A/N: Inspired by the Writers Anonymous Halloween Challenge. Note that this story contains some racial slurs. All comments are appreciated.

The Woman in the Blue Coat

Japanese Pacific States – San Francisco

The world shifted so subtly Ed McCarthy barely noticed until he saw his mother standing at the market stall. Everything had changed. The stall-holder was no longer an elderly Japanese woman, but a white man with hard eyes, and the prices on the stall were labelled not in yen, but in dollars. His mother wore her faded blue coat, the one he'd sold almost five years ago, and although the blazing sunlight behind her meant he couldn't see the colour of her hair, her stooped posture was so familiar it made his chest hurt.

He stopped dead, muttered a distracted apology in Japanese when someone bumped into him, but he couldn't bear to tear his gaze away from his mother and the market stall.

As he pushed through the crowd towards her she turned her head, and Ed was momentarily blinded by liquid sunlight. He squinted, and when his vision had recovered his mother had gone, and in her place stood a middle-aged woman with thinning reddish hair. She squinted up at him with wary suspicion. "Can I help you?" she asked. Her voice was thin and sour, raspy from too many cigarettes.

A memory rose unbidden, of losing his mother in a busy marketplace when he was a small boy, and thinking that he had found her again. He'd slipped his hand into hers, only to look up and see a young woman in a dress the same shade of blue as his mother's coat staring down at him, her eyes startled but indulgent.

"Sorry," he stammered, now. "I, uh... I thought you were somebody else."

She grunted, eyeing him with suspicion. Then two police officers came swaggering through the parting crowd. Ed shifted, trying not to look guilty about the bottle of black-market whiskey weighing down his jacket pocket. And maybe the woman had something she wasn't supposed to as well, because she hurried on, keeping her head down.

Ed found himself staring at the spread of fruit and vegetables laid out on the stall. Much of it was Japanese, daikon radishes and galangal, bunches of mustard greens, all fresh and vibrant, and it brought back more memories of his mother, of the bags she would haul home, packed with fresh food. How she would unpack it reverently and lay it all out, so much fresh food there was barely room for it all on the kitchen counter.

The kabocha squash caught his eye.

"You know what day it is, Ed? It's Halloween."

And his grandfather's sour voice, cutting in as he wheeled himself into the kitchen, "Don't fill the boy's head with that damn nonsense."

Ed ran his hand over the kabocha. It was nothing like the bright orange pumpkin he remembered his mother bringing home; this was a dark green with mottled bumpy skin, but he felt the ghost-touch of his mother as she placed the knife in his hand, folded his fingers over it. "Be careful now, Ed," she'd told him softly. "It's sharp. Don't cut yourself."

The shop keeper was watching him, her eyes impatient. Ed drew his hand back, his cheeks burning.

He picked up the squash, hesitated, and chose some daikon radishes and a handful of carrots that smelled of ripe wet soil, waited while the stall holder counted up what he owed her. He tried not to wince when she told him the price; it was more than he could afford, particularly after buying the whiskey for his grandfather, but he kept his expression neutral, and handed over the yen. "Domo arigato."

She was already turning to her next customer.

At home, he found his grandfather in the dining room reading manga. "Hey, Grandpa." He's starting to look older, Ed thought, eyeing the greying stubble that covered his grandfather's jaw. The room smelled of smoke and skin that hadn't had a thorough wash in a while.

"You're late home."

"I went to the market." Ed pulled the bottle of whiskey from his coat and set it on the table. No reaction from his grandfather, other than the barely perceptible tightening around the mouth that was the closest Jim McCarthy ever got to a smile these days.

"You're a good boy, Ed." His grandfather's gaze dropped to the bag. "What else you get?"

The bag of vegetables felt heavy in Ed's hand. He was already starting to feel self-conscious about the money he'd spent. Daikon, for God's sake, when he didn't have the first clue how to cook it, or what they were going to eat it with. They never ate Japanese food at home. Not since his mother had died.

"Some vegetables. Uh, carrots. Daikon. And a squash."

His grandfather stared at him. "Daikon."

