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perfectly, his memory having never failed to retain the finer details of her
scrunched-up nose, the freckles across her forehead, the way her mouth tilted
to one side when she smiled. Such a pretty face, one that fooled everyone; and
hiding behind it were such unconventional desires.
    Hesitantly, he began to cut.
    The eyeholes came first, allowing
her to see as he carried out the rest of the work. Then there was the mouth, a
long, graceful gouge at the base of the skull. She smiled. He blinked, taken by
surprise. In his dreams, it had never been so easy.
    Hands working like those of an
Italian Master, he finished the sculpture. The rain intensified, threatening to
break the glass of the large kitchen window. More children capered by in the
night, their catcalls and yells of “Trick or treat!” like music to his ears.
    The pumpkin did not speak. It was
simply a vegetable with wounds for a face. But it smiled, and it waited, a
noble and intimidating presence inhabiting it.
    “I love you,” said Baxter, standing
and leaning towards the pumpkin. He caressed it with steady hands, his fingers
finding the furrows and crinkles that felt nothing like Katy’s smooth, smooth
face. But it would do, this copy, this effigy. It would serve a purpose far
greater than himself.
    Picking up the pumpkin, he carried
it to the door. Undid the locks. Opened it to let in the night. Voices carried
on the busy air, promising a night of carnival, and the sky lowered to meet him
as he walked outside and placed Katy’s pumpkin on the porch handrail, the low
flat roof protecting it from the rain.
    He returned inside for the candle.
When he placed it inside the carved head, his hands at last began to shake.
Lighting the wick was difficult, but he persevered. He had no choice. Her hold
on him, even now, was too strong to deny. For years he had covered up her
crimes, until he had fallen in line with her and joined in the games she played
with the lost children, the ones who nobody ever missed.
    Before long, he loved it as much as
she did, and his old way of life had become nothing but a rumour of normality.
    The candle flame flickered, teased
by the wind, but the rain could not reach it. Baxter watched in awe as it
flared, licking out of the eyeholes to lightly singe the side of the face. The
pumpkin smiled again, and then its mouth twisted into a parody of laughter.
    Still, there were no sounds, but he
was almost glad of that. To hear Katy’s voice emerging from the pumpkin might
be too much. Reality had warped enough for now; anything more might push him
over the edge into the waiting abyss.
    The pumpkin swivelled on its base to
stare at him, the combination of lambent candlelight and darkness lending it an
obscene expression, as if it were filled with hatred. Or lust.
    Baxter turned away and went inside.
He left the door unlocked and sat back down at the kitchen table, resting his
head in his hands.
    Shortly, he turned on the radio. The
DJ was playing spooky tunes to celebrate the occasion. Werewolves of London,
Bela Lugosi’s Dead, Red Right Hand . . . songs about monsters and madmen.
Baxter listened for awhile, then turned off the music, went to the sink, and
filled the kettle. He thought about Katy as he waited for the water to boil.
The way her last days had been like some ridiculous horror film, with her
bedridden and coughing up blood – her thin face transforming into a monstrous
image of Death.
    She had not allowed him to send for
a doctor, or even call for an ambulance at the last. She was far too afraid of
what they might find in the cellar, under the shallow layer of dirt. Evidence
of the things they had done together, the games they had played, must never be
allowed into the public domain. Schoolteacher and school caretaker, lovers,
comrades in darkness, prisoners of their own desires. Their deeds, she always
told him, must remain secret.
    He sipped his tea and thought of
better days, bloody nights, the slashed and screaming