The October air set chills to their bones as they walked down the dry, grey sidewalk. It was a weekend, Saturday to be exact, and the perfect time to take a walk considering the fact that there were three hours before Halloween took full swing. The five walkers were bundled up in their winter outfits, but still shivering in the bitter wind.

"I d-don't think it's e-ever been this c-cold." The raven haired girl in a hot pink coat muttered from behind her scarf.

"Twenty-two degrees exactly." Her British friend pointed out, looking at a thermometer attached to his trench coat.

"I don't know about y-you guys… but I think I'm gonna reconsider the m-mummy costume." Said a raspy voice.

"Who's idea was it to go on a w-walk in this kind of w-weather?" A higher voice murmured. "I cannot feel my appendages."

"Phineas? You wanted us all to c-come so b-badly."

The red-head darted his eyes over to the girl. "I wasn't expecting a blizzard."

"What did you expect then, hot-shot?" Buford shouted in frustration. The wind tried to carry his beanie off, but he trapped it with his hand.

"The weatherman said it was g-going to be f-fifty degrees." He stated, tightening his scarf. "I thought we m-might scope out the n-neighborhood for good houses to hit tonight."

"In case you haven't n-noticed, Phineas, it's not anywhere close to fifty."

"I noticed."

"Then let's go back." Buford said, rubbing his hands on the insides of his pockets.

Suddenly, white flecks of snow began to fall down in sheets, blurring their vision. It was so sudden, in fact, that there was a burst of cold air that came down upon them, and they all closed their eyes and their teeth chattered.

"Something tells me…" Baljeet began. "We will not make it back."

"We should go in this house." Isabella said, referring to the huge three story building they stood in front of.

"Are you KIDDING?" Buford yelled. "That's the old R-Riley mansion! That place is u-uber haunted!"

"Oh…yes…" Baljeet seconded, turning towards the mansion. "I have heard m-many tales about that place. It is said, that many years ago, a family used to live here, b-but t-there was a tragic fire. All of them passed on except for the small girl, who w-waited for her family to come and rescue her, but was never saved. Although it was rebuilt in honor of the lost souls, the house has remained vacant for three decades." He paused, letting the silence take over as the gang stared at the house in wonder. "But, everyone knows it is j-just a story. Ghosts are not real, they are m-merely figments of our imaginations."

They stayed quiet for a moment longer, just long enough to realize that their feet were no longer visible, and they were standing in six inches of snow. Phineas shrugged. "You heard him. There's nothing to be scared of, Buford. Let's go in. I don't see a No Trespassing sign."

With that, Phineas trudged up the sidewalk that led to the front doorstep. Buford groaned and caught up to them after hesitating for a moment, questioning whether he had the ability to make it all the way back to his house. Isabella kept close to Phineas as they got nearer, examining the mysterious home from the outside. The snowflakes reflected in her eyes like they were two sapphire mirrors.

The pointed boy jumped onto the porch and looked at the ominous wooden door in front of him. It seemed to cast an eerie shadow… one that made the group feel uneasy.

Ferb stepped in front of his stepbrother, closer to the door than anyone else. Buford winced as the grass-haired boy set his gloved hand on the golden knob, triggering a gust of wind to blow across the porch. Two old rickety rocking chairs creaked back and forth with the air. The loose articles of clothing blew backwards, and every one of their winter hats blew off into the snow. Isabella reached for hers, but to no avail.

Phineas blinked. "What a show." He laughed uncomfortably.

Ferb turned back to the knob and turned it, and surprisingly, it opened with ease. The group didn't hesitate from getting out of the horrible weather. They piled in one by one, trying not to let too much of the nasty frigid air inside. Buford was the last to enter, and he slammed the door behind him and leaned against it, letting out a relieved sigh along with the bang.

Inside, it wasn't as freezing cold, but it definitely wasn't cold enough for it to snow. In fact, it was kind of nice and homey. The only bad thing was the fact that it was pitch-dark.

"I cannot see anything!" Baljeet yelped.

Phineas felt something warm latch onto his arm and he froze.

"Phineas? Is that you?" Isabella asked, straining her eyes in the darkness.

Relieved, the red-head relaxed his body and squeezed the frightened girl's hand. "Yeah, Izzy it's me." He too put stress on his eyes, trying to pinpoint the location of his brother. "Ferb? Where are you? Is everyone okay?"

Then, suddenly, a scraping noise filled the crisp air, stunning the teenagers. It sounded like a piece of paper being dragged across a wall.

"What was that!?" Buford's voice could be heard from his position on the floor next to the door.

The sound was heard a second time, and a third, and then with the fourth came a brilliant light and the face of Ferb. He smiled. "I've got some matches."

Isabella let out a sigh of relief.

