Halloween

by Paula Guran

  She climbed onto the bed. “I don’t suppose you know how to make cupcakes.”

  He slid his arms around her. “No, but I know how to make you happy.”

  Sighing, she picked up the goblet and swallowed down the rum. He kissed her. Again. And again. He ran his fingers through her hair and marveled aloud at how exquisitely, achingly beautiful she was. He wept with joy that they had found each other at last.

  “What about the cupcakes? I have to make cupcakes. I’m supposed to take them to Ellen’s after drop-off tomorrow.”

  He eased her onto her back and gazed with limpid desire into her eyes.

  “Forget them,” he urged her in his deep, barrel-chested voice. “There’s nothing but you . . . and me. Nothing in the world but our passion.”

  He was almost right about that. But Andy’s tears echoed in her mind as she slumbered beside Aidan. She tossed and turned. Then at four a.m., she got up and started making the batter. She’d bought all the makings the first day she’d read Aidan into her life. While digging for the extra package of butter in the freezer, she discovered a treasure trove of microwave meals and frozen vegetables. Kevin and the kids didn’t have to eat so much fast food. They’d had food in the house all along. But no one had looked for it. No one else seemed to be able to cook. And why was that?

  In the next room on the couch, Kevin snored on.

  Yawning, exhausted, Deb made chocolate cupcakes with orange frosting, each one topped with a gumdrop spider and legs of black licorice. Four dozen. Her eyes were bloodshot and lined with sandpaper by the time she finished, just as the sun came up. And as she awakened her son with the wonderful news, he just stared at her in horror.

  “Four dozen? You were supposed to make six dozen,” he said.

  She realized with dawning horror that he was right. She’d miscounted. She’d been too distracted—too tired, and too eager to get back in bed with Aidan.

  “Ellen, hi, I’m sorry,” she said, calling Ellen on her cell phone. “I hit a snag,” she said. “I’ll bring the cupcakes over a little later today.”

  “Oh,” Ellen said, sounding surprised. “All right.”

  Andy didn’t talk to her the entire way to school. He sat in the back, sulking beside Sarah, who was also sulking, because she was gaining weight and her face was breaking out from all the fast food.

  “Sarah, if you don’t like all the stuff Daddy’s been buying, why haven’t you zapped any of the meals in the freezer?” Deb asked her daughter.

  “Me?” Sarah asked, stunned. “You’re the mom.”

  Deb jerked as if she’d been pelted with a water balloon. She blinked, stunned, at what a curt, spoiled, thoughtless child her daughter was. And her son, glowering at her because she was two dozen cupcakes short of a Halloween party.

  I’m the mom, Deb thought, as she dropped her kids off at their schools. It became a litany with the swish-swoosh of the windshield wipers as the sleet crackled down on her windshield. The mom, the mom, the mom.

  She did feel guilty, but more than that, she was angry. She went home to her filthy house, half-covered with ants, and the cupboards and trashcans overflowing with fast-food containers and tissues; and the nest Kevin had made on the couch, and the remote on the floor. She looked at it all and she blasted into the bedroom, where she found Aidan lying in bed, the light in his eyes leaping to life as she stomped toward him.

  “At last,” he said. “How I have been pining for you, my beauty.”

  She stared at him. “Do you love me?”

  His chest swelled. His eyes welled with tears. “Oh, yes. I love you, with all my heart, and my soul. You are my life. Without you, I’m . . . I’m nothing.”

  “Then why didn’t you help me with the cupcakes last night?” she demanded. “Because I’m the mom?”

  “You are my one true love.” He looked puzzled. “Come to me, be with me . . . ”

  “I can’t,” she said miserably. “It’s all getting worse. It’s going to be overwhelming if I don’t get back to work.” She broke down sobbing. “Because I’m the mom.”

  “No, you are my beloved. My darling. My life.” He enveloped her in a loving embrace and kissed her tears away. “Don’t cry, my heart, my wonder, my sweetling.”

  “Can’t you help me?” she asked him. “If you love me?”

