Columbine

Halloween.

That one word carried with it so many memories that I had to think it one syllable at a time. Costume shopping, candy hunting, and toilet-papering million-dollar homes had been a tradition for me until I’d entered puberty. It was probably at that point that I no longer had friends and didn’t want to dress up as a Disney princess any more. But what few years of trick-or-treating I did remember, I remembered with more fondness than I ever had before.

I watched Scarlett struggle on a ladder as she attempted to tack orange-black paper lanterns to the ceiling. If her skirt had been any shorter, I could have easily read the label on her underwear. Charlie was trying his hardest to develop X-ray vision so that he could accomplish just that. I threw a paper lantern at him. It bounced off of his chest, and he gave me a dirty look that basically said “Don’t distract me.”

The two of us were standing on opposite sides of the ladder in the event that if Scarlett fell, she would fall on one of us. I prayed that Charlie would be the one to be crushed underneath her model’s figure and two-hundred pound hairstyle.

Sarah was in the kitchen baking Halloween muffins, and Valentin was still gone. It had been three blissful days without him and I hoped that he’d accidentally meant that he’d be gone for two or three weeks instead of one.

“Hand me another lantern.” Scarlett said, her hand reaching downward. I handed her another lantern, and Charlie craned his neck in the hopes that he could see under her skirt if she was crouching. He had no such luck.

“Stop looking at my butt, Charles.” Scarlett said. She was no longer outraged when Charlie was being himself. It seemed that it had all been spent the first week or so that he’d been here. Now being outraged at Charlie was like being upset at the ocean for not staying still.

“Please remind me why we’re doing this again.” Charlie said.

“I can’t believe it.” Scarlett said. “I’d expected you, of all people, to get Halloween.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Charlie asked, sounding vaguely insulted.

Scarlett finished stapling the lantern to the ceiling tile. Having covered two of the corners, she crawled carefully down the ladder and moved it so that it was underneath a different ceiling tile.

“Well, you’re a member of the undead.” She said, climbing back up the ladder with a new lantern. “Halloween’s supposed to be your time to shine.”

Charlie actually looked irritated at this. Had Scarlett finally managed to strike a nerve of his? If she did, I was going to be eternally grateful.

“In America, maybe.” He scoffed. “When has Egypt ever had Halloween?”

“Have you somehow not noticed all the white people that have immigrated here?” I reminded him. “Immigration brings customs with it.”

Charlie had a desperate look in his eyes. I suddenly got a idea of positively platinum value.

“I’ve got it.” I said. “You’re dressing up as Dracula.”

He glared at me, but I somehow didn’t melt into a puddle, like I should have under a glare of that magnitude. Scarlett giggled from the ladder and reached down for another lantern. I gave her one.

It was at this point that Sarah came in with a tray of baked good balanced on her hand. The smell hit me and it almost hurt to swallow all the saliva.

“Don’t touch them yet!” Sarah warned as she set them down on the table. “They’re still hot!”

I had no idea how Sarah had managed to recreate a culinary vision that everyone had long considered dead, but I was grateful that she had. I looked lovingly at the muffin platter. Small tendrils of steam were rising up from them. Yes, they were feisty little muffins.

“How about some quiet mood music?” Charlie suggested. Nodding, I put the tub of bloody water onto a table and poured some anticoagulant on it. While it thawed, I put the tub into a special cavern under the floor that had been dug especially for the purpose of muffling the music. Soon enough, a tune became audible from the floor and everybody smiled.

“God, you’ve got to love that.” Sarah sighed, and sat down leaning against the wall. “It’s a crying shame that no one else can even remember what songs they used to like.”

Sarah and I had managed to keep our secret thus far, and we weren’t about to spill the beans now. But it was tempting, though. I could still remember the expressions of the people in the bakery. I hadn’t stayed long after the music had started, but what I had seen had obviously been enough to convince me that starting a dance club was good idea.

“I--” I started, then stopped. It was another idea. Crap. This one was as bad as the one about the dance club.

“What?” Scarlett asked.

I’m not sure what compelled me to answer truthfully. It would have saved everyone a hell of a lot of misery if I’d just replied “Oh, nothing” and continued handing Scarlett lanterns for her to hang up.

“Well…” I said, “You know how loud the tub can be if it’s not muffled, right?”

