(2)-A BIG MAN.
October 30th, (1978)
The following morning, Tommy had gotten out of bed, got ready for school, and now sat downstairs at the dinner table, staring at his syrup-covered pancakes. As he stared at his food, the 8-year old couldn't stop thinking about that double-dream he had last night, with the second one ending with the Boogyman taking his Dad. But can't couldn't be right...could it? The Boogyman only kidnapped little kids, not teenagers and grown-ups. Wasn't that how the urban legend went? Of course it was. Monsters only targeted little kids, not teens and grown-ups.
Tommy was so entuned into his thoughts, he didn't even notice his Mom, Stephanie Doyle, come out of the kitchen and over to where he was sitting, with her holding a glass pitcher of orange juice. She had blond shoulder-length hair and blue eyes.
"Okay, Tommy, do you want some orange juice?" Stephanie asked. But her son didn't answer. "Tommy? Tommy. Tommy!"
Tommy snapped out of his thoughts and back to reality. "Yeah, Mom?" He asked as he looked at his mother.
"I said do you want some orange juice?" Stephanie said.
"Oh. Sure." Tommy said.
Stephanie poured some orange juice into Tommy's glass cup on the table next to his plate.
Ronnie entered into the dining-room, dressed for work. "Hello, beautiful."
"Hey, handsome." Stephanie said before placing the glass pitcher on the table and then going back into the kitchen.
"Hey, Big Man." Ronnie said, calling Tommy by his nick-name.
"Hey, Dad." Tommy said before he started eating his pancakes. His Dad always called him "BIG MAN" since he was 5 years old, as he believed that boys were merely little men growing into big men.
"And how are you this morning?" Ronnie asked as he sat down at the table.
"Pretty good...i guess." Tommy answered.
"You guess? What kind of talk is that?" Ronnie asked as he got the glass pitcher of orange juice and poured some into his glass.
"Nothing. I guess i just slept the wrong way, that's all." Tommy said.
"Did you have an accident?" Ronnie asked jokingly as he sat the pitcher of orange juice on the table. Little did he know how right he was.
"...No." Tommy said. He didn't like lying to his Dad, but he felt like he couldn't share his current problems with him. Such as him wetting himself for the 29th night in a row, the nightmares about the Boogyman and the nightmare he had about the creature taking his father.
"Are you sure that's all it is?" Ronnie asked.
"I'm sure." Tommy answered.
"Alright then." Ronnie said, dropping the matter.
Tommy's Dad always took his word for anything he said and refused to press the issue whenever he gave an answer. Which was alright with Tommy because he didn't want to talk about his current troubles with his Dad...or his Mom, for that matter. What good would it do? He couldn't talk to them about the Boogyman, he tried. Since he was 4 years old, to be exact. But all they would do was simply deny the monster's existence and assure him he was safe. As if that was somehow going to make it not be real. After he turned 7, Tommy stopped talking about the Boogyman because he didn't want his Dad to think he was a big baby. What was he thinking being scared of some urban legend? Like his Dad always called him, he was a big man. And he needed to handle this like a big man. Besides, it was ridiculous anyway. An 8-year old man still afraid of monsters. There was no proof that the Boogyman was real. There was no proof that monsters in general were real. They only existed in kids' imaginations and nightmares and he wasn't a kid. He was a man. And men weren't afraid of anything.
Stephanie came back out of the kitchen with a plate of waffles and carried them over to the dinner-table where she placed them in front of her husband.
"Thanks, honey." Ronnie said.
"You're welcome, dear. I'll be right back with a fork and the syrup." Stephanie said. "Hurry up and finish your breakfast, Tommy, or you'll be late for school."
"Actually...i think i'm gonna just head on out." Tommy said.
"What? But you've barely touched your pancakes." Stephanie said.
"I'm not very hungry this morning for some reason." Tommy said before getting up from the table and leaving out of the dining-room.
"Oh, well...okay. Have fun at school." Stephanie said.
"I will." Said the voice of Tommy, followed by the sound of the front door opening and closing.
...
Outside, Tommy walked of the porch and went over to his bicycle, which was leaned up against the wall, and started walking off with it. Before he got off his house property, he got on his bike and started peddling through the suburban neighborhood of Haddonfield, heading off for school.
The 8-year old looked around at the neighborhood as he rode through it on his bike, gazing at how beautiful it was, as well as looking at how bright and blue the sky was and how pure white the clouds were. Haddonfield looked beautiful everyday and that was what Tommy loved about it. Nothing bad had ever happened around here. Sure, there were a few petty crimes, such as break-ins, robberies and vandalism, but other than that, nothing serious or life-threatening. Haddonfield was just that kind of town. A quaint little boring community where nothing big ever happened.
"Hey, Tommy!" Said 8-year old Logan Van Der Klock as he rode up beside Tommy on his bike. He had brown hair, his eyes were blue, he wore a pink short sleeve t-shirt, gray pants and white sneakers. Logan was the younger brother of Lynda Van Der Klock, who was one of the friends of Tommy's babysitter, Laurie Strode. Logan and Tommy had been friends since the first grade in 1975 and had since done everything together. Such as biking, sometimes walking, to school...visiting each other's homes...sleeping over at each other's homes, biking through the neighborhood, Trick-or-Treating every Halloween, etc.
