Let me introduce you to Tommy, a ten-year-old dressed as a mummy, all set for trick-or-treating on a chilly Halloween night. Carrying his pumpkin basket, he was headed to the infamous, decrepit house down the lane, rumoured to host a mischievous spirit. As he reached the creaky gate, strangely, his fear quickly evaporated.
Mustard yellow light flickered from within the house. Tommy hesitantly knocked on the splintered door, which creaked open with a gust of cooling breeze. “Trick or Treat!” He managed to squeak, but the silence echoed his voice back. Tommy, almost expecting this, reached for a candy inside his basket and placed it on the doorstep, deciding to treat the inscrutable spirit.
As he turned to rush away, he heard a munching sound behind him. He whipped around to see a small, grinning girl. Dressed in a sparkling princess costume, she was happily chewing the candy he had just left.
“Thanks for the treat. I’ve been waiting to trick someone brave enough to leave a candy for the ‘ghost’. Happy Halloween!” she said, waving him goodbye.
And that’s how Tommy’s runaway spirit found a fiendish plot, not among the dead but the living, in the wickedly clever princess next door.