Nickel didn't usually celebrate Halloween. The day just was not one that he particularly cared about. Even as a kitten, the spookiness did little to elicit excitement from him.

So when October rolled around and all the hype was being built for the holiday, Nickel did not choose to play a part in it. Not even the convincing of his little xanthic friend as the day approached made him want to participate in the classic Halloween tradition.

"Aw, but mister Nickel!" Lily complained. "I wanted to go trick-or-treating with you!"

"What benefit to you would there be if I was there?" Nickel asked. "You know I'm not very sociable. I'm not the person to ask if you really want to have fun on Halloween."

Lily pouted. "Why couldn't you have been six like me too?"

Nickel grinned cheekily. "Fun fact: a six-year-old me didn't like Halloween either."

That gave Lily pause. "You didn't?"

Nickel shook his head no. "Never was a fan," he added. "The decorations were cool, and I guess they still are, but I never enjoyed the costumes."

"What about the candy?"

"Bold of you to assume I ever got any," he snickered. "Not that I would be able to eat that much of it. I don't like eating candy in excess."

Lily stared at him. "Mister Nickel," she finally said, "you're weird."

"Thanks." Nickel grinned wider in jest, before turning to look at something else, as he tended to do. There wasn't that much to see, other than the clock saying that it was one-thirty in the afternoon.

A knock sounded at the door. Nickel swiftly answered; when he opened the door he was greeted by Zero, who looked even less jovial than usual.

"What happened?" Nickel asked him.

Zero didn't answer, instead choosing to trudge past the cat and to the couch.

"Alright. Sure. Fine. 'S not like I asked a question or anything. That didn't happen," Nickel muttered lowly so that no one could discern his words. He tried again: "What happened, Zero?"

The jackal finally spoke. "Can I avoid Halloween here?"

"So you walk in here looking like somebody stole your sword, because of Halloween." Nickel scoffed. "As if, right?"

"Well, when people are dressing up as your villain self, you would be the same way."

Just then, Lily reappeared, almost as if she'd been summoned by the sound of Zero's voice. "Hi, mister Zero!"

"Hello, Lily," he answered, a twitch possessing the corners of his mouth as he fought the smile.

"Did you know mister Nickel doesn't like Halloween?" she questioned, making Zero look up at Nickel. The vermilion feline shrugged and shook his head no.

"Well, I don't necessarily like it either," Zero admitted, and Lily looked comically aghast. Nickel chuckled at that. Here it went again.

.

.

.

Nickel and Zero were still "avoiding" Halloween when it was evening, and Lily had come back from some kind of school event for the holiday. She'd apparently been given an angel costume - Nickel certainly hadn't bought one - that, he had to admit, fit her really well. In both ways.

"I'm back!" she called out.

"Welcome back," he answered, getting up from his reading to see if she wanted anything. Zero behind him didn't seem to be interested at the moment.

"Mister Nickel, um," Lily began, "can you come tell us a scary story?"

Nickel blinked. "Who's 'us'?" he asked. He had a tale ready already, but he was unsure as to whom his audience might be.

"Some friends from school and me," Lily answered. "And make it really scary," she added.

Nickel was still a little apprehensive, but he decided he didn't want to let the little girl down. Besides, he liked storytelling. "Alright, I'll go."

"Yay!" She grabbed his hand, beaming away, and pulled him along out the door and down the street, until she remembered that he could walk by himself and let go of him.

She took him to the schoolyard, where a campfire was burning safely in the midst of a group of students, all of various species and all sporting different getups. Nickel felt a little underdressed.

There was a vacant spot in the circle where he guessed Lily had been sitting, and indeed that was where she led him.

All the way, Nickel had been getting the details of his story in order for a congruent telling. He wanted to make sure that this was a grand experience for the children.

"I got him!" Lily called, getting the attentions of the group. She and Nickel sat down together.

"You sure his story's gonna be scary?" One of the boys spoke up, voice purposefully deepened to sound older than he was. "He looks kinda wimpy."

Nickel chuckled at the words used. "Looks can be deceiving, young man. Just because I don't look scary, doesn't mean that I can't be scary."

