by Joey W. Hill
The woman smiled. "I wouldn’t steal a girl’s chance to be rescued by you, Sam. Go ahead."
Sam cleared his throat. "Okay. I’ll be right back, guys." He whisked princess and cookie onto his hip and headed across the street.
"Sirs?" Both men turned as Sam approached. "Melanie here says she belongs to your group."
Sam put her down and she toddled into one man’s leg. He caught her upper arm. "Melanie, I told you not to wander off," he muttered.
"Cookies, Daddy. Want one?"
"No, I don’t want one. Jesus." Her dad rolled his eyes at his friend, then turned his attention back to Sam. "Thanks. I drew the short straw with my wife tonight. She’s at home watching reruns while I’m out freezing my ass off."
Sam nodded. "Melanie’s a nice little girl." He motioned to Ms. McGady’s porch. "I take some kids out every year. My name’s Sam, if you want to use me next year. I live in the green house on Terrace Street
."
Melanie’s dad snorted. "Holiday daycare. Pretty lucrative business."
Sam shook his head. "I don’t charge. Er,... she’s wandering off again."
The man whirled on his heel and caught the child by the arm. "Dammit, Melanie, if I have to tell you to stay close one more time, we’re going home. You’re lucky I took you out at all this year."
Sam stiffened. "With all due respect, sir, the whole point is that it’s supposed to be fun for them."
Her dad scowled. "Listen, smartass –"
"Joe, come on," his friend intervened. "Let’s not get into this. The kids have moved on."
Joe cast Sam a sullen glance. "When you get a job and pay a mortgage, you can lecture me about my kid. Until then—"
"You’re right, sir. Absolutely right." Sam turned his back on him, but gave Melanie a parting wink and his cookies. He knew better than to be judgmental. He knew better, but it didn’t stop him from doing it.
He headed back across the street. Ms. McGady had his Crusaders bobbing for apples in the metal washtub on her porch. Sam made it two steps up the walkway to them, then time and motion stopped.
He heard the Voice.
He knew it anywhere, even in the most crowded hallways at school. A tight place in his chest always listened for it, probably the same way the shepherds of Bethlehem always listened for angel’s voices after they had gotten to hear them that one unforgettable night.
Sam turned and watched Jennifer Lind Meriweather come down the street. Her friend, a tall, elegant girl named Marcie, was dressed as a 1920’s flapper. Jennifer sauntered beside her in jeans and a pale blue, fuzzy sweater that showed her delicate collarbones. She had her left hand hooked loosely into her back waistband, and her beige bra strap was revealed by the slide of the neckline. She withdrew a cigarette from her lips, and tossed back her rust-gold hair. The satin sweep rippled across Sam’s memory, taking him back ten Halloweens.
He had dressed up like Superman. Before his mother could tell him to put a coat over the costume, he slipped out of the house to join his friends. Jennifer Lind was one of the friends. Sam loved her beautiful hair and her small nose. She dressed like Lois Lane
, so he knew they were meant for each other. Now he knew she had dressed up like her mother, a paralegal in one of the big city firms. At seven years old, he did not know that secretaries as well as roving female reporters dressed in silk blouses, carried notepads, and stuck pens behind their ears.
They ran from house to house. Every light was on. The adults exclaimed over their costumes, played with them, and beamed them on their way. Jenny and Sam became a team, racing other kids from door to door on opposite sides of the street. They pulled out extra pillowcases and left their full bags of candy at the street to go back to the same doors, blending with another group to get more candy. If the adults knew, they didn't let on.
It was a Leave It To Beaver memory. Jenny Lind seized his hand, and her rust-colored hair brushed his cheek. Then it happened.
