Fic: Everybody Make a Scene
Title: Everybody Make a Scene
Fandom: Defenders (TV)
Rating: G
Summary: Halloween with Mr. Urich's second grade class is a little chaotic, but then, what isn't with them?
Notes: This came out of an elementary school AU I've been goofing around with on tumblr, where all of our good guys (and good-ish guys) grew up together in some kind of weird Hell's Kitchen/Harlem amalgam you shouldn't think about too hard, and no one's powers are a secret. For the "holidays" prompt on my Daredevil Bingo card. Title is from "This Is Halloween."
Jack Murdock rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly. “This month kinda got away from me,” he said. “You know how it is.”
Mr. Urich looked at Matt, who was stroking the worn leather of the boxing gloves dangling around his neck by the laces with an expression of total contentment. Without them, he would have suspected Matt had come to school in his pajamas again - white undershirt, fluffy bathrobe, too-big sweatpants. With the gloves, though…
“Are you a boxer, Matt?”
Matt beamed and puffed out his narrow chest. “I’m Battlin’ Murdock. I’m the champ!”
“Well, you look very tough. Don’t get into any fights outside of the ring, though, okay?”
Matt nodded and threw his arms around his father’s hips. “I’m gonna go show Foggy my gloves. Bye, Daddy!”
He ran off, cane whipping back and forth in front of him almost as an afterthought. Jack shifted again. “The Nelsons are picking him up after school today for trick or treating. I would, but I got this job…”
“He’ll have a good time with Foggy,” Mr. Urich said carefully. “And he loves his costume.”
“For some reason,” Jack said, smiling a little.
“He’s a good kid, Jack.”
“Yeah, he is,” Jack said, glancing over to where Matt was loudly bragging about his gloves to Trish and Claire. “Damned if I know how he got that way.”
*
“And it was very expensive,” Marci continued, fluffing out the glittery skirt of her fairy princess costume. “My mommy had it made special, because I’m her princess.”
“It’s a really fancy costume,” Malcolm said admiringly.
“I know.” Marci tossed her hair, then frowned at Malcolm. “If you’re a magician, where’s your wand?”
“I’m not a magician, I’m - Alexandre Dumas,” Malcolm said, stumbling briefly over the complicated name before delivering it with a careful French accent and beaming proudly.
“Who’s that?”
“He’s my daddy’s favorite writer. He wrote the Three Musketeers movie and, um…The Count of Monty Crisco.”
Marci gave him another appraising look, then shook her head. “You should have been a magician.”
But Malcolm was already distracted. “Wow, Marci, look, Trish just got here and her costume is even fancier than yours!”
Marci whipped around. “WHAT.”
*
“But why an avocado, though?” Mr. Urich asked.
Foggy stared at him like he couldn’t believe he had to explain something so obvious. Mr. Urich loved his job, but it was remarkable how often the seven-year-olds made him feel stupid. Even one dressed in a massive paper mache half-oval that looked in danger of toppling over at any moment. “It’s green,” he said.
“That it is.”
“And you need it for gakker...quauca…”
“Guacamole?”
“Tacos,” Foggy concluded triumphantly. “And it’s the good kind of c’lesterol.”
“Where did you even hear that?”
Foggy just blinked at him, his round face framed by the circle cut out of the avocado half’s flat side, which was admittedly beautifully painted in a green-yellow gradient. Mr. Urich sighed. “It’s a very nice costume, Foggy. Go ahead and put your lunch in your cubby.”
Foggy toddled past him, staying upright with apparent difficulty, and Mr. Urich chuckled to himself. It was an impressive costume, to be honest. He just hoped that…
Foggy tugged on his sleeve. “Mr. Urich? I need help. I gotta go pee.”
Mr. Urich sighed.
*
“Look at this brave knight!” Mr. Urich said. “Sword goes in the bin, though, Karen, no weapons in the classroom.”
“Then how’m I gonna protect myself?” Karen asked.
“You’ll have to use your words.”
“Words are stupid,” Karen grumbled, but dropped her plastic sword in the bin Mr. Urich held up.
*
“Wow, Misty and Brett, you’re both cops? Did you plan this?”
Misty and Brett glowered at each other from under matching hats, and Mr. Urich bit his tongue. No, they had clearly not planned this.
“Ten-four.”
“Copy that.”
“Copycat,” Misty hissed, and Brett stuck his tongue out at her.
