My mother excitedly clapped her hands together. "Oh my goodness sweet heart, you look amazing!"

I chuckled. "Mom, calm down, it's just a suit."

She suddenly puffed out her lips and curled her eyes brows up as she walked towards me. She took my hands as I playfully rolled my eyes. "I know. I am just trying to savor the last little bits of your high school career. And the time that I have left with you before you go off to college."

"Mom..." I teased. "I don't know if I'm going to college right away. We talked about this." I looked down. "Especially now. Considering the circumstances. I don't know if it would be wise."

She nodded her head. "Well, we'll talk about it later on. You have a dance to get to." She walked into the kitchen and took a pizza out of the oven. "Is Nate coming to pick you up?"

The doorbell rang. She went over to answer it with the candy bowl. "TRICK-OR-TREAT!" A bunch of little kids screamed. My mom smiled at them as she bent down to their level and offered them the candy. They thanked her and ran off to the next house.

I shook my head. "No, he's not. I'm going to meet him there."

She looked up at the clock. "Well then, you'd better get a move on. It's almost 8."

"Yeah," I said, grabbing my keys. "Be safe tonight."

"I should say the same to you, Ava." She playfully winked at me, but the words had a much heavier meaning to me.

"Yeah."

I walked out the door to my car and drove to the school. The place, despite what I thought it was going to be like, was absolutely booming with lights, music and excitement. I locked my car door and walked into the school with my ticket to the dance.

The inside was even more exquisite than the outside. Spider webs hung all over the place, a smoke machine filled the surface of the floor with fog, and a live band was playing on the platform. I smiled. This was going to be better than I had expected.

I looked around to find Nate, but he found me first. "Hey you..." he said, taking my hand. "Do you want something to drink?"

I bit my lip. "Um...I don't know, I don't want to get a side-ache."

He nodded. "I understand." He turned his head back to where the snack table was. "Well, I'm thirsty as hell, so I'm going to go get myself some punch, okay?"

I nodded. "Sure, go ahead, I'll be right here."

He smiled and nodded at me. "I'll be right back."

He walked off, leaving me alone in the sea of sweaty bodies and zombies and vampires. Everyone's costume seemed to be of something gross and undead. It was rather disturbing, but it was Halloween, after all.

I nervously looked around the room. I had this strange, unnerving feeling that Luther was going to show up out of no where. In fact, I had the feeling that he was already there. I knew that was crazy, however, because especially on a night like this, Gomez wouldn't let him out of his sight.

But he would. Gomez was going to be up and down all night answering the door for trick-or-treaters. There's no way he'd keep Luther in plain sight. He'd have him tucked away where no one could find him. Then how could Luther escape? But he's intelligent. He would certainly find a way.

I nervously bit my finger nails and looked around, hoping not to see him anywhere. "Hey," Nate said, causing me to jump. I looked at him as he gave me a strange look. "You...okay?"

I nodded my head and removed my finger from my mouth. "Yeah, yeah. I'm fine. Halloween has just got me in a jittery mood." I laughed lightly.

He nodded and smiled as he handed me a red, plastic cup. "Here you go. I figured you would want some anyway."

"Thanks," I said as I took it and gulped it down. My head was beginning to ache from worry.

"Are you sure that you're alright?" he double checked. "You look really..." he put a hand on my cheek. "Flushed."

I grabbed his hand and held it in mine as I led him closer to the dance floor. "A-Okay!" I exclaimed. "Can we dance now?"

He rolled his eyes and nodded. "Yeah, sure."

We started dancing together to the creepy music that was playing. We got a lot of compliments on our costumes throughout the night, too.

Suddenly, there was some sort of commotion at the entrance of the dance. A few people closer to the doors stopped dancing and looked on to observe what was happening. I clutched tighter onto Nate and looked on myself.

"Don't worry," he whispered into my hair. "It's just Jesse being a butthead."

Just then, a group of people burst into the crowd as several people gasped at their outfits. I nearly fainted myself. The group of boys strolled right up to us as I clung tighter to Nate's Superman suit. The boy in the front, who I assumed was Jesse, extended his arms out to his side and twirled around.

"So? What do you think?" he asked loudly.

"Why did you dress as Luther?" I asked shakily.

"Jesse, get out of here, you're upsetting Ava," Nate tried to defend.

Jesse rolled his eyes. "We dress as Luther every year, and we got it down really good this year so there was no way that we were going to change it at the last second."

"Was that why you had trouble getting in?" Nate asked. "They all thought that you guys were Luther?"

"Yeah..." Jesse said as he scratched the back of his head. "We had to get out our student IDs and shit."

Nate waved his hand at them. "Well, stay away from us, okay? I don't want you guys to ruin her night."

"Com'mon, guys," Jesse said, waving his arm. "Let's go somewhere where our work is appreciated."

Him and four other boys all walked past us. I had to admit, the costumes were magnificent. They all wore Luther's signature black turtle neck and skinny jeans, along with black wigs, pale complexion, and they got his facial structure down just perfectly. They looked just like him, and it scared the hell out of me.

"Don't worry about them," Nate assured under his breath. I looked up at him and smiled.

"Don't worry, I'm not."

"I can tell that you are." He licked his lips and looked around. "Are you sure that you're okay with this?"

"Yes...!" I assured. "It's fine, okay? Can we just move on with the night?"

He smiled and looked down. "Oh...alright..." He took my hand and started to lead me towards the gymnasium. "But I'm tired of dancing. I want to go play a game or something."

"Sure." I said. As we walked to go into the gym, he stopped once more to get a cup of punch. He offered me some, but I declined.

Once we made it into the gym, we took a quick picture at the photo booth that they had set up, and went on over to bobbing for apples. After we each won, we received a little Frankenstein plush toy, of which Nate let me keep. He suddenly put his hand over his stomach.

"Oh man..." he said.

"What is it?" I asked.

He shook his head as the two of us swiftly started out towards the main area again. "I don't feel so good..."

He ran off towards the bathroom, while I stood there, perplexed. Several minutes later, he came back out, wiping his forehead that was drenched in sweat.

"What happened?" I asked.

"I think that I ate a little too much candy this afternoon..." he said. "I kind of hurled."

I scrunched up my nose. "Oh my god, are you okay?"

He nodded. "I should be fine in a little while. But...I don't want you to be alone while Luther is still out there."

"Oh...I don't want to keep you if you're sick..." I said.

"Then don't keep me. My parents and older sister are out at a cocktail Halloween party tonight. Why don't you come over in a little bit and we can watch a movie or something?"

I smiled and looked down. "Are you sure?"

"Positive."

I shrugged. "Then I don't see why not?"

"Great," he said as he took my phone. He typed his address into it and handed it back to me.

"Thanks."

"See you in a few." With that, he left the dance, his superman cape flowing behind him. I watched longingly as he left.

I looked back towards the dance. There were a lot of people running into the bathroom. One girl walked out of the women's bathroom, helping her friend out by her shoulders.

"Hey," I said as I walked up to them. "What's going on?"

"There's a ton of people throwing up," the helping one replied. "There must be some sort of bad food or something."

I nodded. There were too many people throwing up for it to be from some sort of bad food. And why wasn't I getting sick?

I looked across the room at the group of boys dressed as Luther. There were six of them. I froze.

They only came in with five... I thought.

One of them looked up at me, his green eyes crackling. We stared at each other for a few good seconds, the room becoming still around me. Internally, I screamed, I panicked, I cried for help, but outwardly, I did nothing.

It was undoubtably him.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Sorry I haven't updated in a few days.

Could someone explain to me why Outlawry was #3 one day an then not even on the list the next? That's really bothersome.