Halloween: The Official Movie Novelization

21

As the red-and-orange-streaked sunset faded to darkness, children prowled familiar streets in costume, clutching bags filled with candy, some so heavy with sugary loot younger kids had trouble holding them aloft. Some children stumbled along behind plastic or rubber masks, turning their heads to compensate for blinkered vision. Others wore blinking lights clipped to their costumes as protection against distracted motorists. Friends exchanged tips on which houses had the best candy and the rare few giving out full-sized chocolate bars.

Parents followed the youngest, pushing strollers or carrying heavier bags between homes to give their kids a break. They walked with flashlights, occasionally reminding the youngest to say the magic words each time a homeowner answered the door. Most welcoming homes sported a jack-o’-lantern or two and artificial cobwebs stretched across plants or around doorframes. Some parents took photos on their phones of the more imaginative decorations: a ring of ghosts holding hands around a simulated fire, novelty dismembered body parts dangling from ceiling fans on covered porches, front yard cemeteries with dark foam tombstones behind zombie hands clawing up from the ground. Most of the photos appeared on social media before the neighborhood photographers returned home with their exhausted children.

Young teens sporting minimalist costumes—smudge-faced hobos, sports-jersey jocks, zombies with gruesome makeup and ripped clothing—carried converted pillowcases and ran from house to house as if hoping to get through the trick-or-treat process as soon as possible, some feeling the first stages of embarrassment in pursuing what would soon be deemed a childish activity. To compensate, they rebelled in their own way, setting off strings of firecrackers every block or two—POP! POP! POP!—shrieking with laughter as they ran from imaginary pursuers.

Startled by a nearby series of exploding firecrackers, Jared, dressed as a cowboy with a boombox small enough to hold on one shoulder, stumbled and dropped his candy bag, spilling his treats across the sidewalk. Oblivious to his accident, his friends rushed along without him. As he dropped to his knees, putting down his boombox to scoop the spilled candy back into his bag, he looked up and called, “Hey, wait up!”

None of them heard, and they continued without him.

Redoubling his efforts, he leaned forward and made a scoop out of both arms to pull the rest toward his bag all at once. While collecting the final pieces, he heard someone breathing louder than him. As he climbed to his feet, lugging his bag and the boombox, a dark shape moved from behind a tree.

Determined to catch his friends, Jared lunged forward—

—as The Shape stepped in front of him—

—and bumped into him, this time managing to hold onto his bag. A quick glance up revealed a pale face that neither smiled nor frowned, no reaction at all—a mask!

Jared might have thought the man too old for trick-or-treating, but he’d seen other parents walking the streets with their kids in full costumes or masks to get into the spirit of the night. Slipping past the unmoving Shape, Jared ran after his friends, shouting back, “Sorry, mister!”

After the collision with the boy The Shape turns to watch him run away—and sees a woman with a flashlight walking behind her house toward a dark utility shed. A moment later, an overhead light switches on. Wearing a red robe, her hair in curlers, she lifts the lid of a freezer and removes a frozen chicken. With the flashlight in one hand and the chicken in the other, she leaves the shed light on, walks out of the shed, and tries to close the door with her foot. On stiff hinges, the door stops short.

As she returns to her home through the back door, The Shape walks toward the light spilling from the open shed door. Unhurried, breathing steady…

Inside, on the floor, The Shape notices a red gasoline storage container next to a propane tank and hedge trimmers. On a cluttered work bench, several padlocks, a bunch of loose nails, a paintbrush, and—

—a wood-handled claw hammer.

A powerful hand closes over the handle, hefts the hammer, testing its weight.

Leaving the light on and the door ajar, The Shape crosses from the shed to the back of the house, taking the same path as the woman, slipping quietly through the rear door.

Inside the house, The Shape notices the glow of a television, the volume turned low and the sounds of activity in the kitchen…

Mentally kicking herself for getting such a late start, Gina Panchella placed the frozen chicken in a plastic container in her kitchen sink, turning on the faucet to defrost it with a cold-water bath. If she’d been thinking clearly, she would have taken it from the freezer and placed it in the refrigerator the day before, soon as she got home. But she’d been a bit scatterbrained lately. She’d write herself lists and place sticky notes on the counter or fridge, but half the time she’d forget to read her own notes. Now she worried she wouldn’t have time to thaw and cook the chicken before Ralph got home from his swing shift.