"Yeah. Mom used to cook it, remember? I've been thinking about her a lot lately."

His grandfather wheeled his chair towards the dresser, pulled out a glass. Then hesitated, glancing back at Ed. "You want some?"

Ed shrugged. "Sure."

His grandfather set another glass on the dresser. Then he reached for the whiskey, twisted off the cap and sniffed the bottle. "This real?"

"I think so." Ought to be; he'd paid enough for it. Nearly half a day's pay.

"You going out to meet Frank later?" his grandfather asked, pouring them each a glass.

"Not tonight. Tomorrow maybe." Ed smiled, shook his head. "Hey, you should see some of the designs he's working on. They're really beautiful. Frank says Mr Wyndam-Matson might actually let him develop some of them into jewellery..." As he spoke, he glanced at his grandfather, saw him staring back with speculative eyes. You're talking too much about Frank, Ed thought, and he looked away, heat creeping up over his cheeks.

He escaped, carrying the vegetables through to the kitchen, and, for a moment, it was like walking into a different room, clean and sparkling, the faint smell of something hearty cooking in the oven. Then he blinked and he was back in the real world, in a kitchen that was dark and grimy, the walls stained with grease, because Ed didn't have the time to clean them and his grandfather sure as hell couldn't..

One by one, he set the vegetables on the kitchen counter. The daikon. The carrots. And finally the squash. And then he stood back and stared at them. Ed, he thought, you're a damn idiot.

But even so, he pulled a knife, a plate, a serving spoon and a tea-towel from the cluttered drawer. Carried them and the squash back through to the dining room. His grandfather raised an eyebrow as Ed laid the towel on the table, set the squash down.

"What the hell is that?"

"You know what day it is, right?"

"Oh yeah. Tuesday." His grandfather's voice was dry. The level of whiskey in the bottle was already noticeably lower, and Ed sighed. It wasn't going to last much longer than a day or so. Still it might be worth it.

"I meant the date. It's Hallowe'en. Remember Mom used to bring pumpkins home to carve–"

"Goddamn it, Ed. What the hell's brought this on?"

"I don't know. I just... I've been thinking about her lately." I've been seeing her. In the market. The kitchen. And she's different. The whole damn world is different. That was what he wanted to say, but under the weight of his grandfather's gaze the words caught in his throat. He knocked back his glass of whiskey, and dropped his gaze to the pumpkin. He curled his fingers around the handle of the knife, hesitated before making the first cut. The knife was old, but as sharp as ever – his grandfather took pleasure in the few household chores he could still manage – and the point slid through the thick skin of the squash with ease. He sawed in a rough circle around the stalk, while his grandfather watched

"You're a lot like her, you know," his grandfather said after a while.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah." His grandfather reached for the bottle of whiskey again. "Head in the goddamn clouds. That woman..." He drew a breath, then waggled the bottle towards Ed's empty glass.

"You sure? I bought it for you."

"Put hairs on your chest. Lead in your pencil. Christ knows, you need some of that."

Ed said nothing, held out his glass. His grandfather was a hell of a lot less generous with this shot than he was pouring his own. He took a sip, then set the glass down, and levered the circular chunk of pumpkin out with the blade of the knife.

"Waste of damn money," his grandfather said.

"The whiskey?"

"The pumpkin." His grandfather flashed him a rare smile. "Whiskey's never a waste of money. kid." And he winked. "Just like whores."

"If you say so, Grandpa." Ed reached for a spoon to scoop out the seeds inside, placing them carefully on the plate. Strings of orange flesh smeared across the cheap white porcelain, stained his hands orange. He felt his mother watching at his side, standing so close he could hardly breathe.

"You know you oughta..." His grandfather broke off.

"I oughta what?"

"Nothing." His grandfather stared down at the whiskey and grunted. "I'm sorry to tell you this, Ed, but you got gypped. This isn't the real thing."

"They said it was."

"You're too trusting, kid. There's probably no Irish whiskey left anywhere in America now. Not in the Pacific States anyway. Maybe in New York. How much you pay for it?"

Too much. Ed took a sip, felt it burn a trail down his throat. "I think it's okay."

