Devil
's Night© Jes-eek!-a Knorr
Let's do the time-warp!
A look at what could have been one of Cade's first tastes of criminal mischief!
Cade's not mine. The rest of them are. Just a short, nostalgic vignette for Halloween. ;)
Happy Hallow's Eve everyone.
Cade Foster always loved Halloween. He was finally old enough to be going out to trick-or-treat alone, as long as he stayed within the neighborhood. Chicago was a big city, his mom always warned him, and it was easy enough to get lost or abducted, even with his parents close by. Tomorrow he was going to be alone, except for his best friends Dan McRae and Ritchie Wilson, of course. Tonight he would be with them too, but not dressed as a pirate, an alien and a cop-a mismatched trio if there ever was one. It was Devil's Night, and though Allison Foster would greatly disagreed with the activities that would happen, as with all adults, Cade ate his dinner and cleaned his dishes like a good boy, then fibbed about going upstairs to finish his English homework. He went upstairs, but didn't give a second look to that old, beaten book full of bizarre words that he 'needed' to know.
Black was a color Cade liked. It helped him blend, so that no one could see what he was doing. He had always been a little mischief maker, splattering his aunt's makeup all around then blaming it on his fruity cousin Cecilia, who was always doing it anyway. One time he even managed to shave her annoying little rat-dog bald without getting caught, until they found him with its hair all over his pants before he could brush it off. Cade loved the color black, and it loved him. He could tell it was something that he'd soon become good friends with, especially since he would be a teenager in 4 or 5 years. He grabbed his backpack off his bed and dumped everything out onto the comforter, then pried open his drawer which had been stocked well before. Cade picked out his weapons: six entire rolls of toilet paper and one of double sided duct tape, whipped cream, a barbecue starter, a few paper bags and three pairs of rubber gloves. Lots of dogs lived where Cade did, which provided him with ample opportunities to get back at his teachers using a bag, a little "dirt" and a good sized flame, right on the door-step.
Yeah, Carter was going to pay dearly for avalanching them with summer reading last year.
He made sure to put on the radio before he left. He always listened to the radio when he was "doing" his homework. Not to mention that he'd heard the new KISS song a few days ago, and knew his mom was absolutely floozy over them. They weren't bad, but Cade liked the old Elvis songs that used to be played to him as a kid even more. He cried like the dickens when they found out The King had died. Cade shook his head and finished packing, got his navy ski coat and hopped out his window. Their house was one level so it was easy to do so without making a commotion. He snook through the gate and made like a banshee to the bridge over Paxton Creek, where they were supposed to meet before setting out. Dan was there already, dressed similar to him, with a plastic shovel of his younger brother's that they would put to good use.
"About time," Dan called out just above a whisper when he finally spotted Cade.
"Where's Ritchie!?"
"Grounded. His mom found the test he bombed in History. He said she said he wasn't coming out tomorrow if he didn't study real hard for the nouns quiz tomorrow."
"Aw man!"
"Yeah, I know. But we can do it next year, the three o' us, with Jake and Bobby too."
"Next year's gonna be the best! I can't believe their parents dragged 'em all the way to Texas, on Halloween!"
"Yeah. Come on. I've got the perfect starting place that'll prove if you're gonna chicken out the rest of the night!"
"Me?" Cade's eyes bugged. The smaller boy with the floppy brown hair nodded, a smirk on one side of his face. "What about you? How do I know you won't bail?"
"'Cause I got here first, so obviously I wasn't havin' second thoughts!" They shut up after that and left, walking up to the bridge and crossing, headed away from their houses, down a few to Campbell Street, where their arch-nemesis lived. "You gotta have guts to dare to egg Samantha Lyndsay's house!" Cade looked up. Sam's was one of the older, more expensive houses in west Chicago. It was a gracious brick two-story, with balconies and even a stained glass window. Her father was a police officer and her mother was a chaplain, though they'd split up. Sam had a twin sister who they'd never met before, but Mrs. Lyndsay had moved back with her and now, as they'd overhead Sam babbling away to her airhead friends, they were a family again. Sort of. Cade had eavesdropped again on her, and heard that her sister, Hannah, was way smarter than she was, and she was jealous. If they were twins, Hannah was probably just as ugly and dog-breathed as Sam, which made it even more fun to do all those nasty things to them.
"I dunno, Dan. Mr. Lyndsay's a cop, and he'd get mighty mad."
"C'mon, Cade! A few eggs, a couple swings of the TP. We won't do the flaming dog-mess, we'd get killed for that, but at least try to get into the spirit. See, Sam's window's wide open up there!" Cade craned his neck up and saw that it was. Though he couldn't tell of the short figure with the waves of curly hair was actually their target or her copy. Did it really matter? "What's-a matter, Kincaid? Chicken?"
