I held it out, and a hand reached out from behind the door and took it. It wasn’t a hand like any I’d ever seen before. It was pale white, and the nails were thick and long and yellow and sharp. That was what bothered me, how sharp they were.

The hand disappeared with the invitation in it, and after a second or two the voice said, “Thisss isss very nissse. I will be there. Will you be at the door to invite me in?”

He already had the invitation, so I didn’t see why I had to do any more inviting, but I said, “If I’m not, my sister will be.”

“That isss sssatisssfactory.”

And then the door closed. I stood there a minute, blinking like I’d just come out of a dream, and then I walked back to where Binky stood waiting.

“What about my invitation?” he said.

“I’ll ask my sister.”

“She’d better invite me.”

“We’ll see,” I said, because knowing my sister, I was sure she wouldn’t want Binky hanging around the way he did. She only liked the popular kids, who were all a bunch of phonies. Binky was weird, but at least he wasn’t phony, which was about all I could say for him.

A funny thing happened at school the next day. Somebody stuffed Harry Larrimore into a locker. I wasn’t the one who let him out, but I heard about it from Fred Burley, who did. He said he asked Harry who put him in there, but Harry didn’t want to talk about it, like he was scared or something. I didn’t think that was right since Harry wasn’t scared of anybody, not even the teachers.

Harry and Fred both got tardy slips because it took awhile to get Harry out of the locker. He was a lot bigger than Binky, and nobody would have believed you could get him into a locker if Fred hadn’t seen it himself and described it.

I told Binky about it at lunch, but he didn’t seem to think it was funny. All he said was, “Sometimes things come back on you.”

I had a feeling he wasn’t talking about the cafeteria food. We had fish that day because it was Friday, but Binky wouldn’t eat any. He looked interested when I poured ketchup all over mine, and I thought for a minute he’d give it a try, but he said he just wasn’t hungry.

My sister surprised me when I told her that Binky had demanded an invitation to the party. She didn’t even argue. She pushed her hair back and said, “All right, Binky can come, as long as he stays out of the way.”

She meant, “as long as he stays out of sight of my phony friends,” which also meant that he’d be hanging out in my room, since that’s where I’d be staying. I didn’t like Binky any better than she did. I just put up with him because I felt sorry for him, but I didn’t want him in my room during the party. There wasn’t anything I could do about it, though.

“Did you see the vampire?” Kate said. “Is he the real thing?”

Like I would know a vampire if I saw one, and I hadn’t really seen this one, mostly just his hand, which I have to admit looked real enough to satisfy me, so I said, “He’s the real thing, all right, and if I were you, I wouldn’t want him coming to the party.”

She just laughed. “You don’t have to worry about a thing. We’ll take plenty of precautions, and there aren’t any real vampires, anyway, no matter what you think.”

“If you say so.”

She could believe it was all a big joke if she wanted to, but it so happened that I didn’t agree with her, not that it made any difference.

“I do say so, and I want you and your pal Binky to stay out of the way.”

I didn’t bother to remind her that Binky wasn’t my pal. I asked if she’d told our parents about the vampire, and she gave me this condescending look.

“I don’t tell them a lot of things,” she said, as if she had these big secrets to keep, but I knew she didn’t because I’d sneaked into her room and read her diary one day. “And you’d better not tell them, either, if you know what’s good for you, buster.”

I told her I wouldn’t cause any trouble and handed her my geometry book.

“Oh, no, you don’t,” she said. “I’m not doing any problems until after the party and after the vampire shows up.”

I wished I’d never said anything to her about the vampire. Binky had warned me not to, but I had. There was nothing I could do about it. I took my geometry book upstairs and got to work.

Halloween was pretty dreary. It rained most of the day, and the thick clouds stayed dark and low all afternoon. By the time of the party, it was inky black outside, with no sign of the moon or stars.

Kate’s friends started to arrive, and our parents went next door to play canasta with our neighbors. Our parents were very liberal that way, not pushing in where they weren’t wanted. My mother said to be sure to call if there were any problems, and Kate told her not to worry about a thing. I wasn’t so sure, myself, but I kept my mouth shut. I knew what was good for me, buster.

When Binky got there, Kate invited him in. He had on a black plastic rain jacket with the hood pulled over his head, like it might’ve still been raining, and he didn’t seem to like the wreath of garlic hanging around Kate’s neck. I couldn’t blame him. It smelled pretty bad, but Kate thought it was just the right touch. She had a crucifix, too, not just a cross but the real thing with an image of Jesus on it, which was pretty funny considering nobody in our family had been to church in the last ten or fifteen years as far as I knew.

After Binky got inside, he wanted to hang around the way he always does, but I told him we had to go up to my room.

“I want to be here when he comes,” Binky said, and I didn’t have to ask who he meant. I told him we could slip back down later, and he said he guessed that would have to do.

“That crucifix won’t do any good,” Binky said when we got to the top of the stairs. “You have to believe in it.”

“I don’t guess it matters,” I said. “There’s all that garlic.”

“Yeah. That might help.”

I didn’t like it that he said might, but I didn’t believe in the vampire anyway, or that’s what I kept telling myself.

The doorbell rang exactly at eight-thirty, which is when the invitation I gave the vampire had said for him to come. Kate wanted all her friends to be there first.

Binky and I slipped to the head of the stairs and looked down. Binky still had that dumb hood over his head, but I guess he could see all right. Kate went to the front door and opened it. She said something, and then the vampire stepped inside.

He was tall and pale, and his hair was slicked back. From where I was standing, it looked as if he had pointed ears and red eyes. A bunch of Kate’s friends came into the room and stared.

The vampire looked them over like they were buffet items at the smorgasbord restaurant downtown. They all took a step back, even Kate, who usually didn’t back away from anything.

I looked at Binky. He pushed the hood of the rain jacket off his head, and I saw the tips of his ears.

“Binky,” I said.

He smiled. I wished he hadn’t. His teeth weren’t bad anymore. They were white and shiny, and his incisors were pointed and sharp.

“Binky,” I said.

His eyes looked as if they were lit from the inside with red lanterns.

“Binky,” I said.

I thought of a lot of things all at once: Binky studying in the dark locker, wearing long sleeves when it was so warm, Harry Larrimore. I remembered a lot of other things, too, things that I should have thought about before.

“Binky,” I said.

There was some screaming from downstairs now, but I didn’t look to see what was happening. I couldn’t take my eyes off those red eyes, Binky’s eyes. I wanted to look away, but I couldn’t.

“Binky,” I said.

The screaming was louder, and I wondered if anybody had called next door, but I was pretty sure they hadn’t been able to get to a phone.