Castle Juliet

by Brandon Berntson

  Jack looked back at the clown and the princess and realized it was Alice and her father. He smiled, but they hadn’t noticed him yet. Phillip and Jack found a table at the rear of the gym and Phillip set the pumpkin down. Jack set the knives beside it.

  “Hey, this is pretty far-out,” Phillip said, eyeing the place with satisfaction. He nodded, approving. “They did a good job, don’t you think, Jacky-boy?”

  “I do, sir,” Jack said.

  “Well, how about you get us a plate of those cookies and some punch, and I’ll get everything ready.”

  “Sounds fabulous, sir.”

  Jack returned to the front of the gym, where Dracula was playing. He watched the movie, smiling the whole way. What a perfect way to celebrate this ghoulish, creepy time of year, he thought! He had a truly blissful feeling moving through every ounce of his tiny frame. It encircled his hands, neck, and shoulders. Jack couldn’t recall every being this truly happy before, and he didn’t even know why. He was smiling wide.

  The table at the front of the gym was laden with bowls of punch, paper cups, and sheet after sheet of frosted cookies, all shaped like ghosts, spiders, and monsters. Jack grabbed a plate, heaping a generous pile of cookies on top, then poured two glasses of punch.

  “Hi, Jack!”

  Jack turned. Alice stood behind him in all her demented princes glory: copper curls surrounded by a cardboard knife wrapped in foil. Fake blood spilled down around her face and onto her right shoulder. Her skin had a pale, powdery complexion, make-up from her mother, no doubt, giving her a frightful, ghostly look.

  “Hi, Alice,” Jack said.

  “I almost didn’t recognize you,” she said. “Your dad was easy enough, but I did a double-take because of the Mr. Hyde costume. You look, scary, Jack.”

  “Look who’s talking,” Jack said.

  “I’m glad you came. This is neat, huh?” Alice scanned the entire gym, motioning toward every cryptic decoration.

  Jack looked around as well, taking in the scene. “It is,” he said. “Your dad looks funny.”

  “He’s a goof,” Alice said, looking to where her father sat. The big, clownish man in white make-up turned and waved at Jack. Jack waved in return.

  “Wouldn’t it be cool, if we both had the best pumpkins?” Alice asked.

  “It would.”

  “Well,” Alice said. “I love your costume.”

  “Dad made it under half and hour right when he got home.”

  “Wow,” Alice said. “He did a great job.”

  “I’ll tell him you said so,” Jack said. “I love the knife in your head.”

  “Thanks. Mom almost had a hard attack when she saw me.’

  “I almost fainted when I saw you. But not from the butcher knife.”

  “Oh, Jack!” Alice said, slapping him on the arm, and she blushed under the powdery make-up.

  “Well, I’d better get back and help Dad. He doesn’t like being left alone at these kind of things.”

  “Okay,” Jack said. “It’s good to see you.”

  “You, too, Jack. You look happy under all that creepy make-up.”

  Jack laughed. “Thanks,” he said. “I am.”

  “Well, bye,” Alice said. “I’ll see you for lessons and dinner again next week, okay?”

  Jack nodded. “I can’t wait.”

  Alice waved her fingers at Jack, and Jack carried—somewhat awkwardly—his plate of cookies and the two cups of punch back to the table and his father. Alice’s dad turned and said, “Love your costume, Jack! Hi, Phillip!”

  Phillip waved from where he sat and smiled at Gerald and Alice. “You look great with even redder hair,” Phillip told Gerald, and both men shared a chuckle.

  Jack made it to the table and set the items beside the pumpkin. Next to Phillip, a mother and daughter had already begun to carve their pumpkin. The mother was dressed as a hobo with a beaten, oily-stained fedora, and a red clown nose. The daughter was a football player, replete with cleats, white pants, shoulder pads, a blue jersey with the number 17 on it, but without the helmet. Her eyes had black circles around them—probably shoe polish as well, Jack thought, and her teeth had been blackened. Jack shuddered when she smiled at him.

  Phillip eyed the plate of cookies. “What have we here, my boy?”

  “Some creepy cookies and pumpkin punch,” Jack said.