“Hey. No name-calling, no tongue-sticking-out, and guns in the bin.”
“Roger.”
“Over and out.”
*
“I’m my grandpa!” Colleen announced before Mr. Urich could ask. She was wearing a bathrobe - bedecked with pink and yellow flowers, unlike Matt’s plain red one - with her hair in a topknot and a thin mustache carefully drawn on her upper lip with what Mr. Urich assumed was eyeliner. “He’s a samurai!”
“That’s a wonderful costume, Colleen, but the sword has to go in the bin. You can have it back at the end of the day.”
Colleen drew herself up to her full height of not even close to four feet. “A true samurai never rel...relinquershes her weapon.”
“Well, you can’t go into the classroom with a sword, and that means you can’t get the goody bag on your desk.”
The sword clattered into the bin and Colleen took off towards her desk. “It’s only a costume. Don’t tell Grandpa!”
*
Mr. Urich squinted at Frankie. “Soldier?” It was hard to tell. True, Frankie was dressed in head-to-toe camo, but that didn’t necessarily make this different from any other random Monday.
Frankie scoffed. “Marine.”
“My apologies. No weapons in school though, Frankie. In the bin.”
Frankie rolled his eyes, then dropped his plastic rifle in the bin.
“All of them.”
Frankie pulled a toy pistol out of the back of his pants, a slingshot out of his back pocket, and a plastic knife out of each boot. They all went into the bin.
Mr. Urich raised an eyebrow.
“Fine,” Frankie said, and produced a plastic grenade from his coat pocket. “But don’t come crying to me when we’re under attack and I’m not prepared!”
Frankie stomped off. Mr. Urich shook the bin and watched as the plastic guns, knives, swords, explosives, and nunchucks rattled around each other.
“What the hell is wrong with these children?”
*
“What are you supposed to be?” Jessica demanded.
Ellie tilted her head to the side and gave Jessica a blank, manic smile. The effect was unsettling, considering the effort that had been gone to to make her look like a rotting corpse.
Luke crossed his arms - because he felt like crossing them, of course, and not because he was scared. “Matt said Ellie said she was gonna be a zombie queen.”
“There’s no such thing as zombies,” said Claire, who watched a lot of hospital shows she was technically too young for, hence her doctor costume. “When you’re dead, you’re dead.” She didn’t move out from halfway behind Luke, though, staying partially hidden behind his giant afro wig.
Ellie tilted her head in the opposite direction.
“Is that what you look like when you’re dead?” Jessica asked.
“Um.” Claire wasn’t sure. Mostly people on the hospital shows got saved at the last minute by attractive young doctors. When they did die, they looked peaceful and maybe a little blue - but Ellie’s skin was a mottled greenish-gray, peeling off of her unusually gaunt face in places, her clothing hanging off her frame in tatters and her hair wild. The rumor was that the people who did makeup for Broadway shows had come to her house to do her Halloween makeup. If it was makeup.
“Well, I’m not scared of you,” Jessica told Ellie defiantly, shoving her hands into the pockets of her dad’s old leather jacket to prove it. It wasn’t exactly a costume, but no one so far had had the nerve to tell Jessica that.
Ellie let out an earsplitting screech.
“I’mgonnagoseewhatTrishisdoing,” Jessica said, backing away quickly.
“Is Danny here yet? Let’s go find Danny,” Luke said, grabbing Claire’s hand and pulling her away.
Ellie smiled wider.
*
Mr. Urich’s class had storytime at the library with Mr. Pop right before lunch. Even though it was broad daylight, the class was held spooked and spellbound by Mr. Pop’s dramatic - if abridged and simplified - reading of “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.”
“...and when Ichabod turned around, the other rider was holding his own head underneath his arm!” Mr. Pop boomed.
Foggy squeaked and grabbed Matt’s hand.
“Ichabod kicked his horse into a gallop, but the Headless Horseman did too, and his horse was faster. He was gaining on Ichabod. Ichabod didn’t know what to do.”
“PUNCH HIM IN THE NOSE!” Frankie shouted. Two thirds of the class erupted with agreement, some of them leaping to their feet.
“Yeah, punch him!”
“Punch him right in the nose!”
“Turn around and punch him!”
“Kick his butt, Icky!”
“RAWR!”
Mr. Pop closed his book and waited. The class went quiet. Trish and Misty sat down, looking a little shamefaced.
