"Peter And The Carnival Of Evil" Page 8

“Of course, if I had Peter with me, then we could just go off on our own,” Dill said thoughtfully. “Cuz he’s my bud, and we’d totally keep each other safe. But Peter can’t go,” Dill finished sadly.

“Yes, he can,” Mom said. “Peter, you can go.”

“YES!” Peter whooped.

“Alright! You think you can drop us off?” Dill asked Mom.

“You just said that Woody was taking you!” Mom spluttered angrily.

“Yeaaaaah…you don’t want Woody driving Peter around if you can help it,” Dill said in a low voice, as though he were imparting confidential information.

“FINE,” Mom snapped. “FINE, I’ll take you. And I’ll get another babysitter for Beth. FINE!” she said bitterly as she started slamming soup cans in the cabinet again.

“You could get Grandfather,” Dill suggested helpfully.

“FINE!” Mom laughed mirthlessly. “Sure, WHY NOT! I’m sure he’d LOVE to! Peter, go get the groceries – ”

But by the time she finished the sentence, Dill and Peter had already cleared the area. They knew that partial victory and retreat was often the wisest strategy of all.

***

Friday at school passed in a fever haze of a thousand kids talking and chatting and gossiping about the carnival.

“What’s so great about this thing?” Peter asked.

“It’s spooky,” Dill informed him.

Again, Peter remembered the dream, and shuddered.

At dinner, Mom finally broke the news that Ranger Eric would be going with them to the carnival. Peter faked being surprised. “Ohhhh, so that’s why you didn’t want Dill hanging around with him.”

Mom looked at Peter suspiciously. He just went back to eating his peas and corn.

That evening, Dill came over. While Mom got ready upstairs, the two boys grimly waited on the front staircase until the doorbell rang.

Dill raced forward and threw the door open. There stood Eric.

“Uh…hi Dill…”

“Don’t you ‘hi Dill’ me,” Dill snarled. “You went back on the plan!”

Eric looked incredibly uncomfortable. “Um…is your mom around, Peter?”

“She’ll be down soon,” Peter said coldly.

“I helped you out!” Dill said, as hurt as he was angry. “I did you a solid! And how do you repay me?”

“What are you talking about?” Eric tried, lamely.

“You know exactly what I’m talking about!” Dill cried out.

“Yeah!” Peter joined in.

“Guys, can we talk about this later”

“NO! We can talk about this NOW!” Dill bellowed. “You owe me. And Peter,” he added hastily. “You wanted two annoying kids to tag along with you all night? Well, you got ‘em.”

“Guys – ”

“All night long,” Dill hissed.

Eric sighed. “…unless…?”

“Unless we get a lot of money.”

Eric frowned. “What’s ‘a lot’ of money?”

“By the end of the night, I wanna be pukin’ up hotdogs and cotton candy,” Dill said matter-of-factly. “THAT’S how much.”

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"Peter And The Carnival Of Evil" Page 7

“Mo-oooom!” Peter protested.

Beth looked up with her ice-cream-covered face. “Nunh-unh!”

“He can’t babysit,” Dill stated loudly.

Mom looked down in surprise. Normally she would have been angry at Dill’s tone, but she was still too happy to care much about him.

“And why not?”

“He’s going to the carnival with me.”

Mom’s eyes got big. “Uh…Peter, why is this the first I’m hearing about this?”

“Um…”

“Cuz I just told him today.”

Mom’s good mood was quickly fading. “Well, I’m sorry, but that’s just not acceptable. I need you to babysit tomorrow night, Peter – ”

“He has to go,” Dill interrupted. “He has to.”

“And why is that?”

“Because he’s a loser at school. Everybody thinks he’s a total spaz.”

“Hey!” Peter objected.

Dill ignored him and plowed on through. “They’re calling him ‘Peter Ab-Normal,’ and that’s not cool. We have to make him cool again, and the only way to do that is to get him to the carnival.”

“Again I ask, why is that?”

“Cuz only the cool kids go to the carnival! So if he goes, then he gets cool again! And everybody’s happy!”

“There’s more to life than looking cool around others,” Mom lectured as she started stacking soup cans again.

“Yeah, right,” Dill scoffed. “You obviously haven’t been a kid for a looooong time.”

Mom darted an irritated look at Dill. “Sorry, Bodinski, you’re on your own.”

“Sowee Bojinki,” Beth gurgled through her ice cream.

Dill paused. For the first time, he looked completely lost. Then a look of cunning stole back into his eyes.

“Okay…well, I guess I’ll just go with my brother Woody.”

“Good for you,” Mom said absent-mindedly.

“But Woody and his friends always ditch me…so I guess I’ll go find somebody to hang out with. Like Ranger Eric…he said he was going.”

Mom’s arm stopped midair, a can still in her hand.

Dill saw her hesitation and went in for the kill.

“Yeah, I’ll just hang out with him ALL NIGHT. He’s cool, he won’t say no to me. He knows I have a crappy family life.” Dill gave an exaggerated sigh.

Mom turned around to face Dill. “I don’t think you should bother Eric.”

“He won’t mind.”

“I think he might.”

Dill shrugged. “I don’t care.”

“You should stay with your brother.”

“I told you, he ditches me.”

“I think you can stay with him if you really try.”

“Nope. He runs faster than I do.”

“Dill – ”

“Nope, I’m hangin’ with Ranger Eric!” Dill crowed triumphantly. “I’ll find him, and follow him, and talk to him ALL NIGHT LONG!”

The desperation that had recently twisted Dill’s face had now switched over to Mom’s.

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"Peter And The Carnival Of Evil" Page 6

They played outside for awhile, then watched a half hour of FRIENDS reruns over at Dill’s. Dill liked FRIENDS for some unusual reason; Peter didn’t care one way or the other.

After the show, Dill insisted they make their way back to Peter’s house. At exactly 5:37 they were sitting at the kitchen table, eating peanut butter sandwiches, when Peter’s mom walked in. She had a howling Beth in one arm and a sack of groceries in the other. She didn’t look too cheerful.

“Hi, Mrs. Normal,” Dill piped up.

Mom ignored him. “Peter, I need some help with the groceries out in the car.”

“I’ll help!” Dill volunteered.

Mom looked at him wearily as she shifted Beth from arm to arm. “What do you want, Dill?”

Dill tried to look genuinely shocked. “What’re you talking about? I’m just trying to help!”

Beth wailed on. Mom scowled more.

“I don’t have time for your baloney, Dill. What do you want?”

Dill gestured to his chest innocently. “Baloney? Moi? That hurts, Mrs. N.”

“It’s Ms. N,” Mom said with irritation, just as the phone rang. She picked it up and said sharply, “What?”

Peter cringed. Dill’s plan was going to backfire…

…and then a miracle happened. Mom’s face suddenly brightened, and she broke out into a big smile.

“Oh, hiiiii!” she beamed. “Oh, no, I’m sorry, I thought you were a telemarketer… hold on, sorry.” She set Beth down on the ground, pulled out a tub of ice cream, took off the top, and dropped the tub in Beth’s lap.

Beth stopped crying. She looked down at the ice cream, then up at Mom, then at Peter like, What just happened?

Then she dug in with both hands.

Mom went back to talking on the phone.

“Okay, there we go…uh huh…oh yes! Uh huh…that would be great, I’d love that! Okay – 7:30? Okay, that’s great! Do you know where I live – oh, yeah, I guess everybody knows,” she laughed. “I’ll see you then.”

She hung up the phone, all smiles.

Dill’s mood, however, had gone from jubilant to sour in 30 seconds flat. By the time the phone clicked down, he looked like he wanted to play kickball using somebody’s head.

“Soooooo…what was that all about?” he asked.

“Hm? Oh, nothing,” Mom said happily, as she started stacking cans in the pantry.

“Doing something tomorrow night, huh?”

“Yes. Oh, Peter, that reminds me, I need you to babysit tomorrow night.”

Dill went a ghastly shade of pale.

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"Peter And The Carnival Of Evil" Page 5

Dill snagged a list of handwritten phone numbers off the door and scanned it as he walked over to the kitchen phone. The piece of paper had all the important phone numbers Mom used a lot – her office at the university, Beth’s daycare, the pizza delivery place down the road.

“What are you doing?” Peter asked.

“You’ll see. What time does your mom get home every day?”

“Five thirty, usually, maybe a little before. You know – ”

Dill held up his hand for silence, then picked up the phone.

“I was just going to say you’re doing pretty good at getting over your fear of Grandfather.”

Dill froze mid-dial. “You think he’s around?” he whispered.

“He’s probably in his study.”

Dill gestured at the door to the living room. “Go over there and be a lookout.”

“Dill – ”

“Buh-buh-buh-buh-buh!” Dill said, and waved Peter over. Peter sighed and positioned himself by the open door.

Even from this distance, he could hear the voice that answered the phone: “Itcheepatucknee State Forest, how can I help you?”

