The group was slow and given to horseplay, which explained the driver’s face. Maren had sufficient time.
She walked to the house resolutely, sticking to shadows, though as much to verify their emptiness as to conceal herself.
In the yard, cheap, cotton-blend cobwebs draped a sawtooth oak, a medium-sized tree waging a campaign to undermine the driveway, its roots beginning to lift a slab that would crack when moisture and the spring thaw returned.
Maren huffed with disdain at plastic spiders positioned in the cotton netting; at a larger, motion-activated device on a string that would leap down in a flurry of noise, red lights, and gear-driven legs when approached.
Dilettantes.
A family of pumpkins lined steps leading to tall double doors of the brick monument, the smallest gourd slashed into crude shapes, the larger ones ornately made; carved like permanent sculptures.
The two larger pumpkins were hollowed as though with a melon-baller, and a light flickered in each. Not magic, a peek under a pumpkin lid confirmed, but worse: a tiny LED coolly replicated nature, its microprocessors making mockery of a burning wick.
Maren repressed the desire to kick the pumpkins to pie filling, instead lifting a hand to test the cotton webbing.
It would hold.
Twenty feet tall and far above, a headless rider with a flapping blanket was poised aggressively at a gangly man made of cardboard—the slender victim was glued to the house atop a knob-kneed nag.
Her necklace warmed. Maren identified the watcher in a room filled with real darkness and fake thunder. Her hand dipped into leather, deposited the tachyderms—a remarkably bad choice at close quarters—and she rifled blindly, closing her eyes and opening her mind.
It was smart to be certain.
She closed a spotted fist around a many-sided object, dense as a chunk of garnet. Maren leaned to the steps and let the twenty sides roll. “Seventeen,” she said, concentrating.
A crash of thunder boomed behind her; the smell of hot metal, scorched pine, and a torched castle washed from the little park. Electricity blinked out of being.
A scream rolled from the room where the lightning had been extinguished. A man was exhorted loudly to check a breaker box. The storm window was open a crack, and Maren had a keen sense for reds, merlot in particular—the wife was into the wine.
No use wasting darkness. Maren drew a jagged symbol around the odds-maker using a piece of loose gravel, bouncing slightly to music unheard outside her own head.
At a tap of her finger, the die flared with inner fire. The man roared like a minotaur from the basement or the back yard.
Maren grunted through her nose as she straightened. The man shouted about twenty-amp fuses and blown circuits and how that twice-be-damned electrician promised this wouldn’t happen—right to my face—that’s what I get for hiring an illegal…
She silenced the man’s voice in her mind, not bothering with tinfoil. Maren ran a fingertip along the egg carton, pressing three dents and the accompanying nodes that held the lid in place, if one were careful—and with these eggs, she was.
The headless horseman and the stick figure hung silently; the projector clicked as it cooled.
Bouncing softly, Maren chanted…
Out now: shake your hairy legs.
Be fat about the abdomen;
Rise from these gosling’s eggs
And nest instead in living men.
Maren opened the carton with a scrape of cardboard, held each of the dozen brown orbs briefly for inspection, and dropped them onto the concrete steps without further ado. The eggs shattered like ornaments of the winter season, one following another.
She leaned to retrieve the large, many-sided die, confirmed it had read seventeen—it had—and secreted it into the bowling bag.
“Found it!” the man bellowed. A hoot of derision lifted from elsewhere, followed by a clink, a curse, and something concerning granite islands and stains.
The projector whirred suddenly and threw a rectangle of white light at the side of the house, its program in need of a manual resumption. Maren turned and tottered down the step she had ascended.
“—Just have to handle that by yourself. There’s a girl at our door I’ll get rid—” Maren heard.
The action of the double doors oil-quiet, the woman’s head in silhouette as she turned one way and another, bickering with her husband as the doors came ajar.
The spiderlings shook free of their placental coating, scraping bits of shell from their dusky bodies. They were a solid crop, each as wide as Maren’s open hand from thumb to pinkie—a hand she used to suggest, rather indelicately, that the attercops abandon the walkway.