  Phillip took a sip of punch, tried one of the frosted cookies, and smiled at Jack through a mouthful of goodies. “Mmmm,” he said. “Them’s good cookies.”

  Jack sampled some as well and agreed. They were good cookies, heavily frosted and dyed orange.

  “Well, Jacky-boy,” Phillip said. “You want to do the carving?”

  “No, Dad. I want you to do it.”

  “You sure?”

  Jack nodded vigorously. His hat, slightly too big, dipped down, covering his eyes. He pushed it back up with his index finger. “Yes,” he said. “But I want to scoop all the guts out.”

  “Sounds like a fair trade,” Phillip said. “Let’s shake on it.”

  They shook on it, which made Jack laugh.

  “What time we got, son?”

  “We’re already here,” Jack said, beaming, holding his cape out on either side, as if he were going to fly away.

  “Oh! Right,” Phillip said, stabbing the pumpkin through the top of its orange head. He began to carve.

  *

  Jack got his hands all slimy and sticky with orange pumpkin guts and seeds, plopping them down onto the table with a heavy wet sound.

  “We could’ve had pumpkin gut sandwiches for dinner instead, Jack,” his father said. “Just had to bring the bread.”

  “Ewww,” said the football girl beside them, overhearing. She made a face.

  “Well, we would’ve shared,” Phillip said, and the hobo mother laughed.

  “Well,” Phillip went on. “What kind of face should we carve, son?”

  “Something mean and scary,” Jack said.

  “That’ll do,” Phillip said. “That’ll do.”

  Phillip picked up one of the smaller knives and began to carve the eyes. The judges, who were various teachers, walked around the tables, making notes on little pads of paper. A microphone had been placed near the front of the gym, where the principal, Mr. Jenkins, announced there would be a costume contest as well, featuring best parent/child combo.

  Sitting with his dad, Jack didn’t necessarily care about placing first, let alone placing at all. He stood beside Phillip as the man carved, concentrating solely on his father. Strange things had happened to Jack over the years, instances that seemed otherworldly, and it seemed, as he watched his father then, that another similar moment was happening now. Jack had never had any explanations, let alone answers for these occurrences, other than how irregular they seemed. For Jack, nothing else existed but him, his father, and the pumpkin on the table. Yes, for some odd reason, the pumpkin, too, was part of the mystical spell. Magic—at its most simplistic—spoke to Jack from the other side of the veil. Time and space slipped away with everybody else, as if a great shadow had come into the gym and blocked everyone and everything out. The laughter, the talking, the raucous carrying on faded to a sibilant hush. Jack was enraptured in the moment, concentrating on every minute detail, the blade his father used, the hair on the back of his dad’s knuckles, the way the cape felt against his hands; he barely heeded this bewildering sensation moving up and around him, and at the same time, he’d never been more focused on anything in his life. Even the sights: the others parents and kids, the movie, the streamers, all faded into the darkness. It was, in fact, as if a spotlight were shining directly on Jack and his father and no one else. This was how it seemed to Jack, and it took only seconds for this small miracle, this sensation to present itself. Jack’s being was enamored in joy. He didn’t realize how wide he was smiling until he felt the muscles tighten in his cheeks. As he did, the sights and sounds came into focus again, and like a magician, he willed them away, focusing on the magic.
Why wouldn’t he be a magician, he thought? Mr. Hyde, after all, was dressed exactly like one. It was just Mr. Hyde and Lumber Jacky-boy under the celestial spotlight. They’d been defined through a world of shadow. His mother was proud, too. He didn’t understand how he knew this; he just did. He was standing outside himself, looking on, as though he were the eyes of his mother. Simple, he thought, just a boy and his dad carving a pumpkin, yet the meaning dug so deeply into Jack’s being, he knew it was anything but simple. The moment, yes. But not the meaning. Perhaps because neither had a single thought in the world except for each other.

