"Go on," Lincoln said, his tone mocking, "don't be a chicken."
Clyde shot him a dirty look. "I'm not a chicken," he said.
"Yeah?" Lincoln's eyes were narrow. He looked like a shark moving in on its prey. "Prove it."
They were standing on a cracked sidewalk running past big, expensive homes. Younger children streamed past them, giggling and making monster noises. Across the street, an identical sidewalk ran past identical homes. Except for one. Smaller than the rest (two floors instead of three), it was pretty in the sun, its roof red and its porch shady and inviting. But now, in the night, it looked haunted -dark, and foreboding like a vampire haunted castle on a jagged Romanian mountaintop. Plastic gravestones dotted the front lawn, and cheap ghosts and demons hung in the trees, rustling softly in the biting October wind. From the porch, bright white light flashed in a dazzling strobe effect that would send someone with a too-weak constitution into seizures. It was like opening and closing your eyes really fast; light, dark, light, dark. Clyde didn't know who owned the house, but every year they went all out for Halloween. Music. Lights. Decorations. And every year, he was scared.
Not this time, he thought, trying to be brave, I'm almost thirteen; only babies get scared on Halloween. Thirteen or not, Clyde was still afraid. It wasn't the decorations (those were lame), it was the light machine. It disoriented him. Anything (or anyone) could come rushing out, and he wouldn't see them until it was too late. And running? Forget about it. He'd probably trip and wind up dead meat. But that was stupid. It was only a house. So what if it was spooky? And so what if his heartbeat sped up every time he passed it? It was a nice house in a nice neighborhood. There weren't any monsters inside, because monsters didn't exist. If he knocked on the door, some guy would come out and give him candy. That was all. A cold gust of wind swept down the street, kicking leaves along the pavement. It's just a house, he told himself, stop being a baby.
"You're not scared, are you?" Lincoln asked.
"No!" Clyde said. Lincoln smiled. He was Clyde's best friend. He could run fast and everybody liked him. He was the opposite of Clyde. Clyde didn't make friends very easily. He was shy, awkward, and had anxiety issues. When he was a baby, his parents abandoned him at a hospital and never came back. He heard they were drug addicts but he wasn't sure. He spent the first eight years of his life in an orphanage. At nine, he was adopted by Harold and Howard McBride, a married gay couple he'd come to love as though they were his actual family. He lead a good life now, all things considered, but he still had abandonment issues and panic attacks.
Lincoln, on the other hand, was normal and well-adusted. Clyde envied him many things, but his sisters most of all. He had no right to complain about anything, but being an only child got really lonely sometimes. Lincoln never felt that way. He had ten sisters and his house was always buzzing with activity - so much so that he groused about it almost everyday. I just want a moment of peace and quiet. And privacy. Is that really so much to ask?
Guy didn't know how good he had it.
"It's okay if you're scared," Lincoln taunted. "We can go somewhere else. I hear the kindergarten kids are having a party."
"I'm not scared," Clyde said again. He was determined. He was going to go up to that house, knock on the door, and carry away as much candy as he could.
"Are you sure?"
Clyde started crossing the street.
"Hey, wait up!" Lincoln called.
At the other side of the street, Lincoln caught up with Clyde. "What do you think he has in there?"
Clyde stopped to think. Images of Skittles, Reese's Pieces, and Carmelo's danced through his head. Certainly enough to make dressing up (as the Grim Reaper, only he left the mask and plastic scythe at home) worth it - he felt kind of dumb putting on a costume and running around like a little kid, but hey, candy. "I don't know," he finally said.
By now they were standing at the end of the little stone path that led up to the porch. The lights flashed hypnotically and, from a radio hidden out of sight, spooky sounds played: Wind, rattling chains, and high, scary screams. Clyde gulped. "Maybe they'll have brownies or something," he said. Even the thought of brownies couldn't distract him from his fear.
"Maybe," Lincoln said, and Clyde was surprised that he too sounded scared. "Or candy apples."
"Yum," Clyde said, even though candy apples were the last thing on his mind. "Let's go."
Clyde started up the path. Lincoln stayed close behind. On either side, tombstones and plastic skeletons loomed out of the darkness; Clyde caught only quick glimpses of them in the light. Halfway up, something grabbed his foot, and he screamed. Lincoln screamed too. "What?" Lincoln asked, panting. Clyde was afraid to look down, but he forced himself to. His pant leg was caught on one of the stones lining the path. That was all.
He laughed at himself. "It's nothing. Come on."
At the bottom of the stairs, Clyde stopped. Next to the door was a table with a big bowl of candy on it. Next to it was a chair, and in the chair, some sort of monster, its face green and its eyes red. Its chest was all puffy, like it was stuffed with something. It's a dummy, Clyde thought, just a dummy. "Get the candy and let's go," Lincoln said. He was whispering.
"Okay. Okay." Clyde went up the stairs slowly. The world around him pulsed with light. Light, dark, light, dark, light dark. He was just in reach of the candy. He stretched his arm out... ...and the dummy came alive, jumping forward with a loud roar. Clyde screamed and stepped back. The porch was gone and he was falling down the steps, his arms flapping. When he hit the ground, all the air in his lungs was knocked out of him. Lincoln was screaming and crying. Clyde tried to get up, but he couldn't; he could only lay and wait for the monster to get him.
Suddenly, the lights and music went off, and the porch light came on, soft and yellow against Clyde's tightly closed eyes. "Oh, no," the monster said, its voice muffled. Lincoln let out a sharp yell, and Clyde closed his eyes even tighter. "I'm so sorr..."
"Please don't eat us!" Lincoln yelled. He was so scared he sounded like a girl. "We'll do anything you want! We'll be your minions!"
"What?" the monster asked. "No, I'm not going to eat you!"
Clyde opened one eye. "You aren't?"
The monster, standing over him now, only laughed. "No! Why would I do that?"
"So..." Lincoln started, "you're not a zombie?"
The monster laughed again. "Of course not! It's just a mask." Clyde sat up. Boy, did he feel stupid. What was he thinking? Only babies got carried away and thought monsters were going to eat them. I guess we're babies. "It's just a mask," the monster repeated. "Look." He pulled it off...
...and Clyde froze. The man's face...it wasn't a face at all; it was a gray, grinning skull. "See? It's just a mask…"
This is a rewrite of an original story I wrote and published several years ago. Hope you liked it. Happy Halloween.