"Candy Apples and Razor Blades-
Little Dead are Soon in Graves"

Wednesday, 31 October 2018
Haddonfield, Illinois

The Sawyer Estates

Jordan placed her hands on her hips as she stared Officer Roth down, who let out an exasperated sigh. "Someone was in my home!" she persisted.

Roth shook his head, gesturing behind him at the face of the paint-chipped, fading house. "We've searched the whole place, Miss Jones," he held three fingers in the air between them, " three times on this call alone. We've been searching this property, time and again, ever since we'd gotten the tip about the Sawyer man. There hasn't been any indication that anyone here that wasn't supposed to be here in the five years we've been looking, and there isn't now."

Stomach churning unpleasantly as her heart sank, Jordan waved the Roth off. "But the flowers -"

"Look, Miss Jones..." the officer trailed off, rubbing the back of his head. His mouth twisted in uncertainty as he watched her. "I've read your files about the Psych facility back in Florida and, don't get me wrong or anything-"

"This is not in my head!"

"-but I think that maybe you'd outta think about getting some help." He gave her a sympathetic look that fueled a repressed rage inside of Jordan. "Doctor Lennox at the Memorial Hospital-"

Jordan crossed her arms over her chest, fighting the feeling inside of her that was pulling her into herself-the one that made her feel like she was going fold into her own body, turning her inside out and back again. "I don't need a psychiatrist," she muttered.

"-has done great work and, quite frankly, it's not going to take much more of this for the department to file a recommendation with the school board for psychiatric counselling."

Images bombarded her-

The cool concrete of the basement landing against her cheek, rubbed raw from the abrasive surface, had been a sleepy peace until the light seeping through the door bent beneath a brutal shadow. Ropes pulled tightly around her wrists and ankles, biting unforgivingly into the tender flesh, pulling almost too painfully far. The malign glint from the silver blade and the rattle of husky laughter sent Jordan's insides

A hand on her shoulder soothed her out of her nightmare, trembling and sweating, and back into reality. "And, for the love of God, stop talking to Roster-man's crazier than a zebra in running in the Preakness."

Is it in my head? Jordan stood silently as the police cruiser rolled down her winding driveway, glaring through its clear rear window. "It can't be," she said, her whisper lost to the breeze.


Smith's Grove Sanitarium

Jordan's mind was still reeling when she pulled into the visitor's lot of the Sanitarium. Dusk had already fallen over the trimmed yard of the main entrance, only illuminated by the pale lights pouring from large, barred windows.

Bah-bing! Jordan's phone beeped with yet another text from Roster. She was running over two hours late after having waited for Roth to show up and then waiting again for the officers to canvass the house and property.

She forced herself into a haze of existence, floating thoughtlessly passed the loud buzzing as the doors were opened; barely taking note of the pen in her hand as she signed in on the tablet and the mocking smile of the plastic, candy-toting Jack-O-Lantern on the receptionist's desk; ignoring the shuffle of nurses and doctors and patients; pressing back those memories beneath the sterile smell and harsh fluorescence.

I'm not losing it. Jordan padded down the narrow hall of offices, focusing on her breathing. I wasn't then. I'm not now.

I hope .

"I'm telling you," said a voice that poured from Roster's ajar door. "Michael has been waiting for Laurie to come back to Haddonfield and you've had her transferred right back here!"

Jordan paused, peering through the crack to see who was in the room but the angle didn't allow for it. She leaned in to listen as a female began speaking.

"Doctor Loomis," she began, authoritatively, "East Maloine transferred her back after a budget cut-they've referred all of the transfers they've had in the past four years back to the origin facilities. We weren't left with much of a choice-at least temporarily."

"She doesn't belong here," Loomis snapped. "She's in danger and she certainly doesn't belong in a sanitarium."

Roster hummed, sounding a bit distant from the conversation. "Strode began exhibiting similar symptoms as her brother," there was a shuffling of paper, "might be...genetic?"

"The main concern, of course, is the violent outburst to which Myers was prone."

