A panoply of Halloween costumes

Welcome back to Weekend Writing Warriors and Snippet Sunday, weekly Sunday hops where writers share 8–10 sentences from a book or WIP. Since it’s October, I’m showcasing Halloween snippets.

This comes from the fourth section of Chapter 83, “Halloween Happiness,” of my WIP A Dream Deferred: Lyuba and Ivan at University. It takes place over Halloween 1950. This week’s snippet comes a bit after last week’s, when Igor met up with his girlfriend Violetta outside the apartment (above a restaurant) hosting their Halloween party.

Igor and Violetta were so wrapped up in sweet-talking one another, kissing, and cuddling, they didn’t notice their friends had all gone inside, and only came back to their surroundings when the cold hit them.

This has been slightly tweaked to fit ten lines.

Luiza is an aviator, in a body-hugging leather jacket and pants she would’ve had to hide from her parents if she still lived at home. Maja is a Harlequin clown, while Zhdana, Zoya, and Susanna are barely dressed, as a sailor girl, nurse, and Little Red Riding Hood in extremely short skirts and low-cut, short-sleeved blouses. Once again, Ilya and Milada have matching costumes, genuine Edwardian outfits Valeriya and Mr. Golitsyn let them borrow. Aelita has costumed herself like her namesake, Tomik is a lion tamer with a real whip, Vilorik is a Vampyre, and Nikita is a Pharaoh. Andrey is the most old-fashioned one there, in an 1890s golfing outfit.

“I bet I know what you were doing out there so long,” Tomik smirks.

“We were just talking,” Igor says. “Just because you have poor morals doesn’t mean everyone does.”

“I’ve only slept with five women, and seriously dated maybe five more.” Tomik cracks his whip on the floor.

Still from 1924 Soviet film Aelita, Queen of Mars, based on Aleksey Tolstoy’s 1923 novel of the same name