Peter’s eyes narrowed. He didn’t like where this was going.

“Hey, is this Lance? Hey, dude, it’s Dill, in the work program. Yeah. Yes. Yes, the troublemaker,” Dill repeated with irritation. “Hey, is Eric there?”

Peter’s eyes shot wide open. He really didn’t like where this was going.

“Dill – nunh-unh! No!” Peter hissed.

Dill waved him off.

Eric was the head of the Rangers at Itchneepatucknee Springs, the unfortunate site of Dill and Peter’s standoff against a giant, prehistoric reptile. Peter had needed to, shall we say, borrow some equipment to fight the monster. But when the creature disappeared at the bottom of the lake, Peter and Dill had been left on the hook for the…borrowed equipment. Eric was the Ranger in charge of their work detail two weekends a month, and dedicated to making sure they paid back every penny.

He also seemed to take a sort-of-kind-of liking to Peter’s mom.

Peter wasn’t quite sure how he felt about that.

Eric was cool, of course. He was the coolest person Peter knew.

But this was his mom he was talking about…

“Thanks…uh huh…hey Eric, it’s Dill!”

There was talking on the other end of the phone, and Dill rolled his eyes. “Noooo, I didn’t do anything bad…hey, are you going to the carnival? Huh… that’s too bad, cuz Peter and me are going to get his mom to take us, and I really think you should ask her to go, cuz she’s going anyway.”

At this point, Peter was doing jumping jacks and waving his hands all over the place trying to get Dill to shut up.

No dice.

“Eric, Eric…” Dill sighed. “Just do it. Call back here at 5:40 exactly and I’ll make sure it happens. But me and Peter’ve got to go along with you. That’s part of the deal. It’s for my birthday!”

Dill listened to something over the line.

“Dude, 5:40,” Dill said impatiently. “And remember, Peter and me HAVE to go. Remember to say that to his mom. Don’t wuss out on me, man. 5:40.”

Then Dill hung up.

“What are you DOING?” Peter howled.

Dill looked smug. “You’ll see.”

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"Peter And The Carnival Of Evil" Page 4

Rory McCusken came over to them during lunch. Since the Itcheepatucknee Springs adventure a month before, Rory had become casual pals with Peter and Dill, even though he was a year ahead of them – the kind of guy who nods at you in the hallways, or picks you third or fourth on dodgeball teams. He was a friendly kid who tended to see the best in everybody, and for that reason he ignored his parents’ frantic warnings to ‘never talk to those two boys again.’

Since Sheriff Jenkins had hushed up all details of the Swamp Monster, practically everybody in town thought that Peter and Dill had played some horrible prank on Rory that had nearly killed him. When Greg Witherspoon (the other almost-victim of the Swamp Monster) and his family moved out of town because of Greg’s lingering nightmares and panic attacks, most fingers in the town pointed squarely at Peter and Dill.

Rory knew the truth, though. He hadn’t clearly seen the thing that had dragged him under the lake (it had rendered him unconscious too fast for that), but he knew it wasn’t two fourth graders.

“Whassup, guys,” Rory said.

“Hey, Rory,” the boys greeted him.

“You guys goin’ to the carnival?”

“Hellz yeah!” Dill said.

“‘Hellz yeah?’” Peter repeated incredulously. “Where did you come up with that?”

“You need to start watching YouTube more,” Dill scoffed, then turned to Rory. “You goin’?”

Rory nodded vigorously. “Oh yeah, it’s gonna be great – I can’t wait. They say it’s really creepy…they got a freak show and everything.”

Peter frowned. “A freak show? What kind of carnival is this?”

“Just the coolest one e-ver,” Dill said.

“I’ll see you guys there!” Rory said over his shoulder as he walked away.

After waving goodbye, Peter turned to Dill. “I forgot – how are we getting in, again?”

“Just wait,” Dill said, and busted out one of his self-assured smiles.

That was when Peter knew he was really in trouble.

***

When they walked into Peter’s kitchen after school, Dill headed straight for the refrigerator – but not for food. No, he was looking for something on the outside of the freezer rather than within.

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"Peter And The Carnival Of Evil" Page 3

Peter looked at his clock: 6:00AM. He still had another thirty minutes before he had to get up for school, but no matter how hard he tried, sleep would not come.

His shoulder still hurt from the grip of the thin man behind him, and the imagined bruises on his ribcage felt real.

***

“Well, that was lame,” Dill said, and yawned.

They were standing outside at the bus stop. Peter was angry; he had told the entire story to Dill, who seemed considerably less frightened than Peter had been when he woke up. Even now, the terror of the dream still lingered on, like the smell of something rotten.

“Well, sorry my nightmare wasn’t more entertaining for you,” Peter snarled.

“I thought maybe it was gonna have spaceships. Or aliens. Or, like, something cool, like a bunch of monkeys riding dogs in a rodeo or something.”

“It was scary!” Peter protested.

“Which part?” Dill asked. “Where you took a walk? Yeah, I was shivering during that one. Or that part where it snowed? Cuz that was spoooooky. Or where some dude was sitting at a table? Man, that was cra-ZY. I about wet my pants when you said that.”

Peter snorted. “When do you not wet your pants?”

“Hey,” Dill said sharply, a warning in his voice.

“Whatever. I’m never telling you my dreams again.”

Dill shrugged. “Who knows, maybe you’re just dreaming about the carnival this weekend.”

Peter frowned. “What’re you talking about?”

Dill suddenly grew more excited. “The carnival! What, you mean you don’t remember? I know I musta told you – the carnival’s coming to town! I didn’t get to go last time – I had to listen to Woody talk about it for weeks. I am DEFINITELY going this year.”

Peter shook his head. “What carnival?”

“The carnival! They only come through, like, every three years. We gotta do it – for my birthday!”

Dill had been talking about his birthday for weeks. He was about to turn 10 years old, and every time he wanted a favor, it was ‘for my birthday.’

Hey man, let me copy your math homework. For my birthday!

Hey, Peter – gimme your Twinkie. C’mon – for my birthday!

“How much does it cost?”

Dill shook his head. “Don’t worry about that.”

“What, are you going to get some birthday money from your parents?”

Dill cackled. “What, are you still dreaming? Nooooo, that’s totally not gonna happen.”

“Is Woody going to sneak you in?”

“Ha! Are you kidding me? Woody hates my guts, he’d never do that. Plus, he’s busted for driving the car without a license. This time I’ll get to go, and he’ll have to stay home!” Dill gloated.

“How?” Peter asked impatiently.

“You let me take care of that,” Dill said, and clambered to his feet. The school bus had arrived.

***

It seemed that every kid in school was talking about the carnival. Notes were passed, plans were whispered, boasts were made. Peter began to realize that the carnival had a pretty shadowy reputation – lots of kids were morose because their parents wouldn’t let them go.

“Suckers,” Dill jeered.

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"Peter And The Carnival Of Evil" Page 2

Peter tried to see the man’s face, but all he could see was a pointed, bony chin and a thin, lipless mouth. The rest was hidden in the shadows of a top hat.

“So,” a deep voice said from the center of the room. “What brings you here?”

Peter turned back and saw that where there once had been empty space, now stood a small, wooden table. Behind it sat a man, dressed in a wifebeater t-shirt, overalls, and a funny hat, the kind that a city slicker might wear in an old western. There was a bottle of whisky in front of him, and a half-filled glass that he held in one hand.

The man was ugly. He had an upturned nose, kind of like a pig’s, and long greasy black hair that hung loosely under his hat. There were dark circles under his black eyes, which regarded Peter with a kind of curious detachment. He wasn’t overly muscular, not like a bodybuilder, but his arms looked like they could beat the living crap out of anybody who made him mad.

Maybe it was the tattoos. Small, swirling bands of black reached across his powerful shoulders. Each one looked like a demon’s arm, and each ended in a grasping claw. The man had monster hands creeping their way across his skin.

Behind the man were more bales of hay and a large oval mirror, six feet tall in an old-fashioned wooden frame. It was the kind a grownup woman might have in her fancy bedroom so she could see herself head to foot.

Beyond the mirror, in almost complete darkness, stood something humongous. Peter couldn’t see what it was – just that it looked as tall as a man, but big around as a small car.

“You know you’re here forever, right?” the man at the table asked, his voice so deep it could have rattled windowpanes. He smirked. “We’ve decided to make you a permanent addition.”

Peter didn’t like the tone the man was using, and backed away. He bumped up against the tall, incredibly thin man, who placed a pincer-like hand on Peter’s shoulder.

The ugly man laughed, and was joined by other voices. A rattling wheeze of a chuckle came from the skeletal man behind Peter. A meaty, guttural guffaw boomed out of the mountainous shadow in the corner.

“The funniest thing is,” the ugly man leered, “you think this is all just a dream.”

