"You know how Aunt Toph is a big fan of Halloween? Always dressing up in crazy costumes? Well, she wasn't always that way. Back in 2005, she thought she was too cool for Halloween. Unlike your Aunt Katara."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Back in New York in 2005...~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"Guess what came in the mail today?" Katara asked her fiancée, who was just sitting down in the booth she shared with Zuko and Toph.
"Our costumes? Do they rule?" asked Aang eagerly.
"They rule." said Katara nodding with a grin on her face. "And yours in one hundred percent wool so you won't get hypothermia like last year."
Aang snickered. "Tarzan nipple blue." he said, putting his hands on his chest. They all laughed.
"You know what I love about Halloween?" Zuko cut in on the laughter. "It's the one night a year chicks use to unleash their inner ho-bag. If a girl dresses up as a witch, she's a islutty/i witch. If she's a cat, she's a islutty/i cat. If she's a nurse--" Katara stopped him.
"Wow, we get it," she rolled her eyes.
Zuko looked into his cup and at his hand, frowning. "…She's a islutty/i nurse" Toph laughed the most hard.
"Toph, what are you doing for Halloween?" Aang asked, his eyes sparkling.
"Oh, I don't know," she started. "Probably hanging out with Teo, this guy I've been seeing."
"Teo? There's a Teo? You have a boyfriend and you haven't told us?" pushed Katara.
"No, I mean, he's not my boyfriend, he's just this guy I've been seeing for a couple weeks."
"Boyfriend." Katara said in a mockingly high-pitched voice.
"So why haven't we met him?" Aang asked, in a sort of taunting way.
"We're not really ready to go public yet." Toph answered.
"Married." Zuko said a the same sort of high-pitched mocking voice Katara used before. Aang laughed and shook his head. Katara grabbed his arm, and gasped, obviously with a good idea.
"How about we go on a Halloween double-date?"
"I don't know, we were kind of thinking about staying home and dressing up as naked people." Zuko was the one who found that most amusing.
"Come on, Toph, try out your new fella. Let us judge and evaluate him behind your back. It'll be fun!"
But Toph's thoughts were interrupted by Sokka coming in and Aang spotting him and asking
"Hey, Sokka, you'll never guess what happened! Our costumes--"
"Your costumes came in?" Sokka knew exactly what happened. He hadn't been home yet, but he knew what got Aang exited.
"Yes. That is why we're best friends." he held his hand out for Sokka to shake it and he obliged, shaking his head as well.
"Hey, Sokka, what are you doing for Halloween?" asked Toph, being new to their little group.
"Well…" he started, but everyone but him and Toph groaned. "What?"
"Every Halloween Sokka waits for the "Slutty Pumpkin"" Katara told Toph.
"That's right." said Sokka, surely.
"What's the Slutty Pumpkin?" Toph asked her table of friends."You mean "iWho/i is the Slutty Pumpkin?"" Sokka told her. "It was four years ago. I was at this Halloween party on the roof of our building. About to call it an early night, when out of nowhere, appeared this girl in the sexiest pumpkin costume."
"Wait, how can a pumpkin costume be sexy?" said Toph, cutting in on Sokka's fantasy.
"It was carved in strategic places." Sokka answered, causing Toph to smile with thought. "So we're at the bar, and I see her mix Kahlua and--"
Katara cut him off. "Kahlua and root beer."
Aang added something. "A cocktail she invented herself."
Sokka tried to keep telling his story "And she--"
But this time Zuko cut him off to say "And she called it the "Tootsie Roll"" Sokka tried again,
"Because--" but failed.
"Because it tastes like an alcoholic Tootsie Roll!" Aang, Katara and Zuko said together, reciting from memory.
"Hey!" Sokka yelled, to get their attention. "Can I please tell the story!?" He had told it to them so many times they'd all memorized the whole thing, "So we had this instant connection, She gave me her number. But then--" and apparently, Sokka used the same words every time.
"Something went terribly wrong!" Aang, Katara, and Zuko all said at the same time with fake horror.
