Halloween showed up at Burl's house big time. The whole front yard was decorated like a cemetery with tombstones sporting humorous little sayings. Fog flowed over the ground and spooky noises originated from speakers that had been carefully placed out of sight.
Burl, dressed up like a farmer in overalls with a straw hat, was seated in a lawn chair in front of the house. He had a big plastic pumpkin filled with candy bars and a pot of hot cider on a television stand next to his chair. It didn't take much imagination to know that his house was a favorite stop for kids and their parents. The kids loved the candy and the parents enjoyed the hot cider.
His first visitors were George, Junior, and Maggie. Maggie was pushing a stroller. Being too young to wear a real costume, Junior was wearing a superman bib. It was kind of cute.
"Hey Burl," George said.
"Hello, Maggie, George, and Junior," Burl said.
George looked at all of the Halloween decor. He asked, "Have you got enough stuff here?"
"Maybe," Burl said.
"How did you get all of this stuff? You didn't have it last year," George said.
"Last year I bought the last of the stock from Maxwell at the mall. I got Halloween and Christmas stuff at about ten cents on the dollar," Burl answered.
He had purchased a hundred dollar fog machine for ten dollars. All of the headstones had come to five dollars. The plastic pumpkin had come to a dollar. The skeleton in the corner that made spooky sounds had been two dollars. He had gotten even more stuff for Christmas.
"That's a good deal," Maggie said.
"If you tell me what you want, I'll see if I can get it for you. It'll have to be after Christmas though," Burl said.
"That would be great," Maggie said.
"I'll let you know what he's got left," Burl said.
Knowing the answer to his question, George pointed over at the pot and asked, "What's that?"
Burl answered, "Hot apple cider. Have some."
"Will do," George said.
"Who's handing out candy at your place?" Burl asked.
Some of the older kids were liable to throw eggs at houses that didn't hand out candy. It hadn't been that long ago when George or him could have been the ones throwing eggs. They had never done it, but a lot of other kids they knew had.
"Me," George said. "I can get back there before anyone gets to the house."
"The older kids won't be along until later," Burl said.
"I know," George said. He held out a cup of hot cider for Maggie.
Maggie rocked Junior by pushing the stroller back and forth a little. She took the cup of cider from George and took a sip.
"This is good," Maggie said.
Burl said, "It's my Mom's recipe."
"You'll have to give it to me," Maggie said.
Burl pulled a piece of paper out of the top pocket of his overalls. While handing it over to her, he said, "Last year I had so many requests for it that I printed up a couple copies of the recipe."
"Thanks," Maggie said while slipping it into the diaper bag hanging from the stroller.
"You're welcome," Burl said.
Maggie said, "I better get next door. I'm sure that Herbie is ready to head out trick or treating."
"The kid has a great costume – Captain America," Burl said.
"How did Kat afford that?" Maggie asked.
Burl said, "I stopped by the Halloween store and picked it up for him. Maxwell was discounting everything by then."
"That was nice of you," Maggie said.
"It was just a couple of bucks," Burl said dismissively.
George shook his head thinking that it was likely to have been more than a couple of bucks. Burl had spent a hundred dollars helping Laura get a brake job and a new spare tire. He doubted Laura even knew about it since all she had been charged for were the parts for a long overdue oil change. He hoped that Burl had gotten laid out of the deal, but he doubted it.
"See ya' later," Maggie said heading over to Kat's house. She was going to hand out candy while Kat took Herbie trick or treating.
"I'll be right here in case you have a problem," Burl called after her.
"You're always around when someone has a problem," George said.
"If you can help, you help," Burl said summing up his lifestyle in one sentence.
"Have you heard from Laura?" George asked.
"I got a letter from her. She made it to California. She says that there are a lot of buskers there, but she's added storytelling to her repertoire and manages to collect a pretty good crowd," Burl said.
He had been very surprised to get a letter from her. It had been a long letter. She wrote about her trip across the country and the stops she had made along the way. She described some of the people she met. It seemed to him that she had run into quite a few characters. There had been one teenage fellow who tried to build a house out of plastic bottles as a school project. Thinking that he would be clever, he had filled them with water to give them a little weight and strength. Everything was great until the first freeze when all of the bottles burst. An entire wall of the house had come down. He was rebuilding it using sand to fill the bottles.
