👻Just One Last Time! 🎃

 

 
            Floyd, I kid you not, and Ricky, were both 13 years old. It took some convincing, but they managed to talk both sets of parents into the idea that it would be OK one more time. They wanted to do the thing one last time. In some cultures, 13-year-old boys are officially men, and they knew that. Men don’t go trick or treating.
            Darkness comes early at the end of October. It was a rainy fall too. When Floyd came to pick up Ricky at his house, the wind blew up the road. Big cold drops of rain hit them full in the face.
            “You sure you want to do this?” said Ricky, zipping up his jacket and shivering. His plastic bag was in his pocket. His costume was his dad’s beret and a mustache made of eye makeup.
            “Last chance, Ricky. We better make the best of it,” said Floyd, who was shivering a little too. His costume was a red bandana over his mouth and nose, like a bandit in a cowboy movie. His blond hair was back in a stubby ponytail. He had twenty pounds and four inches on his friend.
            “We don’t have to stay out all night. Some people might even tell us to go away,” laughed Floyd.
            Ricky lived at the edge of the sticks. Floyd had to hike from his development, clear out there to pick Ricky up. Once they were out on the road the night felt wild. From time to time the rain let up, and the moon granted them a little pale light.
            No other kids were out there.
            “Do you want to walk back to my street and start there, or here?” said Floyd, glancing up and down the road. “Does anybody live here?”
            “We do. There’s one other place. I don’t know them, but there is a long driveway into the trees, and there is a house down there. We could try there,” said Ricky. “We just walk back the way you came, and turn in by the mailbox.”
            In about a quarter of a mile the mailbox appeared on the right side and beyond it was a dark driveway leading off into a stand of firs and alders. No light was apparent from the road.
            “OK, remember this was your idea,” said Floyd.
            They could hear their own steps squishing through fallen leaves and muddy gravel. It was a long driveway. When they were about halfway down to the house it felt like the forest closed in around them.
            Eventually, a small old house appeared. There were two dull lights. One on each side of the door. This place looked like somebody had built it himself in the 1950s or something. It had one single story, a corrugated metal roof, and a two-step porch made of lumber.
            There was a window on either side of the door. Each was comprised of two horizonal panes. There seemed to be a light deep inside the house somewhere.
            “I don’t know,” said Ricky.
            “Their porch lights are on. They must expect kids,” said Floyd.
            Floyd stepped up first and knocked. They waited for like two minutes, feeling slightly foolish, like someone would laugh at them for this.
            The door opened slowly. An older lady in a terrycloth bathrobe stood before them. Her salt and pepper hair was in curlers, not that either kid knew what those things in her hair were. Her robe was red. She had homemade knitted slippers with pompoms on her feet. She looked surprised. Her eyes were black, like maybe she was Italian or something.
            “Trick or treat!” said Floyd cheerfully. Ricky grimaced.
            “Oh!” said the lady. “Wait here.”
            Three more minutes passed. “Maybe we should go,” whispered Ricky.
            But she came back. She had a Tupperware box in her hand. In it were pink and chocolate cupcakes, wrapped in saranwrap, and some big pieces of fudge, also wrapped in saranwrap. She held the box toward them.
            “Help yourselves,” she said. “I made them today.”
            This was not how Floyd and Ricky had expected Halloween to go, but they each took a cupcake and a piece of fudge and put them in their plastic bags.
            “Thank you, ma’am,” said Floyd. “Happy Halloween!” As they turned to step down, she winked, and slowly closed the door.
            Neither spoke as they walked back down the driveway. Halfway back to the road, Ricky said, “I don’t know, man. Do you think we should eat this stuff?” But he was laughing, and they both got the giggles. 

            “Wow!” said Floyd. He glanced back down toward the house. But now, he saw only night down there. No porchlights shone in the darkness. Like the place had never even existed.
            “Hey, look, she turned out the lights!” said Floyd. He had a funny feeling in his stomach.
            “No! Look!” said Ricky. “There’s a light or something.” And there was. Right behind them, hanging in the air, a dull orange sphere, casting no light, glowered silently. Softball sized.
            “I’m done. I don’t need this!” said Floyd. “Time to go!”
            But as Floyd and Ricky turned back to the business of getting to the paved road, it seemed as if some presence paced them, just a bit off into the trees. Heavy footsteps walked when they walked, and stopped when they stopped.
            “Somebody’s messing with us,” said Floyd, quickening his steps.
            “You hope. I’ve heard some stuff,” said Ricky, walking just as quickly.
            “Nah, don’t start that, Ricky!” said Floyd, as they broke out onto the road by the mailbox, which, by the way, had no name or number on it.
            Things went better in Floyd’s neighborhood. Nice square blocks were full of Halloween decorations, brightly lit porches, laughing groups of kids. There were little kids with parents. Dogs barked here and there. The rain quit, and it turned into a very nice night.
            Ricky enjoyed Floyd’s neighborhood, and they each got a disgraceful amount of candy. Neither gave a thought to the saran wrapped cupcake and fudge getting smashed in the bottom of their bags.
            It was after eleven when Floyd and Ricky walked back to Ricky’s place. Floyd was going to spend the night with Ricky at his house.
            Once more they walked the dark country road. No one was out there. The clouds closed back in and the wind came up again. Both guys were tired, sick of candy, and glad to get into Ricky’s nice warm house with bright lights and cheerful parents.
            “So, where did you go?” said Lucy, the mom. “Get lots? Let’s see! Oh no! That’s ridiculous!” she laughed.
            “The first place we went was weird,” said Ricky. “It was right down the road on the right side down a real long driveway.”
            “You should have seen the lady!” said Floyd. “She had things in her hair, and was wearing a bathrobe.” He was giggling again. “She was real old and scraggly!”
            “Where do you mean, Ricky?” said Lucy, quietly.
            “By the mailbox, just down there a little way,” said Ricky. But he didn’t look happy.
            “Ricky, honey, nobody has lived in the old Lambert place for twenty years. I don’t know what you mean,” said Lucy. “Nobody could have been there. The house isn’t even inhabitable.”
            “No, really, mom. She gave us cupcakes and fudge,” said Ricky. “I’ll show you.”
            So, both guys dumped their bags out on the kitchen table, and there at the bottom were the squashed, saran wrapped cupcakes and fudge.
            “I wouldn’t eat them even if they weren’t squashed,” said Floyd.
            “Me neither,” said Ricky.
            With a shudder, Lucy unwrapped the cupcakes and the fudge and put them down the garbage disposal.
            Neither kid mentioned the footsteps in the dark driveway.

💚🎃💚