"Like you know anything about whiskey." His grandfather ran his tongue over his lips. "It's drinkable, I'll give you that. But if this is the real thing I'll give my left ball."

"I'm sure you can spare at least one of 'em. Not like they get much use these days," Ed said quietly.

His grandfather gave a snort of laughter. "You're getting a smart mouth. Maybe this Frank guy's a good influence on you after all. What's his girl's name again?"

"Juliana."

"Fancy name," his grandfather said. "She pretty?"

"She's beautiful," Ed said, and he meant it. The whiskey was already going to his head.

Talk of Juliana got him thinking about that night at theirs, the impromptu house-warming they'd thrown when Juliana had moved in with Frank. The three of them drunk on cheap sake, Ed dancing with Juliana around the dingy basement apartment until Frank had cut in, and Ed retreated to the outskirts to nurse his glass of sake and watch them, Frank and Juliana, beautiful and in love. And then Frank had gone to fix the skipping record, and Ed found himself watching him, his mouth suddenly dry as he wondered what it might be like to–

And then he'd looked around, realised Juliana was watching him watch Frank, her expression unreadable. He never had been able to tell what she was thinking.

"You in love with her?" his grandfather asked now.

"No." It came out harder than Ed had intended, and something dark flashed in his grandfather's eyes. He swallowed. "I wouldn't do that to Frank. Anyway those two are perfect for each other." And Christ, how much that hurt him to admit. "Frank says she has a sister though," he said, watching his grandfather almost smile. The right thing to say. "Well, a half-sister. Frank says–"

"'Frank says,'" his grandfather said. "Sounds like Frank says a lot of things."

Ed's mouth went dry. "He never shuts up."

"Uh huh." Watery eyes fixed on him.

"He says they'll introduce me. Next time she stops by San Francisco." Like that's ever going to happen, he thought, and wondered if his grandfather was thinking the exact same thing.

"She as pretty as her sister?" his grandfather asked, and Ed laughed, because that at least was an easy question to answer.

"No one's as pretty as Juliana, but Trudy's okay, I guess. I haven't met her."

"Sometimes it's safer to be in love with a woman you can't have," his grandfather mused, and Ed relaxed because the mood was finally starting to shift. His grandfather was mean when he was sober, but whiskey made him reflective. It made him want to tell stories. "At least you're in no danger of doing something stupid like getting married." He shifted in the wheelchair, grinning. "I ever tell you about Peggy?"

"Oh Jeez. Yes." He pushed the pumpkin away, leaned forward, peering at it, knife in his hand.

"–She was this whore in Honolulu. Christ, I thought I was in love with that girl. The things she'd do. Maybe I would have married her, but I was already married to your grandmother at the time–"

"Grandpa, I don't want to hear about whores."

"Maybe that's your trouble." And his grandfather stopped again, swirling the whiskey in the glass. "You gonna cut that thing or kiss it?"

"I don't know. I'm trying to remember what Mom used to do. What's the point of these damn things anyway?"

His grandfather paused, eyes glittering. "You trying to draw me out, Ed?"

"No, sir."

"Trying to get me to reminisce about the 'aul' country'? About your parents?"

"No, sir." He started with the eyes, pushed the point of the knife into the flesh, sawed it in a rough-almond shape, pushed his hand into the pumpkin and pressed it out.

"You always were a terrible liar, Ed." His grandfather poured them both another glass of whiskey, and when he finally started talking, his voice was slow and soft. "It never used to be pumpkins," he said. "That was an American thing, back when there was an America. In Ireland it used to be turnips."

"Turnips?" Ed said, grinning.

"That's what my father said. Christ, he could be mean. You think I'm a bastard, Ed? You should have seen my father. Knocked me and my mother five ways to Sunday, but he doted on your father." He nodded to the squash. "They were meant to scare away spirits."

Ed lifted his head. "You mean like ghosts?"

"Ghosts. Spirits." His grandfather paused, lifting the whiskey to his lips. "The aes sídhe."

"The..."

"The aes sidhe. Fairies. Load of superstitious bullcrap, but your father just lapped it up. He was a dreamer, like your mother. Like you."

