It's Jo.

The Flutter

"Son of a bitch."
I slam my hand on the Dig Dug console as that fucking Pooka kills me. Again. I think it's the same one too, the mother fucker is messing with me.

Huffing in annoyance, I search for more quarters in my pocket, refusing to let the Pooka win. Suddenly, I see a flash of curly brown hair duck down behind a car in the parking lot. Curly brown hair I could place in a lineup, one of the nerds from my science class. What was his name? Justin? Or was it Dustin?

Either way, I guess they weren't lying when stalking was brought up as an option.

Looks like he has another friend with him, Lucas. I know this one's name because Mr Clark made him come up in front of the class to explain a topic, which he didn't look thrilled about.

I stand by my opinion that Mr Clark is a sadist.

They are crouching behind a car, looking at me with binoculars.

Binoculars? What the fuck do they need binoculars for? I'm standing 30 feet away from them.

Scoffing, I turn back to my game, intending to show that damn Pooka who was really in charge, when there's a loud obnoxious honk coming from the parking lot.

Did one of the morons accidentally trip the horn or something?

Nope, just my asshole of a stepbrother.

Fuck.

I angrily stuff the quarters back into my pocket and pick up my backpack, rolling my eyes when I see the 2 morons behind the car haul assing it out of the parking lot. Some stalkers, caught on their first mission.

I get into Billy's car, slamming the door behind me and stuffing my bag at my feet. He peels away at 60 miles an hour, careening out of the parking lot and heading towards home.
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Today is a good day, for one reason and one reason only.

It's Halloween. The best day of the year.

The one day a year I can scare the shit out of kids and not look like a complete jackass. It's the one thing Billy and I have in common, our shared love of Halloween. Back home it was the one day a year we could hang out together and not fight.

We had a tradition. We used to have this huge bush in front of the front porch of our house. We would dress up as something terrifying (last year I believe it was clowns) and jump out at unsuspecting trick or treaters as they came up to ring our doorbell.

To us it was great fun, watching the pure terror on faces.

Wasn't too fun for anyone else, but that's their problem.

We have a bush outside our house here, but I have a gut feeling our tradition will not be continuing. Considering the fact that he was in a particularly foul mood this morning, very nearly hitting an old lady crossing the street while he drove me to school.

That's fine, I don't need it. I can find some other way to get my yearly dose of scaring in. People did trick or treat in the hellhole right?

I walk into school, heading to my locker to grab my books and drop my bag off. It's a daily struggle trying to get my backpack into the locker, considering the locker is so small half of it is taken up just by my books. I was beginning the strenuous process of shoving the bag into the minuscule locker when I am interrupted by louder than usual laughing coming from behind me.

Curious, I turn around and-

Holy shit.

It's the Ghostbusters.