The Halloween Memories I Didn't Share

Or, We Never Asked Why We Were Searching for Satanists to Fight in the Cemetery

Four years ago when I was living in China, I volunteered to do a presentation on Halloween at the U.S. Consulate in Guangzhou for a local Chinese audience (mostly university students). I shared a brief history of the holiday.¹ I projected pictures found in children’s books from different decades to show how trick-or-treating costumes have changed over time.²

I shared personal stories of how I celebrated Halloween growing up in the United States – trick-or-treating; going to haunted houses with my dad to be scared when I was younger; putting on make-up and scaring amusement park patrons in a haunted house at Six Flags Over Texas (as a way to fund-raise for student organizations or the Boy Scouts) when I was older; and finally, by watching scary movies in between handing out candy when the doorbell rang.

            Here are the memories I did not share:

            When I was young enough to trick-or-treat but old enough to wander our neighborhood without my parents’ supervision, my mom told me to watch out for my brother. She said his blonde hair and blue eyes would make him a target for Satanists on Halloween. The same fear led her to insist we keep our black cat locked inside during the last week of October. Years later, after listening to a podcast on the Satanic Panic of the 1980s, I asked my mom if she had been serious or joking³ with me. She said she did not remember ever giving me those warnings. She said she hoped she wouldn’t have let me and my brother leave the house to trick-or-treat if she believed there were roving gangs of Satanists in our neighborhood.

            When my brother was old enough to trick-or-treat on his own, he and a friend were knocked down, punched, kicked a couple times, and had their candy bags stolen. This happened not far from our home, on a dark sidewalk that short-cut between two cul-de-sacs and was lined on either side by a tall wooden residential fence.

            When our sister (the youngest of us) was old enough to be chaperoned by just me and my brother, as she was ringing a doorbell, a voice from behind us shouted, “Stay away from the robot.” Looking back at the driver who had yelled, he flashed a handgun at us. Until then, we hadn’t even noticed his little girl in a cardboard box with the silver stretched-coil dryer tubing around her arms and legs.

            If you like spooky echoes on Halloween, you’re going to love what happened to me in high school.⁴

            In tenth grade, because two of the three junior highs that fed into Sam Houston High School split and sent their student bodies to two other high schools, and I had attended one of those that sent only half their students to Sam Houston, I unexpectedly had the opportunity for reinvention. Despite being firmly in the nerd circle at my junior high, when I got to Sam Houston, it was kind of like being the new kid. No one knew I didn’t drink or smoke or was a virgin or still went camping with my Boy Scout troop. Every week, I would be asked if I was going to parties on the upcoming weekend that I assumed I needed an actual invitation to attend.

            This was at the peak of grunge when poor kids and rich kids dressed the same. No one had a cell phone or online reputation. The pool where I worked over the summer still had a payphone by the gate.

            So come Halloween my first year of high school, I’ve not yet found a permanent circle of friends, I’m mostly hanging out with my buddy James (from Scouts) and this guy Josh, who had also been a nerd at our old junior high, but had got a car, a serious girlfriend, and long hair before the rest of us. I’m drawing a picture of Buddy Holly in art class, and this cool kid, let’s call him Brandon, a year ahead of me, a junior; he asks me, “What are your plans for tonight?”

            “I don’t know,” I said.

            Maybe I would go to some haunted houses.

            “We should go to the cemetery by the lake,” Brandon said. “I hear Satanists sacrifice kittens there on Halloween. We can fight them. Tell your friends. We’ll meet at the parking lot at nine.”

            I told my three friends.

            After hitting up a couple haunted houses, we drove to the school parking lot. Brandon wasn’t there. Honestly, I hadn’t expected him to show. What surprised me was the twenty or so cars waiting and a stranger shouting my name, “Will is here! Let’s go!”

            I didn’t know if Brandon had been serious about fighting Satanists, but I had brought two pieces of chain, about a foot and a half each, left over from when my dad had installed a new swing on the play-set in our backyard for my sister. I figured I could wrap them around my fists or swing them like Ghost Rider. (Fighting wasn’t really my scene). Mostly, I brought them because I thought they looked cool. You could rattle them for atmosphere.

            Of the sixty or so kids waiting for me to arrive that night, most seemed ready to party. Their shirts shimmered. They had picnic coolers in their backseats filled with Bud-Light and Zima. Joints were being prepped. But a couple cars were ready to fight. A handful of baseball players had brought their bats.

            The athletes said to me, “What the fuck? If there’s a fight, I don’t want to have to worry about those girls.”

            I assumed Brandon would sort it out when he arrived.

            But it turned out everyone had already been waiting a while. Brandon had said to look for him or for me. Since I was there first, they expected me to lead them. But I didn’t know the way to the cemetery. Luckily, someone else did. So when the cars caravanned out of the parking lot, we followed.

            The cemetery was near Cedar Hill Lake, down an unmarked dirt road off an unlit, lonely, two-lane highway. Because the dirt road was bumpy and maybe we’d all have to retreat quickly, it was decided that most of the cars would park along the shoulder of the highway and we would ride in the beds of two trucks to the cemetery.

            A David Lee Murphy song played on the radio, spilling cheer out the open windows into the surrounding darkness. With every bump, someone spilled their beer and cursed loudly. Hooting. Laughter. Bottles tossed back and forth. I remember hoping that if there was actual danger lurking in the woods, hopefully the raucous truck-bed parties would chase it away.

            When the trucks reached the cemetery, they parked facing the tombstones; their high beams illuminated the empty grounds. The cemetery was the size of half a football field. No one was there. No Satanists dancing. No sacrificed kittens. No smoldering fire pits. Someone in the other truck lit a joint.

