Their town had a Halloween celebration

That year

And Chester went with all his friends

He laughed and talked,

Like any teen,

At the edge of the woods where the bonfire blazed.

The sun had set

Darkness took the fields and the forests.

Tonight was the night when the spirits and fae roamed free,

Both evil and good.

The bonfire threw dancing orange light

On the trunks of the trees as they reached their branches

Towards the moonlit sky



He remembered his nights of trick-or-treating

But vaguely

He remembered the magic of this night

Only a little

As he laughed and talked with his friends,

Holding a mug of hot cider in his cold hands.

But when they drifted away,

He saw what he'd seen

Many years before.

He felt the magic of this night, he felt the world

That lay beyond.



And he stepped into the trees.

The bonfire roared cheerily behind him, far away

Far past with the safety and the crowds.

He was past that now.

He was no longer a part of it.

He was on the edge

Of the veil that held the worlds apart

He was there, and he saw

The ghostly specter he had seen

So long ago.



Tall and thin

Pale white face,

And empty black sockets for eyes

A leering grin

A cackling laugh

The long slender limbs and furtive slink

That characterized Skeleton Jack



So far away, from the warm safe haven

The cozy bright fire

Ringed with grinning Jack o' lanterns

To keep away the mischievous spirits

Of that other world.



You want to come with me, don't you?

Yes, of course I do.

Escape from that world, where things are so dull

And so ordered

And predictable

Escape with me to a world

Of magic and mystery.



Where things have color, and life

And energy

Where emotions leap high

Magick leaps higher

And best of all,

You can fly.



I remember flying before.

Yes, I did it then.

Against a black sky

Carpeted with glittering stars

And a full moon

Which cast its silver light

Over everything it saw.



I've missed it for so long.

Then come with me, I will take you there.

Yes, I'll go with you,

And escape this world,

Where the chains bind you down

And the others trample you

As heartlessly as they feed on each other.



Are there trees there?

Yes, there is everything. Life is there

But it changes and it flows

And it is always wonderful.



Let me go with you then, please.

I would like to,

But first you must breathe your last

As you know

These two worlds

Are so far apart

That to cross between them

Takes much more than it did in the past.



You can come without dying

But you can't ever stay

Until you are born there

As one of the fae



And Chester turned back

So afraid of death

As he was

It felt so uncertain,

And so he returned

To the warm cheery fire

That held the spirits at bay

But it now was a prison

With bars of flame

Locking him away

From that world

That felt so much like home.