Snap. Snap. Snapsnapsnap. The guy took a bunch of pictures with his smart phone and then sat back down, fiddling with his keypad all kinds of different ways.
“We just want to send these back to corporate headquarters,” he said, not even glancing back up at me. “Get their approval before moving forward with the process…”
I stood there, listening to the grumbling from the rows of chairs to my left. I guess the kids who had been waiting weren’t too happy about all the attention I was getting. Humph, I thought, maybe you should have been born with rounder heads.
There were more pictures to take, more forms to fill out, and finally Cara had to whip out her phone and call my stepdad, Gary, to come down and fill out some more papers. Mom was away on business, so he was pretty much it for my “legal guardian,” as the man behind the picnic table kept saying.
He wasn’t too happy about it, at first. That is, until the man behind the picnic table told him the modeling contract was worth ten thousand dollars. Then he signed on the dotted line, as often, and as quickly, as he was asked.
Only Cara had the forethought to ask, “Sir, if I may, what company is this all for?”
He stood and smiled, shaking her hand. “Why, little lady, we are proud to offer your friend here a lifetime contract as the new face of Happy Holidays Pumpkin Pie.”
“I love those pies,” Gary said, nudging me with his shoulders like maybe I should back him up on this. I took a step or two away from him and did nothing of the sort.
“Me too,” said Cara.
“Me too,” grumbled some sad, lonely kid from the folding chairs before his Mom finally took him home.
“For real?” I asked, when I could pick my jaw up off the ground.
The woman smiled, winking at her partner. “Yes, Ralph. Fact is, sales are down and we’re trying a new… strategy… to pick them back up.”
The man stepped in again. “We’re hoping, Ralph, that you’ll be our secret weapon when the holiday season comes this year!”
Gary rubbed my head, which I think is the first time the man ever touched me since meeting my mother three years earlier. “I guess that big round head of yours finally paid off, huh Ralph?”
I blushed, but… for once, the big jerk was kind of right.
“Of course,” said the man from Happy Holidays Pumpkin Pies. “We’ll need to do an entire makeover on Ralph before we launch our big Halloween ad campaign, so… if you don’t mind, Mr. Pepper, we’ll take it from here.”
“What?” I asked as the man and woman came from around the tables and stood on either side of me.
“Well, we can’t do a proper makeover here, in Nightshade. We’ll have to take you back to our corporate headquarters in Washington and give you the full treatment.”
“Gary?” I asked, voice catching.
“I’m sure it will be fine,” said Gary, smiling at all the zeroes in the advance check the man had given him. “I’ll call your mother and let her know your big news…”
“Cara?” I asked.
She turned, face a little frozen, smile fixed. “Well,” she said, reaching for my hand and clutching it tightly. “It happens. Remember when I had to go to that pageant school all the way down in Miami last summer?”
“Yeah,” I nodded. “But… but your Mom went with you that time, right? I mean…”
“Now, now,” said the woman from Happy Holidays Pumpkin Pies, taking my other hand and dragging me away. “It’s just a little nip here,” she said, pinching my cheek, “And a tuck there,” she said, pinching the other. “Nothing to worry about, my dear.”
And then, everything changed. I had to say goodbye to Gary and Cara and the folks from Happy Holidays Pumpkin Pies led me away, down a back hall, to a black van, where they sat me in the back.
“Now,” said the man, adjusting some knobs and dials on the wall of the van. “You’re going to feel a little groggy, but it’s nothing to worry about…”
“W-w-wait, what?” I stammered as he shut the van door and locked it tight behind him. In no time little nozzles popped out of the roof and a fine mist fell all over me. I coughed a little, and the back of my throat stung and my eyelids got real heavy and then… nothing.
The whole world went black. I woke up hours, days, I dunno, maybe even weeks later in a hospital room. Only, we weren’t in a hospital.
We were back in Happy Holidays Pumpkin Pie headquarters, and my makeover was complete. I sat up, my head feeling so heavy I could hardly hold it up.
The man and woman from the modeling audition were there, waiting, only this time they were in lab coats. They smiled. “Perfect,” said the woman, to the man, not to me.
“Better than we could have expected,” said the man, to the woman, not to me.
“And his head was already so round, the plastic surgeons hardly had to do any re-sculpting,” said the woman.
“I love the eyes,” the man said, inching closer. He had plastic gloves on, and reached out to gently touch my face.
“Ouch,” I said, my skin feeling tender and bruised beneath his fingers.
He turned to the woman. “It will probably be sore for a little while,” he said, to me. “Look at this coloring,” he admired. “It’s perfect.”
“What coloring?” I asked, my voice sounding thick and strange to my ears.
The woman inched closer, still talking to the man. “I love how they used his real hair to make the stalk up top, and that green they permanently dyed it with is really powerful.”
“Green!” I shouted, leaping out of bed. “Permanent!”
My legs were unsteady on the cold tile floor, and I was only wearing a hospital gown. The air felt cold on my exposed backside as I raced into the bathroom, looking for the closest mirror.
