Halloween IV: The Ultimate Edition by Nicholas Page B

Rachel!”
    The next door revealed an overweight, t— shirted fellow who held a can of beer in one hand and a handful of candy in the other. Alcohol undoubtedly blending his thoughts into a jelly of drowsiness, he nearly plopped the half-empty can into her sack before catching his actions and withdrawing, chuckling to himself. Jamie joined in the laughter and frolicked merrily away.
    “Cute kid,” the man remarked to no one, and he closed the screen door.
    The next house; this time it was a grey haired elderly woman who greeted her, an orange robe covering a pink nightgown. She appeared to be delighted before the little girl, and perhaps this was the reason her handful of candy was the most generous thus far.
    “Trick or treat!” Jamie said, at the same time the lady held out the candy.
    “My,” the woman said, “what a cheery little clown. Look what I’ve got for you.”
    Jamie’s eyes immediately lit up into a felicitous resplendence. “Thank you.”
    “You’re very welcome, honey.”
    Jamie walked toward her foster sister, who was waiting on the sidewalk listening to the meager sizzling of the electric cables of the telephone poles above, her mind on the pleasantries of the remainder of the evening, back at home, Jamie asleep and Brady downstairs with her.
    Jamie halted beside her for a moment, her fingers sifting through the bulk of her plastic jack-olantern/ghost bag.
    Rachel looked down at her. “Had enough?”
    “No way,” Jamie said. She turned, and Rachel followed her past a series of hedges enroute to the next house. “Halloween is great. Can we stay out all night?”
    “Forget it, kiddo. We’re home by eight o’clock.”
    As they came upon the next house, the last house on the corner past the hedges, they saw that the porch light was off. Rachel told her to ignore the house, and that the family living there was either sick or out somewhere on vacation or at a party. In Haddonfield, most everyone participated in one way or another in this particular holiday, unlike other cities Rachel had heard about where churches had condemned the celebrations as being paganistic and therefore sinful to practice. All Rachel knew was that tonight, in the world of the contemporary, all of the parties and bobbing for apples and putting on costumes and going door—to—door was as innocent as a newborn baby. She had many fond memories of the custom from her childhood, and Jamie and every other little girl or boy would not be the least bit harmed with the same fond memories.
    Besides, wasn’t Christmas ’ origins paganistic, too?
    Anyway, aside from what other people did or did not do on this night, Rachel knew that it was also a night for little, quiet get-togethers get-togethers in livingrooms, dark livngrooms, maybe even dark bedrooms while certain parents were having a good time with their friends somewhere, too.
    Rachel directed Jamie across the street to start on another block, and when Rachel looked down at her glow-in—the-dark Timex, she knew that this block would be the last. As they arrived at the other side, they came across a small group of children who appeared to be around Jamie’s age, wearing brightly colored clown suits with awkward-looking shoes and ghost white sheets and there was even a kid with a huge, plastic buffalo head which forced him to hang his bag of candy by a string around his neck in better effort to hold up the monstrosity. They looked like refugees from a Saturday morning cartoon nobody wanted to view. The one with the stupid floppy shoes, the clown with the stripes as if posing as an escaped convict from the circus, went up to Jamie.
    “Wow!” Kyle said to her. “That clown costume’s really cool.”
    Jamie didn’t know what to say. She was fearful the first instant, but the fear soon evolved into a certain delightful surprise. “Thanks.”
    “I’m sorry about today,” the boy said sincerely. “I didn’t mean it.”
    She was stunned. “Really?”
    She knew it; it