Peter tried to turn and run, but the pressure on his shoulder turned into two snake-like arms circling around him, constricting the air out of him. He couldn’t hear his own scream, only the laughter of the evil voices swirling around him.

***

Peter flailed his arms against the twisted bedsheets that had somehow entwined him during the night.

He looked wildly around. He was back in his bed, in his room, and everything was normal – no snow outside the window, only a half-lit gray sky.

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"Peter And The Carnival Of Evil" Page 1

PETER AND THE CARNIVAL OF EVIL

It started with a dream, though Peter didn’t know it at the time.

He woke in bed in the middle of the night with the moon shining across the floor. Everything was silent except for a soft, almost inaudible tapping at the window. Fear gripped his insides for a brief second, and visions of vampire classmates flickered dimly in his brain. But when he sat up, he saw that it was snowing. Large, thick flakes batted against the windowpanes, like the tick tick tick of moths against a faraway lightbulb.

He’d never seen it snow in his life – not unless you counted TV and movies. He’d certainly never seen it fall from the sky in California, where he’d spent his entire life until the last three months. Plenty had been on the ground on the skiing trips he and his mother had made before Beth was born, but he’d never actually seen it snow.

He got out of bed, wrapped his arms around himself for warmth, and moved to the window. He got up on the cushioned ledge and looked down through the blizzard of white…

…and saw himself down on the street.

His heart thudded in his chest.

It was impossible for several reasons. First of all, he couldn’t be in two places at once. Second, he shouldn’t have even been able to see the street from his bedroom window; his room looked out on the giant field behind Grandfather’s house, including the garden patch and the rose bushes.

But there he was, staring back up at himself.

And then he was on the street, just like that, with no memory of how he’d gotten down there.

He was bundled against the cold in layers of scratchy woolen clothes – which was weird, because he didn’t own anything made of wool. But he pulled the scarf and cap and jacket tighter around him as he trudged through the drifting flakes, his boots squeaking with every step he made in the pristine layer of white on the road.

Where he was going, he had no idea. He just knew that he had to keep walking.

Before too long, he found out. Up ahead in the dark loomed a dimly lit ferris wheel that hung still and unmoving in the night sky. As he got closer, he realized why it was dim: about every third light was burnt out or missing. By that point he was close enough to see the fairgrounds and the other attractions around it, like a rickety rollercoaster and a shack of a building with “Hall Of Mirrors” painted over a dark doorway.

Somewhere far away, carnival music drifted through the air. It was soft and sinister, and sounded like it was played on an organ made of hollowed-out bones. Peter shivered, and not from the cold.

Bales of hay formed a makeshift fence around the carnival. Peter walked through a gap, one so large that it was obviously meant to let customers in. But there was not a soul in sight – not a money collector, nor anyone who might have paid entry.

His feet led him to a large tent pitched far away from the attractions, a dumpy shelter made of stained and spattered canvas. He walked through the flap of a doorway and into a makeshift room, carpeted with straw and lit by a single lantern.

From the corner of his eye he noticed a tall, thin man in a trenchcoat standing behind him. Peter glanced back and saw the hand that pulled the canvas door closed. It looked like one of the burned-up hobos in his first adventure at Grandfather’s house, except their hands had been charred black; this hand looked like a skeleton that had been dipped in wax.

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"Peter & The Psycho Trick-Or-Treaters" Pg 24

“I was trying to stop this from happening,” Grandfather said. “That’s all you need to know right now.”

“You didn’t do too good of a job!”

“I know it doesn’t seem like it, but they weren’t in any real danger. Not tonight.” Grandfather paused. “Not for a year.”

Peter’s eyes widened. “So you do know what they were talking about!”

Grandfather turned to walk off. “Goodnight, boy.”

“You can’t keep not telling us! We keep getting into danger because you’re not telling us! ”

Grandfather wheeled around and jabbed a finger in the air. Now he was angry again. Very angry.

“You keep getting into trouble because you do things you’re not supposed to!” He pointed at Dill. “If you would stop listening to this little fool and behave like I tell you, none of this would ever happen!”

“Dill was here tonight when you weren’t! ” Peter shot back. “And I didn’t ask for Mercy to come back from the dead! I didn’t ask for those psychos to come here tonight!”

“Uh,” Dill said quietly, his hands over his ears, “I don’t want to talk about this…”

Grandfather savagely counted off his fingers. “You went out in the garden patch after I told you not to, you went back to the swamp at night when I told you to leave it alone, you lied to your mother and got locked in the mall after hours – am I missing anything?”

Peter scowled. “Well…I didn’t know any of that stuff was going to happen,” he grumbled.

“There is danger out there, boy, and I am trying to protect you from it, but you are doing your damnedest to get in my way. I am working to fix the situation. When the need arises, I will tell you what you need to know. Until that time, stop being a nosy little fool and let me handle it.”

Grandfather stormed out of the room as Peter looked on in shock.

“Ooooooh, he said ‘damn,’” Dill whispered.

Peter shook his head. “Grownups stink, man,” he grumbled.

Dill put a hand on his shoulder. “Finally, you’re learning.”

Peter gave him a rueful little smile. “You wanna stay over?”

“Naaaah…having knife-crazy psycho trick-or-treaters in your house doesn’t exactly make me wanna do a sleepover, you know?”

“But you’ll have to go outside in the dark to get home.”

Dill put a finger to his lips and reconsidered. “I think I’ll spend the night at your house.”

As they walked towards the front door, Dill got a smug little smile on his face. “Well, the night’s not a total loss.”

“How’s that?”

“I still got a pretty good haul, remember?”

“Oh, yeah,” Peter said, a disgusted look on his face. “Thanks for all the mystery candy. And the candy corns. Which you took back.”

“Come onnnn,” Dill said as he peeled off into the darkened living room and disappeared into the shadows. “That was all a joke. I’ll divvy it up fair and square with you upstairs.”

“One for you, one for me?” Peter asked from the staircase.

There was silence from the living room.

“Dill?” Peter said quietly. “Dill, come on, don’t be funny – ”

There was a blood-curdling scream from the pitch-black room. Peter’s stomach clenched tight, but still he flung himself down the stairs and into the room.

Dill was crouched on the floor, forehead to the Arabian rug, beating the ground with clenched fists. Near him lay the psychos’ discarded knives and meat cleaver, arranged neatly on Dill’s flowery, cut-up bedsheet. Strangely, the pillowcase was absent.

“Dill, what’s wrong?” Peter asked as he eyed the weapons, fearing the worst – a booby trap, maybe? A horrible accident?

Grandfather ran into the hallway, shotgun at the ready. “What happened?”

Mom raced down the stairs, her face a mask of worry. “Dill, are you alright?

Dill lifted his tear-streaked face and pointed an accusing finger at Grandfather. “YOU SAID WE WEREN’T IN ANY DANGER! YOU LIED TO ME! YOU LIED!” he wailed. “NOW IT’S DOWN A SEWER SOMEWHERE!”

Everyone stared at him, completely bewildered.

Dill flung his hand out at the glass-top coffee table. There was nothing on it, not even a black or orange wrapper.

“THOSE BUTTHEADS STOLE MY CANDY!”

Starting tomorrow: PETER AND THE CARNIVAL OF EVIL

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"Peter & The Psycho Trick-Or-Treaters" Pg 23

Mom laughed a little, then shook her head. “It was just so frightening…”

“I’m sure it was,” Grandfather said, “but it’s over now.”

“Especially when the one with a sack on his head was holding Beth…”

“Beth kicked his ASS!” Dill hooted, and pumped his fist in the air.

Beth popped her thumb out her mouth and shouted, “UH HUH!”

Mom laughed in spite of herself. “Dill, do not teach my daughter bad words.”

“I’m just sayin’. If you’d sicced Beth on ‘em to begin with, she woulda kicked all their –”

Mom glared. Dill stopped short.

“…butts. She woulda, you know.”

“Why don’t you go put Beth to bed, Melissa,” Grandfather said. “She’s had an upsetting night.”

“So have I!” Mom stood up with Beth in her arms and walked over to the couch. She kissed Peter on the forehead…hesitated…and then ruffled Dill’s hair.

“Thanks, guys. I don’t know what I would have done without you tonight.”

“This is worth a couple of get out of jail free cards, right?” Dill asked.

Mom looked at him sideways. “We’ll see,” she said as she left the room.

Dill rolled his eyes. “What good is being good if it doesn’t get you out of being bad sometimes?”

Peter wasn’t paying attention. His gaze was focused on Grandfather, who had returned to his frowning, spaced-out, thousand-yard stare.

“You made that story up, didn’t you,” Peter said.

Grandfather looked over at him. “The toilet paper idjits? No, I never laid a finger on them.”

“Awww,” Dill complained.

“No,” Peter said. “I mean what happened tonight. That whole thing about them being the kids of the ones from 20 years ago.”

Grandfather didn’t say anything.

