A Circle of Celebrations

by Jody Lynn Nye

  Trick

  Creak slewed his bright-yellow eyes desperately around the twilit lawn. His shroud was gone. He should never have turned his back on it for a second, but that brackish puddle full of icy cold water and decaying autumn leaves had been just too tempting. Without hesitation, he’d slipped off the shining white cloak and slid into its depths. Once he’d finished reveling in its delightful chill sliminess, he had discovered the shroud was missing.

  What could he do? Without it he was a pair of disembodied eyeballs in a blob of invisible ectoplasm floating about three feet off the ground, unable to groan, shriek, fly or cause mischief. Not properly terrifying for Halloween. Which this was.

  Creak rolled his eyes about again, scanning trees, bushes, houses and cars, in case his shroud had only fluttered to the ground. Wait, there it was! On the other side of the hard path mortals called a ‘street.’ The wind must have picked it up. He glided across, passing through automobiles, giving minor hallucinations to the humans within, and swooped gladly on his cloak. But it was not his! The one he had doffed was moonlight spun into fine silk by silver spiders and woven by witches adding spells to the weft as they went. This was coarse, wrinkled cloth, only called white out of courtesy. And the eye holes! Crudely hacked into the cloth, two gaping wounds, not the round wells of loss, fear and despair through which Creak gazed at the world. Some being, he was now sure, had seen his beautiful shroud and stolen it, dropping this in its place.

  Creak felt outraged. He must find the thief and punish him!

  But where to begin? Now that Creak concentrated, he perceived that both sides of the street were filled with mortals. As was proper for the sacred day, the short ones were clad in outfits to mimic the beings who crossed freely between the worlds of the seen and unseen: goblins, witches, vampires, even a blue and red outfit meant to represent a spider…but mortals had an odd perception of reality, after all. And many ghosts. Creak flitted after the first one. Its cloak was not his, but rather like the one he had found on the ground. Grumbling, he scooted back to the discarded shroud, looking for clues.

  A child dressed as a pink fairy spotted his glowing eyes and screamed. Creak was gratified. Even without his mystic cloak he could still inspire awe and fear. Her father, clad in a warm jacket and the ubiquitous leg coverings mortals called ‘blue jeans,’ shot over to see what had frightened his offspring. Creak stood his ground, but suddenly noticed a religious emblem about the man’s neck. In the possession of a true believer, amulets had the power to banish his kind to the unseen world for a hundred years. Without his shroud Creak was vulnerable. Quickly he snatched up the crude cotton robe and put it on. The man saw him embodied and stopped short.

  “Oh, honey,” he said to the girl, “it’s just another kid dressed as a ghost. Come on.”

  He hauled her away by the hand, but she kept looking back over her shoulder at Creak. She knew what she’d seen.

  Now, to find the thief.

  O O O

  “You shouldn’a taken that other kid’s ghost costume,” eight-year-old Brianna Cole scolded her one-year-older brother Jay. Her Little Mermaid costume slid down her shoulders inside her fleece coat, and she stopped to put her plastic pumpkin of treats on the ground to hike it up. “Jay!”

  The formless white shape halted impatiently on the sidewalk. The sides of the sheet bulged out as though the boy underneath it had put his hands on his hips. “What?”

  “It was mean. Besides, it’s stealing.”

  “I didn’t steal nothing,” Jay said, his voice sounding sepulcheral and far away. “I traded.”

  “But you didn’t ask first. That makes it stealing. What do you think Mom’s going to say when you come home with that costume instead of yours?”

  “Hah!” Jay snorted. “She’ll never notice the difference.” Brianna considered. That was true. Mom never did notice stuff, which is why Jay always got away with things. “It’s way cooler than mine. The eyes are round and the cloth’s so light it’s like it’s not really there. Come on, let’s haunt Mrs. Springer.”

  Brianna hoisted her pumpkin and hurried up the front steps of the old frame house after him. Mrs. Springer always gave full-size candy bars. The Cole children never missed visiting her.

  Jay reached up and pushed the button. Deep inside, they heard the clang of the bell.

  The door swung open. Mrs. Springer, a nice older lady with pale gray-blond hair who always wore tweed skirts, peered out at them. In one arm she held a big crockery bowl. “Well, well, two scary visitors! What can I do for you?”

