A Catered Halloween Read Free Page B

involved.”
    “Involved?” Libby could hear her voice rising. She took a deep breath and told herself to calm down, because what she wanted to do was throttle him. She took a second breath and a third before she regained control.
    Bernie gestured around her. “This must have taken months to figure out.”
    “Not really,” said Mark. “I hired a company, FX Productions, that specializes in this sort of thing. It took them a day and a half to set the show up.” Mark shrugged. “I’m not good with technical stuff,” he confessed.
    “Just making money,” Bernie observed.
    Mark’s grin flashed on and off. “Well, I’ve foundthat if you can do that, everything else falls into place. And this is only the beginning of the tour. Wait till you see what else FX has come up with.”
    “I’d rather not,” Libby told him.
    Mark reached over and took Libby’s hands in his. “But you have to.”
    “She doesn’t like gory stuff,” her sister explained.
    Mark patted Libby’s hands and then let go. “The rest of it is just scary. Promise.”
    Libby was about to say that she didn’t think that was much better when Bernie interrupted.
    “Is the whole thing movie themed?” Bernie asked.
    Mark shook his head. “Not at all. We have vampires; we have ghosts; we have a little bit of everything.”
    Libby realized she was still breathing hard. What ever happened to the days when going through a haunted house meant being blindfolded and having your hands forced into a bowl of oatmeal and spaghetti and being told that was someone’s guts?
    “After you,” Libby said to Mark. She just wanted to get this over with.
    He laughed. “My pleasure.”
    “Enjoying yourself?” Bernie asked him.
    “I have to confess that I am. I feel like I’m watching my baby take his first steps,” said Mark.
    And with that, they opened a door and stepped out into a hallway. Smog rolled around their feet and drifted upwards. A fog machine , Libby thought. She jumped as a bony hand dropped down in front of her.
    “That’s Bob,” Mark said.
    Now that Libby looked closer, she could see the outlines of someone’s arm.
    “He’s one of our actors,” added Mark.
    “Actors. That’s a laugh,” came a disembodied voice out of the ceiling.
    “Bob Small?” Bernie asked.
    “How’d you guess?” came the voice from the ceiling.
    “Your voice,” said Bernie.
    “When did you—” Libby began to say, but Bernie kicked her.
    Bob finished the sentence for her. “Get out of jail?”
    Libby rubbed her shin. “Yes.”
    “About two weeks ago,” replied Bob.
    “Comfortable up there?” Mark asked.
    Bob snorted. “Yeah. If you like being in a coffin.”
    Mark patted his hand. “Don’t worry. We’ll have someone come and relieve you in two hours.”
    “Two hours?” Bob squeaked. “What happens if I have to take a leak?”
    “We already discussed that. You hold it,” Mark told him as he guided Libby and Bernie toward the center of the room. When he got there, he stopped. “I like to give people a second chance,” he practically whispered.
    “Very noble,” Libby observed.
    Mark shot his cuffs. “No. It’s just what I call enlightened self-interest. You give a guy like that a second chance and he’s yours for life. See, we have Bob to set the mood, and then you come over here and see this.” He pointed to a big black coffin that was seemingly rising out of the floor.
    There was a creak as the coffin’s door began to open. A squeal of laughter came from a skeleton as it sat up. He had an eye patch over his left socket and a long mane of white hair that came to his shoulders. He stared straight at them and shook a bony finger.
    “Soon you’ll look just like me,” the skeleton cackled. “Just like me. Eat, drink, and be merry. We don’t have six-packs in the graveyard.” Then he lay backdown as the coffin door started closing. A minute or two later, the coffin was gone.
    “It comes up through the floor,” Mark explained.