As we got near the staircase, all my worries had gone. I wasn’t a boy in a girl’s costume. I was Aurora, and Aurora had no reason to be scared. Tracy told me to wait just around the corner at the top of the stairs, and to not show myself till she announced me.

 

I heard her call for Her Mom, my Mom, and Amanda. She even greeted her Dad whom I didn’t know had even come home and then I heard her pronounce “Everyone, may I present to you, her royal highness, Princess Aurora” and at that, I did my best to mimic what I’ve seen in the movies.

Of course I was far from perfect at this and there was a mistake here or there, including tripping on the last step as I looked to Amanda, and away from the path in front of me, only to be caught by Amanda’s Dad. But the looks I had been getting up till that point told me that they knew what I had been trying for.

 

After setting me on my feet, Amanda’s Dad bowed to me as if I was really royalty and kissed my hand, which caused me to giggle. Amanda’s Mom came over and said “You are so brave to do this!” which caught me slightly off guard, and my Mom just smiled brighter than I’d seen her in a long while and gave me a hug, a tight warm hug.

 

Once all the gushing of our two Moms and even Amanda’s dad was over, and what I will swear to being enough pictures to fill two large memory cards in Mom’s digital camera were taken, Tracy grabbed her purse, and keys and ushered us outside.

 

Amanda and I were starting to walk to the street when we noticed that Tracy wasn’t right behind us. When we turned around, she was standing by their Mom’s SUV asking, “Where are you two headed?”

 

We looked at her blankly and pointed at the neighbors when she said, “Well, I don’t know about you, but I thought we would do a lot better if we headed out to a slightly more upscale area. The Houses are bigger and they generally give out better candy, but the houses are still all close together like a normal neighborhood.”

 

And with that description, our eyes completely lit up and we both started to run, quite un-lady like I might add, back to the SUV. When we got to the car, Tracy opened the back door for us, and Amanda made sure she got in first, after directing me how to get in properly by sitting down and then rotating sideways and sliding across the bench seat. I tried my best to copy her, but got my skirt all caught and tangled, at which point Tracy had me get out, and she helped me keep the skirt and everything in order properly this time. The key seemed to be to reach behind and really smooth out the skirt, and making sure nothing really got bunched up in the first place.

 

Once we were both in, and buckled up in the back, Tracy got into the Drivers seat, and placed a couple of what looked like pillowcases in the seat next to her.

 

“What are those for?” Amanda and I asked in unison, and then giggled.

 

“That’s for Overflow!” At the surprised look on our faces, Tracy continued, “My friends and I heard this would be a great place to take you guys. Some of my friends will be there too, with their sisters and brothers and whatnot. We think there will be enough candy in this small area to load you guys up for an entire year!”

 

Now at that, both Amanda and I started dreaming. I mean what kid doesn’t want a mountain sized haul of Trick or Treat candy that can last a whole year? Thoughts of Scrooge McDuck diving through his money vault passed through my brain, and I started giggling.

 

When Amanda asked me what I was giggling about, I whispered it into her ear and she joined me in giggling. When I noticed Tracy looking at us through the “mommy” mirror in the SUV, I just returned a smile.

 

Before I knew it, we were pulling into the parking lot for a grocery store/strip mall. I had been past this area before, usually at Christmas time when looking at Christmas lights, but I didn’t really know the area well.

 

I saw a group of cars parked at the rear of the lot, with what looked like a group of older Teens and younger kids in costume hanging around. The Teens looked to be mostly in one group, whilst the younger kids were in another. It was fun watching the smaller of the younger kids breaking away and bugging the older kids, and just generally bouncing around excitedly.

 

After Tracy parked, and got out of the car, we approached the group of what I assumed were Tracy’s friends. All the girls seemed to hug and were almost as excited as the little ones, whilst the older teen guys seemed to be there begrudgingly.

 

None of the older kids were wearing costumes, although Tracy was dressed somewhat festively in black jeans, and a black t-shirt with a large glow in the dark Orange jack-o-lantern on the front, with a suitably goofy face carved into it. She also wore some orange bangles around her wrist and dangly pumpkin earrings, which complimented the temporary orange streaks in her hair quite well. As we got out of the car, she reached over for her purse and pulled something out of it. It was an inexpensive plastic headband with 2 Pumpkin topped dancing antenna.