  “Trick or treat,” Brianna chorused obediently. But Jay decided to ham it up. He raised his arms and wailed.

  “Whoaa-aaaa-oooo!”

  Mrs. Springer let out a strangled scream. Her eyes went as round as her glasses, and she retreated into the house, slamming the door.

  “What did you do?” Brianna demanded. “She had Snickers!”

  “Me?” Jay asked, hurt. “I didn’t do anything. Hey!” he shouted, raising a cloth-covered fist to pound on the door. “Trick or treat! We want our candy!”

  But to both children’s surprise, his hand passed straight through the polished wooden panel. Brianna gasped.

  “Hey, cool!” Jay said. He withdrew his hand and tried it again. He thrust his foot through. “Wow. This costume must be magic.” His happy voice scared Brianna more than his newfound ability to pass through walls.

  “Jay, we’re gonna get in trouble!”

  “No, we’re not,” he said, turning his blank eye holes toward her. “Look. I’ll go get our candy, and we’ll go to the next house.”

  He turned his back on her protests, and walked straight at the door.

  His eyes knew the wood was solid, but he slid through it with no more resistance than if he was walking through water. The shock was the change in temperature. It was bright and warm in Mrs. Springer’s hallway. Everything in it was decorated in cheery red checks, and it matched, unlike the decoration in their house.

  On a gingham-covered table by the door was the huge bowl. It was filled with candy bars: Snickers, Mounds, Crunch, Laffy Taffy, Chuckles and York Mints. Jay chose a Crunch bar and put it in the pumpkin bag under his costume. He heard Mrs. Springer’s panicky voice in another room. He eyed the bowl, and decided to bring it outside so Brianna could take her choice. That courtesy ought to sweeten her disposition and make her stop nagging him about taking the other costume. It was only a trick, right? This was Halloween. Trick or treat.

  His leg went through the door all right, but the bowl in his arms would not pass. The shock of it striking the door surprised Jay. The bowl tilted off his hands and fell backward through his body, crashing to the tiled floor and dumping treats all over.

  “Oh, hurry!” Mrs. Springer’s voice cried. “I think it got into the house. It’s horrible!”

  Jay didn’t hesitate. He dove through the door.

  “Where’s my candy?” Brianna asked, as he rushed past and down to the sidewalk.

  “She’s calling the cops,” Jay said. “Come on, we’ve got to get away.” Alarmed, Brianna fell in behind him.

  “What did you do?”

  “I broke the bowl. It was an accident!”

  “You better go back and tell,” Brianna insisted. “And pay for it.”

  “Tomorrow,” Jay panted. “I swear. I don’t want to get thrown in jail. Let’s just keep trick or treating.”

  Brianna groaned, but it was no use pushing him. He’d keep his word to own up; he always did.

  The next house was past a big hedge. Jay stopped being nervous the moment they were behind it. Mrs. Springer couldn’t see them any more.

  “Hey, guess what?” Jay asked, as Brianna concentrated on lifting her skirts to climb the stoop. “I can fly in this thing! Look at me!”

  Brianna refused to turn around. She rang the bell. “Trick or treat,” the children chorused together.

  Mrs. Park, a Korean woman who did crossing guard duty, slowly put down her bowl of treats and
opened the door, holding out her hand to Brianna.

  “Come in here, honey. This is a Neighborhood Watch house. You be safe until you mama come fo’ you.”

  “Why?”

  “There a bad thing behind you.” She screamed something in Korean over Brianna’s shoulder. “Now hurry come in call you mama.” She grabbed for Brianna’s wrist.

  “Run, Brianna, she’s a pervert!” Jay cried. Brianna scooted out of reach of the little woman’s hand, and stumbled down the stairs after her brother. Mrs. Park squawked out another diatribe behind them.

  O O O

  Creak floated up and down street after street. The mortal who had taken his shroud could not know all of its powers, therefore it could not have gone far. Its principal talent was the spreading of fear and awe, so he must look for the center of the greatest disturbance in this area. With the borrowed robe dragging along the ground, he wove as quickly as he could in between the groups of mortals on the sidewalks, sensing ahead of him for strife and turmoil.