"That is ridiculous," Loomis insisted. "There's nothing wrong with Laurie Strode. Michael Myers-"

"-is dead , Doctor Loomis," the woman cut in.

The room grew eerily silent for a moment before someone cleared their throat. "Well, if that's all..." Roster trailed off, an air of finality about it.

Jordan stumbled backwards as the door opened suddenly, revealing a thin-lipped woman with shiny auburn hair.

She paused, eyeing Jordan appraisingly and narrowed her eyes. "Can I help you with something?" Her crisp, clinical voice wasn't dissimilar to any other doctor she'd met-save, maybe, the eccentric Roster-complete with an undertone of hidden agendas and weighted questions.

"Ah, Jordan!" Roster said from behind the woman. "You've finally made it! Come in, come in."

The woman stepped aside, allowing Jordan to force a smile and slip into the office that was overcrowded with oversized furniture and messied stacks of books and papers.

Roster made a show of introducing Jordan to Doctor Loomis as Roth cast one last glance towards the room and walked away in an echo the fading tap, tap, taps of Oxford heels on vinyl tile. As the footsteps became faint, Roster's voice quieted. "Jordan is the new owner of the Sawyer Estates."

Doctor Loomis regarded her distractedly, placing his hands on his balding head in distress. "Sawyer Estates? You don't think...?"

Roster shrugged. "I'm still in firm belief that Jedidiah Sawyer is hiding somewhere on the Estates. I wouldn't be surprised if Myers was seeking refuge there, too, just until he could track down his sister."

Shaking his head, Loomis said, "No, people like Myers and people like Sawyer couldn't possibly be living together."

"Isn't Michael Myers an urban legend?" Jordan asked. "I mean, I know that he existed and killed his sister, but isn't his 'return' just a tall tale?"

Both men stopped to look at Jordan, confusing etching there features.

"Of course not," Loomis said. "What is wrong with the people in this town?"

"It's just...I overhead some of the children at school talking about him and when I asked a couple of the teachers-"

"Michael Myers escaped Smith's Grove four years ago," Roster explained, calmly tap, tap, tapping on his keyboard as he nodded at the monitor.

Loomis rounded on Jordan so quickly that she stepped back in surprise. "I'm sure you've heard the story: he murdered his sister as a child and was brought here...to the Juvenile Ward" His eyes grew distant as he spoke as if he was looking through Jordan. "He's not...not right. He was nothing more than a shell of a person when I'd met him. I'd never seen a child so emotionless and his eyes, these empty, black eyes...it might as well have been the devil staring at me through this child. I spent eight years trying to reach him, and then another seven trying to keep him locked up, because I realized that what was living behind that boy's eyes was purely and simply... evil.*

"And then he escaped.

"He just seemed to come to one night before I'd arrived...completely snapped out of his catatonia and opened some of the other patient's doors. When I made it, there were patients all over the yard and that's when he made off with my vehicle.

"He went after Laurie Strode, the youngest sister who had been put up for adoption and killed several people that night. He's not going to stop until Laurie is dead."

Jordan swallowed thickly. "So, he's real then? And...at my house?"

"No, I don't think so," Roster said. "Not if Sawyer is there anyway."

"The empty Sawyer Estates is the only place that makes sense...somewhere to hide for so long." Loomis shot back.

"Someone left flowers on my table," Jordan mumbled, interrupting the impending argument. " Someone is in my house and I don't care which psychopathic it is-"

"Psychopath doesn't begin to cover it," Roster mumbled.

"-but I want them out . The police said-"

Roster laughed. "You went to the police again? They never listen."

"-that they couldn't find anyone in the house. I left my bag in the kitchen, got changed, and by the time I got back someone had left flowers on it." Jordan crossed her arms over her body, becoming uncomfortable as both doctors regarded her with identical levels of confusion on their faces. "I feel like I'm losing my mind."

Loomis was the first to speak. "Flowers?" he asked. "You-you're worried about flowers? " He threw his hands in the air, lost in exasperation.

"Are you certain you don't have a secret admirer, Jordan?" Roster asked.