"Haha! Good thinking, Ferbooch." Phineas complemented. "Let's try to find a candle or something."

The flame glowed in the dark room, and all five faces could be seen.

Phineas looked about the front room with eyes as wide as golf balls. Isabella let go of his arm and he stepped apart from the group. "There has to be something in here that'll give us some light." He looked up at the ceiling, where an old ceiling fan sat, spider webs latched to it from the ceiling. "It really is a shame that no one ever came and lived here."

The boards and rafters holding the roof together shook from the wind outside.

"I guess Halloween will have to be postponed…" Isabella muttered sadly, rubbing her hands together. She blew hot air on them to warm them.

Phineas hummed in disappointment. He crossed his arms as Ferb lit another match.

"Aha!" Baljeet shouted. He turned towards them from a desk that sat in the inside of a study nearby. "I found a candle!" He smelled it. "It is mandarin orange scented." The boy brought it to Ferb, who cupped his hand around the flame and lowered it to the candle's wick. The rope lit instantly, and the flame grew. Ferb blew the match out and stuck it back in his matchbox for safety.

"Cool!" Phineas exclaimed in content. "I'd say we're doing pretty well right now." He smiled and looked at the room again, which was now lit brighter. There was a staircase on either side of him that led to the second floor hallway, where three doors were set an equal distance apart.

"You said a family of four lived in here? It seems to me they could fit a whole army in here." Isabella said.

"Yes, it is said the family consisted of the mother, father, son, and daughter." Baljeet explained. "I have heard this story so many times before, I have it memorized." He shook his head from the annoyance. "Such information is not needed to me."

Ferb walked over to a window that was covered with a white lace curtain, and pulled it back so he could see out. He held the candle in front of him, and made sure not the catch them aflame. The snowflakes still fell down in blankets, swirling about, accenting the patterns of the wind. The yard in front of the house was completely white, and the road was nowhere to be found. The snow was so thick; he couldn't see the houses on the other side. It was like a white sheet had been placed in front of the window.

"I don't think we'll be leaving any time soon." He muttered.

"What do you mean? Is it really that bad?" Phineas wondered, approaching him to look.

"It's basically as if someone took a blizzard away from the poles and dropped it off here." Ferb explained.

Seeing the condition outside, Phineas bit his lip. "How are we gonna get home?"

"We're not." Ferb said.

Isabella and the others widened her eyes. The girl took off her big lug of a coat, and searched through the inside pockets for her cellphone. "Can our moms come get us? Or do you think they'll even be able to get out of the house?"

"I don't think they could get their cars out of the driveway. Besides, our mom and dad went to a Halloween party all the way across town before the snow started. They're probably snowed in too." Phineas said, a frown lining his face.

"That reminds me!" Baljeet said. "My mother went to the same party."

Buford shrugged. "Mine wouldn't care. She probably thinks I'll be out all night getting candy anyway."

"But what about my mom? She was planning on handing out candy tonight. I told her I would be back in the next hour."

"I'm sure she'll understand." Phineas comforted. "Go ahead and call her."

Isabella looked down to her flip phone and found her mom's number. The girl put the device up to her ear casually, but once it got close to her face, she pulled it away quickly and retracted. "Whoa! What the?" She looked at the screen in confusion. "There's some sort of interference. It sounds like someone's on the other end with a high frequency whistle."

"It's the house, I tell ya! It's haunted!" Buford shouted.

"This house is not haunted." Baljeet retorted again.

"It must be the weather." Isabella said as she stuck the phone back in the pocket.

"So we're stuck here all night?" Phineas questioned.

"I'm not going out in that mess again." Ferb put down. "I don't think we could make it an inch without turning into snowmen. It's coming down in thick blankets."

The red-headed fifteen year-old shrugged. "Well, we do have a whole house to ourselves. I'm sure there are beds somewhere. We could pretend like we're stranded on some island and make do with what we have." He giggled.

"That's already happened to us once, and you didn't take it that well." Buford stated. He raised an eyebrow. "You tried to dig a hole through the island for minerals, Dinner-bell. MINERALS."

Phineas rolled his eyes and sighed in aggravation. "No one will ever forget that, will they?"

"I plan on mentioning it in my speech at your wedding." Ferb exclaimed proudly. The candle flickered, making his face glow brightly, and it made the statement all the more humorous.

Isabella giggled behind her hand.

"I can picture it now!" Baljeet laughed. "Use it as an example for bad situations yet to come!"

Phineas frowned and starred at them.

"And when you two get into fights, because it'll happen, it's just what married couples do…" Ferb stated what he would say. "Just remember that island we got stranded on back when we were ten, and pretend that you're both stuck on it, and you can't get off until you've made up. Because that's what marriage is… an island you get stranded on for the rest of your life."

All four boys started to laugh uncontrollably, even Phineas, who covered his face with his hands.

