7

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Andrea pulled the car next to the curb on Anderson Green Gardens and turned off the ignition. She looked ahead and saw that the street looked cold and depressing. She stepped out of the car and pulled her winter coat tighter around her neck. Her auburn hair blew in her face as the wind carried her along the side walk to the Carter residence at 458.

The trees along the street were stripped bare of leaves and she noticed that most of them were dried and dead and whirled up in circles around lamp poles and gate posts. She looked up to see a pumpkin stare right at her from where it sat on the wall of the property next to the Carter place.

It was Hallowe'en, how had she forgotten.

She went up to the front door to the Carter house and went to knock when she noticed that the door was on ajar.

"Mrs Carter?"

She pushed the door inward and it creaked a tad. She peeked around the door and called out again, "Mrs Carter?"

The House was dark and dank. It had been that way last time she had visited a week or so ago. The shutters where closed and the curtains were pulled shut.

She heard the rattle of glass and looked to the floor to see that she had knocked down a row of wine bottles.

She went through into the kitchen and the first thing she did was open the blind to let some light in. She gasped about her, the kitchen was a tip. There was weeks of unwashed-up crockery and cutery and a basket of unwashed clothes sat on the table overflowing.

She felt like that she was being watched and called out, "Mrs Carter is that you?"

She stepped back into the hall and went to the foot of the staircase. Looking up to the shadows above she could sense something not right.

"Mrs Carter...are you up there? It's me...it's Andrea Darlington, I came to see you last week...remember?"

She swallowed down, licked her dry lips and started to climb the steps that creaked upon the way...

/

At the Hospital, Cecile and Patrick had stopped by to visit Sadie.

"So...when did they say you could come out?", asked her best friend.

Sadie smiled and sat up, "tomorrow, but I feel fine now...I really do"

Cecile shuddered, "You gave us half a fright at school...you were covered in blood...what happened to you Sade?"

Sadie wasn't quite sure herself to be honest but she put on a brave face, "I don't remember, to tell you the truth, that night is all a blur to me now"

Patrick picked off another grape and Cecile pushed his hand away, "Hey! They are for Sadie not you..."

"Ohh I'm off to the john"

They watched him go and then Cecile turned, "hey you are gonna miss Susie's Hallowe'en party tonight...everyone is gonna be there"

Sadie looked so disappointed, "Ohhh I wanted to go! Look...I feel fine...maybes I can just discharge myself"

"Oh I don't know..."

"I feel fine! Never better"

Patrick was coming back from the washroom and Sadie smiled, "Help me get dressed...I'm gonna go with you two"

/

Andrea looked about the bedroom that had belonged to Jess Carter. Her mother had kept it just so, so it seemed intrusive to go through drawers and stuff, but she knew she had to.

She found a diary in the top dresser. She picked it out and saw it had a lock on it.

"So where would a teenage girl keep the key", she muttered to herself.

She looked around the drawer and the other drawers further down. Then she went and searched inside trinket trunks on the window ledge but there was no key to anything.

She sighed and pulled back the curtain further to see the black car parked on the opposite side of the street.

"Who the hell...?"

She raced down the stairs and went flying out of the front door only to see that there was no car parked in any way shape or form.

She scratched her head as the wind whipped up dry crispy leaves in her face.

"I'm going crazy", she muttered.

/

Sadie had made it back to Cecile's place and sat on the bed in a loose fitting top and hot pants.

"These are cool! So retro!"

Cecile called from the ensuite bathroom, "You can wear them if you want...maybe go as a mutant corpse from the 70s and have clawed your way up out of some grave.."

Sadie nodded as the idea formed in mind, "Yeah...I can rub some dirt in it all and have real cobwebby hair and stuff"

Cecile came out of the bathroom with a towel around her, "Yeahhh this party is gonna be so much fun!"

She sat down next to her on the bed and turned, "Are you sure you are okay? You seem alittle pale"

Sadie shook her head, "I'm fine! Look...what are you going as anyways...?"

"The human centerpede...have you seen that movie, it's gross, but Patrick said we can be bound together all night"

"Oh right..."

"You don't like Patrick much, do you?"

Sadie shrugged, "He's okay I suppose...but..."

"But what?"

He touched me up. But Sadie didn't say that, she thought it, "He's just a guy and guys are so stupid"

"But fun though...what about whathisname? The one you've been seeing but we all never see"

Sadie turned away from her and smiled to herself and smelt his wonderful aftershave that wofted around her, "Ohhh he'll be there...I know he will..."

/