Halloween (8 page)

Tommy didn't like this at all. Grown-ups didn't go prowling around schoolyards wearing masks, Halloween or not. And this guy's breathing sounded like something he'd heard when he'd visited his dying grandpa in the hospital. Creepy! He looked down at the pumpkin, wondering if it could be salvaged.

No way. Meat, pulp, and seeds spilled out of its shattered hull like the contents of a cracked orange skull.

When the man stepped toward him, Tommy needed no inspiration to run like crazy. In a moment his blurred legs had carried him out of the schoolyard and down the street, thinking about the bogeyman.

The man stood indecisively for a moment, then returned to the station wagon. His gait was quick and graceful for a big man. He started the engine and pulled away from the school, turning the corner and accelerating down the street on which the little boy had run. There he was, still running.

He pulled the station wagon parallel to the boy, studying him for a long moment. Then he accelerated again, leaving the kid in his dust. He turned the next corner, then began cruising at random, familiarizing himself with the street patterns—or returning to places dimly remembered . . .

"It's
totally
insane!" the leggy blonde was saying. Her hands flew out in a wild gesture, making Laurie laugh. Linda always made Laurie laugh. Just about everything the girl was, everything she did, was so alien to Laurie's thinking and behavior that Linda was like a visitor from another planet. Whereas Laurie's beauty was modestly contained in quiet clothing and hairstyle, Linda wore skin-tight jeans and sweaters and bright ribbons in her hair that virtually shouted
sex here!
to anyone with eyes to see.

Linda had never learned to moderate her voice, so everything she said was an announcement or a declaration, supported by gesticulating hands that never seemed to be burdened by such impediments as books or schoolwork.

The girl's friends had unanimously elected her president of the In-Word of the Month Club. Linda was a lightning rod for trendy phrases, which she used to exhaustion for a month, then dropped from her vocabulary forever, to everyone's immense relief. Three months ago it had been
weird
; two months ago,
gross
; last month, she was calling everyone "Jack." This month's word was
totally
.

"It's totally insane! We have three new cheers to learn in the morning, the game in the afternoon, I get my hair done at five, and the dance at eight. I'll be totally wiped out!"

"I think you have too much to do tomorrow," Laurie observed needlessly.

"
Totally!
" Linda replied, even more needlessly.

Laurie sighed. "As usual, I don't have anything to do."

"It's your own fault, and I don't feel sorry for you," Linda declared as they turned a corner onto a shady avenue. "Look at you, Laurie Strode. You dress like a fugitive from Miss Prudence's School for Proper Young Virgins. Your hair is
totally
plain. You wear no makeup at all, no eyeshadow, not even lipstick. If you're hoping to catch a boy, forget it. You couldn't catch a frog the way you look."

"Thanks a lot!"

"Don't get insulted. You know perfectly well how pretty I think you are. But you go around like being pretty is embarrassing. I don't think anyone in Haddonfield knows if you have any boobs, you're always hiding them behind a stack of books that would bring a Sumo wrestler to his knees, for God's sake! And that walk!"

Laurie was shaking with laughter. "Enough!"

"That walk!" Linda shouted her down, really warming to the subject. "With all those books and bags, you look like a drunken mountain-goat with an injured . . ."

"Hey Linda, Laurie!"

They didn't have to turn around to recognize Annie's strident voice, which Linda had characterized once as so sharp it could shatter a hero sandwich. Their inseparable friend slid between them and their pace doubled. Annie was always in a rush, though no one was ever able to figure out why. She rushed to get somewhere and rushed to get out of there. She rushed to eat, but then found herself with so much time on her hands she'd complain about being bored. She was dark-haired, with abundant ringlets that glinted auburn in the late afternoon sunlight. She wore a red sweater and a sweater-vest over that, but it did very little to moderate the thrust of a very large pair of breasts that jiggled unharnessed beneath the fabric. Despite the trends, most of the teenage girls in Haddonfield chose not to disdain bras, either because of traditional midwestern modesty or parental restrictions. But Annie, whose father was the town sheriff, cared not a whit about traditional midwestern modesty or parental restrictions. She not only had been the first of her crowd to abandon her bra, she had been the first to abandon her virginity. Linda had been the second to sleep with a boy, and now the two girls talked about "it" like connoisseurs talking about three-star French restaurants.