While the boy continued to look disbelieving, Nickel cleared his throat and spoke again. "Ready for me to start?"

There were sounds of allowance from the soon-to-be audience. He obliged.

"There once was a woman who was not very nice at all, but she was good at making people think she was nice, so she could steal from them. Any time they wanted to lock her up, she would fake-cry to make the judge feel bad and let her go, and she would just keep robbing people.

"But one day the judge decided he wasn't gonna listen to her anymore, since she was always being accused of being bad. The judge didn't let her escape this time, and she got put in jail. She got really mad, and everybody got to see what she was really like just before she got put away."

Nickel could feel the unrest from Lily beside him as he spoke. That was good. He wanted to create a thick atmosphere with his storytelling.

"When she got to jail, she met this nice old man who couldn't see really well, so she got to be his friend by pretending to be nice to him. He didn't know she was actually really mean, so he thought she was actually helping him and being nice and stuff.

"One day, she saw him send a letter somewhere and she asked him what it was about. He said it was something to let him get some eye surgery to help him see better. He was trying for a long time but didn't get through, but he was sure that this time he would get it."

"When's the scary part?" One of the girls asked.

"We're getting there, don't worry." He paused to restart the tale. "The woman told the old man about a plan she had to escape, since she had been "wrongfully jailed", as she said." He made air quotes around those two words.

"But she was locked up fairly! Right?" Lily asked, almost indignant at the woman's brazenness.

"Right, but he didn't know that, so he thought she was telling the truth. So he asked her what it was, and she told him."

He paused again. "See, the old man was in charge of the funerals for people who died in the jail. There would be a bell ringing, like a school bell, and those dead people would get carried out and to a graveyard somewhere close by. So she said, maybe when the next person died, she could get in the coffin too, and - "

"Eww!" the collective shouted, some sticking their tongues out in disgust. Nickel chuckled.

"It wasn't that bad. The dead people didn't have any gross stuff on them yet. But anyway - so she would get in the coffin, get carried out the jail, and then the old man could come and dig her out when nobody was looking so she could escape. The man said okay.

"Now, a couple days passed before that letter the old man sent came back. He wanted to know what it said, but he couldn't read it properly. So he asked the woman to read it for him. She saw the letter say the old man got accepted to get the surgery he wanted, but it meant he had to go away to get it. That meant she would have to stay in jail until he came back, and she didn't want to do that. So she said he didn't get it."

Beside him, Lily was aghast, as were a number of the other children, most notably the girls. Nickel continued on: "The old man got really sad, because he was so sure he would get it that time. Well, he did, but she didn't tell him. See how bad she was?

"Anyway, the next day, the bell for the dead people rang, so she went over to the coffin and got inside. She was looking all around to see if anyone saw her, but they didn't. Soon she felt them pick her up and carry her all the way to the graveyard.

"They put the coffin in the grave and covered it up, and the woman down there smiled since things were going really good. All she had to do now was wait for the old man."

Nickel knew what was up next, so he switched his voice from a calm, controlled one to a whispery, airy, eerie tone. "But the old man was taking a long time to come, and she started getting mad. She waited and waited, but still nobody came.

"So she got a match, and she struck it to get some light... and who should be in the coffin, but the old man who was supposed to dig her out. She had been buried alive. She had escaped jail, but at what cost...?"

That was the end, and Nickel eyed the children up again. Not a peep came from them, and they all looked thoroughly terrified. Lily was gripping his arm, probably wishing she'd never asked for a scary story from her big friend.

"Th-That's it? That-That wasn't s-scary," the brash young boy who'd expressed doubts beforehand stammered. Despite his words, he was obviously frightened as well.

Nickel decided to have one more say. "What if I told you she's buried right where we're sitting?"

That got everyone up and running, screaming for all they were worth, excluding Lily who just gripped his arm tighter and whined, "Mister Nickel, stop...! I'm scared!"

"Aw, I'm sorry, Lily." Nickel used his free hand to give her a few comforting pats on the head. "I was just kidding - she's not buried here, it's just a made-up story."

"I'm never asking you for a scary story again," she resolved.

He laughed. "Maybe that's for the better."

This Halloween turned out actually to be quite enjoyable.