I was exasperated at this point. “We don’t even know if it’s a werewolf!”
“We don’t know it’s not,” reasoned Simon. Before I could form a retort, he quickly explained. “Remember when Mom and Dad got this house? That old treehouse over here? Well, it’s the perfect hiding spot at least twelve feet off the ground and built into the tree. Erik and I could kill the wolf from there!”
“We don’t even know that Matt is a werewolf!” I hissed through clenched teeth. Not only did we not know if he was or wasn’t a werewolf, we were talking about possibly killing a person. It was asinine. I was just thankful Miranda was not yet home from work to hear this ridiculousness.
“Didn’t you touch Matt with the silver?” Simon pushed. “If he’s our guy, there’s no time to waste.”
“Matt was a no-show at work today. I couldn’t do it.”
“Then do it tomorrow!”
“He’ll be off.”
“Drat,” said Erik numbly. He removed his thick-framed glasses to dab the sweat off his forehead with his sleeve.
Simon rolled his eyes heavily. “You had one job, Everly. One.”
“I’m sorry, but…” I cut myself off. I was about to apologize for going to work to earn money instead of testing out a hypothesis that my supervisor was a werewolf. I glared at Simon and Erik, who wore matching looks of disappointment.
“We don’t even know if there is a werewolf, let alone that it’s Matt!”
“You really want to live not knowing?” Simon balked. “What if one day we wake up and it’s Miranda dead in the backyard and not a deer?”
My stomach clenched uncomfortably at the very thought. My sister was a strict pain in the butt a vast majority of the time, but I loved her as much as Simon did. I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if something happened to her and I hadn’t done everything I could to prevent it. I didn’t want to believe that werewolves existed and that my supervisor was possibly one, but I also didn’t want to face the risk of something happening and we hadn’t done something.
“Well…” I began slowly. “He might go to the employee Halloween party tomorrow night.”
Simon’s previously dejected green eyes suddenly lit up excitedly. It unfortunately made me see when he wore that look he resembled me. We had the same dark-brown hair and bright green eyes that could make us pass for twins. Miranda was the abnormal one with her strawberry-blonde hair and our mother’s hazel eyes.
“That’s it! That’s the perfect way to accidentally touch him and test out our theory!”
“Ohh no!” I said suddenly, realizing my stupidity for mentioning the party immediately. “Darren asked me to go with him tomorrow! I can’t use the date as an excuse!”
“Not an excuse,” said Erik suddenly. He blushed as Simon and I looked at him. It was sometimes easy to forget that Erik was around. He was a large kid but so quiet and stealthy when he wanted to be. His eyes were big and bug-like under the bulky frame of his glasses. He looked uncomfortable that our attention was suddenly on him. “As a cover,” he explained simply. “If you go with that one dude, no one will suspect you’re trying to get information on the other dude.” My eyes widened. His plan was short and simple enough. He wanted me to use my date with Darren to spy on Matt.
I was about to object before Simon offered Erik a fist bump. “It’s decided! Tomorrow you’ll find out if Matt’s the wolf while Erik and I look for ways to successfully kill a werewolf.”
Even while being the only adult of the trio, it seemed there was no winning for me against Simon and his friend’s dumb logic. “I don’t even have a costume!”
“Oh, c’mon, it’s the night before Halloween. Everywhere will have costumes available,” scoffed Simon.
Simon’s logic was flawed. He hadn’t taken into consideration that we were on the very edge of Adams County. We didn’t have any nearby clothing stores. The closest place to our house was a crummy gas station that also served as a small sandwich shop. Across the street from that was a bar. My lack of a costume was made worse because I stupidly waited until after work the next day to start looking. I thought for sure there would be some kind of costume available, but there was nothing. The closest clothing stores resided in Wisconsin Dells, and they were a Walmart and a Clayborne’s, respectively. Given the latter didn’t have any available adult costumes for purchase, I tried my luck at Walmart. But I had even worse luck there. It seemed everyone who was struggling to find last minute costume purchases had swarmed through the costume aisles and taken everything that was available or leftover. Simon and I eagerly filtered through the racks. Almost everything was far too small to fit my curvy body.
“How about you just wear a headband and a matching colored shirt?” Simon offered.
I scowled as I took in the sight of the bumble bee headband. “No, thanks. I’d rather not go at all then.”
“You can’t not go! You’re the only chance we have of touching Matt with silver.”
“I’m going to look like an idiot at a Halloween party!”
“If Miranda can find a costume to go, so can you,” huffed Simon as he continued scouring the racks. That caught me off guard. “Miranda is going?”
“Yeah. She’s going with Matt. It’s even more reason for why we have to prove he’s the bad guy. If we don’t, he’ll end up making Miranda have his puppies before eating her,” muttered Simon gravely.
“That’s not accurate lore, but I get ya,” said Erik nearby. His hand was shoved into a bag of puffy Cheetos. I had forgotten he was there. He brought a handful up to his mouth and crunched loudly as he watched us.
“Why did you even come with?” I snapped impatiently.
“Allies gotta stick together.” Erik shrugged indifferently. He continued to munch his food obnoxiously. He poked his head up to watch as Simon and I continued to look for a costume.
It was hopeless. The costumes were either incredibly too big, too small, or too hideous. Cat headbands or witches’ hats seemed broken or they just didn’t fit given they were child sized. There was hardly anything left on the shelves, and we were running out of time. I covered my eyes with both hands out of frustration. Sometimes I really detested my curves and extra weight. If I were two sizes smaller, there were an endless amount of costumes available. But I wasn’t two sizes smaller, I thought bitterly. None of these cute or revealing dresses would be able to pull up past my hips. Suddenly, Simon pulled out a velvet adult-sized blood-red cape with a hood. It was on the bottom shelf, forgotten under a large amount of headbands and body glitter. He paused his searching. A knowing smile suddenly lit up his face with an idea. “Your homecoming dress from senior year matches this color,” he said triumphantly.
“So, I’ll be a dork in a red dress and a cape?”
“No, stupid. You’ll be Little Red Riding hood!” He sniggered at the delicious irony of his costume choice.
I cackled with my own laughter. “No. No way, no. There is not a snowball’s chance in hell I’m wearing a knee-length dress with heels and a dumb cape. Sorry, baby brother, but absolutely, positively NO.”