Trick-or-Treat

"This is stupid, Twiggy," Marilyn sighed heavily as he plopped down next to me. I ignored his pessimistic attitude, knowing that he was going to complain no matter what I tried to get him to do. Rather, I handed him a knife and marker. He glared at me but reluctantly grabbed the two objects I was handing him anyway.

"Do you have any idea what you're going to do?" I asked him. I pulled my pumpkin into my lap.

He shrugged. "I don't know. Can I just do something else? Are there any more decorations to put up?"

"Nope. We already did everything else. Carving pumpkins is all that's left," I stated happily. Marilyn sighed yet again and began to draw a design on his pumpkin with the marker. I did the same, opting for a traditional, angular face. Marilyn finished his sketch quickly and began to cut through the top. I peeked around his arm to see what he'd drawn: a rather fetching face with angry eyes and a growling mouth complete with large teeth. As soon as he was able to pull the top off, he grimaced in disgust.

"Ugh," he groaned, "It smells fucking disgusting."

I glanced up at him and smiled. "I know."

"It's like a dead body." He picked up a spoon and started to scoop out the web-like innards.

"You would know what a dead body smells like," I laughed. I picked up a knife and began to cut open my own pumpkin.

He glared, then flung a spoonful of pumpkin guts into the bushes. "Doesn't it bother you?" he asked.

"It does. When I was little, I used to wear one of those kiddie scuba masks - like, the goggles that cover your nose - so that I didn't have to smell it. It made me want to puke."

Marilyn looked at me, his nose scrunched up, confused.

"That's kind of disgusting," he informed me. I snickered and continued carving the pumpkin before me.

It didn't take long for us to carve both of our pumpkins. Marilyn worked quickly just to be done with it, and I was just eager to be done having to smell them. We had accumulated a pile of the innards beside the steps to our house. I made a mental note to take care of it later.

"Where do you want me to put it?" Marilyn asked, awkwardly motioning to his pumpkin.

"On the bottom step, over there," I said with a vague motion of my hand. I placed mine on the opposite side of the same step. Once it was in position, I jumped back from the steps to admire our handiwork.

The past few weeks had been spent decorating the front of our house in anticipation for Halloween. Now, on the afternoon of it, we had finally finished our task. The windows were rimmed with purple and orange lights in the shapes of pumpkins and ghosts. There were cobwebs, fog machines, and headstones decorating the driveway to our house. Marilyn claimed that it was silly to go all-out when all we were doing was handing out candy to kids, but I didn't care.

Marilyn stood beside me. With his arm wrapped around my waist, we admired our house. I layed my head down on his shoulder.

"Looks good," he commented with an appraising stare and a short nod.

"Thanks," I grinned happily.

"What's next?"

My smile intensified as he said that. It was about time that he realized I wasn't going to let him off easy, although we had finished all the decorating. "Well, we can go inside and get ready. Trick-or-treating begins soon," I said.

"What do we dress up as?" He followed me inside.

I shrugged. "I didn't really buy anything for us to wear. I figured we had enough weird shit in our house to begin with."

"That's true," he murmured as I threw open the door to our hallway closet. That was where we kept all of our costumes, stage clothes, and random pieces of clothing that we bought but never wore.

I scanned the racks of clothing carefully, looking for something - anything - that could be made into a new costume. For Marilyn, I grabbed a pair of silver vinyl pants, a tattered trench coat, and a pair of patent black boots with a rather large heel and platform. He glared at me again when he caught a glimpse of what I was holding as I shoved it into his arms.

"What do I do with it?" he pouted unhappily.

"I want you to put it on, silly. What else would I give it to you for?" I laughed. Marilyn groaned dramatically but turned to the bathroom anyway.

Rolling my eyes, I turned back to the closet. It took me a few minutes to decide on what I wanted to wear before I chose a corset, a black skirt rimmed with pink fur at the hem, a pair of tights, and some silver boots. I took my things to the bathroom and knocked on the door.

"What?" Marilyn snapped from inside the bathroom.

"I was just wondering if you were almost done."

"Does it look like I'm done?"

"Well, I don't know, I can't see you. But I'll assume that you're not," I snickered. Rather than wait for him to take his sweet time, I stripped off my clothes right there and changed outside the door. I had just finished when Marilyn opened the door. He had done his makeup and hair as well and now looked like an emaciated black metal enthusiast.

"I like it." I smiled in acknowledgment. He made a sweeping gesture with his hand and walked away. I couldn't help but snicker and called after him, "Could you fill some bowls with candy? And make sure they're the big ones."

"Sure," he sighed loudly.