Peter continued his prodding. “What did they mean about ‘the boss says one more year’? What does that mean?”

“I don’t know,” Grandfather said gruffly.

Peter didn’t believe him. “Does this have anything to do with the Curse?”

“NO,” Grandfather said brusquely and stood up.

“Where were you tonight?”

Grandfather suddenly looked angry. “You had best stop asking all these questions, boy, before I lose my temper.”

But Peter had already lost his. “You know something you’re not telling us! You were off somewhere doing who knows what, and me and Dill were the only ones here to protect Mom and Beth!”

“Boy – ” Grandfather warned.

“You didn’t have to almost watch them die!” Peter roared.

A change came over Grandfather’s whole body. The anger seemed to run out all at once, and his shoulders slumped. His face lost its hardness, and instead he just looked old.

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"Peter & The Psycho Trick-Or-Treaters" Pg 22

Faithful reader AnakMoon did such a cool and funny rendition of the Beth / Sackhead smackdown (page 19) that I had to pull it out of the comments section and share it with the rest of you. Awesome job, AnakMoon - thanks!

One by one the trick-or-treaters merged with the darkness, until the last – a tiny silhouette with curling horns and a pitchfork – stopped and turned back towards the house.

Peter stopped breathing as the small shape regarded him for what seemed like ages…then wheeled around and disappeared into the woods.

Grandfather’s truck was halfway up the drive, gravel crunching under his tires. Peter waved the flashlight, then decided he should tell Mom and Dill that the psychos were gone.

He ran up the steps, huffing and puffing, his heart lightened that the danger had passed. As he got to the bedroom and opened his mouth to reassure Mom and Dill that they were safe, he shone his light on the door, and the words died in his mouth.

Choppy letters were carved in the wood, ugly brown gashes dug deep in the white paint. The words were unmistakable, and just as cryptic as when he had first heard them:

1 MORE YEAR.

***

“And that’s what happened,” Peter explained to Grandfather.

The lights were back on as they sat in chairs in the den. Mom, her eyes red and puffy, held a far more composed Beth, who was calmly sucking her thumb. Peter and Dill sat side by side on the couch. Grandfather held sway in his leather-covered recliner, but he wasn’t lying back; he was sitting on the edge of his seat, shotgun across his lap, as he listened intently to everything being said.

Now that the story was finished, the old man stared off into space, his wild, bushy eyebrows knit into a furious scowl.

“Dad, who were they?” Mom asked, her voice still trembly.

Grandfather broke out of his trance to look at her, then shook his head. “Just hooligans from the neighborhood.”

“But they looked exactly like the kids from twenty years ago, Dad,” Mom said forcefully. “Don’t tell me – ”

“Melissa,” Grandfather said, his voice soft for the first time Peter had ever heard – though he still didn’t smile. “Do you really believe that a handful of children from two decades ago never grew up? That they stayed like the Lost Boys in a Peter Pan story, only to return tonight to terrorize you? Do you really believe that?”

Mom hemmed and hawed. “Well, no…no, but – ”

“It’s silly. What probably happened was those children from twenty years ago grew up all their lives having a good laugh about how they put one over on crazy old Seamus Flannagan and his family. And of course they told their children the story for years and years, every Halloween, until the little brats concocted an even more elaborate plan to scare the dickens out of you. Which they did.”

“But – but they knew my name…”

“Part of the story. Plus, it’s common knowledge about town that you and the boy moved back in.”

“But…but they wore the same masks…”

“Saved all these years in those same idjits’ basements, hung on to just like they keep hanging on and retelling the same story.”

“I thought you killed all those kids,” Dill said.

Grandfather turned his steely gaze to Dill. His voice dropped all pretense of kindness. “No, I killed the ones who toilet papered my front lawn.”

Dill shrank back in the couch and whispered to Peter, “I told you, dude.”

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"Peter & The Psycho Trick-Or-Treaters" Pg 21

The voice stopped. Fingernails…or something else…scratched across the other side of the door.

“Tell him this: the boss says one more year.”

Peter frowned. Confusion overwhelmed his terror.

“What?” he asked, bewildered.

“Tell your Grandfather this,” the voice repeated. “The boss says one more year.”

Outside the door, footsteps padded down the hall.

Peter stood there, body tensed, waiting for another attack against the door.

None came.

From the stairs came the creaking of feet on the steps, which slowly receded into the distance.

It was a trap…it had to be.

Out in the hallway, the front door opened…then closed.

It was a trap, it was a trap, it was a trap…two or three of them had left, but the others had stayed behind, and were waiting outside the door with knives…

But something in his gut told him that wasn’t true.

He ran to the end of the crib.

“Help me, Dill.”

Dill looked at Peter like he’d just suggested eating raw worms. “UNH-unh.”

“Peter, no!” Mom pleaded. “Don’t – what are you DOING?!”

With all his might, Peter shoved against the crib and forced it a couple of inches past the door.

“PETER, NO!” Mom sobbed.

Peter unlocked the door handle.

“DUDE, NO!” Dill howled, and threw his arms around Peter’s body to try to pull him away.

Peter shook him off to the floor and hissed, “Lock it behind me.”

His heart thudded in his chest.

Am I making a horrible, horrible mistake?

He opened the door, ran out into the hall, and slammed the door behind him. He half expected to get stabbed as soon as he set foot outside – but no one was there.

He raced down the stairs, flashlight bobbing wildly in front of him, and stumbled once, falling several feet to the next landing. He sprang up and kept going, legs pumping wildly in the darkness.

The front door wasn’t even all the way closed. He swung it open, readying his flashlight to clobber anyone on the other side in the face –

But no one was there.

He looked out across the lawn. Two hundred feet away in the dim moonlight, he could see six small figures racing across the grass. They were heading for the woods – not the ones on the left where Dill’s house sat, but on the right side of Grandfather’s property.

There was a noise from the road: a chugging, clunking engine. Two headlights turned up the gravel driveway, and a wave of relief swept Peter’s body.

Grandfather’s truck.

Peter returned his attention to the forest and watched the six small figures disappear into the treeline. He noticed with satisfaction that one was limping horribly and holding his crotch as he ran.

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"Peter & The Psycho Trick-Or-Treaters" Pg 20

Mom snatched up Beth (who was still kicking Sack Head) and raced into the bedroom. Dill followed them, then Peter. As he ran through the doorway, he turned around, slammed the door and locked it.

Beth’s bedroom had no windows, so the only thing lighting the room was the jittery beams of their flashlights.

BAM!

The bedroom door rattled from a heavy impact.

BAM! BAM! BAM!

It sounded like something was chopping into the wood. Maybe the meat cleaver.

“Meliiiiiiiiisaaaaaa…” called a voice from outside the door.

Mom held Beth tightly in her arms and whimpered. That is, Mom whimpered; Beth was still slobbering from rage, her face red and flushed from the recent smackdown she’d handed out.

“PETER, DILL, PUSH THE CRIB IN FRONT OF THE DOOR!” Mom screamed.

Peter and Dill both raced to the crib, which was against the same wall as the door, and pushed mightily. The heavy piece of wood-carved furniture slowly slid in front of the banging door.

“That’s not going to help, Melissa,” a voice giggled from the hallway.

Peter and Dill backed away to where Mom huddled against the far wall.

“Mom, how do they know your name?” Peter whispered.

Mom shook her head violently.

“MOM, you were scared when you saw first them – WHY?”

Mom’s haunted eyes stared at the door. “Because…”

The banging against the door stopped.

“Tell them, Melissa…tell them…tell them…tell them…” a voice chanted in the hallway outside.

“Because I’ve seen them before,” Mom whispered. “Almost 20 years ago, I saw them…I was about your age, Peter…the same masks. They wore the same masks…they were the same size, everything…they did the same thing then, they attacked the house, but Dad stopped them…I don’t know what he did, but he stopped them…”

“Mom, these can’t be the same kids from 20 years ago.”

…right?

He wanted to believe it, because of course it couldn’t be the same kids. It was impossible.

But Peter had seen enough of the impossible over the last two months to know better.

There was whispering on the other side of the door. Unintelligible words in hushed voices.

“LEAVE US ALONE!” Peter yelled.

Still more whispering. Then, silence.

“We have something to tell you,” a voice said from the hallway. “A message for your father, Melissa.”

“Leave us alone,” Mom choked out. “Please just leave us alone…”

“Peter, do you hear me?” the voice called. “I have a message for your grandfather. Do you hear me?”

“WHAT?” Peter yelled back angrily. “WHAT?”

“Tell him…”

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"Peter & The Psycho Trick-Or-Treaters" Pg 19

Peter whimpered under his breath and rounded the corner railing of the top floor, only his way was blocked by Dill and Mom.

“What – ” he started to ask, and then saw why they were stopped.

Their flashlights were focused about 10 feet in front of them, right at the door to Beth’s bedroom.

