Resurrecting Bianca

Warning: This blog post contains spoilers about "Be Right Back," Season 2, Episode 1 of "Black Mirror," the British anthology television series that explores the dark side of technology. If you haven't seen this 2013 episode yet, well, what the heck are you waiting for?!


If bloody curtains and a skeletal clown don’t say, “Come hither, children; we have candy,” I certainly don’t know what does.

Bianca in costume

Within minutes of arriving home Monday, I hung my handmade curtains in the living room windows and clothed the mannequin in a mask and clown costume. I lined the front walkway with tiki torches borrowed from the backyard. I dumped a bag of mixed chocolate bars in a bowl and stirred in plastic cockroaches and Ping-Pong balls painted like eyeballs. I draped the front door with crime scene tape, the red-colored kind that sternly warns, “Danger.” I launched iTunes and cued up “Thriller.”

I have never lived on a street conducive to soliciting or distributing Halloween candy.  Throughout my childhood, my parents drove my sister and I to trick-or-treat in neighborhoods with sidewalks and cul-de-sacs. And thus far, the addresses of my adult years can be characterized in one of two ways: sleepy retirement community or two-lane thoroughfare to more inviting, tranquil pockets of suburbia.

This year, I told Matt, would be different; on this, our first Cupertino Halloween, we resided a mere block from an elementary school, and a steady stream of young families passed by our front door en route to class or work or home each day. I would become the Cool Lady on the block who answered the door in costume and dished out king-sized Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups. I’d compliment the creative kids on their homemade costumes and cast a reproachful eye at the pillowcase-toting teenagers too lazy to dress up at all. 

My first visitor of the evening arrived as I maneuvered the clown-attired Bianca through the front door and onto the stoop. Bianca, like many third-hand mannequins, tends to shed her appendages at the most inopportune times. And this proved one such time, as she dropped her left hand for the benefit of a middle-aged woman passing by.

“Nice mannequin,” the woman said. “Are you registered to vote?” She thrust a flyer into my hand. The ensuing conversation set me back 10 minutes of decorating.

Follow the torches, children.

I retreated to the safety of the couch, where I could maintain a clear line of sight of the front walkway. I peered through the red paint-splattered polyester curtains and waited. And waited.

Eventually, Matt fired up an episode of “Black Mirror” – the one with the rehydrated dead boyfriend – and my attention drifted from the street to the T.V. Right about the point where Martha begins to suspect Ash has been gone far too long, Wolfie uttered a low growl.

“Trick-or-treaters!” I said, leaping from the couch. Matt paused the television as I ran to the door. I would surprise the little goblins by yanking it open before they had a chance to knock. My excitement became so great that when I finally did throw open the door, the action seemed to lack an “A-ha!” exclamation.

The stoop was empty. Across the street, however, five silhouettes crowned by multi-colored glow sticks approached the darkest, most un-deserving house on the block. 

“Black Mirror” resumed, and Martha struck up an online romance with a computer.

I ventured out onto the sidewalk the second time Wolfie sounded a false alarm. No pedestrians in sight. I resisted the urge to yank a tiki torch from the ground and wave it in the air, a candy beacon in the night.

Back inside, Martha was adding electrolytes to a bathtub of Ash. By the time she began bedding her Frankenstein, I had abandoned my post to shower and change into pajamas. But I kept my bra on – just in case.

“Did anyone come?” I asked Matt, rejoining him on the couch. Part of me wanted assurance I hadn’t missed anything, but the other part desired affirmation someone – anyone – had seen my ridiculous decorations.

Bianca waits

No, no one had come, but Martha’s Frankenstein was becoming a bore. 

The doorbell, when it finally sounded, was jarring. I sprinted to the door.

“Trick or treat!” said the 12-year-old on the stoop. She wore her hair in pigtails – a homage to some character I couldn’t place. I offered her my decoy treat bowl, the one with the Styrofoam skull in it.

“Oops! Wrong bowl!” I laughed at my joke. Pigtails did too, albeit nervously.

She selected a Twix bar from the second bowl I presented. Behind her, beyond the flaming tiki torches, I heard chatter emanating from the driveway.

“Do your friends want any candy?” I asked, hopeful.

“Um, they’re afraid of the clown,” Pigtails said.

We laughed. Carrying the bowl, I followed Pigtails past Bianca, past the plastic severed arm and past the steely-eyed plastic rat to deliver my treats.