I rolled my eyes - something I figured I'd be doing a lot that day - and took my place in the bathroom. We had more makeup than the average woman, and it took a while just to find the things I needed. However, the actual application of the stuff didn't take me long. I painted my face like a half-dead hooker, something I'd gotten my fair share of practice of almost every day on tour.

"Marilyn!" I called in a sing-song voice as soon as I had finished. His response was a painful-sounding groan. I laughed to myself as I wandered into the kitchen. He was pouring a bag of chocolate candy bars into a large bowl. When he glanced at me, he looked almost startled.

"Do you always dress up like a girl on Halloween?" he finally asked, a distant smile on his face.

I shrugged. "Yeah. But I pretty much dress up like a girl most of the time, anyway." I walked over and snatched a piece of candy from the bowl.

"Hey!" the black-haired man exclaimed defensively, glaring at me. "That's for the kids, not you."

"Don't act like I can't see all the wrappers in the trash," I grinned, then planted a sloppy kiss on his cheek. I left the remnants of my lipstick there on his painted face. I giggled and reached up to wipe it off.

"How long do we have to stay outside?" he asked me as I jumped on the island counter in the kitchen.

"Two and a half, maybe three hours, I think."

"Three hours?!" He looked as if he'd just heard me describing how I was going to kill him, in elaborate detail.

"Don't worry. I'll bring out the stereo so we have something to listen to," I grinned.

"What are we going to listen to?" he groaned. I could only imagine what sort of possibilities were running through his mind.

"You'll see," I smiled, making a point of my too-sweet tone. Marilyn groaned again and tossed the last empty bag into the trash. He stalked over to me and dropped his head onto my chest. I stroked his hair gently and kissed the top of his head.

"What's wrong?" I cooed as if I were speaking to a small child.

"I don't know," he pouted. I had to bite my lip to stifle a giggle. He was even acting like he was five.

"C'mon," I said kindly. I slipped off of the counter and coaxed him toward the door. "Let's go have some fun."

Twenty minutes late, I had finally gotten Marilyn outside. I took a blanket and a pile of CD's while he lugged our stereo out to the front steps. As he spread the blanket out, I sifted through the music to decide on what we should listen to. Marilyn snatched them from me and checked out the titles.

"Really, Twiggy?" he sighed as he processed the names.

"Yup," I grinned.

"Twiggs, these aren't exactly child-friendly."

"It was the closest thing to Halloween music that we have," I snickered in protest. I grabbed my CD's back from him and kneeled down to put one in.

"I could probably go find a 'Halloween Sounds' CD or something," Marilyn offered. "It wouldn't be a big deal. I just don't think we should be playing black metal."

"I like black metal," I pouted. Completely ignoring his offer, I flipped through my collection of Venom, Mayhem, Burzum, and many others before deciding on a classic: Venom.

"I don't think seven-year-olds will like it very much."

I glanced up and found him crossing his arms over his chest, trying to be intimidating. I put the CD in and plopped down on the steps. Marilyn sat next to me.

"What are you so concerned about children all of a sudden?" I laughed. I rested my head on his arm and looked up at him.

"I just don't want to deal with upset parents," he explained, a little too slowly.

"Sure, if you want to go with that."

He sighed in frustration and rested his head on mine. Somewhere in the distance, a clock tower rung, announcing that trick-or-treating had begun. Almost immediately, the doors to the houses in our neighborhood flew open and the costumed kids came running out.

"I'm surprised you didn't make me go trick-or-treating with you this year," Marilyn mused with a smile.

"I would've, but I didn't come up with our costumes until today," I shrugged. "Besides, I tried convincing the rest of the band to come, but they all turned me down."

Marilyn scrunched up his nose and looked at me. "What the hell is more important than passing out candy with us?"

I snickered; he had been the one on the opposite end of that statement a mere few hours ago. "Well, I guess Pogo and Zim had a party they wanted to go to."

"What about Ginger?"

"He and that new guitarist, John I guess they wanted to hang out. They were both really secretive about it."

"They're probably fucking," Marilyn laughed half-seriously, rolling his eyes.

"No, really?" I scoffed sarcastically. "Either they haven't realized they like each other yet, or they're trying to hide it from everybody."

"I don't see why they should," Marilyn shrugged. The first few kids then came running up the driveway.

"Trick-or-treat!" they cheered happily when they reached us. There were three: a boy dressed as Batman, a girl dressed as a pink Power Ranger, and another girl dressed as a Disney princess. A woman in the background, who I presumed to be their mother, stood by and watched over the scene protectively. I dropped a handful of candy into two of the waiting pillow cases while Marilyn handled the other. As soon as we finished, the kids ran back to their mother.