  “Help you . . . yes, I will help you, yes, my darling,” he said. “We’ll weigh anchor in an hour and be gone from here forever.” He pulled the rubber band from her hair and clutched her face, kissing her long and hard. “My beauty.”

  “Make it two hours,” she pleaded.

  “For you . . . an eternity,” he whispered moistly into her ear. “Soon, we will leave all this behind.”

  She left the bedroom, but she didn’t make the extra two dozen cupcakes. Trembling, she loaded what she had into the car and drove straight to Ellen’s house. She’d never been there before, but as her arms shook around the Tupperware containers loaded in her arms, she noted the impeccable lawn, the little Japanese footbridge, and the stone lanterns on either side of the entrance. WELCOME FROM THE DEWITT FAMILY, said a little sign on the door with two big cherry blossoms and five little ones.

  Balancing the containers, she rang the doorbell and tried to catch her breath. She thought she was going to faint. As dots of yellow swam before Deb’s eyes, Ellen opened the door. Every hair in place, she was dressed in her black moon sweater, jeans, and black Uggs. She was taking off a pair of rubber gloves.

  “Oh, good,” she said. “Come on in. I was just cleaning up.”

  Deb stumbled across the foyer into a homey living room filled with antiques. Pushed against the wall beneath a painting of an old forest, there were five large plastic bins, each one labeled with a name: SEAN, MARCIE, HAILEY, DOUG, STEPHANIE. The names of her children.

  Deb and Ellen went down a hall where various certificates were framed—soccer, softball, good citizenship, honor roll—and a large white board labeled CHORES. The children’s names were written there, too, with a series of checkmarks beside each one. To the right that were at least half a dozen calendars, hung up side by side, each with a different theme—puppies, baseball, France, sunsets, motorcycles. The squares for October were all filled in, with different handwriting for each calendar.

  Ellen caught her looking. “Each of my children has their own calendar,” she said. She laughed. “Of course I have one for my husband, and one for me. And I keep it all on a spreadsheet.”

  Deb stared at Ellen as if she were speaking a foreign language. She swayed behind Ellen as she led her into her kitchen. It was blue and white, and it was immaculate, from the white grout between the white tile squares on the counter, to the white tile floor and the white appliances. Tidy refrigerator art. A pumpkin candle sat in the kitchen bay window, overlooking a perfectly manicured yard. There was one orange coffee cup decorated with a black cat in the dish drainer. Ellen laid the rubber gloves on a stand that hung over the sink, wiped her hands on a brown dishtowel with a smiling jack o’ lantern on it, and reached for the containers.

  “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, there are only four dozen,” Deb said in a rush, “but I had to talk to you. What did you do? Did you come back, or . . . or . . . ?” She trailed off as Ellen cocked her head quizzically and set the containers beside each other, burping open the nearest one.

  “What adorable cupcakes. Did you run out of supplies? I always keep some mixes on hand. I get them when they’re on sale.”

  Deb stared at her. “Ellen, what did you do about Aidan?”

  “Aidan?” Ellen said, opening her cupboard. She pulled out a box of chocolate cake mix. “Who—”

  “You know,” Deb said. “The man . . . in the book.”

  “Oh.” She laughed. “You see, I have it all blocked out. “ She smiled at Ellen. “On my calendar.” As Deb blinked, she walked back to the row of calendars and pointed to the one closest to them, themed with sunsets. She tapped her finger on Wednesday’s square. “See? Nine to ten p.m. tonight
. Mom’s Reading Time. I’m halfway through a great new one about a highlander.” She leaned toward Deb. “Scorching. I’ll give it to you after I’m finished.”

  “Reading time,” Deb said, trying to make sense. “Scorching.”

  Ellen. “My husband teases me about my romance novels but I’d go crazy if I didn’t have some ‘me’ time, you know?“

  “Me,” Deb said.

  “No one better interrupt my reading time,” Ellen declared. “It’s my life saver.”

  Deb flopped backwards against the wall. Ellen peered at her. “Are you all right?”

  “Dinner,” she blurted desperately, scanning the chore list. “Do they make dinner? Do you have . . . what about the store? If you run out of toilet paper . . . .”