“Do we yell in the library?” Mr. Pop asked.
Everyone shook their heads.
“Do we need to put some sorries in the Sorry Jar?” Mr. Pop asked, pointing to the colorful, oversized jar on his desk, where students whispered “sorry” when they broke library rules.
Everyone shook their heads again. “Rawr,” Danny said.
“No roaring in the library either, Danny, even for dragons.”
Danny frowned and puffed up his cheeks. Luke elbowed him. “You promised not to breathe fire on the books!” he hissed. Danny frowned harder and swallowed his fire with an audible gulp.
“Thank you, Luke,” Mr. Pop said, and opened the book again. “The Headless Horseman chased Ichabod down the dark and lonely road…”
Foggy squeezed Matt’s hand tighter.
*
In the afternoon they had cupcakes with smiling pumpkin faces drawn on them in bright orange and black frosting. While Mr. Urich was distracted with trying to get frosting out of Danny’s hair, Brett leaned forward and said, “I heard some of the big kids were going to go around smashing jack o’ lanterns tonight, to ruin Halloween for us little kids.”
“We’re not little kids,” Colleen protested. “Little kids go trick or treating during school hours, in strollers.”
“Fine, us regular kids,” Brett said, rolling his eyes.
“Those jerks!” Claire said. “Why would they do that? My mommy worked really hard on our pumpkin.”
“They better not try to smash mine, or I’ll smash them,” Frankie growled.
From beneath the table, Ellie let out a quiet zombie shriek of agreement. She hadn’t spoken in non-zombie words all day.
“There oughta be a law,” Foggy said, and Misty nodded firmly.
“There is, it’s vanderization,” Brett said. Matt opened his mouth to speak, then closed it again. “So if you have your jack o’ lantern on a stoop, tell your moms and dads to bring it inside before it gets dark.”
“Then what’s the point?” Trish asked. “You put a candle in them so they look cool in the dark.”
“We should smash their pumpkins,” Jessica said. She had frosting on the tip of her nose. “That’ll show them.”
“Two wrongs don’t make a right, Jessica,” Matt murmured from where he was quietly folding his, Karen, and Foggy’s cupcake wrappers into a bracelet.
“You’re not the boss of me, Matt.”
“Just because other people are doing something bad doesn’t mean you should too.”
“You got into a fight with that big fifth grader last week!”
“That’s different.”
“How?”
Matt frowned, trying to come up with an answer. Ellie stole the rest of his cupcake and retreated back under the table.
From the craft sink came the sound of Mr. Urich’s despairing voice: “Danny, how did you even manage to get frosting down the back of your shirt?”
*
After an early dinner and before nightfall, but when the sun was low enough to make the city feel a little spooky, Mr. Urich’s students hit the streets in groups of threes and fours, parents straggling behind. Trick or treating started at Nelson’s Hardware for most of them, because Edward Nelson gave out full size candy bars - and for Foggy, Matt, Karen, and Brett, because they’d just finished eating grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup in the apartment upstairs.
Anna Nelson and Bess Mahoney dawdled behind them as they raced into the shops on Ninth Avenue, Anna pushing a stroller with Foggy’s baby sister Candace half-asleep in her taco-shaped onesie. “Remember to say thank you!” Bess called as Matt rooted around in a bag full of lollipops, trying to find the cherry ones by smell.
On the other side of the street, Luke and Danny were sneaking two fortune cookies each instead of one at Ghengis Connie’s, while Misty, Colleen, and Claire collected Ring Pops from Aisha Axton and her daddy, both in baseball uniforms.
Even Miss Josie was giving out candy, though from the doorway rather than letting kids into the bar. “What are you supposed to be?” she grunted at Jessica, who was still just wearing her dad’s jacket.
“What are you supposed to be?” Jessica retorted, and Miss Josie laughed and gave her, Trish, and Malcolm two packs of Smarties each.
When the sun was nearly gone and the kids were dragging their feet and picking fights with each other about nothing, the parents steered them to Soledad’s. They commandeered two tables in the back and divvied up their spoils.
“Here, Matty, you don’t like white chocolate. I’ll trade you for my dark chocolate.”
“Thanks, Foggy. Do you want this black licorice?”
“Ew, no, give it to your dad. That’s what I’m doing with mine.”