When I found it, I gasped. The man and the woman stood at my back, whispering to themselves in clenched, tight little voices. Then the man said, “Now, it’s still a little puffy, but it’s going to look even better when the swelling goes down.”
“Puffy?” I asked, slurring through thick, orange lips. And now I could see why: They’d cut my mouth open and sewed it together to look like… like… a jack o’ lantern.
Big and wide, and my eyes had been reshaped to look like giant black triangles. My skin had been dyed orange, my hair green and they’d carved little stripes up and down my cheeks to make me look just like… like… a pumpkin.
No wonder they were so excited about my big, round face that day back at the modeling audition!
“What did you do?” I asked and, when I whirled around, the man was holding out paperwork.
“It’s all quite legal,” he said, pointing to my stepfather’s signature at the bottom of about a dozen very scary – very official – looking forms.
“And,” said the woman, nodding as I turned to face them, sagging against the sink at my back, “what’s done is done, so… I’m afraid you’ll just have to get used to it.”
“Used to it?” I asked.
“But I’m a jack o’ lantern!”
“Correction,” said the man, a hard edge to his voice. “You’re a male model!”
* * * * *
Story # 3:
King Dumpster
“Why do you have boxer shorts in your trick or treat bag?”
I cringe and turn around to see Violet Himple (rhymes with pimple) standing in the middle of the alley, hands on the hips of her flaming red and yellow Gamma Woman costume.
“And why are you quitting trick or treating early when there’s still another few streets to go?”
I ignore her and keep walking, trying to outpace her but it’s hard in my stupid fat Frankenstein boots. Oh, why didn’t I go as a ghost instead? I could have already been there by now!
She catches up in a hurry. “Hey, Dexter Riley, I’m talking to you.”
I stop and face her. She had a growth spurt last year in fourth grade so this year she’s almost as tall as me. “I… they’re not boxer shorts.”
She sm
irks, yanking them out of the top of my Halloween cinch sack. “I can see them sticking up right here.”
She waves them in my face, a pair of white boxer shorts covered in candy corns. They must have gotten rearranged when I was leaving the last trick or treat house on my block.
“Oh, uh, Mrs. Johnson was giving them away for trick or treat,” I lie, hustling away again. Or, at least, trying to. I look up, anxiously, the full moon slipping between two gray clouds.
“Nuh huh,” she says, following me deeper into the alley, her own trick or treat sack rattling and crackling and crunching with every step she takes. “I was just there and she was handing out stupid green apple suckers.”
I’m sweaty in my Frankenstein costume, despite the brisk October chill in the air. “Oh well, I dunno… maybe someone put them in there as a prank.”
She stomps next to me, her yellow superhero boots splashing up puddles from the earlier rain storm. “And where are you going, anyway? Your house is back that way.”
I turn to her, never slowing down, and growl, “I’m not going home, Violet.” Then I look into her kind of scared eyes and say, as threateningly as possible, “But you should.”
She stops, stands still and I shuffle-stomp away a few feet before she catches up. “You don’t scare me, Dexter. And besides…” she stops again, whipping out her cell phone. “I know what you’re up to…”
There is a threatening tone to her voice that makes me pause. Not stop, exactly, but pause. From the middle of the alley she calls after me: “Okay, then, if you don’t want to see I’ll just show everybody else at school. I’m sure they’ll be interested in where you go every full moon…”
I hear her Gamma Woman boots marching back through the puddles and I turn, racing back to her as fast as my clumsy Frankenstein boots will take me, but she wasn’t going anywhere; she’s just standing there, smiling, marching in place.
“Ha!” she says, showing me her phone. She has a picture pulled up, a little grainy, but I can see a full moon in the corner. “That’s you,” she says, tapping a shadow at the bottom. “That’s you sneaking out of your house last month.”
She slides to the next picture and it’s of another moon, but I’m at the end of our street now, looking left and you can see my face in the full moonlight.
“And that’s the month before,” she explains triumphantly before flipping through three or four more pictures: all featuring me, slinking around under a bright, full moon. “And the month before, and the month before that.”
My heart is racing but I turn around like I don’t care, heading deeper into the alley. “Stalk much?” I harrumph over my shoulder, as if being smug will make Violent and all her evidence just… go away.
She catches up to me in a flash, shoving her phone deep in her trick or treat sack. “Tell me where you’re going,” she huffs, “and I’ll stop following you every full moon.”
“I can’t,” I grumble as I reach the end of the alley and turn right, toward the vacant lot that leads out of town. I glance down at my watch and grunt; I’m way late if I’m going to make it there in time.
She follows across the lot, dry grass crunching under her clompy yellow boots. I turn about halfway there and growl, louder this time. “Back. Off. Violet!!”
She doesn’t even flinch. “No. Way. Dexter!” she growls back at me, just as growly. Stomp, crunch, stomp, crunch, her feet follow me across the lot.