"Why didn't you wait for me?" Annie panted.

"We did," said Linda. "Fifteen minutes. You never showed up."

"That's not true. Here I am."

"What's wrong?" Laurie asked. "You're not smiling."

"I'll never smile again. Paul dragged me into the boy's locker room . . ."

"I'd smile plenty if a boy did that to me!" Linda said exuberantly.

"Exploring uncharted territory?" Laurie asked.

"It's been totally charted," Linda remarked, giggling.

"No, he dragged me in there to talk to me."

"You just talked, huh?"

"We just talked."

"Sure," both girls said in unison.

"Honest. Old Jerko got caught throwing eggs and soaping windows. His parents grounded him for the weekend. He can't come over tonight," Annie sighed, almost ready to cry.

"I thought you were babysitting tonight," Laurie said.

Linda sneered. "The only reason she babysits is to have a place to . . ."

"Shit!" Laurie cried, snapping her fingers.

"I
have
a place for that," Annie said, mock-indignantly.

"No, I forgot my chemistry book."

"Who cares?" Linda laughed. "I
always
forget my chemistry book!"

"You forget everything but your pill," Annie teased.

Laurie turned on her heels, wondering if it was worth it to run back to school to get her book. Maybe she could just borrow one.

The station wagon turned into the street and cruised slowly toward them. Laurie frowned. This was the same car that that spooky man had been in when Laurie spotted him from the window of her English Lit class. She peered at the figure in the driver's seat, but the glint of late afternoon sunlight and the reflection of trees on the windshield made identification impossible.

The girls turned to look too as the driver gunned his engine and glided by, staring at them.

"Isn't that Davon Graham?" Linda said, squinting. "He's cute."

"I don't think so," said Laurie, noting again the strange pale face with eyes limned in dark purple. A moment later the car whizzed by, leaving the three gaping at what they thought they'd seen behind the wheel.

"Speed kills!" Annie yelled at the driver.

All of a sudden the car screeched to a halt. The figure sat there, waiting.

The girls stood on the sidewalk hesitantly. Usually they'd pile into a passing car that stopped for them, even if they only remotely knew the guy. But there was something unsettling about this situation. "Can't you take a joke?" Annie said, addressing the car but making sure the driver didn't hear her.

He stared at them, making them intensely uncomfortable, as if he had the power to see through clothing. Then, to their relief, he stepped on the gas and took off down the street, disappearing around a corner.

Laurie shook her head. "Annie, some day you're going to get all of us in deep trouble."

"Totally!" Linda agreed, putting a hand over her chest and hyperventilating.

"I hate a guy with a car and no sense of humor."

"That's the only kind you date," said Linda.

They strolled on, their spirits somewhat subdued by their encounter. Laurie was pensive and troubled Something was wrong. That man . . . the figure in the window of the Myers house . . . Halloween . . . a butcher knife blurring toward her . . .

Meanwhile, her friends chattered on.

"Well," Linda was saying, "are we still on for tonight?"

"I wouldn't want to get you in
deep
trouble, Linda," Annie replied.

"Come on, Annie. Bob and I have been planning on it all week."

Annie sighed. "All right. The Wallaces leave at seven."

Laurie made a conscious effort to pull her mind away from its morbid fixation. "I'm babysitting for the Doyles. It's right across the street. We can keep each other company."

"Terrific," Annie groaned. "I've got three choices. Watch the kid sleep, listen to Linda screw, or talk to you." They stopped in front of Linda's house, a pastel green frame house with dark green shutters. It was nestled beneath a towering elm whose leaves twirled to the prim lawn with every gust of the autumn breeze. "What time?" Annie asked, without enthusiasm.

"I don't know yet," Linda replied. "I have to get out of taking my stupid brother trick-or-treating."

"Saving the treats for Bob?" Annie asked gaily.

"Fun-ny. See you." Linda walked up the path to her house, her tightly clad rear end jiggling seductively.

