This Is Halloween

My plans for Halloween to take Baby Brother and Little Brother trick-or-treating. As I mentioned, Baby Brother and I were Luke Triton and Flora Reinhold from Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box for Halloween. What about Little Brother?

When Little Brother found out that Baby Brother and I were doing a costume together, he became grumpy. Baby Brother suggested that Little Brother be Professor Layton, but Little Brother did not want to be Professor Layton.

Sometimes, being around Little Brother is exactly like this quote from The Wednesday Wars:

"I can't do this," he'd say.

"You can do this," we'd say.

"I don't want to do this," he'd say.

"You want to do this," we'd say.

"I don't even care about this," he'd say.

"You care about this," we'd say.

Sure enough, in the week leading up to Halloween, there was much moaning on Little Brother's part. The closer Halloween got, the more upset he was about not having a costume, and the more he was known to say things like this: "I'm not dressing up for Halloween!" "I hate Halloween anyways!" "I don't even want to go trick-or-treating!"

Our entire family did our best to talk him off the ledge of grumpiness, but it wasn't easy. Blessedly, two days before Halloween, Little Brother finally procured a satisfactory costume. It was more than satisfactory, actually. He liked the costume so much that he called me seven times within the space of an hour to tell me to come see it.

So everything was fine, right?

Wrong.

As Baby Brother and I prepared to go trick-or-treating, Little Brother dramatically announced that he would not be coming with us. He said this was to the effect that everyone in our neighborhood thought he was weird. And that they wouldn't get his costume. And that they probably thought he was too old to trick-or-treat, anyways.

We had another Wednesday Wars discussion. We pleaded, begged, and cajoled. But Little Brother stood firm that he would not, no would not, go trick-or-treating with us.

So Baby Brother and I left without him. And after about fifteen minutes of fun, we returned to try one last time.

"Please come trick-or-treating," we said.

And to our great surprise, Little Brother said, "Okay," and put on his costume.

This costume that he loved so much consisted of an otter costume worn with a moustache, glasses, and a newspaper.

"I'm an Otter Pop," he told me when he showed it to me the first time.

Little Brother is definitely a Ravenclaw.

The only other thing worth mentioning that happened that evening was that, when we were on our aunt and uncle's block, a police car slowed down near us.

"Hey, do you want some glowsticks?" one of the police officers in the car called out to us. Which isn't so different from a stranger saying, "Hey, kids, do you want some candy?"

"No, thanks. We already have some," I said, because we did. But also because my parents taught me to never take candy or glowsticks from strangers in cars. Even if those strangers are police officers. Especially if those strangers are police officers, because they should not be confusing children by behaving like potential kidnappers. Unless they were testing children by behaving like potential kidnappers. In which case, I passed and would like a certificate of completion.