"That's nice," George said.
"She's going to do okay," Burl said.
"I'm sure she will," George said.
The door next door opened and Captain America came charging out holding an empty pillowcase. He ran directly for Burl shouting, "Uncle Burl, I'm Captain America."
"You sure are," Burl said laughing at Herbie's enthusiasm.
"Mommy kept telling me that I was going to have to go as a ghost because she couldn't afford a costume, but this morning she had this one for me. Isn't that great?" Herbie said excitedly.
The ghost costume would have come from an old sheet with a couple of holes cut in it for eyes. He had nearly died on seeing the simple Captain America costume.
"That is great," Burl said. "Now aren't you supposed to say something when you go door to door?"
"Oh yeah. Trick or treat!" Herbie shouted.
"I've got some treats over in that plastic pumpkin for you," Burl said.
Herbie ran over to the plastic pumpkin and looked inside. He could hardly believe his eyes – there were a half dozen varieties of chocolate bars. Now he was faced with the problem of choosing which kind to take.
Turning to Kat, Burl added, "I've got some hot apple cider if you're interested."
"Thanks, Burl. Thanks for everything," Kat said watching Herbie pick through the candy in the pumpkin.
"My pleasure," Burl said.
George looked down the street and said, "The kids are starting to come out. I better get back to the house."
"Good move," Burl said.
Kat said, "I'll be over there in a few minutes."
George returned to the house pushing the stroller. He was going to watch Junior while Maggie handed out candy at Kat's house. Maggie had come down with a bad case of cabin fever and wanted a little time out of the house. George was only too happy to spend a little time at home with Junior.
For the next hour, young mothers with their even younger children stopped by the house. The kids went ape over the candy while the mothers appreciated the apple cider. A good percentage of the mothers were single, but none eyed Burl with any real interest. Everyone knew Burl. Everyone liked Burl, just not in that way.
Next door, Maggie handed out candy listening to the women discuss Burl. The core of their comments were positive. After all, they were talking about Burl who would help anyone when there was a need. Despite that, all of the women couldn't keep from making negative comments about his appearance.
There were a few single women who complained about how hard it was to find a nice guy. Maggie was tempted to point out that Burl was a nice guy, but she knew how they would react. It was always the same – he's like a brother and dating him would be icky.
Of all of the women in the neighborhood, Maggie knew Burl better than anyone other than Kat. She felt that if anything happened to George that Burl would be the first guy she would turn to for comfort. Her opinion of her own gender was getting lower with every negative comment the women made about Burl's appearance.
It was starting to get dark and the older kids started making their appearance. Rather than mothers or fathers escorting their one or two young children, there would be one adult watching a herd of kids. It was always the same.
Maggie was handing out candy to a pack of kids when Kat returned with Herbie. The pillowcase wasn't exactly billowing with candy, but it was enough to excite Herbie. He could hardly wait to get inside to survey his take for the night. Maggie opened the door and let him into the house while warning him not to eat anything until she had a chance to check the candy.
The crowd of kids ran to the next house followed by a harried mother. Their departure left Maggie and Kat standing on the porch. Kat glanced in the bowl with candy to see how much was left. She hoped that it would last through the night. If not, she was pretty sure that Burl had extra and would help her out.
Kat asked, "How did it go?"
Maggie said, "I was listening to all of those single mothers talking about Burl. I kept thinking they were the stupidest bitches in the world."
"Why?" Kat asked.
"They kept talking about what a nice guy he is, but that it is a shame he's so big. Stupid cows don't realize just how great of a catch Burl is," Maggie said.
"He would be a great catch," Kat said feeling a little self-conscious.
"They just can't past his appearance. The stupid bitches can't put character above appearance," Maggie said. Seeing the sour expression on Kat's face, she quickly added, "I don't mean you."
"I really miss Jimmy. He spoiled me for all other men," Kat said softly.
"He was a hunk," Maggie said.
