Flames hissed from the two heads. Their ragged orange grins grew wider.
“Drew—let’s try one more time to run away,” Walker whispered. “Maybe if we catch them by surprise…”
We both spun around and started to run. Tabby and Lee came stumbling after us.
My legs felt so wobbly and weak, I didn’t think I could run. My heart pounded so hard, I struggled to breathe.
“Run!” Walker cried breathlessly, pulling my arm. “Drew—faster!”
We didn’t get far.
Uttering their shrill, frightening hisses, the creatures whirled around us once again. Trapping us. Holding us prisoner inside their circle of flames.
No way we could run away. No way we could escape from them.
Peering over the flying flames, I searched desperately up and down the street.
No one in sight. Nothing moved. No cars. No people. Not even a dog or a cat.
Holding their heads at their waists, the two creatures stepped up to us. They stood over us menacingly, raising the red, glowing heads high above their bare shoulders.
“More houses. More houses.” The jack-o’-lantern lips pushed out the words. The red eyes stared down at us.
“More houses. More houses.”
“You cannot stop. You must keep on trick-or-treating!”
“Pick up your bags. Pick them up—now!” one of them growled. Her head held up between two hands, she gazed down at us, her jagged lips forming an evil sneer.
“We—we don’t want to trick-or-treat!” Lee wailed, holding onto Tabby.
“We want to go home!” Tabby cried.
“More houses. More houses. More houses.” The pumpkin heads continued their hissing chant.
They bumped us together. They bumped and pushed us.
We had no choice. Wearily, we picked up our trick-or-treat bags from where they had fallen on the grass.
They moved behind us, chanting, chanting in their low, dry whispers. “More houses. More houses.”
They pushed us to the first house on the block. They pushed us onto the front stoop. Then they hovered close behind.
“How—how long do we have to trick-or-treat?” Tabby demanded.
The pumpkin heads grinned together. “Forever!” they declared.
23
A woman came to the door and dropped packages of Hershey’s kisses into our bags. “You kids are out awfully late,” she said. “Do you live around here?”
“No,” I replied. “We don’t really know where we are. We’re in a strange neighborhood, and we’re being forced to trick-or-treat by two headless pumpkin creatures. And they say they’re going to make us trick-or-treat forever. Help us—please! You’ve got to help us!”
“Ha-ha! That’s good!” the woman laughed. “That’s very funny. You have a very good imagination.” She closed the door before I could get out another word.
At the next house, we didn’t even bother to ask for help. We knew no one would believe us.
“Your bags are so full!” the woman exclaimed. “You must have been trick-or-treating for hours!”
“We… we like candy a lot,” Walker replied wearily.
I glanced back at the pumpkin heads. They were motioning impatiently. They wanted us to move on to the next house.
We said good-bye to the woman and made our way across the front yard. Our trick-or-treat bags were heavy, so we dragged them along the grass.
As we headed to the next driveway, Tabby hurried up beside me. “What are we going to do?” she whispered in my ear. “How are we going to get away from these… these monsters?”
I shrugged. I didn’t know how to answer her.
“I’m so scared,” Tabby confessed. “You don’t think these pumpkin creatures really plan to make us trick-or-treat forever—do you? What do they really want? Why are they doing this to us?”
“I don’t know,” I said, swallowing hard. I could see that Tabby was about to cry.
Lee was walking with his head down. He dragged his bulging trick-or-treat bag behind him. He was shaking his head, muttering to himself.
We stepped up to the next porch and rang the bell. A middle-aged man in bright yellow pajamas opened the door. “Trick or treat!” we cried wearily.
He dropped little Tootsie Rolls into our bags. “Very late,” he muttered. “Do your parents know you’re still out?”
We dragged on to the next house. And the next.
I kept waiting for a chance to escape. But the two creatures never let us out of their sight. They stayed right with us, keeping in the shadows. Their eyes glowed red from the deepening fire inside their heads.
“More houses,” they chanted, forcing us to cross the street and do the long row of houses on the other side.
“More houses.”
“I’m so scared,” Tabby repeated to me in a trembling whisper. “So is Lee. We’re so scared, we feel sick.”
I started to tell her I felt the same way.
But we both gasped when we saw someone walking along the street.
A man in a blue uniform!
At first I thought he was a policeman. But as he stepped under a streetlight, I saw that he wore a blue work uniform. He had a blue baseball cap on his head. He carried a large black lunch box in one hand.
He must be coming home from work, I told myself. He was whistling softly to himself, walking with his head down. I don’t think he saw us.
Tabby changed that. “Helllllp!” she screamed. “Sir—please! Help us!”
The man raised his head, startled. He squinted at us.
Tabby began running across the grass to him. The rest of us followed, dragging our heavy trick-or-treat bags.
“Help us—please!” Tabby pleaded shrilly. “You’ve got to save us!”
The four of us hurtled breathlessly into the street. We surrounded the startled man. He narrowed his eyes at us and scratched his brown, curly hair.
“What’s wrong, kids? Are you lost?” he asked.
“Monsters!” Lee exploded. “Headless jack-o’-lantern monsters! They’ve captured us! They’re forcing us to trick-or-treat!”
