“Fuck,” Mel said. “Sorry.” But then she smiled ever so slightly and shot a quick glance at Manda and Katie, and Hannah knew she wasn’t sorry. Not one bit.
Hannah still had the scar.
“It’s Halloween, Hannah,” Manda said now, pleading. She was dressed up like a cat burglar with a striped shirt and watch cap, a black mask, and a pillowcase with a huge dollar sign drawn on the outside. Katie was a girlie clown, a feather boa draped around her shoulders. And Mel, she was some kind of superhero space princess with a silver dress, tall black boots, a silver cape, a tiara, and a big plastic laser gun strapped to her back.
“Don’t you want candy?” Katie asked as she stood shoulder to shoulder with Mel. “We’ll get candy. So much candy! Whole pillowcases stuffed full of KitKats, peanut butter cups, Mars bars.”
“So much sugar we won’t sleep for a week,” Mel promised.
“Then we can swap,” Manda said. “I know you love peanut butter cups — I’ll give you all of mine.”
Hannah let herself imagine it: roaming the streets, going door-to-door with these girls, opening her sack up, and watching the candy fill it until it was heavy, so heavy that it was hard to carry, bulging with chocolate, lollipops, wax lips, candy she’d never even heard of, never even tried.
“Come with us,” Mel said.
“Come with us,” Katie begged, an echo of Mel. Which was how Hannah thought of her. Not a person all her own, just an echo. Whatever Mel said, Katie did. Whatever Mel wore, Katie wore. She even brought the same kind of sandwich as Mel to school each day — peanut butter and fluff, with the crust cut off.
Hannah looked at Manda. The only one she half-trusted. She’d been to Manda’s house before, spent the night once even. It had been during February break, and the other girls were away; Hannah knew this would never have happened if they’d been around, if there’d been even the slightest possibility that they’d find out.
Manda’s house was big and beautiful. Her parents were real nice too. They took Hannah and Amanda to the video store, let them pick out whatever they wanted; then they stopped at the grocery store and bought a pan of popcorn that they cooked on the stovetop — pop, pop, pop — and the foil over it puffed up as it filled, turning it into a crinkly, metallic mushroom. She and Manda made pink cupcakes with purple sprinkles, and Manda’s mom wrapped the leftovers up for Hannah to take home. Hannah stayed in her clothes at bedtime, and Manda’s mom was all like, “Where’s your nightgown, sweetheart?” and Hannah said, “I forgot it,” when the truth was she didn’t own one at all.
“Well, I’m sure Amanda has something you can borrow! Let’s go see.” Then Amanda’s mom was opening all the drawers in her dresser and going through the closet and making a whole pile of stuff that she said was either too small for Amanda or that Amanda never wore anymore. Not just nightgowns, but jeans and a dress and shirts and this pair of pink cowboy boots that Hannah tried on, and they fit perfect, like her feet and Manda’s were the same shape and everything. “Take them,” Manda’s mother said. “Take all these things. Amanda doesn’t wear any of it anymore.” Amanda looked kind of surprised, a little angry maybe even, so Hannah said, “No, thanks. I’ll just borrow the nightgown for tonight.” Manda’s mom gave Manda a look, and Manda smiled at Hannah and said, “No, you should take all this stuff. I was just gonna give it to the Salvation Army anyway.”
Hannah went to sleep that night curled up against Manda, wearing her white nightgown, Manda’s heavy comforter on top of them, and it was the happiest she’d ever been. “I love you, Manda,” she said. “Manda Panda,” she added, giggling the new name into Manda’s shoulder.
“Go to sleep,” Manda said.
She wore Manda’s pleated acid-washed jeans and lavender polo shirt (with the collar turned up, the way Manda always wore it) to school when they all came back from break the next Monday, and Mel had laughed, then got all angry, and asked, “Amanda, isn’t that your shirt? And your jeans?” and Manda turned bright red, and Hannah said, “Yeah, they are. I stole them. When I was at her house.”
Mel glared at Manda. “When was Dog-face at your house?” And Manda — she looked all frantic, little drops of sweat dotting her forehead.
“I broke in,” Hannah said quickly. “Broke in when no one was home.”
“Thieving little bitch,” Mel said. “Give them back. Right now.”
“Yeah, go take them off, or we’ll do it for you,” Katie said. She took a step closer to Hannah like she was going to start ripping them off right in the hall.
“It’s okay, really,” Manda had said. “They’re like a hundred years old, they don’t even fit, just let her—”
“It is not fucking okay,” Mel snarled. Manda hadn’t said any more.
And Hannah had gone into the bathroom and taken off the clothes and put on her gym clothes and worn those all day instead — her stinky T-shirt and too-tight shorts. She’d folded Manda’s clothes up neatly and returned them to her during study hall. Manda slipped them into her book bag without saying anything, but she smiled apologetically at Hannah. When Hannah got home from school that day, she put the rest of the hand-me-downs in a kitchen garbage bag, sealed it tight, and hid them in the bottom of the trash bin in the garage. One of her chores was rolling the bin to the curb every Friday night, so she knew it’d be gone soon, and her daddy would never know.
But the boots, those lovely pink boots, she kept those. She knew better than to wear them to school. She put them on every day when she got home and danced around in her bedroom, imagining she was Manda, and she lived in a big house with a big closet full of clothes she never wore and sweet pink cupcakes baking in the kitchen.
The real Manda, just outside her bedroom window, smiled at her now, held out her hand. “Come on,” she said. “Come trick-or-treating with us. It’ll be so much fun. Promise.”
“I... I don’t even have a costume.”
“It’s cool. We’ll make you one,” Mel said. “We’ll give you parts of ours.”
Then Mel reached up, untied her beautiful silver cape, and held it out.
It sparkled in the streetlights.
“Katie will give you her wig,” Mel said.
“But the wig is—” Katie started to protest, then Mel shot her a glance.
“The boa too,” Mel ordered.
Katie took off the wig and boa without question and held them out to Hannah.
Hannah lifted up the screen, wiggled her way out the window.
It was only when she dropped to the ground that she realized she was wearing the pink boots, Manda’s boots, but no one said anything; no one seemed to notice, not even Manda.
“Oh, Hannah,” they all said, putting their hands on her, patting her back, stroking her hair like she was something truly great, like their own pet unicorn. “We’re going to have so much fun. It’ll be a night you won’t ever forget.”
2016
Amanda stood looking out the living room window, watching Erin and her friends saunter off down the street. They moved so easily together, bumping against each other, moving the same way, the same direction, like a school of fish. She’d walked that way once with Mel and Katie, like they were one being, a three-headed beast, finishing each other’s sentences, breaking into Journey songs: “Don’t Stop Believin’” and “Who’s Crying Now.”
It was just past six now, already full dark. Amanda went out onto the porch, plugged in the plastic glowing witch, the strings of tiny orange lights wrapped around the porch railings. Putting up the lights had been Jim’s job too, but Amanda had gone out and bravely gotten up on a stepladder, wrapping them around the posts, but no matter how she’d tried, she couldn’t get them to come out even. “Being honest? Looks like shit, Mom,” Erin had said with a shrug. And she’d been right.