Karen's Little Witch Read online

  “Yeah! Can Nancy come to the pumpkin patch with us?” I asked.

  “Of course,” said Mommy.

  * * *

  “Pumpkins here, pumpkins there. Pumpkins, pumpkins everywhere!” I sang.

  “We have to pick just the right pumpkins,” said Nancy.

  “I did not know there were this many pumpkins in the whole world,” said Andrew. He was looking at the pumpkin patch. We were standing in the very middle of it. All around us were bright orange pumpkins, in every shape and size.

  “I want a fat, round one,” said Nancy.

  “I want a skinny one,” said Andrew.

  “I want a big one!” I exclaimed.

  We looked and looked. When we had found a round pumpkin, a skinny pumpkin, and a big pumpkin, we went home.

  That night, Seth said, “Time to carve the pumpkins!”

  Andrew and I put our pumpkins on the kitchen table.

  “I am going to make Mr. Pumpkinhead,” I announced.

  “I am going to make a goofy pumpkin,” said Andrew.

  Seth carved the tops off of our pumpkins. Their stems became handles for the lids. Then Andrew and I scooped out the seeds and the squishy pumpkin insides. We used big spoons.

  “Who wants a snack?” asked Seth. He showed Andrew and me how to separate the seeds from the gush. He spread the seeds on baking pans and he roasted them in the oven. Yum!

  While the seeds roasted, Andrew and I planned our pumpkin faces. We drew them on paper. Then we drew them on the pumpkins. Then Seth helped us cut out the eyes and noses and mouths. I gave Mr. Pumpkinhead a big smile. I gave him round, wide eyes. I even gave him ears.

  “Lovely,” I said, when Mr. Pumpkin-head was finished.

  “Goofy,” said Andrew, looking at his pumpkin.

  Seth put a candle in each jack-o’-lantern. He set Mr. Pumpkinhead and his friend in the living room window. He lit the candles and turned out the lights.

  “Ooh,” I said. The pumpkin faces glowed eerily. “I feel very Halloweeny. I am ready for ghosts and spooks and witches.”

  “And candy!” added Andrew.

  “I Told You I Was Sick!”

  “Are you ready to decorate for Halloween?” Seth asked.

  Andrew and I had just woken up. We had not even eaten breakfast. But Seth was very excited about Halloween.

  “How much decorating are you going to do?” Mommy wanted to know.

  “Well,” Seth began to say.

  “Please do not go overboard,” Mommy went on.

  “I promise,” said Seth.

  But he winked at Andrew and me. I knew we would do plenty of decorating. Just like we always did.

  The first decoration we made was … a witch. Not just a paper witch to hang on our door. We made a lifelike witch. We gave her a long, dark robe, and a witch hat, and a broomstick. We sat her in the branches of a tree in front of our house. I stood behind the tree and said, “This is the witch speaking. Heh, heh, heh.” (I did not mean to scare Andrew, but I did.)

  When Andrew stopped crying, we made a huge ghost. We hung the ghost in another tree. The sheet fluttered in the breeze. When the ghost was finished, we made a graveyard. Honest! Andrew and Seth and I cut tombstones out of white cardboard. We wrote things on them like “Rest in Peace” and “Frank N. Stein.” Seth even made a tombstone that said, “I told you I was sick.”

  In the afternoon, Nancy came over. She read the tombstones. She laughed. Her favorite one was “I told you I was sick.”

  Nancy helped us decorate. By the end of the afternoon, the witch, the ghost, the graveyard, a black cat, and a skeleton were in our yard.

  “We need a monster,” said Andrew.

  But Seth was tired of decorating.

  “I’ll teach you a monster song instead,” offered Nancy.

  “Goody,” said Andrew.

  Nancy and Andrew and I went to my room. We sat on my bed.

  “This is a very silly song,” said Nancy. “I heard it on the radio. This is how it goes: I was working in my lab late one night, when my eyes beheld an eerie sight, as my monster from his slab began to rise, and suddenly to my surprise, he did the Mash! He did the Monster Mash!”

  “ ‘The Monster Mash’!” exclaimed Andrew.

  “Yeah. It was a graveyard smash,” added Nancy.

  “Let’s sing it for Mommy and Seth!” I exclaimed.

