Johnny Halloween Read Online Free

the masks, but it didn’t work out that way. Sure, I shot Willie. But I had to shoot him three times before he died. I wanted to kill Johnny, too, but he got away. So I changed the story I’d planned. I hid Willie’s skull mask, and I hid the gun and the money, and I said that Willie had been visiting me at the store when a lone bandit came in. That bandit was Johnny Halloween, and he’d done the shooting. And all the time that I was lying, I was praying that the cops wouldn’t catch him.”
    I blew my nose and got control of myself. Helen’s eyes were wide in the dark, and there was a welt on her cheek, and she wasn’t moving. “I was young, Helen,” I told her. “I didn’t know what to do. It didn’t seem right—getting married, bringing a baby into the world when I couldn’t be sure that I was the father. I wanted everything to be just right, you know? It seemed like a good idea to use the money for an abortion instead of a wedding. I figured we’d just go down to Mexico, get things taken care of. I figured we’d have plenty of time for kids later on.”
    That’s when I ran out of words. I took the tape off of Helen’s mouth, but she didn’t say anything. She just sat there.
    I hadn’t said so much to Helen in years.
    I handed her the tequila bottle. There was a lot left in it.
    Her hands shook as she took it. The clear, clean liquor swirled. The worm did a little dance. I turned away and quit the room, but not fast enough to miss the gentle slosh as she tipped back the bottle.
    I knew that worm didn’t stand a chance.
     
    ****
     
    I don’t know why I went out to the garage. I had to go somewhere, and I guess that’s where a lot of men go when they want to be alone.
    I shuffled some stuff around in my toolbox. Cleaned up the workbench. Changed the oil in the truck. Knowing that I should get rid of the pumpkin mask, but just puttering around instead.
    All the time thinking. Questions spinning around in my head.
    Wondering if Helen would talk.
    Wondering if I’d really be able to pin the clerk’s murder on the Mexican girls. Not only if the charges would stick, but if I had enough left in me to go through with it.
    Wondering if my deputies would find Johnny’s corpse, or his El Camino, or if he’d left any other surprises for me that I didn’t know about.
    They were the kind of questions that had been eating at me for thirty years, and I was full up with them.
    My breaths were coming hard and fast. I leaned against the workbench, staring down at the pumpkin mask. Didn’t even know I was crying until my tears fell on oily rubber.
    It took me a while to settle down.
    I got a .45 out of my tool chest. The silencer was in another drawer. I cleaned the gun, loaded it, and attached the silencer.
    I stared at the door that led to the kitchen, and Helen. Those same old questions started spinning again. I closed my eyes and shut them out.
    And suddenly I pictured Johnny Halloween down in Mexico, imagined all the fun he’d had over the years with his pretty boys and his money. Not my kind of fun, sure. But it must have been something.
    I guess the other guy’s life always seems easier. Sometimes I think even Willie’s life was easier. I didn’t want to start thinking that way with a gun in my hands.
    I opened my eyes.
    I unwrapped a Snickers bar, opened the garage door. The air held the sweet night like a sponge. The sky was going from black to purple, and soon it would be blue. The world smelled clean and the streets were empty. The chocolate tasted good.
    I unscrewed the silencer. Put it and the gun in the glove compartment along with the three hundred and fifteen bucks Johnny Halloween had stolen from the liquor store.
    Covered all of it with the pumpkin mask.
    I felt a little better, a little safer, just knowing it was there.
     
     

 
    SATAN’S ARMY
     
     
    Tonight is his night! Halloween belongs to the Prince of Darkness! It’s not a night for children, and it’s certainly not a night for