April 20th 2023

Chapter 110
We Color the Halls

When they woke up on the morning of October 31st, both Maya and Lucas had only one thing on their mind, and that was their firstborn child, the one who'd made them parents, and how she was a whole nine years old as of this day. Did it feel possible in the slightest? Not at all. Would it get wilder year after year? Of course, it would. All it had taken with this one had been for them to realize how it would be the very last year where she had a single digit age, and they were goners.

After that, all they could think or want to do was to go down the hall and look in on her, maybe catch her as she woke up. Except she wasn't asleep at all, and neither were her little sisters. When Lucas gently pushed the door open and he and Maya looked in, the scene froze, showing them the birthday girl in the midst of painting her littlest sister's face, turning her into an – eerily effective – image of a ghost. Sitting on the floor between them, there was another small ghost already there, with an expression like 'oh, no, the surprise is ruined!'

"How long have the three of you been awake?" Lucas had to wonder.

"Not long," Marianne assured him. "They asked," she pointed to Mackenzie and Aubrey, who were busy looking at one another, beyond amused with their transformations. They would both stretch their faces into as silly of expressions as they could make them, and it would break their resolves and leave them giggling.

"Good thing that none of you have to be in school today, because that little ghostie there would get the preschool crowd in a screaming mood," Maya whispered, looking to her youngest pair.

She could just imagine Mackenzie having a fit of her own the moment they tried to clean her face up. They would have to later on, sure, for her costume, but for now she was in the clear to ghost it up with Aubrey for a while, and so she would. It was Sunday morning, they would all have breakfast before long, all to celebrate...

"Happy birthday, pumpkin," Lucas closed his arms around the brand new nine-year-old, pressed a loaded kiss to the top of her head. He laughed as he sensed her giddiness quaking right out of her. Maybe one day she wouldn't care much about her birthdays - doubtful - but right now she really, really cared, and they cared with her.

"Mom, Mom, guess what, I figured it out, the last thing for my song!" Marianne excitedly leaned back when she next found herself in Maya's arms. "Can I go in the Hex until breakfast is ready? It won't take long, I promise."

"Are you sure about that promise?" Maya had to ask, and Marianne's hesitation was admitted in her face. "It's your day, okay?" Maya reminded her. "We follow your lead. How long do you think it's really going to take?"

They would work around Marianne's request to the best of their abilities and, thankfully, wouldn't have to compensate too much while they worked on the meal, minding the fact that hungry small children were not so easily managed. Maya helped them through this by sharing stories from two days ago, when they'd had Halloween at school. She'd told these stories before, but there would always be space to expand, to add more details so that the stories felt as fresh as though they had never been heard.

She couldn't tell them about all of it, or at least there were some parts that she didn't feel were necessary to them, parts that they wouldn't fully understand at their ages.

For one thing, she didn't tell them about the sheer number of students who came along in costumes that could have fit under the banner of 'Support the Arts' on Friday. It might not have been so evident at first, not if you just looked at them individually. But the more that you saw of them, the ballerinas, the painters, the famous icons of stage, screen, and song... the more you'd have to think that this was anything but coincidence. This was a quiet protest happening right before their eyes, and if anyone, if any principal for instance, took issue with this, there was nothing to be done for it. They'd been permitted to come to class in costume and this was what they had chosen for themselves. What was the problem?

Oh, Maya had been so proud, as had Morgan, and Stella, and Cory, just about every teacher. She hadn't asked any of the kids about what had led to this, not at first, but those of them who had been in her class throughout the day and were 'participating' in this project had such a look to them when they'd sweep into the room, and greet her, and generally existed around her throughout those periods, that there was no doubt that this had all been staged.

It came clear at lunch, where she was visited by Kinsey and the Maxes. The three of them had fast become a habitual sight at midday, especially once the cheerleaders had been announced and Max McAllister had swept up her lifelong best friend's new teammate into being friends with her and him. Kinsey couldn't help but come off like a bit of an oddity when placed alongside the other two, but in a spirit not unlike what they'd seen when Ava Nash had joined up with Olivia Zhu and their previous Farrell, Kelsey, the appearances did not matter in the end. Kinsey liked her new friends very much and she would stand by them in anything, including a Halloween costume 'demonstration.'

It didn't matter that she wasn't taking art classes. She still appreciated it from the outside even if she didn't want to participate herself. For this though? For standing up to the woman who had found any and all ways to get her in detention when she continued to come to school in a way that was not in violation of anything except the principal's tastes... Yeah, sign her up.