  Nancy taught Andrew and me the words to the song. Andrew kept saying, “I was working on my slab late one night,” and, “He did the Smash!”

  Oh, well.

  We were about to perform the song when I got a great idea. “Wait here!” I said to Nancy and Andrew. I ran to the kitchen. When I came back, I was carrying three spoons. “These will be our microphones!” I said.

  Nancy and my brother and I gave our performances from the staircase. Nancy stood on the bottom step, Andrew stood two steps above her, and I stood two steps above him. We held up our microphones.

  “I was working on my slab late one night,” sang Andrew.

  Mommy and Seth clapped for our song.

  “Thank you,” said Andrew. “You have just heard ‘Monster Smash’!”

  Pippi and Charlotte

  “Oh, yippee! Oh, yippee! Oh, yippee!” I cried. “Tricks and treats aren’t far away. Halloween is here today!”

  That was not quite true. Halloween was the next day. But my rhyme sounded pretty good. I liked it a lot. Maybe I should add to it.

  No! I did not have time. I had to get dressed and go to school. Usually, I can get dressed in about two minutes. But on that morning, I needed half an hour. I had to have time to put on my Pippi Longstocking costume for … the Halloween parade.

  First I put on my long stockings. They were very tall socks. Mommy said, “Why don’t you just wear tights, Karen?” But I wanted to be like Pippi. I mean, I wanted to look like her. (I already act like her.) Then I put on a dress like the one Pippi was wearing on the cover of my book. I put on big Pippi shoes, too. After that came the fun part.

  Freckles! Mommy let me color big freckles across my cheeks and nose. I used her eyebrow pencil for that.

  I looked at myself in the bathroom mirror. “Gigundoly beautiful,” I said. “And now for the extra-special Pippi braids.”

  It is not easy to make braids that stick straight out from your head. Here is what I did. I leaned over. I let my hair fall toward the floor. I brushed it out. Then, while I was still leaning over, Mommy made two long “upside-down” braids. When I straightened up, they did sort of stick out from my head, although not as well as Pippi’s. But I did not care.

  “Do I look like Pippi?” I asked my family at breakfast.

  “Definitely,” said Seth.

  “You could be her twin,” said Mommy.

  “Did Pippi look like a frog?” asked Andrew. (He was mad because he did not get to wear his costume to preschool. So I ignored him.)

  Ding-dong!

  “There’s the doorbell!” I cried.

  “Trick-or-treaters already?” asked Andrew.

  “No, silly. It’s Charlotte,” I told him.

  “Who’s Charlotte?”

  “Charlotte is really Nancy,” I whispered. “But she will be wearing her spider costume. From Charlotte’s Web.”

  Nancy’s costume was terrific. Anybody would have known she was a spider. Her mommy and daddy helped her make extra legs. The legs stuck out of her tummy and dangled down from her wrists. She wore a black leotard and a black hat. She was carrying a paper spider web. Written in the web was: SOME PIG!

  “You look great!” I said to Nancy in the car. (Seth was driving us to school.)

  “Thanks. So do you, Pippi.”

  “Why, thank you, Charlotte.”

  Seth stopped the car. Nancy and I ran into our school. Our classroom looked so funny! Sitting at the desks were a teddy bear, a cat, a princess, a farmer, even an elephant. (The elephant was Babar.)

  We had a hard time thinking about work. So Ms. Colman let us color very special
Halloween pictures. We colored designs on oaktag. Then we covered the designs with a layer of black crayon. Then we scratched pictures into the blackness. The colors underneath showed through. I drew a picture of me in the Halloween parade.

  The Halloween Parade

  I liked my picture of the parade. (So did Ms. Colman. She tacked it to the bulletin board.) But I was more excited about the real parade.

  When recess was over, Ms. Colman said, “It is time to get ready for the parade. Who needs help with their costumes?”

  A lot of kids raised their hands. So Ms. Colman helped them put on makeup and things like that. Soon it was time to line up to walk to the auditorium. I stood between Charlotte and the Cat in the Hat. (The Cat in the Hat was Hannie.) Guess what. Ms. Colman dressed as Mother Goose!