Sack Head was standing in the middle of the hall, fully illuminated by their flashlight beams.

In his arms he held a squirming, crying Beth.

“Give me my daughter,” Mom said hoarsely. “You give me my daughter, or so help me God…”

“Put her down!” Peter yelled, then looked back behind him. The others weren’t in sight yet, but he could hear them slowly tromping up the stairs.

Mom moved towards Sack Head.

Immediately he stepped back and put a threatening arm over Beth’s throat.

Mom stopped, terrified.

Unbeknownst to Sack Head, though, he had already made his mistake.

He had been holding Beth under both her armpits. When he moved one of his hands, his grip became far weaker.

Beth immediately lifted up her arms and went limp. She had tons of experience getting out of Mom and Peter’s grasp; there was no way she was going to be trapped by a little twerp like this.

Holding a twenty pound kid is hard enough. Holding one that’s gone as slack as a balloon full of Jell-o is almost impossible.

As soon as Beth started slipping out of his grasp, Sack Head tried to clamp his arm around her face.

Which brought her mouth within biting range.

CHOMP.

For the first time that evening, Peter heard Sack Head make a noise.

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!” he screamed.

Beth fell to the floor, her face almost demonic in its fury. She turned around, faced Sack Head, and placed a well-aimed punch right to his private parts.

His screaming stopped, and there was a loud GRUNT as he toppled sideways to the floor, his whole body doubled over with his hands between his legs.

Then Beth started kicking him in the head as she screamed at the top of her lungs.

“Holy CRAP,” Dill swore. “Not like he dudn’t deserve it, but – holy CRAP.”

Peter turned around and shone his light back on the stairs.

Devil Boy’s head was just appearing behind the bars of the third floor railing.

“MOM, THEY’RE COMING – AND THEY’VE GOT KNIVES!”

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"Peter & The Psycho Trick-Or-Treaters" Pg 18

Peter watched Mom feel her way along the wall until she reached the laundry room. He remembered the yellow flashlights, and how the magnets on their plastic casings kept them stuck them to the washing machine.

A beam of light cut on, blinding Peter and Dill.

“Hey!” Dill snapped.

“Sorry, sorry,” Mom said. She came out of the laundry room and handed a light to both Dill and Peter. “We’ve got to go upstairs, guys, and get Beth. Come on.”

They walked quickly but carefully from the kitchen into the den, where Peter remembered the messages scrawled on the windows.

“Mom, wait – did you see these?”

He swung the flashlight beam over on the windows, outlining the words in stark white against the darkness outside: KILLER. DEAD MAN. FOOL.

He heard Mom gasp a little.

“What is it?” Peter asked.

“Soap…that’s what trick-or-treaters used to write on windows a long time ago, before I was even born,” Mom said dully, then turned around and started running – not walking – through the darkness, her flashlight beam bobbing over walls and the floor.

“Whoa, these guys are kickin’ it old school,” Dill muttered before he ran off to join her.

“That’s not what I meant,” Peter called. “I meant, why did you sound so…”

His voice trailed off as the flashlight beam dipped a little and revealed a new phrase on the glass, one that he could have sworn wasn’t there before:

HI PETER

Something looked different about it, too. When he shone the light on the other words, there was a reflection over them from the light bouncing off the glass.

The new words didn’t have the reflection.

Peter walked over to the window and rubbed a fingertip across the letters.

The pasty white lines of soap smeared the glass.

Whoever had written this…was inside the house.

Peter’s heart skipped a beat as a noise shuffled to his left.

He swung his flashlight beam in a panic across the whole room.

As it flitted by, the light caught a flash of something.

A red face with curling horns and white, leering fangs.

And in the brief glimpse that he got, Peter was sure it was moving towards him.

He screamed and bolted for the hallway without pausing for a second look.

“MOOOOM, THEY’RE INSIDE!”

From far off in the kitchen there was a loud THUNK, followed by the metallic tinkling of spoons and forks rattling over each other.

Peter rounded the corner and darted up the stairs. Mom and Dill were already on the second floor.

“What did you say, Peter?” Mom cried out.

“RUUUUUN!” Peter screamed as he bolted up the steps two at a time.

Mom and Dill didn’t have to be told twice. They reached the third floor before Peter, but not by much. While they raced on ahead, Peter turned back quickly to shine his light down on the staircase.

His pitchfork clutched in hand, Devil Boy was walking slowly up the lowest part of the stairs, taking all the time in the world.

The shadowy figures of Baby Doll, Mop Face and Fishbowl came around the corner of the dining room and into the hallway. They were walking just as slowly as their leader.

In their hands, each clutched a sharp, heavy knife. Fishbowl had a meat cleaver that glittered in the flashlight’s dim beam.

That’s what the clatter in the kitchen was.

They were getting weapons.

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"Peter & The Psycho Trick-Or-Treaters" Pg 17

“Guys, come on, we’ve got to make sure the back door’s locked!” Mom said frantically, and took off running for the kitchen.

Peter ran after her. As he passed the windows in the den, he stopped in his tracks so fast that Dill nearly ran into him.

Words written in flaky white paste smeared the windows, large letters scrawled in childish handwriting:

KILLER

DEAD MAN

FOOL

Peter walked up to the window and felt the glass over the letters. It was still smooth and untouched, which meant the white paste they had written with was on the outside.

Thank God.

“What does that mean?” Peter wondered aloud about the handwriting.

“I don’t know, but it looks like they don’t like you very much,” Dill said as he raced on by.

In the kitchen, Mom was jiggling the doorknob to the back door when they all heard the screen door outside it squeeeeeeeaaaak open. Mom cried out and backed away as a hail of eggs smashed against the glass part of the kitchen door.

“WHAT DO YOU WANT?” Mom screamed. “WHY WON’T YOU LEAVE US ALONE?”

In his terrifying encounters with monsters, Peter had always been scared – but now he felt a different kind of fear as he watched his mother fight back tears. He didn’t like to admit it, because adults often seemed mean and clueless, but he’d always believed that they understood the world and were totally in control. Grandfather certainly seemed to be. Mom might have lost her job back in California, but she’d brought them here to Duskerville. She’d had a plan. She’d been in control.

For the first time in his life, he was seeing his mother act just as scared as he felt. Totally helpless, and all because of a bunch of strange kids outside. Seeing her like this made him realize that maybe being a grownup didn’t mean you were really in control of the things around you, just that you faked it pretty well. And that was really scary, in a way that changed how he thought the world worked.

Then the new fear got replaced by a more familiar one, the old type that chilled him to the bone, as all the lights in the house suddenly shut off and plunged them into darkness. Only a pale glow from the moon outside shone through the windows.

Mom cried out again in surprise, but managed to get a hold of herself.

“Guys, are you okay?” she asked.

“Yeah,” Peter whispered.

“NO, this really SUCKS,” Dill said in a trembling voice.

Mom was about to say something, but stopped. Outside the house, childish voices called in the darkness.

“Meliiiiiisa, come out and play…”

“We won’t hurt you…much…”

“Meliiiiisa…don’t make us angry…”

Peter’s stomach turned flip-flops in his belly. “Mom, how do they know your name?”

“We’ve got to get flashlights,” Mom said, ignoring his question.

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"Peter & The Psycho Trick-Or-Treaters" Pg 16

“Wait a second,” Peter said to Devil Boy. “You said ‘we.’ You said we cut the phone line…”

Beside the porch came a rustling from the bushes. Slowly, five small figures walked to the bottom of the stairs. Their masks were heavily shadowed in the porch light, but Peter didn’t need to see them clearly to know exactly who they were.

Sack Head. Baby Doll. Fishbowl. Mop Face. Pantyhose.

Mom cried out and her hands flew up to cover her mouth. Peter looked up and saw stark terror in her eyes.

“I’m so glad you remember us, Melissa. We thought you might have forgotten,” Devil Boy whispered.

Without warning, Mom raked Peter and Dill back into the house with such force that they fell to the ground. She slammed the door and locked the deadbolt and doorknob.

“Mom?!” Peter asked. “Mom, what’s wrong?!”

“Holy crap – psycho trick-or-treaters!” Dill shouted.

“Get away from the door – Dill, get away from the door!” Mom called, her voice shaking. “Get back!”

CRUCK.

An egg exploded against the glass panes that lined the door, then slowly oozed down them.

“We have to get Grandfather!” Peter cried out.

A voice from outside taunted him, “He’s not he-eeeeeeere.”

CRUCK. Another egg splattered against the glass.

Peter looked at his mom. “He’s not?”

She shook her head wildly.

“Did you look in the study?” Peter asked, now really beginning to panic.

“Yes, Peter, yes! I looked, he’s not here!”

“Maybe he’s in his bedroom – GRANDFATHER!” Peter screamed at the top of his lungs.

“I told you he’s not here,” laughed the voice outside.

CRUCK. CRUCK. CRUCK. Egg after egg smashed apart and glooped a slimy trail down the glass.

