Halloween Baby
SLADE
Sometimes, life takes you places you’d never expect.
For me, right now, it’s standing in front of my bedroom mirror, wearing an ankle-length white fake fur coat, a silver medallion necklace, and a black bandana around my forehead.
I frown at my reflection. “Are you sure I don’t look like a pimp?”
“As long as you’re standing next to me,” Lila says, “people will get it.”
My wife is wearing hot pink bell bottoms with a matching vest, along with a white cowboy hat and boots. She’s the prettiest Barbie I’ve ever seen.
I look like Ken if he got really into underground fighting rings and whiskey.
But I sure as hell don’t mind the excuse to stick close to her all night long if she thinks we need to be seen together for people to understand the costume.
“Are you sure I need to be shirtless under this coat?” I ask.
She bats her eyelashes. “If you want it to be authentic to the movie, then yes.”
I look grimly at my reflection again. “I’m not used to letting it all hang out.”
“Slade, you don’t have an ounce of body fat. There’s nothing to let hang out.”
Her gaze lingers on my abs for a minute and I resist the urge to flex. I’ll wear the goofiest costume in the world if it makes my wife look at me like that.
Lucky wags her tail. She’s got a pink bandana of her own, along with heart-shaped glasses and a rhinestone cowboy hat. Lila bends down to tie a tutu around her, then frowns. “Huh. This fit her when we tried it last week. She’s gaining weight. Are we feeding her too much, do you think?”
I look at the dog. Her belly does look rounder than it did a few weeks ago. She’s also been sleeping more, tucked into corners, seeking out quiet spots. Still recovering, I figure.
“She’s filling out,” I say. “Probably just the rest and the regular meals.”
Lucky wags her tail.
Lila’s phone buzzes. She checks it and smiles.
“That’s it,” she says. “Final transaction went through. Took me less than an hour to spend five million dollars. That’s gotta be some kind of record, right?”
I tuck a strand of pink hair behind her ear. “How are you feeling about it? Giving away your five million dollar birthday present?”
“Satisfied,” she answers immediately. “I like knowing that money’s going to work, going to do some good. The Marble Falls Animal Shelter is going to have a new heater at least, finally.”
“Their online donation platform needs work,” I tell her. “The interface is slow and clunky. Maybe my buddy Kyle can redo it for them.”
She goes still. “How do you know what their online donation platform is like?”
Ah, shit. I was hoping to never have to admit this. “I made a donation,” I say gruffly.
“For how much?”
My lips twitch. “Hasn’t anyone told you it’s rude to ask someone how money they donated to a cause, sweetheart?”
“Not when that someone is your husband.” She pokes my bare chest. “Slade. How much?”
“Ten thousand,” I grumble.
I know the jig is up immediately as her eyes widen.
“It was you,” she says. “You placed the remote bid on a date with me.”
“I wanted to give money to the shelter and I didn’t like the thought of you being forced to go out with some random guy.” More like the thought of her on a date with another man made me jealous as hell, but I don’t admit that. “It was a win-win, in any case.”
“You could have been the random guy I went out with, you dork. Why didn’t you say anything?”
“It felt weird to pay for a date with you.”
“But proposing a fake marriage is different?” she teases.
“I did that because I care about you. Not because I want anything from you. Other than your happiness.”
Her gaze softens. “You’re a very chivalrous man.”
She wouldn’t be thinking that if she knew what went through my head every time I take my dick in my hand. If she knew the things I’ve imagined doing to her all these weeks we’ve been married. I think about my wife’s tits and ass way too much to ever be in the same universe as chivalrous.
But I’ll let her have her high opinion of me in this case, because admitting the truth is not an option.
After loading Lucky into the rear seat of my truck, we’re off to Marble Falls’s Halloween parade.
Main Street is decked out for the occasion, strung with orange and purple twinkle lights, planters overflowing with orange mums, storefronts lined with cinnamon broomsticks.
The storefronts are decked in ghosts and bats and the whole town smells like caramel apple.
Half the population is in costume. The other half is handing out candy from lawn chairs on the sidewalk, drinking “grown up drinks,” as Jonah calls them, while they do it.
Jonah is riding in the parade on one of the ranch horses beside my dad. Dad is Captain America and Jonah is Spiderman. He spots us in the crowd and his whole face lights up.
“Uncle Slade! Auntie Lila!” He waves both arms, nearly losing the mask he’s pushed up around his forehead. “You’re Ken and Barbie!”
My dad tips his round costume shield at us from horseback, eyes crinkling. Lila presses both hands to her cheeks and laughs.
I never had strong feelings about Halloween one way or another. I do now, because Lila has them, and watching her pleasure and enthusiasm as she pours herself into a project is something I can’t get enough of.
She decked out our whole house for the holiday, inside and out.
Jonah just about lost his mind when he saw the twelve foot skeleton in the front yard.
One afternoon, Lila enlisted Jonah’s creative input on where to put the fake spiderwebs and paper bats and the two of them had a blast decorating the place and eating their weight in candy corn Rice Krispie treats.
She’ll be such a good mom.
The thought arrives with a vividness that stops me in my tracks. We haven’t talked about kids—why would we, when this marriage has an expiration date?—and I never thought I wanted them, just like I convinced myself I never wanted to be married. Too much emotional risk.
