Arlo and I sit across from each other at our café, each working on stuff for other classes; Art History homework is the first thing we do since it's the only classwork we get to do together.

My phone buzzes on the table and we both look at my screen at the same time. He snatches it up so fast I almost jump.

"What do you want, Ollie?" He asks, answering it. A pause. "I don't know." Another pause. "I don't think she'd—" he stops short, and listens. After a few seconds he looks at me with an odd expression. Then, biting the inside of his cheek he hangs up the phone.

I wait, fingers poised on my keyboard. I'm in the middle of an English paper.

"Little Wren," he begins innocently, "When was the last time you went trick-or-treating?"

"Absolutely not. No fucking way," I say firmly, shaking my head at the white bundle Oliver holds out for me.

They both look devastated.

"But, Wren," Arlo begins, gesturing to the outfits sprawled out on the bed behind them. "We'll be dressing up, too."

"That's not fair!" I snap, pointing at their costumes. "Those are okay—they cover your asses!"

He sticks out his bottom lip in a pout, while Oliver puts an arm around my shoulders.

"Are you self-conscious, Wren?"

I gape at him. "No, it's not that—"

"Because you are so hot I'd fucking take you right now if I thought you'd let me."

I wriggle out of his grasp, suddenly feeling a heat creep up between my legs. "It's just that I've never dressed like this for Halloween, I'm not that kind of girl."

They give each other a look like the thought never crossed their minds that I wouldn't want to dress up for them.

"Plus, it's freezing outside, and I guarantee there would be a mob of parents after me if they saw me wearing that out in public. It belongs in Playboy."

"Who do you think made it?" Arlo says, taking the outfit from his brother to check the tag—the Playboy bunny logo is big enough for me to see.

But Oliver grabs my shoulders and spins me towards him. "We're not actually going trick-or-treating, you know that, right?"

The look on my face pulls a laugh out of him.

"You think I'd let you walk the streets in that? Fucking hell—we'd be beating off dudes left and right, Wren."

"But—Arlo said—"

He pulls me into a surprisingly tight hug. Oliver has never hugged me before. I give a confused look at Arlo through his arms, and even he looks mildly alarmed.

"Where we're going, everyone's going to be dressed like that," he says, releasing me. I look up into the eyes he shares with Arlo—but where Arlo's are soft and brown, Oliver's are harder, darker, hungrier. But through all that, there's a glint in them I've never seen before. The night at the movie theater changed something between us.

"Fine," I say, somewhat breathlessly. I turn to Arlo. "As long as you can promise I won't get pneumonia."

The kitten outfit is tight, but soft. The stretchy white fabric leaves little to the imagination, and I find myself staring at my own nipples through the crushed velvet that's pulled tight across my breasts. The one-piece fits like a strapless swimsuit and comes with a frilly corset which Arlo volunteered straight away to do up for me. It also came with white fishnets and lace gloves. The main feature, however, has to be the white collar studded with gold points and a ring with a bell.

I pull my hair up into a sort of knotted bun I learned to do from one of Lila's friends, who is a hair stylist. Then I mess it up a bit, pulling out strands before placing the signature cat ear barrettes on top. I refused the pair of heels the twins bought for me and instead slide on my white vans. I don't have any makeup at their place, so I make do with what I have in my backpack already and some Chapstick.

I do another once-over of myself in the mirror before leaving their bathroom. I don't feel like myself—I feel like a college girl who knows what she's doing, who knows her body and her limits.

I wonder if it's possible to feel like this all the time?

Oliver wolf-whistles me and Arlo mutters "fuck" when I emerge from their closet.

They have matching costumes; twin dogs. Shirtless, their bottoms consist of jeans with studded belts with two belt buckles that have their names on them—"Fluffy" for Arlo and "Spot" for Oliver. They also have studded collars with rings—though theirs are black and made of thick leather and are convincingly more realistic than my costume one.

There's a twisty feeling in my gut that these aren't costumes they're sporting, but outfits they already owned.

Oliver slides off the bed, twirling something between his fingers. "Ready, Kitten?"

My mouth goes dry. "As I'll ever be."

