When Greta passed, I kept to myself. Avoided neighbor small talk. Averted eye contact at the grocery store. I simply wanted to be alone with my tv dinners and old shows, inching closer to complete rot. There was no reason for me to seek a fresh start. Society is not kind to the elderly. When you are in your eighties, people stare at you and remind you that your life has almost reached its expiration date.
Halloween was Greta’s favorite holiday. She was a people pleaser. Loved passing out candy to the neighborhood kids; she even threw in a little extra for the parents. For forty plus years, dozens of children knocked loudly at the door, knowing Greta would bring them a smile and chocolate. The first Halloween after she passed though, I felt hollow. No desire to interact with others. I purchased no candy that first Halloween. I had become a bitter old man.
“Trick-or-treat!” two girls screamed, rattling my ears.
“Sorry, no candy tonight.”
Stunned expressions on their faces. I glanced at their parents a few feet behind them. They looked irritated and stormed off with their kids to the next house.
Wet squishing thuds woke me from my nap on the recliner. I poked my head around the curtain and caught those very same parents in the act, launching eggs at my living room window. The woman with the bush of hair locked eyes with me.
“Asshole!” she shouted, and then drove off with her husband and kids in the backseat.
“Trick-or-treat!” This time a boy with a scary mask on his face, his father behind him eagerly awaiting a generous portion of candy for his son.
“Sorry kid. I’m not giving out candy this year.”
The father’s face turned beet red. “Wow, why would you even open the door then? Let’s go Billy.”
Fifteen minutes later, I heard laughter coming from the front yard. The boy and his father were throwing rolls of toilet paper into my tree, watching it unravel.
“Hey, get out of here,” I said.
They both ran off, giggling.
“Free toilet paper. I’ll take it.” I smirked and gathered as many of the butt wipes as possible.
As I sat back down on my recliner and reflected on how much of a miserable sad sack I had turned into, more knocking arrived. After turning away a dozen kids, I was fuming. I couldn’t escape the noise. I went into the kitchen and opened a cabinet, looking for anything I could hand out to the kids.
The half-empty bag of raisins. The very same raisins Greta was eating when she choked. I hadn’t touched them since that fateful night. I grabbed a box of zip locks and started putting four or five raisins in each bag.
“Nothing wrong with a healthy snack,” I said aloud and tossed the bags into a salad bowl.
“Trick-or-treat!”
“Here you go little man.”
“Raisins, gross!”
For the first time in months, I felt human again, like part of Greta was inside of me. The kids kept showing up, and I kept handing out raisins. It was not until eleven at night when things took a dark turn.
Horrific screaming from outside. I opened the front door. A chaotic scene unfolded. Neighborhood kids were running in the middle of the street, their parents chasing them, trying to stop them. A young boy ran up to my front porch.
“Raisins, raisins, raisins!” he screeched.
The kid pulled his face apart like a glob of freshly stretched salt-water taffy. His eyes dropped to his neck, and the boy jumped around like a puppet on strings. When his parents caught up to him, they tried to hug him, but the skin slipped beneath their arms.
“My oh my. I cannot believe my eyes,” I said.
The father turned to me. “You did this. Those fucking raisins. He ate them, and then… this happened.”
My eyes stayed focused on the pile of skin on the concrete, as it scurried over to another mom. It towered over her like a wave and latched onto her. Her muffled screams cut tiny holes through the bubble gum blob of flesh.
“Jesus, in all my years, I have never—” A teenage boy grabbed my shoulder.
“You have to help—” his mouth sealed shut. Face from pale to a dark burnt crisp.
He flailed around like a five-foot tall hot dog that had been left on the grill too long.
Sirens and flashing lights came roaring down the street. I watched as all the infected children formed one giant blob of flesh. Desperate parents were sucked into the goo. When the cops got into position and aimed their guns, the gunk retreated to the street gutters. In a matter of seconds, the giant goo had drained into the gutter openings and vanished.
I was questioned of course about the raisins. A special team was assembled to investigate the crime scene and analyze in their labs what was left of the raisins. I’m still not exactly sure what to make of it. All I know is lives were lost, and I’m still here breathing.