Not Microwave Safe (A Halloween Story)

by Kyle Adams

  ****

  Uriah kept his grip on Kent’s hand as he led them into a dimly lit hallway. He wasn’t sure how he got Kent to agree to come here, but he knew if he gave Kent a chance, he would insist they just leave. He loved Kent, but sometimes the guy had no sense of adventure outside of his online games; he was really hoping tonight he’d be able to just let loose and have some fun. Uriah loved everything about Halloween, especially a good scare. So he shamelessly begged and flirted and used his puppy dog eyes to get Kent to agree to come. Later tonight, he would make sure the bump and grind marathon he had planned rocked Kent’s world, as a little delayed gratification.

  “Looks like we’re going the right way,” Kent said unenthusiastically, breaking Uriah’s thoughts. Kent was pointing at the dusty hardwood floors. There was a clear path down the center where something large had been dragged, like a big bag of laundry. Then he saw the blood trail and knew it was supposed to look like a body had been dragged across the floor.

  “Let’s see where it leads!” Uriah knew he should feel guilty being so excited while Kent looked miserable, but he couldn’t help it, he just really loved Halloween. He tried not to skip as he pulled Kent quicker down the hall. The bloody smears led to a closed door. “Open it,” Uriah said, nudging Kent.

  “You open it; you’re the one who likes this kind of thing.” Knowing Kent was probably fighting just to keep his eyes open, Uriah didn’t try to persuade him any further. He reached out and slowly turned the knob. There was something about the unknown that had him moving timidly. He knew, logically, if something did lurk behind the door, opening it quickly would probably catch it by surprise, too. But, still, he opened the door like he had all the time in the world. If you can’t catch the unknown by surprise, make it wait, and maybe it will give itself away out of impatience.

  With the door barely cracked open, Uriah felt resistance from the other side. It felt like something was holding onto the door from the inside, trying to keep him from opening it. After all this suspense, there was no way he wasn’t going to see what was waiting behind the door. Counting to three in his head, he pulled on the handle as hard as he could, jerking it wide open.

  Kent screamed as something lunged at him from within the darkness off the closet. It happened so fast that Uriah had no time to even try and help or pull Kent out of the way. Uriah couldn’t even keep his grip on Kent’s hand; he hadn’t been at all ready for the surprise of Kent being tackled to the ground with such force.

  “Get off me!” Kent yelled, as he struggled to get away from whoever was now sprawled on top of him. He wasn’t sure if it was instinct to protect Kent or jealousy that someone else was pinning his boyfriend down, but he was livid seeing Kent so vulnerable. And no one got to be on top of Kent like that except for him. Uriah was about to jump on the thing attacking Kent when his mind registered what it was; a fat body wearing a rather large pair of blue parachute pants with white polka dots and a matching shirt. It also seemed to be missing a head.

  “Relax Kent, it’s just a dummy. It’s fake. We found the lower half that goes with the microwave clown head.”

  “No, it’s a corpse, it’s still fucking warm. Let’s see you relax with three hundred pounds of headless dead clown trapping you!” Kent wailed.

  “It must be filled with hot water or something to keep it warm and weigh it down. That’s so cool.” Uriah told Kent as he tried to move the bloated clown off Kent. “They must have used too much water, this thing weighs a ton.”

  “Trust me, I’m well aware of how heavy he is, or was. Just hurry up and get him off me,” Kent whimpered.

  “You’re so hot when you’re angry,” Uriah said, as he finally got the dummy to roll over enough to pull Kent out. Once they were standing, he checked Kent for injuries by gently running his hands all over Kent’s body. Kent didn’t flinch or anything, which was a good sign; he was only angry and scared, but not hurt. Uriah still thought he’d better make sure Kent’s butt was okay, since he did land kind of hard on it. Uriah took his time gently massaging Kent’s firm bubble butt.

  “His pants ate my shoe. And his gross neck dripped congealing blood on my shirt; I can feel it soaking through.” Kent sounded so defeated. Uriah had noticed the shirt was wet, as he looked down and saw Kent’s sneaker sticking out from between the folds of the clown pants.

  “Don’t worry, I’ll get your shoe back for you, for the low price of just one kiss.” Uriah squeezed Kent’s ass again and pulled him closer.

  “You’re so sappy, I’d rather just get my own shoe, you extortionist.”

  “It could be a trap though, using your shoe as bait so that when you get close enough, the pants will suck you in, too. I won’t let you risk that, I love you too much. But I need one little kiss, just in case I don’t make it back,” Uriah said with a small smile and his trademarked puppy stare. He didn’t know what he’d do if Kent ever grew an immunity to his pleading eyes.

  “Fine.” Kent gave a heavy sigh, as he leaned forward and placed a quick peck against Uriah’s cheek.