  My friends and I walked into the auditorium. On the walls were pictures of ghosts and pumpkins and skeletons. In the seats were mommies and daddies and brothers and sisters. I could not see Mommy and Seth and Andrew and Daddy and Elizabeth and Nannie and Emily Michelle. But I knew they were there. They had said they would come.

  All the kids in my school had a chance to show off their costumes. We paraded across the stage, class by class. One class was dressed as animals. Another class was dressed as cartoon characters. (I liked those costumes. It would have been fun to dress as Charlie Brown or Lucy or Elmer Fudd.) Another class was dressed as food!

  I was very excited about parading across the stage. I could not wait to show off my costume. I hoped everyone would say, “Look! There’s Pippi!”

  Pretty soon Ms. Colman led my class to the stage. Our principal said, “And now Ms. Colman’s second-grade class will show us their storybook character costumes.”

  Ms. Colman walked across the stage. We followed her. The audience clapped for us. So I waved to them. While I was smiling at the audience, I found Mommy and Seth and Andrew. Andrew was wearing his costume! He was dressed as a Christmas elf.

  I was so embarrassed. Nobody else’s brother was wearing a costume.

  I stopped waving.

  But I was too late. Andrew had seen me. He waved back.

  “Who’s that kid?” Ricky Torres whispered.

  “Nobody,” I replied.

  “Wait. Isn’t that your brother?”

  “I don’t know.”

  When the parade was over, refreshments were served. Everyone got to drink cider and eat doughnuts and candy corn.

  Andrew ran to me right away. “Hi!” he called. “Listen to me. I jingle!”

  “I know you do,” I said. (I had seen his costume about a hundred times.)

  “Hey, Karen! That is your brother!” exclaimed Ricky Torres. “How come he’s wearing a costume?”

  I looked at Mommy. “Why did you let Andrew come to my school like that?” I asked her. (I decided not to say he was embarrassing.)

  “Oh, honey,” said Mommy. “He just wanted to wear his costume today. After all, you got to wear yours.”

  I thought about that. “Okay,” I said finally. Then I whispered to Andrew, “I really like your costume. But don’t stand near me. And whatever you do, do not tell anyone you are my brother.”

  “Okay,” replied Andrew.

  After that, we had a lot of fun at the party.

  The Night Before Halloween

  Andrew and I stayed in our costumes for the rest of the day. He called me Pippi. I called him Kringle. (He had said his name was Kringle Jingle.)

  We rode to the big house in our costumes.

  We rang the big-house doorbell in our costumes.

  When Kristy answered the door, we said, “Trick or treat!”

  Kristy laughed. “Come on in,” she said. “You are just in time to help us decorate the front hall for tomorrow.”

  “We want it to look really spooky,” said David Michael.

  “We want to frighten the trick-or-treaters,” added Sam.

  “Oh, we do not,” said Charlie. “Sam is kidding. We just want to make a fun spookhouse. Do you guys want to help?”

  “Yes!” cried Andrew and I.

  “First let’s make a ghost,” said David Michael.

  “Maybe we can make him look like he’s floating down the stairs,” said Sam.

  Sam and David Michael worked on the ghost.

  Kristy and I made a monster. We found a scary rubber mask. We hung it on the wall. We put a flashlight behind it. When we turned on the light, the monster face began to glow.

  “Let’s make a spookhouse tape,” suggested Charlie.

  David Michael found the tape recorder. He taped Andrew screaming. He taped Kristy rattling some chains. He taped Charlie clomping up the stairs. He taped Sam wailing like a ghost. He taped me cackling like a witch. At the end of the tape, we all yelled, “BOO!”

  “This is going to be the spookiest spookhouse,” said Andrew.

  David Michael flicked on the tape we had made. Aughhhhh! Rattle-rattle. Clomp, clomp, clomp. Ooooo-ooooh. Heh-heh-heh. BOO!

  “Yipes!” cried Andrew.

  “Let’s play it for Emily,” suggested David Michael. So we did. (Emily laughed.)

  “Dinnertime!” called Daddy.

  I did not eat much dinner. Just a hamburger bun.

  “Oh,” said Nannie, “you have to eat better than that if you want Halloween candy tomorrow.”

  “But I’m not hungry,” I replied. Besides, I was getting nervous about the next night. I had tried not to think about Druscilla’s party. But in twenty-four hours I would have to go to it. I would be in the witches’ house.

