Autumn Nuptuls

Bethany was sitting in her room, going over her checkbook. She would have sat in the kitchen to do this, but she was avoiding her ass of a mother. Bethany hoped she’d have enough money to move into the new condominiums in town. Bethany couldn’t wait to leave this hellhole that her fatass mother was the keeper of.

You may think her thoughts about her mother were cruel, but I’d have to tell you that you don’t know Bethanay’s mother. You see, her mother was one of those mothers who clung to their children too hard. Not because they loved them but because they were scared that the child would leave and then they’d have no one to do all the work around the house.

Bethany’s mother stood 5’5”, but she weighed 400 pounds. She claimed she couldn’t do anything because her back hurt so bad that she would sit in bed all day, putting on makeup, smoking weed, drinking alcohol, and trying to pick up guys on social media. Bethany’s mother never cleaned the house and hardly ever cooked for them. When her mother would get out of bed, she would wear clothes three sizes too small. Then she would sit around the house, telling anyone who would listen to her how wrong people were to her when it was her that would maltreat people.

Bethany was the same height as her mother but only weighed 125 pounds. Bethany worked hard at work, then came home to her mother’s house to cook and clean. She had no rent here because her mother owned the house, but she just couldn’t stand to be around her mother.

You see, every boyfriend Bethany had, her mother chased them off with her disgusting, judgemental, lazy ways. The final straw was when her mother called and reported a break-in, trying to get Bethany’s fiancee arrested, effectively ending their relationship that night: Bethany’s, her fiancee’s, Bethany’s, and her mom’s. That was the night she decided she was moving out.

Sadly for Bethany, she only made $15 per hour, and her mother ensured she didn’t have time to get a second job. The one time she did, her mother called her repeatedly until the manager said he had to let her go. Every time Bethany would start saving, her mother would come up with some other life-threatening emergency, and Bethany would have to spend her hard-earned money to fix something around the house. She just couldn’t understand where her mother’s disability check went every month. It wasn’t like her mother had a lot of bills to pay. Sure, Bethany’s dad had left her mother and taken all the money from the checking account, but it’s not like her mother paid rent. All her mother had to pay was electric and Wi-Fi. They had a well that ran on electricity; all the appliances were electric. Her mother refused to have a phone and said she could make all her calls through Wi-Fi. There was no trash bill, for a local businessman allowed them to toss their small amount of trash into his dumpster. He even sent a worker to pick it up once a week. She tried to curb her mother’s spending on needless things, but that did no good, not when her mom was always broke by the first week after her check came in. Then Bethany was stuck paying the bills.

But this time, Bethany was determined she was moving. She was already paying for less stuff around the house. Bethany bought fewer groceries and more of what her mother liked: healthier foods like fruits and vegetables. When her mother asked her for money for her weed and alcohol, Bethany told her that she had had to take a pay cut at work and didn’t have any extra money.

So here Bethany sat, figuring out her checkbook, and was surprised that she almost had enough for a deposit plus first and last month's rent on one of the new condominiums in town that she wanted to move into.

** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** **

Six weeks had passed since Bethany had put the application in at the condo, and Bethany was starting to feel anxious. She worried the housing committee hadn’t selected her application for one of the three empty apartments. She decided to call the committee to see what was going on.

When she got the committee on the phone, they told her that they had called her two weeks prior, and she had said to them that she was no longer looking for a place that she decided to stay at her mother’s house. She knew better than to deny he called because she knew who would be so bitchy as to prevent her from moving.

She wouldn’t spend another night in this hell of a prison her mother was trying to turn this place into. She wasn’t going to be the one having to quit her job to wipe her mother’s ever-widening ass. Which, if her mother had her way, would have already happened. No wonder her father had left them. If she were married to someone like her mother, she’d take the money and run, too.

Suddenly, Bethany had a vast idea. Since her mother had ruined her plans to marry and move out, Bethany would just marry Pumpkin Head. Laughing at her vision, she decided to spend her savings on a forest-clearing wedding.

** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** **

Before Bethany’s father left, they would carve pumpkins for Halloween. As they cut, her father would tell her stories. One of her favorites was always about Pumpkin Head. Pumpkin Head roamed around, looking for a wife, and if any young girls were unlucky enough to be seen on the night of a full moon, he would take them to be his wife. Any girl unfortunate to refuse him would be found dead the next day with a pumpkin on her head.

Bethany didn’t care about any of the rest of the story. She just wanted to be taken by Pumpkin Head. Living with him had to be better than living with her obese mother. And even if he was not real, she could become part of the Pumpkin Head legend.

So, Bethany carried the things she had bought outside and put them in a wheelbarrow. Returning, she told her mother she was leaving for good. When her mother screamed after her, asking where she was going, Bethany hollered back to Pumpkin Head, If I play my cards right!!!

** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** **

Bethany stood in the clearing under the full moon, dressed in an old-fashioned white wedding dress with a matching veil over her face. She had already set out the feast for Pumpkin Head. Holding a batch of small pumpkins, she waited.

Not long after the full moon rose, she heard a noise behind her; turning around, she saw a figure in the shadows. When the figure stepped forward into the moonlight, Bethany saw Pumpkin Head for the first time.

He stood before her in his tux, smiling his Jack’o Lantern smile. She felt no threat from him, so she lifted her veil. If a Jack’o Lantern could smile bigger, Pumpkin Head did. For standing there before him, Bethany stood in her wedding gown, wearing a Jack’o Lantern on her head.