Suzie could not go to the party because

Suzie had lost her trademark smirk. A frail pink mouth quivered in its place. Her green eyes sparkled in the firelight, the naive naughtiness now absent. She was holding back the rest of her story, almost as if she wasn't sure if it was fiction anymore. Our touching knees parted. Karl accidently knocked over a can of Budweiser and we lost unity. The energy dispersed around the ritualistic circle and I stared back at Jack who was using subtle hand gestures to suggest we escape. I started to sober up, but the night had felt sober for Suzie ever since she started this horror story. Nobody had the guts to ask her what happened next. We leant in but still nobody said anything. The flames illuminated the cemetery landscape behind her; gigantic forest trees created a fortress miles deep surrounded by a locked gate. Our breath disappeared into the thick enchanting smoke before us and our bodies shivered. Suzie gripped Jack's hand and behind his blond bangs his eyes closed as if affected suddenly by her contact. I closed my eyes too; partly to hide my envy, partly to recall the story already revealed. We were only a few blocks away from the ghost story setting on the edge of town. Four months ago there was carnage on the streets due to a change of government. Military gas masks cloaked the identity of so many alienated, senseless yobs. Feisty riots broke out and youthful hooligans took to torching and looting local stores and homes. I don't even think they knew what they were fighting for; they just wanted to be part of something anarchistic. Luckily enough, nobody we knew was injured. But House of Reeves, an ancient, discount furniture store, was burnt to the ground. It was as if the fire services were just avoiding it, a conspiracy theory for the local government to use it for a new commercial fast food joint. It had been there for years beforehand so it was already decrepit and nobody ever went inside its enormous complex. It was on the verge of being disused. My dad told me that where it stood was a portal to another world from the past; but that rumour was only spread to make our hometown sound more thrilling in bedtime stories. The most recent owners, twins late in their eighties, were surprisingly proud of the building and lived together in the attic above the store. It had been passed through his family for generations-their great-great grandfather Edwin being the founder sometime in the mid nineteenth century. And Suzie had said that ever since the violence occurred, no trace of the twins has been discovered. There is no news report remembering their endangered lives, or copies of their death certificates; their existence was never acknowledged. Although, on the last of the CCTV footage, the brothers were seen clambering up the stairs to safety. No deceased bodies were found in the wreckage where a wasteland now remains; despite the later police interviews which claimed that male screams were heard from the attic as the perpetrators fled the scene. One of the more curious arsonists looked up at the window before he ran. Police were sceptical that it would have been too smoky and late in the evening for him to have seen in the deceptive firelight, but he reported that through the darkness, there was a grey haired gentleman standing peacefully still, the flames roaring behind him and the smoke slinking around his dated three piece suit. The man's lack of expression troubled the young boy; he didn't seem to be affected by the destruction. His paranoid friends kept yelling at him to leave the scene but the last thing he saw was the old gentleman extending his finger toward him sternly. Suzie said it was the ghost of Edwin Reeves. I realised that for a while it had been silent and intense. Karl looked agitated and asked if Suzie thought the boys had been cursed by Old-Man Reeves in the window. Aurora laughed and nearly fell into Jack's arms. Suzie said it was only a scary ghost story and nobody had died in that fire anyway. Besides, the arsonists had got what they deserved and were locked up in jail now, so what was the point