Jimmy looked like a soldier was supposed to look. He had a great physical build, square jaw, and piercing eyes. When he wore his uniform women swooned. He had command presence. When he walked into the room everyone knew it. In short, physically he was everything Burl wasn't.
"Yes, he was," Kat said with a sigh.
Maggie said, "He was a nice guy, too. Even men liked him."
"I know," Kat said. "He was a lot like Burl in that respect."
"Yes, he was," Maggie said.
The two women stood there remembering Jimmy. Maggie didn't know how Kat would ever find a man who could live up to the standard Jimmy had set. Kat sighed thinking that she would spend the rest of her life alone. It wasn't fair.
"I guess I better head home," Maggie said. "George is probably getting worried about me."
"Happy Halloween," Kat said.
"Same to you," Maggie said.
Maggie walked past Burl on her way to the house and then went back to visit for a few minutes with him. They exchanged a few words about how few trick or treaters there were that year. It seemed to Burl that there were fewer and fewer of them every year. At most, mothers only took their kids around the block. A few of them only visited houses where they knew the owners.
Every year it seemed like there was one story on the news where some sick bastard put a razor blade in an apple or injected a piece of candy with drugs. Burl couldn't imagine anyone actually doing that and wondered if it wasn't more of an urban myth than fact. Yet every year, there were all kinds of warnings about checking the children's candy on the news. Of course, with three hundred and fifty million people in the country there were bound to be a few nutcases out there.
The light started to fade and the traffic of young kids dropped off significantly. Burl sat on his chair handing out candy to older and older kids. By the time eight o'clock rolled around, the kids were in their late teens. These were the ones who would play tricks on the houses where treats weren't to be found. Burl handed out candy and found that quite a few of them were more interested in the hot apple cider than the chocolate bars.
It was finally past curfew and Burl started packing up the halloween decorations. He wasn't going to leave the fog machine out overnight. Although there were a lot of things, it didn't take long to remove everything. He dumped everything in the living room planning to take it down to the basement in the morning.
After taking a short look around the outside to make sure he had picked up everything, he went into the house. He was a little disappointed by the number of kids that had stopped by that night. He had four bags of chocolate left. He estimated that maybe eighty kids had come by that evening. He remembered when it was well over a hundred.
He went over to his chair and took a seat. Thinking he would pass the time with a movie, he turned on the television and flipped through the hundred and fifty channels. Like usual, he saw nothing interesting. There were a lot of horror films, but he didn't like gruesome movies.
He looked over at the Halloween decorations and decided that he might as well carry them down to the basement now. It took a half an hour to box up the decorations and another fifteen minutes to store them on the shelves in the basement.
It was now nine at night and he was bored. He wasn't looking forward to another night at home alone with nothing to do. He tried to read a biography of Robert E. Lee, but just couldn't get into it. It had been nice having Laura around and he missed the company.
Bored, he looked at the literature he had picked up at the Army recruiting office. There was a URL to look up more information about individual jobs in the Army. He wondered if he was willing to make the Army his career. There wasn't much of a future being a security guard at a local mall.
He sighed. "No one would miss me."
Getting on his computer, he went to the army website and browsed the career categories. The first job that he looked at was as a military policeman. It was too much like his current job except he would get to carry a gun. Upon finding the job listing for becoming a Ranger, he laughed at the idea. There was no way he'd make it as a Ranger.
After spending nearly an hour reading job descriptions, he was still not convinced he had seen anything that attracted his attention. That was his real problem in life. There wasn't a career he was just dying to pursue. He had just kind of settled into being a security guard and was drifting along earning a modest living. What he really wanted was a wife and family; the job was just a way to pay the bills.
Not finding a career didn't affect his thinking about joining the Army. He liked the idea of being with a squad of men and women for most of the time. It would beat sitting around the house every night with no one to talk with and no where to go. He guessed there were a lot of reasons to join: learning a new career, getting some money for college, ending his loneliness, and doing something important. He'd even get paid while doing it. He looked at the pay thinking it was more like they would be pretending to pay him.
"I'd like to be a medic," Burl said. "I'm going to stop by the recruiter's office to learn more tomorrow morning."