  O O O

  “What did we do?” Jay asked, desperately, as they cut through the back yard hedges to the next street. The man who had answered the next door didn’t say a thing, but reached for a shotgun—a shotgun!—from next to his armchair, and sprang up to chase them. “Is he still following us?”

  Brianna looked back. “I don’t see him, but I hear noises. Everyone’s coming.”

  “We’ve seen a monster!” voices behind them shouted. “It went that way! Hurry, help us! Call the police!” Footsteps crackled through the brush as they emerged on the far sidewalk.

  “I’ve gotta get rid of this thing,” Jay panted. “Something about it’s wrong.”

  “It’s stolen magic, that’s what,” Brianna said.

  O O O

  The disturbance was heaviest here. Coming around the block from the opposite direction, Creak spotted his beloved shroud at once. A boy running toward him was wearing it! Creak could see the uncouth movement of breath puffing out the hood. The mortal was afraid. Good. Perhaps he was ready to return the stolen shroud now.

  Creak shed the heavy, crude cloak on a bush in plain sight.

  O O O

  A crowd of adults burst through after the two children. “Look, another ghost suit!” Brianna yelled, pointing.

  Jay threw off the borrowed costume. It whisked away before it hit the ground, and he caught a mysterious glimpse of yellow light. Not caring what became of it, he dove for the sheet on the bush. “It’s my old one!” He managed to shrug into it just before a policeman sprinted ahead of the group of pursuing adults. He grabbed Jay by the shoulder and turned him around to show Mrs. Springer and the others.

  “Is this your spectre?” he asked. “It’s just a little boy, folks.”

  “Well, I thought it was a monster,” Mrs. Springer declared, as the officer pulled the costume off. “Oh, it’s Jay Cole. I’m sorry, honey. I don’t know what I was thinking. Probably been watching too many horror movies.”

  Jay put on his best pathetic face, the one that kept him out of trouble at home. “I’m sorry I broke your bowl, Mrs. Springer!”

  “How’d you get through the door?” she asked. “It was locked.”

  “Uh, it was a trick. You know, trick or treat?”

  The older woman put her arm around him. “It’s all right, honey. I never liked the darned thing. Come on back to my house, and I’ll give you both a bunch of candy bars.”

  “Crunch is my favorite,” Jay said. Brianna followed him, rolling her eyes.

  O O O

  Creak followed them, too, floating along easily and invisibly at their heels in his silken robe. The boy needed a lesson in respect. He’d wait until Jay was tucked up in bed, maybe wait until just before midnight, and then he’d teach him what haunting was all about.

  Smiling Jack

  Rebecca Jenner jumped off the hay wagon onto the uneven ruts of earth behind her boyfriend Don Giatelli. The dry, gray soil caught at her Nikes, making her stumble. A gust of chill October wind lifted her light brown curls. She wished she’d worn a hat.

  “Look at the size of that pumpkin!” Don exclaimed, ignoring the knee-high gourds all around his feet. He headed straight for an orange-red fruit as big as a La-Z Boy recliner ridged with furrows as deep as Rebecca’s hand was long.

  “Don’t touch it, kid,” Mr. Barrow warned him. The weathered-faced farmer sat on the tractor seat and leaned an elbow on the controls. “You gotta look out for the ones who’re rocked back on their haunches like that. The mouth at the bottom’s smilin’ at ya. It’ll getcha. That’s why they cut ‘em into Jack o’lanterns, takes all the power outta ‘em. You wait until tomorrow, when I cut it open to get the seeds out. Then you can touch it all you want.”

  The pumpkin did seem to be smiling at them, the blossom end that would normally be resting on the soil puckered into a mean grin. Rebecca recoiled, but Don patted it anyway. Barrow gave him a sour look. Clearly, he thought he was wasting his time driving all the way out with just two teenagers. “All right, choose the ones you want, and let’s go.”

  “He’s cranky,” Don whispered, as they climbed back into the hay wagon with their chosen pumpkins. “Let’s come back tonight and make him sorry he was mean.”

  O O O

  A full moon shone over the big open field as Rebecca climbed out of Don’s crowded car. Four of their friends had listened to Don’s plan to get even with the bad-tempered farmer, and decided they had to get in on it.

  “Come on!” Don whispered, as Rebecca hesitated. The others ran out ahead of them and started kicking in the unharvested pumpkins.

