far too young to die ✰ m.w.

CHAPTER TWO

Halloween. Emily hadn't celebrated it since her former best friend Amber moved away in the 5th grade, so for the past two years, she and Jonathan had spent it at their house with their mother, acting like it was just a normal day, while Will went trick-or-treating with the rest of the party. This year, however, the boys had convinced her to go with them, and she had readily agreed. While Joyce and Jonathan had always managed to make Halloween enjoyable for her at home, she had had a much better time going trick-or-treating with Amber when she was younger, so now that she had even more people to go with, she was looking forward to it for sure.

This meant she would have to figure out a costume, and after some thinking, she decided on Princess Leia from Star Wars. The boys were each going as one of the Ghostbusters, so their costumes were identical except for the nametags, which each had a different name on them, or they were supposed to, at least.

The morning of, after having a small freak-out when she couldn't find Will in his bedroom or the kitchen (he was in the bathroom), Joyce helped Emily and Will with their costumes, which they would be wearing to school, and then Jonathan took pictures of them, both separately and together, before taking them to school.

"Who you gonna call?" Mike, Lucas, and Dustin sang, parking their bikes in the bike rack in front of their school.

"Ghostbusters!" Emily and Will finished the theme song.

The party greeted each other, proud of how well their costumes turned out. The good-naturedness of it all ended when Mike saw the name on Lucas's nametag.

"Why are you Venkman?" he questioned.

"Because I'm Venkman," Lucas answered.

"No, I'm Venkman."

"Why can't there just be two Venkmans?" Will asked.

"Because there's only one Venkman in real life. We planned this months ago. I'm Venkman, Dustin's Stantz, you're Egon," Mike said to Will and then turned to Lucas, "and you're Winston."

"Mike, it's not like anyone's going to notice," Emily said.

"Um, I've noticed!"

"I specifically didn't agree to Winston," Lucas said.

"Yes, you did!"

"I don't think he did," Will said.

"No one wants to be Winston, man," Lucas said.

"What's wrong with Winston?" Mike asked.

"What's wrong with Winston? He joined the team super late, he's not funny, and he's not even a scientist!"

"Yeah, but he's still cool."

"If he's cool, then you be Winston."

"I can't!"

"Why not?"

"B-Because..."

"Because you're not black?"

"I didn't say that!"