Fan Fiction ❯ Fade to Black ❯ Halloween ( Chapter 6 )

Chapter 6: Halloween

It was Monday and I was sitting in homeroom, waiting for fucking school to begin. I was watching the people around me interact with each other. Two guys in Tie-Dye shirts where in front of me and to the left. Apparently, the one guy was satisfied with the quality of the other guy's marijuana on Saturday. He seemed pleased, but maybe that was just his mental retardation showing through. I heard two preppy girls behind me talking about how their dates for Friday didn't take them out to some French restaurant. They seemed pretty pissed off, so I glanced back to confirm my suspicion that they were preppy, Abercrombie-Whores. I never get tired of being right. The bell rang and I moved off to my first period Cultures class.

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" So, getting back to the colonization of America, we left off with the Mayflower leaving port and coming to America to escape religious persecution," my Cultures teacher droned on and on. When I was about five years old, I remember going to my grandmother's house for Thanksgiving and she gave me a little I-Can-Read storybook about the first Thanksgiving. It taught me just about the same shit this guy was puking out. I tuned him out and started doodling idly on my notebook. Hmmm, what can I draw? Anarchy symbols are classic....there we go, a big black Anarchy symbol. Christ, what else, I thought. I finally settled down and covered the front of my notebook with a large sketch of a man with a crooked-tooth grin and hollow, bleeding eye sockets. Cuts and lacerations lined his face. Jesus, why the hell did I draw that? It looked cool, but if my school's fat-ass guidance counselor saw this, he'd have a stroke. I scribbled out the picture and looked up and started copying the notes the teacher was putting on the board. My teacher couldn't even write notes correctly. He'd write a heading and then draw like, seven arrows and write about twelve subheadings and then a definition. When he went to repeat the definition, it was nothing like the first definition. A retarded group of Rhesus monkies could write notes better than he could. Plus it'd be funny when they started hurling their shit at the people in the front row. I wish this were over.

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Four periods later, I was sitting with Sarah and John having lunch. John took a bite of his sandwich and swallowed before he started to talk, which was a plus.

"Hey, you know, Halloween is this Friday and Saturday. We should go around and be unruly and such," he said.

"Why the hell is Halloween on two nights here?" Sarah asked.

"To give all the little kids time to get more candy and probably to piss the older people off," I answered.

"Come on, Jo, this could be fun. Really, really fun," John said, whining like I had said no.

" Ok, Jesus, don't act like such a whiny little bitch, John" I said and turned to Sarah." What do you think?"

"Well, I jump at the chance to dress up like a freak and scare old people and little kids and to be unruly, as you put it," Sarah said, sipping her Brisk iced tea.

"Well, it's settled, come to my house on Friday night at about eight-thirty and we'll get started," John said. John lived in a fancy-pants housing development for rich people, only John wasn't really rich. His mother had gotten the house as a prenuptial agreement a long time ago, when John was really young. Lots of preppy kids lived there and it'd be fun to cause trouble on their turf.

"Sarah, how's your dad?" I asked, remembering what happened Saturday. She looked up.

"He's been quiet lately, but I'm not sure if that'll last. But, all in all, he's been pretty decent" She answer, rubbing my arm briefly before turning back to her lunch.

"Good," I said. John just looked around, confused and I gave him a look that it didn't matter and he happily drank his soda and finished his sandwich. I was looking forward to Friday.

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The week went by so slowly, it was almost painful. On Tuesday, I found a note in my locker that said:

I love you, Josiah, I just thought you'd like to know that!!! Good luck with your Lit test today. Think of me and I'll bring you luck!!!

Love,

Sarah

We were getting closer and closer and I could feel it. Obviously she could too. I got my test back Thursday and I got an B on it. Not bad, considering almost half the class got lower or failed. She must be lucky.

It was Friday night, eight o'clock, and I was standing in my bathroom. I had on black cargo pants, my black boots that looked military and a black T-shirt under a thin, long-sleeved, black shirt like the one Brandon Lee wore in The Crow. I looked up into the mirror and was greeted by a ghastly white face. The white face powder looked great and I had smeared it all over my face, ears, neck and shoulders. It wasn't rubbing off on my clothing, either. I picked up the tube of black lipstick and painted my lips, adding sharp lines from the corners of my mouth slightly angling down before shooting up about two inches. I then painted thin lines running from my forehead over each eye to about two inches from the bottom lid of my eye. I covered my eyelids with the black lipstick and stared foreward at the face of The Crow. I looked great, really like Eric Draven, Brandon Lee's character. I picked up a role of black electrical tape and wrapped it from the middle of my forearm down, taping up all the skin loose enough so as not to restrict circulation. When I got to the wrist, I went around twice and then went between my index and middle finger and across my palm and back around my wrist once. I did the same to the other hand and went into my living room. I threw on my leather trenchcoat and looked in the full-length mirror. It was an absolutely hideous site. I loved it. I looked exactly like Eric Draven. I checked my pockets for money, cigarettes, and my Zippo and then left my house. My coat flapped behind me as walked down the driveway to my truck and climbed in.

