A gentle Halloween day at Ollie’s house
Morning, While the Fog Was Still Asleep
It was still grey outside. Fog lay over the garden like a big soft blanket, and nobody felt like crawling out from under it.
Ollie opened one eye and heard it right away:
“Meow. Meeeow.”
Shushu the cat was sitting on the windowsill, meowing straight into the glass.
“Meow,” Ollie answered, because he spoke quite good cat.
Mum peeked into the room. “Good morning, grumbler. Do you know what day it is?”
Ollie thought about it. It was Saturday, he knew that much. And there was a pumpkin in front of the house, as big as a bicycle wheel. He knew that too.
“Halloween!” he shouted, and jumped out of bed.
His little sister Suzy wobbled through the door in her polka-dot pyjamas and said the only word she ever said in the morning:
“Breakfast.”
A Pumpkin on the Table
Dad carried the pumpkin into the kitchen with both arms and set it on the table as carefully as if it were an egg.
“Right then,” he said, and picked up the knife. “Here we go.”
Tap. Tap. Tap.
First the lid. Then the eyes. Then a nose like a little triangle.
Suzy pulled the seeds out with her bare hands and made a horrified face at every handful.
“Yuck! It’s slippery!”
“Those are pumpkin guts,” Dad said cheerfully. “Pumpkin brains, if you like.”
Suzy dropped the whole handful back in at once.
“BRAINS?”
“Shushu would be jealous,” said Dad.
When the pumpkin finally had a mouth too, they stood it in the middle of the table and looked at it for a long time.
“He needs a name,” said Ollie.
“Tappy,” Suzy announced. “Because it tapped.”
And that is how the pumpkin became Tappy.
The Kitchen Started Bubbling
In the afternoon Grandma Betty arrived and brought her own apron, because Grandma Betty never bakes in somebody else’s.
On the stove, the pumpkin filling was bubbling. Blub. Blub. Blub.
“Do you hear that?” Grandma asked. “That’s filling talk.”
Ollie leaned over the pot and answered it: “Blub.”
Tappy sat at the edge of the table and watched the whole kitchen from there. Ollie was certain of one thing: Tappy liked the smell of cinnamon. You could tell by his mouth.
Meanwhile Dad was making popcorn in a pan. For a moment there was nothing at all. And then it started:
Pop! Pop! Pop-pop-pop!
Suzy laughed so hard she nearly slid off her chair. One kernel jumped all the way to the floor, and Shushu batted it under the fridge with one paw, where it stayed for ever.
The buns came out of the oven orange and smelling of cinnamon. Grandma Betty said one was for tasting.
They tasted four.
The Wardrobe That Rustled
In the early evening they opened the big wardrobe in the hallway, and out fell an old scarf, two hats and one slipper that had gone missing back in the summer.
Everything in that wardrobe rustled.
Ollie chose a white sheet with two holes in it. Suzy wanted to be a cat, so Mum painted whiskers on her cheeks and put a headband with ears on her head.
Dad put on a wide-brimmed hat and made a spooky face. The spooky face wasn’t very good, but nobody told him that.
Ollie pulled the sheet over his head and went to stand in front of Tappy.
“Boo,” he said.
Tappy went on smiling, because a pumpkin that has already had its brains taken out is not afraid of anything.
And when everyone was finally ready, a small voice came out of the wardrobe:
“Meow.”
Shushu had hidden in there at the very beginning and had been waiting quietly the whole time for somebody to notice her.
A Road Full of Leaves
Outside it was already as blue as ink.
Ollie carried the lantern with the little candle inside, and held it very, very steady so the flame wouldn’t go out.
Leaves rustled under their feet. There were so many that Suzy stepped into them like puddles, lifting her knees up high, high, high.
The wind blew, and the leaves rose off the ground.
“Look!” Suzy pointed upwards. “They’re flying!”
And they really were. The leaves flew around the lantern like big slow butterflies, and one of them stuck itself to Ollie’s sheet, right where his heart would be.
Trick or Treat
The first house on the lane belonged to Mrs. Rosalie.
Before they even knocked, a deep sound came from behind the gate:
“Grrrrrr.”
That was Rufus, a big shaggy dog who always growled first and only afterwards remembered that he knew these people.
When he recognised Ollie, he stopped growling and began to wag his tail so hard that his whole back half wagged with it.
Mrs. Rosalie opened the gate and looked surprised, even though she had been expecting them since morning.
“Trick or treat!” the children shouted together.
“Treat, please,” said Mrs. Rosalie quickly. “I’ve got plenty of tricks at home already.” And she looked at Rufus, who was lying on his back by then, looking innocent.
More Doors, More Treats
At the next house, a lady in a pointed hat opened the door and pretended not to know them at all. She looked Ollie up and down for a long time and said she had never in her life seen such a small ghost. Ollie stood as tall as he possibly could.
Two houses further on, spooky music was coming out of an open window: long creaking sounds and somebody laughing very, very slowly.
Suzy held on to Mum’s coat and listened to the whole thing from the gate. Then she asked to listen to it again.
And at the very last house they were given an apple. Suzy carried it home in her hand the whole way and never took a single bite, because you simply do not eat an apple while you are a cat.
When the Candle Went Out
It was warm at home.
Mum made tea, Dad put Tappy on the windowsill and lit a candle inside him. Tappy glowed, and a big orange smile jumped up onto the ceiling.
Suzy fell asleep first, still in her costume, with cat whiskers on her cheeks.
Ollie sat down by the window for a moment longer.
“Can I blow it out?” he asked.
He leaned towards the pumpkin, took a breath, and blew.
The candle went out. A thin ribbon of smoke curled up from the wick, and the room went quiet.
Shushu curled into a ball at the end of the bed. From Suzy’s room came a soft snore.
“That was a good day,” Ollie said into the dark.
“It was,” Mum said from the doorway.
And Tappy the pumpkin kept on smiling at the window until morning, even though there was nothing shining inside him any more.
The End
About This Gentle Halloween Story
Meet Ollie, his little sister Suzy and their whole cheerful family, and spend one unforgettable Halloween day with them, from the morning fog all the way to a candle blown out at bedtime.
There are no monsters in this story and nothing scary happens. There is a pumpkin that gets a name, popcorn that escapes under the fridge, a cat hiding in the wardrobe, a dog who forgets he is supposed to be fierce, and an apple that is far too precious to eat.
A gentle read-aloud story for family evenings in late October.
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