  “It’s creepy,” she said.

  “It’s just a pumpkin patch. Hurry. Raree and the others are already having fun!”

  “Don, this is vandalism,” Rebecca protested. “We’re destroying private property.”

  He gave her a withering look. ““It’s an old tradition, and it’s just fun,” he said. He ran off to join the others.

  Pieces of shell and wads of pulp, ghostly gray in the moonlight, flew all over the field. Rebecca followed reluctantly, her arms folded over the little purse on the long strap across her body. Raree Tondal, the high school’s prized 7’2” basketball forward, drew back one incredibly big foot, and kicked a huge pumpkin halfway down a row. It bounced and split into three big pieces. The others cheered. Raree held his hands up in a victory clasp over his head.

  “Shhh!” Luis Olmedos hissed. “The old guy’ll hear us!”

  “So what?” asked Mark Greenberg, laughing. But the boys lowered their voices. The only sounds were calls from the occasional night bird, the rush of car tires on the tree-lined roads surrounding the field, and the thud—gunch! of a shoe penetrating the shell of yet another pumpkin.

  “Hey, pretend they’re the asses of the cheerleaders,” suggested Carlos Cruz, pointing a finger at a row of basketball-sized gourds. He was notoriously unlucky in his attempts to get any of the girls to date him. “That one’s Cheree,” he said as he booted the first one. “This one’s Marylou…”

  Rebecca turned away in disgust. She could have told him why none of them would ever go out with him, and it started with deodorant. Angrily, she stalked over the deep furrows toward Don, who was going down a row of small white pumpkins, decimating them like Godzilla walking through Tokyo.

  “Grrrh!” he growled, waving his arms. “Grrr-ooough!”

  “You’re really enjoying this, aren’t you?” Rebecca asked.

  “Dude, what’s your problem?” he asked her. “Go kick something! It’s fun!”

  “I want to go home,” she said.

  “Soon,” Don said. His legs were covered up to the thighs in gleaming pulp. “C’mon, you try it.” He pointed at a small globe on the ground between them. “C’mon, just a little one.”

  “No. I don’t want that junk on my shoes.”

  “God, you’re dreary,” Don groaned. He booted the little pumpkin. It rolled down the row and split, lying with its seeds leaking out like
entrails. “Wow, look at that one!” He moved toward a huge sphere tilted sideways, its surface a zebra pattern of dark and light.

  “It’s freezing out here,” Rebecca said, disgusted. “I’m going to sit in the car.”

  He ignored her, marching down on his prey with purpose. Rebecca glanced around. Carlos had hoisted a huge gourd over his head. He staggered a few paces, and heaved like a shot-putter. But a vine caught his leg, ruining his timing. He dropped the pumpkin almost on his feet.

  “Dammit,” he swore, jumping back to avoid the splatter of goo. Undaunted, he went straight for another, bigger fruit.

  Boys, Rebecca thought in dismay. Why wasn’t she at home with her girlfriends, painting jack o’lanterns on their toe nails for tomorrow night’s Halloween party? She had a great costume, Trinity from The Matrix, all black vinyl and cool shades. If she caught a cold standing out here in a field in the middle of the night and had to miss the party, Don was a dead man.

  The moon made eerie shadows across the fields as it ducked behind a veil of cloud. In the diminished light Rebecca couldn’t see either Raree or Mark. Carlos and Don had joined forces to ruin two rows of head-sized pumpkins leading up to a file of humped giants.

  The keys were in the old Delta 88, just where Don had left them. Rebecca cranked the ignition, relieved to see the blue light of the speedometer. The big engine sounded deafening after the silence of the field. Suddenly scared at the loneliness of it all, she turned the radio up full blast. Rage Against the Machine howled out of the car’s four speakers, and Rebecca leaned back with her head against the seat rest to enjoy the music.

  Pretty soon, the radio station turned over to some dreary ballad. Rebecca twisted the ancient silver knob off. How long had they been in the field, anyhow? The longer they stayed, the more likely it was someone was going to come and maybe arrest them for trespassing. She’d better go get the guys.

  A dire chill wind whistled up the arms of her thin coat as she got out of the car. She peered over the field, but could see no movement in the faint silver light.

  “Don?”

  No answer but the the whisper of leaves moved by the breeze.