I drove quickly towards John's house, getting looks from the motorists coming the other way. I just grinned sadistically at them. I made a kid in the backseat of a car cry when I passed by him while his family sat at a stop sign. I was proud. I pulled into the development and flew down the streets to the last one in the large development and turned down it. I pulled into John's driveway and saw a black car I had seen at Sarah's house on Saturday. Good, she's here, I thought. I looked back up the street I came down and saw kids running up to house on the opposite street. The development was set up was so that there was a main street and streets on either side with about ten houses on each side of the side street. I turned back to John's house and walked to the front door and rang the bell. John opened the door.

"Holy shit, nice face. Jesus Christ," John said. He was wearing black tattered robes and carrying a mask from the movie Scream.

"Thanks. Where's Sarah?" I asked eagerly.

"I'm right here," Sarah said, crossing from the living room into the hallway to give me "hello" kiss. I never got tired of kissing her. Sarah looked awesome. She was dressed in a long, black, flowing robe that started with a collar a priest would wear. It was like a priest's garment, except it was kind of like a dress. Collar was the same, though. Her hair was let down and she had black makeup above her eyes and white makeup from the bottom of her eyes down, making her look like a corpse with deep, set-in eyes. She had on black lipstick and a barbwire choker. The garment clung to her arms and upper body tightly, but just below the waist is started getting looser and longer. Wrapped carefully around her arms were lengths of real barbwire. She was careful to eliminate prongs that could puncture her skin if she wasn't careful. She had on a silver necklace, with a pentagram hanging by the chain. Under her eyes, it looked like she let thinned-out paint run down like tears from her eyes. She looked really great.

"Sarah, you look fantastic," I said, thinking what a macabre congregation we made.

"Thanks, but you look really, really good. Just like Eric Draven," She said, running her hand along my stark white face. John rushed into his living room and came back holding two backpacks.

"Here's our munitions. TP, shaving cream, gasoline and a lighter for you pyros out there, and two dozen eggs," John said. He strapped one bag on and Sarah took the other. We exited John's house and moved off down the main street of the development. Little kids dressed up like monsters and vampires and princesses ran around screaming with joy as parents with the thousand-mile-stare hurried to keep up. It must have been a long night.

My trench coat flapped behind me in the breeze as we moved down the main street, collecting horrified stares from passers-by. A few kids who laughed at us got the middle finger as a rebuttal. We turned up a side street and continued for a little way past a few houses. We passed a group of preppy kids under a streetlight and heard snickering from behind us. These bastards were going to be trouble. I heard quick footsteps behind me and when I turned around, I was knocked sideways through the air, landing on my face and getting the wind knocked out of me. I felt a punch into my lower back and cringed with pain that quickly subsided, only to be replaced with rage. I calmly stood up and turned around to face my antagonist. I came face to face with a kid shorter then me and older dressed in a Abercrombie and Fitch sweater. He seemed a little taken back by my garish makeup. He laughed.

"Yes, that's right, laugh all you want, Chuckles, cause in a minute you'll be in the hospital," I responded to his laughter.

"You're a freaky excuse for a mime. What, are you going to do anything? Walk against the wind?" He laughed again and looked back to his group of friends who were laughing and having a good old time.

"Kick his ass, Kevin," the guy's girlfriend said. At least I figured it was his girlfriend. While his back was turned, I twisted my face into the most hideous grin I could muster. He turned around and his face turned somber. I winked at him.

"Hey, Chuckles," was all I said. I quickly gave him an uppercut to his jaw and he bit down on his tongue, blood gushing from his mouth. He swung and hit me in the side of the head. Pain exploded in my head like fireworks. Shit, that fucking hurt, I thought. I shook my head to clear it. By this time, John and Sarah turned around to watch. I swung again and hit him directly in the eye and he leaned back, surprised. He kicked at me, hitting my shin and causing a stinging pain to shoot up and down my leg. I punched him in the stomach and when he doubled over, I drove my elbow down in between his shoulder blades and his legs flew out from under him and he landed on his face. His body was instantly limp and I knew he was either unconscious or semiconscious. I stood up and stretched my appendages, working out the kinks. I reached down and grabbed Kevin's right leg and began to drag him over to his friends. I moved with long strides. When I stepped into the halo of light projected by the streetlight, the crowd before me gasped at my hideous face and toothy grin. I quickly closed the distance and with all my strength I whipped him around in front of me and let him go tumbling to their feet, moaning. I stood there, my coat flapping behind me. I cracked my knuckles and looked each person in the eye, stopping on his girlfriend. I walked forward and she cringed with fear at my approach, but I got my face within an inch of hers.

