Halloween Antics

Written By: LJ


“Oops, sorry! I didn’t know you were home, Rowan,” Darby exclaimed as he ran through the kitchen door and collided with his partner.

“Whoa! I just got here!” Rowan reached out and steadied the younger man before kissing him. “What’s your hurry, Sweets?”

“I’m in between lessons and I wanted to grab a quick snack before my next student arrives. How come you’re early?” Darby asked as he opened the fridge and took out a quart of milk.

“A serious problem has come up at Jayson’s place. The sewage system backed up and as a result they will be staying with us for a few days.” Rowan explained, taking two glasses down from the shelf.

“Sounds like they’ve got a real mess on their hands,” Darby commented while pouring them each a drink.

“There’s water damage throughout the entire basement.” Rowan got the cookie tin out of the cupboard and sat down at the counter beside the other man. “I came home early to make up the guestroom and get supper started.”

“Great! I'm glad they're staying here because Riley and I were planning to spend a lot of time together this weekend. It’s Halloween, remember?” Darby said excitedly, reaching into the tin.

Swallowing some milk, Rowan laughed. “As if you’d let me forget.”

“Well, we have a lot going on, like the party on Saturday night and getting together with Pete and Freddie on Sunday night.” Darby tried to talk around a mouthful of cookie.

“Just don’t forget about our plans. You were going to carve a jack-o-lantern and help me shell out to the little rug-rats who’ll be dropping by.”

