Subject Zero: CONFIDENTIAL (Short Stories)

Don't Look Away (10)

Part Ten: Family's Warmth

October 31, 1983
8:15p.m.
Burkitt Village (A Part of Town)
Norwood, Indiana

Third Person's POV
Tens of dozens of parents and children were wandering the streets, some dressed up in unique costumes and others in clichés. The streetlights and glow-sticks were lighting up everyone's surroundings.

A normal man, not dressed up in any specific costume and was just wearing casual work clothes, was walking down the sidewalk, past a few stores in an empty part of the street.

A teenager with a white sheet over his head walked past him. "Boo! Heh, happy Halloween!"

The man looked at him and replied, "Yeah, you too."

When he looked ahead, he saw a jester leaning on the streetlight at the corner of the sidewalk, just lightly swinging his black cane side to side. It was Joker.

The man immediately felt uneasy, and gave him a small wave. The masked man bowed to him, lowering his top hat.

     "...Hello," the man uncomfortably greeted.

Joker stood back up, straightening up his hat as he placing it back on his head. He stepped up to the man and pulled a piece of candy from behind his ear. The man lightly and awkwardly chuckled, hesitantly taking the piece of candy.

     "That was very good. Thank you."

The masked magician took a step back, tilting his head a bit to his right.

     "Yes, it was very nice," the man plastered a fake grin on his face.

Joker looked at the man up and down, wondering why he wasn't wearing a costume.

The man looked at his clothes then back the magician, "Oh, yeah, heh... No costume for me. No. I work on Halloween."

The magician put his fists on the side of his own hips, shaking his head.

The man awkwardly smiled. "Yeah, sorry, uh... Thank you for the candy. Have a nice night."

When he tried to walk past him, the magician only stood in his way, fanning out a deck of cards in his hands, the numbers facing the man. He lowered the cards so neither of them would know which card would be chosen.

The man just looked at him, confused and a bit surprised. Joker covered the eyes on his mask with his gloved hand.

"...Okay," the man had a perplexed expression on his face as he picked out a card, pulling out a clean Ace of Spades.

Joker uncovered his eyes and shuffled the rest of the cards, then lightly tapped the side of the deck to make the stack of cards look neat. He held out his hand, gesturing for the man to place the card back in the deck, so the man did so. Right after, Joker started shuffling the cards again, then handed the deck to the man, telling him to take the whole deck.

Awkwardly, the man reached out and grabbed the stack of cards, "Okay."

He shuffled a few cards, but because he didn't know what he was even doing, the magican shook his hands, signaling for the man to stop before he took back the deck of cards and shuffled them himself.