“Okay, so he’s not here,” Dill said. “Why should we be worried if that’s all they got?”

CRACK!

A stone bounced off one pane, leaving a spiderweb of splintered glass.

“Uh oh,” Dill said.

CRACK! Another glass pane broke but didn’t shatter.

Dill looked like he was about to speak again.

“Don’t jinx us any more!” Peter warned.

“I wasn’t sayin’ ‘uh oh’ for us, I was sayin’ it for them. Your grandfather really is gonna track ‘em down and kill ‘em.”

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"Peter & The Psycho Trick-Or-Treaters" Pg 15

Dill shook his head at the trick-or-treater. “Dude, you are in so much trouble.”

“Whatever.”

“What did you come here for? You already finish all of my candy?” Peter asked angrily.

“No, I just threw it down a sewer drain,” Devil Boy said.

Peter and Dill both looked at the kid as though he had uttered something both indescribably stupid and unutterably evil. Which he had.

“You threw it…down a sewer drain?” Dill repeated in shock.

Devil Boy looked at his hand like he was inspecting his nails. “Yeah. I don’t eat candy.”

“Then why’d you steal it in the first place?!” Peter asked, horrified.

Devil Boy’s shadowy eye sockets zeroed in on Peter’s face. “To mess with you. In fact, that’s why I came here. So I can mess you up some more.”

Peter looked at Dill, and then they both stared at the red mask.

“To mess with us,” Dill said flatly, as though he were trying to understand but didn’t quite.

Devil Boy shook his head. “Not you.” He raised one hand and pointed a single finger at Peter. “Him.”

Peter felt ice water drizzle down his insides.

The kid turned back to Dill. “If you’re smart, you’ll leave right now.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Dill asked angrily.

“You don’t wanna find out.”

Peter shivered. “You better get out of here,” he said to Devil Boy. “My mom’s calling the sheriff.”

“Nobody’s coming,” the kid said quietly.

“Oh yeah? Why not?”

The kid didn’t answer. He just stood there staring at them from the black pits he had for eyes.

Mom came walking back through the hallway. She was already talking before she reached the door. “All right, young man, I just called the sheriff’s office and they’re sending over a deputy now. I’ll give you one last chance: you better get out of here if you know what’s good for you.”

Devil Boy shook his head slowly. “You didn’t talk to them.”

Mom sounded a little unsteady. “Yes I did, they’re coming now – ”

“You couldn’t have.”

Peter’s flesh was crawling. The kid was using that same monotone from before, the one he’d used right before the attack on the street.

What was worse, Mom didn’t sound entirely convincing. “And why couldn’t I have?” she asked haughtily.

The kid cocked his head slightly to the side before he answered. “Because we already cut the phone line to your house.”

Peter, Dill, and Mom stood there in shocked silence.

“You’re lying,” Peter said. He looked up at his mother. “He’s lying, right?”

“I – I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Mom said, her voice faltering. “I just talked to a deputy, and – ”

“You didn’t call them on your cell phone, either,” Devil Boy said.

Mom’s face turned white. Peter saw it and began to get very scared.

“Mom?” he whispered.

Devil Boy reached into his pocket and pulled out a silver object. A cell phone.

Mom gasped. Her voice shook. “How did you get that?!”

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"Peter & The Psycho Trick-Or-Treaters" Pg 14

His mother watched in surprise as Peter rushed to the half-open front door and flung it wide. There was the kid from earlier, devil’s mask and all, standing halfway down the steps to the front porch.

Except he was alone. And he wasn’t carrying his pitchfork. Or Peter’s sack of candy.

Seeing the kid’s total vulnerability, Peter felt all his fear turn to anger. “YOU!”

The little devil kid jerked his head up in a streetwise, gangsta-style greeting. “Hey, Peter.”

“What? How do you two know each other?” Mom asked, confused.

Dill raced up behind Peter. “Holy crap, he’s back!”

Peter pointed, furious. “That’s one of the kids who hit me!”

Mom’s eyebrows shot up. “It is?!”

Dill nodded. “Kind of small, ain’t he?”

“HE STILL HIT ME!”

The little devil held his hands out in a whoa, it wasn’t me gesture. “I didn’t hit you.”

“Yes you did!”

“My pitchfork hit you, not me.”

Peter looked around at Dill. “He’s like another you.”

“He wishes,” Dill scoffed.

“Where’s all your stupid friends?” Peter snarled.

Devil Boy just shrugged.

“Young man, you can NOT go around hitting other people and stealing things from them,” Mom said angrily.

“Too late. Already did,” Devil Boy replied.

“It’s against the law!” Mom snapped.

“What are they gonna do, throw me in jail? I don’t think so.”

Mom’s face was half angry, half in shock. She wasn’t used to dealing with this much sass, even from Dill. “I’m going to call the police.”

“Go ahead, old lady, knock yourself out,” Devil Boy squeaked without a trace of worry in his voice.

Mom’s eyes bugged out, and she turned around and stomped down the hallway muttering to herself. “I’ll ‘old lady’ you, you little…”

Peter and Dill stood there silently glaring. Devil Boy stared back at them without a word.

Finally Peter spoke up. “I wanna know something.”

Devil Boy didn’t respond.

“I wanna know how you know my name.”

“I know a lot about you.”

Goose pimples crept up Peter’s back. “How?”

“You’ll find out.”

Peter shivered. Even though he couldn’t see beneath that creepy mask, he knew the kid was smiling.

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"Peter & The Psycho Trick-Or-Treaters" Pg 13

Mom had only walked about ten feet away when the bell rang again. “Well, for goodness’ sake…I thought we were far enough away that we weren’t going to get anybody!”

She opened the door. “Oh, it’s you again…can I help you?”

Suddenly, there was a clatter in the main hall. Peter looked around to see the bits of orange and black mystery candy sliding across the hardwood floor.

“Excuse you, that was very rude!” Mom said sternly. “Your mother and father wouldn’t appreciate you behaving like that.”

“Whoa, that kid’s badass,” Dill whispered. “I get crappy candy, too, but I don’t throw it back.”

Peter got up to walk to the door. Before he’d gotten halfway there, Mom snapped at the unseen trick-or-treater, “How dare you! Get out of here before I call the sheriff's department, you little brat!” Then she slammed the door.

Peter’s eyes opened wide. “Mom, what did he do?!”

Mom folded her arms and shook her head in angry disbelief. “He…he made a very rude gesture, that’s what he did.”

“Flipped you the bird, huh?” Dill called from the living room.

Mom shot Dill a look. “I’m just glad you two are better behaved than that.”

“I wouldn’t say that about Dill,” Peter muttered as he gathered up the black and orange candy from the floor.

“I heard that!” Dill called out.

Mom shook her head again, then started up the steps. “You boys keep it down, I’m going to go to bed.”

“‘Night, Mom.”

“Goodnight, Peter. Goodnight, Dill.”

“‘Night,” Dill mmphed from the other room, his mouth full of something.

Peter rushed back over to the coffee table to see chocolate stains around Dill’s mouth. “Hey! What is that, a Baby Ruth? That’s not cool!”

Dill shrugged. “Like you were getting any, anyway.”

Peter looked down at the coffee table and exploded. “YOU TOOK BACK THE CANDY CORNS, TOO! THE ONLY HALFWAY DECENT CANDY, AND YOU STOLE IT BACK?!”

Dill looked around innocently. “Whaaaa? No, man, your mom must’ve given it to the jerk kid.”

Peter pointed. “IT’S RIGHT THERE IN YOUR LAP!”

“Whaaa? What, this? Oh, this just fell there…”

Mom came tromping back down the stairs. “Guys, what did I just tell you about keeping it down?”

“He’s stealing my candy!” Peter protested.

“Your candy?” Dill said, offended. “Don’t you mean the candy I gave you?”

“Dill, if you can’t be nice, you need to take your stuff and go home,” Mom ordered.

“Fine by me,” Dill said, and encircled the giant pile of junk food in his arms.

“MOM!” Peter cried out, horrified that she had made a terrible situation even worse.

“Peter – ”

Suddenly, there was a loud booming knock.

“I don’t believe this,” Mom snapped as she turned around and jerked open the front door. “I told you to get out of here!”

“I will, once you give me something besides some crappy-ass candy,” a familiar, squeaky voice said.

Peter’s stomach dropped.

“Mom, get away from the door!” he shouted.

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"Peter & The Psycho Trick-Or-Treaters" Pg 12

“That’s one for you, and two for me,” Dill continued. “One for you, and two for me…”

“YOU’RE GIVING ME THE CRAPPY CANDY!” Peter shouted. It was true: so far Dill had a Milky Way, a Hershey’s Bar, two Blow-pops, a Snickers, and a Baby Ruth. Peter had mostly ‘mystery candy’ – the black- or orange-wrapped stuff that old ladies gave out, and which usually tasted like crusty peanut butter or sub-standard chocolate.