He and Jenny had slowed to a walk, panting for breath. Tires squealed behind them. Sam spun and three big kids hung out the window of a hot rod, wearing gruesome rubber masks and screaming like demons. Raw eggs struck Sam in the face and chest. He spun away in reaction, but one of the boys leaned out and grabbed a handful of his bulging Superman pillowcase. Sam couldn’t get his wrist free of the twisted neck of the case, and he screamed in terror as he was dragged with the car. The boy in the mask yanked, hard, and the fabric uncoiled. Sam skidded across the pavement on his knees, his wrist and lungs burning. The car screeched away in a black ball of smoke.
Sam’s blue tights were ripped and his knees bled. Tears blurred his vision. A shaken Jenny Lind cried as eggs dripped down her mother’s borrowed blouse. The boys had tried to get her candy, too, and missed, catching her mother’s costume pearls instead. The beads were all over the street and rolling down the gutter to the storm drain.
Sam unclenched his hand, feeling the memory of Jenny’s touch fade. He could not stop Jenny’s tears. He could not get his candy back. He could not stop the ache he felt inside every time he saw her. That night of terrible loss had bound his heart to her, a remembrance of sweet possibilities. He still felt seven years old in her presence, as if he could reclaim those possibilities if he could only make up for that one night.
Jennifer walked by without noticing him, the sway of her hips gradually vanishing into the night, her path erased by bands of trick or treaters crisscrossing the street behind her.
"Sam! Sam!" "He’s fallen under a spell!" "The fairies have gotten him!" "Ms. McGady, get another bucket of water!"
Sam snatched Larry and Aaron up under each arm as Celia and Demetrios shrieked and dashed out of range. Calypso danced around them excitedly, barking. "The fairies told me to eat you unless you give me half of your cookies!" Sam demanded.
Demetrios brandished his mace. "I’ll defend my cookies with my last dying breath."
"Your breath makes people die," Celia retorted. "You should defend a fair maiden with your last dying breath, not cookies."
Larry wrinkled his nose. "Girls are just trouble. Right, Sam?"
Sam grinned and dropped his charges. "You’re right, Larry. But they’re the best kind of trouble around." He nodded goodbye to a chuckling Ms. McGady and led his group back down the walk. Celia’s hand crept into his while the boys quarreled over who had the most candy so far.
"You really like that girl, don’t you, Sam?"
I’d die for her. He hadn’t had the courage to speak to her since that Halloween night ten years ago, but his soul belonged to Jennifer Lind Meriwether. Sam accepted it the way he was able to accept nothing else and, in some twisted way, he felt it was an anchor, holding him to sanity.
"Sam," Celia tilted her face up to him. "You know I’ll marry you in ten years, if you want me to, but if you like her, that’s okay. I don’t want you to be lonely waiting for me."
Sam squeezed her hand, hard. He couldn’t think of anything to say, so he settled for lifting Celia off her feet and carrying her on his shoulders the rest of the way down the street.
About fifty houses later, when the boys started complaining about the weight of their pillowcases and Celia grew quiet, Sam headed for D’s house. He dropped Larry off with D, since Larry was spending the night. Demetrios’s mace dragged the ground with a rasping noise as the two boys made their way up the walk. Sam waved at Demetrios’ grandmother as she opened the door.
Celia lived two blocks away. When they got to her house, she gave Sam a long hug before running up the walk to her mom. Sam nodded at Mrs. Friedrickson. She looked pretty relaxed tonight. Maybe she’d spend some time with Celia and let the kid tell her about her Halloween, rather than holing herself up away from her daughter with a TV remote and a National Geographic for her ‘personal quality time’, like she usually did.
Aaron didn’t have much to say during the four-block walk to his house, but Aaron was not a chatterbox like most kids. He did a lot of thinking. Maybe plotting was the better word.
A smile tugged at Sam’s lips.
"Sam," Aaron stopped in front of his porch stoop. "No one gave me any Reese’s Pieces tonight."
"Oh." Sam pulled at his sleeve, straightening a fold of shirt bunched beneath the back harness. "So, you’ll just have to get some at the store."
"But I can’t. Mom’s traveling, and Dad won’t have time to take me. No one will take me." Aaron shrugged. "Your mom won’t really remember anyway, will she?"
