HALLOWEEN PRAYERS
stories of faith and fright
by Al Bruno III
rev 1.0
Copyright Al Bruno III 2011
Smashwords Edition License Notes:
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HALLOWEEN PRAYERS
stories of faith and fright
Deus Ex Machina
by
Al Bruno III
It had taken Louise York five years to get her nursing degree and it wasn’t until five years after graduation that she came to understand how much she loathed humanity in general and sick people in particular.
That was why she came in late and she left early, why she was sycophantic to her superiors and a terror to her coworkers, why she spent as little time as she could doing any work at all.
That was why she kept finding her way to room that belonged to the nameless boy, room 549.
In the summer of 1938 he certainly wasn't the Asheboro Public Hospital's only patient entombed in an iron lung but he was the only that had a room all to himself.
The first thing Nurse York did when she was in the nameless boy's room was to close the door firmly behind her. Then she started cursing, letting loose the stream of profanity she had been holding back since breakfast. She kept her voice down so the groan and hiss of the iron lung drowned her out.
If the nameless boy heard her he made no sign. Usually the boy was flat on his back, looking up at the cracked ceiling, but today he was on his side. He stared glassily at Nurse York as she sat in the chair beside him and retrieved the flask and cigarettes from her purse.
She lit her first cigarette and inhaled, then she had a nip from her flask. It usually felt good to hide out here for a while but she couldn’t quite relax with him facing towards her. She thought of repositioning him but then sneered in contempt. He, and all the other saps in the polio ward, got doted on more than enough as far as she was concerned.
“What are you lookin‘ at?” Nurse York said, then she blew smoke towards the iron lung and watched it drift.
The nameless boy didn't blink or cough or complain, he never did. According to the hospital rumor mill he had been found in an alleyway two winters ago, silent and paralyzed, no relative had ever come foreword to claim him and no attempt to learn his identity had ever succeeded.
After a few more sips from her flask Nurse York leaned forward and spoke conspiratorially, “Lucky boy. Private room, all the doctors and nurses feeling sorry for you. I bet you love it.”
She leaned back in the chair and took in the room, it really was the nicest room in the hospital. It was wide and softly lit, there were paintings of starry skies hanging on the walls and a little table on the windowsill that had fresh flowers and unlit votive candles set upon it. The iron lung so clean it almost glittered.
“I bet you’re just lazy, most men are lazy. You like getting waited on hand and foot, we even have to wipe your butt for you.” She finished her first cigarette and lit her second, “You know what? I bet you’re playing with your peter in there.”
The nameless boy regarded her emptily. The iron lung hissed and chugged.
“Are you blushing?” She laughed sharply, “Well, it’s no skin off my nose what you do. It’s not like you’re ever gonna get to use it anywhere else. You’re gonna be nothing but a jellyfish in a few years time... No better yet! You’re like a snail with just the head sticking out.”
More sips, more cigarettes. Someone should be looking for her by now but she didn’t care. “Poor lonely snail...” A wicked grin filled her face. Without bothering to get off the chair she hiked up her skirt and gave him a little flash, “Wanna bite of my sandwich?”
Then she started laughing, laughing so hard that tears came to her eyes, laughing so hard that she fell off the chair. It wasn’t until she righted herself again that she saw the nameless boy had turned away.
He was facing the other direction.
Nurse York’s face went red with humiliation and rage. She got to her feet so quickly that she kicked one of her shoes across the room.
“Look at me!” she grabbed his chin and twisted him back to face her. She didn’t know if the cigarette in her hands was her third or her fifth but she knew he was going to feel it. This was a trick she had played before, just a tiny burn behind the ear or deep in the hairline. Something that was just enough to send a patient a warning.
The iron lung hissed and groaned. The red-orange light of the cigarette made a slow arc downwards.
Then his head came off in her hands.
It pulled away bloodlessly leaving a tangle of boneless, fleshy tendrils that writhed to life like a nest of angry serpents. The sight set Nurse York screaming, she ran vowing to leave the boy, room 549 and this entire hospital behind her.
When she opened the door she found the hospital staff standing in the hallway. It wasn’t just the night crew, there were people from the day shift, even a couple of long term patients were there.
Nurse York tried to shove past them only to have them crowd her back into the room. They were utterly silent and none of them looked at her, they only stared reverently at the nameless boy in the iron lung.
When her arm had been dragged into the iron lung she felt a flare of pain as something bit down. She knew that soon her entire body would be pulled through the neck hole of the machine, her bones would crack and splinter but she would fit.
