Finding the Perfect Costume

This story is my contribution to the 2010 Halloween contest. I'd appreciate your vote and any comments you'd care to leave.

Thank you.

*

Lizzie didn't really believe in vampires, although she was careful to always tuck a small gold cross into her pocket, just in case. Any paranormal activity in the old house was most probably explained by the creaks and groans as the centuries-old house settled or by her father's restless pacing late at night and not by ghosts or poltergeists. Those 'bumps in the night' were probably her little brother kicking the bedroom wall as he chased rabbits and ran through the woods or whatever it was that young boys dreamed.

Lizzie liked the idea of an angel watching over her, someone or something keeping her out of trouble, but she certainly didn't think they really existed. As she looked out her window into the deep, dark expanse of the night sky, she pondered the existence of life out there somewhere, but any signs she saw were more likely to be the lights from an airliner or a satellite orbiting the earth and not visitors from another galaxy.

Lizzie surveyed the mounds of discarded clothing scattered over her bed and draped over every available surface. Glancing at the clock and counting backward from the time the Halloween party was scheduled to begin, she figured she had about an hour left to think of a costume, assemble it, get ready and head out the door. She'd been trying to get inspired for the past few hours by thinking about supernatural entities, but had, in reality, spent a great deal of that time tossing things out of her closet and raiding her mother's stash of clothing. She had made a big mess of her room, but was no closer to finding something to wear than she was when she started.

Lizzie pictured zombies in her mind. They creeped her out and made her uncomfortable, wondering "what if..." No, she didn't really believe in zombies. She certainly had no desire to dress up as one, especially since there would undoubtedly be several of them out tonight. She wanted to find something special, something that was truly "Lizzie".

Lizzie knew several of her friends had shopped the local thrift stores, scouring the racks for donated bridal gowns and "embellishing" them with red paint and knife slashes and other gruesome touches. She wasn't ready to get married, she didn't even have a boyfriend at the moment, but the idea of treating a wedding dress like that, gave her an uneasy feeling. Lizzie didn't feel she was especially superstitious, but there was no sense in tempting fate, either.

Lizzie spied a pale lavender color in the corner of her closet and pulled out her prom dress from several years ago. She slid the dress over her head, the taffeta rustling as she twirled around in front of the mirror. At last she had an idea. Lizzie took off the dress and swept all the piles of clothing off her bed. She spread the dress out on her bed and dashed into her mother's sewing room where she took the shears from the table. Gathering the hem of the pale purple taffeta gown in her hand, she cut jagged points into the bottom of the dress. She used the same technique to trim the sleeves.

Lizzie went through the house and down the steps to the basement. She rummaged through her father's workbench until she spied the roll of Mylar left over from last winter's weatherization project. She unrolled a length, looking at the faint glimmery sheen of the transparent film as it caught the light from the bare overhead bulb. It would be perfect. She cut off a couple of feet of Mylar, rerolled the rest and put it back on the shelf. She ran upstairs and into her mother's sewing room once more. Spying a half-filled tube of glitter from some long-forgotten project, she tucked it into her pocket along with an extra glue stick for the hot glue gun she knew she'd find somewhere among her crafting supplies.

Lizzie carried everything back into her bedroom. As the glue gun heated up, she gathered the Mylar in her hands, fashioning make-shift wings which she pinned to the back of her dress with a couple of safety pins. When the gun was hot enough, she triggered a line of glue down the center of the wings and then sprinkled multicolored glitter over it, cleverly hiding the small golden glints of the pins.

Lizzie admired the way her wings fluttered as she moved and took one last look in the mirror. She stepped out under the cool light of the night's full moon, her tail securely tucked inside her dress.