“I know and I will.” Darby got up in response to the bell ringing in his studio. “Got to go, my love; my next pupil is here.” Leaning over, he kissed his partner and whispered, “See ya in a bit.”

~~~~~~~~~~

“So, Riley, what the hell happened?” Darby was sitting on the bed in their guestroom, watching Riley unpack a small sports bag.

“It was the city’s fault. A pipe broke or something. I don’t really know much about it except that there is a god-awful mess in our basement and it will take the cleaning crew most of the weekend to drain the place, disinfect it and get rid of that nasty smell.” Riley shuddered as he spoke the last two words.

“I think it’s neat that you get to spend the weekend here. I mean, with everything that’s going on.”

“Yeah. My parents wanted us to go to their place. Thank goodness, Jayson had already made arrangements with Rowan.”

“Did you bring your costume for the party tomorrow night?”

“You bet I did! Jay brought all our other junk such as our pumpkin, treats for the kids and anything else he could think of.”

“The party is going to be a blast. The organizers have set up a spook alley, so be prepared for a major scare ‘cause everyone has to go through it to get into the party.” Darby was looking forward to this particular activity and was bouncing excitedly on the bed.

“You university guys are crazy and will do anything for fun,” Riley commented, shaking his head.

“Yeah, right; like you should talk! What about all your adventures with Pete and Freddie?”

Riley laughed. “You sure missed some great times, man.”

“You’re nuts!”

“Come on, you two. Didn’t you hear me call? Rowan has supper ready,” Jayson informed them, coming into the room.

“Guess we didn’t over our own chatter, Jay,” Riley offered as an excuse.

“That’s right!” exclaimed Darby, looking up at the older man with a mischievous grin. “Neither time.”

“Brat! I didn’t say how many times I called so if you didn’t hear, how did you know it was twice?”

Darby giggled as he slipped out the door. An unexpected hand landed on the seat of his pants. “Ow!” he laughed as he rubbed the offended area and ran down the stairs.

“Are you going to be able to salvage anything, Jay?” Rowan asked when everyone was seated at the dining room table.

“Not a thing,” Jayson responded, shaking his head. “The furnishings, carpeting, even the paneling has to be ripped out, disposed of and replaced. Thank god, our insurance is covering everything.”

“Darby and I want you to know you have a place to stay for as long as you need it.”

“Thanks, Rowan. Riley and I really appreciate your hospitality. Hope we don’t end up wearing out our welcome.”

“That won’t happen. We’ve spend a fair amount of time together in the past with a lot less space,” Rowan assured him.

“We are in for one busy weekend!” Darby explained enthusiastically.

************

“That was one wild party last night, Darb,” Riley said for the umpteenth time during the afternoon as he placed a large bowl of packaged treats on the table set up on the front veranda.

“I told you it would be. That spook alley was a real hoot!” Darby agreed as he put the boxes of chip on the floor next to the table. “There, everything’s ready. Let’s go sit with Rowan and Jayson.”

“So you boys will be heading out just after eight o’clock, right?” Rowan asked as he pulled Darby down beside him on the wicker love seat.

“Yeah! Pete and Freddie should be picking us up around eight-fifteen,” Darby answered.

“Don’t stay out too late and no pranks,” Jayson admonished.

“Why do you always think we’re going to get in trouble, Jay?” Riley teased, sitting next to his partner.

“Hmmm, let’s see. It’s Halloween and you’re going to be with those two mischief-makers, right? Need I say more?”

Darby and Riley looked at each other and rolled their eyes in response to Jayson’s rhetorical questions.

“Didn’t you ever do anything even the least bit mischievous when you were younger?” Darby asked his partner.

Nodding, Rowan thought over some of the situations he and his siblings had gotten into while they were growing up. “Oh, yes! I’m sure my brothers and I are responsible for a great number of our parents’ gray hairs.”

“Come on! ‘Fess up!” Darby demanded playfully. “Tell us about some of your mat night capers.”

“Actually, we didn’t do too much on mat night. My friend, Stewart, had an ongoing tradition. Every Halloween without fail, he soaped the display windows at the town’s co-op. The workers there eventually started expecting it. If any of them saw Stewart on the street that day, they’d ask him if he'd be stopping by that night. When they saw him the next day, they’d always comment on what a wonderful job he had done.”

When the laughter died down Darby joked, “And innocent, little-ole you never got up to any mischief, right?”

“Wrong! Once harvest began, we were never without our trusty salt shakers and were often caught raiding the neighbourhood gardens.” Rowan chuckled as memories came rushing from the past. “We usually ended up losing privileges for a day or two as it wasn’t considered a major crime.”

“You never did anything more serious than that?” Riley was astounded. “Why do I find that so hard to believe?”

“Probably because we did do things that had more dire consequences. We once hid in a ditch beside the road and threw apples at passing cars. We all got a good tanning for that prank.”

“Tell us how you got the scar on your abdomen, Rowan,” Darby requested.

“Oh, yes! The battle scar of my misspent youth.” Rowan chuckled and rubbed his hand over his shirtfront before continuing. “Stewart and I were about fourteen when we became the proud owners of a dirt bike. We couldn’t get it started, so Stewart got his father’s car to tow the dirt bike, with me on it, through a field near our home.”

“You mean he took his father’s car?” Riley asked.

“No, he had permission to use it.”

“His old man gave him the keys, at the age of fourteen?” Jayson's curiosity had been peaked enough to ask.

“Sort of…. he was drunk at the time. Anyway, no matter how fast we went, we never did get that piece of junk to start. All that we succeeded in doing was practically killing me. At one point I flew off the bike, hitting my stomach on the handle bar and landing hard on the ground. I ended up spending Halloween in the hospital that year recovering from surgery. I had ruptured my spleen and this scar is proof of that poorly thought-out caper.”

“Wow! You really did a number on yourself,” Darby commented as the gravity of what could have been a life-threatening accident hit him.

“So you didn’t get to go trick or treating. That must have been a bummer,” Riley commented.

“It wasn’t so bad. My brothers carried a second pillowcase each and told everyone where I was. I ended up with twice the amount I usually would have.” Rowan laughed at Jayson’s eyes rolling upwards.

“Hey, here come our first visitors,” Darby announced, getting to his feet.

After the first group of costumed children had moved on, Rowan remarked on the various outfits being worn. “Every year the choice of costumes gets bigger.”

“You wonder where they come up with all the ideas,” Jayson said. “When I was a kid, I dressed up as a ghost year after year. My brother was always a monster of some kind and my sister was usually a witch.”