It was only then that Louise York understood she had transgressed, that this room was a temple to the chosen few. In her last moments she begged to be forgiven her trespasses but the boy in room 549 was not a merciful god.
Halloween Prayers
stories of faith and fright
In The Pit
by
Al Bruno III
Science had long ago replaced the faith of Professor Mercer Conrad’s childhood. With no prayers to comfort him he could only whisper scraps from his latest thesis to keep madness at bay. “...in order to pursue my examination of the convergence of post millennial social degeneration and economic disruption...” he said, “...I will approach the subjects directly and establish a dialogue...”
The pit they had thrown him into was eight feet deep and barely a yard across. It had been dug out of the concrete sub-basement of a half-completed house. Serrated ridges were carved into the walls of the pit and the simple act of moving was enough to cut bare flesh to ribbons. A thick iron lattice had been placed over the mouth of the pit and was bolted down. When Mercer shook the bars they didn’t even rattle.
Somewhere a halogen lamp blazed, it cast dark, sharply defined silhouettes along the walls and ceiling of the sub-basement. From his vantage point in the pit Mercer watched the fate of his friends and co-workers unfold like grotesque shadow-plays that ended when the puppets were reduced to scraps.
There were other pits nearby, most were empty but not all. A shape drifted past, the cloaked shaman was about to choose a new victim.
“Hey!” Mercer shouted, “Please talk to me!”
But there was no answer, none of his captors had spoken a word this night. They had committed each of their atrocities in silence.
Mercer said, “...in times of social and economic despair religiosity inevitably takes hold of the general public but in this era of skepticism and spiritual nihilism those impulses have become...”
The clang of a nearby gate being flipped open startled him into silence. Then there were the familiar grunts and cries as another one of sacrifice was dragged away.
What would it be? Flaying or spikes? Or perhaps something far worse. Mercer cursed his foolishness. Where others had seen unsolved mysteries and unreported disappearances he had only seen right-wing fear-mongering and urban myth-cycles.
His teaching assistant Farkas had tried to warn him but Farkas had been the first sacrifice. They had let him keep his tongue and he had shrieked and begged until his voice became the choking gurgles of a half-drowned man.
“...legends that spread over social networks, so-called evidence that is nothing more than here-say and poorly doctored photographs...” Mercer breathed, “...they are the embodiment of middle class fears, the terror that a lost job or economic setback will throw them down amongst...”
A cry rose up and dwindled. There was a sound that reminded Mercer of celery stalks being torn from the root.
A week ago Mercer had convinced a group of friends and students to join him in Las Vegas for what he had promised would be a ‘working holiday’. They would spend a few days enjoying the sights and the shows, then they would head off to Vantage Acres with digital cameras and notebooks.
The cloaked shaman drifted past again. Mercer called out, “Listen to me! People know where we are!”
That was a lie, both he and his captors knew it, but wasn’t that all part of the ceremony? Weren’t sacrifices supposed to beg?
“...the recent wave of foreclosures have left the city of Las Vegas with one of the highest concentrations of empty houses. Pools have become stagnant breeding grounds for biting insects. Vermin infestations are common as are encroachments from larger animals like bobcats and coyotes but rumors abound that human beings are responsible for the most terrible...”
Mercer heard the sound of someone blubbering, then a struggle and a brief chase. The chase ended with the muffled ringing of metal pipes crashing down on soft flesh.
At first Mercer and his friends had found exactly what they were looking for, downtrodden families living in forgotten homes, foraging for food in the garbage of the financially solvent and stealing what they needed from local stores. As wildlife slowly reclaimed the abandoned neighborhoods some families and clans had begun hunting and trapping.
A crowd of strangers had approached Mercer and his friends shortly after sundown. He had marveled at their piercings and their warpaint and most of all how young they were. Most were little more than teenagers in dirty designer clothes but some of the older ones wore faded military fatigues with the insignias torn away. Farkas and the others had wanted to retreat but Mercer made them stand their ground. He needed to speak to these people, to understand and explicate them. His conversation was rambling and one sided as he had tried to draw them out by talking about class warfare and economic angst.
“... they are called many things such as Urban Headhunters, White Savages and, most often, the Pilgrims. Supposedly they roam the countryside snatching up unwary children and stealing wi-fi. What truth is there behind the terrible legends that have sprung up around them? There are...”
