Trick or Zombie Treat
Prologue to the newly revised 2nd edition of my Halloween horror novel
Tom was back in the Hudson Valley suburbs of New York, cleaning out his old childhood bedroom. His parents had recently sold their house and were planning to move down to Florida. So Tom and his five-year-old son, Kyle, were going through his old stuff to see if there were any toys he might want—or any collectibles Tom might want to keep for himself, such as his old baseball card collection.
Kyle wasn’t interested in baseball—America’s pastime was far too slow for the TikTok generation. To be honest, the MLB had become a bit too slow for Tom himself. He now preferred watching the NBA or NFL—and even then, always had a second screen to keep his attention. Still, Tom couldn’t bear to throw away his Ken Griffey Jr. rookie card or autographed baseballs, even though the signatures had faded and were barely legible. He also had a souvenir Louisville Slugger from Bat Day at Yankee Stadium, plus half a dozen jerseys, including a Jerry Rice 49ers and a Michael Jordan Bulls #45 from the GOAT’s 1995 comeback season. The clothes didn’t fit Tom anymore, but Kyle might grow into them someday.
“Try to sell that crap at the garage sale,” said Amy, Tom’s wife. “Or else just toss it all.”
“Sure,” Tom said, though he had no intention to do either. He would find a place to hide it all in their shed.
The only professional sports Kyle followed were eSports. Tom didn’t understand why kids these days liked to watch other people play video games. Then again, was that really so different from him watching other men play basketball?
On the bookshelf were Tom’s old Goosebumps paperbacks and VHS collection, featuring titles such as The Land Before Time, Home Alone, Jurassic Park, Independence Day, The Sandlot, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze. Tom would have loved to keep all the tapes, but they didn’t even own a VCR to watch them on.
Luckily he did have the consoles to play his favorite video games: Super Mario Bros. on the original Nintendo, Sonic the Hedgehog 2 on Sega Genesis, Diddy Kong Racing on Nintendo-64, and Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 2 on PlayStation. Probably best to save Mortal Kombat until Kyle was a bit older.
“All that stuff can go too,” Amy said.
“What? No,” Tom said. “Kyle likes video games, right Kyle?”
“Not the old ones,” Kyle said.
“The old ones were better,” Tom said. “You gotta learn your roots.”
“They probably don’t even work anymore,” Amy said.
“Sure they do,” Tom said. “You just need to blow the dust out of the cartridges.”
“Sell ‘em or toss ‘em,” Amy said.
“Right.” Tom put the video game collection in the Garage Sale pile, but when Amy left to help his mother downstairs, he moved them back to the box of things to store in their shed.
Kyle was most interested in the crates containing his father’s old toys: the Lego sets and Nerf guns (minus the directions and ammo), dozens of Hot Wheels and Matchbox cars, a model F-14 Tomcat fighter jet, and an army of action figures from G.I. Joe, X-Men, Power Rangers, and other franchises. Kyle wanted to keep them all—which was a relief to Tom because he couldn’t bear to part with any of them either, and their shed wasn’t that big.
“What’s in here?” Kyle pulled out a small lockbox requiring a three-digit numerical code.
“I don’t know.” Tom took the box and recognized his handwriting on the lid in black marker reading HALLOWEEN 99. “That’s right,” he recalled. “That’s when I set the record…”
“What record?” asked Kyle.
“For the most trick-or-treat candy ever,” Tom said.
“Really?” said Kyle. “How much?”
“Four-hundred and forty-four pieces.” Tom lined up the dials to 4-4-4 and the lockbox opened.
“Did you eat them all?” asked Kyle.
“All except one.” Tom lifted the Cadbury Screme Egg which he saved as a trophy to commemorate the occasion.
“What’s this?” Kyle lifted a small device with a keyring from the lockbox.
“My old laser pointer.” Tom took it from him.
“I want to try it!” Kyle reached up.
“It’s not for kids,” Tom said. “You might blind yourself.” He pressed the button, but the laser didn’t light. “Battery’s dead anyway.” He tossed it into the trash bag.
“Oh, cool.” Kyle pulled a magnifying glass from the lockbox and looked through the lens at his father. “Were you a detective?”
“Inspector Gadget.” Tom hummed the theme song.
“What’s that?” asked Kyle.
“A great cartoon show from the 80s,” Tom said. “And a not-so-great movie from the 90s. It was my costume that year.”
“Whoa, was this all your candy?” Kyle pulled a 4x6 photograph from the lockbox showing a giant pile of Halloween treats dumped on Tom’s bed from when he counted them all at the end of the night.
“Yep, that’s it,” Tom said. “Are there any more pictures in there? I think me and Uncle Brandon posed with our bags outside this house. He was dressed as a cowboy—Will Smith from Wild Wild West.”
“Yeah, here.” Kyle pulled another photo out. “But I don’t see you. And this isn’t Grandma’s house.”
“Let me see that.” Tom studied the photograph which depicted five boys in costumes on the porch of a suburban home. “Here, that’s me.” He pointed to the boy dressed as Boba Fett.
“You were Jango Fett?” said Kyle.
“Yeah—or no, I was…” Tom studied the other boys in the photo: a dinosaur, a ghost, a soldier, and a Lakers player. “This must have been from the year before… I went to my cousins’ house to go trick-or-treating around their neighborhood, and we…”
As Tom absorbed the details of the photograph from Halloween 1998, a flood of memories surfaced that had been long forgotten—gruesome scenes of teenage zombies oozing with green slime while uttering spine-chilling groans. The memories had been buried so deep in his subconscious that he wasn’t sure if they were real or imagined, dreams or reality. Did those things really happen back then, or was it all one long nightmare?
Trick or Zombie Treat is an action-packed horror book full of scares, laughs, and 90s pop culture references. It’s spooky fun in the style of classic Goosebumps—perfect for kids today and millennials nostalgic for when they were kids in the 90s. The new and improved second edition is available now on Amazon.