The combination of watching Kate’s baby girl and dealing with trick-or-treaters until she’d finally run out of candy and turned off her porch light to signal to kids the candy well had run dry, meant she hadn’t had anything to eat since lunch. She couldn’t wait for the chicken to thaw to grab a bite with Ralph, so she decided to make herself a sandwich. Placing a baked ham on the cutting board next to a plate with two slices of white bread, she went to the fridge for a jar of pickles and mayonnaise. After setting them on the counter, she sliced several pieces of ham with a large black-handled chef’s knife, placing them one at a time on the bread. Normally, she’d use two slices, but her stomach was rumbling, so she sliced a third. Then she realized she’d left the Swiss cheese in the crisper drawer. Couldn’t eat her ham sandwich without a slice of Swiss on top.

Leaving the knife on the counter, Gina returned to the fridge, opened the door and flipped through the bagged cold cuts until she located the Swiss cheese. Back at the counter, she peeled off a slice of cheese and added it to the sandwich. After adding a pickle and some mayo, she carried the plate to the kitchen table and set it on the blue-and-white checkered tablecloth. A simple meal for one.

In the sink, the cold water overflowed the plastic container and made a gurgling sound as it splashed down the drain. After she turned off the faucet, Gina made a mental note to refresh the water in thirty minutes. Then reminded herself a mental note wasn’t worth the paper it was written on. Of course, the paper notes hadn’t helped much either, so she had to trust herself to remember. With her stomach continuing to growl, she sat at the table to take a bite of her sandwich—and remembered she’d left out the condiments and cheese.

Forget it, she told herself. I’ll clean up later. Then she had a sudden craving for some chips to pair with her sandwich. Raiding the pantry would only take a few seconds. So, she slid back her chair and tried to stand. Something pushed back against the chair and she lost her balance. As she caught the edge of the table with her hand, she saw a man in dark coveralls standing over her, face hidden by a pale mask.

She opened her mouth to scream—

—as he swung a hammer down and smashed it against the crown of her head, shattering her plastic curlers, which cushioned the blow slightly but lacerated her scalp.

Terrified, she screamed, but the sound came out more as a raw gasp.

And a second blow crunched against her skull.

Her legs buckled, and she fell back against her chair. Blood poured down her forehead, spilling over the bridge of her nose.

She tried to raise her hands to ward off the blows, but her limbs felt as if they were encased in cement. Even as the light dimmed around the edges of her vision, she saw him turn the handle in his hand, twisting the clawed end of the hammer around to face her. His arm rose again. Then the biting edge of the metal claws came at her in a blur of motion. The last thing she felt was a jarring impact, followed by tremendous pressure and the sensation of her skull bursting open, the bones of her face twisting, fracturing and—

The Shape watches the woman collapse into her chair, her open eyes vacant as her head falls forward to strike the tablecloth.

Dropping the bloody hammer to the tiled floor, The Shape walks to the counter, reaches past the cutting board and picks up the black-handled knife.

The Shape turns the sturdy knife back and forth to catch the gleam of light on the sharp blade. Satisfying.

Without glancing at the dead woman again, The Shape crosses the kitchen and the dining room beyond, into the living room. A baby’s crib sits by the front window, bathed in the glow of the television. Inside the crib, swaddled in blankets, the baby cries.

Unaffected by the infant’s distress, The Shape walks out the front door, down the porch stairs and continues to the sidewalk.

A few trick-or-treaters pass, veering around The Shape without comment or reaction. Ahead, The Shape sees a man and a woman hurrying to their car, a doctor and a nurse—costumes not professional attire based upon how much of the woman’s skin is exposed. They open the car doors, get inside, husband in the driver’s seat.

“Oh, hell,” the man—husband—says, “I can’t find my keys.”

“We’re going to be late,” the woman—wife—tells him.

The husband hurries back into the house.

The Shape stops, watches the wife—alone in the car—sitting impatiently in the passenger seat. Vulnerable. The Shape’s fingers flex around the handle of the blade, pressed against The Shape’s side. Hidden, for now.

In the silence, crickets chirp.

The Shape considers.

“Hello?” the woman says, staring at The Shape.

The Shape’s hand tightens around the handle.

“Come on, baby,” the husband says as he crosses in front of The Shape to return to the driver’s seat with his car keys. “Let’s go.”

The Shape steps away from the curb as the car pulls away.

Once the car is gone, The Shape looks up to the next house.

Through the front window, The Shape sees a woman moving around inside…

For possibly the hundredth time that evening, the doorbell rang.

Andrea Wagner veered toward the door, scooping up the wooden serving bowl of Halloween candy she’d placed on the small table by the front door. A few hours ago the bowl had been overflowing with miniature chocolate bars and bags of hard candy. Now… not so much. Only a few lonely items remained. She’d checked the cupboard earlier to confirm she’d emptied every bag she’d stockpiled in the last month or so. This was her last candy hurrah of the evening.