The shaman passed by again, rough fabric trailing across the bars of the pit. Mercer grabbed at the hem of the dark robe and caught it in his bloodied fingertips. He held tight.
There was a soft tear as the cloaked figure stumbled and turned back. The face beneath the cloak was bespectacled and cherubic, it stared indifferently at him.
“Talk to me!” Mercer demanded, even now he was sure that if he could just establish a dialogue he could save himself and his career, “Please. Just say something.”
The cloaked shaman paused thoughtfully, then spoke with a soft, sickly voice, “You're next.”
Halloween Prayers
stories of faith and fright
Little Ophelia
by
Al Bruno III
“It slobbered into sight and gropingly pulled its gelatinous green body through the crack in the Earth. After vigintillions of years the stars were right again and Glutomoto was loose and ravening for delight. But you know what?” Uncle Roy said as he lifted the jar from the shelf, “I nearly stepped on him.”
The jar was a cylinder of glass the size of her uncle’s thumb, the lid had been sealed in place by a wire band and a layer of red wax. Little Ophelia held it up to her eyes and puzzled at the confusion of tentacles and eyes within, “Is it dead?”
“No, it is merely sleeping.”
“But how does it breathe?”
“It does not need to, my child,” Uncle Roy plucked the jar from her hand and put it back on the shelf with all the others. Uncle Roy was tall and fat, with pink skin and thick glasses. He had been Little Ophelia’s guardian for as long as she could remember.
“You’re not teasing me are you?” she asked. She wore a dress that was the same shade of black as her hair.
“Of course not my child.”
“Wow.” She whispered. A whole room full of gods, each of them carefully labeled and kept in glass, all of them small enough to fit in your pocket.
No wonder Uncle Roy never went to church.
Then again Little Ophelia never went to church either, or to school for that matter. But what did she need school or church for when everything she needed to learn was contained within the walls of the house’s expansive library?
At least that’s what Uncle Roy said.
And not just books, she had all the toys and games she could ever want. And music too, symphonies and jazz records all for her to play on a hand cranked Victrola. Little Ophelia didn’t miss the amenities of the modern world or the company of children her own age. Why would she when she had her own thoughts to keep her company?
“What about that one?” she pointed at another bottle and Uncle Roy dutifully handed it to her.
“That,” he explained, “is Halmas the Unnamable. I found him in an apple orchard in upstate New York. How fortunate I was to have brought along a butterfly net.”
Halmas the Unnameable didn’t look much like a butterfly, in fact it looked like a half crumpled leaf. Little Ophelia almost said so but then it twitched. It was a tiny motion, so quick that she almost thought she imagined it. “Why is it Unnamable?”
“Supposedly if you speak its name it will appear and smite you,” Uncle Roy explained, “such smitings usually do nothing more than raise a few welts but there have been some allergic reactions.”
She handed the bottle back to him and turned her attention to the long table in the center of the room. Bottles, tweezers and pins were at the ready. A thick old tome was in the corner, the cover was pockmarked and leathery, the pages brittle and worm-eaten. Uncle Roy’s workshop wasn’t anything like Little Ophelia had imagined and she had imagined a great many things.
How many times had she passed by the closed door at night and heard her guardian singing tunelessly to himself? How many times had she surreptitiously tried to open the workshop door while he was out in his garden or away on one of his long trips? She had spent weeks reading detective novels before daring to try and pick the lock.
In the end all it had taken was a hatpin and some patience. When the workshop door had swung open Little Ophelia found Uncle Roy sitting in the darkened room, he had been waiting for her.
“I wish I could go with you,” Little Ophelia said as she thumbed through the old book. It was written in a twisting unfamiliar script, “I hate being alone in the house for so long.”
“It is for the best,” he patted her shoulder, “I assure you.”
“What is this Uncle?” she pointed to a scratchy illustration of a creature that looked like a worm trapped into a clump of dust.
Uncle Roy sighed, “Ah, this is Dievini the Chaos Sultan, or at the very least it was. It drowned in a rainbarrel before I could find it. I tried to preserve it in amber but it was too decayed. I was so disappointed.”
“Are these really gods?” Little Ophelia asked.
“Now your old Uncle wouldn't be one to pull your leg would he?”
“But...” she looked around the workroom, from the neatly arranged glass bottles to the butterfly nets and framed black and white photographs of strange, lost looking places. “But these gods aren't very godlike. Why is that?”
