October days can be a bright splashy spectrum of orange and candy apple red, while October nights display those same colors on a field of inky ebony.
Throughout the month, there is an atmosphere of fabulous fright because this is the season when everyone loves a good scare. There’s a spider on your back! See how much fun we’re having?
So, let us enjoy the Night Before All Saints’ Day, sometimes called All Hallow’s Eve, as shrieks of delighted terror float on the wind and millions of people clutch each other while watching a semi-classic flick starring Bela Lugosi, Boris Karloff, Christopher Lee, or Vincent Price.
Halloween is not actually a holiday, despite appearing on the calendar. In the USA, it is all about accumulating free candy and taking things a bit too far at parties. (“Hello, girls. Nice fishnet stockings! Say, are you two into bondage?”) And in the capitalistic marketplace, retailers offer plenty of stupidly spooktacular sales events throughout the month.
In Mexico, things can be a bit more serious with Dia de los Muertos, which despite the name appears to be a multi-day event. England combines festivity and politics with their Guy Fawkes Night. China has the Ghost Festival and Hong Kong has the even-more-deliciously-named Festival of the Hungry Ghosts. In Sweden, Alla Helgons Dag is celebrated for a week, while in San Francisco, October 31st is Bitches’ Christmas, with partying that gets delightfully out of control.
In every U.S. city with decent weather, the youngest trick-or-treaters begin making their rounds in the late afternoon under the supervision of Very Concerned Parents. Some adults accompany their offspring right up to the door while others linger nearby. Either way, the parents watch their kids with furrowed brows and gritted teeth.
Costumes on the tots are sometimes more decorative than those on the older kids. Possibly this is because the parents spend more time fussing over them. Or perhaps it just seems that the little tykes’ outfits are more intricate because they can be better seen in the light of the sun which is still hovering lazily above the horizon.
On the walkway in front of one quiet suburban home, two sisters are moving up to the door as their parents observe from five yards behind. The older child, perhaps seven, is in a beautiful black velvet witch’s costume. Her younger sibling, probably no more than four, is a mini-symphony of silver and white, a perfect glittery fairy princess complete with tiara and wand.
Inside the house, preparations had been made for the trick-or-treaters. The owner, a 44-year-old divorced man now living alone, had put on black jeans, black socks, black boots, and a long-sleeved black shirt. On each hand he had pulled novelty gloves that sported ape-like black fur and robot-like fingers. His old-fashioned living room stereo was playing an eerie electronica-goth piece of music.
“I am the Master of the Macabre!” the man shouted for his own amusement.
Now standing on the man’s front stoop, the two little girls knocked politely. The homeowner threw back the deadbolt on the door and pulled it open just an inch or two, crying out, “Bwwaaaahaaaahaaaa!”
The man put one set of robot/ape fingers around the door’s edge, then the other. He pretended to exert tremendous effort in opening the door, grunting as he moved it inch by agonizing inch. Finally, it was thrown wide and he took two stomping steps forward to fill the doorway with his menacing presence. “So,” his hissed at the two adorable girls, “trick or treat is your demand?!? You want pieces of candy from the cauldron?!?” He raised one robot/ape hand in the direction of a large bowl of candy sitting on a table next to the door.
Looking up at the man, the cute little seven-year-old witch-costumed girl did not flinch. In fact, she barely batted an eyelash. Instead, she offered the man a small, clear-eyed smile. But not a perfectly innocent smile, no; it was the look of a wise-beyond-her-years adolescent who was tolerating the foibles of a misguided adult. Keeping her eyes on the man, she slightly tilted her head toward her younger sister and said quietly but oh-so-distinctly, “Don’t scare the little one.” Her voice went up the scale from the first word to the fourth, then took a gentle half-step down on the final word.
There was a pause through which you could have driven a Mack truck and then the man shook with laughter. He picked up the bowl of candy and held it out to them, saying, “Take all you want; you earned it.”
“Two pieces will be fine, thank you,” came the reply. And with that, the two little girls turned primly and walked serenely toward their parents.
“Happy Halloween,” the man called out.
“Same to you!” replied one parent.
The man closed the door, still chuckling about his encounter. “Bwwaaaahaaaahaaaa,” he said to himself sheepishly. “Master of the Macabre, my ass.”
A story from the collection Your Panties are Broadcasting on my Frequency.