October Flash #1 - "Charming" 👸🎃🤴🥃

We can't celebrate Halloween without a Berry Swirl tale...🧹

Halloween

Maynard, Kentucky

Kay ends up in the kitchen. She looks harried, she looks pinched and furious. Which is a shame, because she also looks cute, which is an impressive trick, dressed in a costume like that.

“Fuck,” she says. I get the feeling that she doesn’t curse much, I’m guessing that something serious has pushed her to the expletive.

Just kidding. I don’t have to guess.

“Cool costume,” I say from my seat at the table.

Kay puts a hand to her chest and looks over with wide, blue eyes. “You scared me.” The last thing she needs, given the circumstances.

I shift my black pointy hat to reveal an empty glass and a bottle of Maker’s Mark in front of me. “Just having a moment.”

Kay frowns, as if trying to decide whether it’s my fault she didn’t see me at first.

(It is.)

She looks at my costume and I imagine her wondering if I’m a real witch.

(I am.)

I wouldn’t normally wear so much black, and I don’t need the pointy hat, just like I don’t need the broomstick that’s propped up against the table. That’s just for fun, to celebrate the holiday. Besides, who’s going to think a red-haired girl in a witch costume from Target can cast spells for real?

Kay looks back towards the hallway. Is she thinking of returning to the party? The living room door is closed but we can faintly hear the DJ playing ‘Superstition’ by Stevie Wonder, which is excellent, but he’s also played ‘Monster Mash’ and ‘Ghostbusters’ in the last few minutes. Not the coolest of parties. But when was Halloween ever cool?

I need Kay to stay in the kitchen, but she looks twitchy – I don’t blame her – and there’s a chance she’s just going to run, which will make things messy. I just want to finish the job and go home. Clean my cauldron, feed my black cat, ha-ha.

“Get a glass,” I say, pointing at the cabinet. “Have a drink with me.” I give her a sympathetic eye. “You look as though you need one.”

She sits across from me. “I’m Kay.”

I nod. “Melissa Jane. People at parties can call me MJ.” I pour the whisky and then I raise my glass. “What are we drinking to?”

Kay doesn’t provide a toast. She downs the shot, coughs with watering eyes, and then pushes her glass towards me for another.

“Here on your own?” I ask.

“My boyfriend.” She waves at the empty space around her. “Around here somewhere, can’t find him.” She moans. “Least of my problems.”

She’s pretty enough, but she looks miserable. Despite her costume, she is not, if anyone asks me, good enough to eat.

“Tell me all about it,” I say gently, and I pour her second shot.

She holds her glass, peers down at the whisky, and then looks at me. “MJ, what’s my costume?” she asks. “Because every single other person at this dumb party says I’m a princess.”

I raise an eyebrow. “A princess?”

She nods emphatically, and then says, her tone helium-pitched and sickly sweet, “A pretty pink princess.” She stares at me, as if daring me to agree with the other guests.

I look her up and down. “Less princess and more…delicious snack. I can see a toasted tortilla, and I can see a filling of lettuce, tomatoes, and cheese. So…I’m guessing you’re dressed as a taco.”

“Thank you!” she cries, her tone back to normal. She takes another drink, more leisurely this time, jerks her thumb towards the hallway, and says, “They’re playing like some giant, dumb practical joke in there, and it’s not funny.”

“Everyone says you’re a princess?”

Kay scowls. “And they say it like I’m five years old.” She throws up her hands. “And then they ask where my daddy is!”

“Spooky.” I turn my whisky glass around in my hand. I could drink some if I wanted to, it wouldn’t affect me. But I’m not a big liquor fan. “So what’s your boyfriend dressed as? Assuming he hasn’t disappeared forever, I mean. Fast food or royalty?” I ask curiously, as if I’m deducing, as if I don’t already know.

Kay rolls her eyes. “Prince Charming.”

“Huh,” I say. And then I tip my glass and drink the whisky, because what the hell, sometimes I just need the burn.

“You think he put everyone up to this?”

I make a so-so gesture with my free hand. “Kay, I think Steve put someone up to it. Everyone else, they’re just innocent bystanders.”

Kay frowns. She’s thinking, no doubt, that she never gave me his name. She doesn’t look panicked. She’s not as horrified as she’ll be in a few seconds. “You know my boyfriend?”