"Don't call me that," Cade shot. Dan stuck out his tongue and clucked around quietly, giggling along with the bucking noises. "Just gimme the eggs, jerk." Dan let out a small cry of triumph and forked over the carton. Cade took out one of the largest ones and surveyed the bull's-eye. It'd be tricky, getting it up that high, especially over the hedge. But it was nothing Cade Foster couldn't manage. He tossed the egg gently between his hands, still watching as whoever it was in the room sat up on the sill and looked sky-ward, and grinned. Then he yanked his arm back, wound up and let it fly. Three seconds later, a crack loud enough to echo down the empty street sounded and the girl shrieked. As she turned into the light of the room, the boys saw that the yellow goo had exploded all over her face, the egg had smashed her in the forehead. Samantha, or Hannah, continued shouting and screaming, maybe even crying but it was hard to tell because she'd gone further into the room where the sound didn't carry out. They were about to slip through the hedge to spray whipped cream and the canned cheese Dan had in his bag when the front door came open.
Ben Lyndsay, a big, fat, bald man came storming out to the last step on the porch. Cade and Dan giggled behind the hedge, hidden from the steaming officer's view. He shouted something about them coming out of hiding before he had them arrested, but they stayed where they were. Whoever they hit came out along side him, sniffling and patting a cloth to her face and dirty nightgown. Father and daughter finally turned back into the house. When Cade saw who they hit was in fact Hannah, since Sam would never wear a frilly nightgown unless she was forced to, his smile dropped for some reason. She really hadn't done anything to them, it had been her sister who was the stupid, psycho freak who had slammed their basketball into a puddle and gotten them in crap with the principal, not to mentioned soaked, along with 12 kindergartens who happened to be standing at the edge watching their spit float in the water. They didn't even know Hannah. Cade couldn't help but feel guilty, and a little worried; he hoped they hadn't made her bleed. Then, if anyone were to find out it had been them, they could forget about tryouts or anything else until they were out of college.
Dan nudged him in the side. "C'mon. Carter and Lansing and Powers are all waiting to wake up to ruined tomato plants and creamed cars, or to ruin their brand new shoes trying to stomp out the bags!" Cade grinned again, gathered up his bags and the two friends ran off back north to wish their Math teacher happy Halloween.
* * *
The next morning when Cade was all packed up again and dressed in his red over-coat, black hat and eye patch, painted on his scars and made it look like he was missing teeth with some black caps slipped on, he ran downstairs and greeted his mom in the kitchen. Allison was buttering the toast, reading the Sun-Times at the same time and shaking her head.
"Mornin', landlubbers." His step-father wasn't up yet, and wouldn't be till noon. Thankfully, neither would be there to hear his hung-over ranting about being late for work when he'd been fired 6 weeks before.
"And what's our pirate's name?" his mom grinned and handed him his juice and scrambled eggs. Cade laughed softly and grabbed a fork from the dish rack, along with the salt and pepper.
"What's it matter? Not like anyone's gonna use it." Allison sighed at her son. 10 years old, but so grown up already. She kissed him on the forehead, careful to avoid a bloody gash, and pulled his hat down lower. "Hide the candy, mom, would you? Then when me and the guys get home, we can make like veggies on the couch and watch Charlie Brown And The Great Pumpkin again?"
"Like every year," she smiled. Cade nodded and scooped the eggs into his mouth. He guzzled down his juice and sat watching her as she cleaned the dishes, ate her own breakfast and finished reading the front page. On it was a grainy picture of two figures cloaked in darkness running with bulky bags hung over their shoulders. The headline read, "Hallow's Eve Pranksters Strike 7 Homes". Cade grinned again, and Allison presumed, when she looked up for a split second and caught it, that he was returning the one she gave. Several minutes spent in undisturbed peace were broken by the loud bleating of a horn. Cade's bright blue eyes shot open and he ran off from the kitchen at full speed, scrambling to grab his bag and coat, and some money for lunch, before the bus sped away on him. In the rush, he forgot the Halloween cookies they'd baked earlier the night before. But she decided not to worry, those kids would be fat enough and have enough cavities to last them well into winter. That thought pushed aside, she returned back to the story and read that the police had no idea as to who the two were. The she thought she recognized something.
On the back of the head of one of the pictured people was a Cubs' logo. On the jacket was a medium gray stripe. One of Allison's old boyfriends, before settling upon Peter, had taken Cade to a Cubs' game when he was three and gotten him that hat, which he never left behind anywhere. And his new ski jacket was dark blue and had a lighter blue stripe, just like the one in the picture. She looked away from the picture and thought back. The radio and light had been on all night. When she finally had opened the door, she found Cade asleep surrounded by his books. His old clothes had gotten messy with the flour so she presumed he'd changed and gone to bed while still studying. Something had smelled bad, but she didn't think anything of it since his room regularly had a stench to it, the origin which had never been found. She read over the report again and remembered, when peering into one of his drawers, seeing a can of whipped cream. There was no explanation for that, since Cade hated the stuff.
Allison paused once more. One of the attacked houses had been Ben and Alex Lyndsay's. Their daughter, Hannah, had gotten a face full of egg. Her twin, Sam, wasn't on too good of ground with Cade nor his friends. She finally managed to put two and two together, let out a soft growl and slammed the paper down so that the car ads on the back shouted up at her.
"Those boys!"
The End