"Secret-" Jordan scoffed. "Are you kidding me right now? Someone is... was ...in my house!"

Brrriiiing! Brrriiiing! Brrriiing!

The shrill calling of Jordan's cell caused her to jump slightly, breaking the tension that was welling inside of her. Of course, she thought bitterly, not even Roster will take me seriously.

Pulling her cell out of her bag, she glanced down at the number.

Brrriiiing! Brrriiiing! Brrriiing!

1-844-555-0101

Brrriiing! Brrriiiing! Brrriiiing!

It was her home phone.

Numb fingers pressed to answer and raised the cell to her ear. "Hello?"

THUD!

The loud sound rang in her ears, then shuffling, and finally ragged, heavy hissing of uneven breathing on the other end. Something rattled from inside Jordan, transforming in her mind to memories.

"You'll never leave me." Excited words came in harsh whispers. "You're mine." Breathless from anticipation, from enjoying his own sick mind games.

"Mine."

Blood seeped across cold steel, dripping soundlessly to the floor.

"Mine."

The phone clicked and Jordan shook the memories from her head. The silence on the other end of the line was enough. She was not going to go home alone tonight, especially because, if she did, she would not be home alone.


Jordan stood beside Roster and Loomis, listening their quiet argument of whether or not they should be here, with Laurie Strode, or investigate the peculiarities at the Sawyer Estates. Roster argued that if either Jedidiah Sawyer or Michael Myers were hiding out at Jordan's house, it would be best to spread out and do another thorough search because there must be something that was missing. Loomis, on the other hand, thought that it would be a waste of time searching the Estates if Myers was going to return to try to Laurie.

"It'll be tonight, on Halloween, if he does," Loomis said, anxiously. "Now that we know he's after Laurie, he'll be back on the anniversary of Judith Myers murder. He won't stop until he's killed them all."

"If it's either of them, Jordan's in danger. Do you think either of them will hesitate to kill her ?"

Loomis folded his arms in front of his chest. "Well, they haven't yet."

"Yet."

Jordan's stomach hit the floor. Yet .

She was not going to be the victim of someone's psychotic games. Not again. "I'm not going back there by myself," she said. "Not after someone called me from inside my house . And the flowers-"

"Again with the flowers?" Roster scoffed.

"Someone is inside my house!" Frustration filled Jordan. It was the same frustration she had when he kept slipping away from the police after she'd escaped for nine full months. Nine months of filled with dread and anger that he was going to show up and finish her off this time. It was the way she felt when, even after being caught, he smiled at her in the courtroom, as if he'd just gone away on vacation and was excited to see his wife again. It was the same type of frustration she felt every time the local police came to the Sawyer estate and told her she was being paranoid.

"Look, since that guy-" she nodded her head at Loomis, who raised his eyebrows at her, "wants to stay here, why doesn't he? And then at least you could come back with me and then everyone is covered?"

The two men shared a silent moment of consideration before Loomis finally spoke. "That does make the most sense." He glanced between Jordan and Roster gravely. "If it is Michael...I don't know how to kill him-to stop him. He's taken gunshots and stood back up from it. Be careful."


The Sawyer Estates

The heavy front door swung open with an unearthly groan, the weight pulling against the too-old hinges whose eerie protest sent chills racing up Jordan's spine. Taking great care as to not make any further noise so as not to alert any potential serial killers hiding out in her house, she took slow, tentative steps with Roster bringing up the rear, treading just as carefully.

It didn't take more than a few paces into the house to realize that something was amiss.

No. Not something .

Everything.

Beyond the foyer, Jordan could see that the couch had been moved-shoved to touch the far wall as flush as possible to open up the middle of the room, unfolded clothes and all. In fact, Jordan could see the room quite well, despite the darkness outside, because of the remarkable display of candles, alight with flickering flames that danced in an imperceivable draft. They were everywhere-along the floorboards, on the sills, on the mantle and coffee table.

It was a wonder the house hadn't burnt to the ground.