“You have a package of Candy Corns,” Dill pointed out.

“Cuz you don’t LIKE Candy Corns!”

“I like all candy,” Dill said haughtily. “I just like some candy better than others.”

“You little punk, you can take your Candy Corns and stick them up your – ”

“Boys,” Mom called from the staircase in the hallway. “Keep it quiet, I just put Beth to bed.”

“Yes, Mrs. Normal,” Dill said sweetly.

Peter gritted his teeth and wondered if he could get one of the monsters he’d tussled with to come back from the dead and take Dill with them.

The doorbell rang.

Mom looked down from the stairs at the front door. “I wonder who that could be?”

“Somebody brave or stupid,” Dill remarked. He saw Peter’s quizzical look and explained, “They say some high school kids TP’d this place years ago, and your grandfather tracked them all down and killed them.”

“He wouldn’t do that,” Peter protested. “You’re just afraid of him.”

“I’m just sayin’, that’s what they say. Besides…I’m not the one who gets beat up by four-year-olds.”

Peter narrowed his eyes. “I am gonna wring your scrawny little neck,” he whispered.

Dill just smiled. “One for you, two for me…”

They could hear Mom open the door and use the fake voice that grown-ups reserved for little kids during Halloween. “Well, aren’t you scary! That’s a wonderful little costume you have there!”

“Not like some people’s girly ghost costumes,” Peter sneered quietly to Dill.

“Who has the candy?” Dill asked. “And who’s begging for some of it?”

“I’m sorry,” Mom continued from the door, “but I don’t have anything for you – I was out taking my daughter trick-or-treating earlier, so we didn’t buy anything…”

There was no answer from the trick-or-treater. Maybe the kid looked really disappointed, because Mom seemed to reconsider.

“Well…you know what?…hold on, let me check,” Mom said. She walked over to the living room and stuck her head in. “Hey, could you guys donate some candy?”

“Do I look rich?” Dill huffed, and pointed at Peter. “I already have one mouth to feed.”

Peter gathered his pieces of black and orange mystery candy and held them up in his cupped hands. “Here, you can have this.”

Dill shook his head. “Some people just don’t appreciate anything these days.”

Mom walked over and took the candy. “Thanks, Pete.”

“No problem,” Peter said as he glared at Dill.

Back in the hallway, Mom handed the candy over to the unseen child. “Here you go. Happy Halloween! Keep safe!” Then she closed the door.

“One for you, two for me…” Dill droned.

“Would you at least give me something good?!” Peter griped.

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"Peter & The Psycho Trick-Or-Treaters" Pg 11

Peter rode all the way home with the sound of Beth’s laughter mocking him from the back seat, and Mom lecturing him from the front about how he should have gone with her and his sister.

“So your moooommy could protect you,” Dill said sweetly.

“SHUT UP!”

“Dill, stop making fun of Peter,” Mom said, struggling to keep a straight face.

Beth laughed so hard tears were streaming down her cheeks.

Dill pointed at Peter’s sister. “See, dude? You see how people react? You better pray those kids don’t go to our school.”

Peter grumbled, but Dill had a point. After burnt-up hobos, vampire schoolgirls, troll baby changelings, swamp monsters, and evil hordes of mannequins, the only time Peter’d really gotten his butt handed to him was by a bunch of second-graders in stupid masks.

If they weren’t first graders.

Or, God forbid…kindergarteners.

Peter shuddered. It was humiliating.

On the plus side, Dill and Beth had never gotten along better.

***

Back at Grandfather’s house, Peter sat sullenly on the floor of the living room – the same place he had fought Agnes Smithouse a month and a half before.

I went up against a vampire who could fly and had super crazy strength…and I won, Peter sulked. With Grandfather’s help, yeah, but I won.

Now, though, Dill’s huge pile of loot lay on the glass-topped coffee table. It was like those little multicolored packages of candy were mocking Peter’s failure to keep his own.

Dill sat on the other side of the table, his ratty ghost sheet crumpled on the floor beside him, and regarded Peter with a world-weary expression.

“We both know what happened tonight,” Dill said gravely. “It was…not cool. But I am SUCH a good friend that I will…”

Dill looked to the side and bit his clenched fist, as though he were about to make the ultimate sacrifice.

“…I will SHARE my candy with you,” he finished, his voice trembling dramatically.

“Gee, thanks,” Peter said sarcastically.

“Hey, if you don’t want my candy…”

“Nooooo, no, I’d like some candy,” Peter seethed.

Dill put a hand to his ear and cocked his head like he was listening for something.

“PLEASE,” Peter snarled.

Dill smiled like Peter was being a brat, but that he, Dill, was too mature and ‘above it all’ to hold it against him.

Dill put one finger on a piece of candy and slid it to the far end of the glass tabletop.

“That’s one for you, two for me…”

“HEY! Why aren’t you doing one for you, one for me?”

Dill looked over the table. “Whose candy is this?”

“You should give me half and you half so that it’s – ”

“I’m sorry, whose candy is this?”

“Yours,” Peter hissed.

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"Peter And The Psycho Trick-Or-Treaters" Pg 10

“Yeah, a bunch of preschoolers,” Dill said as he peeled open a pixie stick.

“They were NOT preschoolers!” Peter snapped. “They were totally our age.”

Dill scoffed. “Did you see how short they were?”

“Kids our age can be short!” Peter said defensively.

“Yeah, if they’re midgets. They were like, four years old.”

“They were eight at LEAST.”

“Pff. Five, maybe.”

Mom looked back and forth in confusion between Peter beside her and Dill in the rearview mirror. “You’re saying…little kids stole your candy? Not big kids?”

Dill snorted. “Definitely not big kids.”

“One of them had a pitchfork!” Peter protested.

“A plastic pitchfork.”

“Oh,” Mom said, her voice a lot less urgent. “I thought some older bullies had picked on you.”

“Nope,” Dill said as he bit on a Jolly Rancher.

“It was still SCARY!” Peter yelled.

“I’m sure it was, honey,” Mom said soothingly.

“Dude, you can’t tell anybody about this at school,” Dill cautioned. Then his face fell. “Oh man…I hope they don’t go to our school…I mean, they knew your name and all…if they do go to our school, they’re gonna tell everybody, and everybody’s gonna laaaauuugh at you…it’s, like, the uncoolest thing the world to get jumped by kindergarteners…”

“They weren’t kindergarteners! And you were running, too!” Peter said angrily.

Dill held up his sack of candy and gestured to it with an expression like, What’re ya gonna do?

The message was clear: I still got my candy. I ain’t no wimp.

“You said the very first day I first met you that we could beat up a teenager, cuz both of our ages added up to 20,” Peter reminded Dill. “Well, there were six of them!”

Dill gave him a pitying look. “Dude…that doesn’t count for little kids.”

“YOU NEVER SAID THAT!”

Dill put out his hands in a defensive gesture. “Hey, man, don’t get mad at me cuz you got jumped by a bunch of preschoolers.”

“Wha’ happen Petuh?” Beth asked, a confused look on her face.

“Some of your baby friends jumped him,” Dill explained.

“HE WASN’T A BABY!”

“Peter, calm down,” Mom said. “Dill, quit teasing him.”

“Jump up ‘n down on Petuh?”

Dill shrugged. “Might as well have.”

Beth tilted back her head and cackled.

“SHUT UP!” Peter roared.

“Peter, don’t get upset,” Mom said, but he could tell she was trying hard not to smile, which enraged him further.

“Took all his candy, too,” Dill added.

That just made Beth laugh harder.

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"Peter And The Psycho Trick-Or-Treaters" Pg 9

Peter and Dill had longer legs, adrenaline, and a head start on their sides. They made it to Main Street first, and thundered down its deserted sidewalks. At least here the streetlamps lit their way, and they didn’t stumble so much.

Within sixty seconds they had made it to Lumpkin. There sat the beat-up little Honda, the best thing Peter had seen all night. He could make out Mom’s silhouette behind the wheel. She was turned around and talking to Beth in her car seat.

“Get in the front, I’ll take the back!” Dill shouted.

Peter didn’t argue. He was running so hard that he slammed up against the door, startling Mom, who jerked around in pure fright. Beth actually jumped inside her car seat.

The door handle was locked.

“MOM, OPEN UP, OPEN UP!” Peter shrieked.

“HURRY, HURRY, HURRY!” Dill yelled.

Inside, Mom fumbled for the automatic lock button.

Click. The little door locks popped up. Peter and Dill piled into the car, shut the doors, and slammed down the locks.

Peter looked out the window. Nobody was outside. In fact, he couldn’t see anyone at all out on the street.

Mom looked panicked. “Peter, what’s wrong?!”

“Just drive, Mom! Just go, GO!”

