“I don't know about this one, Dad. The light's not on.” He stood on the sidewalk looking up at the porch of the house next door. Unlike every other house on the street, it was dark, same as every night. Not once from his bedroom window had the boy seen the glow of a TV, or a light in the bedroom. “Let's just go home.”
“Lucian, it's your last year trick-or-treating,” his father said. “You said you were going to hit every house on the block.” A glowing iPhone illuminated the man's face.
Lucian shrugged. He took a step toward the house, then froze, as he heard the sound of voices shrieking from across the street.
“Hey, Lucy-N! You got some 'splainin' to dooooooo!” It was Elmo Jenkins, threepeat douchebag champion of the world, doing his best Ricky Ricardo.
Lucian looked to his dad. His dad looked to his phone, now held sideways, thumbs typing away, frowning vaguely.
“'Sup, Peanut Boy? You get me any Reese's Cups yet?” Elmo raised his fingers to his mouth in a crude gesture, wagging his tongue at Lucian and rendering his costume a sudden obscenity.
How many years had Elmo threatened Lucian because of his peanut allergy? Lucian did the math. He was eleven now, so...four years?
Lucian held up four fingers in Elmo's direction. As the bully's face registered delighted surprise, Lucian lowered each of three fingers, except for the middle one. He danced it around in the air, merrily for a moment, before putting it away as his dad looked up from the phone.
On the porch of the house next door, the light flickered on.
“Go on,” Lucian's dad said. “Light's on now.” In a whisper he added “Maybe we'll finally see what the old recluse looks like.”
Elmo grabbed his crotch and made lewd gestures from across the street, his cronies snickering.
Lucian stole up the steps to the front door before he lost his nerve. The door creaked open as Lucian approached.
“Hello?” he said. No answer. “Trick or treat?” This time he whispered, and looked over his shoulder to see if he'd just given Elmo more ammunition for making fun of him. Who says “trick or treat” anymore?
“Come in, child,” the old lady said, her bony hand grasping Lucian by the wrist and pulling him inside, before he could whip his head around and register her appearance. A confluence of teeth and darkness, the smell of smoke like a million cigarettes and Grandma's church at Christmastime. He pulled away from her grasp, but she was quick and powerful and he felt himself fly forward with a jerk, like that time his dad had taken him to the Harry Potter theme park, and they'd ridden the 3D ride.
Lucian caught his breath, stumbling away from the woman and landing hard on his bottom, his trick or treat bag spilling onto the grimy hardwood floor. As much as he wanted the candy, he didn't dare scoop it up from the mess of ooze and sticky goo.
“What the hell?” he said. “What was that?” He stood and tried to take a look around the dark room. It was candlelit, but just barely. They were deep into the house now—somehow the old crone had pulled him inside. She was cloaked in a black flaxen robe, the kind he'd seen in a number of boring Halloween specials every year.
She laughed. “Oh, you're better than I thought, little boy. You've come for a treat, I think, and--”
“That's cool and everything, nice costume, but I gotta get back to my dad,” Lucian said. He tried to squeeze past her, and it shouldn't have been difficult, as slight as she appeared to be under the robe. She reached for his wrist, but Lucian pulled away. His hand flailed, striking a thick glass jar, and he cried out in pain as he bungled past the woman.
The witch threw back her head and laughed. “Oh, oh ho, oh no,” she said, leaning over, one bony hand clutching a crowded wooden table as she rasped hard for breath. “Don't go, Lucian, don't go. This is too much fun.”
Lucian was set to run, for real and for truly this time, but just as he felt his body respond to the sprinting impulse, his mind registered the contents of the thick glass jar upon which he'd banged his hand. Hair. Swollen lips. A lazy eye.
“Dad!” he screamed. “Dad, Daddy, Dad!!!” At first he couldn't move anything but his teeth and tongue, a web of paralysis hand-sewn and tailor made for him, trapping him to the spot in the dark hallway of this stranger's home as he shrieked.
The laughter continued, the woman laboring through wheezing breaths to beg “Lucian, no--Lucian stay, please...” But Lucian wouldn't stay. He tore out of the house and ran hard into his father's chest, who wasn't where he'd left him, but had found his way to the front porch to retrieve his only child. “Where you been? What's going on? Did the old lady give you any candy?”