"Guys." Sokka said stopping his friends from mocking his story telling. Toph laughed every time Sokka tried to keep telling his story, much to his expense. "Something went terribly wrong," Sokka continued, telling of something that happened four years ago. Up in the apartment, Sokka had just been arriving through the front door, to see Katara, dressed as Sonny, with little hippie glasses and a little mustache and bowl cut wig, wishing a kid and his mom who were walking away, a Happy Halloween.
"Sonny, where's Cher?" Sokka asked. Looking for Aang.
"Cher?!" Katara called.
"Right here, babe!" Aang said, coming from around the corner dressed in a sparkly gold dress, a feather boa, and a long black wig.
Sokka laughed at his entrance. "I just met the perfect woman! She's funny, she's beautiful, she loves Star Wars."
"Whoa, whoa, whoa! What's her take on Ewoks?" Aang asked. He and Sokka were iuhuge/i/u fans of the movie.
"Loves them!" Sokka said.
"Oh, good," sighed Aang. "I don't know why people are so cynical about the Ewoks. The Rebellion would have failed without the Ewoks."
"And get this. She's a marine biologist." Sokka continued. "She spent a year in Antarctica studying penguins."
"Oh, penguins are cool. Kind of like black and white Ewoks. I approve." said Aang, pointing at Sokka marking his approval.
"Hey, where's my Kit-Kat? I put it right here on this table." Sokka said a little worried, searching the table with a giant orange bowl on it full of candy.
"I don't know, but we have plenty of chocolate here." Katara said.
"No, no, no, you don't understand, I ineed/i that Kit-Kat," Sokka was beginning to be a little dramatic. "She wrote her number on that wrapper, where is it?"
"Uh-oh."
Sokka ran down the hall to the first kid he saw. A little boy wearing a black cape, white make up and fake fangs.
"Hey, Dracula, gimme the candy! Gimme the Candy!" Sokka ripped the orange plastic bag from the kid's hands and dumped it out searching frantically for the fun-sized candy. "Where's the Kit-Kat? bWhere's the Kit-Kat?!/b"
"Never found her number, never saw her again." Sokka said finishing his story. "But every year they have a Halloween party up on the roof, so that's where I'll be."
"Sokka, It's been four years." Zuko said. "She could be engaged, or married, or, God forbid, fat!" Everyone gave him disapproving looks.
"I don't know, I've got a feeling. This could be the year. Halloween is a night of wonder and magic." Sokka said sort of thoughtfully. Everyone groaned again. "Alright, bring the mockery. Fine. I can take it. Come on, wouldn't it be the coolest story ever if the slutty pumpkin turned out to be my future wife?" Everyone stopped groaning and took a moment to consider that.
"Oh, on the off-chance that that could happen, maybe we should stop calling her the slutty pumpkin." Katara said.
"Good idea" agreed Zuko.
Later that night, back in the apartment.
Sokka was working on something on his laptop while Aang and Katara were getting ready for the night.
"Sokka? Is your world ready to be rocked, rocked, rocked, rocked?" Katara called from the other room, imitating an echo.
"Can't wait!" He called back.
Aang and Katara emerged, Aang dressed as a pirate, and Katara as a very feathered parrot.
"So, what do you think?" asked Aang.
"So, what do you think?" asked Katara in a parrot-like voice and squawked.
"Wow!" Sokka said, looking them up and down. "Aang, are you wearing eyeliner?"
"Oh, yeah." he answered. "Weirdly hot, right?"
"We are so gonna win the costume contest this year!" Katara said, turning around and fixing Aang's costume.
"First prize, a fifty dollar gift certificate at the bar." Aang said.
"And, how much did you guys pay for your costumes?" Sokka asked.
"One hundred dollars." Aang replied looking away.
"Each." Katara said in her parrot voice again.
"Well, I think you guys look great." Sokka said, putting his laptop on the couch he was sitting on, and getting up.
"What are you going as- Oh, like I even need to ask." said Katara.
Sokka had gone as the same thing for Halloween for the past four years.