"What do you say?" she murmured to them.

They turned and yelled, "Thank you!"

I waved to them, then they turned and left. I smiled at Marilyn innocently. "Have you ever wondered what it would be like to have kids?"

"No."

I burst out laughing. "Honestly, though. Haven't you ever thought about it?"

"I don't think we'd make good parents," he said tentatively. I grinned and took his hand in mine. "Twiggs, we're all over the world, and kids are just... ugh."

"I know. I just like making you uncomfortable."

The two hours of passing out candy slipped by rather quickly. There were a lot of small children dressed in generic costumes. At one point, there were even two teenage girls dressed up as Marilyn and I. They were, unsurprisingly, more excited to get an autograph than the candy we had to offer. A few of the younger ones gave us compliments on our outfits, saying we looked, 'cool', 'scary', or 'pretty'.

The temperature dropped rapidly through the night, and most of the kids were bundled up with winter jackets over their costumes. The flow of children dramatically slowed down around then. By the time the whole ordeal was over, many of the people had packed up and left.

"Are you ready to go inside?" Marilyn asked. His voice trembled slightly from the chill in the air.

"Hell yes," I said, jumping up quickly. Within seconds, we had packed up all of the things we'd brought outside and left them in a heap just inside the front door.

Marilyn paused and looked at the CD player. "No one complained about the music."

"I told you it'd be fine," I laughed, not sure if I'd even told him that or not. "Anyway, what do you say about watching a movie with me, hm?"

"What movie did you have in mind?" he asked, though he offered no resistance as I dragged him into the living room.

"The Exorcist."

"You know I can't turn that down," he grinned. It was one of our favorite movies and was the first we'd seen together when we were getting to know each other.

As I set the movie up in our VHS player, Marilyn drifted into the kitchen to make us some popcorn. By the time I'd gotten the whole thing back to the beginning in an awkward process of hitting 'stop', 'rewind', and 'play', Marilyn had returned. He was juggling a bowl of popcorn, a bowl of candy, and two Cokes for us in his arms.

"How much candy is left over?" I asked. I gracelessly plopped down next to him. The movement jarred the man next to me, and the popcorn in his hands spilled into his lap. He responded to my sheepish grin with a glare.

"A bowl or two," he said in answer to my question.

"Sweet."

I pulled my boots off, threw them into the doorway, and curled into Marilyn's side as the previews started. We quietly munched on the popcorn, enjoying the warmth of the room.

"Hey Twiggs?" he called softly.

"Huh?"

"I just... I want you to know that I had fun tonight. Really, I just liked spending time with you without being bugged by someone else," Marilyn admitted. I assumed that he wasn't counting the kids we'd given candy to.

"I knew you would." I lifted his hand and kissed it gently. "I had fun, too."

Marilyn pulled my face up to his and placed a series of soft kissed on my jaw. Soon, we were full-on kissing with everything we had. The bowl of candy was discarded, spilling sugary treats on the floor. I climbed onto his lap so I could straddle his waist. He pulled back as things got heated. He buried his head in my neck and left his hands lingering on my hips.

"What do you say about coming to the bedroom with me? We can put that costume of yours to good use."

"Mmm, I say that sounds fantastic," I purred.

I crawled off his lap quickly and practically dragged Marilyn after me. We were in the bedroom, kissing, when we heard the doorbell ring.

"Ignore it," Marilyn growled just before he slammed his lips down on mine yet again. When the person behind the door realized that we weren't coming, they furiously pressed the button several more times in quick succession.

Marilyn growled and pulled back. With a sighed, I stormed out of the room and threw the front door open.

"Trick-or-treat!"

Marilyn groaned from the depths of the house. "What do you want, Pogo?!"

The keyboardist grinned, his face painted up like a clown. "It's Halloween. We came to get candy." He motioned to Zim, John, and Ginger behind him. It was too dark for me to see anything but John's shock of platinum blonde hair.

"We're busy, you guys," I huffed impatiently.

"I see that," Pogo said, ruffling my hair. "We're headed to a party, and we wanted to see if you two were interested, but it doesn't look like you're up to it."

"Thanks, but we'll have to pass this time," I responded with a smile.

"Well, we'll see you later, then. And have fun," Pogo said with a wink.

"Bye." I waved to everybody as they stepped off our porch. I could see Ginger's car in the driveway, but I didn't bother to see them off. As soon as Pogo had turned, I closed the door. Marilyn was there in seconds, his mouth on mine.

"Bedroom. Now," he commanded.

I smirked and smacked Marilyn's backside gently before heading to our room. "Yes, sir."