Uncle Roy sat down in his comfortable-looking leather chair, both it and he creaked with age, “A sensible question my dear. You see these are the gods of a thousand other worlds, they travel through space stopping by each planet to deliver their telepathic gospels and father messiahs.”
Little Ophelia nodded, it made perfect sense.
“That was the way it went of eon after eon until the stars were right and these gods seeped down to came to Earth. But they found that there was something about our world, or maybe out humanity in general that weakened them. They shriveled up like salt-sprinkled slugs, some became no bigger than a baby or kitten, others became smaller than the smallest bugs. Many of them went mad with misery some forgot they had ever been gods at all.”
A shudder ran through Little Ophelia, the thought of shrinking away, it was the most terrible thing she could think of, and it was familiar, like a half remembered nightmare.
There was a twinkle in Uncle Roy's eye as he pinched her cheek, “The stars were right but the world was wrong.”
Halloween Prayers
tales of faith and fright
Sugar-Coated Sacraments
by
Al Bruno III
They wore no costumes, just dark clothes and black greasepaint.
Don hit the kid in Frankenstein costume from behind, sending him flying. The kid hit the ground and sat there for a moment stunned and then started bawling as only an eight-year-old could. Roaring like animals Pete and Timmy ran up to the crying boy pushed him back down and stole his bag of candy. The kid screamed even while the three teenagers scurried back into the shadows, laughing hysterically and shouting, "Happy Halloween!"
*
Seventeen minutes later and halfway across Schenectady they hid behind a car and prepared to strike again.
"Check it out the kid in the skeleton costume over there!"
"Nah over by the alley is better, there are four of them. See?" Don whispered.
"Where?" Pete asked.
"Right over there!"
"Ohhhh. See any parents?"
"Nah."
"How old do you think they are?" Timmy said.
Don laughed, "Who cares? Lookit the size of those bags! "
The four children moved down the street, stopping at each house to ring the bell and chant 'Trick or Treat!'
In a few moments the brightly costumed foursome scampered in front of the parked car. Don darted out from hiding, running by and snatching a bulging pillowcase from one of the shocked children.
The kids were screaming by the time Timmy and Pete were on their victims. Timmy snatched the bag from his prey easily, Pete was having a bit more trouble. The girl in the princess costume was hanging onto her treats for dear life. Everyone winced at her high pitched screams.
Don and Timmy were halfway up the street when they turned to see their friend involved in a tug of war with a girl half his size.
A fat man stormed out onto his front porch, his voice a meaty bellow, "What are you doing? Hey you kid!"
Don gasped, “Aw crap!"
Several things happened at once. First the fat man called into his house, "Call the police Ellen!”
Then the faded blue pillowcase tore in half, spilling candy and one lone apple onto the street. Without thinking Pete bent to scoop up a handful and received a swift kick in the nose from the little girl. Pete fell to his knees. The four enraged children pounced on him.
The other candy thieves doubled back and started shoving and throwing fourth graders in every direction.
"Hold it right there!" The fat man was running across his lawn, puffing like he was in the middle of a marathon. "Hey you kids!"
Don pulled Pete up onto his feet and the three boys started running, the voice of the fat man driving them forward.
*
There was a small, nearly abandoned cemetery on the outskirts of town where no tombstone offered a date beyond 1940. A frosty wind wove its way between the dying trees, toppled headstones and defaced mausoleums, carrying in its wake the sound of laughter.
"The nose didn't hurt so bad. It was when the other one kicked me in the balls. That's what hurt!" Pete snickered through a mouthful of Milk Duds, "It hurt so bad I couldn't move! I thought I was gonna die."
Don had three lollipops stuffed into his mouth, "Is that why we had to carry you while we were running from that guy."
They sat in a small clearing; the unkempt grass was tall enough to mask their presence among the broken grave markers. Timmy ran his hands through the rapidly thinning pile of candy, "This's gotta be the best Halloween we ever had!"
Don bit down, chewed and then spit three bent white sticks out of sight. "Here's to tradition."
They had been doing this for four years, an idea born on an October afternoon when on of them had commented "I want to get candy, but Trick or Treating is so stupid."
The rest was history.
Don sifted through the pile of sweets, cursing at the unbelievable amount of candy corn they had. "Who eats this shit?"
"Not me.”
"Can't stand it."
The other two looked to Don as their leader; mostly because he could always get them beer and was gifted with an almost magical way with the girls.