  “Thanks, I’ll die happy knowing my boyfriend’s last kiss had the same sizzling passion he’d use to kiss his grandma.” Uriah tried to sound offended, but he was glad to have Kent teasing him since it meant his mind wasn’t on what had just happened. Uriah let his grip slip away from Kent’s ass as he walked the few steps to where the shoe was being held hostage. He noticed the house was unsettlingly quiet. If the house was even starting to make him feel nervous, he could only imagine what this had to be like for Kent.

  Uriah was bending over, just about to grab Kent’s shoe, when something grabbed him around the waist and tugged him roughly backwards. At the same time, he heard “Boo” being shouted into his ear. He couldn’t help the high pitched scream he let out as he scrambled to get away. Unfortunately, his feet got tangled in the clown pants and he fell forward. Uriah tried turning into the fall, but landed awkwardly on his shoulder, before rolling onto his back. He had no time to react as something suddenly crashed into him. It was Kent. Somehow, Kent managed to fall more gracefully and caught most of his weight before it hit Uriah. Kent was holding himself over Uriah with his hands placed on either side of Uriah’s head; Kent was staring down at him and laughing quietly. Uriah could tell that Kent was elated by how much he’d freaked Uriah out.

  “You butt wipe! It’s a good thing I have all these pads on or that fall would’ve hurt.” Uriah tried to hide his smile.

  “It’s your own fault. You should know by now not to bend over in front of me, especially in your football pants. I couldn’t control myself.” He accentuated his words by pressing his hard groin against Uriah’s.

  “I like making you lose control.” Uriah gripped Kent’s waist and pulled him down so they were pressing harder into each other. He couldn’t help the moan that slipped between his lips as he started to lean up for a kiss; but he instantly froze when there was a loud screeching sound coming from above them. It sounded like a door with rusted hinges being opened upstairs. He could tell by the way Kent stiffened that he’d heard it too. “Kent, get up,” he whispered softly, unsure why since they’d already both screamed enough to make it obvious they were there.

  Kent hopped up and reached out his hand to help Uriah get on his feet. Uriah linked their fingers together and headed for the staircase. “Let’s go find out what’s upstairs.” They reached the bottom of the landing before Kent’s arm reached out and stopped him.

  “Uriah, just because you dressed up as a dumb jock doesn’t mean you have to act like one. Who cares what’s upstairs, we should just leave.”

  “I’m a football player not a dumb jock, asshole. If you’re too chicken to go upstairs, you can stay down here and hold hands with Puffy,” Uriah nodded towards the lifeless clown body. “I’m here to have a good time, and this is the best haunted house in Delaware. It’s supposed to be scarier than Paula Abdul without any makeup. We are perfectly safe here, but if you’re going to act like a baby, you can just wai
t here.”

  Kent just glared at him for a few seconds. “Now you’re just being an asshole.”

  Uriah sighed and took a deep breath. “You’re right, and I’m sorry, but you know I hate being called stupid.”

  “I didn’t call you stupid; I said you were acting dumb. There is a huge difference. You find a decapitated body in the closet, a head in the microwave, and then hear a noise upstairs. Any logical person would get the hell out of this house, but you want to go check out the noise. You’re the horror movie fan, you tell me when investigating a noise ever turns out well!”

  “But it’s a haunted house, they’re supposed to have creepy sounds and make you want to get out of them as fast as you can.”

  “That may be true for a haunted house, but a haunted house also charges admission and has people trying to scare you along the way with props, like bowls filled with skinless grapes or cold spaghetti you blindly reach your hand into. And let’s not forget decorations like pumpkins and cotton thrown over everything. But, most importantly, it should have other people wandering around, also being scared. Do you see any of that here? No, you don’t, because this is just an old neglected house with some kind of psychotic clown murdering squatter living in it. And I really don’t want to meet whoever is demented enough to be able to stomach murdering a clown and then microwaving its head for dinner!”

  “So, you think I’m so stupid I can’t even follow simple directions to the right haunted house?” He knew Kent had valid reasons for wanting to leave, but he also knew this was the right house, and he really hated being made to feel stupid. People always assumed he was dumb because he liked to play sports, and maybe his grades weren’t the best, but that didn’t make him stupid.

  “Everyone makes mistakes, it doesn’t make you stupid. You know I would never think that about you. Unless, of course, you go up those stairs. That would just be plain dumb.”

  “Kent, you have to trust me. We are perfectly safe here and I’m going to find out what’s up there.”

  “You won’t be going anywhere,” a hoarse voice spoke from the stairs. They both jumped, but neither screamed. Uriah turned his head to see a figure reach the bottom step, dressed like another, more twisted, clown. Uriah tightened his grip on Kent’s hand, who was probably too terrified to even scream out.