Sam stopped working at his sleeve. "Aaron, why do you do this stuff? Why do you make promises you won’t keep?"
"I meant to, Sam, it’s just…nobody gave me any Reese’s Pieces tonight. Hey," the boy brightened and pulled out Ms. McGady’s cookies. "I’ll give you these if you go to the store for me."
Sam shook his head. "No deal, Aaron. You promised my mom Reese’s Pieces. You get them tomorrow, or next Halloween I’m not taking you."
"But—that’s not fair!" Aaron’s bottom lip poked out. Sam sighed. He sat down on the top porch step, presenting his back to Aaron, and ran his hand over his hair.
"Are you really mad at me, Sam?" Aaron touched his shoulder.
"I don’t know," Sam said. "It’s really important to me that you keep your promise."
"Why?" Aaron sat down next to him, his hip pressed against Sam’s, as if he hoped physical contact would bring exoneration.
Sam crooked an elbow on his thigh, braced his chin on it and considered the younger boy. It was hard to know what Aaron could and couldn’t understand. Maybe nine was old enough to understand all of it. Aaron watched him with large, apprehensive eyes and Sam’s throat got tight looking at him, at his future. Why did things have to change? Why couldn’t Aaron be a manipulative little kid that exasperated and amused, but did no real harm? Why did they have to learn about consequences and grow up?
"Aaron, you know how sometimes things happen to you that make no sense?" Sam asked. "Things that hurt?"
"Like what?"
Like maybe your mom and dad make promises to you they don’t keep, Sam thought. So Aaron did it, too, unintentionally doing exactly what they did to hurt him. Parents had a bond to their kid's soul that could never be broken, that affected your actions in ways you could never imagine happening.
"Just things. You know ’em when you feel ’em." Sam nudged the boy’s hip with his own, but his eyes stayed serious. "You need a place to go, in here," he pressed his fingers against Aaron’s chest, "Where you can figure it all out. It’s tough to go there when you’re not telling the truth to people—" he held up a hand before Aaron protested. "or to yourself." Sam shook his head at Aaron’s expression. "You have no idea what I’m talking about, do you?"
Aaron looked down at the tips of Sam’s boots and fidgeted. "I’ll get the candy, Sam. Somehow. I promise."
"I know, Aaron." Sam stood up and drew the boy with him, hugging him. To his surprise, Aaron hugged him back, looping his arms around Sam’s hips and pressing his cheek to his ribs. Sam smoothed a hand over his curly brown hair. Aaron drew away after a silent minute and straightened his glasses.
"Bye, Sam."
"Good night, Aaron."
Sam waited while Aaron unlocked the door with the key around his neck and listened for the latch.
It was about 9:00. The midnight tournament was at Snow’s Cut campground, only a couple miles if he took the railroad tracks behind D’s house. He headed in that direction, and contemplated what was ahead to dispel the shadows that had come from his talk with Aaron. It was going to be a good tournament. Sam liked it okay when they did the tourneying in front of crowds, but he liked it best like it would be tonight, just the players. Being lost in it was better than performing.
He slipped behind D’s grandmother’s harvested vegetable garden and skidded down the steep incline of the path that led through pine trees to the railroad tracks. The rails reflected the moonlight, creating a silver path. He walked between them, and imagined Jennifer walking with him. He’d hold her hand while she tried to walk on the metal rail, and catch her if she slipped, or they’d each walk a rail, holding hands in the middle to steady each other.
It was a good fantasy. He stuck with it for awhile, until the woods truncated for the Howe Street
intersection. The neon sign of Patel’s Railside Convenience Store colored the rails gold and violet. Sam turned off. If Aaron made good on his promise, Sam's mother would get two bags of Reese’s Pieces. Sam believed Aaron really would try, but he knew promises sometimes got broken, despite the best intentions.
