I couldn’t believe I met him. I was just strolling along, my bag of candy dragging on the ground. My wife told me 36 was too old to Trick or Treat, but ten pounds of candy proved otherwise.
I was still in my Justin Bieber Halloween costume, and my stomach was overstuffed from too many Bit O’Honey’s and Mary Janes—don’t judge, someone has to eat them—when I stopped to vomit. As I bent over, I puked right on a pumpkin. Wiping some forgotten Mike and Ike from the corner of my mouth, I noticed his dark silhouette rise up out of the pumpkin patch.
First off, let me tell you, he’s kind of a dick. When I walked across the pumpkin patch, I couldn’t help but step in those damn rotted gourds. They squished beneath my feet, and I slipped and fell flat on my back. And what did he do? Nothing. He stood there and laughed. Eventually he came over to me, and there I was, face to face with the Great Pumpkin.
You want to know what he’s like? I hate to spread rumors, but he’s got some serious issues. He told me that he’d been watching some kid named Linus for years, and just to fuck with him, refuses to appear. I guess the kid is his biggest fan, his only fan, but he just watches from afar. He said he’s waiting for the right time, and age, to appear. I think there are some lascivious motives to his stalking. It seems unnatural, downright creepy for this dude to follow a progeria stricken child once a year. Come to think of it, most of the young boys in this neighborhood seem to have progeria.
Anyway, there I was, with Great P—yeah, that’s what he told me to call him. I’m smeared in squash guts and rotting gourd and this dude is telling me about this kid, and how he tricks him into waiting outside on Halloween night. I guess last year, Linus got mild hypothermia because he fell asleep waiting. After he passed out, Great P crept through the patch, and took a selfie with him. Messed up. And, to boot, Linus still carries around a safety blanket; some obvious developmental and psychological issues going on here. This just seems downright cruel, like he’s torturing this kid.
So, after I get up, he asks me to go to a party with him. I figure, what the hell, this is my year of Yes, and its not often I get to party with a celebrity. So, we walk across the field to this rager being thrown by a chick named Violet. The party. It. Was. Insane. People were passing around ludes, taking E, smashing whippets. They punked some kid by drawing a face on the back of his bald head and then it went real dark, they tried to drown a dog.
It was screwed up. This white beagle. They were all high and decided to dress this dog up like a World War One flying ace, and then put him in the same tub they were bobbing for apples. I tried to stop them, but Great P was ODing in an upstair bathtub after shooting up with some PSL, and I had to give him an atomized dose of Starbucan up his nostrils. I’m not sure what PSL is exactly, but the kids told me it was some form of spice. The only way that dog escaped, was by latching on with his teeth to an apple in this chick, Lucy’s mouth, as she pulled her head up out of the water. She freaked out because, this dog, Snoopy, “kissed her.” This whole family has some deep seated issues.
The live music wasn’t bad. It was real hipster. Like bringing a typewriter to the coffee shop, hipster. This kid, Schroeder, he carries around a portable toy piano, all casual, like its a normal thing. Seriously, who even finds shit like that. What vintage store in Logan Square did he purchase that in?
Now, Charlie, he was the brunt of all jokes. He took a beating. This is the kid whom they drew a face on the back of his head. You can tell if this continues in life, he’s going to buy an AR-15 and find himself perched in a bell-tower. It was his dog they tried to drown. They held him down and made him watch. Kids can be so cruel.
Linus’ sister, Lucy, she’s the ringleader of all the bullies, and, typical, basic bitch. She spent hours showing me selfies on her phone; all Han Solo and Duck Lips and Starbucks and PBRs. In one she was even drinking a unicorn frap. I couldn’t help but cringe. She fed poor old Chuck alcohol all night. After he was good and drunk, they took him outside, and dared him to punt a football. Charlie, all wobbly and shit, seeing double, well, he’d try to concentrate and take a running start, and at the last minute, Lucy would pull the football away, causing him to land flat on his back. They must’ve done this four or five times. Fuck, I think he might have retrograde amnesia after hitting his head that many times.
Great P eventually joined me outside. He was drinking some concoction of pumpkin beer with a shot of spiced rum. He had a mean drunk on, and wanted to cause mischief. I was pretty buzzed by this point, and figured we better leave before Charlie went all Waco on this place, and burned it down to the ground with everyone inside.
Most of his tricks, in oneway or another, involved shitting on people’s doorsteps or smashing Pumpkins. At one point he picked up a Jack O’Lantern and began dry humping its face. He was screaming, “What ya think of your boy now Ma? Huh?” It was slightly disturbing. I tried to fade away when he was busy, to leave him to his own devices, but he noticed, and grabbed my arm, pulling me on with him.
We came full circle, ending the night in that damn pumpkin patch. It was so creepy. That poor kid, Linus, he’s worse off than I thought. His head is huge—I think he might be hydrocephalic—and he looked wan, like he was going through cancer treatments. We watched as Lucy came by all drunk and berated him in front of her friends. He stood resolute though, defending Great P. He could’ve ended this debate and saved Linus, but instead he remained crouched down behind a bunch of cornstalks, staring intently, breathing heavy, with that huge toothy grin of his, stroking the tassels on an ear of corn.
I called it quits when he began muttering to himself, and taking nips off his flask. At one point he snorted a mixture of cinnamon and nutmeg off the curved back of a butternut squash. He told me it was, “to stay frosty.” He began to look at me with those hollow triangular eyes and his broad smile in a weird way; as if I were Linus. It creeped me the fuck out.
I woke up the next morning with a raging hangover, but ten pounds of candy to my name. I now have street cred with a lot of the neighborhood kids.
Word got around to Linus that we all partied with Great P. I guess he’s on suicide watch right now.
I think next year I might want a change of scenery. Maybe I’ll travel to Derry. I hear that town has a crazy Halloween.
Drinkers with Writing Problems 