The man started to laugh.
“No—it’s true!” Tabby insisted. “You’ve got to believe us! You’ve got to help us!”
“Hurry!” Lee cried.
The man scratched his hair again. He squinted at us hard, studying our faces.
“Hurry! Please hurry!” Lee wailed.
I stared back at the startled man.
Would he help us?
24
“You’ve got to help us!” Lee pleaded.
“Okay. I’ll go along with the joke,” the man said, rolling his eyes. “Where are your monsters?”
“There!” I cried.
We all turned back to the front yard.
No one there. The pumpkin heads were gone.
Disappeared.
Tabby gasped. Lee’s mouth dropped open.
“Where did they go?” Walker murmured.
“They were standing right there!” Tabby insisted. “Both of them. Holding their heads in their hands! Really!”
The man let out a long sigh. “You kids have a good Halloween,” he said wearily. “But give me a break, okay? I just got off work, and I’m beat.”
He shifted his black lunch box to the other hand. Then we watched him make his way up the driveway. He disappeared around the back of the house.
“Let’s get out of here!” Lee cried.
But before we could run, the two pumpkin heads leaped out from behind a low hedge. The red flames hissed inside their heads. Their jagged mouths were turned down in angry snarls.
“More houses,” they insisted, rasping the words together. “More houses. You can’t stop trick-or-treating.”
“But we’re so tired!” Tabby protested. Her voice cracked. Again, I saw tears wetting her eyes.
“Let us go—please!” Lee begged.
“More houses. More!”
“You can never stop! NEVER!”
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“I can’t!” Lee cried. “My bag is full. Look!” He held out the bulging trick-or-treat bag to the pumpkin heads. Candy bars spilled over the top.
“Mine is full, too!” Walker declared. “It’s filled to the top. I can’t squeeze another piece of candy corn in it!”
“We have to go home!” Tabby cried. “Our bags are totally full.”
“That’s no problem,” one of the pumpkin heads replied.
“No problem?” Tabby wailed. “No problem?”
“Start eating,” the pumpkin head ordered.
“Huh?” We all gasped.
“Start eating,” he insisted. “Start eating.”
“Hey—no way!” Lee protested. “We’re not going to stand here and—”
The creatures appeared to rise up. Bright yellow flames shot out from their eyes. A roar of hot wind escaped their jagged, snarling mouths. The wind burned my face.
We all knew what would happen if we refused to do as they said. We’d end up inside the flames.
Lee grabbed a chocolate bar from the top of his trick-or-treat bag. He tore off the wrapper with a trembling hand. And he shoved the candy into his mouth.
We all started to eat candy. We had no choice.
I shoved a Hershey bar into my mouth and started to chew. I couldn’t even taste it. A big gob stuck to my teeth. But I shoved in more and kept chewing.
“Faster! Faster!” the pumpkin heads ordered.
“Please—!” Tabby begged, with a mouthful of red licorice. “We can’t—”
“Faster! Eat! Eat!”
I shoved an entire bag of candy corn into my mouth and struggled to chew. I saw Walker pawing through his bag, looking for something he could eat quickly.
“Faster! Eat!” the fiery heads demanded, floating over us. “Eat! Eat!”
Lee choked down his fourth Musketeer bar. He grabbed a Milky Way and started to unwrap it.
“I—I’m going to be sick!” Tabby declared.
“Faster! Faster!” came the raspy command.
“No. Really. I feel sick!” she cried.
“Eat more! Eat—faster!”
Lee started to choke. A gob of pink taffy shot out of his mouth. Tabby slapped him on the back until he stopped coughing.
“More! Faster!” the pumpkin heads ordered.
“I—I can’t!” Lee cried in a hoarse whisper.
The creatures leaned over him, angry flames shooting from their eyes.
Lee grabbed a Crunch bar, tore off the wrapper, and bit into it.
All four of us huddled there on the curb, gobbling down candy. Chewing as fast as we could. Forcing it down, then shoving in some more.
Trembling. Frightened. Feeling sick.
We had no idea that the biggest horror was still to come.
25
“I… can’t… eat… any more,” Tabby choked out.
We had been stuffing ourselves with candy for several minutes. Tabby had chocolate running down her chin. And I saw chocolate stuck in the tangles of her blond hair.
Lee was bent over on the grass. He held his stomach and groaned. “I don’t feel so hot,” he murmured. He let out a long, loud burp. And groaned again.
“I never want to see another candy bar in my life,” Walker whispered to me.
I tried to reply. But my mouth was full.
“More houses!” one of the pumpkin heads ordered.
“More houses! More trick-or-treating!”
“No—please!” Tabby begged.
Bent over on the grass, Lee let out another long burp.
“It’s almost midnight!” Tabby protested. “We have to go home!”
“There are many houses to go,” a pumpkin head told her, narrowing its fiery eyes. “Houses forever. Trick-or-treat forever!”
“But we feel sick!” Lee moaned, holding his stomach. “We can’t do any more houses tonight!”
“Everyone has gone to sleep,” Walker told the pumpkin heads. “No one will answer the door this late.”