“Here, Colleen, let’s put all our candy in a big pile together and then we’ll take turns taking a piece out of it until it’s gone, so we have exactly the same amount.”
“Good idea, Misty. You can pick first.”
“NO ONE GIVE DANNY ANY MORE CANDY, HE’S ALREADY THROWN UP TWICE.”
“Okay, Luke, we heard you the first time, jeez.”
Karen slid off the edge of her bench. “Mrs. Claire’s Mom, do you have an extra bag I could use, please?”
“Of course, cariño.”
“What’s that for?” Foggy asked when Karen returned with the bag.
Karen ducked her head as she dropped a carefully curated selection of candy in the bag. “I didn’t see Frankie anywhere tonight. Maybe he didn’t get to go trick or treating. I want to make sure he has some candy.”
Foggy grinned and opened his mouth to tease, but Karen went pink and Foggy settled for passing her one of his extra Now and Laters. He didn’t like them much anyway.
“That’s a nice thing to do,” he said. “Give him one of these for me.”
*
When Malcolm nodded off, head cushioned on a pile of candy wrappers, the parents agreed that it was time to head home. Anna helped Foggy out of his avocado costume, which he could no longer walk in, and carried it for him while he and Matt pushed Candace’s stroller home.
Sluggish from coming off of their sugar high, no one paid much attention to a group of preteens milling around on the corner a block past Soledad’s. Once everyone had dispersed and gone down their own blocks, though, the preteens moved, heading for a jack o’ lantern glowing merrily on the nearest stoop.
As the ringleader bent to pick it up, a stone came zipping out of nowhere and stung him on the bottom.
“Hey!” he cried out, jerking upright and clapping a hand to his rear. “What the - ”
Another stone hit one of the other kids in the shoulder, and then a third in the foot. There was no one in sight.
“Who the hell - ” the ringleader started to say, but a stone hit him in the stomach and he gave it up as a bad job. “Come on, forget this block.”
“Do you think it’s haunted?”
“No, you idiot, but let’s get out of here anyway.”
They took off.
From a rooftop where he very definitely wasn’t supposed to be, Frankie smiled and pocketed his slingshot. “Not on my watch, punks,” he announced to no one. “Happy Halloween.”
The silence of evening settled over New York.
“...Okay, how do I get off of this roof?”
Fandom: Defenders (TV)
Rating: G
Summary: Halloween with Mr. Urich's second grade class is a little chaotic, but then, what isn't with them?
Notes: This came out of an elementary school AU I've been goofing around with on tumblr, where all of our good guys (and good-ish guys) grew up together in some kind of weird Hell's Kitchen/Harlem amalgam you shouldn't think about too hard, and no one's powers are a secret. For the "holidays" prompt on my Daredevil Bingo card. Title is from "This Is Halloween."
Jack Murdock rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly. “This month kinda got away from me,” he said. “You know how it is.”
Mr. Urich looked at Matt, who was stroking the worn leather of the boxing gloves dangling around his neck by the laces with an expression of total contentment. Without them, he would have suspected Matt had come to school in his pajamas again - white undershirt, fluffy bathrobe, too-big sweatpants. With the gloves, though…
“Are you a boxer, Matt?”
Matt beamed and puffed out his narrow chest. “I’m Battlin’ Murdock. I’m the champ!”
“Well, you look very tough. Don’t get into any fights outside of the ring, though, okay?”
Matt nodded and threw his arms around his father’s hips. “I’m gonna go show Foggy my gloves. Bye, Daddy!”
He ran off, cane whipping back and forth in front of him almost as an afterthought. Jack shifted again. “The Nelsons are picking him up after school today for trick or treating. I would, but I got this job…”
“He’ll have a good time with Foggy,” Mr. Urich said carefully. “And he loves his costume.”
“For some reason,” Jack said, smiling a little.
“He’s a good kid, Jack.”
“Yeah, he is,” Jack said, glancing over to where Matt was loudly bragging about his gloves to Trish and Claire. “Damned if I know how he got that way.”
*
“And it was very expensive,” Marci continued, fluffing out the glittery skirt of her fairy princess costume. “My mommy had it made special, because I’m her princess.”
“It’s a really fancy costume,” Malcolm said admiringly.
“I know.” Marci tossed her hair, then frowned at Malcolm. “If you’re a magician, where’s your wand?”
“I’m not a magician, I’m - Alexandre Dumas,” Malcolm said, stumbling briefly over the complicated name before delivering it with a careful French accent and beaming proudly.
