Halloweensie 2018: Delight Night

No Tricks, No Treats.

Felina Nightbone used jagged teeth to rip sticky tape. She affixed the cardboard sign to her letterbox.

“Right. I’m off to bed.”

She shut the iron gate. Inside she snuffed candles.

Still they came, giggling in ridiculous dress-up. They thought she’d carved the pumpkins for them. They thought this house had been decorated.

Felina peeked through tattered curtains from her attic window. “Why do they come?”

The cat swished its tail.

But the house knew why they’d come. The cauldron howled, floorboards creaked. Walls shivered, and screeched like the cackly old woman she housed.

Costumed children ran screaming, happy, toward the iron gate.

(If you’d like to participate in Halloween flash fiction for junior readers, here’s the details.)

And here’s my Halloweensie entry from 2017.

CONTEMPORARY FICTION SET IN AUSTRALIA AND NEW ZEALAND (2023)

On paper, things look fine. Sam Dennon recently inherited significant wealth from his uncle. As a respected architect, Sam spends his days thinking about the family needs and rich lives of his clients. But privately? Even his enduring love of amateur astronomy is on the wane. Sam has built a sustainable-architecture display home for himself but hasn’t yet moved into it, preferring to sleep in his cocoon of a campervan. Although they never announced it publicly, Sam’s wife and business partner ended their marriage years ago due to lack of intimacy, leaving Sam with the sense he is irreparably broken.

Now his beloved uncle has died. An intensifying fear manifests as health anxiety, with night terrors from a half-remembered early childhood event. To assuage the loneliness, Sam embarks on a Personal Happiness Project:

1. Get a pet dog

2. Find a friend. Just one. Not too intense.

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