Toil & Trouble: A Know Not Why Halloween (Mis)adventure (6 page)

“Nothing,” Amber says. “That was just, I don’t know,
very Elizabeth Bennet of you to say.”

“Did Elizabeth Bennet ever cut a bitch?” Cora asks
sweetly.

“Scholars have argued on the matter,” Amber
replies.

“And I know you did not just call Heather my Mr.
Darcy, because you’re not delusional.”

“At the most, I tastefully implied it.”

“Yeah, well, your Mr. Darcy is Mitch, and it’s
frankly offensive to me that you haven’t ridden that all the way to
Pound Town.”

“We’re platonic friends, and please don’t ever say
Pound Town to me again. That’s horrible.”

“I bet you he literally has a notebook somewhere with
your name and a bunch of hearts scribbled in it.”

“He does not,” Amber says severely, her cheeks
reddening.

Cora cackles.

“Besides,” Amber adds, “if we did ... get together or
whatever—not that I want to!—”

She so wants to.

“—wouldn’t it put Howie in a totally awkward position
to have his two best friends dating? I don’t want to freak him
out.”

“Howie freaks out exponentially less now that he and
Arthur are banging on the regular,” Cora says.

“That’s true, actually,” Amber reflects. “Honestly,
sometimes I kind of want to write Arthur a thank you note, but I
don’t think anyone makes a Thanks For Boinking My Bestie card.”

Cora laughs. “Homemake that shit, girl.”

“Seriously, though,” Amber says, sobering. “I don’t
like Mitch.”

“And I want to marry Heather and raise a thousand
slutty babies with her,” Cora retorts. Then, just to make sure she
really hit the point home: “See, we both said completely untrue
things just then.”

“Sluttiness is a fictitious product of the patriarchy
used to control women through shame and sexual double standards,”
Amber scolds.

“I know.” Cora groans and covers her face with her
hands. “She’s turning me evil. And patriarchy compliant. God, I
hate her.”

Amber mutters something that sounds suspiciously
like, “I ship it.”

Cora wisely chooses to ignore that one. Lest she
choke a bitch.

+

“A chainsaw? Why in the world do you need a
chainsaw?”

It is, Howie understands, a little shady of him to
spend like eighty percent of his living time at Arthur’s and only
come home when he needs something from his mommy.

Especially when that something is a big giant murder
tool.

But, well, this is dire.

This is the serious business.

“Dad used to chop down trees and shit all the time,”
Howie says. “He had a certain Ron Swansonocity.”

“That’s true,” Mom says. “I suppose there might be
one out in the shed. Honestly, Howie, I haven’t thought about
chainsaws in ... possibly ever.”

Howie scoffs. “You’re such a Tom Haverford.”

“High praise. What’s with this new interest in
chainsaws, exactly?”

“Uh,” Howie says. “We’re throwing the most hideous
haunted house in arts ‘n crafts history, custom designed by a
gross-brained ten year old, so that we can get his mom, the queen
bee of the local crafting scene, to write a favorable post about us
on her super popular blog that is called, I regret to inform you,
The Yarn Yarn.”

“... well, okay,” Mom says, and leaves the room.

If only everyone involved could walk away so
easily.

+

Instead, he and Amber and Mitch tromp through the
frosty backyard grass to the woodshed.

“Boom,” Mitch says, pointing at a rusty old
contraption at the back of the shed. “Chainsaw.”

They are going to have to fight their way through so
many framed posters from Disney movies and old Nerf guns to make it
there.

“I can’t believe you’re actually even contemplating
the idea of bringing a chainsaw to a party full of third graders,”
Amber says. Ah, Amber. Forever the voice of reason.

“It’s no big. We’ll just take the chain saw fluid
out,” Howie says, “or turn off the ... activation switch.”

“You have no idea how a chainsaw works, do you?”
Amber says.

“Do you?” Howie retorts.

Amber huffs. “I know there are a bunch of sharp edges
all over it even if you do take out the ... activation ... fluids
...”

All three of them stare worriedly at the
chainsaw.

“Who are these kids anyway?” Amber says. “When we
were kids, all we needed was The Monster Mash to keep us
entertained for, like, all of October.”

“You. To keep you entertained. I was just doing my
bff duty.”

“You got really good at the zombie twirl. Don’t deny
it.”

“Unfortunately, I don’t think sweet dance moves are
the answer this time,” Howie says.

“You know,” Mitch says, “it’s really mean for you to
keep talking about it and then not show me the dance. When are you
going to dance again??”

“Never,” Howie and Amber say in unison.

Mitch shakes his head woefully. “That’s messed
up.”

“It’s a messed up world, Mitchy,” Howie says.

“And we’ve totally wandered from the point,” Amber
says.

“Oh yeah,” Howie says, staring gloomily at the
chainsaw.

“You know,” Mitch says, “I bet we could make a
totally realistic chainsaw replica.”

“Oh yeah?” says Howie.

“Yeah! How hard can it be? You’re a professional
craftsman, basically.”

True, Howie hasn’t actually ever put his own arts ‘n
crafts skills to use – those who can’t do ... sell stuff? – but
Mitch is kind of talking some sense right now. Making a ‘chainsaw’
is obviously way better than the deadly alternative.

“Mitchell,” Amber says with an admiring sigh, “you
just saved the lives of scores of children.”

“Well, ya know,” Mitch says, and shrugs humbly. “I do
what I can.”

+

The three of them spend all afternoon crafting an
imitation chainsaw out of an old Nerf gun, a toy broadsword, and a
truly alarming amount of tin foil.

The end result is, well ...

Underwhelming.

“On the plus side,” Mom says diplomatically, upon the
unveiling of their hideous creation (now Howie gets how
Frankenstein feels), “I bet it will be very convincing in the
dark.”