"You don't have to wiggle it," Annie called out to her, "there aren't any guys around."

"You can never tell when one may be hiding in the bushes," Linda replied, shouldering the front door and disappearing inside.

Annie and Laurie started up the street again, Annie launching into a tirade about Paul's stupidity in getting himself grounded on one of the key weekends in the year. As she rattled on, Laurie saw the figure again.

At least she thought she did. About fifty yards down the street, something was standing at the edge of a tall hedgerow separating two homes. The khaki green of his coveralls blended so well with the olive color of the bushes that for a moment she thought it was merely an extension of the shrubbery. Then she glimpsed the ghostly white face through the leaves. "Look!"

"Look where?"

"Behind that bush there?"

Laurie pointed to . . .

. . . an empty spot beside the hedgerow.

"You're going to tell me there was a guy in the bushes, right?"

"There was."

"Very funny. A second after Linda says there may be a guy hiding in the . . . really, Laurie. Your sense of humor. "

"I'm telling you. The man who drove by, the one you yelled at?"

"Subtle, isn't he? Hey, creep!" Annie raced down the street ahead of her friend, balling her fist to slug the masher lurking in the bushes. She peeked around and . . . A cunning smile came over Annie's face. "Hey, Laurie, he wants to talk to you," she shouted. Laurie stood riveted to the sidewalk. "He wants to take you out tonight!"

Laurie approached the hedge cautiously, knees tensed to catapult her out of there quickly. Like a timid kitten, she peered around the hedge. Nobody there. "Very funny, to use your expression."

"One practical joke deserves another."

"He was standing right here."

"Poor Laurie," Annie commiserated, "you scared another one away." She petted her friend on the head.

"Cute."

They ambled down the street, Laurie looking skittishly behind her and approaching another hedgerow with trepidation.

Annie became serious. "It's tragic. You never go out. You must have a small fortune stashed from babysitting. What's your story? You scared? I'll show you how to relax. You prefer girls? I'll try anything once."

Laurie laughed, then shrugged. "Guys think I'm too smart."

"I don't. I think you're whacko. You're seeing men behind bushes!" They stopped before a pretty ranch home partially masked from the street by a pair of dogwood trees. "Well, home sweet home. I'll see you."

"Okay. 'Bye."

"I'll call you or you call me."

"Right," said Laurie, approaching the last privet hedge on the street with steeled legs. She leaned around it, inch by inch.Nobody.

She looked behind her, walking backward as she scanned the street for the mysterious figure or his station wagon.

Suddenly a hand gripped her arm.

She screamed, dropping her books. She tried to run but the hand clutched her arm too tightly. Over her right shoulder she caught the shadow of a big man. Vaguely remembering some judo moves her gym teacher had taught her class for warding off would-be rapists, she shifted her weight, grasped the man's wrist, and stuck her leg between his. She started to roll forward. "
Unggg
," she groaned, as the man stood his ground effortlessly. Momentarily she expected to feel the cold steel of his blade plunging into her stomach or slicing across her throat. Then she noticed the color of his sleeve.

Navy blue.

She relaxed and the hand released her. She whirled around and almost collapsed with relief in the arms of Sheriff Lee Brackett, Annie's father.

The handsome, ruddy-faced man in the blue trooper's uniform laughed. "You won't win a black belt that way."

Laurie sighed loudly. "Mister Brackett! Thank God!"

"You were maybe expecting the bogeyman?"

"I don't know what I was expecting."

"I'm sorry, honey. I didn't mean to startle you."

"It's okay."

"Well," he said, stooping, to help her pick up her scattered books, "it's Halloween. I guess everybody's entitled to a good scare."

"Yes, sir."

"But look here. Next time someone comes up to you from behind like that, here's the way that throw is supposed to go."

He stood in front of her and demonstrated the classic move.

"For one thing, you used the wrong foot. No leverage that way. Here, put your books down for a second."

Laurie set them down, then positioned herself in front of Brackett, who must have been six foot two and close to two hundred pounds. "I think I could toss an oak tree easier than I could budge you!" she laughed nervously.

"Some ancient Greek said, 'Give me a lever long enough and I could move the world.' It's all in leverage."