"What are you wearing?"

"Shut the fuck up Dean. I didn't choose it."

"Is that a- are those-"

"Dean!"

"Your fosters dressed you up like a fucking fairy!"

I scowled and hit him with the orange pail I held. "Not a fairy stupid. I'm an angel. It's Halloween, it's not that strange."

Dean bent over and clutched his sides, trying to hold in howls of laughter. I kicked him in the shin and he kicked me back, and we both hopped on one foot for a second. Finally he stood on two feet and placed his hands on his hips. "So how did they get you in that getup?"

I tugged the headband halo off and threw it to the ground. "Wouldn't let me leave the house without a costume."

Dean raised an eyebrow incredulously. "And them telling you you couldn't leave has stopped you before?"

"No. But they said I could sleep over at Stacey's house if I wanted when I went out."

"The fuck is Stacey?"

"Some bitch in my class. But for tonight Stacey is you."

"Atta girl Lion!"

"Help me get these wings off!" I tried to tug at my cardboard wings. "I think they tied them, those dicks."

"Wait, wait!"

"What?"

"Since you're in it, let's use it yeah?"

"Fuck you on about."

"Let's get some candy!"

"…now when you say 'candy', what drugs are we talking about?"

"The drugs that parents give their spoiled kids every day! Come on now Franks, free candy!"

"No way Dean. I've been out Trick-or-Treating exactly twice. And both times were horrible."

"But you've never been out with me before!" He picked up the headband and held it out. "Come on Franky! It could be fun!"

"… you're going to case houses aren't you? Look inside when they open up count valuables and hazards you can see."

Dean winked at me. "Free candy Franks."

My stomach churned in a mixture of discomfort and excitement. Conflicting emotions of guilt and a thirst for a challenge and an adrenaline rush battled it out for a few moments until I let a smile creep across my face. "Come on then Robin Hood."

"Steal from the rich and give to the poor!"

I took the headband back and put it on. "What about you? You don't have a costume or a bag."

"Course I have a costume! I'm the older brother who's pretending to be too old for Halloween but was forced by darling mum to take his angel sister out."

"Fucker."

"Now see, you're gonna have to do most of the acting here Franky. We're going for innocent and cute." I pounced on him and we wrestled on the pirate deck for a few minutes. Finally we pushed off each other and I straightened my dented wings. Dean came over and started to pat my hair back into less of a wild-child style. After a time he nodded his head. "There. You could be a fucking choir girl Lion!"

"I will thump you again, I don't care if it messes up my hair."

Dean slung an arm around my shoulders and we started out of the darkening playground and toward the bright lights of the real world.

We spent three and a half hours moving through the different streets, Dean slouched and sulky and I bouncing lightly on the balls of my feet and fluttering about with a big smile on my face. If we try we can be the best actors in the world. Usually we don't care enough to.

In all by the end of the Trick-or-Treating we had a pail full to the brim with sweets and seventeen houses Dean had pegged as good burglary targets. I agreed to nine of them. We pigged out on candy and spliff on the pirate ship until half passed two. Before we went back to hit the houses Dean pulled out a packet of powder. "Gotta be sharp Franks," he said as I sniffed up a hit. "Time to work."

We had to hit them all in one night, before the neighborhood could realize they were a target and bulk up security. We reached the first house at just before three. I handed Dean my Manikin and shimmied up the drainpipe easily. The window popped open obligingly and I swung my legs in and sat on the sill, then ducked my head under and moved to hop down onto the floor.

And was immediately stopped.

My wings snagged in the window, too tall to get through.

I tugged at them desperately but suddenly it was if they were made of steel and not flimsy cardboard. I put my knuckles to my mouth and started to bite down on them. Shit shit shit. I clawed at the strings attaching the wings to my back.

How stupid could I be to forget to take off the fucking wings?

I tried to twist sideways to get the wings at a diagonal but the wings still wouldn't fit. I was too fucked out of my mind to think rationally and thoughts started to rattle about in a distracting way.

Ok Franks. Calm down. Think. Just be calm.

With all my might I tugged. The strings dug into my shoulders painfully. I clenched my jaw and kept pulling.

Finally with a satisfying rip they pulled free and I pitched forward, tumbling onto the floor and hitting my chin against the thin carpeting so hard that instantly blood filled my mouth from where I'd bitten down on my tongue. I got up on my knees and covered my mouth with my hands so I wouldn't gag as I swallowed. It took me a few minutes to stop shaking. I was terrified someone had heard my disastrous entry. The family I was currently living with wasn't bad, but I never knew what to expect, not fully. Each new foster family reacted differently from situation to situation, and since I never stayed any one place for long I could never really fully gauge what different fosters would do.

They could easily turn nasty.

I put my head in my hands and tried to steady my breathing.

Finally satisfied no one had heard me, or if they had they hadn't registered it as anything odd, I stood and surveyed the office I'd ended up in. Instantly my eyes lit upon a pair of scissors and I scooped them up and snipped the wings off my back. They fluttered to the ground, horribly bent out of shape and torn.

Suddenly full of anger, drugs heightening my paranoia, I bent down and started to slash at the cardboard with the scissors, shredding the wings into strips. They'd endangered my safety, they'd tried to trap me, they were working against me.

I wasn't a girl who dressed up for Halloween and went out normally with friends and family. I could never be that kind of girl.

I gathered up the destroyed wings and threw them out the open window, then shut it tight. Dean wasn't at the drainpipe anymore. Usually he waited there until I gave an OK, but I'd taken too long. He probably saw me get caught in the window and had seen me fall in. I picked my way carefully down to the front door and opened it.

Immediately Dean burst through the door, wrapping me up in a hug. He leaned back and cupped my face in his hands. "I thought you might have got caught Lion!"

I shrugged and motioned for him to enter so we could start.

I didn't deserve angel wings anyway.