"Ms. Saaaakakiii!"

Sakaki turned and was startled to be looking into the face of a demon. Chiyo's giggle emerged from the scary face.

"I gotcha!" Chiyo pulled off the mask and Sakaki smiled at the cute girl she liked to think of as her little sister. "Happy Halloween, Ms. Sakaki! Are you ready for the party?"

"I'm ready."

"Do you have a costume? Cosplay is a really important part of Halloween."

"Yes, I have something.""Okay, don't tell me what it is. I want to be surprised."

Ms. Yukari came in and told everybody to pass in their homework.

It had been Chiyo's idea to celebrate the American holiday. It would probably be fun but Sakaki felt a little embarrassed about the costumes. Oh well, if everybody was doing it it wouldn't be so bad.

"Tomo, why does this homework you handed me have Yomi's name on it?"

"Oh, sorry. I must have forgot to give it back to her after I co-I mean I was just holding it for her while she tied her shoelace."

"Yomi's shoes don't have laces!"

"Oh, I meant while she was tying Chiyo-chan's shoes for her. You know, cause she's just a little kid."

"Hey! I know how to tie my shoes!" Chiyo squeaked indignantly.

Ms. Yukari threw a piece of chalk at Tomo. Tomo blocked it with her folder and gave a martial arts yell.

Just a typical day in class.

Sakaki looked at herself in the mirror. This shirt was really tight in the chest. She undid the top two buttons. And the skirt was way too short since she'd grown a few more centimeters. She just didn't have many black clothes. Well, it was too late to think of something new now. She sighed and put on the pointy hat, feeling pretty silly, and headed out.

The gym was decorated in orange and black and pictures of ghosts and monsters. There were pumpkins with faces carved into them and a table with lots of food.

When Chiyo saw Sakaki she came over. "Wow, Ms. Sakaki! You look so cool!"

Chiyo was also dressed in black and she had a black and red cape pulled over her shoulders. Her hair was dyed black but still pulled into her trademark pigtails. She wore pointy teeth that gave her a slight lisp. So cute.

"Uh, so do you."

"Hi Sakaki!" Tomo was almost entirely wrapped in gauze.

"Hi Tomo. What are you?"

"I'm a moomee. You know, like in that movie."

"Oh right."

"Actually, it's pronounce 'mummy'" Chiyo said.

Tomo rolled her eyes then raised her hands in claws and staggered around. "Looook at me! Ah'm a leetle know-eet-all vampire!!" She mocked in an accent Sakaki was pretty sure didn't come from anywhere on earth, let alone Transylvania. "Hey Sakaki, wasn't Brendan Frasier hunky in that movie?"

"Um, I-I don't know." Sakaki said awkwardly. She wondered if it was strange that she didn't think at all about guys and whether they were good looking like Tomo and a lot of the other girls in school did.

She said hello to the rest of her friends. Yomi was also a witch. Kagura was dressed as a ninja. Osaka wore a costume Sakaki couldn't figure out that consisted of colorful mismatched clothes and feathers. She doubted asking about it would do much good.

Ms. Yukari wore a high school uniform and she was bragging about how she could still fit into it.

"Yeah, though it fits a little tighter than when we were in school." Ms. Kurosawa, in a police woman's uniform, said.

The two teachers started arguing and roughhousing.

The door opened and Kaorin stepped in. Sakaki stopped and stared, felt her face starting to grow red. Kaorin was dressed all in pink and wore big fluffy pink slippers shaped like animal feet. She had on a cat ear headband and whiskers were painted on her face, She even had a tail hanging from the back of her pants. Such a cute costume!

Kaorin walked right up to her. "Happy Halloween, Ms. Sakaki! You look really cool!"

"Hi. You look-" Sooo cute!! "-nice too."

"Hi Ms. Kaorin!"

"Hi Chiyo-chan. Sorry I couldn't think of a good monster costume."

"Oh that's okay. You look very cute and a lot of people wear cute costumes on Halloween too."

"Really?" Sakaki asked with a wistful smile on her face.

"Oh yes. But I wanted to be scary!" Chiyo hissed cutely.

Sakaki couldn't help constantly sneaking glances at Kaorin, smiling and blushing.

The first of the activities Chiyo had planned involved them sticking their hands into boxes filled with things like noodles or pudding while she claimed they held body parts. It really wasn't scary but Chiyo was having fun.

"And this last box hasn't been opened in years. Nobody knows what's in it. I wouldn't stick my hand in there but if you do, be very careful!"