“Until I was about twelve, my parents would buy me a new costume every year. My favourite costume was a ‘Toy Soldier’ outfit my father brought me home from a business trip he had taken just before Halloween one year.” Darby spoke softly, remembering some of the happier times of his childhood.

“My brother, Corby, and I just wore whatever we could dig out of the trunks in the attic. Most the time nobody knew what we were. We rarely knew what we were ourselves.”

They all found Riley’s comments highly amusing.

“Do you remember any of the costumes you wore, Rowan?” asked Darby, sitting down again after shelling out to another group of youngsters.

“Some of them; my mother made new ones for us as often as she could. We had an old used clothing store in town. Mom would buy all kinds of stuff and make it over. One year she found two old, fur coats and sent my sister, Kayla, out as a brown puppy and my other sister, Erin, as a black kitten. My kid brother once dressed up as a Glow-worm.”

“How did he do that?” Darby and Riley asked together.

“Mom sewed up a green one-piece outfit and tied a flashlight under it on Logan’s chest so he’d be able to turn it on whenever he got the urge to ‘glow’. Trevor and I dressed up as a couple of dice that year. We both wore black clothing under cartons that we had painted white with black circles on them. Of course, moving around in those cartons was a bit tricky.”

“What’s the funniest costume you can remember wearing?” Jayson prompted his friend.

“Hmmm, I think it was the time Trevor and I went trick or treating as a toothbrush and toothpaste. I got to be a tube of Colgate. But Logan’s was even funnier. My mother bought some big, dark, purple balloons. She blew them up and attached them to a large black garbage bag. She then made a really neat hat out of green felt in the shape of a stem with leaves.”

“So exactly what was your kid brother supposed to be?” Darby’s curiosity was definitely getting the better of him.

“A bunch of the ‘Fruit of the Loom’ grapes!” Rowan had to handout the treats to the next group of Halloween guests because the other men were doubled over with laughter.

The four friends spent the next two hours reminiscing about past Halloween excursions and handing out treats to various little ghosts and goblins.

“See you later!” Darby and Riley shouted as they waved and climbed into the back seat of Pete’s truck.

“Do you think it might have been a mistake to share the misadventures of our youth with them, Rowan?” Jayson asked, watching the truck head down the street.

“I don’t think it will do any harm. After all, it’s not as if they’d do some of those things themselves,” Rowan tried to reassure his friend.

“Yeah, right! What rock have you been hiding under? Those four boys are just trouble waiting to happen,” Jayson grumbled.

************

“Hi, guys! We’re home!” Darby and Riley entered the house together, letting the door slam behind them. They were brought up short by the unhappy expressions on their partners’ faces.

“Anything you’d like to get off your chests, boys?” questioned Jayson. Both he and Rowan stood with hands on hips, facing the younger men.

“Nooo, I-I don’t think so,” Riley answered hesitantly.

“Umm, did you have something particular in mind?” Darby asked nervously.

“We had a phone call from a co-worker earlier. Apparently, he saw you at the Taco Bell across town, Riley. In fact, he claims to have seen a great deal of you,” Jayson informed the younger man. “He said he and his wife witnessed you streaking with a couple of other young men. What are the chances of me guessing who the other young men might be?” The volume of Jayson’s voice had been slowly rising.

“Ahh, we accepted a dare from a couple of the other fellows we were with, Jay. We were just having fun.” Riley opted for his often-used explanation, looking to Darby for back-up. His partner-in-crime only shrugged his shoulders.

“Darby, assuming it was Riley, Pete, and Freddie racing around stark naked, what exactly were you doing?” Rowan had a pretty good idea that Darby had disobeyed by agreeing to be the driver of the get-away vehicle.

“I dropped them off at one door of the restaurant, drove around and picked them up at the other door,” Darby admitted, suddenly finding his shoes very interesting.

“And have your driving privileges been re-instated, young man?” For a couple of moments, Rowan watched his young partner shuffling from one foot to the other. “I expect an answer, Darby.”

Darby recognized the firmness underlining the other man’s words even though Rowan had not raised his voice. “No, they’re still suspended,” he murmured as he looked into his partner’s face.

“Say goodnight to Jayson and Riley, then head upstairs and get ready for bed. I’ll be up shortly.”

Darby struggled unsuccessfully to keep the tears out of his voice as he followed Rowan’s instruction. “Night, Riley and Jayson.”

“Goodnight, Darby,” Jayson said to the retreating back as Darby ran up the stairs. “Riley!” he said, looking expectantly at his own partner.

“Night, Rowan,” Riley said in a subdued voice before running up to the guestroom.

“Goodnight, Riley.” Rowan sadly shook his head.

Having already cleaned up the remaining Halloween paraphernalia, Rowan locked the front door and turned out the porch light. Two minutes later, he and Jayson slowly climbed the stairs together. Neither of them was looking forward to the next part of the evening.

Entering their bedroom, Rowan found Darby sitting on the side of their bed still wearing his underwear. “Is there anything else to be said, Darby?” Rowan gently asked as he took a seat on the bed. Getting a shake of the other man’s head, Rowan took Darby’s arm, lifting him up and over his knees.

“Why are you getting this spanking, young man?” Rowan asked as he pulled down the boxers and pushed up the T-shirt.

“I drove Pete’s truck and I’m not allowed to drive yet.”

Across the hall, Riley was in a similar position and answering a similar question.

“I broke the law by streaking in a public place.”

The only sounds heard in the house for the next several minutes were the twin spankings being administer to two bare bottoms and the cries that accompanied them.

************

Two Brats sat gingerly at the kitchen table, stirring scrambled eggs around the plates in front of them.

“Please eat up, Sweets. We’re already running late,” Rowan said as he bent to brush a soft kiss across his Brat’s bowed head.

“You too, babe. You have a long day ahead of you.” Jayson leaned over and gently squeezed Riley’s shoulder before suggesting, “I think next year, just to be on the safe side, Rowan and I won’t let either of you boys out of our sights.”

Seeing the expected pouts falling into place, Rowan added, “After all, we want to prevent a repeat of last night’s fiasco and the only way to accomplish that is by not turning you four boys loose on the unsuspecting public.”

“You know, Riley, they’re probably right,” Darby grinned at the other Brat, accepting the teasing as a sign of forgiveness.

“Yeah, I guess.” Riley also understood the message being sent by the older men. He smiled back at Darby and said, “But Pete and Freddie aren’t going to be too thrilled when we tell them no more Halloween antics.”

The End