 

Amanda and I both giggled and asked her why she was dressed so differently from most her friends whom seemed to be dressed for a party more than Trick-Or-Treat, and she said “I really love Halloween!” and then with a sigh “I wish I wasn’t ‘too old’ to dress up like you, and probably still would have, but my friends had this idea, and I didn’t want to be the only older kid to dress up.”

 

Whilst I was not worried about knowing any of the older Teens, I mean this certainly wasn’t the crowd Denny hung around with, I was certain I would know one of the younger kids our aged. But thankfully that wasn’t true. There were some really younger kids that I recognized from the lower grades, like 3rd an 4th, but no one that I knew, and that made me feel even more at ease.

 

As we approached the groups, Amanda and I stuck with Tracy for saying Hi to her friends. We were about to join the younger group, when one of Tracy’s friends, I think it was Lucy, had what she thought was a great idea.

 

Lucy had us move over beside one of the cars, and then went with 2 of her friends to gather other kids from the other group.

 

When all was said and done, we had a Charming young Aladdin, a very young, Prince Charming, and even a baby in a Genie costume for boys. As for the girls, we had a bit more of a selection. We had Mermaid Ariel whom was wearing a tight green skirt with sequins sewn in and green swim flippers, a Human Ariel wearing a simple pink gown, with her natural flowing red hair and bright blue eyes. There was a store bought Snow White, she was cute, but the costume seemed a bit cheap to me. It had almost a plastic feel to it. There was another store bought costume, Cinderella. It was much nicer quality than Snow White, and then there was another, home made costume, Belle, from beauty in the Beast that was quite Elaborately done. Amanda and I were both in purchased outfits ourselves; they weren't your average store bought costumes though. For the 2nd year in a row Amanda's Dad had acquired the costumes that you could only find in the actual Disney parks.

 

Amanda as Princess Jasmine was in her light blue, sparkly Harem Girl costume that had modesty covering for the translucent bits, which made the costume much less revealing. I was wearing the big, elaborate, Princess Aurora or Sleeping Beauty costume that Amanda had worn last year. It was fairly elaborate with overlays and the petticoats fluffing the pink skirt. The collar was modest, with the white collar only revealing my neck. The shoulders were pink, and pointed up, and there was a translucent sleeve that went all the way down to my wrists.

 

Lucy, Tracy and their friends spent a few minutes arranging us just right, and then took a series of pictures. It was fun as we were asked to do both serious smile poses, but goofy funny poses and whatnot also. The longer the night went on, the calmer I got.

  Trick or Treat

 

After our impromptu photo shoot was over, we all joined the group of the younger kids whilst the older kids started to get ready to leave.

 

In hopes of not inundating each house the big group split into two smaller groups, and each group headed to a different neighborhood.

 

Most of our Disney Princess crowd stayed together. The exception being that Prince Charming, the Mermaid Ariel and the Genie were in the other group. Ariel and Prince Charming were attached to cute girl whom wanted to follow her boyfriend to the other neighborhood.

 

So there were 10 of us ‘kids’ that were left heading into the main drag of the neighborhood behind the grocery store, whilst the other group crossed the large intersection to head to another. So there was Amanda, Myself, Colleen (Human Ariel), Asleigh (Belle), Cathy (Snow White), Robyn (Cinderella), Grace (Tinkerbell), Samantha (a bag of Cotton Candy), Jonathan (Vampire) and Timothy (Buzz Lightyear).

 

In the other group were of course Cindy (Mermaid Ariel), Prince Charming and Genie, along with 2 girl Vampires a Lady Bug, 2 witches a Dora the explorer, a rock chick and a Harry Potter.

 

Trick or Treat was normally a kind of hard holiday for me. Don’t get me wrong, I loved seeing all the costumes and the mini haunted houses, and what kid doesn’t like all the candy and whatnot, but you see, for most kids this holiday is all about being someone else for one day a year, but I always had to pretend to be someone else. But this year was different, for the first time, Trick or Treat meant that I could finally be myself, even if for just one night.