“I bet it would look scary in a strobe light,” Mitch
says. “Everything looks scary in a strobe light.”

“That’s true,” Amber says. She nudges Howie.
“Remember that middle school dance we went to with the strobe light
that you said made me look like Wednesday Addams?”

“No way,” Mitch protests cheerfully. “You’d look
pretty in any kind of light.”

“Shut up, dork,” Amber says, elbowing him lightly in
the side. Who knew the elbow could be such a flirtatious body
part?

“Just sayin’, Ambie,” Mitch replies, beaming at
her.

“Don’t call me that,” Amber says, somehow making it
into the verbal equivalent of fluttering her eyelashes
flirtatiously.

Mom gives Howie a look that says,
When will those
two idiots kiss each other?
It is a facial contortion that
basically everyone in the same vicinity as Amber and Mitch has to
don at some point.

Howie shrugs. The great mystery of all the ages.

“Um,” Amber says, clearing her throat. Busted. “So
... strobe light.”

“You might consider,” Mom says, “getting a fog
machine too. You know. Just to be thorough.”

“Yeah, sure,” Howie says. “Okay. Anything looks
convincing in the cloak of foggy darkness, right?”

Mom stares at the ‘chainsaw’ for a moment longer.

“Convincing-ish,” she says.

+

“You spent hours on
that
?” Arthur says that
night, staring at ... well, at what is clearly an old Nerf gun with
a plastic sword cunningly fastened onto it and covered in
tinfoil.

“As Amber wisely pointed out,” Howie replies, “the
alternative is bringing a giant bladey choppy thing into a room
full of children.”

“That’s fair,” Arthur acknowledges.

“Anyway, get this,” Howie continues, trying to sound
motivational. “We get a strobe light and a fog machine. Everything
will look all mysterious and trippy and shit, and no one will be
able to fact-check us for accuracy! Not when they’re standing in
the dark with a bunch of scary-ass monsters running around.”

“I just don’t want to incur the wrath of Tyler.”

“Tyler is ten.”

“I know,” Arthur says. “It’s complicated.”

+

The next day, Arthur calls a staff meeting.

Once everybody’s seated around the kitchen table, he
sets something down with a
thunk
! Howie leans forward to
see—

A plastic chainsaw.

Oh. Right. Because those are things that exist.

“It was twelve dollars at the Halloween shop,” Arthur
says.

“Oh,” Howie says, and tries not to look wounded.

“I just thought it might be a spot more ... durable,”
he adds apologetically.

“No, no,” Howie says. “Smart move, bro.”

“All right, good.”

Howie wonders if it would be a touch too over-the-top
to have a ceremony of remembrance for the homemade chainsaw.

Mitch and Amber will be into it, he decides. They
were there for its strange and unholy creation. They
understand.

“Then it’s time to get costume matters officially
settled,” Arthur goes on. “Kristy will be the ... elegantly
underdressed—”

“I know I’m a sexy mummy,” Kristy interrupts. Then
she puts on a bright smile. It’s way less convincing than her usual
bright smiles.

“Okay. Yes. Good. Kristy is the sexy mummy. Cora,
you’re the werewolf.”

“Ow ow, aroooooo!” Cora contributes. So at least
someone is still chipper.

“Howie,” Arthur continues, “you’ll do the honors of
being our chainsaw killer. If you could recruit Amber and Mitch to
be brains-eating zombies, that would be fantastic. Kristy, if Cliff
would like to join us, he’s more than welcome to do the same.”

“He’s gonna be so excitedddd,” Kristy says, with
approximately ten percent of her usual enthusiasm.

“And I ...” Arthur finishes, “will be the ghostly
troubadour.”

Everyone stares at him.

“What the hell is that?” Howie says then.

“There’s no way that kid requested a ghostly
troubadour,” says Cora.

“Maybe not specifically,” Arthur says. “But it will
be in keeping with the theme.”

“Yeah, okay, Zombiever,” Howie scoffs.

Now everyone stares at him.

“Like Bon Iver,” Howie explains.

Cora shakes her head. An
oh hell no
kinda head
shake.

Howie looks hopefully at Kristy.

“Not your best,” she admits.

“Damn it,” Howie mumbles.

“I assure you I’ll be suffering just as much as the
rest of you,” says Arthur—sorry, wait, The Ghostly Troubadour.
“Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to spend all of my spare time
from now until haunted house day learning the complete
discographies of Taylor Swift and ... a snake and Little John—”

“What?” says Howie.

“—and writing new eerie arrangements to reflect our
terrifying Halloween setting.”

“Okay, that’s pretty bad,” Cora acknowledges,
snorting.

“What about this whole situation isn’t?” Arthur
replies.

Wouldn’t you know, dude has a point.

+

It’s 12:42. A really excellent time to be asleep.
Howie is
trying
for the whole asleep thing, but it’s made
kind of difficult by the fact that Arthur is still up and sitting
at his desk beside the bed. He’s got his guitar in his lap and
headphones on, and he’s watching YouTube music videos with a
chilling fixedness.

Howie never thought he would find himself battling
Taylor Swift for his boyfriend’s affections.

So, you know, at least wonders never cease.

“Babe,” Howie croaks in a very sleep-mushy voice.
Words ... hard. “You could just, you know, do ... not that. Come
on. Sleeeeeeep.”

“Is it just me, or is You Belong With Me inherently
frightening?” Arthur says, his bleary eyes locked on the computer
screen. “There’s a very menacing undercurrent to these lyrics.”

“Or you could just keep doin’ what you’re doin’,”
Howie says, “that’s okay too,” and covers his head with his
pillow.

Arthur twangs a few melancholy Swiftian notes on the
guitar.