  “Can I be excused?” I asked.

  Daddy said yes. I stood up and whispered something to Andrew.

  “Okay!” cried Andrew.

  My brother and I ran to our playroom. In the box of dress-up clothes we found two more scary masks. We put them on. Then we went back to the kitchen. The rest of our family was still sitting at the table.

  “What’s this?” Elizabeth wanted to know, when she saw Andrew and me.

  Andrew and I jumped forward. “I was working in my lab late one night,” I sang. (Andrew sang, “I was working on my slab … ”)

  We performed the song. When we finished, our family clapped for us. Then I went to my room. Believe me. I remembered the No Spying rule. But I just had to spy on the witches’ house. It was for my own safety.

  I turned out the light in the bedroom. I looked in a window at Morbidda’s house. There was Druscilla! She was playing with Midnight. Wait! She was dangling a toy in front of him. The toy swung back and forth. The little witch was hypnotizing the black cat!

  The Face at the Window

  On Halloween, I tried very hard not to think about Druscilla’s party. Instead, I put on my costume again. I invited Hannie over. I showed her everything in our spookhouse. Sam showed her how he could make the ghost float up and down the staircase. Then Elizabeth let us put the Halloween candy in a basket for the trick-or-treaters. (Hannie and I hardly sampled any of it. Just a few tastes to be sure the candy was okay.)

  Late in the afternoon, Kristy called, “Who’s ready to go trick-or-treating?”

  “Me!” shouted David Michael and Andrew and Emily and I.

  We made sure our costumes looked just right. Then I found my “trick-or-treat-for-the-hospital box.” Soon the doorbell rang.

  “That’s Mary Anne!” called Kristy. (Kristy has a good friend named Mary Anne. She is a baby-sitter, too. She was going to help with trick-or-treating. That was because nine kids were going out. Even Kristy could not watch nine kids by herself.)

  We stopped by Hannie’s house. We picked up Hannie, Linny, and Sari. (Mrs. Papadakis handed out boxes of Cracker Jacks.) Then we stopped by Melody’s house. We picked up Melody and her older brother, Bill. (Mr. Korman handed out Butterfinger bars.)

  “Okay. Let’s get going!” said Kristy.

  My friends and I walked down our street. The sky had grown black. Dry leaves whisked around our feet. I looked past the bare branches of a tree. “Maybe the moon will be full tonig
ht,” I said.

  Nobody answered. We tiptoed to the doorway of a house.

  “I think this is a ghost house,” I said.

  David Michael rang the bell anyway.

  The door flew open. An old man gave each of us a package of gum.

  Hannie and Linny and I stuck out our boxes. “Trick-or-treat for the hospital!” we cried.

  “How nice,” said the man. He smiled. He dropped a quarter into each box.

  “Thanks!” we said.

  “Yum! Gum!” exclaimed Emily. She peered into her bag. She looked surprised.

  At the next house, Emily ran ahead of us. She reached the door before anyone else. She tried to ring the bell. When someone answered the door, she stuck her bag right out. “Candy!” she said happily.

  Emily became a champion trick-or-treater. She did not seem to notice how scary everything was. She did not care when I said that a house was haunted. She did not care when I thought I saw a skeleton. Or when we walked by a tree that looked like a hiding place for goblins…. Or when we climbed the steps to someone’s front porch and I saw a face at the window.

  “Yipes!” I shrieked. “A face!”

  The face belonged to the man who lived in the house. He opened his door. He gave us each a package of licorice sticks.

  “Trick-or-treat for the hospital?” said Linny.

  “You are the fourth one to ask,” replied the man. He closed his door.

  “Meanie-mo,” I whispered.

  Trick-or-treating was gigundoly fun. Except for the mean man. And except for when Emily’s bag broke and all her candy fell out. And except for every time I thought about the witches’ party. When I got home, I raced upstairs with my bag and my box. I counted my candy. Then I counted the money for the hospital. “Not bad!” I told myself.

  “Karen!” called Daddy then. “Time to go to the party!”

  Oh, boo.

  The Pumpkin People

  Dum, da-dum, dum.

  Witching time.

  I only bothered to say, “Do I have to go, Daddy?” once. That was because Daddy’s answer was, “Yes.” I knew he meant it.