 

All the girls around me were busy talking, including Amanda. I had been introduced to the group as Aurora whom was dressed as Sleeping Beauty. When one of the older girls had been about to blurt out about Sleeping Beauty being Princess Aurora, Tracy mentioned to her how it was an inside joke that I had “dressed up as myself” for the night.

 

I was a little shy at the start of our little venture and tried to hide near the back of the group, but Amanda made sure that that didn’t last long. It was the second or maybe the third house we hit that really changed the tone of the night for me.

 

I wasn’t at the back of the group, but I wasn’t at the front of the group either at that point. I was kind of hiding in plain sight in the middle of the group as it were. This was the best compromise that Amanda I could come up with. She said if I had stood to the back by myself, I would stand out more, and honestly I couldn’t disagree with her. One of the girls went up and knocked on the door, quickly returning to the rest of our group to wait. When the woman opened the door, everyone yelled “Trick-or-Treat!” except me. I was still being a bit shy.

 

Somehow the woman at the door noticed, and said “Wow, what a wonderful group of costumes we have here, but I think your friend Sleeping Beauty there seems to have gone silent.”

 

Everyone turned to me at that point, and  my body took it upon it’s self to betray me and blush violently. Once that was taken care of, I smiled politely and said “Trick or Treat?” and even added a bit of a curtsy.

 

Clumsy as it may have been, it seemed to set of a round of giggles including from the woman at the door. She was so delighted she let us “double dip” into her pot of candy, and the rest of the girls in our little group decided that we should do that at every door from now on.

 

From that point on, I was just another one of the girls. It was easy to get lost in the running banter and rolling conversations. These girls were fun to be around just like Amanda, and I was happy to be there.

 

I had dressed up quite a few times with Amanda and Tracy but we always still hid it from their parents, and of course my Mom so it was only the 3 of us that knew, so it never really felt “real” like it did tonight.

 

It’s funny to think that on the one night a year that most Kids got to dress up and be someone different, someone they weren’t, I finally got to be ME, the REAL ME.

 

The Accident

 

By the time we hit the third neighborhood we were quite tired. We had a lot of energy coming in, but we had covered a lot of ground. Neither of us was willing to admit we were tired, but I’m sure Tracy was able to pick up on the signs. I say this because it was Tracy that decided we should head back to the parking lot, and home. Some of the other kids wanted to keep going, so we said our good byes, and started to head back to the car.

 

Amanda and I had a good haul at that point. I was just so excited at everything that happened, and was just absolutely gushing to Tracy, and we unfortunately weren’t paying much attention.

 

The three of us reached the large intersection and started crossing the street together. I know I should have been holding Amanda’s hand, as Tracy was holding our first candy bags in one hand, but Amanda pulled her hand away for just second to get something out of her bag I thought. Little did I know her bag had actually broke and spilled in the middle of the crosswalk.

 

I remember looking back, and seeing her there, head down. I saw the car coming from down the street and noticed the Cross/Don’t Cross signal had turned to solid “Don’t Cross”. I can clearly remember pulling my hand free of Tracy whom was screaming to Amanda. Amanda looked up terrified of the car she saw coming towards her, and just started to scream. I got to her and pushed her out of the way and then things get kind of blurry.

I can remember a sound of some kind, and I can remember my hands hitting something. I guess it was the sound of the car, and the feeling of my hands hitting the hood. It could have been the feeling of hitting the ground, or even something else. It just feels so weird.

Wait, that’s not right, I mean I’m trying to remember for all I can, and yet, it’s like something doesn’t want me to remember. Sometimes I can occasionally get a glimpse of something. It’s like a light, the lights of the car maybe?

 

Everything is just glances and glimpses. Just a bit of feeling here or a trace of a memory there. The only thing I can remember clearly is the scream. I can hear a girl crying, and sometimes screaming.

 

Wherever I am, I hope she’s ok. I Hope Amanda is ok.

There was another voice in my head. A sweet melodic voice that sounded dearly familiar but that I couldn’t place right then. All it said was “You should have been named Brianna not Brian”