Halloween
Eddie’s
Seymour opened the door,
glow-in-the-dark fangs already bared, hands raised in camp dramatics. But when
he saw Nathan’s devil-faced appearance, he hesitated.
Seymour retreated into his living
room, his hands still raised, his gaze glued to the pistol.
Seymour did as he was told.
Seymour looked horrified. “What
money?”
Seymour ’s eyes bulged like a cartoon
from the black makeup. “I’m not! I swear to you I’m not. I have twenty-five
dollars in my wallet. Please, take it!”
Seymour ’s fear sizzled into anger and
he seemed to grow in stature, pushing the pistol away as if it were a toy.
“Take that stupid mask off!” he shouted.
Seymour didn’t even flinch. “Mess
with you? It’s the police who’re going to be messing with you, Nathan. You’re
going to jail, boy.”
Seymour picked up the cordless phone.
“I can’t believe this, Nathan. I tried to be a friend to you, boy. I even let
you work in my shop...and this is how you repay me?”
Seymour shuddered, his eyes wide and
staring. He convulsed, blood welling in his mouth and oozing down the sides of
his face, stark crimson lines against the white makeup.
Seymour ’s eyes rolled up into his
head and the shaking gradually ebbed away. He let out a long, gurgling sigh and
fell still.
Seymour ’s body jerked and shifted.
Seymour coughed and shuddered and
clawed at the carpet.
Seymour ’s silvery gaze fell on
Nathan, focusing and narrowing.
Seymour ’s lips stripped back from his
blood-clotted teeth and he made a sudden screaming lurch toward him.
By Alan
I’Anson
Nathan wished he’d added another layer of clothing beneath his
disguise. He’d only walked a few blocks and the cold, damp night had already
seeped right though to his skin. The latex devil’s mask he wore bugged him too.
It smelled like old rubber bands, his breath condensing inside and wetting his
chin and neck.
Freddy Krueger and Jason
Voorhees walked by. Nathan blinked rapidly and glanced down as they passed, but
neither horror icon gave him the even slightest bit of attention.
Nathan grinned. What other
night of the year could you stalk the city disguised from head to foot and no
one gave you a second glance? Praise the
Underlord and the parents of every little vampire, ghoul and demon walking the
streets tonight.
He pinched the devil’s rubbery
chin and pulled it away from his face, letting a miserable drizzle of
condensation dribbled into the hollow of his throat.
Fucking
mask.
Halloween was a dumb holiday
anyway. Witches and demons? Grown adults dressed as white-faced vampires,
walking the streets crying ‘trick or treat’ for a handful of sweets? How lame
was that?
Nathan
slowed his pace. Halloween Eddie’s costume and novelty store stood on the next corner. Dumb holiday
and an even dumber name for a shop, he thought. The guy who owned it wasn’t
even called Eddie. Dude’s name was Seymour .
And what was the idea of
naming a shop that was open all year round after a single annual holiday anyway?
Sure, Eddie’s sold all kinds of spooky shit, but Halloween Eddie’s all year round? That wasn’t just dumb - it was
plain stupid.
Nathan eased into the shadows
and watched Seymour’s apartment which sat behind the shop. A home made
jack-o’-lantern glowed in the window, candles flickering behind its leathery
skin.
Seymour was on the doorstep entertaining
a bunch of kids in plastic masks and capes, laughing and passing out candy. He
was a tall man with a scrawny face and a graying bird’s nest of a beard. He’d painted
his face white and blackened his eye-sockets, his mouth bulging with a set of
goofy plastic vampire teeth. A flowing, crimson-lined cape completed the costume.
He gave the kids a vampire-like
hiss, and waved them farewell before closing the door.
Nathan waited a half-minute,
shivering and wondering if he should still go through with it. Seymour lived alone, but Nathan hadn’t
thought about trick or treaters calling. Half the costumes on the street
tonight were probably hired from Halloween Eddie’s. People liked Seymour and his novelty
shop. Nathan should have realized they would include the shopkeeper in their
rounds.
Still, Nathan reasoned, he
should be in and out in minutes. If anyone knocked while he was inside, he
could just ignore them until they got bored and moved on. He felt uneasy about
it, but it was a risk he was willing to take.
Nathan crossed the wet
blacktop to the apartment. It was getting late, not many people about, and they
all seemed too preoccupied with the festivities to notice a lone trick or
treater anyway.
