Trick and Treat

The celebration of Halloween is a unique one-its negotiable,
breaking away from the thirty-first of October and seeping deeper into
the calendar, not because of its frightening, supernatural nature, but
because Halloween is about convenience, fun, and harmony.

It's about trick or treating, which defines when and what Halloween is,
stripping away the murkiness and mystery.

In the small town of Carrick, Halloween fell on October twenty-seventh.
The flashlights streaked toward beckoning porch lights-the city became
a constellation under construction.

A sliver of moon was lost in the night sky, unseen and uncared about
because it offered no candy. A swollen, ominous moon wouldn't have fit
on this night. Ghosts were only as hideous as the K-Mart sheets that
formed them. Werewolves walked on two feet, staring at their prey with
soft, civil eyes. Freddy and Jason walked right by Barney the Dinosaur
and beautiful princesses without so much as a second, lustful look.
Cowboys walked alongside Indians with silent pistols and un-drawn bows.
Angels and devils put aside their eternal conflict for the sake of
Bazooka gum and Snickers bars.

A night of darkness and fear became swallowed by an overwhelming sense
of playfulness and peace. It filled the air, which was brisk with the
smell of approaching winter.

It was also filled with opportunity, and so far the night had been a
blazing success for Ashley-her bag was so heavy she had to switch hands
every block or so. The burdened shoulder sunk down, buckling under the
delightful cargo, which she sampled early. She couldn't help herself,
and she was too old for her mother to check it.

Trick or treating had tremendous, cute appeal to Ashley and her
girlfriends-at first. They giggled until tears smeared their make-up,
flaunting their costumes at each door. But now embarrassment was
creeping in as night grew more powerful, and it was time to go home,
wash off the make-up, do homework, and go to bed. The cuteness wore
off, so they parted ways.

But Ashley just couldn't resist. Trick or treating was on the
downswing, but a lot of porch lights were still shimmering, and her bag
wasn't full. She walked up to a brick house on the corner, almost sure
she didn't know who lived there, but that was fine by her. Unlike her
friends, she still felt comfortable.

She knocked on the door, which was a rich, boisterous red. It was a
timid knock, but the storm door still echoed back. Just before she
turned to leave, an old woman answered who looked like she jumped off
of a box of cookies, with gray-black hair, a sagging face, and tight,
circular glasses.

Ashley greeted her with an overly enthusiastic, "Trick-or-treat!"
"Oh, why hello dear! You look positively frightening. If you hang on
just a sec, I have something for you, just not handy. I'm all out of
the small candy, but . . . my, how old are you?"

"Seventeen ma'am--me and my friends all went out tonight just to have
fun, you know? It's tough to let go sometimes, I may trick or treat in
college for all I know, but if you don't have anything handy, that's
ok. I'm almost full anyhow . . ."

"Oh no dear I was just asking. How 'bout you step in from the cold for
just a sec, I want Marv to see your costume for one thing, and I'll
have to dig up something special for you, so come on, come right
in."

"Really Ma'am, you don't have-"

"No, I insist! Marv! Marv come in here for a minute, I want you to see
something!"

The old lady walked away from the doorway. Ashley figured that the
situation looked innocent enough, so she stepped onto the welcome mat
inside. Marv, who looked even older than his counterpart, met her in
the living room. Ashley thought he looked so old that he had seen
everything; that getting dragged into the living room to see her was
insulting.

"Woa! You scared the bejesus out of me!" Marv tried his best to imitate
genuine fright, jumping back and clutching his chest with one hand,
flapping the newspaper with the other, but he couldn't help but start
chuckling.

"Lucy, while you're over there you better get me my pills, this one may
give me a heart attack!" Marv was loud and obnoxious, spitting the
words out through bellows of laughter.

All Ashley could do was laugh right back.

"Ahhh, don't mind him, he's such a big goof," Lucy called out as she
rummaged through her cupboard.