“Who’s that?”
“He’s my daddy’s favorite writer. He wrote the Three Musketeers movie and, um…The Count of Monty Crisco.”
Marci gave him another appraising look, then shook her head. “You should have been a magician.”
But Malcolm was already distracted. “Wow, Marci, look, Trish just got here and her costume is even fancier than yours!”
Marci whipped around. “WHAT.”
*
“But why an avocado, though?” Mr. Urich asked.
Foggy stared at him like he couldn’t believe he had to explain something so obvious. Mr. Urich loved his job, but it was remarkable how often the seven-year-olds made him feel stupid. Even one dressed in a massive paper mache half-oval that looked in danger of toppling over at any moment. “It’s green,” he said.
“That it is.”
“And you need it for gakker...quauca…”
“Guacamole?”
“Tacos,” Foggy concluded triumphantly. “And it’s the good kind of c’lesterol.”
“Where did you even hear that?”
Foggy just blinked at him, his round face framed by the circle cut out of the avocado half’s flat side, which was admittedly beautifully painted in a green-yellow gradient. Mr. Urich sighed. “It’s a very nice costume, Foggy. Go ahead and put your lunch in your cubby.”
Foggy toddled past him, staying upright with apparent difficulty, and Mr. Urich chuckled to himself. It was an impressive costume, to be honest. He just hoped that…
Foggy tugged on his sleeve. “Mr. Urich? I need help. I gotta go pee.”
Mr. Urich sighed.
*
“Look at this brave knight!” Mr. Urich said. “Sword goes in the bin, though, Karen, no weapons in the classroom.”
“Then how’m I gonna protect myself?” Karen asked.
“You’ll have to use your words.”
“Words are stupid,” Karen grumbled, but dropped her plastic sword in the bin Mr. Urich held up.
*
“Wow, Misty and Brett, you’re both cops? Did you plan this?”
Misty and Brett glowered at each other from under matching hats, and Mr. Urich bit his tongue. No, they had clearly not planned this.
“Ten-four.”
“Copy that.”
“Copycat,” Misty hissed, and Brett stuck his tongue out at her.
“Hey. No name-calling, no tongue-sticking-out, and guns in the bin.”
“Roger.”
“Over and out.”
*
“I’m my grandpa!” Colleen announced before Mr. Urich could ask. She was wearing a bathrobe - bedecked with pink and yellow flowers, unlike Matt’s plain red one - with her hair in a topknot and a thin mustache carefully drawn on her upper lip with what Mr. Urich assumed was eyeliner. “He’s a samurai!”
“That’s a wonderful costume, Colleen, but the sword has to go in the bin. You can have it back at the end of the day.”
Colleen drew herself up to her full height of not even close to four feet. “A true samurai never rel...relinquershes her weapon.”
“Well, you can’t go into the classroom with a sword, and that means you can’t get the goody bag on your desk.”
The sword clattered into the bin and Colleen took off towards her desk. “It’s only a costume. Don’t tell Grandpa!”
*
Mr. Urich squinted at Frankie. “Soldier?” It was hard to tell. True, Frankie was dressed in head-to-toe camo, but that didn’t necessarily make this different from any other random Monday.
Frankie scoffed. “Marine.”
“My apologies. No weapons in school though, Frankie. In the bin.”
Frankie rolled his eyes, then dropped his plastic rifle in the bin.
“All of them.”
Frankie pulled a toy pistol out of the back of his pants, a slingshot out of his back pocket, and a plastic knife out of each boot. They all went into the bin.
Mr. Urich raised an eyebrow.
“Fine,” Frankie said, and produced a plastic grenade from his coat pocket. “But don’t come crying to me when we’re under attack and I’m not prepared!”
Frankie stomped off. Mr. Urich shook the bin and watched as the plastic guns, knives, swords, explosives, and nunchucks rattled around each other.
“What the hell is wrong with these children?”
*
“What are you supposed to be?” Jessica demanded.
Ellie tilted her head to the side and gave Jessica a blank, manic smile. The effect was unsettling, considering the effort that had been gone to to make her look like a rotting corpse.
Luke crossed his arms - because he felt like crossing them, of course, and not because he was scared. “Matt said Ellie said she was gonna be a zombie queen.”