Nathan rapped on the door with
leather-clad knuckles. Adrenaline rushed him, quickening his heart. Suddenly
his palms were slick, his nerves wrenched tight.
The pumpkin grinned at him
through the glass, its eyes burning orange and yellow. A shadow passed over it
and the flames shimmered.
Nathan drew a semi-automatic
pistol from his pocket, holding it low and close to his body.
“Inside,” he ordered.
Seymour’s hands remained in
the air, eyes wide and confused. “What?” he asked.
Nathan gritted his teeth. This fucking mask!
“Get inside!” he said again,
louder this time.
Nathan closed the door behind
him and reached out to flip the pumpkin off the sill. It split open on the floor,
splashes of hot wax dousing the candles. Gray threads of smoke curled from
between its roughly carved teeth.
Nathan took stock. They were
in a cramped living room lit by a couple of small table lamps. By the side of a
battered armchair, a sprawling avalanche of books and magazines spilled across
the threadbare carpet. The television played, the sound turned way down. The
channel was showing Phantasm.
“What do you want?” Seymour asked.
“Shut the fuck up!” Nathan
said, deepening the tone of his voice.
“Okay,” Seymour said. “Take it easy. I’ll do whatever
you say.”
“Sit down!”
Nathan brandished the pistol.
“I want the money, man. I want all the cash outta the safe.”
Nathan stepped closer, focusing
the pistol on Seymour ’s
face. “Don’t fuck with me!”
Seymour squeezed his eyes shut.
The plastic teeth slipped from his mouth, a silvery string of saliva still
attaching them to his quivering lip.
“This place is a goldmine this
time of the year,” Nathan said. “I want it all.”
“But it’s not here,” Seymour told him. “I
don’t keep it here.”
“Bullshit! Give me the money
or I swear to God I’ll kill you.”
“It’s gone!” Seymour insisted. “I banked it.”
Nathan blinked rapidly. His
mouth worked, but no sound came out. Banked it? Seymour didn’t bank the takings
until the following day. Sometimes he’d even leave it until the Friday. Nathan
had observed long enough to know that.
“You’re lying, man! You keep
the money in the safe!”
“I...I do...normally I
do...” Seymour stammered, “but not on Halloween. I don’t like keeping that much
cash over night on Halloween.”
Nathan stood there panting,
the devil face sucking in and out like a shriveled heart. This wasn’t the plan.
Seymour had to
be lying.
Nathan dragged him off the
sofa and manhandled him into the hall leading to the shop. “Open it!” he
shouted, offering encouragement with a painful jab of the pistol.
Seymour opened the cupboard
under the stairs and moved a cardboard box hiding the small vault. He dialed in
the combination and opened the chunky door.
“Take a look,” he said.
“There’s no cash.”
Nathan pushed Seymour aside and checked. The safe was empty
but for a few worthless documents.
“Fuck!” Nathan cried. “FUCK!”
He turned on Seymour , ramming the terrified man against
the wall and pinning him there with a forearm across his throat. He thrust the
pistol into Seymour ’s
face and deliberately cocked the hammer. “I’m warning you, man, if you’re lying to me...”
Twenty-five
dollars? He’d
risked all this for twenty-five lousy dollars? There must be something in this shit-hole worth taking
- jewelry or an expensive wristwatch?
Nathan suddenly became aware
that Seymour
was peering down at him, his brow creased and his eyes narrowed.
“What’re you looking at, man?”
“Nathan?”
Nathan froze in horror.
“It is you, isn’t it?” Seymour said. “What
the hell are you doing, boy?”
For a second, Nathan couldn’t
breathe. His head prickled with heat and sweat. The plan had hinged on
anonymity and in a moment that mask had been snatched away.
What made
him think he could pull off an armed robbery? He was sixteen for God-sake!
Nathan shuffled back a few
steps, unsure of what he should do next. The game was up. He was caught. He
pointed the gun again, his aim trembling. “Don’t mess with me, Seymour,” he
warned, but his voice sounded laughably weak and childish now.
He strode off into the living
room.
“Seymour , stop,” Nathan called. When he
didn’t, Nathan followed, tears already in his eyes.
He tapped 911 into the keypad.
Nathan raised the pistol, the tears
blurring his vision. “Put it down, Seymour ...please.”
“Put it down, my ass,” Seymour said. He turned
his back as the connection was made. “Yes. Police, please.”
