Smashing Pumpkins by Dee Jordan

          
When I got home that afternoon, I noticed the smiling jack-o-lantern in my front yard had been crushed. It must be that bully three houses down trying to intimidate my daughter again. 

Callie was only twelve years old, and he was thirteen. Yes, she outweighed him, but there was no way she had been the bully in the latest complaint by Mrs. Anderson to the school principal. 

"Ms. Jenkins, this is Mr. Oliver at Bayview Middle School. Carolyn Anderson has complained that your daughter has been bullying Joel for weeks now. She said she tried ignoring it until yesterday when Joel found a dead bird in his locker after lunch. He claims your daughter threatened to make him as dead as the bird if he didn't leave her alone." 

"I'm sure you have it all wrong. My daughter is the one being picked on all of the time with unkind remarks made to her. For instance, he called her a ‘fatty fatty two by four.’” 

"Joel admits to taunting your daughter, and I made him apologize to her in front of the class. But due to the bird incident, she will be suspended for three days. We have a student who witnessed her putting the bird into his unlocked locker." 

I couldn't believe what he said. My Callie wouldn't dare pick up a dead creature, must less carry it in the school and put it into Joel's locker. The school was out to get her. I'll make her three days at home pleasant. We'll cut a Jack-o'-lantern while she is home. 

This Halloween was the first year I'd allowed her to cut the pumpkin. She wielded the knife very well, and the pumpkin turned into a grand grinning apparition of a ghost. 

Then there was today. Someone had smashed and slashed the pumpkin to giblets. It looked as if Joel had used an ax on it. Horrific anger was the only reason someone would have done something so heinous to our smiling greeter. My Callie, despite her constant teasing, never exhibited any signs of anger. Before I could get my key into the door, a siren blasted my thoughts, and an ambulance sped by our yard. To my horror, it stopped at the Anderson home. Curiosity got the best of me. I headed to their house, feeling smug that the little bastard had cut himself in his ax-wielding frenzy. 

Imagine my shock when a bloodied Joel was brought out of the house, indeed an ax accident. His arm bled as the EMT wrapped it. He screamed at the top of his lungs like a sissy. 

Above the din was Mrs. Andrew's voice, "Are you going to do something now? Do you see what your daughter has done to my son?" 

"My daughter? You jest. He smashed and slashed our pumpkin and trespassed, and you blame my daughter because he cut himself?" 

By now a police officer was on the scene. “Arrest her daughter. My son claims she chased him with an ax and ran back to her house. She's dangerous and demented." 

"How dare you say such a thing?" 

"Ma'am, where is your daughter? There is no way this could be a self-inflicted wound.” 

"She's not even home yet. She has dance after school on Tuesday afternoon. She normally doesn't get home until nearly 5:00." 

"Let's check things out," the officer said with a calmer voice to me. "Mrs. Anderson, I will let you know what my investigation finds out." 

"Follow me; I'll prove that not only did my daughter not do this, but this boy has tried to frame her. He is guilty of coming on our property and destroying our Jack-o-lantern. You need to be reading him his rights." 

We walked up the street, and when we got to my house, the pumpkin had been cleaned up. Surely, I didn't do that? But then again, I do a lot on automatic pilot. I noticed the door had been left slightly ajar.

"Where is your evidence of trespassing? Did you clean it up?" 

"Yes, I did. I have it indoors in our garbage can. 

Imagine my shock when we opened the door, and there stood a bloody Callie holding a Brownie Scout ax I'd given her two years earlier when she went camping. 

"I got him, Mama. I got him good." 

What scared me the most was her calm demeanor. 

Dee Jordan has two novels on Amazon. She reviewed Alabama writers for the Alabama Writers' Forum Online Reviews, and she wrote articles dealing with mental illness for the newspaper, New York City Voices.She has had seven short stories published in literary magazines and ten published in different anthologies.

In the Shadow of Sin Kindle: http://amzn.to/2x5qKHk

In the Shadow of Sin Paperback: http://amzn.to/2xC6RJs