I was never allowed to do anything bad on Mischief Night. My mother once told me she had a crystal ball and I believed her all the way up til my junior year in college, assuming that if she hadn’t beaten me to death by then, then she couldn’t see anything I was doing.
Mischief Night was relatively tame where I lived. We had some ruffians nearby, but they didn’t do anything but throw an egg or two at your house and then run screeching into the night and forest. Some kids from my high school once tried to egg the house of Randall Cunningham. I wasn’t there, but in hindsight nobody seemed to express much shock at getting caught, what with the caravan of Volvos Nissans lined up outside the estate of the state’s most famous professional athlete. I wonder if Randall still thinks about it.
My one and only Mischief Night confirmed my lifelong status as a rule follower. I went out with three guys from my street. We were ill equipped, I believe only bringing along a roll of toilet paper to cover someone’s house in and I don’t think there were eggs. We dressed in dark clothes, which for me meant my grade school uniform. It was dark green, but this is what I had to work with. I did so under the assumption that we’d be in the woods. Dark Green + Dark Woods = Where’d that guy go?
I was wrong.
Almost instantly I was seen from a back window. A woman doing dishes peered out into the woods and noticed four stalking idiots. An evidently highly-trained operative, she snapped off her lights and was quickly on her porch. Seconds later she was yelling at us to disappear. Most of us did. Most. I became petrified and stayed in position. This position was lying on my stomach in front of a tree. The flood lights of the backyard were on and I could feel them pouring into my head. Every time they’d snap off, the woman would wave a hand and snap them back on. Eddie squatted behind a tree a few yards away, impoloring me to get up and make a run for it. I thought I was hidden.
“Listen to your friend. Get out of here,” the woman shouted.
“Dame. Come on.”
I tried to get up, but alas my shoelace was attached to a stick that wasn’t budging. Eddie wandered out of his hiding spot to help and, when that gesture proved useless, the woman herself came out and undud my shoelace. She pulled me to my feet and padded me on the butt (different times, I called no authorities).
Thus was the beginning and the ending of a great criminal mind. Since then I’ve left all sorts of mischief to those who aren’t me. I stay home, watch a movie, and listen for ruffians and shenanigans.