“Are you okay, dearie?” asked the starch woman, her voice dripping with false care, her tongue thickened by wine. “Where’s your group?”
“Here and there,” Maren replied, honestly enough. “We don’t travel together as we used to.” The woman’s eyes narrowed at the depth of Maren’s voice.
The hostess traveled to the bowling purse, to the greasy mink around Maren’s neck, to the waistcoat, the patchwork blouse beneath; to the stretched hose that had slipped scandalously low on Maren’s calves.
The last of the attercops was fleeing the cinematic projector’s light when the hostess saw the eggshells, brown and speckled and ruined—there were no yolks, obviously.
“Egged again!”
“I dropped my groceries when the lights—” Maren smiled in apologetic conclusion, cheekbones prominent, her right palm upturned.
“Oh, you poor thing,” the woman said, her face a mask. “Burt!” she screamed, causing Maren to wince. “Bring the hose! Hurry! The long one. We have a group coming!” She paused to listen to a reply. “Of course it’s a mess! The hose! Now.”
“We get egged again?” The man’s voice boomed, his footsteps thudding down a hallway that resounded as if floored in oak veneer.
“Close enough,” the woman said.
Maren shot a glance at the cotton cobwebs… plastic spiders were no longer the largest occupants.
“What the hell’s this?” Burt demanded, a husky man, pig-faced and fleshy, strangely built, his thighs heavy in the places Maren associated with a woman. A garden hose was looped about his barrel chest, making him look rather explorative.
“It’s just afterbirth,” Maren explained. “This jellyfish on your steps is not from the sea. Had they been afforded… usually, the amniotic nutrients get consumed.”
“What?” the woman snapped, but her mouth dropped in horror. “Burt! The projector’s off! Put the program back on! Now!”
Maren took a step backward and fished into her purse again. “I should probably… trick or treat, don’t they say?”
The woman stared at Maren, an empty goblet in her hand. “After a stunt like this? Your groceries! I don’t know how you got in here, but we pay the HOA a pretty penny to keep… they must’ve thought you were in costume. Christ’s last bruise. Aren’t you too old to be… out?”
The merlot mother jumped as though goosed before Maren could respond. A frail-looking boy, tall for his age, rawboned and quiet, stood at his mother’s rump, a plastic cauldron in his hands. The bowl was heaping with name-brand candies—big ones.
“Austin, inside!” his mother commanded. “Go on!”
“I’ll have a sweet,” Maren said pleasantly. “Bring it in here, Austin! Look at this! You know how to put out a spread, young man. Why, it’s… ostentatious!”
“Austin Osmand! Throw a Milky Way at this vagabond and get inside!” Austin’s mother reviewed her words. “He’s on the spectrum,” she said in a stage whisper.
“Aren’t we all,” Maren said softly. “Come here, boy. I may have a shabby costume, but I have treats in trade.”
“He’ll curse at you,” the hostess said. “He doesn’t know half of what he—”
“—Good woman, take your husband and your hose back inside your home. Tend to your rites—they could use supervision.”
&n
bsp; “What?”
“The remains of twenty people smell inside.”
“Smell? I assure you, we do not smell.”
“Of course you do. Everyone does. Were you what you want to be, you would know that. As to your son, I have been cursed by things more horrible than he. The words of a child do not sting the experienced ear.”
The woman fluttered her eyelids and turned. “Burt!”
Maren was not alone in wishing for tinfoil—the boy flinched from his mother’s voice as though slapped.
Burt, for his part, was attempting to spray water from the hose (exactly where was unclear) and restart the projector at the same time. Maren thought she might get to see the man electrocute himself. She hoped not: that was a dance she would rather reserve for the less culpable.
The boy, Austin, continued to hold the plastic half-pumpkin of candies.
“I’m waiting,” Maren said, more to the mother than the boy.
“Take your supper, then—but hurry it up!” the woman shouted, turning to walk swiftly down the hallway with her empty glass.