“We’re not buddies or anything.” I screw the cap back on the whisky bottle. “We had an arrangement, that’s all.”

Someone down the hall opens the door, and we can hear ‘I put a Spell on You,’ by Screamin’ Jay Hawkins. Which is kind of perfect.

“What are you talking about?” Kay glares at me. She’s sure that she doesn’t like me, but she still doesn’t know the whole story.

If she did, she’d be on her knees, begging me to change the plan.

Then again, there are some folks who have paid me to do this to them.

Let’s see what kind Kay is.

I tap the pointy hat. “I’m a witch, for real. And the reason why everyone is treating you like a little girl in a princess costume is because that’s exactly what they’re seeing. It’s called a glamor.”

“B.S.,” whispers Kay. But she flinches when I flutter my fingers at her, hocus-pocus style.

“The glamor stretches further than this party. It’s the whole town.” Meaning, don’t bother trying to run. I don’t actually know how for the glamor goes, but city limits is a good guess. “As long as you stay here in Maynard, everyone will see you as a regular little girl. If you leave town, then the glamor fades, and you’ll be normal again.”

Well, kind of.

Kay pushes back her chair, stands up and points at me as if she’s going to cast a spell of her own. “You’re full of it,” she says, without expanding on what ‘it’ is. She sneers. “You wasted your time. Like this was supposed to scare me. I’m not scared, I’m just bored.” She pats the side of her costume, probably figuring out how she’ll get a ride home. Her phone and money will be useless to her in another sixty seconds.

“Steve didn’t want to scare you,” I reply. “He just wants you to have a fun Halloween.” And to have her see him like a real Prince Charming, because he knows about her swiping right. I spare a thought for her Zoosk and eHarmony profiles, and I almost say, You didn’t wear your taco costume for those guys, did you.

“Fun?” Kay snorts. “This isn’t fun, it’s lame. I’m leaving.”

“You’re not having fun yet, because you’re still thinking like the old Kay. Give me a second, and you’ll be having the best Halloween ever. Because Steve won’t be Steve, he’ll be your daddy, and he’s going to take you trick or treating so you can show everyone your pretty princess costume.”

“You can’t just…” She screws up her face, and I wonder if she wants to stamp her feet. She pokes her finger down at me. “You don’t even look like a witch,” she says. “I saw that costume at Target!”

I can afford a smile. “Yeah, you’re right. I actually got this at a discount because it was missing the wand.” I look right at Kay. “The rest of the spell doesn’t need a wand. You just drank it.”

The living room door opens again, long enough for the chorus to ‘I want Candy,’ by The Strangeloves. I make a mental note to tip the DJ.

Still sitting down – because some spells are so easy, some are like falling off a log these days – I wait for Kay to look down at the whisky bottle, and then I say something that’s not in English. Something ancient, something scary-sounding, and Kay feels it, she stiffens, eyes wide, and then she relaxes.  Because it’s done.

I watch her face as the magic takes hold. Her face softens, her shoulders lower. I don’t tell her that while the glamor really does fade outside of Maynard, the changes to her own mind won’t.

Now, I get up and put on my pointy hat. I look at Kay, and I enjoy the look of childish apprehension on her face. Because she believes it now, she knows I’m a real witch, but she can’t remember how she knows.

I’m not here to torture her. I put my hands together and say, just as high-pitched and sweet as the other guests that has so infuriated her before, “What a pretty princess!”

Kay looks down at herself and beams, her cheeks reddening with a mixture of pride and excitement. In truth, she looks like a tipsy young woman in a taco costume to me, but if I squint my eyes, I can see her, physically as well as mentally diminished, and she does make an adorable princess.

I put a thoughtful finger to my chin. “But where’s your Prince Charming?”

Kay giggles, swinging her hips and gazing at the sparkles before replying grandly, “That’s my daddy!”

I nod with approval. “Wanna go find Daddy so you can go trick or treating?”

“Uh-huh!” She grabs hold of my hand eagerly, smiling trustingly up at the woman who has stolen her adult mind, and I take her through to the party.

THE END

“Kay lost her boyfriend at a costume party, but everyone keeps asking if she's looking for her Daddy” - Joseph