(*Readers, don't forget to click on the above "black screen" to hear the chilling tune. It'll start this Halloween fright read off just right for you!)

Faith Moore felt like an old shoe. That was odd. After all, she was just turning twenty-five. But that feeling was the trade off she accepted for still living with her mama.

Those in Woodcreek despised Faith. She, the oddest girl in town they believed, had never gotten along properly in life. Their collective, evil thought? How could she have and still be living with her mama? 

But that townsfolk belief didn't match Faith's outwardly appearance. Blessed with an angelic face that held a soft, rosy expression, piercing warm light eyes, long hair that she often wore up in a bun, and svelte figure made Faith a walking contradiction of what people saw in her.

Odd. Weirdo. The little girl who would be eaten by life as she grew up, would then be spit to the roadside for having always been babied by mama, everyone Woodcreekian was confident would be the case.

That didn't matter to Faith, though. She was expert at tuning out the town and going about her roadkill-collecting hobby. 

Still, perhaps the town's hatred of Faith resulted from the suspicious circumstances surrounding the death of her father, Morgan. He had died on Faith's eighteenth birthday--Halloween--the same day of her "coming out into society" party.

Or maybe the town's loathing for Faith stemmed from how they felt about her mother, Tabitha. A woman who had been twenty years Morgan's senior had always dressed Faith to the hilt. Woodcreekians disliked having wealth rubbed in their faces.

The most likely reason, though, why Faith had teasing friends and cruel-minded townsfolk leering at her? No doubt it was due to her roadkill collecting obsession.

I'm taking them home to bury! Faith would shout whenever Woodcreekians spied her on the roadside, ogling her as she put dead animals into a burlap sack slung over her shoulder.

It's the undertaker! Townsfolk would scoff back, laughing and pointing at the most peculiar girl in their town.

But no matter what Woodcreekians yelled, Faith always did the same thing: scampered away cradling her bag of animal carcasses, all the while mumbling on the run her rhyming mantra:

Precious cargo,

you are mine,

and I'll keep you close.

Safe with me,

you'll always be,

'cause I love you most.

Those words Faith held true to this day. Matter of fact, she had just finished reciting them as she fled a group of teasing "friends" who had come upon her on the roadside.

Clutching her carcass bag, she gaped around.

Did they follow me to mama's house?

But the road was vacant. The town was quiet.

Is this day all in my mind?

Then her mother's front door pulled open.

"Just where in the hell have you been?" spat the wheelchair-bound Tabitha through a wavering voice.

The suddenness of her mother's appearance startled Faith. She gasped more heavily facing mama, trying to catch her breath. Shifting in place on the wooden front porch, she got a better hold of her burlap sack from underneath with one hand, as she locked her grip around the bag's neck with her other.

"Mama," she sighed thankfully, bending slightly over at the hips from exhaustion.

"Well, where?"

Faith was unable to speak through her labored breathing.

Tabitha's lazy eyes dropped their look to her daughter's bulky burlap sack. Disgust registered on her face. Then in a huff, the old lady about faced her wheelchair and rolled herself away from the door.

Faith stepped into the house. Hugging her death bag, the head of a dead raccoon bobbled up over the top edge.

"Mama, please," pleaded the roadkill angel, pushing the door closed, caressing the raccoon's head back into the bag as she hurried after mama.

"God dang it, Faith!" exclaimed Tabitha, banging repeatedly one fist down onto the padded armrest of her wheelchair, as her other hand haphazardly maneuvered the chair around the antique furniture in the room. "You're still doing that crud?"

Faith held silent.

Tabitha grunted out a breath of disgust. Then her wheelchair crashed into an end table.

"God dang it, Faith! See what you made me do?"

Tightly gripping the chair's wheels, Tabitha tried to back up. But one of the chair's footrests was caught on the table's leg.

Eyeing Tabitha, Faith got a better grip on her carcass bag. Then she timidly stepped toward her mother who faced away from her.

"Well, hurry it up, will you," demanded Tabitha, her cracking voice directed at the wall in front of her. "God dang it! I ain't got all day, girl!" She twisted her double-chinned neck back, glimpsing her approaching daughter with eyes that dubbed Faith her savior.

"It's all right, mama," said Faith reassuringly, her heart melting from her mother's pleading look. "I'm here."

A simple, toothless smile stretched the corners of Tabitha's lips, her eyes now looking beyond her daughter's carcass bag. "You're always so good to me, Faith."

Close to her mother's chair, Faith lowered her carcass bag to the wooden floor. leaning it up against the all. The stiffened animals held in place under the cover.

Kneeling down, Faith unhooked the wheelchair's footrest from under the end table's leg. Turning the chair around, she instructed, "You can't get upset like that, mama. Doctor said so. You were there. You heard him."

"'You were there. You heard him,'" Tabitha mocked, he love mood for her daughter suddenly changing. "God dang, right, I heard him. And I don't give a God dang about what he said. I'd be perfectly fine if it weren't for you babying me all the time. God dang it, you didn't even notice my Halloween decorations. That's what makes me upset."

