Welp, the Coronapacolypse has derailed my blogging - and the rest of my life - completely… how about you? Do your days blend together until suddenly there is a stand-out moment of some kind? Are your kids/pets/plants always around? Do you really, really hope this is NOT the “new normal”?

I do.

So, on to the Halloween-themed FREE STORIES for your reading pleasure! If you’d like to hear this one and many more read to you, please listen to the Alone in a Room with Invisible People podcast for Halloween - this story and many others will be performed by Holly, Rebecca, or Mark. I loved the stories last year and I’m looking forward to this year’s! Happy socially distant Halloween!

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The creature desperately twisted and wriggled, pulling itself through the tiniest gap between worlds until it popped into existence in the parking lot of the less-than-five-bucks store. Looking around furtively, it became shadow, and panted until it got its breath back.

A group ran past, but its denizens were all wrong: a ghost, a witch, a human in black leather with a sword… they should not be cooperating, but battling each other!

Drawn by the improbability, it followed until the witch glanced back, took it by the hand, and dragged it along with them.

"Trick or treat!" the rest of them chorused to a closed door.

Fire-lit scowling pumpkin faces flickered. The door opened, and an antlered goddess gave them all candy.

The creature snatched the offering before it could be rescinded, shoving the whole thing into its mouth. So wrong… This was supposed to be the human world, but it was populated with strange, marvelous creatures who proffered sweets instead of screams.

It would never go back, it decided. Some of the pumpkin faces were friendly instead of fierce. Shrieks and giggles threaded through the night. And it belonged to a group. Strange, but it belonged. 

At the next door, the sweet-giver was human. She looked at it three times before latching on to one of its spindly, spidery hands and waving the ghost, the witch, and the sword-bearer on. "Come in," she told it, gently dragging it past the threshold.

Even after the door was closed behind it, the human didn't let go, but examined it more carefully. "You're… not from around here," she said. "Not like the others."

"Not," it agreed, fear biting its tongue. But after all, what could a human do to it… other than send it back to where it had come from?

"Our world is strange tonight," the human said. "You won't find friends so easily tomorrow. The others will take off their costumes and masks when--if you want to stay--you should put yours on."

The creature cocked its head, baffled. "On?"

"You wish to stay?" she asked.

"Stay," it confirmed. Nothing awaited it but pain and more pain in the other world.

"Then I'll help you." The human pulled her long black hair off and plopped it on the creature's head.

The creature hissed, but couldn't back away, still caught by the human's other hand. 

"A wig," the human said softly, shaking out short blond hair. "You'll need make-up too, but with the right clothes, you'll fit right in at the middle school. You're not any stranger than the rest of the little monsters out there."

It blinked, baffled. "Why help me?"

The woman finally released its hand. "I'm lonely," she admitted, "and you want to stay. You keep me company. I give you candy."

"I stay." The creature nodded. Anything was better than going back. Add in candy? It would do a lot for candy.

The woman smiled.

"Happy Halloween."

Jump to more free spooky stories here:

Missing Parts by Jemma Weir

A Perfect Match by V. S. Stark

The Glistening Bat by Karen Lynn

II-The Priestess by Raven O’Fiernan

The Old Ways by Nic Steven

Halloween Pest by Elizabeth McCleary

Tales From the Pumpkin Patch by Marilyn Flower

Immortality by Juneta Key

Unwelcomed Vistors by Bill Bush

The Witch at the End of the Road by Katharina Gerlach

Unraveled by Bonnie Burns

Holiday Guest by Sabrina Rosen