"Hey. I want the Slutty Pumpkin to recognize me, and she knows me as…" He picked up a yellow-ish piece of card board with the word 'BALLOT' written on the top with squares up and down it, and one square punched out, and hung it around his neck with a piece of rope tied to it. "…a Hanging Chad." Katara and Aang shook their heads. "What? She thought it was hilarious." defended Sokka.
"Yeah, ifour/i years ago." said Katara. "But no one remembers what the hell a Hanging Chad is."
"What a sad commentary on our national attention span that we could forget such a turbulent time in our political history," Aang said.
"… sad commentary," said Katara, squawking again. "Alright. Polly gotta pee." Katara started towards the bathroom.
"Again?" said Aang walking after her.
"Where are you going?" asked Sokka, confused.
"It's an elaborate costume." Aang replied. Sokka laughed. Then stopped. He could here music coming from somewhere. He looked around and decided it was coming from the door. He walked over to it and opened it to see Zuko standing there in a camouflage jumpsuit with air force patches on it, sunglasses and he was chewing gum.
iHighway to the Danger Zone. I'll take you right into the Danger Zone./i
Zuko slowly walked in took off his sunglasses and tossed his head around. But once he caught sight of Sokka's costume, his face turned sour and he turned around to turn off the music.
"No, no, not again. Not this year, you're going as my wingman." he thrust another jumpsuit in plastic at his chest. "Flight Suit up!"
"No thanks," said Sokka putting the costume on the chair next to him. "I'm sticking with the Hanging Chad."
"Oh, you're dangerous Maverick, your ego's writing checks your body can't cash." Zuko said with his face close to Sokka's, who laughed. Zuko, on the verge of laughter, smile and said "Okay. Here's the plan, and I crap you not. I'm getting us into the Victoria's Secret Halloween Party. Trust me, by the end of the night, your Chad will not be hanging."
"we can get rejected by super models any other night." Sokka retorted. "Tonight, I'm going up to the roof, I'm gonna have a few beers, I'm gonna wait for the Slutty Pumpkin. It's just what I do."
"Hmm." Zuko put up his left hand like a scale and said "Victoria's Secret models prancing around in bras and panties," he put up his left hand "Or, Yale preppies reuniting their stupid a cappella group. What's that left hand?" he lifted his left hand closer to his ear like it was telling him something. "Right hand sucks? Word." he put both hands down.
"I'm heading up to the roof." Sokka said turning towards the door.
"Well boys, Looks like it's just the three of us." Zuko said, putting his hand up again. "What's that?" he hput his left had to his ear again. "Self-five? Nice." he gave himself a hi-5. "Nice. We out." he walked to the door to find Toph just walking in. Then she saw Sokka's costume.
"Hey, Chad, how's it hanging?" she said, looking at the ballot.
"Hey, word play, funny!" Sokka pointed at her with his hands like guns. Sokka left and Zuko followed him. "Whoo!" she said, seeing Katara walk up in her costume. "Nice outfit."
"I'm a Parrot." Katara said.
"You sure are!" Toph said closing the door behind her.
"Where's Teo?" asked Katara.
"He's meeting me here." Toph answered. "I ran late covering the Halloween Parade in the Village. There are like, a izillion/i gay pirates this year."
"Seriously, does my eyeliner look okay?" Aang asked walking in.
"Yes, it's weirdly hot." Katara said, turning to him. "So, where's your costume?" she asked Toph turning back to her.
"Y'know Teo and I joked about doing something together, but we decided not to dress up." after hearing someone knock on the door she turned and opened it. There was Teo, with green lederhosen and a blond Dutch-boy wig. "oh, jeez."
"Hi," Teo said walking in.
"Everyone, this is Teo. That is not his ireal/ihair." Toph said kind of frantically.
"Um…where's your costume, iGretel/i?" he asked.
"You thought I was…" Toph started "Oh, I was just kidding, I've got to stop making jokes in e-mails, it's so ihard/i to convey tone!"
"I think we got them beat." Aang whispered leaning over to Katara and high-fiving her.
On the roof~~~~~~
"I can't believe you talked me into this." Zuko said looking around.