Lucian pulled his father down the steps to the sidewalk in fits and starts. His father wasn't much bigger than he was, but his old man strength made moving him like dragging an anchor across the ocean floor.
“Dad, I pissed myself, okay?” he finally blurted, Elmo or no Elmo. “I gotta change!”
The wall of laughter across the street told him there'd be Elmo to pay, indeed.
“Ah, damn it, Lucian,” his dad said. “Good thing we're almost home...”
Lucian was already on the porch of the house next door, taking the key from the shoestring he wore around his neck, and putting it into the lock, eyeing the porch of the house next door.
The old lady waved, laughing. “See you soon, Lucian!” she called.
And then Lucian slipped inside, panting, the door shut against his father's pounding. “I didn't see what I thought I saw. That didn't happen. It couldn't have.” In his mind's eye, he saw the witch waving again, transmuting into some amalgam from a Disney flick, or a Bette Midler movie. Was she really that hunched over and warty?
“Lucian. Let! Me! IN!” and now that his dad was kicking, Lucian's reverie was broken.
That night in bed, after his father had kissed him goodnight and left him to his comic books, Lucian stared at the ceiling, his copy of the latest Deadpool lying discarded on his lap among the candy wrappers. He'd tried to read along—it was a new issue and he'd spent most of his allowance on it earlier in the day—but he just couldn't seem to focus. He tried plying his woes with various treats purloined from the Halloween goodie bag stowed atop the fridge for rationing.
Where do skulls come from? The voice in his head refused to be still. Those were heads in jars. Were they real? Pretend? Every shop in town had been decorated for Halloween for weeks. I'm hardly a baby, I'm eleven years old. I know a fake skull when I see one. A chill went through Lucian's body, bringing goose bumps to his flesh. They were real. He rubbed the bumps down and buried his face beneath the covers.
Lucian flew through the air unsteadily beside Deadpool above a sea of oozing, wriggling things in the darkness. Deadpool doesn't fly, he told himself from within the dream, he teleports. And what is that scratching?
He smelled her breath before he opened his eyes and found his glasses on the nightstand. He knew it was her, her bony hand clasped tightly around his wrist. He pissed his pants. Again. Dad'll be mad. Dad!
“Da--” he opened his mouth to call for help, but the witch shoved a balled up pair of superhero underwear into his mouth. Lucian thought he would choke. How did she get in here? This has to be a dream. Deadpool, save me!
“Trick or treat,” she whispered, her eyes inhumanly white in the glow of Lucian's halogen desk lamp. She squinted until all Lucian could see were the yellow irises, then she whispered into his face with breath that gagged him, “Let us steal away into the dark of night, into the graveyard, the bone yard, the de-cay get-away, your way right away, my pet, my sweet, my sweet trick or treat,” she crooned.
Lucian felt himself begin to calm, although his mind did not stop racing. “Mmm, mmm,” he hummed from behind his gag. She put a spell on me. I can feel it.
She chuckled, stooped on the edge of his bed like some hellish grandmother. Her robe smelled of death. Lucian hadn't realized he'd even known the smell of death, but here it was, that undercurrent of decay he'd only sensed one other place: in the funeral home, when his mother was lain to rest. It had been disguised with flowers and candles and food smells, but it was still heavy, ever-present. Now it was here, sitting on his bed giggling, beckoning for him to come away with all its mysterious grotesque gifts just waiting.
She removed the underwear from his mouth, one bony finger held to her paper-thin lips. “Shhhh...” she said. Thump. Thump. Thump. Dad was coming up the stairs. This was his chance, if he wanted saving.
The witch backed away silently, stepping into the shadows of Lucian's deep walk-in closet, not even closing the door. How many times has she hidden there?
Lucian's bedroom door swung open, and his father poked his head inside. “You still up? Turn out the lamp and go to sleep, kiddo. Deadpool can wait until morning.”
Lucian switched off his lamp and turned over on his side. “Okay, Daddy. I love you,” he said.
“Love you, too, kid,” his father said. In a moment Lucian could hear his father's bed creaking beneath the man's weight as he crawled in it to crash. In another moment came the snores.
The witch crept back out from the closet, perfectly gleeful. “Well done, my boy,” she whispered. “Your father sleeps lightly, so let us repair to our facilities in silent haste.”
“I gotta change my pants,” he said. “Could you at least turn around?”
She put a hand atop her mouth, seemingly stifling a laugh.