"Anyone want a toothbrush?" Timmy asked. Timmy was the tough guy of the trio, nobody messed with Don or Pete because of his presence among them. His reputation began in junior high when he stabbed an upperclassman in the knee. It had all been an accident but once the school rumor mill had spun out a much more dramatic story. "Man giving away toothbrushes on Halloween is so gay. It's worse than putting razor blades in apples. Hey catch!"
The toothbrush struck the side of Pete's head, "Ow!" He picked a bag of jellybeans and threw, Timmy ducked and the plastic bag bounced off the side of a tombstone.
"Hey!" A smirk spread across Pete's features "Quick- tell me who I am."
He began to waddle in place, thrusting his stomach far forward, "Hey you kids stop! Stop it right there! I mean it!"
Don and Timmy laughed till they were sick.
Pete had been playing the part of the clown since nursery school; he knew by instinct how to make people laugh. It always seemed to casual observers that he didn't quite belong with his two friends. Why would this gentle faced, giggling boy hang out with a pair of hoodlums? And consequently why would they put up with him?
The simple fact was they had been hanging together since grade school and facet of growing up had been able to separate them. It was unimaginable to them that they could ever be anything else.
Suddenly Don hissed, "Shhhhhhhhh!"
"What?" Timmy grinned, "What?"
"Be quiet! I heard something!" Don whispered frantically. "Something like this?" Pete leaned over and let loose a dry rasping fart.
"Shhhhh!"
"Oh wow. I just got a great idea!"
Don was scanning the dark cemetery for with wide, nervous eyes, "Will you guys fucking listen?"
"You got a lighter Timmy?"
"Sure why?"
"We can take turns lighting our-"
"Somebody's out there! Somebody's out there!" Don was trying to whisper and shout at the same time.
"What the fuck are you talking about?"
"I. Heard. Some. Body. Out. There!"
And in that moment of silence that followed they all heard it; footsteps, moving quickly through the long grass.
Timmy turned pale and tossed the beer can he held out of sight. "I hope that it ain't the friggin' cops." He whispered, "I'm still on probation."
"I'm gonna go see what it is.” Don announced, "If it's the cops I'll make lots of noise." And then he disappeared into the long grass.
Pete and Timmy looked helplessly at their surroundings and each other. Toying with the silver ring on his left hand, Timmy tried to block thoughts of the consequences of breaking probation. He'd already spent two months in the JDH; it had been a savage, nightmarish experience. The thought of going back terrified him. The wind picked up speed, bending the sickly green blades of grass back and sending a shiver through the two boys' bodies.
For the first time they truly became aware of where and when they were; their stomachs were sick with butterflies. Pete shifted uneasily away from the tombstone he'd been leaning against, unconsciously trying to get closer to his friend.
Timmy stood, "He's been gone too long. I'm gonna go an see if I can find him."
"No!" Pete half- shouted as he grabbed the taller boy's shoulder and forced him back down into a sitting position, "He's only been gone five minutes!"
"No way."
He flashed his watch, "It's true. Calm down."
Pete tried to remind himself that this place was a popular local hangout and if anything Don would be coming back with some other eager partiers; maybe even some female partiers. The fantasy was distracting but it vanished quickly. For some reason Pete was reminded of a poem he'd heard when he had been half-paying attention in English class, something about a burning tiger in a fearful cemetery.
"Dudes!"
Pete yelped and Timmy grabbed his chest at the sound; then Don stepped into view.
"It weren't no cop." he said, "It was a kid."
Pete's face creased as he read his watch, "A kid? At eleven o'clock?"
"Shhhh. He's still around, an he's- No waitaminute, you guys gotta see this yourself."
*
A child half-ran, half-skipped through the shadowed graveyard, clutching an empty pillowcase in each hand. The store-bought skeleton costume and mask made the wearer indistinguishable from any other of the kids they'd seen tonight.
"I thought you said the kid had two full bags." Timmy whispered from behind the cover of a tombstone.
Don watched the small figure recede "He did."
"Well maybe he was realllllly hungry." Pete snickered.
Without warning Don clouted Pete upside the head, "Fuck you."
"Ow! What did I do?"
"Maybe the kid lives here." Timmy suggested.
Pete laughed, "No one lives in a cemetery."
"No duh!" Timmy sneered, "I meant maybe he lives close by the cemetery."
"Maybe he's got a tree house or somethin' around here." Don stood, "Lessie if we can find it."
