That’s when he knew that they were all dead. And that’s when a terrible tsunami of guilt overwhelmed him. This was all his fault. He had killed them all. He had forced Nancy to have sex with him and the Karma punishment was immediate and indiscriminate. They were all dead.
Standing next to the bodies, David knew that he no longer belonged in this world. He could feel in the depth of his now ethereal being that he should move on to… … somewhere. But the guilt that covered his body like a thick layer of tar weighed him down. It made him heavy. It made him unable to move on.
David was stuck in a state of nothingness, unable to touch or feel or experience anything. He was no longer a part of this world, but he was unable to leave it. And so he roamed the earth, desolate and alone.
His one respite was on Halloween. At first he thought that it was because it was the anniversary of his death, but then he finally realized that it was somehow part of Halloween itself. On Halloween night, things were different. He still could not touch or feel or experience anything directly, but he could seek out someone else and temporarily possess them, and thus through them feel something… anything.
He tried possessing people on other days, but except in the rare case where someone was particularly vulnerable, he was never successful. After a few years he realized that only on Halloween were people in the right state of mind. Because of all that Halloween is– especially at Halloween parties– people lower their natural defenses and believe and accept many things that on any other day they would say was ridiculous. And as David discovered, it is much, much easier to possess someone who already believes that it is possible.
David followed the noise of the party and passed through the wall of the house into what was apparently a large family room. He smiled. Things looked very promising. It was a young party… but not too young. Everyone there looked like high school seniors or perhaps young college students. Most were about the age David was when he died. He had been eighteen. Nancy had just celebrated her birthday the week before and was also eighteen. Now they were both eighteen forever.
Several couples were already chatting privately in the corners. David walked rapidly around the room trying to listen in on several conversations at the same time. Once he accidentally walked right through a young man who was passing out glasses of soft drinks. If the glasses had been full the young man would probably have spilled all of them as he cried out in surprise and nearly dropped the tray.
“What happened?” a young woman asked.
The young man shivered almost theatrically and answered, “A ghost must have walked over my grave.” He sounded serious as he said it, like he believed what he was saying. Maybe he did.
A few moments later, David found out why the soft drink glasses weren’t full. The girl who had asked the question reached under the couch and brought out a bottle from which she finished filling her glass. “Nothing like the old favorite, rum and Coke,” she said with a smile as she put the bottle back in place.
“Yes,” David thought, “this party has possibilities.” He decided to stay… at least for now.
His first target was a jock type over in the corner. Dave didn’t normally enter jock types, but one of his thirsts on this Halloween night was for the taste of beer, and Mister Football was already well into his third or fourth can of beer. Sliding in was easy. Mister Football didn’t even notice the extra presence within him. He did, however, notice his sudden intense need for another beer… and then another and another.
David felt guilt once again– but only a little– as he left Mister Football slumped over unconscious on the couch. One of the advantages of being a ghost was that you never passed out from too much alcohol. The slight buzz was probably all in Dave’s mind, but there were never any of the bad effects… passing out, puking, the terrible morning after headaches. David left those things with Mister Football as he returned to the center of the room.
Feeling refreshed, Dave decided to work on satisfying his second, much more carnal thirst. He looked around for a couple that might be getting it on before the night was through. He smiled again. From the looks of this party, he might find several couples.
For a moment, he thought that the tall pale, blonde woman with the darker-complected, shorter man might be an opportunity. She was sitting in his lap and nibbling on his neck and ear. But listening to what she was saying and the tone of her voice, it soon became obvious she was just teasing him. No need to go into him. If he did that, both of them would go home frustrated and unhappy.
The African-American couple in the corner also looked promising. They were obviously attracted to each other. But after listening in for just a short while, it became apparent that she was on her period. It also became very apparent that she was not at all interested in oral or anal. David moved on.
He had been ignoring the nerdy-looking couple who sat primly on the couch sipping on soft drinks and eating nachos… until he heard the young man say, “Would you like to go for a walk in the woods in the moonlight?”
Any girl who thought that what he actually wanted was a walk in the moonlight had to have been born yesterday. When the young woman replied, “That sounds nice,” David immediately zoomed in on them and followed them out the back door of the house, down off the patio, and into the yard behind.
He quickly learned that the nerd’s name was Walter and the nerdette was Wendy. Upon hearing that, he almost changed his mind and went back into the party. Wendy and Walter? Was it possible to get any more nerdy? He had even turned to go back to the house, but something stopped him. “Sometimes the shy, quiet ones in the corner have really surprised me in the past,” he thought as he turned to watch Walter and Wendy walk side by side toward the darkness of the woods. “Why not?” he said aloud as he returned to tagging along with the nerd couple as they walked across the back yard and into the darkness of the woods beyond.
There was a cleared path which wound through the woods and eventually came out into a park. The woods were evidently intended to be a buffer between the park and the houses in the subdivision. As the nerd couple walked through the woods, Walter told Wendy, “Let me hold your hand so no monsters can grab you in the dark.”
David shook his head at such an inept line, but Wendy just giggled and took Walter’s hand. They walked slowly, not saying anything until they came to the park. There were lights along the roadway in the park, and the picnic tables which dotted the grassy area near the road were clearly visible. In the area between the woods and the picnic tables, the well-lit grass slowly blended into a thick bed of fallen leaves which appeared to get thicker– and darker– as the ground approached the woods. The open area at the edge of the woods, itself, seemed to be even darker than the woods themselves.