"I didn't. You followed me up here," Sokka said absently.
"This party sucks." Zuko said. "There's iseven/i chicks here…" a guy with his back to them took his wig off and scratched his head. "There's isix/i chicks here."
"Relax, the night is young. It's gonna get better," Sokka assured him.
Just then an announcer of some kind, dressed as a king, introduced the entertainment for the night.
"Ladies and Gentlemen, as on pitch as they were at Spring Fling '95, it's my pleasure to welcome back… the Shagarats!" he walked out of the way of the platform with a Skeleton, a jail bird, a clown, a boxer, and a doctor on it, with his arms out. Sokka Whooped as they started vocalizing and one sang i"My bonnie lies over the ocean, My bonnie lies over the sea. My bonnie Lies over the Ocean. Oh, bring back my bonnie to me."/i much to Zuko's expense.
Laughter filled the Jasmine Dragon as Aang kept telling jokes relating to his costume.
"What be a pirates favorite kind of sweater?" He said in a very pirate-y voice.
"Arr-gyle!" Katara said after a few seconds.
"And what be a Pirates favorite Fast-Food restaurant?" He said in the pirate voice.
"Arr-by's!" Katara said after a little more thought.
"'T would think it iwould/i be Arby's." Aang said in the pirate voice. Teo held onto Toph's hand. "But Actually it's Long-John Silvers." he said in his normal voice.
"Actually, I kind-of need this hand to eat." Toph said offering Teo her other hand, using her right hand to hold her fork. Just then the waiter came with all of their main courses. Katara thanked him as he walked away.
"I'm starr-ving" Said Aang again in his pirate voice.
"It's so nice to finally meet you, Teo." Katara said. "You guys are really cute together."
"Yeah, we've been spending a lot of time together." He told her. "We're even getting to that point where we finish each others…" he waited. Aang and Katara looked at Toph, just as expectant as Teo.
"Oh, this cheeseburger is so-" Toph started.
"Good." Teo ended fore her. "See?"
"I think you won the Dish-off tonight baby," she said to Aang. This steak totally bitch-slapped my pork chops."
"That may be true," Aang said. "But your rice pilaf kicked my spinach in the crotch so ihard/i. It threw up a little bit."
"Aw." Katara cooed feeding him another bite.
"Toph, you ihave/i to try this chicken!" Teo said offering her his fork with a piece of chicken on it.
"Oh, no, that's good," she said. Enjoying her cheeseburger. "I'm okay. Thanks."
"It's really tasty." Teo pressed.
"I'm just really feeling this cheeseburger." Toph said. "It's good."
Aang and Katara exchanged looks.
"Come, on, just try a little bite." Teo said.
"Dude, I'm kind of in the zone here," Toph said, taking another bite of her cheeseburger. Teo looked at his fork in mid air. Katara looked at Aang, and back at the fork.
"Oh. For God's Sakes!" she cried, pulling the fork toward her and eating the chicken. "… really tasty" she agreed as she chewed sheepishly.
On the roof the Shagarats were just finishing their third song, and Zuko noticed a Hula girl walking up to the bar, he smoothly followed her there.
"Hey," he said.
"Hey," she answered.
"So what does a fella have to do to get ilei-ed/i around here?" he looked at her. "Yeah."
"Right, 'cause I'm wearing a lei." she said lifting the necklace of flowers off her chest. "Oh, God" she walked away.
"It's not funny if you explain the joke!" he called after her. Sokka came up behind him and started looking at the labels on the drinks. "Let's bail."
"No, Zuko, come on I'm having fun!" Sokka said. "Plus, it's really great to see all of these guys again."
Zuko looked at him. "Name one person you know at this party."
"Well," Sokka started. "There's Ninja," he pointed at the ninja standing behind Zuko, " Back of horse," he pointed to his left, "Hey, where's front of horse? That guy's a riot, where is he?" he said looking around for a guy in a front-of-horse costume.
"Okay, I'm leaving," Zuko said. "But just know, this Victoria's Secret party is on a yacht. Okay?" and with that he left.
"Have fun." Sokka said shaking his head.