For one thing, Filomena only had a tiny little television, which she kept in an upstairs bedroom. And the room was kind of cold, and it was hard to watch football on such a small screen. Not that his dad had one of those wide-screen TVs like the one in his friend Scott’s family room, but at least it was a reasonable size. Filomena’s was pitiful.When he complained about it, she wasn’t sympathetic, either. She told Billy no one had ever watched TV during all the Thanksgivings her parents had hosted in this house, and if he wanted to watch it, he’d just have to make do with the TV she had. He offered to hike through the woods to his house to watch the game there—he promised he’d be back in time for dinner—but his dad said no.Then she had this music going, Beethoven or somebody like that, a bunch of violins in an orchestra. Dad said it was great music and Billy ought to give it a chance, but it sounded really boring to him.And then he was stuck playing with Gracie, because Dad insisted on helping Filomena in the kitchen and there was no one else to play with.But Gracie actually came up with a good idea: “Let’s see if we can find the spirits.”The last time they’d been at Filomena’s house, on Saturday, he’d been inside for only a few minutes, long enough to eat some cookies and watch Gracie fall asleep on the couch.
