Four
o'clock on Halloween and my bath-tub clogs. I wasn't using it.
Don't know who clogged it, but I have to fix it.
By
bedtime my three-year-old will be covered in caramel and bubble gum.
I'll need that tub.
With
the sun dipping into a pumpkin-colored sky, we park at the hardware
store. The lot is deserted.
“The witch is there,” Nikolas is
saying. “The scary, scary witch.”
“If
you already know she's there, she can't scare you,” I reply.
Last
time we were here, the motion-activated cackling witch came to life
and terrified him.
I see
no one with vests and name-tags as we enter the store. Someone
should be lubricating the sliding doors. They open with a horrible
screech.
They
close with a clank.
“See, Nikolas. The witch isn't even
here.” Unusual that they'd take down all the Halloween decorations
already.
We
walk from sign to sign: Lumber, Tools, Gravestones,
Hardware, Torture, Electrical, Plumbing.
Some bats flap about the rafters.
I find
a rack of pipe snakes hanging between formaldehyde jars and shrunken
heads. I reach for one. It hisses and snaps at me. Nikolas hands
me a length of copper pipe and I whap the serpent on the head.
“Can
someone help me?” I call. My voice echoes. I hear shuffling
steps. “I need something for cleaning drains.”
Around
the corner, dragging one foot, shambles a figure in a vest. An
eye-ball dangles from a rotting socket. He lifts a jug of Drano in a
gangrenous hand.
“Drains!”
he moans. I scoop up Nikolas and back away, wielding my pipe.
With a
whoosh, my weapon is snatched from my grip by the witch on a broom.
“I
knew you'd come back,” she shrieks. “That boy will make a fine
stew.”
I
unscrew the cap from a can of PVC cement and hand it to Nikolas. He
pitches it like a grenade at the zombie's feet. “Drains!” he
shouts, trapped in a sticky blue puddle.
The
witch circles, followed by a swarm of bats. Nikolas trots to the
fire hose. I grab the nozzle while he opens the valve.
“I'm
melting!” she screams as I blast her with water. She dissolves
into a greasy curl of smoke. Her broom harpoons an ogre inspecting
the axes.
The
bats chase us across the store, whirling in Nikolas' hair and
battering my ears. Nikolas rolls a shop-vac to me. I switch it on
and inhale every flapping rodent I see.
Nikolas
snaps a tube of liquid nails into a caulking gun and takes aim at a
giant spider crawling over bales of insulation. She leaps at me,
fangs bared, and he covers her in glue. I sidestep as she splats
wriggling on the floor.
We hop
up into a fork-lift. A horde of goblins masses between us and the
front door.
“Should
we lie down the law, Daddy?”
“Lay
down the law. Let's lay
down the law, Nikolas.”
I mash
the pedal and lurch forward. Nikolas fiddles with all the levers
until the fork raises to goblin-nostril-level. We plow our way
through the crowd, shatter the glass and crush a couple lawn tractors
on our way to the parking lot.
“I
don't want to take a bath today.”
“That's
okay, Niko,” I say. “Maybe tomorrow.”