The store light was garish after the moonlight. Sam quickly found the candy, paid for it and returned to the stillness of the tracks. The candy clicked in the pouch on his hip. He tightened the noose on the bag to still the rattling, but the weight was still there, a few ounces as distracting as a feather resting on his nose. It filled his mind with voices and images, and brought the dull headache back.
His mother had held him in her arms that Halloween until he cried himself out. Then she emptied the large plastic pumpkin they used to distribute their own treats and smiled. "John, honey, go get the car keys. We’re going to the store, and Sam’s going to fill this up with any candy he wants, except Reese’s Pieces. All those Reese’s Pieces are mine."
She knew they were his favorite.
"Nunh-unh!" He wiped at his eyes and lunged for the pumpkin. She was twirling around in her gypsy costume and did not see him. The plastic pumpkin bounced off his forehead.
"Oh, Sam, Sam—" she knelt in front of him, her hand folding over the bump. "You poor thing. What a night. Are you okay? Mommy’s just being silly. You can have all the Reese’s Pieces."
Sam was relieved to see the faint trail that led off the tracks. It wound through a half mile of woods and would end up behind Snow’s Cut.
He liked the hushed stillness of the real woods. He came here when he could, laid flat on the cool earth and listened. He stopped being a person and became part of something that made a lot more sense, the smell of earth and decaying leaves, and the sway of trees against a blue sky.
Harsh laughter shattered the temporary peace of the picture. Sam stopped. It was the kind of laugh someone made when they weren’t really laughing, when they were convincing themselves or someone else that they were having a good time. He peered through the darkness and focused on a dim mushroom of light off to his left, near the ravine. Probably someone fooling around, drinking. Sam took another step, and heard the Voice.
Jen was probably with some of her friends. There was no reason for him to go check it out. Sam turned, turned again. He should make sure she was all right, though. Of course, if she was making out with some guy, he’d feel like crap for the rest of the night. Sam sighed and headed toward the light.
He crept up to the firelit clearing and crouched in the shadows at the edge. Jen faced him across the open space. She stood, one hip cocked and an arm wrapped loosely around her waist as she held a cigarette in a hand extended toward the ground. Her thumb flicked the butt, but there was no ash. Her attention was on Reginald Bartlett, who tended the fire at the center of the clearing. A duffel bag hung from the tree branch over his right shoulder.
Reg was a self styled badass, a menace to anything weaker than himself. Since he was over six feet tall and 200 pounds, that was a lot of menace. What in the hell was Jen doing in the woods with him? And not just him.
Todd Ingle leaned against the tree behind her, the perpetual smirk with which he infuriated teachers apparently permanently frozen on his flaccid, drugged-out face. Jason Darby squatted on the ground, digging a shallow trench around the circumference of the clearing with a hand spade.
Jen wasn’t paying any attention to them. Her eyes rested on Reg in a way that knifed Sam somewhere below his intestines. Fine. He could go now. She was fine, he felt like manure. The universe was as it should be.
"Hey! Don’t fall asleep on me!" Reg flicked his wrist and whacked the duffel bag with his tree branch poker. A squall came from inside, followed by a staccato of hissing.
The bag jerked, bulging out the fabric. Sam saw the pale glint of a claw pierce the bag. The hissing subsided to a growl, then a pitiful mewling.
Sam’s attention darted to Jen. The boys were laughing, but she wasn’t. She managed a half smile for Reg, but her eyes weren’t joining the party. She didn’t like it. Good. Maybe she’d get out of there.
"Is this supposed to be more fun than Tracy’s party?" she asked. "What are you guys going to do, shaving cream him?" Jen shifted to the other hip and tossed her head. Her hair tumbled over her right breast. Sam didn’t like the way Todd’s eyes followed it, like he was looking at something he had already bought.
"Tonight’s a night for power," Jason scoffed, sitting back on his heels. "That’s baby stuff. Todd, where’s the rope?"
Todd pushed away from the tree and brushed Jen’s backside with his arm.
"Hey, watch it." She twisted out of his range, but he crowded her, laying an arm around her shoulders.