Ed chewed on his lip, carving another eye into the flesh of the pumpkin. "You don't ever think it could be real?"

"'Real'," his grandfather repeated.

"Yeah. You know."

"No." His grandfather's eyes narrowed. "I don't know. What are you talking about, Ed?"

"Mom." He swallowed, focused on the pumpkin. He wasn't going to say any more, but the whisky had taken control of him, loosened his tongue. "I see her sometimes. Like in the market today. She's not real, but it feels real. And it feels like the world is different somehow, like–"

"Jesus Christ. Ed. You losing your goddamn mind?"

"No, sir."

"Because you know what they do to people who lose their minds."

"I'm not losing my mind. I know it's not real–"

"The Nazis murdered your father. And as for what happened to your mother.." He broke off, pressed a hand to his mouth. Ed shivered, looked away. "You're just going to play right into their goddamn hands?"

"I know it's not real," Ed said, softly. "I know it's just my imagination."

His grandfather was silent for a long time, studying Ed with weary bloodshot eyes. "You want to know what Halloween's about?" he said, his voice low. "It's about fear. Knowing that summer and the harvest is coming to an end and pretty soon there's gonna be nothing but the cold and dark and your children going hungry. So people acted like there was a damn thing they could do about it. They lit fires and they wore masks to scare off spirits, like any of that could make a damn bit of difference to whether they lived or died–"

"Grandpa–"

"And none of it's changed. Except that this world... it's all horrors. An America where they burn the elderly in hospitals? Where they gas as many Jews as they can get their hands on?" He broke off abruptly, and jabbed his finger at the pumpkin. "Will that scare off the Kempeitai? Will it scare off the SS? Will it, hell. So we wear our masks and we play our parts and we pray that they won't look too closely at us. And your mask is slipping, Ed."

A cold shiver ran down his back. "What do you mean?"

His grandfather's eyes hardened. "There something you want to tell me, Ed? Something you've been doing that you shouldn't, maybe? Something to do with this Frank?"

He stared at his grandfather, feeling as if a weight was keeping him pinned to his seat. Heat and shame burned over his cheeks. "No..." he whispered. And then harder, almost angrily, "No."

For a few moments, his grandfather held Ed's gaze. Then he grunted, poured himself another glass of whiskey. He nodded to Ed's glass, and although the thought of drinking any more made Ed feel nauseous, he held out his glass in numb silence. This shot was considerably larger than the others his grandfather had poured for him, and he knocked it back in one, felt his stomach lurch. He pressed the back of his hand against his mouth, the world reeling about him.

"You don't have to cook it," his grandfather said.

"What?"

"The daikon. Your mother didn't always cook it. Sometimes she'd shred it real fine, serve it with a dressing made out of soy sauce and rice vinegar. It was okay, for Jap food." He sighed. "I miss your mother. She was a good woman for all that she had her head in the clouds."

"I know. I miss her too."

"Ed." His grandfather's voice was low and insistent. Ed raised his head, met his grandfather's weary gaze. "What I'm telling you, it's for your own good. You may not be much, but you're the only family I got left. You be careful. You don't trust anybody. Not this Frank, not this Juliana. Not a soul. Trusting people will get you killed. You understand me?"

"Yes, sir," he whispered.

"Good boy." His grandfather sighed and squeezed his hand. "And as much as I appreciate the whiskey, next time do me a favour?"

"What's that?"

His grandfather was already swivelling the wheelchair around. "You worked damn hard for that money, and I'm just gonna piss it away. Take the money and spend it on a whore instead. Take it from a man who knows, kid. It'd do you the world of good."

And as his grandfather wheeled off, Ed stared in silence at the half carved pumpkin . His mother was back again, standing at the window in the living room, and maybe this was a better world and maybe it wasn't, but she looked faded and fraught, smoking a cigarette furiously. Because this was a world where his father was still dead, where she'd been left to care for her crippled father-in-law and her son on her own. And Ed was still watching Frank and Juliana dance their couple's dance from the outskirts of the room, with the walls closing in.