Alone with the boy, Maren ran a finger around in a tin that looked like a tiny wheel of cheese. “It’s ointment,” she explained. “This wind dries old hands. There’s cajuput oil and mint in this. It’s contact lotion,” Maren said.
“Why’s it called that?”
“I’ll show you,” Maren explained, and threw the unmarked tin at the boy. Austin made the save without spilling the tub of candy—not all of it.
He looked at the tin with apprehension. “My grandma used this, I think. She died.”
“It wasn’t the cream that did her in—you have my word on that. You could toss it back, though.”
On its return, Maren nearly dropped the tin herself—the boy’s fingerprints were laced with memories of abuses she had not been entirely ready to see.
“Ah,” Maren said. She wiped at the corner of her eye. “The reports were incomplete. Silk and candles are too good for them.”
“Do you want any… I have to go. She’s calling.”
“She’s screaming, you mean. That is her way. She’ll scream louder when I am done. Don’t run off just yet. We have an unfinished transaction. Told you I had a trade.”
“Okay.”
“I want you to stay away from the basement,” Maren warned.
“I try,” the boy said, and a shiver like epilepsy shook his thin frame. “I don’t want to, but I—do you want any of the…? I have to go.”
“Go? Not if I have my way, and I will,” Maren said. Acting more on instinct than plan, she unzipped the second pocket of her waistcoat and jabbed for the open mouth of the slit, working the chain and collar.
The worm curled around her hand, hardening like a vine exposed to frost; the creature shriveled, fading to a deep butterscotch.
“Whoa. What’s—?”
The night worm twisted in Maren’s fingers until her bones creaked. An everyday earthworm could move five hundred times its own weight: Maren’s creations were a good deal stronger.
“Care to see what we have here?” She glanced at the adults, who were in further argument about the direction and intensity of the projected film, the hose, the stream of water spouting from same; Maren and the boy were ignored like old furniture.
“To the left! Your other left! Burt, so help me…”
“Have you been out this evening?” Maren asked the boy.
“No,” Austin said.
Maren nodded in understanding. “No costume. You’ll get nothing good as a doorman. Do people still bring presents, or does it go one direction these days?”
“Some kids threw eggs, but you can’t eat those.”
“Smart boy. You wouldn’t want to swallow mine, either,” Maren said. “Salmonella is the sweeter death. Speaking of sweets, I have this to give you. It’s not food, but you’ve earned it—and it will do you more good than sugar, wrong as that feels to say.”
“I can’t have pets,” Austin whispered.
“They say I can’t have a Heath bar, either—but you just watch me.” Maren flashed a conspiratorial smile. “I propose an exchange. Mine has instructions. Living things often do.”
“Does it poop?”
“Not in the way of… I see your shirt hasn’t wrinkled in the wash. Do you care for your own clothes?”
“I… I put them on hangers. Mom gets—”
“—Hangers, you say? That explains it. I throw my duds in a pile. When you have a face like mine, the wrinkles match-up. If you can care for a shirt, you are a prime candidate for… for this,” Maren said, excavating a generous handful of goodies and dropping the worm into the pot.
Austin needed no encouragement to reach for the dry tangle of moving scales.
“Gently now. Yes, good.” Maren looked at the mother’s pointing finger inches above her head. Burt’s name was screamed again. “I’ll take another fist of candy, I believe. Missed a Snickers. Hands are stiff.”
“Take as much as you want,” Austin said.
“Thank you. I thought these bars were—the wrapper has changed colors again. Wait—there’s peanut butter in these? I must take three.”
“What do I do with… with it?”
“That? Oh yes, the… that’s the best part. No hangers needed. It comes with no requirement of parental consent, nor will you need an aquarium, terrarium, jar, or bucket. It eats when you do, and… you had a question about waste management. There is none.”
“What is it?”
“That, young Austin, is something you have to know to understand. When you want to cry, a night worm will comfort you, which any good pet should. When you want to kill, it will give council—” Maren paused as the front door slammed; Austin skipped to the side to avoid being crushed. “The only thing you must do, child, is give it a loving home. Can you do that?”