“Seymour ...”
Nathan looked at the gun with
dismay. It wasn’t worth shit now and Seymour
knew it. But he couldn’t just stand here while Seymour called the cops on him.
Through a starry web of tears, he tried to pistol-whip Seymour across the back of the skull,
misjudging the blow and striking him across the back of the neck instead.
The room exploded briefly in a
vicious white flash of noise and fire.
Seymour pitched head first
onto a small wooden table, the cape billowing behind him, phone flying from his
hand. The table collapsed under his weight, a lamp jumping into the air and rolling
on its side, its shade throwing large curving shadows across the wall and
floor.
Everything fell quiet, except
for the indecipherable murmurings of the television set.
Nathan stared, his ears
ringing, acrid gun smoke swirling around him like a blue wraith.
Blood was
coming out of Seymour’s ear.
Realization slammed into him
like a truck. He put the gun away and ripped back the mask. The rubber tore
hair from his scalp, but the pain barely registered.
“Seymour ! I didn’t mean to shoot you, man.”
The storekeeper lay face down
on the flattened table, the harsh light picking out vivid blood pulsing from
the gunshot wound in the back of his head.
Nathan rolled him over, grimacing
at the loose flap of skin and bone that flopped over Seymour ’s eye. Splatters of brain matter
glistened and shivered on the polished tabletop like hot blancmange.
“Oh Jesus, Seymour!” Nathan
shouted. “Don’t do this, man. It was an accident.”
Nathan blinked and swallowed,
swallowed and blinked.
How had all this gone so
wrong?
He staggered a few drunken
steps away from Seymour ’s
dead face, not knowing what he was doing.
A small, tinny voice focused
his jumbled attention.
The phone. He picked it up and
listened. “Hello, nine one one, do need assistance?”
Nathan hung up.
The dispatcher would have
heard the gunshot. They’d find the address from the number.
Time to get the fuck outta
Dodge.
He made for the exit, but as
he reached for the handle, someone on the other side knocked three times.
Nathan stopped himself at the last instant, his hand hovering over the handle.
Shit! Oh shit!
No
way was it the
police already. He moved his ear closer to the paneling and listened. His hand
tightened into a fist, the leather creaking.
Three louder knocks. His heart
misfired.
He crept over to the window
and peeked around the drapes. Four little kids dressed in full Halloween
regalia gathered around the door. One of them stepped up and knocked again.
Can’t you
see there’s nobody home you little shits? Get the hell out of here so I can get
the hell out of here. What are little kids doing out on their own at this time
of night anyway?
Nathan screamed and whirled
around, sweeping a small bowl of sweets off the decorative stand by the door.
The bowl hit the floor and cracked in half, the cellophane wrapped candy
scattering color across the carpet.
The kids giggled and knocked
again. “Come on, Halloween Eddie,” they called, “we know you’re in there - trick
or treat?”
Nathan rubbed a hand over his
sweaty mouth, his gaze never leaving the corpse. One of the kids started thumping
the door continuously. They weren’t going to leave now, not now they thought
‘Eddie’ was playing games with them.
The only other way out was
through the shop, but that would be all locked up. If he didn’t act quickly, he
was going to get caught red-handed.
His feverish eyes scanned the
candy. He still had his mask and cape. Maybe he could open the door, shove some
sweets into their hands and they’d be happy and leave. Or maybe he should just
shove past them and run for it before it was too late.
He worked the mask back down
over his face and scooped up some sweets. Opening the door a crack, he peeped
out. A bar of light fell across the faces of the four kids.
The last thought Nathan had
before the door burst into his face was, “Jeez, those are good masks.”
#
Groggily, Nathan looked up. He
was on the floor with his back against the sofa. The devil mask lay beside him,
the rubber shredded. His face ached where the door had slammed into it.
Standing in a semi-circle
around him were what appeared to be four little kids, except these kids had the
faces of wizened old men. They stared impassively at him with milky gray eyes,
blue-veined hands hanging by their sides. Limp white hair dangled from their
liver-spotted heads.
The sight of the hideous
little creatures brought Nathan fully to his senses. “What the fuck are you?
What do you want?”
The heavy gaze of one wizened
little man drifted to Seymour’s corpse.
It is a
night for evil deeds.
The voice came from inside Nathan’s
head - none of the little men uttered a word.
