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Other than Christmas, Phil’s favorite holiday is Halloween.
He loves dressing up, loves that his mom lets him pick whatever costume he wants. He loves carving pumpkins, watching scary movies with his older brother, and that his mom makes more cinnamon flavored cookies than normal throughout the month of October.
But most of all he loves the sweets.
Every Halloween his mom lets him go out with his older brother for a few short blissful hours to collect as many sweets as he possibly can. And Martyn, being the absolute coolest older brother to ever exist on the planet, let’s Phil eat a few before they get home and his mom limits him to two per day after supper.
This year’s no different.
Phil rushes home from school, puts on his pirate costume his mother bought for him the week before, and runs down the stairs, yelling at his brother that it’s time to go.
Phil hears Martyn laugh and tell him to “hold his horses” as he gets his things together and puts his shoes on.
While he’s happy Martyn lets him sneak a few sweets before returning home, he did wish his brother shared the same sense of urgency in this matter as Phil did.
Maybe next year he can go trick-or-treating alone. He will be ten after all. That has to mean something, right?
His brother tugs down Phil’s pirate bandana that’s wrapped around his head over his eyes, laughing as Phil lets out an indignant whine.
Phil groans, tugging it back above his eyes so he can see, thank you very much, before rushing out the open front door his brother left through.
Out on the street Phil already feels excited, looking around and seeing tons of other children running up to houses to be greeted with the promise of chocolates or candies.
“Come on, come on!” Phil shouts, unable to contain himself.
Martyn laughs and rolls his eyes, following his baby brother to the first house.
Phil’s practically bouncing on his heels, unable to hold back his excitement as he waits for his kind neighbors to drop a miniature candy bar into his designated trick-or-treating pillow case.
When Phil finally gets to the front door, his neighbor, sweet old Mrs. Roberts, drops three sweets into his pillow case with a wink. Phil smiles brightly at her, the old woman letting out a small chuckle and waving to Martyn where he stands out on the street.
“Now you make sure you give one of those to your brother, okay Philip?”
“Yes, Mrs. Roberts,” Phil says all too politely. “Thank you!”
She laughs again the sound fading away as Phil runs from the house and back towards the street. He pulls one of the sweets from the bag and hands it to his waiting brother.
“Thanks little man,” Martyn says, holding his hand out for a high five.
Phil goes for it, missing the majority of his hand, but he’s too focused on rushing to the next house to pay any attention or care all too much.
The next few houses around the one he lives in give him plenty of sweets, all smiling at him and telling him how lovely his pirate costume looks. They all make sure to give Phil an extra candy or two for his brother, who gladly takes each one Phil offers him when he leaves the person’s house.
“You getting tired yet?” Martyn asked in amusement.
Phil scoffed, rolling his eyes.
“As if,” he replied.
Martyn laughed as they walked together and towards the next house. Phil started to head towards it and Martyn stuck a hand out, grabbing him by the shoulder and stopping him before he went any further.
His older brother looks around at the undecorated house and notes the closed door, a stark contrast to their other neighbor’s houses where most of the adults handing out sweets were waiting outside the door already.
“I don’t think anyone’s home,” Martyn says. “Why don’t we try the next one?”
Phil frowns and looks at the house. What if the world’s greatest sweet is there? What if the owner of the house bought all this candy for Halloween and everyone else keeps skipping them too? He can’t possibly just skip it, surely his brother will understand.
“Can’t I just ring the bell?” Phil asks, nearly in a plead.
Martyn drops his hand and sighs, waving him forward.
“Sure, sure, go ahead Phil.”
Phil grins at him before running forward, stopping only when he gets to the front door.
He swallows, nervously standing on his tiptoes to reach the bell and press it, the faint sounds of a bell going off inside just reaching Phil's ears.
Phil stands there, unsure of how long he should wait. Maybe they’re in the bathroom, or maybe they were fixing up their Halloween costume. He should give them some time, they could just be a slow walker after all.
He hears a sound and perks up a bit, trying to calm down the racing of his heart.
The door opens, and Phil blinks, his expectations of an adult being disproven by the sight of a child probably a little younger than him.
“Hi!” Phil says, smiling brightly. “I like your costume.”