Turns out I fucking love being married. I can’t get enough of my creative, nurturing, sweet wife. And I can’t help but think, what would it be like to have kids with her?
An image of Lila, pregnant, flashes into my mind. I imagine wrapping my arms around her from behind and feeling the swell of her belly. I can practically see the morning sunlight in our kitchen, smell the cinnamon from whatever she’s baking, feel the warmth of Lucky laid across our feet.
And then Denver arrives in my head like a cold wind down from the mountains, a door slamming shut on that vision of the future.
When Lila becomes a mother, it will be to another man’s child.
She’ll build that life with someone else. Someone who can give her what I can’t.
The idea feels deeply, profoundly wrong.
I watch my wife laugh at Jonah pumping his fist from atop his horse and say nothing.
Further up the street we find Walker and Sadie with the twins in a double stroller. Both girls are in pumpkin costumes, Anne already asleep and Mari systematically removing her stem hat and handing it to Walker who keeps putting it back on without looking.
Sadie’s dressed as a witch, and Walker is a werewolf, complete with face paint, torn-up flannel, and prosthetic pointy ears.
The costume suits my brother a little too well, if Lila’s admiring look is anything to go by.
Fuck, now I’m becoming as territorial as Walker. I never thought of myself as the jealous type. Never had reason to be. I kept my distance, kept things casual, kept my heart where nothing could touch it.
Then I met my wife and apparently I’m a different man entirely.
“You two look gorgeous!” Lila tells them.
Sadie takes one look at my fur coat and turns to Walker. “You owe me twenty dollars.”
He drapes an arm around her waist and kisses her cheek. “You were right. As always.” He turns to me. “Slade,” he says solemnly. “Best you’ve ever looked. The vibe really suits you.”
“At least I bothered with a costume,” I volley back. “You’re the same nasty, nocturnal, hairy beast as always.”
Sadie laughs. “He has a point, babe. You’re totally the ‘howl at the moon’ type.”
He squeezes her hip and gives a mock-glare. “This costume was at your request, darlin’.”
Lila beams up at me, then at Sadie. “I’ve always wanted to do a couples costume.”
“You guys are rocking it. You both look so hot,” Sadie tells her.
“Hey!” Walker says. “I’m the one who sat through an hour of face paint. Pimp Ken just had to put on a fur coat.”
She pats his shoulder placatingly. “You’re the hottest furball here, sweetie.” Then she grins at us. “Walker was so sure that Slade would never agree to dress up. I told him he ought to know a wife can always bend her husband to her will.”
My brother’s gaze heats as he looks at her. “Yes, she can.”
Ugh. I look away. I don’t need to think about my brother that way.
But the thing is I’m envious as hell, because I would love for my wife to persuade me in exactly the way they’re implying. The truth is that she didn’t have to do anything but ask, and I instantly said yes.
The group of us watch the parade for a little longer.
Lila leans over and asks, “Where are Tanner and Rafe?”
I pause. I can’t give away the secret, not at this crucial final moment.
“Probably halfway through a fifth of whiskey at Rosemont,” I say. “Figured we’d all tag up there after.”
It’s true. Just not the whole truth.
“Sounds good.”
Those two likely are making a dent in that whiskey, but my brothers are doing a lot more than that too. A favor to me. I’ll owe them big, but it’s worth it.
Because October thirty first isn’t just Halloween.
It’s my wife’s birthday. A birthday her family spent years ignoring.
Her new family is going to do things differently for her.
I wished Lila a happy birthday this morning so she didn’t think I’d forgotten it, but other than that, I’ve been playing it cool.
When the parade is over, we split off from Walker and his ladies while I take Lila in my truck. I can tell she doesn’t suspect anything as we drive up to Rosemont.
Most of the lights are off inside—good. Other than the usual Halloween decorations Dad puts up every year, she has no reason to suspect there’s anything else going on. We had everyone park at Tanner’s place and carpool over here, so there’s nothing to give it away.
I keep a hand on the small of her back as I walk her through the front door. Inside, there’s darkness. Silence.
And then I flip the lights on.
“Surprise!!!”
The huge chorus greets us. It’s my whole family except for Josie, along with Lila’s coworkers and friends who I reached out to privately.
Rose-gold and glitter balloons fill every available corner.
Amid the spread of food, there’s Lila’s favorite pink champagne cake from Loretta’s Bakery.
When we got married, I didn’t know that one was her favorite.
I do now.
While Lucky wanders around greeting everyone, Lila fields the hugs and greetings directed to her one by one. And when everyone has dispersed to start partying, she turns to me, eyes wide. “Did you plan this?”
An almost-smile pulls at the corner of my mouth. “You’re my Halloween baby.”
She throws her arms around me then, and my own wrap around her instantly.
“Happy birthday, sweetheart,” I murmur.
When we pull back, her eyes are shiny with tears. “You’re the best.”
I wish. I’m a clueless husband fumbling my way through a marriage with a woman I can’t stop thinking about, can’t stop wanting to take care of, can’t imagine leaving in June. A woman who I’ve made my wife but pledged to stay friends-only with because…
Because I’m a fucking idiot, apparently.
There are good reasons for it, I know, but every day that level-headed judgment we made together, to keep things free of complications, feels like it’s getting harder and harder.
All I say is, “I’m just Ken.”