"I live here, mama. I helped you put them up."

"'I live here, mama. I helped you put them up,'" Tabitha mocked Faith again. "Not those," Tabitha added, with ease, extending her arm. "Those."

Faith's eyes followed her mother's gnarled, pointing finger to the front door.

"Pumpkins," Tabitha said, in giddy-up happy style. "Just like you like 'em. Remember? I put 'em on both sides of the door. Inside for you this year to enjoy, since we won't be going trick or treating. They're just like, uhh...," she trailed off, thinking. Then she got a shot of inspiration and added, "Greeting demon heads at the entrance of a dungeon!" she exclaimed, through an old hag-like laugh. "For Halloween. You understand."

Mesmerized by the site at the door, Faith's mind tripped to her youth. "Jack-o'-lanterns," she uttered, her words barely a whisper, her mother-daughter Halloween-time recollection overwhelming her. Her eyes filled with tears as she looked back at her mother. "Such a nice memory, mama."

"Oh, sweetheart," said Tabitha with concern. She opened her arms wide, waving her wrists and hands toward herself, summoning Faith to move closer to her for a hug.

Faith stared lovingly at her mother. Then, unable to resist Tabitha's silent call, the child stepped forward. Leaning into her mother's tender embrace, Faith sniffled out, "I miss daddy so much, mama. More so every Halloween."

"Would you stop bringing him up?" Tabitha shrieked, pushing Faith from her hold.

Faith stood, stunned, gaping, indignantly, at her mother. Still, her look was more of a knee-jerk reaction to her mama's display, rather than one of not understanding why she had just done what she just had.

"Mama?" Faith cried softly, trying to bring more tranquility to her mother, as she herself eyed her carcass bag. Faith knew that she only needed to get hold of it, for her own peace. With that idea whetting her appetite, she inched closer to the bag, instead of toward her distressed mother.

But the next holler from Tabitha stopped Faith dead.

"Every God dang time you get into a loving hold with me, you bring up your father. Stop it!"

"Okay, mama," replied Faith obediently, her steps still creeping toward her carcass bag.

"Why you...," Tabitha snarled, her aged eyes growing wild when she realized where Faith was heading. She gripped the bar of her wheels, and struggled to force her wheelchair toward her daughter. Making a half-cocked attempt, on the way, to slap at Faith's face, Tabitha snickered, "Don't you patronize me!"

Faith sidestepped her mother's wobbly swing at her.

"I'm sorry, mama," she voiced with more reserve. Then she took a loving hold of Tabitha's hand. Looking deeply into her tired eyes, she kissed her mother's knuckles.

Tabitha pulled her hand free.

"I didn't see you wash after having handled those things in that sack of yours," she said, wiping both her palm and backhand on her blouse.

"They're not 'things,' mama."

Her mother sighed. "All right. Play your little games, Faith. I'm getting too old to entertain with them much anymore."

An uneven silence fell between them. Then, getting hold of the wheelchair's handles, Faith started pushing Tabitha toward the dinner table.

"God dang it," Tabitha replied with more civility, "must it be the same revelation every year from you? About how you miss your father? He's been gone since you've been eighteen. You have to let it go. Please, honey."

Faith's jaw mentally dropped. She parked the wheelchair at the table, locked the wheel breaks, lowered to her mother's face, and asked, "Why don't you ever want to talk about it, mama?"

"There's nothing to talk about, Faith. He was alive. Then he was dead."

Faith stood erect and slapped her thigh as she challenged, "How can you say that so matter-of-factly? Didn't you care about him?"

"I can say it because I can, okay? I don't have a better answer. Yes, I cared about him."

"Then you should want to talk about it!"

As quickly as Faith had voiced that opinion, so, too, had she wished she'd kept her mouth shut. 

Who am I to upset my widowed mother? 

She swallowed her next father-related question and said instead, "I like the Halloween table setting, mama. It's nice and bright."

Gumming a bit before she spoke, Tabitha said, "Do you believe it? This tablecloth's the one from when you were young? I found it in the back closet with some old costume props of yours. There's jack-o'-lantern stars on this tablecloth. See?" She pointed to several places where the face of the pumpkin appeared, faded now, but, nonetheless, still visible.

Faith craned her neck to see the images that her mother was finger highlighting. Then, curiously, she asked, "Props, mama? What props?"

"Right here on the table," Tabitha replied, pointing to the crude-looking, short-handled axe positioned to the left of Faith. It was sandwiched between two glass candy-corn filled bowls, a piece of folded white paper, and a wrinkled maid costume. Struggling to pick up the tool, Tabitha added, "Remember?" Then, lifting the axe as high as she could, her arm quivered all the way.

Faith's eyes fell dead onto her mother, as she found herself caught in a Halloween recollection of a yesterday with her. It had been of the time she'd gone trick or treating as Lizzie Borden, wearing a maid's costume, and carrying a small hatchet her mother had purchased. Then Faith's focus switched to the axe. Was this the "toy" one she'd been given in her youth?