"Boo," I said, after letting a few minutes pass in silence and followed it up with insane laughter. She wasn't amused and neither were her friends. Two guys had been coaxing Kevin back to consciousness and I waited for him to get to his feet and spit blood out of his mouth. I looked at him.

"Jesus Christ.….what the hell's your problem?" He asked.

"You are. Or should I say, you were. I don't think you're up to giving me any more trouble, are you, Chuckles? Care to disagree?" I asked in a bored tone.

"No, forget it. I'll get you later. Next time in force," He answered.

"Ok, well then I better go change. I don't want to get someone else's blood all over my clothes," I said and walked back to Sarah and John, who were trying not to giggle. We walked to the last house way back on the street and stood on an empty hill across the street from it. The windows were dark. As John led us up the hill, I saw a figure crouching low to the ground, smoking. He was near a large object covered in a green and brown blanket.

"This is Jack Sarem," John said," He brought us the artillery." And with this, Jack pulled the sheet off, revealing an air tank attached to PVC piping. The barrel was 4 inches wide and the compression chamber was the same size, joined to the barrel by a sprinkler valve. A pneumatic cannon, more commonly termed a compression potato gun. The gun was about thirteen feet long and mounted on a swiveling telescope tripod.

"Hey," Jack said," The gun is ready to fire. All we need is ammo." Sarah took off her backpack and searched for the eggs she had.

"Will these do?" Sarah asked, smiling.

"Yeah, real well," Jack answered, ramming thin cloth wadding down the barrel. Sarah spent a minute or so carefully putting the eggs into the barrel on top of the wadding. Some broke on the way down, but that doesn't matter.

"Ok," I said," our target is the house across the street."

"Who's house is it?" Sarah asked, whispering.

"Principal's," I whispered back. Sarah began to choke back laughter. Jack and John adjusted the cannon and John turned to us.

"Ok, his nice white house won't be so nice in a second. This should hit the front of the house and some of the roof," John said, excited. Jack moved his hand to pull a cover off the top of the switch that worked the cannon.

"Ready to fire," He said. I peered across the street at the dark windows of the house. No one was home and the other house shouldn't hear the noise. We were over the crest of the hill, hidden to the houses on the other side of the street.

"Let Sarah fire it," I said, throwing Sarah a grin. She moved forward and Jack moved away in compliance. Sarah's dainty finger hung over the switch and she looked up at the house, grinning. Her finger flipped the switch and the cannon made a muffled FWWUMMPP noise like a mortar. The eggs arched through the air and the wadding fell quickly to the ground. The front of the house exploded in a dim yellow splash of yolk and shell. It looked like buckshot from a shotgun digging into a plaster wall. The eggs made a quiet, wet smacking noise against the wall and started to run down the front of the house. Remarkably, no windows were hit. We all started giggling quietly; Jack was rolling on the ground clutching his stomach.

"Reload," John said, sliding more wadding down the barrel. Jack got up and filled the compression chamber again.

"Aim it right in front of his garage, on the driveway," Sarah said, this time pulling out a shaving cream can. She pulled the plastic top off, leaving the white plastic stem exposed. She slid the pressurized can down the barrel and backed up. This time Jack got the gun in position in a few seconds. He moved in to fire. Another mortar-like FWWUMMPP softly escaped the barrel, propelling the can the hundred yards into the driveway.

"When it hits it should..." Sarah began. She was cut off by the whistling of the can coming down. We knew what she was thinking. The can hit its mark and exploded in a large white cloud with a metallic clang. White shaving cream bathed the blue garage door, splashing all over. Pieces of disfigured metal lay in the driveway. The shaving cream was smoking from the rapid change from a freezing temperature to a warmer one. Explosive giggling broke out in our group. I held my stomach as tears poured from my eyes. I looked at the others and they where all painfully laughing with tears streaking their face. We were still giggling quietly when John looked over the hill at the house.

"Oh fuck," John whispered quietly. We all were instantly somber when we looked over and saw a car pull into the driveway. Agonized and quiet cries of "Oh, shit" resounded throughout our group. Our principal and his wife got out of the car with their young son. Principal Faulken made several exasperated and enraged cries when he saw the vandalism. His son started bawling and his wife was shaking her head, crying. We instantly started to giggle uncontrollably. John and Jack lifted the gun and the tank and Sarah and I got up and we all started to run down the opposite side of the hill, practically falling from laughing so much.