Isabella chuckled and rolled her eyes at the boy's comment. "Marriage is not that bad, guys!"

"It's just a rough draft, I need to go over it and edit things…" Ferb said, smiling slyly.

"I don't think I could ever get hitched. Girls are annoying and needy." Buford murmured between laughs.

Isabella frowned. "Not all of us are!"

"No, not all of you. You're not. You're just self-centered and moody."

Isabella lowered her eyebrows and glared at him. "I am not self-centered! I care about every one of you here! I come and help build things every day, and I never complain about…"She scoffed. "Breaking my nails or getting a bruise or two. I confess to getting a little moody sometimes, but I'm a girl for crying out loud! You're just jealous because I beat you at everything." She ended with a mischievous smile.

The bully pressed his lips together in disapproval.

"Please, Buford, Isabella is one of the best people I know. She cares more about us and the fireside girls than she does air." Phineas said, protecting the girl. Isabella turned pink in the cheeks.

"Gosh, I wasn't even that serious, nerds! You don't have to get all emotional."

"Insulting other people is never a joke, Bufe." Isabella crossed her arms.

"Apologize to her." Phineas insisted. He stared him down.

Buford put his hands out and held them there. "Sorry! Didn't know you would take it that hard…" He said the last part under his breath, and he looked down.

Isabella sighed in aggravation. "Alright well…" She decided to get off of the current subject. "Let's make use of our time. We should go check out the rest of the house. Maybe we'll find something cool."

"Yeah!" Phineas instantly loved the idea.

"We could split up. That way we would cover more of the house faster, and perhaps find more interesting things." The Indian boy suggested.

Buford still grumbled angrily from getting talked down by people lower than his ranking.

"But we only have one candle." Isabella pointed out.

"No, there was a second one in the study." The boy said, and stepped away from the group for a second to fetch it. He disappeared through a doorway, and soon after a small clatter was heard. They could hear the boy feel his way around with his hands on a piece of furniture. After two more seconds, he came back with another candle, this one with a stand and a handle.

"This one says it is zucchini scented… though I cannot imagine why they would make a candle with such a smell."

Phineas stuck his tongue out and grimaced. "Probably just to irritate me, I guess."

Ferb handed him the mandarin orange candle and the boy took it. He looked at it questionably and then back at Ferb. "Wait, who's gonna be in what group?"

Ferb nodded towards Isabella. "You get to be with Izzy. I'll stay with these two and make sure they don't catch the place on fire for a second time."

"Hey, you're the one with the matches." Buford commented.

Ferb raised a finger. "Ah, yes." He reached into his pocket and retrieved the matchbox. He took out what he guessed were half of the sticks and handed them to his brother. "Just in case the flame goes out."

Phineas happily took the matches and stuck them in his jean pocket, having nowhere else to stash them. "Alright. I guess it's settled then. We'll meet back right here when we're done, and I guess then we can talk about finding somewhere to sleep… that is, if the snow hasn't stopped yet."

"That sounds like a plan." Baljeet exclaimed excitedly.

"You people are talking about this as if it's some kind of playground! What if we see something we can't explain? What if somebody gets possessed? That ain't somethin' to laugh about!" The bully again raised his voice.

"Buford, if you see a ghost, then you tell me and I'll shoot it with this." Ferb held up a spaced-out ray gun that looked like it came off of The Jetsons. "It deteriorates any sign of other-worldly manifestations."

"You're lucky Ferb was gonna be a ghost hunter for Halloween." Phineas giggled.

Buford instantly became less fidgety. He relaxed his shoulders. "You two go way too far with your costumes." He eyed them.

"It makes Halloween so much cooler if you actually are the thing you want to be." The red-head explained.

Ferb stuck the gun back in the inside of his trench coat.

"Anyway…" Isabella said, trying to get rid of the others faster. "Phineas and I will take the left side of the house, and you guys can take the right.

Ferb nodded.

"Let us start with the study!" Baljeet led.

Ferb bowed off and turned away as the Hindi teenager slipped into the room again.

Buford murmured something about horror movie clichés as he followed the British one.

After they all were well into the room, Phineas turned his head to face Isabella. He put on a smile that she read as a daring one, and so in turn she smiled and flashed her eyelashes twice.

"I guess it's just you and me, huh?" The boy stated.

Isabella beamed. "Yep!"

"Come on! Let's go try to find the kitchen."

The boy held the candle up in front of him, and he glanced down a hallway worthy of inspection. Isabella stepped forward with one foot and bravely slid her hand in his. Their fingers interlocked and the warmth of his hand sent a nice feeling though her cold one. He looked back at her, his eyes brightened with a spark of adventure. He smiled at her. "Are you up for it?"

"Right behind you, silly boy." She said happily.