31 Days of Halloweeny Teeny Tales, Day 28: LUMBER

Chainsaws, axes. Honestly, I’m surprised more lumberjacks don’t get into the slasher biz. It’s certainly a more sustainable line of work. After all, we’re losing trees at a faster rate than people.

 So, what else are you supposed to do with all those biting, cutting, pulping instruments readily at your disposal? You at least want to use ‘em until the warranties run out, right?

 I guess the real question is—if you’re gonna move from chopping down trees to chopping down co-eds—where’s the money coming from?

 Why don’t you finish that stack of flapjacks, and we can discuss that…

31 Days of Halloweeny Teeny Tales, Day 27: YEAR

The girl from chemistry drew a skull over my yearbook picture. Not a smiling skull, but this evil-looking skull. I’d admire her talent, if it wasn’t so creepy.

 I don’t know why I asked her to sign. I felt sorry for her?

 No one else asked. They ignored her like every other day.

 What, am I supposed to beg for a new yearbook and start over with signatures? Yeah, right. And what’s this skull supposed to mean anyway?

 Ink’s still wet. I touch it. It soaks into my skin. I’m feeling kinda dizzy. Why’s this ink smell so funny, anyway?

31 Days of Halloweeny Teeny Tales, Day 26: GRAIN

One: One grain of sand with one drop of blood goes ignored by attackers, figuring they’re close enough to shore that the tide will wash away evidence.

 Two: Two weeks since the missing report, two detectives get the lab results for one fleck of blood on one grain of sand, found by pure luck.

 Three: Three suspects in three separate rooms won’t get their stories straight. They won’t know why it took the two detectives two weeks to bring them in. They won’t know what the lab had to say about one fleck of blood on one grain of sand.

31 Days of Halloweeny Teeny Tales, Day 25: CLOVER

“Where is it?” O’Flannery asked. In dew-soaked trousers, he spoke to the clover spread below.

 His drinking companions stood watch. They elbowed each other’s ribs to stay awake.

 A big man, wool sweater riding up his belly, belched.

 O’Flannery sprang up, moving face-to-face with the man. Liquor hung heavy on both men’s breath.

 “Have you seen it?” O’Flannery asked.

 Before the big man could push him away, O’Flannery let go.

 He couldn’t tell the others to run. That it was too late.

 He’d finally lost his four-leaf clover. And, with it gone, his bad luck was finally come-calling.

31 Days of Halloweeny Teeny Tales, Day 24: QUEEN

Too often, the Queen wished to let her hair down.

 But every time—as hands snaked up to grasp pins holding each strand in place, the King would intervene. “You mustn’t.”

 And she listened, because he was her rescuer.

 Until the day she found him with those scullery-maids in the pantry. He looked not at all regal with his breeches at his ankles.

 Her hair cascaded over the King, over everyone. Free of its prison at last, it descended from the tower of her body.

Satisfied, she tied it again. Her pinned-up hair muffled their screams against her head.

31 Days of Halloweeny Teeny Tales, Day 23: ATTACK

They came with pitchforks. Torches. From the parapets, he watched them come. He pictured children’s toy soldiers moved across the floor by God’s hand.

 He saw one man, caught up in bloodlust, trip over a tree branch. His torch’s flames lit the back of the shirt of the man before him. Fire traveled down the line.

 Flaming men toppled like dominoes. He smiled, clapped with glee. Countless childhoods sewn up and shocked to life within and without his patchwork body didn’t tell him any different.

 He wondered whose skin, whose flesh he’d wear next. Someone knocked at the castle gates.

31 Days of Halloweeny Teeny Tales, Day 22: MINISTER

Tom Harrison’s boys waded in the ditch and lifted the minister’s corpse onto the roadside.

 Sheriff followed with questions for the Harrison boys and other potential witnesses.

 But one had seen the minister coming or going.

 Finally, Barr McCready—whose homestead sat clear across town—came riding in fast.

 After dismounting, McCready pushed the others aside. He held the dead man’s hand . “I don’t know how ya done it, Father. But the demon’s outta May Ella.”

 “I know,” the minister said, eyes glowing red. He squeezed hard on McCready’s palm.

 “But I might take her for another spin soon.”

31 Days of Halloweeny Teeny Tales, Day 21: BIRTHDAY

“Make a wish and blow out the candles,” they said.

 He closed his eyes, thinking long and hard about his wish. He put his lips together and exhaled.

 The wish came true. But the candles didn’t go out. They burned and burned and burned.

 They found him sitting there among the charred remains of the Chuck E. Cheese. Hair gone, skin blackened and flaking away, revealing new pale, nearly-translucent skin beneath.

 No one knew how he could have survived. No one understood why he was smiling.

 But he knew. It had been the best birthday ever.

31 Days of Halloweeny Teeny Tales, Day 20: COACH

“Would you mind switching seats?” the Man from Seat 2B asked.

 Before sitting, he reached across and pressed a smallish object into my palm. “For my seatmate,” he said.

 My new seatmate (2A) had her back to me.

 I tapped her shoulder. “The man sitting here, told me to give--”

 Her head lolled back, revealing the crimson grin across her throat. The “object” in my hand bit into my flesh, just as it had hers.

 I don’t know how he switched the tickets. I don’t know why my ticket said I’d always been the man in seat 2B.

31 Days of Halloweeny Teeny Tales, Day 19: STEEL

So, you just built a giant robot and it’s gone on a rampage? Haven’t we all?

 The streets and sidewalks of this country are overrun with steel and iron monstrosities, punching holes in skyscrapers and dropkicking airplanes out of our skies. They laugh at us with the electronic roar of a billion connecting modems.

 It’s not too late. Join us today, and our combined brain power will allow us to build one even more giant robot that can crush, stomp, and destroy all of the other giant robots plaguing our country.

 After that, there’s nothing else that can go wrong.