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Our first place winner in the High School category is junior Hillary W. Steinbrook, who attends the Marblehead High School in Marblehead. Ms. Steinbrook becomes our second four-time winner; she also won last year and two years ago in the High School category, and three years ago in the Middle School category. |
Once upon a time... oh, I do detest that beginning! It always makes events sound as if they never occurred, but this tale certainly did. My bones still rattle as I think about my latest encounter with that horrid girl! If my memory serves me correctly, Goldilocks was her name. She had grown, and one might assume that she would have matured, but she was still the same nosy little wench she had been years before. Although the residential properties in the forest had undergone many renovations since her last visit, Goldilocks managed to find her way back through the dense woods. The spookiest day of the year, in the lives of mortals, provided a perfect opportunity for her to be scared straight...
When Goldilocks was younger, as you might recall, she had entered the home of the three Bears while they were out for a lovely summer stroll in the forest. She ate the littlest one's bowl of porridge, broke his favorite chair, and even slept in his bed in his absence. As an adolescent of fifteen years, Goldilocks decided that it might be fun if she paid the Three Bears another visit for Halloween. Big mistake, I might add, for the Bears had moved to the western neck of the woods several months prior to Goldilocks' return visit. I had recently moved into their cozy abode, along with my two sisters, Hagatha and Thornie, and we were starting to get comfortable in our new domicile. By that time, I had already done a substantial amount of redecorating. The interior of the house was now painted black and purple; the window treatments were a lovely gray gossamer fabric that simulated cobwebs so realistically and were even machine washable, so I did not have to conjure any dry cleaning spells, which can be very complicated. The library on the lower level was filled with thick, leather-bound volumes of spells, and the pantry was stocked with small, oddly shaped but neatly labeled jars that contained condiments for conjuring. The gas stove had also been removed and in its place, a grand stone hearth was built. There stood a large, antique, wrought iron cauldron, perfect for brewing strong coffee or Tibetan mountain chicken soup.
On the morning of October 31, I decided to do some last minute shopping to stock up for Halloween. Too old to go flying around the neighborhood -- my joints just were not what they used to be! -- I had to restrict myself to scaring people on the ground. I bought a few large pumpkins and carefully carved them into jack-o-lanterns, several bags of holiday candy (mainly gummy spiders), and all the ingredients needed to bake a big Graveyard Cake, a scrumptious recipe perfect for this time of year.
After I returned to my dark, little corner of the woods, my cat, Poisonpuss (called "Posy" for short) observed me silently. She preened in a warm corner of the commodious kitchen while I prepared the Graveyard Cake.
"One package of Chocolate Digit Crackers..." I read the recipe aloud as I scurried around the kitchen, making my favorite Halloween dessert. Hagatha crushed the cookies while Thornie preheated the hearth. This was one recipe which could not be made using a cauldron, unfortunately. I placed my 13x9x2-inch pan of Graveyard Cake batter into the expansive hearth and set the timer. I could almost taste the scrumptious dessert in my mouth as I made my way from the kitchen down to the library to locate a certain book of Halloween spells.
In years past, I had always worked some evil on Halloween night. Teaming up with a group of ghosts to haunt neighborhoods where children had exhibited some level of disbelief in the ethereal had been one of my favorite activities. This year, however, it seemed as if it was going to be different. I was starting to lose interest in being scary -- a sort of beldam boredom. Hagatha was content to spend the evening reading with Posy curled up beside her pointy-toed, lace-up boots, and Thornie had already made plans to go out with a warlock from the other side of town. I sighed as I searched for the antique tome -- would I get a chance to use my magic, or was I a hapless hag under house arrest?
* * * * * * * * * * *
Forty minutes later, I heard a piercing shriek come from the direction of the hearth. Had a small animal gotten stuck under the hot coals beneath the cauldron?
"Ohh! My Graveyard Cake is done!" I cackled cheerfully as I recalled that this was the sound we had ordered for the new hearth timer. I slowly walked back up to the kitchen, where the wonderful aroma of Graveyard Cake was wafting through the darkened room. I removed the steaming cake and set it on a rusty bat trivet on the distressed table to cool. Growing impatient while waiting for All Hallow's Eve to arrive, I cut a generous chunk of cake for myself and spent the rest of the day locked in my library, poring over my spells. I came upon one for "Hair Straightening By Scaring," for which I just happened to have all the ingredients on hand...
The kitchen was cold when I returned upstairs in the early evening. A brisk wind was blowing right through the cracks in the walls, so I decided to brew myself some Crusty Critter Coffee in my cauldron. Just as I was about to take a sip of my brown, scaulding concoction, I heard a knock on the back door. Apparently, my visitor was impatient; a ring of the doorbell soon followed. Immediately, the sound of howling wolves filled the house.
"The Cozy Compost Home Repair Store really can do wonders to any house," I commented to myself with a self-congratulatory tone as I approached the heavy, wooden door. I unlocked the padlock with an ornate, but warped, key and opened the door just a crack -- Hagatha had forgotten to get a peephole installed. I gasped as I saw Goldilocks standing there in the wind, snapping her bubblegum and running a hand with bright orange fingernails through her long, curly hair. I slowly opened the creaking door wide and gave Goldilocks my biggest, toothiest grin.