“Why do you talk like that?” Lucian said, shimmying out of his wet clothes and pulling on dry ones—the Spiderman set out of his hamper would do. He remembered how his mother used to make a note of what he wore before they parted ways at the amusement park, in case she had to describe him to the authorities. He wondered if Dad would remember the Deadpool pajamas, or figure out he had changed. He slipped a black Spider-Man tee shirt over his head. He knew he should be screaming for help, but he could feel the witch's spell mollifying him and he was so very curious.
“Are you ready, my child?” the witch asked.
“Almost,” he said. “Normally my dad carries this, but...” he eyed the witch, his set of EpiPens in hand. She seemed confused. “I'll just hold onto these,” he said, tucking them into the waistband of his pajama bottoms. “Medicine,” he explained.
He couldn't later say how they left the house, or how they traveled to the graveyard in the dark of night, but the witch snapped her fingers and then he felt like he was flying, not unlike the dream she had woken him from. He knew the graveyard, of course, and as their feet set down on the crumbly dry dirt of a newish grave, he looked around to spot his mother's headstone.
“We're here for heads, aren't we?” he asked, his voice full of undisguised dread.
She pulled two small shovels from beneath her cloak, handing him one. “Trick or treat, smell my feet, give me something good to eat,” she sang. Although her face was shriveled and dry in the darkness, Lucian saw the girl in her, just for a moment.
“As long as we don't dig up my mom,” he said. “Or my grandma or grandpa.”
The witch laughed. “Dig in, dig in!”
The shovels moved a surprising amount of dirt—Lucian figured that must have been magic. The coffins were surprisingly easy to open, as well, like overcooked clams waiting to be split, revealing the meats inside. The witched cooed in delight at the various states of decay. “Some embalmers are better than others, precious,” she said, stroking the hair-sprayed head of a sad-faced corpse, before popping it off at the neck with her enchanted shovel.
Lucian couldn't help but notice the creepy crawlies that made their way inside the open caskets as he and his neighbor made trekked through the rows of the bone yard. The old lady hummed.
“The worms crawl in, the worms crawl out, the worms play pinochle on your snout!” Lucian chanted, as the old woman erupted into peals of laughter. It was wrong. It was all wrong and Lucian knew it, deeply, but he didn't care. He laughed with her. “What is 'pinochle'?” he asked.
The witch did not answer at first. Instead, she counted the heads they had lined up in a row, then drew one bony finger to her mouth, as her other hand fished inside her robe. She produced a mesh bag, the kind Lucian's father took to the farmer's market for carrying potatoes. “Hold this,” she said, and Lucian obeyed. As she deposited the heads, she eyed him momentarily and said “It's a card game. Pinochle. My parents used to play it.” For a moment, her eyes didn't seem to be yellow anymore—but it was hard to see in the dark, and Lucian nodded. Again, she seemed oddly girlish, and Lucian smiled despite himself.
Back at his grisly neighbor's house, Lucian received a full tour of the canning cellar and all the witch's supplies--the rows upon rows of pickled heads in thick glass jars were interspersed with cucumbers, carrots, and other things similar to what his mom had left behind in her own canning closet.
So much of what Mom canned three years ago was still good. He and dad would crack open a jar once a month or so and enjoy the pickled cauliflower, or the dill spears—not crisp like the kind from the grocery store, but not bad, either.
“It's not fair,” he whispered, thinking of his mother's untimely death. How could someone so good and lovely die needlessly, while a wretch like this old woman lived on?
The witch nodded. “Aye, you're right. Not fair to them!” and she pointed her finger at the face of one of the heads, tapping against the jar and jolting it, its flesh half-off and a liberal amount of skull showing through, ivory in the cellar light.
“That wasn't what I meant,” Lucian said. He spun slowly, taking in the room, the canning supplies, the heads. Most of the faces grimaced or frowned. So many sad faces. Some of them were blurry through their chemical baths like Mom's fuzzy peach preserves. He remembered how some of mom's earlier batches hadn't “taken.” Mom had said canning was tricky. Lucian wanted to help her, but he was young, and there were hot liquids involved, a stove-top with a glowing red light—so pretty, but ouch! It had burned.
The witch eyed him now. “What's not fair?” she said. She breathed through her mouth, her lips twisting back over her teeth involuntarily, her eyes squinting. That's a facial tick. He had read about that in a copy of Deadpool. She huffed, too. So peculiar. Lucian wished he'd met her before. Before what? Before she'd gone mad?