The plan itself, as Maya should have expected by now, came together in the morning, right in her classroom, as the quiz teams gathered for their usual sessions. The pairs from each of the four classes had been looking forward to the end of October, going on about how this year Halloween would be on a Sunday, telling Kinsey about how she should check out the games and the maze at the Friar house. She had heard about it already thanks to her sister's boyfriend and habitual visitor of the costume contest, Cade Foster, so she was looking forward to it. And then when the conversation had turned to costumes, for the day itself and then at school the Friday prior, more than one of them had had this same thought, a... deflation, as they thought about their killjoy of a principal, about what she'd been up to lately... and they'd had a thought, an excellent way of giving their excitement some much needed buoyancy.

From there, it had been very easy for Maia and Miley to spread the word among the seniors, as Lydia and Marie did for the juniors, Agnes and Kip did for the sophomores, and lastly Max M. and Kinsey did for the freshmen.

If they wanted to make themselves clear, to show what they thought of her actions... or of her as their principal at all... they could not have found a better way to show it in a perfectly unpunishable way. It promised a couple of quiet weeks on the Davenport front for sure, though it wouldn't be without the chance of retaliation. They were showing her that they didn't want her there, but she was there, and between this and the musical, it was only a matter of time before she made her next move. Maybe it wouldn't come right away, what with Christmas around the corner, but it would come, and all they could do was brace themselves.

"She lit a fire under them, and she thinks they're the ones who are going to get burned," Maya had told Lucas and her siblings on Friday night, after the kids had gone to bed. "But she's the one walking around with her coattails on fire. She just can't see it."

There was so much space for her to think about Halloween at school that year from a perspective of how the principal would or wouldn't respond, but that would never be what Maya or most of them would remember that day. To them, it would be about how much they'd all allowed themselves to have fun in the midst of their purpose. Maya would remember the instances where small groups would form up, bringing together fellow 'actors,' and 'painters,' and 'musicians,' whether or not the people involved were friends or even classmates of the same years. They'd just cluster together, impersonating their chosen characters together, and generally embracing the day and the spirit they had sought to embody. One would call out to another in the hall, and the other would immediately respond, falling into the act, and to Maya it had felt like magic, peace reigning in their halls. If any squabbles happened, the same ones they experienced day by day, she didn't see them, and nothing she heard or saw throughout the day suggested that this was the reason. It had just been a… Halloween miracle. That was what they'd remember it as.

"Did you get it all done?" Lucas asked when Marianne came hurrying back into the kitchen. They'd all watched her come running back from the Hex to the back door with that big smile, so they could guess her answer.

"Yup," Marianne nodded, sending her traditional pumpkin head springs springing.

"Can we hear it?" Wyatt asked.

"Nope," Marianne shook her head. Nellie and Gracie both laughed.

"Should have seen that one coming," Maya smirked even as she nudged for the girls to go ahead and take their seats, school stories over.

"What about me?" Lucas asked, playing up the sad father face, pout, and all.

"Don't do that!" Marianne giggled even as she rushed up and reached to press her hands at his face and make the pout go away. It made his voice come out barely understandable, but they knew he was protesting without ever escaping, and that made both the triplets and the little sisters laugh out loud like it was the funniest thing they had seen in their lives. Lucas finally freed himself and became the captor, which turned up Marianne's giggling until she finally called out, "Okay! Okay! You can hear it! Just you!"

"Alright, hand her over, I need to get my pass, too," Maya stepped up, and Marianne squealed. "No need? I'm in?" Maya asked, and she got a nod. "Yeah, that's what I thought," she grinned, watching as Lucas went on holding to their firstborn, now coming down from her giggle fit.

It was a wonder that they managed to not land themselves in a tantrum from the other girls about the song, but both Maya and Lucas came to the conclusion that they had been promised a listen beforehand, a sisterly pact. Anyway, they were going to put that part behind them for now. What mattered here was that they had a whole Hallowannie ahead of them and so many things they wanted and needed to do. The triplets wanted to be ghosts like their little sisters, all the better for their 'scary movie' plans for the morning, so that would be the first thing to see to as soon as breakfast was over… right there with fixing the parts of Mackenzie and Aubrey Friar that had been brought back to life after an encounter with bits of pancakes…

TO BE CONTINUED

See you tomorrow! - mooners