“Uh-huh.” Scarlett said, having shifted her concentration back to handling lanterns.

“Then what if…” I took a deep breath, “What if we put it outside?”

Scarlett dropped the stapler. It landed on Charlie’s head, and he let out a terrible howl of pain. Sarah was the only one who hadn’t really reacted. It would make sense that she’d stay calm, since she knew where and why I’d gotten the notion. I even got the inkling of a feeling that she didn’t entirely hate the idea.

“You’re joking, right?” Scarlett choked, climbing down from the ladder, probably so that she wouldn’t fall off of it.

I shook my head. Charlie, crazy as he was, was actually grinning, like something had made him happy.

“Why would she be joking?” Charlie asked Scarlett. “It sounds like a fantastic idea.”

For a moment I thought Scarlett was going to pass out. Her skin was suddenly paler than usual, and even her lips looked white through the lipstick.

“It’s out of the question.” Scarlett stammered. “The Demataxt will probably confiscate it if they find it.”

“Then don’t let them find it.” Sarah chimed in. “It’s perfectly easy -- put it next to some outhouse in the village, and let it play. Maybe even throw in some fireworks for kicks. You’ll be giving people the best Halloween in years!”

The enthusiasm with which she explained what had been on my mind was incredible. The fireworks weren’t a half-bad addition, either. I shot her a grin, which she returned with multiplied brilliance.

“So how about it, Scarlett?” Charlie asked the paled scientist who still had a lantern dangling from her elbow. “You want to ditch this and really get into the party-planning spirit?”

I’m fairly sure that everybody held their breath while Scarlett slowly broke down under the peer pressure. Her eyebrows even twitched with the effort to hold on to her initial take on the matter, but in the end she broke down like an old river dam.

“Fine.” She sighed. Sarah grabbed my arm and forced me to jump up with her while she squealed. “But the fireworks’ll take a while to make.”

“How long?” Sarah asked.

“A few hours.” Scarlett said, and finally allowed the lantern to fall, obsolete, to the floor.

“That’s perfect.” I said. “It’s still noon, and Halloween doesn’t start until it’s dark.”

So while Scarlett got to work, Sarah, Charlie, and I got to planning what we’d do with the music. We eventually decided that we’d need to dilute it more in a bigger tub if we wanted the sound to carry.

“Where should we put the tub?” Charlie asked.

“Behind somebody’s house, probably.” I shrugged. “Sarah can put a barrier around it so no one messes it up.”

“And the fireworks?” Charlie asked.

“I think we’re going to have to break up and each release them one after another.” Sarah estimated. “For instance, I’ll release mine first, then Charlie, then Columbine, then Scarlett.”

“Sounds good.” I nodded.

And so we planned the night vigorously for the next several hours while Scarlett worked on the fireworks in her office. For the first time in a while, I was excited enough to jump around, which there was a great deal of whenever one of us got too excited about the plan.

“I can’t believe we’re actually going to do this!” Sarah squealed. “You realize that everyone’s going to hear the music once we turn it on?”

“As long as they don’t figure out where it came from, I’m good.” I said. Charlie smirked.

“Oh, please.” He said. “It would take a great deal of guessing to guess blood as the source.”

He was right, of course, but I couldn’t help but be paranoid. Even though we’d cooked up an even better plan than Sarah’s muffins -- which had been readily consumed during the planning procedure -- there was still a lot that could go wrong. There was still an enormous risk of getting noticed or caught by the Demataxt.

“Don’t worry.” Sarah patted my shoulder. “It’ll be fine.”

And so I forced myself to believe it as we transferred the musical bloody water to a larger tub and diluted it even more. The volume had reached an insurmountable level at that point, and we were all wincing as our eardrums took the beating of a lifetime.

“Make it stop!” I screamed as loudly as I could. Even that didn’t seem to be loud enough. Sarah desperately poured coagulant into the mix, and we anxiously awaited the coming quiet. It took nearly fifteen minutes, and by that time we’d all gone deaf.

“Ow.” I said, hardly hearing myself. “I wish we’d had ear plugs or something.”

“No kidding!” Charlie yelled, rubbing his ears with excessive force.

