Cade Mayson doesn’t get to plan the Cashes Dade school’s Halloween Party for the elementary students anymore. The aliens destroyed their school and the entire kingdom while the citizens are now hiding out in the mountains, but that has nothing to do with it. Cade was fired from the planning committee well before that because of his crazy ideas. Many of his crazy ideas were shot down in the meetings, but he still tried to work some of them in to the party. Here’s what happened:
Early on during the Halloween Party, the kids were hanging out, some dancing to the scary music playing from the band in the large auditorium of the school dimly lit by dark orange chandelier lights hanging from a high dome and along the circular walls. A cake was brought it, with glittering neon green-lit candles throughout, designed like a castle. At first, it looked like what they expected, until more candles lit up revealing a ridiculously tall cake rising well over 30 feet tall. Several kids gasped, while several others whispered, “Oh no.” The cake was supposed to be large, but not this large. It looked amazing, but it wasn’t supposed to be that tall, because it was leaning, and wobbling, as the students carrying it took one shaky step after another down the staircase trying to get the heavy cake to the stage, then it happened, but it didn’t fall, it got too close to one of the chandeliers and caught on fire.
If only that was the only thing that caught on fire that night. Cade had another idea. He wanted to conduct a scary light show. He had a small cannon that could shoot out a dark powder that would put lights out. His plan was to shoot at the high chandeliers and put out the high lights so it would get really dark, then he had these special candles he was going to light up and I guess dance around with them in the balconies. They leave streaks and impressions in the air so it can look cool. The problem was, Cade didn’t do much research about the powders when he bought it at the store, in fact he didn’t do any research. He doesn’t like research. He could have asked Ben Caldade, another student in the party planning who knew how they all worked and it might have worked out right, but he didn’t. He “thought” it was the right one. It wasn’t. It was an explosive powder. Luckily he missed the lights and it fell to the floor and hit with a bang, but shockingly he didn’t get that it was the wrong powder so he tried it several more times until he hit one of the lights. It exploded, fell to the floor, and started a small fire in the seats that had to be put out. You’d think that was the last time something would be caught on fire that night, but you’d be wrong…
One of Cade’s favorite things about Halloween is trying to scare people. Sometimes he tries to get a student to think they have to go to the school basement to get something. He’ll put out the lights and dress up as a ghost or some kind of zombie and creep up silently behind them, then just be standing there with a creepy smile on his face. Sometimes he just hides in the craziest places to jump out at just the right time. For this party though, he had a more elaborate plan, and of course, it involved fire.
For weeks Cade made his “ghost” at home. He tried to make it look as realistic as possible, whatever that means. He made sure no one would see it until that night. He hung it on a string from the balcony. Near midnight, he got ready to release it, but it couldn’t just fly across the auditorium, it needed to be on fire. So he lit it up and let it fly. The kids watched in disbelief, knowing who was behind this bizarre looking ghost on fire as it fell, and hit the seats, and started them on fire.
At midnight, Cade was with the other students in the auditorium, under close watch, when in a sudden chilling rush, all the lights went out. Loud, heavy ticking echoed throughout the auditorium, the ticking of a massive clock, ticking slowly, with the clock hand dragging, dragging around and around.
Some of the students looked at him in shocked, disbelief.
“You can’t blame this one on me,” he said gazing up curiously. The clock ticked on and on and on in the chilling dark waves through the silent auditorium carrying only the dead clicks and tragic dragging of the clock hand, going circling around and around, always missing what’s right there in front of them. Then a fiery green ghost appeared in the center aisle, holding a mop. He began mopping the floor in slow, dragging strokes. He had a rough face with sunken, dark eyes. All of the students moved back toward the wall, trying to hide in the shadows, except Cade. He just stood still, staring directly at the old ghost, swishing his mop slowly back and forth. After several long moments he looked up, gazing directly at Cade and said in a rough voice, “You don’t realize where you’re going. I know your fate. I know your fate.”
“What…what are you talking about?” Cade barely got the words out. Struggling to meet his gaze he asked, “What is my fate?”
“You’re looking at it…”