As he gets closer I see the thing he's playing with is a leash; thin and made of black leather that matches their collars.

"W-what's that for?" I ask, eyeing it.

He gives me wicked grin. "It's for you—don't want you getting lost, do we?"

I throw Arlo what must be a terrified look because he hastily gets between us.

"Not yet," he says in a low voice to his brother.

Oliver looks at me over his shoulder for a moment. Then, with a bite of his lip, he nods.

Arlo lends me one of his jackets that nearly reaches me knees while Oliver heads to the kitchen to get his pregame on.

"You seem nervous," Arlo says to me, pulling me towards him by my hips.

I reach up and lightly pull on his collar. "What's this?"

His tongue runs along his bottom lip and I resist the urge to kiss him. "Ollie loves Halloween."

"That doesn't answer my question."

"Uber's almost here," Oliver calls from down the hall. "Move your asses."

With a wink Arlo takes me by the hand and pulls me out of the room. We pass by the closed-door mystery room.

"What's in there?" I ask, but Oliver shoves a shot into Arlo's hand before scooping me up in his arms, and I forget all about the mystery room.

As we ride through the streets, me sandwiched between the boys, I stare out of the windows. I don't see any kids trick-or-treating, not like back home. Growing up, the streets of our neighborhood were packed every year; everyone decorated their houses with lights and scary decorations. Dad and I set up a graveyard in the front, each year adding more headstones and skeletons. I have the sudden urge to pull out my phone and request a picture from him, hoping he was able to set everything up by himself. I was always better at setting up the gravestones in a straight line than he was.

"Hey," Arlo says, taking my hand in his. "Where are you?"

I snap my eyes to his and try a smile. "Here."

After a while we come to a street lit up like Satanic Christmas, with a row of clubs and bars on either side. The street lamps have a red hue to them and the decorations would give my neighborhood a run for its money. People crowd the sidewalk and street, and police actually have the road blocked off. Our Uber joins the lineup of cars dropping people off and waiting to take the drunk ones home.

When we get out, I look up in amazement; a giant rope spiderweb is slung above, with strands coming from every building down the street. Twinkling red lights twist the rope strands and intricate crisscrossing pattern. Arlo and Oliver take each of my hands and we quickly get sucked up into the crowd of monsters.

Loud music plays from every club and I grip onto the brothers for dear life in the jostling crowd; people are yelling and laughing, sporting way more revealing outfits than mine. I take in the witches and pirates, ghosts and superheroes, haunting masks and bright body paint.

Soon the heat of the crowd makes me shrug off Arlo's jacket, which he slings over his own shoulder, throwing me a we-told-you-so wink. A trio of guys dressed as the Three Musketeers plows towards us, causing me to let go of Arlo's hand. Oliver pulls me safely against him as they pass.

"Bet you're wishing for that leash now, huh, Kitten?"

I playfully push him away, grinning. "I should've hooked it onto you."

He laughs when I reach up and pull the ring on his collar.

Arlo reappears next to us, pushing the hair from his face. "Let's go inside one of these places, I wanna see the view from up above."

He leads the way into a club with a big blow-up devil mouth for an entrance. Oliver pays the cover and I get an X on my hand because I'm underage, and soon we're inside the Devil's Lair.

The ceiling is tall and catwalks hang overhead; lasers bounce off mirrors covering every wall and the sound of the DJ at the back is deafening. The hairs on my arms vibrate. We make our way through the mass of people jumping in time to the music, trying to make our way to one of the spiral staircases leading up to the platforms above.

Suddenly, a loud siren goes off and the lights flicker. The crowd roars and there's a rumble, and someone big barrels through my hand that's linked with Arlo's, breaking our grip.

"Arlo!" I scream, but he's gone—

Spotlights swirl and land on circular pedestals I didn't notice before that rise a few feet above the crowd. On these are shiny poles, and when the siren blares again people slide down them to land on the platforms. Girls and guys in red and white outfits—devils and angels.

The crowd goes nuts for the dancers—the lights flicker again and we're all bathed in red—

"Wren!"

I feel Oliver's grip on me tighten, right before I get thrown backward as someone runs into me—

And then I'm not holding onto anyone.