  “Let me get you a glass of water.” She left Deb, who had slid halfway down the wall, and went back into the kitchen. She got Deb some water and brought it back to her. “It’s Doug’s turn to make dinner. Of course all of them have chores. And if they don’t do them, well, they might say I’m too hard on them but it’s all about consistency, you know?” She wrinkled her nose. “And boundaries.”

  “Oh, my God, I’m going crazy,” Deb said, gulping down the water. “Completely crazy.”

  “Is there someone I can call?” Ellen ventured, taking the empty glass. “Do you need something, some medication or—”

  “I need to go,” Deb announced. She pushed herself away from the wall.

  “You can keep the book,” Ellen assured her. “I just recycle them when I’m finished.”

  Deb lurched to the door. “Okay. Okay, thank you.”

  “Are you sure you can drive? If there’s anything I can do? I’ll make the last two dozen cupcakes. Don’t worry about that.”

  Ellen hovered at the door of her perfect home as Deb staggered out to her car. Her messy, stinky car that was almost out of gas again.

  I’m the mom I’m the mom I’m the mom.

  I am the mom, she thought. Me.

  She did a lot of thinking on the way home. Once there, she threw open the door to the master bedroom. Aidan had on his shirt, and the bed was gone.

  “At last. I have been waiting,” he said.

  She crooked her finger. “We’re not going anywhere.”

  Six months later, and the dark days were over. It was spring.

  The calendars were up. The bins were in the hall. Andy was putting away the groceries, including the items Sarah had requested for her dinner preparation. As was indicated on her calendar—ballerinas—it was her turn.

  “Hey, are you ready?” Kevin asked Sarah, as he strode into the room in his new track shorts and a freshly laundered T-shirt. It had been Andy’s turn to fold and put away. He was clean-shaven, and he had lost forty pounds. Deb had promised Ellen she would have the bright green Camporee invitations finished by this evening at seven.

  “Yes. Hold on,” she told him.

  While Kevin jogged in place, she went to the master bedroom and rapped lightly on the door. It was their code, giving Aidan permission to exist.

  She opened the door and there he was, lying beneath the canopy of Indian silk, naked from the waist up. His eyes beamed with joy at the sight of her.

  “My beauty, my joy,” he whispered. “How I need—”

  She glanced down at the paltry pile of invitations beside his elbow. The scissors in his hand caught the light. “You should get the sheikh to help you,” she told him.

  He sighed unhappily. “But my beloved, I need—”

  “I need those invitations. Pronto.” She blew him a kiss as he huffed and picked up the scissors.

  Smiling, she shut the door, and retraced her steps back down the hall. Stopping at Sarah’s door, she gave it a soft rap.

  “How’s it going?” she asked.

  “Mom,” Sarah said, “do I have to make dinner and the dishes?”

  “Yes,” Deb replied. “You forgot to clean the cat box. That’s the punishment.”

  “It’s not fair!”

  “I know.” Deb smiled to herself.

  “But then why do I have to do it?”

  Deb couldn’t wait to say it. She loved saying it.

  “Because I’m the mom.”

  And Deb set sail for her walk.

  HORNETS

  Al Sarrantonio

  “Hornets,” along with some of Al Sarrantonio’s other seasonal fare, is set in the fictional upstate New York town of Orangefield, the pumpkin capital of New England. As any Orangefieldian could probably tell you, pumpkins are native to the New World. When planted in late May in northern fields (as late as early July in extremely southern locations), they are perfect for pre-Halloween harvest and many seasonal uses—including the fairly recent invention of pumpkin chunking. (A “sport” in which competitors contrive a device to hurl the orange vegetable as far as possible.)

  Orangefield, however, has a connection to Halloween far weirder than growing gourd-like squashes (or chunking them). Detective [Bill] Grant, who appears in this story, must annually deal with both human and supernatural strangeness.

  Too warm for late October.

