The Skeleton

This Halloween, her oldest daughter wanted to be a skeleton, a really scary skeleton. The costume Lisa had bought looked terrifying. She had found it at a small thrift shop uptown and it was not your typical Target Halloween costume she usually chose for the family. It was gross.

Lisa didn‘t like Halloween, but Miles and the kids did. So, every year they picked some new, used or self-made costumes and went trick or treating, among dozens of vampires, zombies, ghosts. And skeletons.

Lisa‘s hands were thoughtlessly running over the fabric of the really scary skeleton costume. The bones had a strange texture that made them feel like real bones from a steak. The colors were faded but not from washing. There was loose tissue on some of the bones and two ribs near the heart were splintered. The skull mask had a nasty grin on its lipless face.

“What a weird thing,” Lisa mumbled while folding the skeleton and putting it on a shelf behind her where all the costumes – a zombie, Harry Potter, and a ghost – had been waiting for the next day. Lisa had decided to be a police officer this year. Her costume was the last in line. When she had put it next to the skeleton, she left the laundry room to help Miles chasing little Harry Potter and the ghost into their beds to assure they would be well-rested tomorrow.

In the early hours of Halloween, Lisa woke up from a faint rattling noise. Miles was fast asleep and snoring lightly, but Lisa was sitting up and straining her ears.

Rattle. Rattle. Thud. Again. What was that?

“Miles,” Lisa whispered, “Miles, wake up!” Then, more urgently, “Miles! Wake up! I hear something downstairs!”

Lisa stared at her sleeping husband in disbelief, but before she could take any further actions, the rattling and thudding continued, only much closer this time. And it was followed by a low groan.

Lisa jumped out of the bed and ran toward the bedroom door, her heart beating so hard her ears were ringing. She opened the door and stared down the hallway. A shadow was standing at the top of the stairs. Groaning.

A shocked gasp escaped Lisa’s mouth and made the shadow turn around. It was the skeleton.

The skeleton moved slowly through the hallway; its hollow eyes locked on Lisa. Its bones rattled and squealed slightly, and it limped forward with a thudding sound. Lisa turned around, yelling: “MILES! WAKE UP!” Nothing. She leaped out of the room, facing the groaning skeleton. All she could feel was terror and the taste of adrenaline in her mouth. Whatever this thing was, it would never reach her children. She would rather die than allow it to hurt her babies.

The grin on the skeleton’s face intensified. Lisa froze. Her mind was a mess, but she remembered faintly that Miles had put his old tennis rackets in the closet at the end of the hall. Without thinking about the consequences, she rushed past the skeleton, almost throwing herself into the closet. She yanked the door open, gasping for breath, her eyes frantically scanning the shelves. When she finally spotted the rackets, she grabbed one and ran back. The skeleton turned to face her, still groaning, still grinning. It almost seemed to wink at her.

“Get out of my house!” Lisa shrieked, raising the racket above her head before smashing the skeleton’s face with it. The blast cracked the skull, but it was still grinning. “Get OUT of my HOUSE!” Lisa cried hysterically, tears streaming down her cheeks, her whole body shaking. The skeleton laughed drily before it grabbed Lisa with its bony hands and pulled her into a tight embrace. Lisa let go of the tennis racket. The skeleton groaned and laughed, and its embrace seemed to crush every single bone in Lisa’s body. She groaned. The skeleton laughed. That terrible hollow grin was the last thing Lisa saw before the lights went out and she lost consciousness.

“Darling, are you alright?”

Lisa opened her eyes. Miles and the kids were gathered around her, exchanging worried looks.

“Hey honey, I’m fine, it was just… it was just a dream. A nightmare,” Lisa whispered, hugging Harry Potter and the ghost who had refused to get out of their costumes in the evening. Of course they had. Lisa breathed a sigh of relief. Just a nightmare. On Halloween.

While preparing breakfast, Lisa told Miles about the dream. She told him that she would get rid of the skeleton costume and replace it before their oldest daughter needed it. Miles shrugged but didn’t have any objections. After breakfast, Lisa went to the laundry room, taking the skeleton from the shelf. She avoided to look at it.

Lisa tossed the skeleton costume into the trash bin in the driveway, furiously slamming the lid shut. She then got into her car and drove to the next Target to buy her daughter a new really scary skeleton costume, more normal and less deadly though.

When she returned from the store with a new costume, the thrash bin’s lid was missing. Lisa never noticed.