"We...should....have spray painted a big, fat dick on his driveway," I managed to huff out in between laughing and running. Sarah started laughing harder and almost fell. We reached the next street down and put the gun into Jack's white van and he drove off after we bid him farewell. We walked back to the main street, still high on adrenaline from our little artillery strike. We sat down on the corner under a streetlight and I lit up two cigarettes, taking one from my lips and giving it to Sarah.

"Why don't you ever give me cigarettes?" John asked jokingly.

"When you're my girlfriend, I'll give you some," I said sarcastically in reply. Sarah and John started to laugh. John reached into his backpack and dug out three iced teas and passed them out. I opened mine and took a big gulp from the can and puffed on my cigarette. I leaned up against the lamppost and Sarah leaned against me. John sat down and we just rested for a while before getting up and moving down to the front of the development. We stopped in front of a house where a stupid asshole that made fun of John and me lived. We quietly moved around back after making sure the coast was clear. We entered the large backyard and moved into the small clearing behind the inground pool. I looked at the house and the only light was coming from under the shade of the window in the upper left of the rear of the house. It was about nine o'clock and we quickly set to work. Sarah watched as John took out a gallon jug of grass killer. We tested this shit and it was about as powerful as Agent Orange. And it was flammable. We carefully wrote on the lawn "Fuck You, Dickhead!" in large capital letters and drew an ejaculating penis under the words. John retraced them with gasoline making sure the letters would be burned into the green grass and we retreated halfway to the next street down, trailing gas behind us. We stopped and crouched down. I pulled out my Zippo and lit it, trying to hide the flame. I touched it to the gas trail.

*WUUUMMMMP*

The fire raced up the trail to the penis and a huge flaming dick appeared on the back lawn. The heat drifted over and caught "Fuck You, Dickhead!" on fire. We stayed and watched the fire burn. We wanted to make sure it didn't get out of control. After what seemed like an eternity, the fire went out. I don't think anyone saw it, I thought. We tried to get a look at our handiwork, but we couldn't see. Sarah finally volunteered to go up and check it out. She moved low and slowly up to the lawn, then sprinted back.

"It's great...really came out nice," Sarah panted, catching her breath. I rubbed her shoulders as we walked away.

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After our little "Flamin' Penis" prank, we just walked around town, stopping occasionally to deplete our supply on targets of opportunity. After this year, because of us, they'll have to outlaw Halloween in Western Heights. I'll leave it at that. We walked down into town, making hilarious observations about the sexual orientation of people who passed us and weren't too nice about our looks. We also liberally distributed the middle finger to those who were worthy of it.

It was about midnight when we returned to John's house. We sat around the kitchen table, with only the hanging light above the table turned on, giving the room a conspiratorial atmosphere.

"What do you want to do now?" John asked. Sarah and I looked at each other.

"I don't know, but I'm not that tired. I feel like going out and just doing something," Sarah said. I reached over and stroked the back of her hand.

"Yeah, neither am I," I said. Suddenly, we heard a wet smacking sound outside.

"Fuck! Eggs!!" John said, running into the living room. He came back with two paintball guns and tossed one to me. We heard shouting and yelling coming from outside.

"I bet those assholes followed us," Sara said.

"I wouldn't doubt it. Stay here, me and Jo will take care of it," John said. Sarah frowned a little, but remained seated.

"Be careful," She said, looking at me with worried eyes. John and I exited the back door and quietly crept around the front. We crouched behind some bushes and looked into the front yard. About ten guys were hurling eggs from the street at John's house. We were lucky we decided to pull the cars down the street into some shadow, or they would've looked like omelets.

"Whoopee-fuckin'-doo," John said," I have a high pressure hose that'll take that shit off in a second." Nothing really fazed John. I looked back at the group and noticed my good friend Chuckles hurling eggs with his buddies. I nudged John and pointed.

"Whoa, they did come back in force," John said.

"Well, let's play some paintball," I said, bursting out of the bushes and striding across the lawn, gun held waist-high. John quickly joined me. The group saw us and stopped.

"Hey, assholes, told you I'd be back," Chuckles said. His buddies grouped around him, waiting for trouble. John and I looked at each other and shrugged. They probably didn't even notice the guns. We raised our guns and poured paintballs into the group, which promptly scattered. In a fit of rage, Chuckles/Kevin charged me. I shot two paintballs into his stomach, but he kept coming. The rest of the group gone, John concentrated fire on the advancing asshole. We caught him in crossfire. He stopped his charge, turned, and ran.

"You know, they never learn that we pretty much always win," John said, going to get the hose. He came back and in minutes the house was clean again. We went back inside.

"What happened?" Sarah asked.

"We did a little painting," I said, grinning along with John. John found this hilarious and began cracking up.

At about one o'clock, I left John's house and headed for my home. Sarah left the same time I did. I was glad to vault onto my bed and get some serious sleep after the nights activities.