Trick or Treat...

She always stood at the back of the group. Everyone holding out their plastic pumpkins or their custom colored bags. A few old school pillow cases. Either from optimistic older kids who got to go to more houses or from kids whose parents forgot to get a pumpkin shaped bucket at the store. She was always a pillow case kid. 

In every group there was always a little power struggle as to who got to knock or ring the bell. These were the kids who always had to be the one to press the button in the elevator as well. In control. In command. Everybody follow me. Usually they would work it out, you get this house, I get the next one. Sometimes it was a struggle at every doorstop. One kid knocking while another rang the bell at the same time. 

Then who would shout TREAT OR TRICK the loudest. Who wanted the prime spot in the center closest to the door to get their costume commented on. Oh aren't you the cutest/scariest/best/ and almost every year there was one kid who started out up front but after the first few rounds of And who are you supposed to be? moved to the back. Their brilliant costume not as great as they thought. 

Since she was in the back nobody ever asked her. She just shoved her bag into the mele and waited for the candy. Then the group shouting THANK YOU or sometimes HAPPY HALLOWEEN depending on the kids and on to the next place. 

Chattering to each other over who got what. Passing rumors on which houses have full sized candy bars. Which houses to skip unless you want a pencil with a bible verse card taped to it. That one kid who always ate his candy and put the empty wrappers back into the bucket after every stop. Don't do that! Your parents need to make sure there aren't any razor blades hidden in there! They aren't checking for razor blades they are stealing the best candy for themselves. You can't tell me that all of the peanut butter cups and half of the Snickers bars have razor blades in them. But if you keep eating all of your candy you're going to get sick.

He swears he won't get sick. 

He always gets sick.

Laughter. There is echoing laughter up and down the street as each little cluster moves from house to house. 

The little kids out with their parents or maybe an older sibling. The slightly older kids allowed to walk on ahead in their cluster with the parents shadowing them. Sometimes sharing their own Halloween treats as they walked. More than one group of kids has come with a sugar rush and a drunk chaperone.

There were the standby costumes. Vampires were always popular. Always a rash of the current Disney movie characters. A gaggle of Elsa's singing Let it Go replaced a few years later with the strains of We Don't Talk about Bruno...

Costumes changed. Kids didn't. Not really.

These kids today were the same as those kids yesterday. The only difference was you. You were no longer one of the little ones. Or one of the little bit older ones. Or one of the probably too old for trick or treating but let's give it one more year ones. They were all the same. It was you that got older and your visions of them shifted. 

When the costumes changed from Hippies to 80s. When the cartoon costumes went from Saturday morning shows to Anime to Video Game characters. When you abandoned your fun Trick or Treating outfits for Sexy Nun, to joke couples costume, then eventually to an isn't this fun pair of skeleton earrings or maybe a cat ear headband. Things changed around you. 

She never changed. 

She always stood at the back of the group.

She always hoped for a full sized Butterfinger. 

She always went as a ghost.