"Can I help you, dear?" I asked in the most saccharine voice that I could muster.
"I was wondering if the Bears are home," she replied, appearing quite bored and disheveled. "Are you the housekeeper?"
"Yes, dear, I'm the housekeeper," I responded after a pause. A wonderful plan suddenly occurred to me. "The Bears are not home now, but they will be returning shortly. Why don't you come into the living room and make yourself comfortable?"
Without even wiping her feet on the "Go Away" mat outside, she walked into the house and sat herself down on the biggest chair in the room; she had gotten muddy footprints all over my gray, spider-web patterned area-rug.
"Would you like something to drink?" I inquired sweetly.
"Sure. How about a soda?"
I hurried into the kitchen and began to pull out all sorts of bottles from the cupboard. Without even measuring amounts, I poured liquid after liquid into my cauldron. I motioned to Thornie, who had been feeding Posy in the adjoining room, and succinctly confided my plan.
"I must get rid of Goldilocks once and for all." I murmured to Thornie as I stirred the rusty cauldron. I could hear Goldilocks muttering derogatory comments about my new decorating from the other room. She wondered aloud, "When was the last time someone dusted here?" in a disgusted tone as she wiped her hand quickly against the leg of her new sandblasted jeans. Then, everything went quiet. I suspected that she had made her way down to the pantry -- she never could stop from putting her nose where it didn't belong.
"Yum, olives!" Goldilocks exclaimed, reading the small, printed label on the front of the jar. She twisted open the lid and peered inside.
"Ewww! Those don't look like olives to me!" she cried, hastily twisting the lid back on. "Besides, I don't think bears eat olives." Because she had entered the house through the back door, she never noticed the cauldron.
Goldilocks left the pantry and took a short, clandestine tour of the house, observing the changes that had been made to the decor since she had last visited.
"Those Bears really have developed morbid taste," she worried aloud as she wandered through the upstairs hallway. Something did not seem quite right. Goosebumps of fear started to rise on the skin of her pale forearms as she noticed a portrait hanging in the hallway. The eyes of the subject of the painting seemed to follow her as she tip-toed back towards the staircase. "My hair almost seems too cheery in this dark and creepy place," she concluded, nervously twirling a strand of her curly, yellow hair around her index finger as a stair creaked. "It looks like ghosts live here," Golidlocks muttered to herself and none too quietly.
"Come on in, dear!" I called to her from the kitchen. "I have a soda for you."
She walked into the kitchen and looked around. Before she could ask where her drink was, Thornie approached her from behind and gave her a shove. With a scream and a crash, she fell headfirst towards the cauldron. Unbeknownst to me, Goldilocks was a gymnast, and she did an amazing aerial flip over the cauldron, but not before her hair dipped into the concoction. The formula ran up her hair, as she stood on her feet on the floor, dripping and angry.
"My scalp is tingling! What's going on?" Goldilocks screamed as she ran into the dingy bathroom. I followed, cackling. Horrified, Golidlocks watched in the mirror as her hair suddenly straightened and turned bright purple.
"Ahhh! My golden locks!"
I shared a secret smile with Thornie as we looked on.
"My hair won't be the envy of all the girls at high school anymore!" Goldilocks spun around and glared at the witches. "You horrible..." a string of expletives tumbled out of her mouth.
"Kids have no respect these days," I told Hagatha unhappily, who had run to the bathroom when she heard the scream. After seeing what had happened, Hagatha decided to get rid of Goldilocks once and for all.
"Purses of curses and ashes to dust, over her hair for years she has fussed. A self-absorbed teen is what we have here, and now this young girl must experience fear." Hagatha spun around three times, spit on the mildewed tile floor, and the house filled with loud moans and screams. Goldilocks began to levitate, which was hard to do, since she was wearing three-inch platform shoes.
"Let me out of here!" Goldilocks cried. The terrified teen flailed about. Finally able to touch the ground, she fled from the possessed home amid the sounds of shrieks that added to the din of the howling wind that helped to carry her quickly through the dark, thick foliage of the forest.
"By the way, dear," I called after her, "the dye -- it doesn't wash out!"
Halloween night was wonderful -- the neighboring goblins stopped to pay a visit and have a taste of my graveyard cake, and we spent the rest of the night playing Poke-Her, similar to the Pin the Tail on the Donkey game. Thornie's date went marvelously -- the romantic warlock, as she later recounted the tale to me, took her on a long canoe ride around the moonlit lake. Surrounded by swooping bats above and shrieking cats on the shore, only powerful bolts of lightning could have completed the tableau.
Hagatha, Thornie, and I have not laid eyes on Goldilocks since that hair-raising event several years ago -- she would be difficult to miss. Life has been peaceful and quiet in this secluded section of the forest, but be sure that it stays that way -- you wouldn't want to try out any of my new potions, now, would you?
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