“Before tonight,” he answered, then realized he was answering the voice in his mind, not the weird woman next door. He thought he would tell her about his mother. “My mother used to can...” he began, but then a sob rose up from inside him, like an unbidden ghost rising up from the grave. This wasn't what he wanted at all. Not to feel, not here, not now.
The witch nodded and picked up a jar, cradling it like a baby. “My parents taught me,” she said “before they went away.” She held the it next to her face. The skull inside was quite old, bits of flesh loosened from it and swirling around the bottom of the jar. “See the resemblance?” Then she kissed the glass, taking on that girlish look again for one brief moment, before crooning “Who's a good Mommy? Who is? You is!” and cackling as she replaced the it on the shelf.
“I can teach you, Lucian.” She picked up another, this one's bloated head with hair the same color his mother once had. But it couldn't be, could it? “Teach my sweet treat, come take a seat, have you something good to eat!” And then to the head, “Who's a good Mommy? Lucian's Mommy! She is, she is!” she crooned, and that was all Lucian could bear.
Without looking to see if it were his grandfather or a neighbor or a mailman from years past, Lucian picked up the nearest jar and hurled it at the witch—then another, and another. They bounced off her body before landing in the soft cellar floor with a thud, the witch scrambling to catch them as though they were precious. Lucian knew they were precious—also profane.
“Boy, stop,” she hissed, “or I'll pickle yours next!”
And Lucian with all his might slammed a canning jar into the glass the old witch held, shattering it, thick blue shards falling as a perilous hail through the salty rain upon her legs and feet and the floor.
Then she dropped all the jars, and they were crashing and breaking, too. Lucian was a force to be reckoned with, and he knew it now, knew this was why she had chosen him—and from the goosebumps on his flesh to his newly dropped balls he knew that she could sense it, too--but too late for her. Too late. He flung jar after jar with the same fury--pickles and peaches and the people from the neighborhood. The people that you meet, when you're walking down the street, the people that you meet...each...day!
Then she toppled over him, her fingers around his throat, pushing and choking him with a passion.
“Stop,” she said. “Breaking,” she panted. “My!” she grunted. “Heads!” she growled.
And though Lucian could scarcely breathe, he knew again that he was, indeed, a big boy now, and the EpiPen in his back pocket was an excellent assurance--the weight of her vigor on top of him had crushed it open, and the pin now stabbed him in the flesh of his back. What had only been Lucian's panic and anger had now turned to adrenalized fury. Lucian realized he had never really tried his strength before. No time like the present.
Reaching his hand into the pile of mess, ignoring the mushy parts that met his fingers, he found a shard of glass. While the witch busied herself with his neck, he plunged the glass into her neck and chest, stabbing over and over, though he could feel the shard cutting his own fingers to the bone.
“Trick,” he panted. “Or treat,” he huffed. “You BITCH!” he groaned.
He sat up, the witch crumpling into the debris, and he brained her with a particularly large jar of pickles, delighted to see it crack against her head.
Lucian's hands trembled from the heady cocktail of epinephrine and fear, shredded and bloody from the glass. He eyed the witch, a foot on her throat. She did not appear to be breathing, but in her arms was the jar of a head with hair the same color as his mother's. Somehow it had survived the fight. He liberated it, and still the witch did not move.
“Yeah, trick or treat, then,” Lucian whispered, pushing his glasses up his nose with his wrist. He would find his father and show him his prize, which he hoped would not be stowed atop the fridge with the rest.
##
Red Tash is the author of top-rated Dark Fantasies Troll Or Derby and This Brilliant Darkness, as well as the quirky short stories The Wizard Tales. Formerly a syndicated newspaper columnist, she now devotes all her writing time to this kind of stuff because real world journalism is simply too scary.
IF YOU LIKED THIS STORY, you will want to read the upcoming Wizard Tale, The Wizard Takes the Cake. It's not every 11 y.o. boy who can take on the neighborhood psycho witch on All Hallow's Eve and live to tell the tale--our Lucian is in need of tutoring, you see.
And I've got just the old man to show him the ropes around the wild world of witches and wizardry.
Stay tuned. http://RedTash.com. Look for Red Tash on Amazon.
This story originally was published in Sirens Call Issue #5, October 2012.