"Hi, Logan. You still comin' over after school?" Tommy said.
"Hey, is Halloween tomorrow?" Logan joked.
"I'll take that as a "Yes"." Tommy said.
"Can we make a Jack-o-Lantern? My sister bought me a pumpkin yesterday while she was out with her boyfriend, Bob. Requested by my Mom, of course." Logan said.
"Sure." Tommy said.
"Watch TV?" Logan asked.
"Yep." Tommy said.
"Can we make popcorn, eat candy, play outside?" Logan asked.
"You know it." Tommy answered simply, as they were the same questions Logan would ask every time whenever he was going to come over to Tommy's house. But this time he was thinking about the Boogyman as they turned a corner and peddled down peacher's street. He couldn't purge his mind of that awful scene of the Boogyman in his double-nightmare. A nightmare where the creature had taken his Dad.
Tommy soon stopped his bike, making Logan stop his at the same time.
"Why are we stopping? What's going on?" Logan asked.
"...Logan," Tommy began. "how old are you again?"
"You know how old i am, i'm 8 years old. Same age as you. Why?" Logan said.
Tommy hesitated, not wanting to be labeled as a wuss by the kid he had been friends with since the first grade. "Have you ever felt like...like monsters are real?"
"Sure." Logan said, shrugging his shoulders.
"You have?" Tommy asked.
"Sure, hasn't every kid our age?" Logan said.
"They have?" Tommy asked, with his blue eyes now wide.
"Sure. When you're down in your parents' basement or in your bedroom at night or in the dark or having a nightmare, you feel like monsters are real. Is that what you mean?" Logan said.
"Uh, well..." Tommy stammered.
"Oh. That's what you mean." Logan said as he looked and saw an old runt down abandoned house, with his eyes wide and the color draining from his face.
The boys had arrived at the Myers house. Or "THE SPPOK-HOUSE" as Lonnie Elem called it. It was a ghost of it's former self. Weather-beaten and dilapidated. Set back from the straight 20 or 25 paces. It stood glowering in the cool autumn morning like some mangey, bruting beast. It's former code of white paint, the symbol of perfection of every mid-western home had turned a dingy gray. And much of it had peeled or flaked off, revealing a pitted and rotting facade of shingles. Several windows had been broken by kids or vandals. A few of whom had been bold enough to sprawl graffiti on the front door. A huge elm beat against the upstairs window as the breezed stiffened.
Logan looked at Tommy. "You're not suppose to go up there."
"I know. It's the spook-house." Tommy said.
"I thought you liked to be scared, Tommy. I know you groove on horror movies enough." Logan said.
"Yeah, but those are movies. You can always turn the television off if you get scared. You can't turn off real life." Tommy said.
"That's very wise, Tommy." Logan said.
"Lonnie Elem said never to go up there. He said it's a haunted house. He told me about some real awful stuff that happened there once." Tommy said.
"Lonnie Elem probably won't get out of the 3rd grade." Logan said. "I gotta go." He said before he started riding off on his bike. "I'll see you at school."
"See ya there." Tommy said. The Doyle boy then gazed back at the Myers house...and suddenly he found himself thinking about the home. It was one property many house-sellers were ashamed to speak of. For this was the house in which a 17-year old girl was had been brutally slain by her little brother on Halloween night 15 years ago. Well...almost 15 years ago, as Halloween wasn't until tomorrow. The Myers couple had disappeared a few months after the tragedy. No one really knew what had happened to them, but there had been some rumors. One was that they had moved away to Indiana to escape the shame and harassment by the press, gawking neighbors and passer-bys...another was that they were killed in a car accident...and a third rumor was that they had moved away from society and were now living in the mountains somewhere in Illinois.
Many house-sellers had tried to sale the "THE SPOOK-HOUSE", as the kids of Haddonfield called it, but as soon as the buyers heard about the events of Halloween-1963, from neighbors all too eager to tell them, their fears took over and got the best of them and it was goodbye sale. And who could blame them? The house was haunted. Nobody wanted to buy it. Tommy wondered what it must have been like that night for the Myers girl. Seeing her tiny brother coming at her with that big sharp knife. The 8-year boy old tried to imagine a blade that long going into the girl's stomach...her chest...her-even her...Ugh. It was unspeakable. Unthinkable.
Not wanting to be late for school, Tommy resumed riding down the street, trying to get back in the good spirits he was in just minutes ago before he and Logan stopped at the Myers house.
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So what did you guys think about this chapter? Were you surprised to see Lynda's little brother was in this chapter? Were you surprised he's friends with Tommy? Now, before you deeply devoted Halloween fan lay into me and say "That's a lie! Lynda doesn't even have a little brother!" Yes, she does. She mentions him in the movie. When she's walking home from school with Annie and Laurie, she says she has to get out taking her little brother Trick-or-Treating. So this character does exist, he was just never shown or given a name in the film.
Please review.