“The fireworks are done!” Scarlett yelled, her footsteps coming closer. Finally she burst into the room was a box stuffed to the brim with twizzler-shaped sticks. Her face was dirty and streaked with sweat, but her dazzling smile made up for that. She set the box down beside the large tub of bloody water. We were set to go. The clock read eight P.M., and there was enough buzz in the room to last the night.

We made Charlie carry the tub, and we each took ten fireworks. We also had a carton of matches each, which amounted to forty total fireworks that would be going off tonight. I hoped that it would be sufficient.

We couldn’t get up the surface fast enough. Everyone was rushing and damn near tripping over each other’s feet. By the time we were standing in a desert beneath a the stars, we were covered in sweat and were exhausted, but still eager to get to work.

As we made our way to the town, we could hear excited shouts, and saw that several bonfires had sprouted up. There were some drums being played, but they practically cried to be joined by guitars and a keyboard.

“We’re almost there!” Sarah panted. We tore forward with more enthusiasm than ever, hearts pounding, pulses racing, heads spinning from excitement and anticipation.

I felt like a secret agent more than I’d ever felt like a secret agent before. It was also the most fun than I’d had in an extremely long time.

“Okay,” Sarah said, once we’d stopped, “Charlie and Scarlett should probably go to that side of town.” She pointed in the general direction. “Try to keep close, but not too close.”

“What about the tub?” Charlie asked.

“Leave it here.” Sarah said. “Columbine and I will take this side of town.”

Without awaiting any more directions, Scarlett and Charlie took off. Sarah and I dragged the tub into the far corner of an alley.

“You ready?” Sarah asked me, anticoagulant held ready in her hand. I was shaking by then. There were a billion reasons not to do this, but still billions more to go through with it. I nodded, clutching my bunch of fireworks for life.

The anticoagulant flowed down into the tub, and it seemed to take forever to take effect. My chest was heaving. Sarah’s was, too. I didn’t know how Charlie and Scarlett were feeling, but they were probably close to an embolism by then.

And then the music started, and I almost cried out in pain. I’d been leaning directly over the tub, and the blast of sound that had exploded from it had rendered me positively brain dead. But I’d somehow managed to stay happy even through that terrible trauma. As Sarah put a barrier around the tub, I got out my carton of matches and began to move away. Sarah did the same.

It was then that I realized that I’d never released fireworks before. Was it difficult? I decided that the safest approach was to light the fuse and back away. I could already see fireworks sailing into the air from Scarlett and Charlie’s side.

With a hasty prayer, I struck a match, and lit three fireworks at once. Clutching the remaining seven of my bunch, I backed away and took refuge in an alley nearby. My fireworks took off and exploded in the air.

Scarlett had really outdone herself. There were even different colors among the fireworks. She was going to get an enormous hug later from all of us, that much I knew.

I waited a little before letting go of three more fireworks. As I got more and more used to the adrenaline rush, I began to notice the music that was playing. It was a techno rock song that was somehow perfect for Halloween and for the fireworks.

A smile had been stuck to my face for what had seemed the entire night, which was very rare for me. My smiles rarely made it to the surface of my skin, and the ones that did usually lasted maybe a few seconds. I was enjoying this. The cheering that had suddenly begun roaring around the town wasn’t for me, for the music and fireworks rather, but it felt like I was the one receiving this fierce gratitude.

I released the last of my fireworks just as the music switched to a Japanese power ballad. I didn’t understand a word of it, but it sure made me feel empowered. From the way the cheers had intensified, I guessed that the rest of the town’s residents felt the same way.

Scarlett and Charlie were still releasing fireworks. Finding myself empty handed, I let myself relax against the wall and listen. I wasn’t sure what was more like music to me -- the power ballad or the cheers. The two of them combined just might have been the best sound that I’d ever heard in my life.

I saw that we’d finished shooting fireworks. We’d made a deal to meet where we’d dropped off the tub in an hour or so. That left me about forty minutes to relax. My feet tapped to the beat of the song, but I didn’t break into a dance. I knew from experience that I was a terrible dancer, and besides, I was tired. It had taken a lot of energy and willpower to make a good Halloween.

I heard footsteps approaching, and instinctively ducked into the dark alley. Despite the blaring music, I could make out voices.

“I can’t believe it!” A young woman’s voice cried out. “The report hadn’t been kidding!”