The boy looks down at himself, inspecting his bear onesie. He pulls at the hood that’s already covering his head, as if he wishes it could cover more.
“Thanks,” the boy says quietly. “I like your pirate costume.”
Phil’s smile grows.
“Thanks! My mom let me pick out.”
The other boy just stands in his doorway, fiddling with one of the loose strings on his costume.
“Um,” Phil starts, trying not to blush in embarrassed silence, “trick-or-treat?”
“Oh,” the boy replies. “We don’t have any sweets.”
Phil frowns.
“None at all?”
The boy shakes his head.
“Well,” Phil says slowly, “At least you can get some when you go trick-or-treating!”
The boy frowns.
“I’m not allowed to go trick-or-tricking.”
This time it’s Phil that frowns. No trick-or-treating? No sweets?
“You aren’t?” Phil asks sadly. “Why not?”
“Mama’s too busy working,” he says, “and I’m too little to go all by myself.”
“How old are you?”
“Seven.”
“Well I’m nine!” Phil says, with a sudden smile. “And my brother is like a hundred years old, so you can come with us!”
The boy looks past Phil to see an older boy standing a bit farther away and looks back at Phil, his paw covered hand coming to his mouth to cover his grin.
“Realwey?”
“Yeah!” Phil says. “Maybe ask your mom first though, I always gotta ask mine first or else she gets mad.”
The boy giggles, the sound making Phil smile. He watches the boy turn and run back into his house, presumably to go ask his mother.
He hopes he can come with him; Phil’s never gone trick-or-treating before with someone closer to his age than his brothers. And plus what kind of Halloween ends in no sweets? Phil’s not even sure that counts as a Halloween anymore.
“Baby brother,” Phil turns at Martyn’s voice, his brother walking towards him, “what are doing?”
“Waiting for- well I don’t know his name but he’s going to come trick-or-treating with us because his mom is busy and can’t take him and it’s not fair for him to be alone on Halloween and have no sweets, right Martyn?” Phil says in a rush of breath, “He can come, right? I already said he should ask his mom, is that okay? I think-”
“Okay!” Martyn laughs, “It’s fine, calm down, take a deep breath.”
Martyn inhales deeply, and Phil mimics it, breathing out with his older brother so he can properly calm himself down.
“Sorry,” Phil says sheepishly once he can breathe again.
Martyn shakes his head, with a smile.
“It’s fine,” his brother says, “now who’s this kid-”
“Oh, hello there,” the two Lester brother’s turn at the sound of a voice, both looking at the older woman standing in the doorway in a professional looking suit.
The boy’s back as well, the older woman with a hand placed gently on his back.
“Dan here says you wanted to see if he could go trick-or-treating with you?” She asks, smiling kindly at Phil.
Phil nods, first smiling at Dan, and then at the woman he assumes is his mother.
“Yes, ma’am.” Phil replies. “If that’s okay. My brother will be with us the whole time, I promise.”
The woman looks at Martyn who nods in polite assurance that he’ll be watching the two of them.
“Well I suppose that’s alright then,” she says, laughing when Dan all but jumps up in excitement. “Okay, silly bear,” she laughs, “you be nice to-” she looks up at the two boys, realizing she doesn’t even know their names.
“Martyn,” the eldest supplies, “and this is Phil.”
“Martyn and Phil,” she continues to Dan, “and don’t eat too many sweets before Mommy has a chance to look at them when you get home, okay?”
“Okay!” Dan says. He gives his Mom a quick hug before rushing out the door, grabbing Phil’s hand on the way, the two of them laughing together as they go back out into the street.
“Where do we go first?” Dan asks, with a huge smile. Phil notices for the first time he has dimples, one larger than the other on his reddened cheeks.
Phil thinks about the matter seriously, wanting Dan’s first house to be a good one.
When the idea comes to him, he sticks a pointer finger towards the sky, resisting the urge to yell out “ah ha!”
“Mrs. Fenwick’s house! She always has big sized candy bars.”
Dan’s brown eyes widen, his tiny hand squeezing Phil’s.
“Let’s go, let’s go!”
They take off, the bear and the pirate, hand in hand towards the first sweet filled house, together.