Halloween night. The coldest night during that autumn season. It rained ice down from the heavens and caused the temperature to drop to thirty-two degrees. Wind kicked up and off the lake, blowing inland. Snow started to fall with the icy rain. Echoes of the once-dead swirled about Bitter’s city streets, deep and lethargic howling that spoke of pain and suffering. Bats escaped hell and flew around the chilly night. Vampires, wolfwomen, zombies, and evil scarecrows that protected pumpkin fields, ran, crept, and crawled throughout the middle-class neighborhoods, willed to cause destruction.
I stayed in, passing out candy to costumed visitors: killer clowns, zombies on skateboards, princesses with slashed faces, jocks missing arms, cheerleaders with twin heads, bloody inmates in straight-jac
