They say October 31st is the day the gates of Hell give way to the damned. But no, it's the day they free me from my prison. A prison of Knick knacks stacked floor to ceiling. Their porcelain cheeks stained red and their beady eyes gleaming with mirth, their grotesque mouths stretched into malicious grins. The clowns were everywhere. I can hear their taunting laughs now as I roam the streets on Halloween night, the night I do not have to hide my inbred face with shame. My mother, my sister, told me that I was conceived by hatred and rape. Perhaps that's why god has damned me with such deformed features. My very own face stretched, lumped and demented; the face of an inbred. A child of Lucifer. Tonight is the night that I'd do my old man proud.
They were Pretenders. They used this Hellish Holiday as a poor excuse to set their sinful minds free. Free of judgment or of guilt. They donned their masks and flaunted their new identities. I could never lose my mask; I see my own stretched reflection in the dark window of a parked car as I limp by on my bad leg. My left eye droops lower than the right, the skin stretched and webbed with burns. Half my face had become paralyzed after the incident with the flat iron, mother had punished me for killing the neighbors cat. There were boils on my neck and most my teeth were rotted or crooked. It was a face no one would ever love, just as God could never love Lucifer when he was an angel. I hear the laughter of children all passing me in flashes, a fairy here, a zombie there. None of them looking as I looked now. For them this was a night to become the thing you feared most and conquer it. I looked upon it in the mirror every day for twelve years locked in that room. Rows upon rows of gleaming eyes sat boring into my very soul; whispering sweet nothings in my ears. Children walk in wide arcs around me even tonight; the night I am supposed to be one of them. I feel a rush of anger course through me and begin hitting myself in the face. A group of teenagers pass mocking me, a teenaged boy dressed as a clown calls "Spazz!" He laughs, "What a retard." I can hear my mother whispering: "He mocks you now, as we do always. You'll never be one of them." I shake my head and follow the boy.
He has long forgotten me by now, and spends the rest of his night drinking with his friends. But I have not forgotten. Hours tick by, time is running out but now finally he has split off on his own.His wig is bright red, his face painted a ghastly white and his lips painted to look stretched into a convincing smile. His vibrant clothing are too much, the smell of mildew coats them. He was an innocent kid, I didn't have to do this. Flashes of those Knick Knacks grinning ear from ear; as my mother forcing holy water down my aching raw throat; cross my mind. "Unholy being, bastard, retard, monstrosity!" The thoughts swirled in my brain giving me another migraine. I follow him down a deserted road sticking to the shadows. He stops checking a cellular device. I hear a ring tone, and see the name 'mom' pop up on his screen as I come up behind him. He doesn't get the chance to answer it, as I slip my chloroform coated handkerchief over his mouth and nose.
It doesn't take long for him wake up. His arms, legs and torso are strapped to the metal table, I watch for a moment as he writhes before attempting to scream. I step in sight holding a glass jar. "Don't bother trying to scream," I say holding up the jar holding his floating tongue. "It'll do you no good." His crystalline eyes widen and he struggles as hard as he can against the restraints. The look of sheer terror on his face should bring mirth to a monster like me. But I feel nothing. I have five hours before my freedom is up. I pick up the thread and needle before proceeding to jam it through his coarse dry lips. He doesn't bleed as much as I'd hoped, though his writhing and sobbing are to be expected. I would probably cry too. He squirms and retches, it's not long before his clothes are covered with blood and bile. Once I finish sewing his mouth shut, I am free to move on to his eyes.
I flick on the lighter and hold it against his eyelid. He slams them shut and presses as far away as he can get. Which unfortunately for him isn't that far. The stench of his melting flesh and singed eyelashes is almost worse than the vomit. His eyelashes fall off as his top lid becomes fused against the bottom. It doesn't take long for him become unconscious. His face and clothes are soaked with blood, sweat and vomit. When I finish I paint his face to match the grotesque dolls in my prison. Now he would look like me. He'd know what it was to be feared, to be hated, beaten, burned, and afraid. I leave him sitting upright, barely alive, amongst pumpkins that had been painted by the children in the churchyard where all would see the message I'd carved on his chest. "There is no God. There is only me."
