An American Halloween

A sinister poisoning.

By Kevin Cummings | Posted 10/11/08 | Updated 10/4/24

Even Dum-Dums know where to get good Halloween candy.

"Oh my God; someone call the ambulance or something!" Veronica's high-pitched screams could be heard echoing through the streets and alleyways from at least four blocks away. She wasn't quite sure what was going on, the world was spinning faster than it ever had to her eleven and a half year old mind. No more than a minute ago had her and her best friend Leslie been comparing their stashes of candy for bragging rights, when Leslie suddenly collapsed; her face making a loud smack as it hit the side of the curb. Now a pool of blood was making a halo around this little girl with an angelic face and a devil's costume.

A crowd of anxious onlookers began to gather around Leslie's limp body, while the uniform houses kept their silent sentry posts watching everything. As shock gave way to curiosity a faceless adult, whose little policeman was ringing a stranger's doorbell appeared taking Veronica by the hand. "What happened here sweetie?" she asked in a motherly tone.

"I don't know, we were just eating some of our candy when she passed out," Veronica managed to get out through her panicked sobs.

These words were like a slap in the face to the growing circle of people. Everyone knew what had happened. A few simple tests in a laboratory twenty miles away would later confirm, after her autopsy, that Leslie's candy had been laced with a deadly poison. No one ever imagined something like this could happen here, in the quiet suburb. They saw it on the news that things like this were happening to other kids in the country, but those kids were only names unimpassionately mentioned by overly made-up news reporters. Leslie was the sweet, innocent little girl everyone loved as if she were their own.

The silent stars, like the gleaming eyes of rabid wolves watched as the ambulance pulled up; clearing a path through the spectators and recently arrived local news crew. Cameras rolled as Leslie was swiftly taken to the nearest hospital, only to be pronounced dead on arrival. The spectators left in the wake of what had happened began to slowly stumble back home; nicely trimmed lawns, neatly painted fences, and a thousand metallic trashcans saying "keep our town beautiful" mocking their every step; feeling defiled, their innocence lost as if they were the ones that had done something wrong.

A man, now at least a hundred miles away laughed to himself in the dark of his cheap hotel room; flushing the rest of his stash of poison candy down to be carried away to the ocean, so he thought, then falling asleep with the static sound of the local news playing on the TV screen; the face of a little girl he had seen only a short hour ago appeared like a demon haunting him, cracking a slight smile he fell asleep knowing he had done a good job. Halloween

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