“There’s never been anything like it.” A male’s voice added. “I didn’t think I’d ever hear music again.”

“That’s certainly unexpected.” A third voice remarked. I recognized this voice -- recognized it too well, in fact.

“How do you think she did it?” The girl asked.

“Who did?” Valentin’s familiar voice asked.

“Sarah Crow. It had to be her. She did the same thing in the marketplace a while back.” The girl evaluated.
I bit my lip. This was the Demataxt, wasn't it? And what was worse, Valenting knew that Sarah and I had snuck out. Plus it made too much sense that he and his Demataxt cohorts would be strolling through my part of town. I mean, what were the odds?

“I’m not sure.” Valentin said. “It’s too widespread to be an illusion.”

“Maybe it’s not magic.” The other male voice said.

“What do you mean?” Valentin asked.

“It feels too real. The ground’s actually vibrating.” The man pointed out.

My heart sped up. Crap, they were figuring it out!

“And what do you suppose the source of the music is?” Valentin challenged. “You know that you can’t just pop in a CD any more.”

The other man shrugged, but I could hear a lot in that shrug -- I could hear the urge to investigate. I ground my teeth. If he stumbled upon Sarah, or, worse, the tub, our operation was going to be busted wide open. It would be like a drug deal gone wrong.

“Whatever it is,” The girl said, “I hope it doesn’t end. At least not until I get tired.”

I couldn’t help but grin a little at that. The general atmosphere had gone from shock and amazement to wonder and appreciation. What party-planner didn’t love that? I smiled again at the title ‘party-planner’.

“Let’s split up.” Valentin suddenly suggested. “We might have a better chance at finding anything suspicious if we do that.”

“Good idea.” The girl agreed.

Two pairs of footsteps then faded away. I wondered who’d stayed behind, and began to gradually slink farther into the shadows of the alley. I stepped on something that broke beneath my foot and winced. The noise must have been audible despite the blaring music, because a figure appeared at the mouth of the alley. I froze. I knew that if I ran, I’d definitely fall into the category of ‘anything suspicious’.

I could tell even in the darkness that it was a man’s figure. I didn’t know if it was Valentin or the other one that I’d overheard. I lost my bet with the forces of the universe at that moment when I found myself wishing that the person craning his neck to see farther into the alley was Valentin and not anyone else.

“Whose there?” He asked. I let out a sigh of relief when I heard Valentin’s familiar voice.

“It’s me.” I whispered.

“Columbine?” He asked.

“Yes!” I hissed. “Don’t give me away, okay?”

I couldn’t tell in the darkness, but he seemed to relax once he’d realized that it was me. A small laugh carried over to where I stood and I couldn’t help but join in. What could I say? I was in a good mood.

“Did you plan this?” Valentin asked.

“We all did.” I explained. “Cool, huh?”

“Beyond cool.” He said. I may have imagined it, but I could have sworn that I’d heard a smile in his voice.

With a sigh of relief, I dared to walk up and join him at the mouth of the alley. Now that I was closer, I could definitely confirm that he was smiling.

“So,” I said awkwardly, “How’s your mission going?”

“You’re not mad?” He asked, sounding shocked.

“Not at the moment.” I said. “But I’m sure I will be later.”

He laughed again. Life had caught us at an astronomically rare moment during which we were both in a good mood. We were also somehow managing not to snarl and bite at each other. I, for one, was shocked.

“I know you and Sarah snuck out earlier.” He accused, but there was no real anger in his voice. I didn’t answer. Some alien part of me kept me from telling him to ‘back the fuck off’, like I normally would have.

“That was definitely a mistake.” I admitted, no doubt losing Valentin’s bet with the forces of the universe for him.

“This was a nice setup, though.” He said, meaning the blaring music that was still going strong. “Even the mage’s are enjoying it.”

I shuddered a little at the thought that my plan had worked out for the Demataxt, as well, but at least while they were busy listening to the sweet, dulcet tones of music, they weren’t trying to hunt me and Sarah down.

“Thanks.” I said.

“You’re welcome.” Valentin replied.

We stayed stuck in that moment for a while longer, both shocked beyond belief that for probably the first time in our lives, we were being civil with each other. Like I’ve said before, life brings all sorts of surprises, like the one Scarlett, Sarah, Charlie, and I had brought for one small Egyptian town.