He lead them back along the path the costumed child had come from until they found themselves standing in a clearing. The darkness made the landscape surreal; the boundary between shadow and solid reality seemed to twist and blur. It took their eyes a few moments to realize what occupied the center of the clearing.
When realization came it kept them standing there, struck dumb by awe and greed. A crude table had been made from a trio of tombstones, and scattered around it was candy.
Candy of every conceivable, size, flavor and type carpeted the ground in clumsy mounds some as deep as three feet. Foil wrappings glittered darkly as the wind picked up a trio of Yummyburger gift certificates and carried them out of sight.
For the three boys it was not unlike seeing the pyramids or Stonehenge for the first time; they were speechless with wonder.
"Do you guys see what I see?" Timmy said numbly.
"I don't know. " Pete whispered, "What do you see?"
"I asked you first."
"I want to find out if your seeing what I'm seeing before I say anything."
Both were silenced by Don, "Look at all this fuckin' candy!"
Pete and Timmy breathed a sigh of relief.
"Will you look at all this fuckin' candy!"
"How could one kid get all of this?" Timmy asked no one in particular.
"Maybe he steals it like us." Pete guessed.
Don was still shaking his head, "This is a lot of fuckin' candy!"
The small shape in the skeleton costume stepped into view and began to sing.
Each of the boys issued a gasp. Pete thought to himself that he was going to have a heart attack before this was over.
"Who are you?" Timmy shouted, angry at allowing himself to be frightened by a kid.
Another child, dressed identically to the first left the cover of the treeline and joined in on the singing.
"OK." Don said, "This is weird."
A third similarly dressed child joined the others.
Then another.
And then another.
By the time there were seven of them Pete stopped counting, "I think we should go." He started to get really creeped out; he swore he could see some of the candy... moving?
"You kids get out of here!" Timmy shouted, "No one saw us take anything!"
"Guys?" It was like watching an avalanche in reverse, the small brightly wrapped packages were rolling up the mound of sweets.
Don stared bewildered at them, "What the?"
The sound of paper and plastic rustling became loud, almost deafening in its intensity, drowning out the sounds of the children singing.
The heap of candy surged upwards and took on a shape that was huge and undeniably humanoid. Seven feet tall and still solidifying; with huge hands it snatched Timmy up and swallowed him whole.
Screaming the two remaining boys broke into a run.
It gulped the last of Timmy down and set off after more. It gave chase, its every movement marked by the crackling of cellophane and foil.
Pete heard Don cry out and fall, without thinking he ran to help his friend. He threw an arm about Don's waist and pulled him to his feet. "Come on. Come on." He panted.
Before they could take a mutual step it had them both.
They were lifted into the air by claws made of Hershey Bars and rolls of Lifesavers. Pete pulled and pried at them but all he managed to do was tear the waxy paper and expose the sweet smelling candy beneath.
It placed Don's screaming head in his mouth and bit. Pete's hands flew to his ears but there was no masking the cracking tear. It spat the severed head away and gulped at the jets of blood that sprayed from the ragged, red hole till it was dry.
Dropping the headless body it turned its attention to Pete, he had gone mad and he giggled fitfully at the nightmare before him. His laughter became more intense as the huge face loomed in front of him. It was a face made of sourballs with a pair of shining lemon drops for eyes; its ears were candy apples, its teeth a gaping maw of candy corn.
The thing split him open and began to suck out his soft filling.
*
After a while the screams had died down. The costumed children waited patiently at the gravestone altar. The masks had been taken off revealing soft faces and disheveled hair. They were scared, scared even though their dreams had promised that the Confection wouldn't harm them.
But how could they hear screams like that and not be afraid?
The Confection stepped out of the woods, licking its fingers in a self-satisfied way. Its stomach of Kit Kat bars and Pixie Sticks bulged. Instinctively the children resumed their dream-hymn. Grinning the Confection made its way through the identically dressed throng, pausing to pinch the occasional cheek or pat the occasional head. "All in all very fine." Its voice was a dignified rustle, "But next year, less quantity, more quality. Something younger, something plumper."
The children nodded. It stepped up onto the gravestone altar and looked out over them. The Confection raised its arms and the singing stopped. Over a dozen little skeletons surged forward. They tore the Confection limb from limb. Then they tore those limbs apart piece by piece and filled their pillowcases and store bought bags with candy. Curiously none of the sweets were streaked with blood or dirt.