“Yes, but… I can’t keep my army men in Mom’s plants anymore. They poison the… I’m grounded.”
“You can’t take responsibility for that. When plastic soldiers attack a plant, you can be certain they have good cause.” Maren looked at the rope burns on the boy’s wrists, wet with scabs Austin picked at nervously.
“This companion needs to settle-in the one time. It will hurt, but it will pass. If you don’t want it, hand it back. If you do, hold it to your nose. Pretend you’re sniffing a fresh slice of rye.”
“What’s rye?”
“Done right? Black bread. Puts junk in your trunk. This worm… the choice is yours. Having a companion requires compromises—the first of which being to share an assigned space. As it will be your body, sharing may seem like loss. That will be the painful moment. It gets easier after that.”
“It—my nose? It lives in me?”
“Yes. Odd, I know, but it’s a puppy you can play with whenever you like. Your parents will never know you have it.” Maren watched the boy with apprehension.
Burt blinded them with the projector; he’d already soaked the walkway, the steps, Maren, and much of the lawn. Seconds remained before the mother remembered her unwanted son and the hobo lady.
The worm, however, knew what it wanted, and Maren was delighted to see it extend from the boy’s cupped hands, reaching for his face.
It would dull its entrance within seconds of assuming local control of Austin’s nerves. A nosebleed was a guarantee, but by the time his parents looked—if they ever thought to do so—the cavity would be vacant. And if they didn’t notice right away, Maren had good reason to believe they never would.
Austin breathed as though he had opened a cold oven and found it filled with turtle brownies. His eyes squeezed until tears flowed; the night worm stretched his nostrils, clawing its way quickly past the beginning of bone.
The child did not protest, which bothered Maren somewhat—a flash of his memories revisited her mind. A pointed tail darted from a tear duct; Austin inhaled as though taking his first breath of air.
The worm flailed, mulberry and scaled, waving as it pushed; Maren could only
hope would not have the effect of a lobotomy.
The boy’s nose dripped, his eyes brightened, and he straightened, smiling for the first time Maren had seen.
“Wow, that was really… but it’s wonderful. It says we can be bestest friends forever. How can it talk?”
“Don’t mind that. It’s sincere about the friendship. Don’t pick your bugle for a day or two,” Maren advised. “Listen to your friend. When you are trapped, listen. The worm will find a way.”
“Wow,” the boy repeated. “I always wanted a puppy. I won’t tell anybody. Ever.”
“Mmm-hmm,” Maren said, pulling at the plastic pumpkin in the boy’s hands; she dumped several thousand calories into her purse. Stooping to recover what Austin had dropped, she recovered as many Heath bars as she could discern. A Hershey’s Special Dark miniature lay in a slick of egg—Maren nearly wept to leave it there.
“He’s a she, and the puppy… she’s like my grandma, but she’s like a snake, too.”
“Talkative, eh? Here,” Maren said, handing the depleted basin back to the boy. “Austin, this new friend of yours—let her help you. You will awaken to changes. Let yourself be guided. Friends listen to each other. If it says he’s a she—what of it? Still a good deal, isn’t it?”
“You bet it is. I’ll listen. I really will,” Austin said, grinning madly. He sneaked an Almond Joy into his front pocket. “She says we should eat more.”
Maren patted the final bulge in her waistcoat. “Perhaps I should dose myself. I could use a friend to tell me such things. Everyone I know says I ought to kill the carbs. And fat. And sugar. I’ll starve if I go dry of carrots.”
“Austin! What in the—I thought you were inside! Git! Is this mother of mountains still pestering you?”
“Momma, she’s a witch! I gave her a candy and she…” Austin put a finger in his ear as his eyes dulled. “I gave her what she wanted,” he said simply, waved at Maren, and obeyed the twist his mother made to his shoulders.
“Oh, for—why’d you let her spill the…?” The woman glared murder at Maren. “May you rot your last tooth,” she said, pushed the door open, pushed the boy through, and stormed behind him, rattling the glass. She reopened the door to scream her husband’s name a final time.
All Hallows Page 23
