Let me tell you, I’m one of those people who like to be right. Often times you’ll find it’s not exactly one of my better qualities, but we all have our faults. This is one of those times I wish I were right, because the truth was much worse than I could have imagined. But now I knew. I knew why Lock, Shock, and Barrel were in the care of Oogie when they were little. When their mother came to Halloween she already had three kids. So my theory was wrong, and yet, it was right. I never looked up much about her, it took forever just to find what I found, but I think her name was Paula. And from what I could glean, she liked collecting guns, which I suppose explains their names. And…she was Oogie’s wife. Before he turned on the people he had married her, and had become their legal parent. I don’t think he wanted to be a parent as much as he just wanted to marry Paula. They had a lot in common I guess. I suppose there’s no accounting for taste. But when Oogie started growing apart from them when he was planning his hostile takeover, and when Paula found out she said she was leaving him. But it was too late. His plan had already started so dad had come to stop him. Dad hadn’t meant to hurt Paula, but he did. He killed her. That’s why he didn’t kill Oogie then, he felt guilty. And now I knew why Barrel had turned on us, because he had seen it. I can’t imagine it. Lock and Shock never knew what happened to her. Oogie never told them. Barrel was the only one. I just can’t imagine watching your mom die and then going all these years holding in all that emotion, all that anger. The story alone deserves its own book. And dad, he had killed an innocent person, by accident of course, but he kept it a secret. Why? I had to get back. They needed me because I knew. Oogie wasn’t trying to get revenge for dad destroying him, but for killing Paula. Paula was only human.
Oogie started trying to learn magic so he could bring her back, but when he tried it didn’t work and the resulting creation soon died. Then Oogie went to revenge. Dad was able to stop him before anyone got hurt. He took the magic book, which was ready illegal by then, and hid it in the trunk so no one could use it. That’s when Oogie really got bad. Now everything was starting to make sense. It was time for my plan. Seeing my body made me think, if my body’s okay, couldn’t I just go back to it? I asked Aunt Em. She thought about it for a moment then said, “We’d better take this to St. Peter; I never heard of a soulless being. Yes, come on.” She grabbed my hand and the between disappeared. Suddenly we were outside what I assumed was heaven and walked towards a desk near the gate. Who I assumed to be St. Peter stood behind it examining a large book. He looked up rather surprised to see us. He said, “This is very unusual. Having a problem?” “Something like that.” Said Aunt Em. She explained what was going on to him and as she did I thought his eyebrows were going to fly off his head. Then all of a sudden he was very serious. He turned to me. “You’re sure that it was your body?” “Positive.” “Dear me, we just can’t have that. The abomination! A being without a soul has no conscious or remorse. It has no love, feels nothing, and only cares about hurting those around it. This, Oogie, you say, let’s look him up…yes, I thought as much, he has no idea what he has done. He’s going to regret this!” “Well what do I do?” He thought for a moment. “Hmm, let me check with the boss.” Then he just disappeared. Aunt Em didn’t seem bothered by it so I figured disappearing was normal here. He reappeared just a minute later. “It seems you’re getting another chance. We’re going to send you down as a spirit, when you get there; you’re going to have to regain control over your body.” “You mean posses myself?” “Ehh, sort of, it’s not really possession when it’s your own body but moving on, your body isn’t going to want to be “possessed” as you call it. It isn’t going to be easy.” “I think I can handle it.” “Let’s hope so. Now, were about to send you, get ready.” I wasn’t sure how one gets ready for such a thing, but as I felt myself being pulled away I waved goodbye to Aunt Em. She waved back and smiled, and then I was back in Halloween.
