"Well, what do you think?"

Aiden ran is hands over Hannah's chest.

"Mm. You can bite my neck any time."

"Wouldn't do much good, you being a zombie and all."

"Nice fangs, but I didn't know Elvira was a vampire."

"She is the queen of darkness, so I just assumed."

The doorbell rang.

"I'll get it."

Hannah felt her jaw clench. It would be Abigail. Why was it she was always available to sit for them... always. And it was not all in her mind. She didn't act 17. She seemed more mature, more calculating. More like... a rival.

She lived a couple of streets over and a couple of blocks up and she walked over during the day, but Aiden drove her home after dark. And he took his truck. The one with the bench seat. The same kind of truck she'd lost her cherry in.

And when he came back he was kind of cool to sex. But she didn't smell her on him. A woman can tell when her man has been with another woman. Even a shower doesn't help much. Maybe she just gave him a bj.

Sophia's squeal brought Hannah back to the present. She went out into the living room. Abigail had the child on her hip. And Sophia, at eight, was too big for that.

'Hi, Mrs. G."

"Hi, Abi. Glad you could make it on such short notice."

"Trust me, Mrs. G, you're doing me a favor. Midterms, you know. It's an excuse not to stay in and study. Cool Elvira."

"Thanks. Well, you know the drill. Help yourself to whatever you want. There's a frozen pizza in the freezer. Oh, and no more candy. She's had enough already."

"Sure."

Hannah tied the black pouch with her wallet round her waist. The couple said goodbye and left.

"So, girl, what do you want to do?"

"I want some more candy."

"Uh uh. You heard what your mother said."

"Since when do you listen to Mom?"

"When I think she's right."

"Okay, I'll turn the oven on."

They ate in darkness, lit only by the gas fire. Abi let her have tea and she liked that. It felt grown up. But it wasn't regular tea. It was her special tea.

"So, what do you want to do?"

"Tell me a story. A scary story. A really, really scary story."

"Okay. what did you wear tonight?"

"A witch. Mom used makeup, not a mask and it was really cool."

"Okay, witch story it is."

"There was this witch who lived alone. She'd been alone for a very long time. More than a hundred years. One day she met this family. The husband was very handsome. And they had a little girl."

"Don't tell me, she was eight."

"That's exactly right. Well, the witch wanted to be with the man and the little girl, but there was one problem."

"His wife, right?"

"Am I going to tell this or are you?"

"Sorry."

"So she cast a spell to make the woman disappear."

"How?"

"By telling a story. But instead of it being all make believe, it was all true... every word."

Sophia slurped her tea and leaned closer...

"Brains!"

"Hi, Ralph."

"Hannah, Aid. Come in, come in. You know everybody. I mean, even in costume, it's the usual suspects."

"Sure."

"One night, the parents of the little girl went to a Halloween party. It was all spooky, with cobwebs spiders and Jack O'Lanterns and creepy music. There was a witch and two zombies, a cowboy, a female vampire, a couple dressed as a monk and a nun, Frankenstein, Beef-"

"Beef?"

"He was a character in Phantom of the Paradise."

"Not the opera?"

"No. It was kind of a silly take-off and Beef was kind of an Elvis transvestite."

"From Transylvania, right."

"No, he's from... oh stop it you! You know what a transvestite is?"

"Hello, duh, internet."

"Okay, anyway, there were a bunch of spooky characters."

"So they're having this party and everything's cool, everybody's getting a little drunk, you know, just having fun. But then the clock strikes midnight. The room goes quiet, dead silent."

"And at the twelfth tone someone screams, 'It's the devil!""

"And then everybody is screaming and they're all pointing to the vampire. 'Grab her,' the zombie yells."

"'We can't hold her! She's a vampire! She can't be stopped!""

"'Nonsense,' said one of the monks. 'She is human, just as you are. She is the devil's consort, but she is still human... mostly.'"

"So they grab the vampire, two guys grab her arms. And she's shrieking and some of the people have to cover their ears because it's a sound from another world."

"'She is strong!' said the cowboy."

"'Mind her teeth,' said the monk."

"'What do we do with her?""

"'Burn her!""

""No! The smoke from her burnt flesh will poison everything it touches.'"

"'Then what? Keep her until daybreak?'"

"'Drive a stake through her heart!""

"The monk said, 'Those are just tales. You must entomb her. She will die if she cannot feed. She must be sealed away for one hundred years.'"

"There was silence. Then, the room erupted. The men dragged the vampire through a door. It was the cowboy's workshop and it was underground and had thick, concrete walls."

"'Bind her.'"

"The vampire fought them, still shrieking. The lady monk grabbed her ankles. They lifted the vampire an set her on the work bench."

"The cowboy was a metal worker and he had iron shackles. They wrapped the iron bands around her wrists and the cowboy hammered the rivets. They put another set on her ankles and he fixed them, too."

"'Somebody quiet her! It's driving me insane!'"

"The cowboy put on a pair of thick gloves. He pushed a metal ball into the vampire's mouth. It wedged behind her fangs."

"They dragged her to an alcove. You know what an alcove is?"

"Uh uh."

"It's like a closet with no door."

"Oh."

"Except this one had concrete walls on three sides. And there were metal hooks where the cowboy hung some of his tools. They removed the tools and carried the vampire into the alcove. they hoisted her up and hung her on the hook. Then they sealed her in."

"How?"

"Cinder blocks and concrete. First they put down some mud. That's what they call concrete. Then they set down a row of cinder blocks. More mud, another row of blocks. Bit by bit they filled the gap, sealing it off, until there was nothing to see of the vampire."

"The cowboy had a dust bin and he scooped out dust and threw it at the wall and it stuck to the fresh mud making it look very, very old."

"The zombie left the party, got in the vampire's car, and drove it away. He abandoned it, leaving her purse inside, and went back to the party. The witch wove a spell so that the cowboy and his wife would forget there had ever been an alcove at all."

"And the vampire? Did she die?"

"No one knows. Once a vampire has been sealed away, well, would you want to go back and check?"

***

Of course, Aiden was a person of interest, but everybody at the party swore he had been there all along and that Hannah had just disappeared. They weren't a hundred percent sure when she had left, but it was sometime after midnight. She was there, and then she wasn't.

No, there wasn't an argument. Everybody was having a good time. Yes, they had been drinking, but no one was really drunk.

***

"Hi, Abigail. Thanks for coming on short notice. I really appreciate it."

"Not a problem, Aiden. Not a problem at all."

"So, have you decided on college yet?"

"No. Everybody goes straight to college. Me? I think I'll just hang around."