Halloween used to be my favourite holiday. It was my one chance to dress up like a beautiful and sparkly (insert over-clichéd childish dream); the one time out of the year I could beg—and eat—all the candy I wanted with no thought of negative consequences. Halloween was almost better than Christmas for me. I truly looked forward to it every year.
Then one year…all of that changed. It was a tradition in our extended family to do our separate trick-or-treating, then head over to the neighborhood Halloween party, and eventually meet up with all our cousins at my grandma’s house down the street. My Grandpa would have prepared a pot of beans (why he chose beans I may never know, but man…were they ever good) for everyone to eat, and that was only if we had room leftover after hoarding Grandma’s stash intended for the neighbor kids.
This time, though, as my sister and I approached the front door of Grandma’s house, something seemed different. Where the door would normally be swung wide open, inviting all to enter, it was unwelcomingly closed. Usually we would be able to hear the raucous laughter of my uncles telling the latest jokes, or my granddad joining in the chaos with his booming, trademark voice—but this year, the lights were off in the house, and all was quiet. Even the jack-o-lanterns, who were glowing with the customary light of candles, seemed to droop and frown. All was not well at Grandma’s house.
Here I am around the time of the dreaded day–in the foreground {my favourite place to be, evidently}. My sister is squished in the back, wearing the gray T-shirt. Don’t we look innocent and unassuming? Totally unaware of any bad in the world…Nevertheless, we two girls approached the entry, foolishly—as two young girls are wont to be—assuming the best. Never considering foul play. Naïve along with the best of ‘em, that’s how we were.
Suddenly, as we took our last step to reach and turn the doorknob, we heard a heart-stopping wail.
“Waaaaaaaaaa…uhhhhhhhhh…waaaaaaaaa…uhhhhhhhh…”
The pitch was piercing, oscillating between two notes of an interval I never knew existed. It sent shivers through my spine, and I knew it was the last noise I would ever hear, for I would soon be dead—murdered by the boogeyman before I ever got to tell Daniel Wilsford of my true love for him, and that was that.
“Run!” I screamed, for—though I was the younger sister—I always worried for her presence of mind during frightful situations. If one of us should die, I was the best for the job. {I’ve always made a very good martyr, you see. It’s my gift.}
We ran. Both she and I screamed blood-clotting screams of terror, our eyes squeezed shut, as if it would make the horror disappear (though running with our eyes closed did substantially hinder our progress of escaping immediate danger).
Tripping over our fairy princess shoelaces, we didn’t make it far before we collapsed in the grass of Grandma’s front yard, damp from our own sweat along with the early-evening dew that was just beginning to form. We panted our pathetic breaths, having skipped out of P.E. often enough to know we were–neither of us–cut out for such exertion. We were doomed.
The pause gave us time to breathe, and during the break we realized the noise of terror emitting from the portico had faded into that of…humour? Humour indeed. Looking back from whence we’d shortly escaped with our lives, we saw the lights had been turned on, the front door opened, and all our long-lost relatives laughing from the entry. Jubilantly. They’d gotten us—the snot-nosed little girls who were always reading books (in my sister’s case) and beheading chickens (in my own).
A practical joke had been played, and we were the butts. I’m always the butt.
And who was the major culprit, you ask? Who was to blame for the wail of fright (and “fright” is putting it mildly)?
A battery-operated ghost hanging from the eaves of Grandma’s front porch. Of course. She’d unearthed them from the bottom of a bin at Pick ‘n Save™ the year before, at the after-Halloween markdown sale for what was no doubt “a steal.” It had a sensor—a sensor!—which detected the movement of any innocent passerby, at which signal it would flatly freak people out. This technology was ahead of its time during the mid-90s, and I had never imagined anything so horrifying. I can hear the wails to this day—probably because they are still common decorations among my relatives—and they frighten me…to…this…day.
We have gone on to live {fairly} normal and well-adjusted lives, despite the turmoil of our youth.Strangely enough, however, I’ve never felt the Halloween fervor since then. I’ll buy my own candy, thankyouverymuch.
Happy Halloween, from everyone (all two of us) here at Archives of Our Lives.
Boo.
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