Dennis realized Violina had gained control of him only after forcing the odd whiskey down his throat. He remembered drinking a lot of water back when he was detoxing. He opened his mouth, letting the driving rain drizzle down his face and find its way inside.
Under the remnants of its raggedly flapping plastic cover, the sigil pulsed with a cold glow.
* * * *
Stopping off at the drugstore, McGlazer and Bernard ran in to pick up masks. Returning to the car, they tried for a quick jump scare, hunkering low to pop up at the windows with monster growls.
DeShaun and Stuart just looked at each other. “Our reflexes are officially dead.”
“Maybe it’s just the masks,” noted Stuart. McGlazer had selected a badly painted knockoff of the robot kaiju Jet Jaguar, while Bernard had a child-size mask of a graciously smiling beauty queen. Framed by his wide head, it looked ridiculous. He had bought if for Emera, after all.
“Maybe these are better?” McGlazer handed a plastic bag back to the boys with their masks—Spider-Man villains: the Green Goblin and the Lizard.
The boys fist-bumped and smiled at each other, but just placed the masks on the tops of their heads.
Ten minutes later, they dashed though the rain across the Community Center’s sparsely occupied parking lot, leaving Bernard and McGlazer in their splashy wake.
The muffled sound of Johnny Cash performing “Ghost Riders in the Sky” wafted out from the high windows, triggering wispy memories of Halloweens past—better Halloweens.
Low light, a sputtery, twenty-year-old fog machine and a spinning sphere projecting witches and ghosts across the rafters and bleachers was the closest to an enthusiastic greeting the quartet would receive. There was no deejay, just a portable stereo tuned to WICH with the center’s PA microphone propped against it, as hurriedly assembled by Timbo Linger, the center’s volunteer maintenance engineer and father to two of the dozen small children present. A dusty speaker bearing a cardboard cutout of an owl taped to the side completed the sound array’s sad circuit.
The only other adult present—Kyle Trainor, a recent divorcé desperate for human companionship of any kind—smiled at the arrivals, though he barely knew any of them.
The underwhelmed children, primary schoolers whose parents saw the event as an evening of free babysitting, peppered the mostly empty bleachers and folding chairs, their costumes and makeup little more than afterthoughts.
“Whoop-a-dee-doo,” deadpanned DeShaun.
The trio went to the office, and McGlazer opened the spiffy new door, which the boys expected would be the most exciting thing about the party.
“Let’s get some punch,” Stuart suggested, “and count yawns.”
The boys dropped off their backpacks and moped out.
Leaving the light off, the reverend went behind the desk, dropping his mask to the side.
“Still pondering your place in the universe?” Bernard asked, clearing out the other chair.
“That and much more,” answered the minister.
* * * *
“The settlers’ first autumn here was hard-core. Even worse than Bennington’s trapper buddy had said.” DeShaun drew an ovoid shape on his napkin with a pen.
Stuart took over the napkin, adding a spiraling stem to the top of the ovoid. “Somebody remembered about putting candles in turnips during the end of harvest back in Ye Merry Old Tea Town. Some enterprising genius tried it out on these spiffy new orange melons. Worked out pretty well, so everybody started carving jackos in the fall.”
“Stands to reason that this led to the town’s name and, eventually, the parade.” Stuart took the pen and started drawing curved lines from top to bottom to give the pumpkin depth.
“Don’t forget to leave room for the eyes, nose and mouth,” Stuart told him.
“Yeah.” DeShaun looked up at the witches. “You ladies don’t have an orange marker, do you?”
* * * *
Settlement era
Chloris knocked twice before entering the tiny guest room at the end of the corridor. She found its odd occupant much the same, pale and unmoving. She put her hand near his mouth. It was several seconds before she was sure he was still breathing.
“Would you rise for me, sir?” she whispered, taking away the napkin she had placed over the soup she had made. Pumpkin seeds, sprouts and bits of wild poultry made up the meal, designed to replenish the blood he’d lost.
She waved the soup steam toward him, hoping the strange man’s appetite would do the job of rousing him so she wouldn’t have to get closer. He gave little more than a whimper.
“Let’s help you, then,” she reluctantly offered. Chloris’s physical strength, from years of servitude starting when she was still a child, served her well enough, even in her late thirties. Though tall, this odd lodger was leaner and lighter than many of the settlement men, certainly more so than any of the livestock she wrangled.
She got him to sit up, supporting his back with one arm while deftly raising the bowl to his lips with the other.
Stirring, he sipped a few drops. Chloris held him till she felt her arm would give out. As she eased him back, the strange-eyed young man sat up and rested against the headboard.
Chloris pulled a stool close and sat patiently while he moved his wobbly head around, trying to grasp where he was. His gaze fell on Chloris and remained fixed there. He raised his shaking arm halfway to horizontal, where it shook with effort. He pointed.
Chloris’s skin crawled. It was like he was pointing through her.
“Jacko?” he rasped.
Chloris realized with relief that he was pointing to the candle on the windowsill behind her. Using the spoon this time, she raised more soup to his lips. “Let’s have a bit more so we can feel better. Then we’ll have a look at that nasty stab, and you can tell me about your friend Jacko.”
Everett accepted the soup, smacking his lips as he
