louise.

“Don’t be silly” replied Steph, nervously.

The mysterious trees looked like they were blocking the end of the alleyway, and then, suddenly the two girls heard a piercing squawk behind them. They began running to the end of the alley, their shoes clattering noisily on the sodden cobbles.

As they were sprinting nervously, Louise was thinking about the events that had brought them here...

A few days ago, Steph’s mum had gone to the Pavillion theatre, to direct and rehearse a pantomime that she had written. Meanwhile, she had seen an advertisement for ‘The Heel-Toe Show’: a ballet performance for 12-year-olds and under. She thought that Steph and Louise might enjoy it.

So, here they were, on their way to evening rehearsals of their ballet show, running down the eerie alleyway, that lead to the entrance to the theatre. Finally, something caught Steph’s sharp eye: “Hey, look! At last! I can just make out the outline of the Pavillion! Come on Lou, we’ve got to persevere!”

As the two came closer and closer to their destination, they began to see the great fountain, lit up brightly, as if it was trying to blind them. In the day, it looked totally normal, and welcoming, but in the night, it somehow had a ghostly look to it. Suddenly, they saw the time on the massive clock, fixed to the front of the theatre. It was twenty minutes until their ballet performance! Were they going to get there, and get changed in time? They desperately hoped they would...

Finally. They had reached the theatre. It looked very unwelcoming and eerie. But they had to do it...they were going in...

The lights were off. The entrance hall was pitch black, and for one moment, the girls thought they glimpsed a ghostly figure in the ticket booth. Then it disappeared. Steph thought it must have been a trick of the mind. (Or at least she hoped it was.) Frightened, Steph and Louise edged nervously towards stage eight, where they were performing. Towering over the pair, the huge double-doors were trying to prevent the girls from entering the great stage, as if there was something lurking in the darkness beyond. Louise went first: the doors gave a painful creak as she pushed them open. There stood silently, the massive stage in front of them. Steph leading the way, the two headed backstage. It was very dark, and it felt as if the darkness was closing in on them.

“I hate this eerie corridor” said Louise.

Eventually, they reached their dressing room. Reluctantly, Steph pushed the heavy door open. They had made it. But suddenly, Steph and Louise saw something on the wall. A picture that they had never seen before was moving. It was still extremely dark in their room, so neither of the girls could make out what the picture was of. But they were sure it was moving. They began to get changed. Scared, Steph whispered to Louise:

“Lou, I think we’re in the wrong dressing room...”

Suddenly, the friends heard someone shouting. Then they realised that they were being called for their show!

They sprinted as fast as they could, towards the stage, crashing through any doors they came across. Suddenly, the girls heard a quiet noise, as if something was about to jump out on them. They froze.

“Come on Lou” moaned Steph, in a worried tone.

The audience was staring at the pair as they crept secretively across the back of the stage, to their places. The music started playing. The show had finally started. As she was daintily dancing, Louise was dreading going back to her dressing room, in case there was something (or someone) hiding there.

The performance was over before they both knew it. Soon, it was time to go back to their dressing room. So, reluctantly, they headed back there. When they were walking slowly down the ‘haunted’ corridor, they heard a deafening scream. This was too much for the girls. They turned, and ran faster than both of them had ever run before, into the audience, up the aisle, and out of the huge double-doors, into the entrance hall and out of the main doors...they were out.

“Phew!” exclaimed Steph, out of breath from running.

“That was close!”

Meanwhile, Louise was thinking about quite a different thing...

“Steph?”

“Yes Lou?”

“I know we made it out, but our bags are still in there, aren’t they?”

“In where?”

“In the dressing room...we’re going to have to go back in there, aren’t we?”

Steph said nothing, but she didn’t need to anyway. Her very worried and frightened face said it all.

The next day, at school, another girl called Annie, who had also taken part in ‘The Heel-Toe Show’ with Steph and Louise, ran up to them.

“You’ll never guess what happened last night. When I got changed back into my normal clothes, I found a huge stain on the front of my ballet dress! I felt so embarrassed, I screamed! I must have been wearing that awful stain all throughout the show!”

Steph and Louise looked at each other, smiling.

“And we didn’t have the normal dressing rooms either! It really scared me, ‘coz I thought I saw a moving picture on the wall, but actually, it was just me, staring into the mirror! Oh, and by the way, Lou, I found your bracelet. It was in the corridor, where the dressing rooms are. On the floor. Your must have dropped it.”

“Oh! Thanks Annie...”

Steph and Louise walked away.

“Well then Lou. Our adventure is over.”

“Yes, and I must have dropped my bracelet in the corridor. That was the noise that made us both freeze! Honestly, we are rather silly sometimes.”

The girls were both thinking about how the explanations of last night’s events fitted perfectly, and how silly they both had been, thinking that it was some kind of supernatural being, as the bell rang for morning registration.