She opened the door with a wide smile on her face.

A chorus of young voices greeted her with, “Trick or treat!”

Three children stood on her stoop, a number that, fortunately, matched the number of items left in her candy bowl. Two girls and a boy, ages ranging from about eight to twelve. Of course, she thought, the McClaren kids. Shane, Payton, and…

Unfortunately, she drew a blank on the younger girl’s name.

“Wow! Look at you, all dressed up,” she said, a phrase she’d repeated throughout the evening. “So, what do we have here?”

Andrea always enjoyed seeing the kids in their costumes. And the littlest ones were so cute. They reminded her of Emma, when she was so small she’d hold her mom’s hand as they walked door to door. Of course, now that her daughter was well into her teens she kept her mother at a socially acceptable distance, basically an adolescent restraining order. Just a phase, Andrea told herself. I was the same way with my parents.

“Let’s see,” Andrea said. “A pretty princess… and a rainbow unicorn, right?” Both girls nodded. “Ooh, and an alien. That’s spooky!”

All three McClaren kids held out their candy bags.

“You guys are my last customers for the night,” she said as she dropped a treat into each bag. “Happy Halloween!”

Mumbling their thanks, the kids rushed off, probably trying to make up for a late start. Only a few costumed stragglers roamed the street. And judging by the number of extinguished porch lights, the flow of candy had cut off at many homes. With a sigh, Andrea closed her door and turned off her own porch light. It was all over so soon.

As she crossed her living room her cellphone rang. Nobody bothered with the landline anymore—other than robo-callers. Not for the first time, she wondered why she still paid for the damn thing.

She stopped in the middle of the living room, pulled her phone out of her jeans pocket and answered the call, immediately recognizing Sally’s voice. “Hey, Sally,” she said. “No, just me. I know. I volunteered as a parent chaperone, but Emma vetoed that idea. Said I’d embarrass her in front of her friends. Well, I hope she’s enjoying the dance. What’s up?” Glancing through the window as she listened, she noticed movement outside, a dark shape, but also something pale—a face or a mask. Another straggler, she thought absently. Tall. Probably a teen making the rounds one last year before—

“Really? Where did you hear that? That’s awful…”

Feeling a chill race down her spine, Andrea suddenly felt exposed.

She hurried to the window, grasped the cord for the horizontal blinds and yanked it to the left to lower them. As the slats dropped, she caught a momentary glimpse of her reflection in the window glass—and she wasn’t alone!

Whirling around, she dropped her phone and screamed.

The dark shape with the pale face stood before her.

Wielding a long chef’s knife, a hand blurred in front of her, slicing left to right below her jawline.

For an excruciating moment, she felt an intense burning pain in her throat—then her world collapsed into darkness…

The Shape watches the middle-aged woman crumple to the floor, blood gushing from the deep neck wound. The blood pools around her tilted head, coating her splayed hair as her empty eyes stare into space.

Turning, The Shape walks out the open front door, knife held low. Drops of blood fall from the tip of the blade, splattering the carpet in his wake…

Dr Ranbir Sartain sat up with a gasp in his hospital bed, covered in sweat. Disoriented, he glanced around the dark room, breathing heavily. The only light came from medical equipment beside his bed and a sliver of light from the hallway outside his room. He was in a hospital now, but he remembered he’d been shot… by the boy who discovered him… on the prison transport bus…

The memory triggered earlier impressions from that evening. Images flashed through his mind; a jumble of violence, like a jigsaw puzzle tossed in the air—accusing faces, staring at him in their final moments—

—a prison guard, Kuneman, bleeds from his neck—

—the bus driver looks up at him, in horror and surprise, involuntarily spinning the wheel as his throat is slit—

—the bus rocks wildly on its suspension as it swerves off the road and down a steep embankment—

—through it all, the Smith’s Grove patients rattle the mesh barrier separating them from the guards, screaming as blood spatters their faces, like a feeding frenzy or a descent into madness—

—a second guard, Haskell, screams, his bleeding face smashed against the mesh-covered window until a gunshot blasts through his skull—

Trembling, Sartain reclined in the hospital bed, focusing on the dull pain in his shoulder to anchor himself. He slowed his breathing to lower his heart rate, watching the display on the monitors as a type of biometric feedback. Though he was alone in the hospital room his recollection of the memories had been so vivid it seemed as if they were on public display.

But the only one who mattered had been there with him.

A witness to the moment.