The Morning After

Well, I hope you all had an interesting Hallowe'en! Because I now live in an apartment, I don't get any trick-or-treaters at my place. So, ordinarily, the night would have gone by in an unremarkable fashion. But Stephanie had stolen some sheets from the hospital and ripped them up to create a sort of ghost/mummy costume with the intention of doing some trick-or-treating herself. She's a little on the short side, so we figured she could pass as a just another regular child. The most important part of creating this illusion would be hiding those incredible melons of hers, which I'd normally be against, but this was a special occasion and some sacrifices had to be made. Anyway, we pulled it off with reasonable success, though the fact it was dark out worked in our favour, too.

While the costume may have been less than stellar, our candy gathering efforts were a remarkable success. When the night was over, we went home with five bags of candy! At first it went slowly, as it no doubt does for any child. But when an hour of trick-or-treating garnered only one and a half bags of candy, she said we should stop by a nearby convenience store to get some condoms. I didn't really understand why it was so important just then; I assumed she had a last minute improv to her costume in mind.Then we resumed our candy quest. Whenever a guy answered the door, she would go into the house with him and I was left standing there on the street( I was posing as her parental supervision). I didn't really mind waiting, as it gave me a chance to observes all the neat costumes the kids were wearing this year. I saw ghosts, dogs, Ghost Dog, vampires, Buck Adam Tomato, the bastard offspring of monoclonius and a unicorn or some such nonsense, Posh Spice, some Batmen, a dragon, Legolas, a couple of Obi-Wan Kenobi's and Anakin Skywalkers, and even General Grievous (who was dressed up as C-3P0!). When three or four minutes would go by, I'd start to get suspicious and angry about what might be going on in the house, but then she'd emerge with a full bag of candy, and it's hard to be upset about that! This went on at three different houses before she decided we were done.

We got home and examined our loot. In addition to all the regular sorts of goodies, we got a giant chocolate dinosaur (obviously left over from easter), some loose Lucky Charms marshmellows, gold coin chocolates, some over ripe blueberries, a half banana, an empty unicef box, a pair of children's mittens, a half kilo of lean ground beef, soy sauce, some sugar and ketchup packets, a brass eagle, a family portrait, $4.75 in loose change, and three wallets with $175 and five credit cards between them.

All too soon, though, Stephanie had to change into a different "costume" to do a different kind of "trick or treating" so she could afford a different kind of "candy". I think that analogy went way too far. Anyway, this left me all alone to figure out what to do with myself for the rest of the evening. I was dismayed to discover she'd taken the wallets with her, which meant I'd have to be extra creative about occupying myself.

Plum out of ideas, I took to the streets, pedestrian style. By now, just shy of the witching hour, most children had retired to their residences with their loot. The teenagers, on missions of hooting and hollering and pumpkin smashing, were taking over. I allowed none of this bother me as I absentmindedly let my feet take me where they may. I might have vetoed their choice of destination if I'd known where they were taking me. But by the time I realised... I was already there.

Old Man Guptar's place is the one place in the neighbourhood that everybody's children know to steer well clear of. If it's dark and foreboding appearance wasn't discouragement enough to the curious, the "Private Property" sign surely was. And on this particular night, it's appearance was exceptionally dark and foreboding, and the letters in "Private Property" loomed especially large. As I stood before this ominous abode, visions of the last time I took to mindless wandering flashed through my mind. I had to look no further than my own torso for the evidence of how well that had turned out. Alarm bells metaphorically rang in my brain and my whole body metaphorically screamed out "Turn back!"

But something in my head, possibly a parasite or tumor, urged me onwards... and I listened to it.

I took my first tentative step towards the home of Old Man Guptar. The whole property was cloaked in the night, as though even the streetlamp light feared to fall upon this evil earth. A cold wind came up out of nowhere as my foot came down on the lawn; More dry, cracked earth than grass and loam. Dead twigs crackled underfoot with each successive step. I froze, suddenly aware there were no shrubs or trees or wheelbarrows to hide behind should Guptar happen to look outside. Only the darkness was my ally in this regard, though I had little doubt it was more his ally than mine.

Stay Tuned! I might not have made it out alive!