She cranked the ignition and the engine roared to life. As the Honda pulled away from the curb, Peter saw them, far down the street, six tiny figures under a streetlamp. One of them waved at him – the one with curling horns on his head – and then they all melted back into the darkness.

***

“What in the world was that all about? Are you guys okay?” Mom asked fearfully. “You scared me to death!”

Beth was sucking on a Sugar Daddy and looking at them curiously from her car seat. Her Strawberry Shortcake bathing suit looked odd with a tutu around the middle.

“He got jumped,” Dill said as he pulled off his ghost costume and settled in beside Beth’s car seat. The two of them exchanged wary looks and shielded their candy from each other.

“What?!” Mom exclaimed.

“I got jumped?!” Peter huffed. “What about you?! We both got jumped!”

Dill shrugged as he reached in his sack for a Tootsie Roll. “Dude, I fought off my guys. Like a man.”

“Give me a break, you were running the same as me!”

“Who’s still got their candy, huh?”

“Wait, that’s what this is about?” Mom asked, finally understanding. “Someone stole your candy?

“Not my candy,” Dill smirked.

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"Peter And The Psycho Trick-Or-Treaters" Pg 8

Peter shook his head. “Come on, Dill, let’s go.”

“I like your bag of candy,” Devil Boy said.

Peter instinctively clutched his pillowcase tighter.

“I want it,” Devil Boy said.

“Too bad,” Peter growled.

The kid shook his head.

“No. Too bad for you.”

Devil Boy gestured with his pitchfork, and the creepy kids sprang at Peter and Dill.

Sack Head, Baby Doll, and Fishbowl flung themselves onto Peter. Mop Head and Pantyhose went for Dill, who screeched and swung his sack of candy around like a weapon.

“Oh no you DON’T!” he howled, and actually smacked Pantyhose upside the head and sent him sprawling.

Peter wasn’t doing quite so well. Sack Head and Baby Doll clawed at his pirate’s costume, ripping the construction paper parrot off his shoulder. Fishbowl was trying to jump onto his back.

“Let – go!” he snarled, and starting twisting and throwing elbows. He felt one connect solidly with Fishbowl’s gut, and the kid slipped off his back and fell to the ground.

From the corner of Peter’s vision, he saw a blur of movement.

THWACK!

A searing bolt of pain raced up Peter’s right forearm, and his hand went limp and numb. The pillowcase of hard-earned candy slipped out of his grasp and onto the ground.

Devil Boy swung the pitchfork again and smacked it into the side of Peter’s head. THWACK! For a hollow piece of junk, it sure packed a wallop: not only did Peter see stars, he could hear them ringing in his ears, too.

“OW!” he screamed. The pain gave him a burst of panicked strength, and he twisted so violently that both Sack Head and Baby Doll went flying to the ground.

Devil Boy reared back his pitchfork, ready for another attack, when Dill dashed in and slammed his bag of candy right into the kid’s red mask. Devil Boy went toppling over like a house of cards.

“Kiss my butt!” Dill yelled, then grabbed Peter by the arm. “RUN, DUDE!”

Peter reached down for his candy, but Fishbowl grabbed it first. Sack Head and Baby Doll were scrambling to their feet again.

“FORGET IT, MAN! RUN, RUN, RUN!” Dill howled.

They dashed down the street, followed by six sets of footsteps clattering after them.

Peter cast a fleeting glimpse over his shoulder. It was so dark that he could only see brief glimpses of their masks, but it seemed that Devil Boy led the pack, with his minions racing behind him.

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"Peter And The Psycho Trick-Or-Treaters" Pg 7

That the kids had suddenly appeared out of nowhere, and silently, was creepy enough. If Peter had heard them sneaking up, it wouldn’t have been nearly so frightening. After all, the kids were hardly imposing; none of them was any taller than Devil Boy, and a couple were several inches shorter.

But their masks…their masks were unsettling. There was one with a canvas sack over his head, with ragged holes for eyes and a jagged frown stitched beneath. Another kid had what looked like a frosted fishbowl on his shoulders, nestled atop flowing green robes. There was a girl with a creepy, white, baby doll mask made out of porcelain. Another kid had what looked like a mop in place of his head, and the last one seemed to be wearing several layers of black pantyhose over his face.

The really weird thing was that, just like Devil Boy, none of their eyes were visible. They were either sunken-in black pits, like Sack Head and Baby Doll’s, or entirely absent, like Mop Face’s. Fishbowl’s helmet was so hazy that it was impossible to see even a hint of anything inside. And Pantyhose definitely had a skull, but the only features visible were slight hollows where the eyes should have been, and a bump for a nose.

And they just stood there, arms hanging slackly by their sides, totally motionless. If Devil Boy had said they were his zombie sidekicks, Peter would have believed him.

Despite his earlier bravado, even Dill had the heebie-jeebies. “Uh – who are they?” he asked, his voice cracking a little.

“They’re my crew. They help me mess people up.”

“They really shouldn’t sneak up like that,” Peter said.

“Why not?” Devil Boy asked, though the flatness of his voice made it more of a statement than a question.

“Because it’s…creepy.”

“So?”

Devil Boy’s tone had gone from confident and playful to hushed and threatening.

Peter heard the change in the kid’s voice, and knew they were having some sort of wacked-out contest. So he stared at the dark holes in the kid’s mask and said firmly, “It’s not very friendly.”

The kid’s voice was quiet, almost soft as he answered.

“Who said you were my friend, Peter?”

Peter’s stomach knotted up, and he instinctively turned around to look behind him.

The creepy kids hadn’t moved, though.

Yet.

“I think we better be going,” Dill chirped. “Nice meeting you.” Under his breath he added, “Psycho boy.”

Something was bugging Peter – a tiny detail buzzing in the back of his brain… then he realized what it was.

“How did you know my name?” he asked.

Devil Boy just stood there looking at him.

“How did you know my name?” Peter repeated.

“Dude, I must’ve said it. Come on, let’s go,” Dill urged.

“No – no, you didn’t, I’m sure you didn’t.” Peter turned back to the Devil Boy. “How did you know my name?”

Devil Boy just stood there, silent.

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"Peter And The Psycho Trick-Or-Treaters" Pg 6

I'm ba-aaaaaaaaack!

Yeah. Seven days in the hospital. That's right. SEVEN DAYS. People have open heart surgery and get out in less time than I did.

But I'm out, and I'm thankful for that. Also, many thanks to N7, Rai, Cat, Showers, daymon34, Andrea, Mary, Todd, MistyCat, and Kurt for their thoughtful messages. And thanks to anybody who sent me some 'good vibes.'

And now, back to our regularly scheduled program.

Well, truthfully, he wasn’t much of a devil. Whoever the kid was, he stood almost half a foot shorter than Dill. He wore a red cape over a black turtleneck sweater, black corduroy pants, and black tennis shoes with yellow stripes. His pink hands grasped a cheesy toy pitchfork that looked hollow, like it had come with a bunch of candy inside.

The only thing cool about the outfit was the mask: glossy red plastic, with curling ram horns that sprouted from either side of his head. The teeth were long, white, interlocking fangs that stretched out in an impossibly wide grin, like a cross between a wolf and the Joker. There was no nose. The forehead bulged over two slanted, pitch black sockets; no trace of the kid’s eyes could be seen in those deep holes.

The costume was a weird mix of creepy and laughable.

“Cool mask,” Peter acknowledged.

“I know, right?” the kid said, his voice muffled behind the teeth.

“Crappy pitchfork,” Dill said, obviously trying to take Devil Boy down a peg. Dill didn’t like anybody to be super confident unless it was himself – which was difficult when you were wearing a flowery bed sheet.

“Oh yeah? What are you dressed as, dirty laundry?”

“W – wh – ” Dill stumbled as he searched for a good comeback. Not finding one, he snapped impatiently, “What do you want? We gotta hit another house.”

“Oh, you don’t wanna go down there,” the kid said. “You definitely don’t wanna go down there.”

“Why not?” Peter asked.

“They took my candy.”

“What?! Who did?!”

“The people in that house down there,” the kid said as he pointed with his pitchfork.

“Serves you right,” Dill muttered under his breath, low enough that only Peter could hear it.

Peter ignored him. “You should call the cops. They just took it? Grown-ups?!”

Devil Boy slapped his hollow pitchfork repeatedly against the palm of his other hand. “Yeah, but don’t worry. We’re gonna mess ‘em up. We’re gonna mess ‘em up real good.”

The sinister tone in his voice sent a shiver up Peter’s spine. He had no idea exactly what the kid meant, but there was no doubt in Peter’s mind that the kid really was going to do it.

Dill, however, was evidently not affected the same way. “Yeah, right – you and what army?” he scoffed.

Devil Boy pointed his pitchfork right between Peter and Dill. “Them.”

Peter looked around, and his blood froze.

He hadn’t heard them walk up, but there they were: five other kids, standing in a semicircle in the street, ten feet away from – and completely surrounding – Peter and Dill.

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