Trick or Treat

A Story by Rachel

Petra is home alone on Halloween, when she notices an odd trick or treater that just won't seem to leave her alone...

Trick or Treat

“Trick or treat!” Four children stood at my doorsteps. One was dressed like a ghost, one as Elsa from Frozen, one as a cat and one as a pirate. They looked to all be about ten years old. They smiled and held out bags. I smiled at them. “Happy Halloween, kids,” I said, grabbing a handful of Hershey Kisses from a bowl and dropping some in their bags. “thanks, lady,” the pirate said, and they ran off. I stepped onto my doorstep. The October air was cold and crisp. The smell of hot apple cider, crisp leaves and woodsmoke filled the air. Jack o’ lanterns lit up the night with their eerie, candle lit grins and kids and families alike roamed the streets in costume. Halloween was my favorite time of year. Unfortunately, I had no one to spend it with. My family was away, my father on a business trip, my mother visiting her sister in Florida. They had left me alone for the week, making me promise to not throw any crazy Halloween parties, jokingly of course. I had been planning to have my best friends Noel and Sarah over to watch horror movies, but last minute they had been invited to Vince Lancaster’s Halloween party, which I knew would be crazy. People would be getting drunk and high, and the police would probably break up the party by ten o’ clock. As an introvert, that sounded horrible to me, so I decided to stay home.

Now, I closed the door and walked back into my house. I was chilly, so I decided to heat up some hot apple cider and watch some horror movies. I grabbed a pot from under the sink and was about to turn on the stove, when my doorbell rang. More trick or treaters, I thought. I went to the door and opened it. Sure enough, a group of kids stood on my doorstep again. I handed them each candy, and they thanked me. “What’s your name?” one of them, a girl dressed as a princess asked. She had big blue eyes and blonde hair. “Petra,” I said, “how about you guys?” After chatting with them for a moment, they skipped off, candy bags in their hands, and I turned to close the door, smiling, when I noticed something out of the corner of my eye. One kid that had been in the group had not moved from his spot on the stoop, and was staring straight at me. Dressed as ghost, in a dirty white sheet with eyeholes, the kid just stood there, looking at me. He or she, I couldn't tell, was tall for a kid, looked about twelve or so. Dirty black boots peeked out from under the sheet.

“Um, kid, I gave you your candy already, didn't I?” I asked. No response. I felt a little uneasy at this point, but I took at step closer to the kid. “Hello?” I said. The kid stared at me, dark eyes boring into me. “Okayy,” I said, “Have a good night, kid.” I walked into my house, closed the door and locked it. That was odd, but I figured that some kids were a little strange at times, and decided not to think about it. When I looked through the peephole, the kid was gone. I sighed and went back to the kitchen to finish making my cider.

I was halfway through Halloween and finishing my cider then the doorbell rang again. By now, it was already late, and most trick or treaters had gone. With a bit of uncertainty, I headed for the door, remembering that creepy kid. I laughed to myself. What could a strange kid dressed as a ghost do to me? Besides, the kid had gone away a long time ago. Ding dong! I jumped. Get a grip, Petra, I told myself. I looked through the peephole, and felt my heart lurch when I saw the same kid standing there. I didn't open the door. “W-what do you want?” I asked through the door. To my disgust, my voice shook a little. Looking at the kid through the peephole, I suddenly saw the kid smile, revealing blackened, rotting teeth, and I realized then that the person outside was not a child. It was a man, and he knew that I was home alone. I jumped when he started knocking frantically on the door, a series of loud raps.

“Go away! I’m calling the police,” I said. I grabbed my phone and dialed 911. “What’s your emergency?” the woman on the other line asked. “I- there’s this man knocking on my door. He won’t leave me alone. He knows I’m alone in the house. Please can you help me?” The woman sighed. “Has he threatened you?” I told her he hadn't but she said that she would send a car over anyway. “It’s Halloween, and you are a girl all alone in a house. Better to be safe than sorry!” I thanked her profusely, and hung up. By then, the knocking had stopped. I looked through the peephole. The man was gone. I sighed in relief, but a voice in the back of my mind told me that he was not really gone.

I waited a few minutes, sitting down on the couch in my living room, my heart racing. This night was turning into a horror movie. Bang! Sure enough, when I checked again, there he was, smiling his rotting smile. For the first time, I noticed a glint of light in his hand, realized he was holding a large, seated kitchen knife. “Who are you, what do you want? I called the police!” I yelled. He tilted his head, an eerie imitation of Michael Myers, holding the knife up to the peephole. Slowly, he slashed the air with the knife a few times, grinning, still silent. Then he turned, walked down the steps and disappeared into the night. I called the police again. “911, what’s your emergency?” It was the same woman as before. “I called before, you said you would send over a car! A man is standing outside my door. He has a knife, and he threatened me with it. He left now, but please, check that the car is on it’s way over!” The woman gasped. “He has a knife? I did send over a car, it should have been there a few minutes ago, according to the GPS on my computer. You sure it isn't there? You gave me the right address, right? 231 Jones Road? Where is the man now?” My heart lurched. Why wasn't the police here yet? That was the correct address. Still on the phone, I did something stupid and cracked open the door. The cold air filtered in. A police car with it’s lights on idled in my driveway, but no one was knocking on the door. “Hello?” I called, “Officer?”

I jumped as I heard a loud snap and screamed as the body of a man in a police uniform fell from above me and landed with a sickening crack in a heap on the porch, his neck twisted at a terrible angle. Dead. “No!” I yelled. The woman on the phone called my name. “Ms. Carter?” she was saying, but was running back into my house and slamming and locking the door behind me. “I’m here!” I gasped into the phone, leaning against the door. Only a dial tone greeted me. “No, no, no,” I yelled as I frantically redialed. The knocking started again, and tears streamed down my face as I heard the man chanting softy, “trick or treat.” Over and over. The phone just kept on ringing, no one picking up. I hung up, sank down against the wall in defeat. By then, the knocking had stopped, but I knew he wasn't done with me. I needed to get out of the house without him seeing. I ran to the window in the living room and looked at it. I could probably fit through it. I lurched it open and put one leg out, then the other. I landed safely on the ground, and immediately started running. “Help!” I screamed. “Someone help me!” The streets were empty and quiet. There was no sign of the man.

I ran down my street as fast as I could, hoping to got to the police station, but stopped when I saw the jack o’ lantern flickering, sitting in the middle of my block on the dark street. I took a shaky step closer, mesmerized by the flickering flame. The carved pumpkin grinned at me. I turned to run, and saw the man a few feet away, knife in the air. “W-who are you?” I asked. The man stepped closer. I saw his watery, brown eyes staring at me through the sheet’s holes. I was frozen, couldn't run or hide. In the distance, I heard sirens. “Trick or treat,” the man whispered, and brought the knife down.

Epilogue

The police found the girl’s body on Jones Road. They wrapped her in a body bag. Identified her as Petra Carter, nineteen. The police shook their heads. “What a brutal Halloween,” he said. His partner nodded, “It’s alway bad to find the younger one’s like this. Like something out of a horror movie.” Neither of them noticed the man standing in the shadows, the sheet he wore for his ghost costume blowing silently in the wind, holding the blood covered knife. He couldn't wait for next Halloween. The flame in the jack o’ lantern flickered out in the cold, autumn breeze, drowning everything in darkness. Trick or treat.