Kaorin was first in line and Sakaki was right behind her. Kaorin stuck her hand in the box and screamed. She jumped into Sakaki's arms and Sakaki caught her awkwardly. "Something licked me!!"

"Is it Mr. Kimura?" Tomo asked.

Kaorin squealed even louder and clung to Sakaki so tightly Sakaki could feel her heart pounding.

Chiyo opened the side of the box. "Um, it's just Mr. Tadakichi." The big white dog came out of the box and Chiyo rubbed his head. "He doesn't even need a costume cause he's white. He's a yuurei. A 'gosuto dogu'."

"Chiyo, you really shouldn't bring your dog to school." Ms. Kurosawa said but she was smiling.

"I'm sorry. I promise he'll behave."

"Well, alright. Just this once."

"I-I'm sorry, Ms. Sakaki." Kaorin was still trembling as she let go and she was blushing.

"It's okay." Sakaki was blushing too and kind of sorry to let her go. The hug felt really good.

Next was apple bobbing.

"Would you hold my ears, Ms Sakaki?" Kaorin asked, holding out the headband,

"Oh, sure."

Sakaki took the headband and watched Kaorin dunk her face into the tub full of apples. She splashed around, trying to get a hold of an apple and her tail wagged. That costume was unbelievably cute but Sakaki realized Kaorin was really cute herself. Cute in a very different way from a cat…

Kaorin came up, her hair splashing water everywhere, with an apple clamped triumphantly in her teeth.

Sakaki clapped. "Good job!"

Kaorin dropped the apple and giggled. "Do you want to try it, Ms. Sakaki?"

"Oh no thanks. I've got too much hair." She handed the ears back. "Hey, your whiskers got washed off."

"Oh really? Could you fix it for me?" She pulled out a tube of makeup.

"Sure. I'm not good with makeup but I can do that."

They went over in the corner where the light was better and Sakaki blackened Kaorin's cute little nose and drew new whiskers on her cheeks.

Kaorin looked out the window. "The sun's going down. This is the perfect time to see Venus."

"Oh yeah?"

"Yeah. It's supposed to be really bright now. You wouldn't…want to go look at it, would you?"

"Sure."

"Really?? I could go get the telescope out of the science room! It would just take a second!"

"Okay."

Kaorin came back with the telescope under her arm and Sakaki followed her outside as she chattered.

"There it is." She pointed to a bright, clear star. "Did you know Venus was the Roman goddess of love?"

"Yeah. I've heard that."

"It'll just take a minute." Kaorin started setting up the telescope, talking about Venus and the other planets and stars.

Even though Kaorin was a nice girl Sakaki sometimes found it hard to be around her because she often seemed really nervous and twitchy for some reason. But here talking about astronomy she was very calm and confident and Sakaki was really enjoying her company.

"There. Take a look."

Sakaki leaned down to look into the telescope. Kaorin's face was right next to hers. She had really pretty eyes and her breath smelled of fruit flavored gum.

She quickly put her eye to the telescope, glad Kaorin couldn't see her blushing in the low light.

"Do you see it?"

"Yeah. It looks really fuzzy."

"That's cause it has a thick carbon dioxide atmosphere. It's over 460 degrees Celsius on the surface."

"Wow. That's really hot."

Sakaki moved away from the telescope. Kaorin was still very close. They were almost cheek to cheek. She was so cute…

She moved forward and pressed her lips against Kaorin's.

Kaorin always thought if she ever actually kissed Sakaki she would just drop dead of pure happiness but now that it was actually happening she was as calm as could be expected. Sakaki's lips were so soft. Her hands on Kaorin's shoulders were so strong. She put her arms around Sakaki and ran her fingers through the tall girl's hair. She'd been wanting to touch it for years. It was as soft and silky smooth as she'd imagined.

Sakaki moved away. Her voice was soft and shy. "You're really cool, Kaorin."

"Thank you very much. You're really cute, Sakaki-chan."

They sat looking up at the stars in silence for a while.

"Well, we better get back inside." Sakaki said.

"Yeah. Hey Sakaki, would you maybe want to go to a movie on Saturday? Maybe that new animated movie. It looks really cute."

"Oh, um, I don't…"

"Or if you think that one's too immature we could see whatever you want."

"No. It's not that. It's just-" Well, I just kissed her. Might as well be completely honest. "It's just movies like that usually make me cry a lot."

Kaorin took her arm and leaned against her. "Oh I don't mind. You can cry on my shoulder all you want."

"Yeah." Sakaki said happily. "And after that we can look at the stars some more."