“What are you talking about?”
“I thought you’d be wearing a costume or something.” I knew I sounded like an idiot the second the words came out of my mouth.
“Oh, you think Casters dress up on Halloween and fly around on brooms?” She laughed.
“I didn’t mean—”
“Sorry to disappoint you. We just dress for dinner like we do on any other holiday.”
“So it’s a holiday for you guys, too.”
“It’s the most sacred night of the year, and the most dangerous—the most important of the four High Holidays. It’s our version of New Year’s Eve, the end of the old year and the beginning of the new.”
“What do you mean by dangerous?”
“My gramma says it’s the night when the veil between this world and the Otherworld, the world of spirits, is the thinnest. It’s a night of power and a night of remembrance.”
“The Otherworld? Is that like the afterlife?”
“Sort of. It’s the realm of spirits.”
“So Halloween really is all about spirits and ghosts.” She rolled her eyes.
“We remember the Casters who were persecuted for their differences. Men and women who were burned for using their gifts.”
“Are you talking about the Salem Witch Trials?’
“I guess that’s what you call them. There were Witch Trials all along the eastern seaboard, not just in Salem. All over the world, even. The Salem Witch Trials are just the ones your textbooks mention.”
She said “your” like it was a dirty word, and today of all days, maybe it was.
We drove past the Stop & Steal. Boo was sitting by the stop sign at the corner. Waiting. He saw the hearse and loped slowly after the car. “We should just give that dog a ride already. He must be tired, following you around day and night.”
Lena glanced in her rearview mirror. “He’d never get in.”
I knew she was right. But as I turned back to look at him, I could have sworn he nodded.
I spotted Link in the parking lot. He was wearing a blond wig and a blue sweater with a Wildcats patch sewn on it. He was even carrying pom-poms. He looked scary and sort of like his mom, actually. The basketball team had decided to dress up like Jackson cheerleaders this year. With everything else that had been going on, it had slipped my mind—at least that’s what I told myself. I was going to get a lot of crap for this, and Earl was just waiting for a reason to jump all over me. Since I had started hanging out with Lena, I had developed a hot hand on the court. Now I was starting center instead of Earl, who was not too happy about it.
Lena swore there was nothing magic about it, at least not Caster magic. She came to one game and I made every shot. The drawback was, she was in my head throughout the game, asking me a thousand questions about foul shots and assists and the three-second rule. Turns out, she had never been to a game. It was worse than taking the Sisters to the County Fair. After that, she skipped the games. I could tell she was listening, though, when I played. I could feel her there.
On the other hand, maybe she was the reason the cheer squad was having a tougher year than usual.
Emily was having a hard time staying on top of the Wildcats pyramid, but I didn’t ask Lena about that.
Today it was hard to pick out my teammates, until you got close enough to see the hairy legs and facial hair. Link caught up to us. He looked worse up close. He had tried to put on makeup, smeared pink lipstick and all. He hitched up his skirt, tugging on the straining pantyhose underneath.
“You suck,” he said, pointing at me across a row of cars. “Where’s your costume?”
“I’m sorry, man. I forgot.”
“Bull. You just didn’t want to put all this crap on. I know you, Wate. You wussed out.”
“I swear, I just forgot.”
Lena smiled at Link. “I think you look great.”
“I don’t know how you girls wear all this junk all over your face. It itches like hell.”
Lena made a face. She almost never wore makeup; she didn’t have to. “You know, it’s not like we all sign a contract with Maybelline when we turn thirteen.”
Link patted his wig and stuffed another sock down his sweater. “Tell that to Savannah.”
We walked up the front steps, and Boo was sitting on the lawn, next to the flagpole. I almost asked how that dog could have possibly beaten us to school, but by now I knew not to bother.
The halls were packed. It looked like half the school had skipped first period. The rest of the basketball team was hanging out in front of Link’s locker, also in drag, which was a big hit. Just not with me.
“Where’re your pom-poms, Wate?” Emory shook one in my face. “What’s the matter? Those chicken legs a yours didn’t look good in the skirt?”
Shawn pulled on his sweater. “I bet none a the girls on the squad would lend him a skirt.” A few of the guys laughed.