  Staring out through the open door of his house, Peter Kerlan loosened the top two buttons of his flannel shirt, then finished the job, leaving the shirt open to reveal a gray athletic T-shirt underneath. Across the street the Meyer kids were re-arranging their newly purchased pumpkins on their front stoop—first the bigger of the three on the top step, then the middle step, then the lower. They were jacketless, and the youngest was dressed in shorts. Their lawn was covered, as was Kerlan’s, with brilliantly colored leaves: yellow, orange, a dry brown. The neighborhood trees were mostly shorn, showing the skeleton fingers of their branches; the sky was a sharp deep blue. Everything said Halloween was coming—except for the temperature.

  Jeez, it’s almost hot!

  Behind him, out through the sliding screen door that led to the back yard, Peter could hear Ginny moving around, making an attempt at early Sunday gardening.

  Maybe it’s cold after all.

  He opened the front screen door, retrieved the morning newspaper he had come for, and turned back into the house, unfolding the paper as he went.

  In the kitchen, he sat down at the breakfast table and studied the front page.

  The usual assortment of local mayhem—a robbery, vandalism at the junior high school, a teacher at that same school suspended for drug use.

  In the back, Ginny cursed angrily; there was the sound of something being knocked against something else.

  “Peter!” she called out.

  He pretended not to hear her for a moment, then answered, “I’m eating breakfast!” and began to study the paper much more closely then it deserved.

  On the second page, more local mayhem, along with the weather—sunny and unseasonably warm for at least the next three days—as well as a capsule listing of the rest of the news, which he scanned with near boredom.

  Something caught his eye, and he gave an involuntary shiver as he turned to the page indicated next to the summary and found the headline: HORNETS ATTACK PRESCHOOLERs

  Another shiver caught him as he noted the picture embedded in the story—a man clothed in mosquito netting and a pith helmet holding up the remains of a huge papery nest; one side of the structure was caved in and within he could make out the clumped remains of dead insects—

  Again he gave an involuntary shiver, but went on to the story:

  (Orangefield, Special to the Herald, Oct. 24) Scores of preschoolers were treated today for stings after a small group of the children inadvertently stirred up a hornets nest which had been constructed in a hollow log. The nest, which contained hundreds of angry hornets, was disturbed when a kick ball rolled into it. When one of the children went to retrieve the ball, the insects, according to witnesses, “attacked and kept attacking.”

  Twenty-eight children in all were treated for stings, and the Klingerman Pre-School was closed for the rest of the day.

  The nest was removed by
local bee keeper and exterminator Floyd Willims, who said this kind of attack is very common. “The nests are mature this time of year, and can hold up to five hundred drones, along with the Queen. Actually, new drones are maturing all the time, and can do so until well into fall. With the warm weather this year, their season is extended, probably well into November. The first real cold snap will kill them off.”

  Willims continued, “Everyone thinks that yellow jackets are bees, but they’re not. They’re hornets, and can get pretty mean when the nest is threatened. At the end of the season, next year’s Queens will leave the nest, and winter in a safe spot, before laying eggs and starting the whole process over again with a new nest.”

  As of last night, none of the hornet stings had proved dangerous, and Klingerman Pre-School will reopen tomorrow.

  Peter finished the story, looked at the picture again—the bee keeper holding the dead nest up with a triumphant grin on his face—and gave a third involuntary shiver.

  Ugh.

  At that moment Ginny appeared at the back sliding door, staring in through the screen. He looked up at her angry face.

  “I can’t get that damned shed door open!” she announced. “Can you help me please?”

  “After I finish my breakfast—”

  Huffing a breath, she turned and stormed off.

  “Aren’t you going to eat with me?” he called after her, hoping she wouldn’t turn around.

  She stopped and came back. “Not when you talk to me with that tone in your voice.”

  “What tone?” he protested, already knowing that today’s version of “the fight” was coming.

  She turned and gave him a stare—her huge dark eyes as flat as stones. She was as beautiful as she had ever been, with her close-cropped blond hair and anything but boyish looks. “Are we going to start again?”

  “Only if you want to,” he said.

  “I never want to. But I don’t know how more of this I can take.”

  “How much more of what?”

  She stalked off, leaving the door open. After a moment, Peter threw down the paper and followed her, closing the sliding screen door behind him and dismounting the steps of the small deck. She was in front of the garden shed, a narrow, four foot deep, one story-high structure attached to the house to the right of his basement office window.