  *

  Alice, with her father (he, too, was carving the pumpkin because she thought they had a better chance of winning the contest with a parent’s skilled hand, and apparently, other children felt the same), could not helping looking over at Jack and his father at they carved. She had to stand up and peer over the heads of other children and parents to see them. Phillip, at times, tilted the pumpkin in Jack’s direction, said something, and Jack would nod eagerly, point to the pumpkin’s face, and his dad would start carving again. Sometimes, they would whisper privately to one another, as if sharing some deep, meaningful secret, and then both of them would break into round, hearty laughter. Alice couldn’t help but grin as she watched them because they were both so intensely focused on the other. She thought of going over to visit, to see how they were doing, but something stayed her. She didn’t know what this was, of course, except a feeling she had—not her father’s loneliness, leaving him by himself—but something else. Though she knew they’d welcome her, she felt she’d disturb a special, even sacred moment between Father and son. She realized it was this feeling that prevented her from asking Jack to sit at their table, though there wasn’t any room to begin with. Even the macabre, dark make-up could not disguise the joy Jack was experiencing, Alice thought.

  “Alice?” her father asked, looking her way. “Are you okay?”

  She hadn’t realized it, but her eyes were wet. Her vision blurred, and she laughed, happy, as tears smeared the powder on her face. She didn’t care. She looked at her father, smiled, and nodded vigorously. “Just happy you got to come with me, Dad,” she said. “Happy to see Jack with his dad. They look like they’re having the best time!”

  Gerald leaned back, looked at Mr. Hyde and the lumberjack, and smiled wide. “Happy hearts make for good holidays,” Gerald said. He turned the pumpkin for Alice to see. “What do you think?”

  Alice looked at the pumpkin and grinned. It was a goofy, albeit comical pumpkin to match her father’s costume. “It’s perfect,” she said.

  *

  The results were in. The pumpkins were done. First prize went to a father/daughter team who’d carved a pumpkin with two faces, both ghouls. They won on originality and detail. The girl, dressed like a pumpkin herself, and her father, a Frankenstein monster, accepted a respectable-sized trophy with a golden pumpkin on top. Alice and her father had won third prize in the costume contest. They received a $50.00 gift certificate to the local grocery story. Jack and Phillip cheered louder than anyone else from the back of the gym. Gerald bowed and Alice curtsied, still charming, despite the gore on her costume.

  With the night coming to a close, the festivities over, Dracula, parents and kids meandered outside into the cold October mist and into the parking lot. Some deposited their pumpkins by the main doors, a contribution to the school for the upcoming holiday, while others, unable to part with their labors, carried them home. Jack was among the latter. He wanted a memento for his night out with his father. He couldn’t wait to set the pumpkin on their porch and light it on Halloween night.

  Jack and Phillip congratulated Alice and Phillip once everyone was outside.

  “You have a fabulous nose, sir,” Phillip said to Gerald.

  Gerald squeezed it, and the nose squeaked. “It’s a novelty, so I’m told,” he said. “It pinches, so I have to breathe out of my mouth, but it’s a good nose.”

  “Bye, Alice,” Jack said.

  “Do you want to go trick-or-treating Sunday night, Jack?”

  “Dad?” Jack asked his father.

  “Of course,” Phillip said.

  “Why don’t you join us for dinner, Phillip?” Gerald said. “It would be more fun with you there. Jane’s making a ham.”

  “You’ve been generous with the leftovers,” Phillip said. “I must say, they’ve been delicious. Some of the best meals I’ve had. I accept.”

  “Fabulous,” Gerald said. “We’ll see you then.”

  Phillip and Jack made their way across the lot to the truck. Jack stepped inside, setting the pumpkin on his lap, much lighter now without all the guts. Phillip hopped in behind the wheel and shut the door after him. When it was quiet, before his dad started the truck, Jack turned to his father and said, “I love you, Dad.”

  Phillip raised his eyebrows and smiled at Jack. “Well, I love you, too, Jacky-boy. That was a lot of fun. I’m glad we went. Did you have a good time?”

  “The best time ever,” Jack said, smiling to himself. He looked somewhere in the distance, as though reliving every moment.

  “Me, too, Jacky-boy. The best time. It was good to see Alice and Gerald, too, huh?”

  “Yes, sir,” Jack said.

  They drove down the road. After several minutes, Phillip said, “I’m sorry we didn’t win anything, Jacky.”