And when the morning came they knew they would find more treats mixed in with the candy, wrinkled currency and tarnished trinkets of gold and silver. Each of the children paused a moment at the gravestone altar to offer thanks and whisper a wish. Already some were making plans for next year, figuring out ways to lure cruel adults and schoolyard rivals into this dark and scared place.
Next year was going to be the best Halloween ever.
Halloween Prayers
tales of faith and fright
The Man That Ate Newborns
by
Al Bruno III
Don't squirm so much my wee one. Don’t struggle. Let me hold you close while I work up my nerve. Only a day old and you're fighting to live, well so am I. Isn't that what we all want in the end? Life, a warm place to sleep and a full belly. Well, that's what you've got and what do I have? Nothing I'm just a middle aged man, used up and waiting to die.
Just like you, not that you realize what's coming next of course.
Then again maybe you do understand, you may be blind and confused but maybe you do know somehow. Is that why you keep trying to get free?
This is all because of Eve. We had known each other since college. She was already halfway towards becoming a lawyer and I was a well respected graduate student. You should have seen her. She was so damn beautiful with creamy skin- just like yours. I first saw her in the college library, I was so smitten that I followed her home. Just to see if she was married or living with a boyfriend or something like that. I spent the next few days tracking her, learning whatever I could and once I was sure I knew enough to pass for her soulmate I made my move.
I played my cards just right and won her heart. It was a whirlwind romance, the kind of thing you'll never know my wee one. Maybe that's just as well, maybe if you could you'd thank me for sparing you the heartbreak.
Even now I don't know what went wrong. Was I too agreeable? Too clingy? It doesn't matter. She found someone else. The breakup was an ugly thing, uglier than you my wee one.
She tried to be gentle, she told me we could still be friends. I was so angry, I said terrible things but in the end I took her up on the offer of friendship and hoped she might come to her senses.
I'll never understand women. They're called the fairer sex but everything they do is unfair. How is it time and time again they're drawn to the wrong men? Why couldn't she see that her new boyfriend was all wrong for her? And why for God's sake did she marry him.
Now don't get me wrong, I tried to move on. There were other towns, other girls and no matter how much I learned about them before I made my move I never got as far as I had with Eve.
Was that why I kept coming back to my home town? Was that why I stayed her friend even though the sight of that ring on her finger left my skull pounding with rage?
Calm down now my wee one. I might drop you if you keep struggling so. Is that what you want?
I stayed her friend, I prayed for her to divorce but then it got worse. They were tears of joy in her eyes when she told me she was pregnant. I smiled at the news but in the back of my mind I was calling her a bitch. She never cried for me but she had a fountain of tears for a baby that wasn't even born yet. A baby that at this point was just a lump of cells no better than a tumor.
Some say life begins at conception but I don’t think it begins until you have your first real thought. Until then your just a thing that eats and crawls mindlessly.
It was during her final trimester that I decided something radical needed to be done. I would steal her little baby and I would keep it away until she promised to leave her husband and love me forever.
We would raise the child together. Even though it was another man's I would raise it as my own.
Thanks to things like email and her husband's Facebook page I knew when Eve started to go into labor. I waited about twenty-four hours, and then made my move.
As always I had done my homework, I knew the hospital's routine. I went at night, wearing stolen scrubs and an official-looking ID badge.
I made my way to the nursery convinced that no suspicious eyes would turn my way. I suppose love blinded me in that respect. I barely had the baby in my arms before someone raised an alarm. Escape wasn't easy but I managed to get out of the building. Then I found myself in the middle of a car chase. I knew I could evade the police if I made it to the state park and drove with my headlights off.
The crash was a directionless blur, I thought I was running parallel to the ravine but I ended up careening right into it.
Now here I am, pinned in my car with broken bones poking through the flesh of my legs. I had dared everything and I came away empty handed. Doubtlessly Eve and her husband are cooing over their baby and cursing me for what I had tried to do.
I'm not sure why no one has found me yet, I mean they must be looking but it's been two days and I'm still waiting alone.
Well, I was waiting alone until you came along. The flies must have laid you while I was drifting in and out of consciousness but now my wounded legs are crawling with maggots.
This isn't cruelty, it's just that I'm so hungry and you’re all I have. I'm going to eat you first and then once I’ve gotten the taste for it your brothers and sisters will be joining you by the handful.
I'm going to live through this, and somehow I'm going to get my Eve back.
Somehow. Somehow I'll do it.
Just don't squirm so much my wee one. Don't struggle.