“They WILL in this neighborhood!” the pumpkin head replied.
“No problem in THIS neighborhood,” the other creature agreed. “In this neighborhood, you can trick-or-treat FOREVER!”
“But—but—but—” I sputtered.
I knew it was no use. The fiery creatures were going to force us to keep going. They weren’t going to listen to our complaints.
And they weren’t going to let us go home.
“More houses! More! Trick-or-treat forever!”
Tabby helped Lee to his feet. She picked up his trick-or-treat bag and placed it in his hand. Then she brushed her hair out of her face and picked up her own bag.
The four of us trooped across the street, dragging the bags beside us. The night air had grown cold and heavy. A strong breeze rattled the trees and sent brown leaves scuttling past our feet.
“Our parents must be so worried,” Lee murmured. “It’s really late.”
“They should be worried!” Tabby declared in a trembling voice. “We may never see them again.”
The porch light at the first house was still on. The pumpkin heads forced us onto the porch.
“It’s too late to trick-or-treat,” Lee protested.
But we had no choice. I rang the bell.
We waited. Shivering. Feeling heavy and sick from all the candy we had forced down.
Slowly, the front door opened.
And we all gasped in shock.
26
“Ohhh!” A low cry escaped Walker’s throat.
Lee jumped off the porch.
I stared at the creature in the yellow porch light. A woman. A woman with a grinning jack-o’-lantern head.
“Trick or treat?” she asked, turning her jagged smile on us. Orange flames danced and flickered inside her head.
“Uh—uh—uh—” Walker hopped off the porch and stumbled into Lee.
I stared at the grinning pumpkin head. This is a nightmare! I told myself. A living nightmare!
The woman dropped some kind of candy into my bag. I didn’t even see what it was. I couldn’t take my eyes off her pumpkin head.
“Are you—?” I started to ask.
But she closed the front door before I could get the words out.
“More houses!” the pumpkin heads commanded. “More trick-or-treating!”
We dragged ourselves to the next little house. The door swung open as we climbed onto the front stoop.
And we stared at another pumpkin-head creature.
This one wore jeans and a maroon sweatshirt. The flames hissed and crackled behind his eyes and mouth. Two wide, crooked teeth were carved into his mouth—one on top, one below—giving him a silly expression.
But my friends and I were too terrified to laugh.
At the next house, we were greeted by two jack-o’-lantern creatures. We crossed the street and found another fiery-headed creature waiting for us at the next house.
Where are we? I wondered.
What is this strange neighborhood?
The two pumpkin heads forced us on to the next block. The houses here all had jack-o’-lantern creatures living in them.
At the end of the block, Tabby set down her trick-or-treat bag and turned to face the pumpkin heads. “Please—let us stop!” she begged. “Please!”
“We can’t do any more houses!” Lee exclaimed weakly. “I—I’m so tired. And I really feel sick.”
“Please—?” Walker pleaded. “Please—?”
“I can’t do another house. I really can’t,” Tabby said, shaking her head. “I’m so frightened. Those creatures… in every house…” She uttered a sob and her voice trailed off.
Lee crossed his arms over the front of his striped costume. “I’m not taking another step,” he insisted. “I don’t care what you do. I’m not moving.”
“Me neither,” Tabby agreed, stepping close beside him.
The two pumpkin heads didn’t reply. Instead, they rose up high in the air.
I took a step back a
s their triangle eyes bulged wide and their mouths stretched open. Bright orange flames flew from their eyes.
And then their mouths stretched even wider. And they both let out high wails. The shrill sound rose and fell through the heavy night air. Rose and fell, like police sirens.
The pumpkin heads tilted back until their flames shot straight up to the sky. And their siren wails grew louder. Louder. Until I had to hold my hands over my ears.
I saw a flash of light. And turned to see another pumpkin head floating toward us from across the street.
“Oh!” I uttered a hoarse cry as two more pumpkin-head creatures hurried out of their houses.
And then two more. And another creature. And another.
All down the block, doors flew open.
Creatures floated out. Floated toward us. Hissing and wailing.
Flickering, dancing flames shot out from their jack-o’-lantern eyes and mouths, sending orange light into the black sky. They floated and bobbed down the street, across the dark lawns, wailing like sirens, hissing like snakes.
Closer. Closer.
Dozens of them. Dozens and dozens.
Walker, Tabby, Lee, and I pressed close together in the middle of the street as the pumpkin-head creatures drew near.
They formed a circle around us. A circle of grinning, fiery jack-o’-lantern faces over dark-robed bodies.
The circle of creatures spun around us slowly. And as they spun, their heads bobbed and tilted on their shoulders.
Slowly, slowly, they spun around us. And then they began to chant in their hoarse, crackly voices:
“Trick or treat! Trick or treat! Trick or treat!”
“What do they want?” Tabby cried. “What are they going to do?”
I didn’t have a chance to answer her.
Four creatures stepped quickly into the middle of the circle.
And when I saw what they carried in their hands, I started to scream.
27
“Trick or treat! Trick or treat! Trick or treat!”
My scream drowned out the chanting pumpkin heads.