            All in all, it was pretty anti-climactic. My friend Josh, who also wasn’t drinking or smoking that night, didn’t want a trip to the cemetery on Halloween to go to waste, so he started walking over the graves. Standing in the tall grass beside one of the thicker headstones, he encouraged the crowd to join him. No one did. There was a smaller dirt road to the side and he suggested we walk down it further into the woods. That, we did.

            This smaller dirt road was a narrow, single lane. There was no moon. Trees lined the road, but were spread out and no more than two-stories tall. Only Josh had thought to bring a flashlight, but he refused to turn it on. Our eyes adjusted. The baseball guys rested their bats on their shoulders, like they were casually stepping up to the plate. I let my chains drag in the dirt, but increasingly felt stupid holding them. If a fight did break out, which I assumed wouldn’t (because did Satanists even exist in the real world?), but if it did - I had brought the weapon most likely to injure myself. Someone kept making ghost “whoo-ooo-ooo-ooo,” sounds.

            About fifteen minutes down this road, we heard a car horn insistently honking. We rushed back, expecting the worst. I worried maybe Satanists had emerged from the shadows, slashed the truck tires and broken out the cab windows, and were drawing us back for a battle I had no desire to join.

            Thankfully, it was a girl who had shown up late. She had discovered the empty trucks and wondered where we were. I was relieved. I had been genuinely scared in the way that expresses itself as bravado when surrounded by peers.

            “Only her,” I said, pretending I wasn’t grateful.

            We walked back into the woods. Josh encouraged the telling of ghost stories. No one did.

            As we walked further into the woods this time, I couldn’t escape the feeling that I didn’t belong. I wasn’t an athlete. I didn’t like country music. I couldn’t afford to drink or smoke pot. I had a curfew! But it was too late to turn back. What else could we do but keep going? Step after step in the dark; listening and looking. But for what? But for why?

            A horn halted our wandering a second time. We walked back to where the trucks were parked. As we approached, the alternating glow of red and blue lights cutting through the trees gripped us with a different fear, one not confined to Halloween night. The baseball players tossed their bats into the trees. I dropped my chains. Those wearing the shimmering shirts set their beer and marijuana gently on the dirt. We emerged from the woods to greet the lone officer who stood in front of his police cruiser, his lights flashing, parked beside the two trucks and the car of the latecomer.

            The police officer paused the flashing lights and spoke to us in the glow of the red and blue. He asked if anyone was over 21. One of the drivers gave his identification to the officer.

            The cop wasn’t quiet. At a near-yell, he told us we were the dumbest kids he had ever met. He asked if we knew how many people were shot every weekend at this very cemetery. He didn’t wait for an answer. He shined his flashlight at the NO TRESPASSING sign and pointed out the many bullet holes that scarred its surface. We were lucky to be alive, he near-shouted. You should never come out here at night, he said. And definitely not on Halloween night. He told us to get out of there.

            My parents were asleep when I got home (far past curfew)! I went to bed thankful that I hadn’t been cited by the police on Halloween, that I hadn’t got shot, that I hadn’t hit myself in the face in a violent and poorly considered confrontation with (likely imaginary) evil.

            The next day the baseball players went back to retrieve their bats. I think whoever dropped their pot went back to recover that as well. I never returned. I didn’t care that I lost the chains.

            All in all, nothing really happened, but I’m still haunted by that night.

            We didn’t find Satanists to fight. There were no ghosts flittering between the headstones. Despite Josh’ best efforts to spook us, no one even screamed.

            But…

            What if we had found some other dumb kids there at the cemetery on Halloween?

            Whenever I think back on that night, the accidental ease and lack of concern with which I put myself and others at risk disturbs me. I hadn’t planned it, but I assume everyone who drove out there considered me the de facto leader. Yet at no point did I consider saying, “This is a bad idea.”

            And I remember thinking it was a bad idea the entire time!

            I like to imagine I am a considerate and thoughtful person, but if past predicts future, what irresponsible and reckless action awaits me?

            In scary movies, you want to judge the character who descends into the dark basement asking, ‘Is someone there?’

            “What are you thinking?” you want to scream.

            Don’t be a fool! Turn around! Get out of there!

            Yet, when I remember that Halloween, I realize it’s not unrealistic.

            I would walk into that dark basement, and bring my friends and a bunch of strangers with me.⁵⁶⁷⁸⁹¹⁰

1. Hat-tip to Lisa Morton’s website and book on the subject.

2. You don’t see hobos in recent Halloween-themed kids’ books!

3. I always assumed it was a playful joke, like in high school when my mom told me to stay near the house if a party moved outside because if a drive-by happened, I would know to duck as the first bodies to drop would be those that had been standing nearest to the street.

4. So far everything I’ve told you really happened and what follows is also an absolutely true story. If the following seems tighter in the telling, it’s because I edited it for a 1000 word limit Halloween Party themed flash fiction contest  ( I didn’t win [shrug] [smiley face] )

5. okay, haha! This footnote is a reminder that the way creative non-fiction works is you don’t lie, but you select details that fit the theme, which may end up telling a story that’s a bit misleading! In this case, of course I’m downplaying that the experience taught me a valuable lesson and I never acted irresponsibly again!

6. It’s too bad I cannot add footnotes to the footnotes.

7. The truth is if Halloween really is the time to think about what frightens you, then this story is my attempt at exploring my deepest fear, which ghost myths can kind of be a metaphor for, and that’s the fear that change isn’t possible, that you’re not free to choose your destiny. What if personal agency is as much a fiction as vampires or zombies or ever feeling like you belong? I know it’s kind of silly. Much better to be afraid of getting in a car crash with your kids in the backseat.

8. Though, I can’t imagine costumes of distracted drivers ever being a top seller. [shrug]

9. Oh, also I’m afraid that we’re all the villains in everyone else’ story and completely unaware of it.

10. Happy Halloween!