"Been redecorating?" To Jordan, Roster's uneasy, joking whisper sounded closer to a shout through the tension swirling around the room. She was sure that it had broken the atmosphere and prepared herself for the catastrophic after-effects that were sure to follow.

But nothing happened.

Stepping further into the room, Jordan noticed the carpet-or, rather, the that was on the carpet. More candles were carefully placed between purposefully deposited bones -small, cleaned and bleached a hauntingly beautiful white-all to form a poorly-crafted heart, uneven at the sides and lumpy around the curves. Laid directly in the center was the bouquet from earlier, the wilting flower petals seeming much less sinister now in comparison to their surroundings.

A hand on her shoulder sent her stumbling to the side, knocking over a candle in her wake, whose flame drown in its own wax as it toppled over.

"Easy!" Roster said. "It's still just me."

"Does this remind you of anything?" Jordan gestured to the room, hoping that Roster would be able to at least identify who was in the house by their strange display. Somehow, she hoped that knowing who it was would help them.

Roster stooped low, examining the catastrophe in her living room with an unwarranted appreciative and quizzical face. "A bit, actually. It's rather interesting, really." It was as if he was speaking more to himself than Jordan at this point, mumbling and humming as he prodded at a few of the bones. "During the Sawyer families reign, corpses would pop up around town from grave robberies. The strange thing was that they would be dismantled and put back together - displayed as art."

"Art," Jordan scoffed, her stomach churning. "Yeah, I remember that from the newspaper clippings."

"When they raided the house, hidden in the basement where they found..." Standing, Roster shook off whatever haunting memories had begun plaguing him. "Well, that's not important. But there were hordes of intricately-weaved 'pieces of art' made from the bones and skin of the victims. Jedidiah Sawyer had a knack for making artwork from human remains."

"Are...are those human bones?" Bile quickly rose up Jordan's throat, leaving a burning trail behind.

Roster shook his head. "No, they're more likely to be something closer to squirrels or birds - I'm not really all that sure. I mean, I'm no anthropologist, but those are awfully small to be human remains, aren't they?"

Jordan reached for the phone on one of the relocated side tables, her hands beginning to tremble. "I'm calling the police."

Roster began slowly following the trail of candles towards the kitchen. "What are they going to do? Come and search the property again? Accuse us of being crazy again?"

"I don't care," she snapped, clicking the receiver on and punching in the numbers to the local police. "Where are you going? We should leave!" She waited impatiently as the line rang, glancing between Roster, who was ignoring her, and the still-open door.

"Haddonfield Police Department. Please hold."

"Hold? Hold! What kind of Police Department-"

" If this is an emergency, please hang up and dial 9-1-1 for emergency services. Please hold while-"

Beep!

Jordan hung up, rolling her eyes, before phoning 911 and following after Roster, who had already disappeared around the corner to the small kitchen.

"911, what's your emergency?"

"Yes, hello? Hi! This is Jordan J-"

Click. The kitchen light blinked off along with the digital clock display on the stove.

Her eyes widened at the dull sound of the line being disconnected. "Hello? Hello!"

"He...cut the power?" Roster was standing at the pantry, peering through the opened door. "Does your fuse box happen to be in your...second basement?"

"Second basement?" Jordan peered over his shoulder and into the cramped pantry. A portion of the wall had been slid to the side, allowing for the candles to continue on down a narrow staircase and disappear around a sharp corner.

Roster nodded, his face finally reflecting the gravity of the situation. "A wine cellar, most likely. But the last time we searched the house, I remember the fuse box in the basement...the regular basement...right?"

Screeetch. Clang! Creeeaak.

Jordan jumped, stepping away from the pantry and the noises below. "He's down there?" she whispered, heart hammering in her chest and panic beginning to cause her breath to come in short, stunted bursts.

"I would think so. Only," he glanced at Jordan warily over his shoulder, "if he's down there...who's in the basement with the fusebox?"


Notes:

Chapter title and beginning quote: Lyrics from Halloween by the Misfits

*quote: paraphrased quote taken from the original Halloween film

And we're still practicing onomatopoeia because I hate myself, apparently :P.