  Jack smiled and looked at his father, shrugging. It didn’t matter to him one way or the other. “I don’t know.” Jack said. “I think we had the best pumpkin anyway, and I don’t think anyone had as much fun as we did, Pop. I’m glad Alice and her dad came in third at the costume contest.”

  “A great start for the holidays to come, right Jacky?”

  “Yes, sir!”

  A pause filled the space between them, before Phillip said, “What time we got, Jacky-boy!”

  “It’s Friday, sir! Time enough for a milkshake, a bowl of popcorn, and a scary movie.”

  “Couldn’t have said it better myself, Jacky-boy! And look, there’s a Dairy Queen up ahead! What are the odds?”

  CHAPTER VIII

  FEASTS AND MERRYMAKING

  Alice loved autumn more than any other season. Of course, summer will edify the others with its warmth and color, but for Alice, autumn held something special. Every season had its own beauty, she supposed, depending on how you looked at it. Yet, for Alice, autumn held sway, and it wasn’t so much the sights, she supposed, as it was the sense—the feel in the air. Autumn had magic in it. Part of that, she supposed, had to do with the smell of rain, the fallen leaves, and the wood-smoke, a coziness the other seasons did not. Maybe it was the round of a great many holidays, Alice thought. And maybe that was why she liked autumn best.

  Halloween arrived that Sunday, and the streets teemed with laughing, giddy children. The clouds parted, revealing a clear night sky. Every star was visible above Storyville. The moon, appropriate for the holiday, was full and bright, adding an eerie calm, hazy glow across the town.

  Bags of candy grew weighty and cumbersome as the night waned. Costumed children flocked the streets, even the fields, venturing off to the lone houses outside the neighborhoods. Parents accompanied the younger children, standing idly on the sidewalk as treats were doled out.

  Jack and Alice walked down Newberry Street, a neighborhood on the west side of town. Other kids rang doorbells, chimed in with “Trick or treat!” as doors opened, and candy was dispersed: candy-bars, lollipops, popcorn balls, candy apples, and dozens of other forms of candies, cookies, and homemade treats. Goblins, ghouls, vampires, zombies, congested the streets and sidewalks. Firemen, hobos, fairies, clowns, athletes, princesses, and dozens of other characters walked alongside them. Houses were decorated like haunted mansions with dark purple lights, orange lights, sheets to represent ghosts, cemetery-filled yards, and witches on broomsticks. Lighted pumpkins flickered and glowed on almost every porch.

  Despite the fun they were having—the fun they’d had—Jack and Alic
e talked about the summer: Tork McGuckin, school, Fred, Sue, Shockwave, and Christmas, the fantasies they’d taken. Jack, of course, was dressed as Mr. Hyde, and Alice was dressed in the same bloody princess outfit. They’d made no changes to their costumes.

  “I’m glad you’re doing better in school, Jack,” Alice said.

  “I couldn’t do it without you Alice,” Jack said, with sincerity. “I owe you a lot.”

  “You don’t owe me anything,” she said. “Having you as a friend is all I need.”

  “Sometimes, that doesn’t seem enough. But I don’t feel nearly as stupid as I did before.”

  “You were never stupid, Jack,” Alice said, nudging him in the side.

  “Well, thank you, Alice.”

  Alice wondered what would happen to them in the future. She thought it funny they talked the way they did, like now. Odd maybe for anyone else but Jack and Alice. Alice savored it. She wondered if they would always be friends, what their futures held, if they would ever drift apart. Would one or both of them eventually move out of Storyville? She hoped not. Jack owned a rare quality that made her feel strongly attached to him. She didn’t have a name for it, unless it was simply Jack’s personality. Whatever it was cut painfully deep. But it was powerful, too, and maybe that was why it seemed painful. Had they talked about this before? Something about brothers and sisters, best friends, more? Whatever the feeling was, it was not a simple boyfriend/girlfriend sort of feeling, or something that would develop into a man and wife relationship later down the road, only because Alice couldn’t grasp the concept with Jack. When she thought about it, she had a feeling she’d always see him as a child. She could not see him as a grown up or imagine what kind of man he would be. All she knew was that she loved Jack deeply with all her heart, and she had no doubt Jack felt the same. Perhaps their love was perfect. She would not change or lose sight of it.