“There’s no such thing as zombies,” said Claire, who watched a lot of hospital shows she was technically too young for, hence her doctor costume. “When you’re dead, you’re dead.” She didn’t move out from halfway behind Luke, though, staying partially hidden behind his giant afro wig.
Ellie tilted her head in the opposite direction.
“Is that what you look like when you’re dead?” Jessica asked.
“Um.” Claire wasn’t sure. Mostly people on the hospital shows got saved at the last minute by attractive young doctors. When they did die, they looked peaceful and maybe a little blue - but Ellie’s skin was a mottled greenish-gray, peeling off of her unusually gaunt face in places, her clothing hanging off her frame in tatters and her hair wild. The rumor was that the people who did makeup for Broadway shows had come to her house to do her Halloween makeup. If it was makeup.
“Well, I’m not scared of you,” Jessica told Ellie defiantly, shoving her hands into the pockets of her dad’s old leather jacket to prove it. It wasn’t exactly a costume, but no one so far had had the nerve to tell Jessica that.
Ellie let out an earsplitting screech.
“I’mgonnagoseewhatTrishisdoing,” Jessica said, backing away quickly.
“Is Danny here yet? Let’s go find Danny,” Luke said, grabbing Claire’s hand and pulling her away.
Ellie smiled wider.
*
Mr. Urich’s class had storytime at the library with Mr. Pop right before lunch. Even though it was broad daylight, the class was held spooked and spellbound by Mr. Pop’s dramatic - if abridged and simplified - reading of “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.”
“...and when Ichabod turned around, the other rider was holding his own head underneath his arm!” Mr. Pop boomed.
Foggy squeaked and grabbed Matt’s hand.
“Ichabod kicked his horse into a gallop, but the Headless Horseman did too, and his horse was faster. He was gaining on Ichabod. Ichabod didn’t know what to do.”
“PUNCH HIM IN THE NOSE!” Frankie shouted. Two thirds of the class erupted with agreement, some of them leaping to their feet.
“Yeah, punch him!”
“Punch him right in the nose!”
“Turn around and punch him!”
“Kick his butt, Icky!”
“RAWR!”
Mr. Pop closed his book and waited. The class went quiet. Trish and Misty sat down, looking a little shamefaced.
“Do we yell in the library?” Mr. Pop asked.
Everyone shook their heads.
“Do we need to put some sorries in the Sorry Jar?” Mr. Pop asked, pointing to the colorful, oversized jar on his desk, where students whispered “sorry” when they broke library rules.
Everyone shook their heads again. “Rawr,” Danny said.
“No roaring in the library either, Danny, even for dragons.”
Danny frowned and puffed up his cheeks. Luke elbowed him. “You promised not to breathe fire on the books!” he hissed. Danny frowned harder and swallowed his fire with an audible gulp.
“Thank you, Luke,” Mr. Pop said, and opened the book again. “The Headless Horseman chased Ichabod down the dark and lonely road…”
Foggy squeezed Matt’s hand tighter.
*
In the afternoon they had cupcakes with smiling pumpkin faces drawn on them in bright orange and black frosting. While Mr. Urich was distracted with trying to get frosting out of Danny’s hair, Brett leaned forward and said, “I heard some of the big kids were going to go around smashing jack o’ lanterns tonight, to ruin Halloween for us little kids.”
“We’re not little kids,” Colleen protested. “Little kids go trick or treating during school hours, in strollers.”
“Fine, us regular kids,” Brett said, rolling his eyes.
“Those jerks!” Claire said. “Why would they do that? My mommy worked really hard on our pumpkin.”
“They better not try to smash mine, or I’ll smash them,” Frankie growled.
From beneath the table, Ellie let out a quiet zombie shriek of agreement. She hadn’t spoken in non-zombie words all day.
“There oughta be a law,” Foggy said, and Misty nodded firmly.
“There is, it’s vanderization,” Brett said. Matt opened his mouth to speak, then closed it again. “So if you have your jack o’ lantern on a stoop, tell your moms and dads to bring it inside before it gets dark.”
“Then what’s the point?” Trish asked. “You put a candle in them so they look cool in the dark.”
“We should smash their pumpkins,” Jessica said. She had frosting on the tip of her nose. “That’ll show them.”
“Two wrongs don’t make a right, Jessica,” Matt murmured from where he was quietly folding his, Karen, and Foggy’s cupcake wrappers into a bracelet.
“You’re not the boss of me, Matt.”