"You can have a seat child. Knowing her, she may be in there for hours
trying to find what she's lookin' for," Marv said. He leaned forward,
like he was telling her a secret. "Not as smart as the old man!" he
cried under his breath, tapping his temple with his finger.

"Oh, no I'm ok standing up. If I sit I might just fall asleep, and I
hope she doesn't take too long, I do have a curfew you know," Ashley
said, carefully adjusted her tone so that Lucy wouldn't be
offended.

Marv was positively charmed, chuckling deeply and genuinely, with
snorting noises escaping his nose.

"You hear that Lucy? She has a curfew over here, you might want to
hurry it up!" He was choking back more laughs. Ashley thought he was on
that drug the dentists give out.

"You be quiet." She stepped from the kitchen with a Butterfinger
wrapper gleaming in her hand.

"I hope you like these hon."

"Oh, I do, I do. Thank-you."

"Well, what do you think of the costume Marv?" She dropped the
Butterfinger in Ashley's bag as she looked his way. "And there you go
honey, big candy bar for a big girl."

"That is a dandy one," Marv nodded in approval, his arms crossed. "A
real dandy. Not the candy bar, but the costume. Must've worked for
hours on it, I mean the makeup must've taken a bit, it's well done. And
the robe? You get that at Louie's shop? Or did your mom make it?"

Ashley was laughing a bit a bit now. Actually, she was laughing a lot.
Marv still looked really charmed by the girl in the doorway.

"What? Your mom not a seamstress is she?" Marv said, joining in.

"It's just funny that you ask," Ashley muttered.

"Why?" Lucy said, worried.

"This isn't a costume."

The bag fell to the plush carpet, the door swung quickly shut and
locked. That left Lucy enough time to back into the wall in panic, but
Marv was still laughing, his eyes watered, thinking it was a joke. When
he recovered and saw the raven-haired teenage beauty attacking his
wife, he wasn't laughing anymore. There were thick spurting noises,
slurping noises. They reminded Marv of his grandkids trying to drink a
McDonalds shake.

In a matter of seconds, blood was everywhere, flowing from the fresh
wound in streams, drenching the front and back of Lucy's white blouse.
She slid down the wall as life left her, leaving behind a dark
smear.

Marv was watching with wide-open eyes, but he saw nothing. His heart
had ground to a halt and he was already dead, but that didn't matter to
Ashley. He would still be warm and sweet, like the butterscotch candies
she had earlier.

Full and content, Ashley collected her bag and walked out the front
door like nothing happened-and because of the nature of the holiday,
she could also walk home like nothing happened.

"Halloween," she whispered to herself, brushing shoulders with trick or
treaters as she walked home.

* * *

"Mommy. Mom. Mom!" Frankenstein, who curiously had a mad scientist
walking beside him, was tugging at his mother's coat until she turned
abruptly.

"What!" she snapped.

"Jeez, don't be so grumpy. Did you see that girl's costume? That . .
.was . . . awesome!"

The rest of the children in this particular group nodded in agreement.
She had long black hair, and her skin was perfectly pale. Her teeth
were of course long and sharp, but they weren't white. They had rust
colored stains, and her chin was pinstriped with rivers of blood, from
her lower lip all the way down past her Adam's apple. It must've taken
time, effort, and at least three tubes of the fake stuff to make it
look so real.

There was even some on her robe, which flowed around her in dark
whispers-black, vivid, and trimmed with red. Louie's shop had nothing
so elegant. The yellow contact lenses were a realistic touch to the
whole ensemble. Even her hands matched in pale color, with long,
curving nails that were harder and sharper than they appeared.

"Yeah, yeah I saw it," the mother said. She didn't. She grabbed her
son's hand with a frustrated tightness.

The night was dragging on, and her nerves were wearing thin, but there
was one more visit left to make. She tried to sound very cheerful in
the announcement despite how tired she was, but she was not about to
deprive her son and his friends of the best trick or treat visit of the
night, the one they were all yearning for.

"Come on kids, let's go to Grandma Lucy's house!"

All of them roared in approval.