CLAIREMBER 2022
Day 18 - Valkyrie
"Trick or Treat!"
If Chris Redfield hadn't been with her, Fran wouldn't have recognized the little…soldier? Goddess? Whatever it was, as Claire Redfield.
The girl wore a silver breastplate and matching wrist and calf cuffs of tinfoil over a red sweater and pants, the latter of which Lee and Ann Redfield had presumably added to keep her warm this chilly evening. A silver-buckled belt held up a split skirt made of burgundy velvet, a toy dagger hooked therein. The pointy tinfoil helmet extended downward to frame her face and cover her nose.
The oddest choice for a little girl, though, was the spear. It was an old broomstick topped with a tinfoil cut-out of a spreadhead. The idea of Cecilia ever holding a weapon, even if it was just a toy, made Fran blanch.
She smiled. "Oh my! I almost didn't recognize you, dear. What are you dressed as?"
Claire said, "A Valkyrie!"
Fran looked at Chris. "A what?"
Chris shrugged. "Something she and Mom are into."
"A Valkyrie," Claire repeated. "They take dead soldiers to Vahalla so they can fight for Odin. They give them mead too. Mead is like beer."
"So you're an…undead barmaid?"
"I'm a Valkyrie!" The girl smiled so wide Fran could see her two missing front teeth.
Cecilia appeared beside Fran. When she saw Claire, she started and hid behind Fran.
"Cecilia, it's me – Claire from down the street."
Cecilia peeked past Fran's long skirt. "Claire?"
"Yeah!"
"What are you?"
"I'm a Valkyrie. What are you?"
Cecilia left her mother and went to Claire. "I'm a fairy. Mommy made my wand out of a chopstick. See?" She held up the pink-painted stick to which Fran had taped curled, holographic ribbon.
"It's pretty," said Claire.
"Thank you." Cecilia looked up at Fran. "Mommy, can I go trick-or-treating with Claire?"
Ann Redfield shouldn't have let her daughter wear such a vulgar costume, but the Redfields were good neighbors. They kept their cat inside, and Chris hardly ever made any noise. In fact, since he'd made the VJ team at school, he rarely came to cut their grass nowadays.
"As long as it's alright with Chris, it's alright with me," said Fran.
"Please, Chris?" Claire begged.
"It's cool with me," said Chris.
The girls cheered and ran to the sidewalk after Fran gave them their candy bars. She gave Chris one too, as payment for letting her elder son, Michael, off the hook to take Cecilia treat-or-treating. Then the shouting started.
Fran and Chris turned to the street. Cecilia was crying, and Claire was smacking Todd Jennings and Brian McClintock, who were the ones causing the ruckus, with her spear. They had both smeared themselves with gray and red paint to be bloody zombies.
Screaming the girls' names, Fran and Chris raced to the sidewalk. Chris yanked the spear out of Claire's hand.
"What the hell are you doing?" he demanded.
Claire pointed at the boys. "They started it!"
"Did not!" Todd shot back.
"Liar! You pulled Cecilia's hair then stole her wand and tore off the ribbons and broke it!"
Cecilia was still crying. In her hands sat the pink wand, snapped in half and missing the ribbons.
"You two better run home before I beat you worse than she did," Chris snapped.
The two boys ran off.
Fran hugged Cecilia. "Oh, sweetheart. We can fix this right up."
"Really?" sobbed the girl.
"Really. Come on." Fran picked her up. To the Redfields, she said, "You're welcome to wait inside."
Chris gave the spear back to Claire, and the two kids followed Fran and Cecilia into the living room, where Michael was still watching that awful movie with the claw-handed man in the hat. Chris and Claire joined him while Fran took Cecilia into the kitchen. Fran grabbed a tissue to dry Cecilia's eyes, fished out a spool of tape, and reattached the pieces and ribbon.
"There," she said, hanging the wand to Cecilia.
Cecilia studied it, and then looked at Claire, who sat on the sofa with their brothers. "Mommy, do you think I can be a Valkyrie next year?"
Fran smiled. "We'll see, sweetheart. Let's think about this Halloween first, okay?"
Fran watched from the window as Chris led Claire and Cecilia down the street. Claire gripped the spear in one hand and Cecilia's hand in the other.
Yes, Fran thought, you can be a Valkyrie next year.