“Just because other people are doing something bad doesn’t mean you should too.”
“You got into a fight with that big fifth grader last week!”
“That’s different.”
“How?”
Matt frowned, trying to come up with an answer. Ellie stole the rest of his cupcake and retreated back under the table.
From the craft sink came the sound of Mr. Urich’s despairing voice: “Danny, how did you even manage to get frosting down the back of your shirt?”
*
After an early dinner and before nightfall, but when the sun was low enough to make the city feel a little spooky, Mr. Urich’s students hit the streets in groups of threes and fours, parents straggling behind. Trick or treating started at Nelson’s Hardware for most of them, because Edward Nelson gave out full size candy bars - and for Foggy, Matt, Karen, and Brett, because they’d just finished eating grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup in the apartment upstairs.
Anna Nelson and Bess Mahoney dawdled behind them as they raced into the shops on Ninth Avenue, Anna pushing a stroller with Foggy’s baby sister Candace half-asleep in her taco-shaped onesie. “Remember to say thank you!” Bess called as Matt rooted around in a bag full of lollipops, trying to find the cherry ones by smell.
On the other side of the street, Luke and Danny were sneaking two fortune cookies each instead of one at Ghengis Connie’s, while Misty, Colleen, and Claire collected Ring Pops from Aisha Axton and her daddy, both in baseball uniforms.
Even Miss Josie was giving out candy, though from the doorway rather than letting kids into the bar. “What are you supposed to be?” she grunted at Jessica, who was still just wearing her dad’s jacket.
“What are you supposed to be?” Jessica retorted, and Miss Josie laughed and gave her, Trish, and Malcolm two packs of Smarties each.
When the sun was nearly gone and the kids were dragging their feet and picking fights with each other about nothing, the parents steered them to Soledad’s. They commandeered two tables in the back and divvied up their spoils.
“Here, Matty, you don’t like white chocolate. I’ll trade you for my dark chocolate.”
“Thanks, Foggy. Do you want this black licorice?”
“Ew, no, give it to your dad. That’s what I’m doing with mine.”
“Here, Colleen, let’s put all our candy in a big pile together and then we’ll take turns taking a piece out of it until it’s gone, so we have exactly the same amount.”
“Good idea, Misty. You can pick first.”
“NO ONE GIVE DANNY ANY MORE CANDY, HE’S ALREADY THROWN UP TWICE.”
“Okay, Luke, we heard you the first time, jeez.”
Karen slid off the edge of her bench. “Mrs. Claire’s Mom, do you have an extra bag I could use, please?”
“Of course, cariño.”
“What’s that for?” Foggy asked when Karen returned with the bag.
Karen ducked her head as she dropped a carefully curated selection of candy in the bag. “I didn’t see Frankie anywhere tonight. Maybe he didn’t get to go trick or treating. I want to make sure he has some candy.”
Foggy grinned and opened his mouth to tease, but Karen went pink and Foggy settled for passing her one of his extra Now and Laters. He didn’t like them much anyway.
“That’s a nice thing to do,” he said. “Give him one of these for me.”
*
When Malcolm nodded off, head cushioned on a pile of candy wrappers, the parents agreed that it was time to head home. Anna helped Foggy out of his avocado costume, which he could no longer walk in, and carried it for him while he and Matt pushed Candace’s stroller home.
Sluggish from coming off of their sugar high, no one paid much attention to a group of preteens milling around on the corner a block past Soledad’s. Once everyone had dispersed and gone down their own blocks, though, the preteens moved, heading for a jack o’ lantern glowing merrily on the nearest stoop.
As the ringleader bent to pick it up, a stone came zipping out of nowhere and stung him on the bottom.
“Hey!” he cried out, jerking upright and clapping a hand to his rear. “What the - ”
Another stone hit one of the other kids in the shoulder, and then a third in the foot. There was no one in sight.
“Who the hell - ” the ringleader started to say, but a stone hit him in the stomach and he gave it up as a bad job. “Come on, forget this block.”
“Do you think it’s haunted?”
“No, you idiot, but let’s get out of here anyway.”
They took off.
From a rooftop where he very definitely wasn’t supposed to be, Frankie smiled and pocketed his slingshot. “Not on my watch, punks,” he announced to no one. “Happy Halloween.”
The silence of evening settled over New York.
“...Okay, how do I get off of this roof?”