With every step I can feel my skin starting to itch as the full moon rises, high overhead. I can feel my teeth starting to crackle as fresh fangs threaten to form just beneath my gum line.
She follows me to the edge of the field, her trick or treat sack rumbling and clacking all the way. “What’s in there?” I turn, growling some more, getting irritated with every step. “Marbles?”
I stop, her eyes glowing yellow, little whiskers poking out of her cheeks. “Violet!” I shout, dragging her out of the open and into the tree line beyond the abandoned lot. Her arm is hot and… getting hairier by the second! “What’s going on with you?”
She’s crying, a little, leaky tears springing out of her glowing yellow eyes. “I don’t know…” she says, voice growing tight and whiny. “A few months ago, I was out in the yard and this… this… squirrel bit me. And now… every full moon…”
“Me too!” I shout, dragging her along as the smell of the dump makes my mouth water, little whiskers of my own poking out of my snout.
“You’re… you’re a were-squirrel?” she asks, making little chattering noises as rusty brown fur springs up all over her bare hands and face.
I chuckle, making chattering noises of my own as my spine starts to crack and I hunch over a little at the waist. “No… I… last Halloween,” I’m growling, voice low and hoarse now, “I was taking out the trash just before bed and this… this… raccoon, bit me. I didn’t think anything of it until late in November when the full moon came. I… changed, like you are now…”
I growl a little, bending over even further as my spine creaks and crunches, practically forcing me onto all fours. “Now every full moon, it happens and I try to get as far out of town as I can.”
“Where?” she asks, following me closely, both of us practically crawling now, claws instead of fingernails, fur popping out all over our skin, eyes glowing yellow under the full moonlight.
“There,” I say, pointing to the town dump with furry fingers and bloody claws. Just inside the fence a dozen or so raccoons, fat and hungry, wait for me. I hold up my trick or treat sack, while I still can. “I like… I like to bring them food, when I come,” I rasp through a thick, leathery tongue. “I hope, I hope they’ll like my Halloween candy…”
“Me too,” she says, veering off into the woods. I hear a tear and her red leather costume rips open and a big furry squirrel tale pops out, waving as she pounces off, a giant squirrel in a flapping yellow cap. “I brought my squirrel friends nuts…”
I look closer and there, at the tree line, a dozen or so squirrels stand on their back legs, little paws clapping as Violet leans on all fours and races into the trees.
* * * * *
Story # 4:
Halloween, Take 108!
There’s a low brick wall on the edge of the school grounds and we sit on it, watching a jack o’ lantern wink at us from the porch across the street.
It’s nearly nine o’ clock, almost curfew, but we don’t budge. The best thing our parents could do for us at this point is ground us, but even when we’re ten or twenty minutes late, they just kind of shake their heads and ruffle our hair and say, “Well, it’s only Halloween.”
I look down into my plastic pumpkin, sitting between us, and sigh. Inez looks over, one of her yellow powder puff bee antennas flopping over her jet black hair. “You gonna eat that Choco-Munch?” she asks.
I roll my eyes. “How can you eat those every night?”
She shrugs, reaching in with one of her bee gloves. “They’re my favorite.”
I watch her, chomping into her chocolate, peanut butter and coconut patty and, honestly, I could throw up all over her black and yellow leggings.
I wrinkle my nose. “Why… I mean… don’t take this wrong, Inez, but… why don’t you wear something else for Halloween # 108?”
She finishes her Choco-Munch and wipes a yellow mitten across her lips. “I like it,” she says with a shoulder shrug, pulling up on her shiny black bee wings. “Plus, my Mom made it and she’d be hurt if I suddenly stop wearing it.”
I sigh, kicking my orange and black striped legs out from under the long hem of my black witch dress. “Mine too,” I sigh. “I guess we’re stuck wearing these costumes forever, huh?”
She gets quiet and folds her Choco-Much wrapper into a tiny little square. “You know I’m sorry about all this, right Cara?”
I nudge her with my shoulder and reach inside my plastic pumpkin for a Nutty Buddy. They’re still candy, but there’s no chocolate and, best of all, no coconut.
“It’s not all y
our fault,” I tell her around my first bite of the night. “I’m the one who said I wished it was Halloween forever.”
And I had. I remember it like it was yesterday, even though it was actually 108 yesterdays ago: It was the end of Halloween, the real Halloween, and I’d eaten too much chocolate to ever go to sleep.
Inez lives right across the street from me and we have this signal, see: whenever I can’t sleep, I turn my light on and if she’s up, she turns hers on, too. That’s when we know it’s safe to sneak outside and talk in the middle of the street.
So I turned on my light and five seconds later hers flicked on. I opened my bedroom door to make sure Mom was snoring – yup, out cold – and then crept out my window, onto the lowest branch of the tree just outside, and then onto the ground.
Inez was still in her costume. Her bee costume! “I wish Halloween would never end,” I’d muttered, high on chocolate and admiring the glowing pumpkins still flickering on every porch up and down our little street.