Corrie
“O h, no you don’t,” Sammy murmured, surprising me in our room. I had laid the Bride of Frankenstein dress out on the bed. I stood in black fishnet nylons connected to a black lace garter I’d bought the week before.
“Sammy, this was supposed to be a surprise,” I laughed, putting my hands on my hips.
He stood in the doorway, walnut eyes devouring me.
“We don’t have time,” I whispered.
“Bullshit,” he murmured. “I’ll cancel this damn party.”
He hadn’t put on his alien-baby shirt yet and wore a green shirt opened to reveal his smooth stomach, his chest a tangle of fine black hair.
He took three long strides across the room and picked me up.
I laughed as he threw me onto the bed.
“My God, you are beautiful,” he told me, nuzzling his face into my neck, clutching one of the plastic bones sticking from my hair in his teeth and dragging it out.
I wrapped my legs around him and leaned back.
“Maybe I should switch to a Frankenstein costume, and we can ask a vampire to renew our vows tonight.”
“Oh my, a second dream wedding,” I murmured as he sat up and unclipped the garters at my thighs.
“I’m the luckiest man in the world,” he told me, leaning down to kiss me hard on the mouth.
I opened my mouth with a sudden urge to demand he admit to renting us another house. Instead, when his lips found mine, I resisted the temptation and allowed the desires of my body to carry us away.
Sarah
SARAH HEARD Corrie’s squeal of laughter and shook her head, grinning. She envied her brother’s marriage. It was rare to see two people so in love after ten years of marriage, a daughter, and all the other life stuff that seemed to chip away at so many people’s love.
Arranging the last tray of food on the buffet in the foyer, she slipped into the bathroom to throw on her costume.
The guests would arrive within the hour.
THE WEATHER WANTED to play too, offering an eerie mist that drifted on a cool breeze from Lake Michigan.
“Seriously, how cool is that?” Sammy nudged Sarah as they surveyed the courtyard where people had parked their cars. Sammy had turned the side yard into a cemetery, complete with plastic headstones and dangling skeletons. The fog drifted low, leaving the headstones peeking from the eerie mist.
“Isn’t that a tad macabre?” she asked, gesturing at one of the headstones clearly reading ‘Sammy Flynn’ with that day as his day of death.
“’Tis All Hallow’s Eve, Sarah-my-dear. The ghosts will run amok. I’m of an ‘if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em’ state of mind.”
Sarah shook her head, waving at Gloria, who piled from a van with a sign on the side that read TC Party Bus. Gloria had paid for a driver and bus rental for her group of ladies. They climbed out in a variety of costumes, from killer clown to mermaid. The last woman who stepped from the van, Sarah had not seen before. Her hair was long and black with bits of color woven through it. She wore a tall, pointed black hat, purple and black stockings, and a witch’s dress complete with a purple lace corset.
Sarah couldn’t take her eyes off her and watched the other women to see if one of them claimed her. No one seemed to.
Gloria marched up to Sarah and grabbed her in a rib-crushing hug, grabbing Sammy next.
“You’ve outdone yourself this year, Sam,” Gloria declared.
“Thanks, Gloria. That’s quite a compliment from a party planner such as yourself.”
“Who’s that?” Sarah asked Gloria, nodding toward the witch who had bent low to pull the laces on her black combat boots.
Gloria smiled, her mischievous eyes twinkling.
“That’s Brook. Go say hi.” Gloria gave Sarah a little shove and walked into the house, heading straight for the table of liquor.
CORRIE
“CORRIE, this is Gunner. The guy who does coffee shop illustrations,” Sammy announced, dragging me away from the group I’d been chatting with.
A tall slender man in ragged clothes with black beneath his eyes and bits of fake flesh hanging from his face thrust out his hand.
“Corrie, you are dashing, my dear lady. Corpse bride?”
I smiled.
“The Bride of Frankenstein.”
Gunner pointed to a tiny woman wearing a fairy costume. Her small, pointed face so perfect in her pixie-wear that Corrie could have believed she was the real deal.
“That’s my wife, Micah. We have a two-year-old. His name’s Jared.”
“I said you and Micah should do a play date with Jared and Isis,” Sammy told me, taking my cup and draining it. “Here, let me refill you.”
I smiled, thinking I’d need another drink or two before I agreed to play dates.
Gunner winked.
“Micah’s the same way, dear. Play dates are on her list next to leg waxing and drinking sour milk. But,” he held up a finger. “A play date where we adults sip coffee tinged with Baileys while the kids run on the beach? I could get behind that.”
Sammy returned with my drink, and I clinked it against Gunner’s plastic cup.
“That’s a play date I’ll attend,” I agreed.
“Oh look, it’s Marcy,” Sammy announced, grabbing my hand and pulling me toward the front door, where our neighbor from Traverse City stood wearing a Super Woman costume. Blue sparkling leggings covered her thick thighs, and her husband, half her size and a tenth of her personality, lingered behind her in a rendition of Freddie Krueger that wouldn’t scare an infant.
Sarah
SARAH SAT with Brook in a dim enclave off the kitchen, what had likely once been a butler’s pantry. Two smoky lanterns hung from hooks on the wall, and the pale wisps of paper ghosts floated overhead.
Brook sipped rum and pineapple and told Sarah how she first met Gloria at a gay club in Grand Rapids three years before.
“I’ve only hung out with her a few times,” Brook admitted. “She’s great, but a little too… jovial for me.”
“Jovial,” Sarah repeated. “That is the perfect word to describe Gloria. Oh, and tenacious.”
“In the van on the way here, she held up an itinerary. Say hello to Sammy and Corrie, get a tour of Kerry Manor, sample all the Halloween-themed cocktails, convince one straight woman to question her sexual preferences, and end the night in bed with mystery lady not yet determined.“
Sarah laughed.
Brook leaned forward and gazed into Sarah’s eyes.
“Tell me, Sarah, what’s your passion?”
“I’m an architect.”
Brook studied her.
“I didn’t say your job. I said your passion. Are you passionate about architecture?”
Sarah laughed, feeling buzzed not just by the alcohol, but an even deeper electricity from Brook.
“I am, actually. That probably sounds boring, but I’ve loved designing houses my whole life. As a kid, I used to fill notebooks with house drawings. Then Sammy would add creepy monsters climbing on the roofs and shimmying down the drain pipes.”
“Sammy’s your brother? The guy throwing the party?”
Sarah nodded.
“More than my brother, my twin.”
“A twin. I have two sisters, but we’re all three oil and water. My dad likes to call us salt, mangoes and patio furniture.”
“That sucks. Sammy and I are so alike, even I confuse us sometimes. I can’t imagine having a sibling that didn’t get me.”
“There’s a lot to be learned from people who view the world differently than you.”