"Easy, mama," Faith smiled, slipping the axe from Tabitha's hold. "We don't want any accidents." The weight of the axe surprised Faith. She didn't recall it being that heavy.

Faith shook off what she considered her faulty memory. Then she put the axe back onto the table, and that's when she noticed the dried blood on its weathered blade and her mind snapped.

"Did you kill, papa, mama?" Faith asked, somewhat sweetly, even though her face was growing red, and her hand was reaching for the axe.

Fear registered on Tabitha's face. She swallowed a clump of saliva down her dry throat. A cough resulted that she struggled to speak through and she said, "Y-you're s-scaring m-me, F-Faith--"

"DID YOU KILL MY FATHER?"

Faith gripped the handle of the axe hard. Veins bulged from her forearm. She shot a quick look at her carcass bag, then, with bloodshot eyes and a demonic countenance, she focused back onto her frightened mother.

"NO!" Tabitha shouted back, with all of her strength, her outburst causing her entire body to tremble in her wheelchair. "Please, Faith." She raised her hands, attempting some kind of defense from her enraged daughter. "Your Aunt Martha...the trick or treaters will be ringing the bell soon," she eked out.

"I want the truth, mama," snarled Faith, stretching over the table toward her mother, raising the axe.

Then, in one fell swoop, Faith slammed the axe down into her mother's forehead, splitting it open. Tabitha's body forced back from the thrust of the axe into her head. Blood sprayed from the wound, splattering everywhere. Pulling the axe blade back quickly from Tabitha's skull caused a suction sound that forced a curious look to Faith's face. Eyeing the dripping blood from the blade, something told Faith to lick it, and she did, once. Then, snarling heavily through gritted teeth, her attention on mama, Faith whacked violently at her mother's head more times than she could count, and the axe slipped from her grip.

Flying up and tumbling into the air, the axe then landed on the table, skid its length, splattering blood onto everything in its path. Crashing into and shattering a glass-filled tabletop bowl, the axe came to a stop as candy corns spilled to the floor from it. Then the blood on a folded white paper caught Faith's eye.

Enraged, Faith snatched up the paper, unfolded it, and read:

Halloween, Faith's 18th Birthday 

Dear Tabitha,

I'm sorry that I had to do what I did to Morgan tonight. But you're my sister. His unfaithful ways had to stop. Since you were not going to leave him, I knew that I had to do something. And I did with this axe. I killed him for you. Please bury the hatchet herewith. No pun intended.

Your loving sister,

Martha.

Shock registered on Faith's face. "Mama?" she uttered sweetly horrified, glancing her dead mother's way. "No." 

Her hand holding the note dropped to her side. The paper slipping from her fingers cascaded to the floor.

Rushing to Tabitha, Faith silently prayed.

"Mama?" she cried lowly near her. "Mama please wake up." She grabbed hold of Tabitha's hand, tapping on her knuckles to bring her around. 

The ring of the front doorbell pulled Faith's attention and her look shot to the door with her heart pounding.

"Helllooo!" called out a woman's voice from beyond the door. "It's me, Tabitha. Your loving sister, Martha. Trick or treeeaaat?"

Hearing her aunt's voice, piecing it together with what she'd just learned from the note of years ago, Faith stood slowly from her mother's side. Stepping to the table with a thousand-yard stare, she reached for and grabbed hold of the axe handle.

"There are two children out here with me, too, honey," Martha, laughed warmly. "They're looking for some caaannndddyyy."

Tightening her grip around the axe handle, Faith strode toward the front door. Glancing once at her carcass bag for further strength, she then focusing front again.

Reaching for the doorknob, she grabbed it tight, twisted it, and pulled the door open in one fluid motion.

"Hello, Aunt Martha, children," Faith snarled out at them through her blood-spattered face. Then, in one snap motion she slammed each of them in the head with the axe before they even knew it.

Thump! Thump! Thump!

Each of their bodies fell solidly to the porch floor like a perfectly timed musical death note. Hypnotized by the bodies lying before here, Faith licked her axe three times--once for each kill-- lapping up a swallow of running blood from it.

Tossing her killing tool onto Aunt Martha's chest, Faith gripped the three dead by their hair, dragged them into house, and set them next to her roadkill bag. 

Snapping her attention next to mama, Faith stepped to her chair. Wheeling it close to the body mix of Aunt Martha and the dead children, she leaned the chair forward on its front wheels and dumped Tabitha's lifeless body onto her dead sister. Then she forced the vacant chair across the floor and it crashed into a far wall with a solid thud.

Hurrying to undress, Faith then slipped into the maid's outfit of yesterday that she snatched from the tabletop. After turning out the lights, she set herself to sleep on the floor close to the death she had caused. Hugging her new kills, and her carcass bag as one, she mumbled her mantra as she drifted off to sleep:

Precious cargo,

you are mine,

and I'll keep you close.

Safe with me,

you'll always be,

'cause I love you most.