You have
taken human life on this evil night, Nathan. Now you must choose.
“Choose?”
A
trick...or a treat.
“What?”
The
question is simple enough. Do you choose a trick or treat?
Nathan swallowed, but the
walls of his throat were glued together. “Why do I have to choose? What happens
then?” His had closed around the pistol tucked into this waistband.
Time is
short, Nathan. Choose quickly now.
“No!” Nathan cried. “You
choose this!”
He yanked out the gun and
pumped the trigger until the slider locked out. But nothing happened. No slugs
hit the little men, nor did they punch the wall or kick splinters from the door
behind them. He might as well have fired blanks.
The wizened little men stared
impassively at him through a haze of drifting gun smoke.
“Oh shit,” Nathan whispered
and let the pistol slip from his grasp.
Now you
have that out of your system, you must choose a trick or
a treat. Choose a trick and we must do
something to you. Choose a treat, and we must take something from you.
Nathan’s mind tumbled. Trick
or treat? Which would be the lesser of two evils?
If he chose a trick, what
might they do to him? He looked at
the little creatures with their ancient, wrinkled faces. What could they do?
Hurt him? Torture him?
And if he chose a treat, what
might they take? A limb? His sight? Nathan’s heart quickened. Could they take
his mother or one of his sisters?
What
about his soul?
Nathan had heard such stories
- demons taking your soul and damning you to an eternity of pain and torment.
Suddenly the light dimmed and
the little men loomed over him, their bony hands curled into horrid claws, their
faces screaming, their mouths crammed with teeth like jagged shards plunged
into bloody, pink gums.
Choose
now, Nathan! Lest we choose for you.
Nathan buried his face in his
knees. “Trick! I choose a trick!”
When he looked up again, the wizened
little men stood as they had before, teeth and claws gone, faces blank and
impassive.
You chose
well, Nathan, for if you had chosen a treat, we would have taken your soul. Our
treat would have been your eternal
damnation.
Nathan’s eyes widened.
However,
you chose a trick.
The little man’s head tilted
slightly, as if considering what trick he might play.
Nathan held his breath.
How would
you feel if we made it so that Seymour
wasn’t dead anymore?
“What?”
How would
you feel if we made it so that Seymour
wasn’t dead anymore?
Nathan
blinked. That was a trick? He almost sighed with relief. But of course
it was a trick...a magic trick. The
little man said he had chosen well. And he had! If Seymour were alive, Nathan could fix
everything else. If he was lucky, Seymour might not remember anything at all.
“I’d like that,” Nathan said.
“I’d like it a lot.”
The four wizened little men
bowed, the wisps of hair dangling from their heads.
Then it
is so.
Silently, they turned on their
stubbly little legs and shuffled out, closing the door behind them with a soft
click.
Nathan waited, his eyes
flicking between the door and Seymour ’s
corpse.
Had they
really gone?
The shopkeeper still lay dead.
How long might it take for it to work?
Was resurrection an easy trick for those creatures?
Nathan drew a breath and held
it.
The flap of skull still hung
there.
Surely they would fix that
too?
Seymour gagged and choked and
coughed up the plug of congealed blood blocking his throat. A wad of gore hit
the carpet and split into clinging strings of thick red jelly.
His eyes opened and scanned
the ceiling and walls as if he’d never seen them before. His irises shone pure
white like a cat down a dark alleyway. Slowly, he began to sit up, his body casting
an immense shadow that seemed to swallow the room. His jaw worked, a guttural
snarl rising from somewhere deep in the back of his throat.
Nathan got slowly to his
knees. He knew what was going on here. He’d seen this shit in movies like Dawn of the Dead.
“Oh, good trick,” Nathan
whispered as he slowly eased himself away. “You didn’t make him alive, did you?
You just made him undead. Very
clever.”
“But not that clever,” Nathan said. “Cause you forgot I can run, man, I can
run like the fucking wind.”
Nathan bolted for the door and
yanked it open.
But we
never said that making Seymour
undead was the trick, Nathan, we just asked how you would feel about it.
Nathan stood on the threshold,
his mouth agape and his eyes pinned wide. The doorway was completely bricked
up, just like all the other exits in the small dark room.
As Seymour closed in, Nathan
heard the wizened little man chuckle.
There’s
the trick, he said
The End
1 comment:
I love this story so much! Very exciting and beautifully written. Great job. Thanks for sharing!
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