This is a work of fiction. The events and characters described herein are imaginary and are
not intended to refer to specific places or living persons. Any resemblance to any person or
persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
All Rights Reserved
The right of Eduard Joseph to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him under the South African Copyright Act of 1978 (as amended).
When Halloween 2012 came along I was still single – not that there was something wrong with me (or at least I don’t think there is). Besides, my mother once said that I am a catch and that I’ll find the right girl one day – she kept telling me that until I came out as gay a couple of years ago. After that she kept saying that I was confused and that the right girl will come along and solve my confusion.
I never really was one for the whole Halloween thing – I just think it’s silly and for kids. My neighbour across the street loved macabre stuff and revelled in Halloween by decorating his front lawn with tombstones, skeletons and all sorts of scary shit.
He was one of those creepy old men parents warned their children never to take candy from, and yet it was acceptable for these same kids to accept candy from this Christopher Walken lookalike on Halloween – it’s like normal rules don’t apply on the day that ghouls and goblins come out to play.
I stared out the window and drifted off into a dazed state as I watched Walken decorate the tree with severed limbs which I often wondered whether they were real or plastic. He came across as the kind of guy who could easily have a few skeletons in the closet and women in the basement.
The sound of my phone vibrating across the nightstand made me jump a little and I turned away from the window. Sarah’s name flickered on the LCD screen and indicated that I had received one text message from her. She had been texting me the entire week begging me to go to some stupid costume party – a party I was sure would suck.
I sighed and picked up the phone and just as I suspected, the message begged me to come to the party. I didn’t feel the need to answer her and just dropped the phone onto my bed before staring out the window again; a small group of kids made their way down the street as the sun set in the distance and I hoped they got butchered by my creepy neighbour.
I never liked kids. They were loud, obnoxious, cried, whined, moaned, sulked, farted and puked too much for my liking – to me kids were on the same level as the slugs in Shrek’s swamp, so Halloween was a day I dreaded. I hated hearing the doorbell followed by that monotonous “trick or treat”.
My phone vibrated on the bed again, but I didn’t look at it – I already knew it was just another message from Sarah and to be perfectly honest; I’d much rather stay at home and watch a movie about people being dismembered by a man wearing his mother’s face than go to some stupid lame-ass party.
The sound of the doorbell echoed through the house and I knew the dreaded trick-or-treating had begun. I didn’t even bother buying candy as I was planning on hiding from the kids like I did every year. The doorbell wasn’t followed by that tedious statement; which was peculiar. I turned around and stared at the bedroom door half expecting rebellious kids to storm my house in search for candy, but instead I heard Sarah’s voice call out my name.
What was wrong with her? Why couldn’t she leave me alone? I knew that if I ignored her she’d simply stand out there calling my name all night, so with slouching shoulders I went to the front door.
She stood on my porch wearing a pink bunny suit with black ears and if I were straight, she would have given me boner. Her smile faded and she folded her arms across her chest.
“Geez.” She said with a raised eyebrow, “You look like shit. When last did you shave?”
“Does it matter?” I asked uninterested.
“Yes!” She insisted, “We’re going to that party.”
I didn’t want to answer her, so I let out a sigh.
“You can’t mope around the house forever.” She said, “Max died almost three weeks ago. You need to get over it and move on.”
“I can’t move on.” I said, “He was my whole life and now he’s gone.”
She raised her eyebrow again and said, “He was a parrot.”
Okay, I bet you thought for a moment that Sarah was quite heartless expecting me to get over the loss of Max within three weeks when you thought he was my boyfriend, right? Now you’re probably thinking I’m a weirdo for mourning a parrot for three weeks – but in my defence, I was single and he kept me company.
Sarah pushed her way in through the door and said, “Let’s raid your closet and get you something decent to wear. You’re going to this party.”
“Why are you so persistent?” I asked annoyed.
“I’m not going to this thing alone.” She said as she scurried down the hallway.
I followed her to my bedroom and stood at the foot of the bed as she opened my closet and sifted through my clothes. What the hell she was looking for was a mystery, cuz it’s not like I had spare Halloween costumes hanging in the back of my closet.
“What are you looking for?” I asked bemused.
“Something you can wear to the party.” She said without looking back.
She raided my closet like the police would raid a house in a search for contraband substances and the fluffy little rabbit tail on her ass wiggled as her hips swayed. She finally turned around and held out something she deemed appropriate and gave me the biggest smile I’ve ever seen on her tiny little face.