Leave It to Beaver : A Wild Hopes Halloween bonus scene

Hope

“If one more person calls this dress ‘brave,’ I’m going to eat the entire candy bowl out of spite.”

I tug the white halter neck back into place and check my reflection in the hall mirror. Platinum wig. Red lips. A beauty spot I’d been forced to draw on twice, because the first attempt had come out looking like a tick.

Marilyn Monroe stared back at me.

Okay, maybe not exactly Marilyn Monroe. More like Marilyn if she’d been raised on apple pie and owned more cardigans than shoes. But still.

Look at you, Hope. Not a claw in sight!

Years ago I’d spent Halloween waddling around a bar in Capricorn Cove dressed as a beaver - complete with tail, teeth, and giant feet, while the boy next door had let a sexy cat settle into his lap. I’d gone home, cried into my pillow, and made myself a promise.

Next time, he’d see me as a woman.

Now, on this, our first Halloween officially together, I was ready.

Gran had called the dress “brave” when I’d shown her over video chat from her room at the assisted living facility. Gladys, eavesdropping from the next armchair, had declared, “that's a lot of bosom for a church town.”

Gladys wasn’t wrong. But then, that was the point.

I can do this. I can absolutely do this! 

Our farmhouse smelled of cinnamon, browned butter and the apple hand pies I had cooling on every flat surface of the kitchen. Peach Springs might be peach-obsessed, but the kids on our road knew exactly which house handed out real pastries for Halloween. 

I set the first tray on the hall table by the door, ready for the first trick-or-treaters. Walking through the door, I grin, taking in the view. 

Orange lights wind around the porch rail, glowing in the fading afternoon light. Justice’s old guitar case sits open on the swing, stuffed to overflowing with full-size candy bars.

We're going to be mobbed. 

I've learned the hard way that my husband passionately believes fun-size were invented by dentists to spite us.

I rub my butt at the memory, smiling.

My phone buzzes with an incoming text. 

Faye
Pics or it didn’t happen. Has he lost the power of speech yet?

Hope
He’s still upstairs. Says he needs a minute.

Faye
WTF? That man can get ready for the Grammys in four minutes flat but needs three hours to put on a costume? What is he DOING?

Hope
No idea. He’s been weird all week. He keeps hiding parcels.

Faye
...

Hope
Wait. What do you know? 

Faye
Nothing!

Hope
Faye.....

Faye
I'M SERIOUS! Which is why I'm worried. God, I'll put an alert on pictures. I have a bad feeling about this... 

I narrowed my eyes at the screen.

Faye lying convincingly to me is like Gran whispering. Technically possible, but nobody had ever witnessed it. Which is why I believe her. 

“Justice?” I call up the stairs. “The Allen twins will be here any second. They always hit us first so they can get to the Wild farm before Beau eats everything.”

A thump is followed by a muffled curse, then a heavy, soft thud against the upstairs wall.

“Coming, darlin’!" 

I frown. “Are you okay?”

“Define okay?”

I leaned against the banister and arranged myself into my best pin-up pose. Hip popped. Lips pouted. One hand resting lightly on my thigh.

Let him come down those stairs and see his wife. Let him forget his own name. Let him—

Something large appears on the landing.

Whatever his costume is, it's enormous. And furry. And brown. Very, very brown. 

It takes me a minute to realize what he's wearing.

There's a flat rubber tail, giant clawed feet and two buck teeth stitched above an oval hole. My husband’s face peers out of that hole, scruffy and entirely unrepentant.

My pose dies a quiet death as recognition slams into me. 

“Justice!" It comes out strangled. “Why are you a beaver?!”

He grins, giving me his full stadium-wattage grin. “Why aren’t you?”

“Because I’m Marilyn Monroe!”

“I can see that.” His gaze travels from my wig down to my red heels, slow and thorough, and the grin turns into something much, much naughtier. “Damn, sweetheart. You going to sing me Happy Birthday?”

Heat creeps up my throat.

Okay. The plan is working. Kind of.

He starts down the stairs but his tail snags on the top step. For a second he teeters and I'm terrified he's about to fall.

"Justice!"

But he catches himself, shimmies his butt until the tail frees itself, then starts down the stairs. 

The tail follows him down, smacking on each stair as it goes. 

Thwack.

Thwack.

Thwack!

It's like the world’s slowest drum solo.

I press my fingers to my lips. The laugh escapes through my nose as an undignified honk.

“You’re laughing at me,” he says, sounding wounded.

“No, I’m laughing with you.”

“I’m not laughing.”

I giggle harder. “Then, yes, I’m laughing at you.”

He reaches the bottom step and spreads his paws wide. “Admit it. I look good.”

“You look like a throw rug that achieved consciousness.”

“A sexy throw rug?" he asks hopefully. 

“Sure. We'll go with that." I reach up, flicking one of his giant whiskers. "You know there are photographers camped at the end of the drive, right? If they get a shot of you like this, Faye will have an aneurysm.”

“Then the world will finally know the truth.” He shuffles closer, claws clacking on the floorboards, and hooks an arm around my waist. “I’m a beaver man, Hope.”

I lose it.

I laugh until my eyes water and my mascara threatens mutiny, until I have to grab two fistfuls of fake fur to stay upright. Justice holds me through all of it, his chest shaking against mine.

A small voice drifts up the porch steps. “Trick or treat!”

We break apart slowly. 

“Showtime.” Justice turns for the door.

“Wait, the tail—”

The tail swings out behind him like a wrecking ball and sweeps the hall table clean.

Hand pies go flying, splattering the floorboards, covering the walls, and ceiling.

We both stare at the carnage.

“Huh,” my husband says. “Did I do that?”

I lose it once again, descending into another fit of giggles. 

He winces, then bends very carefully to scoop the least-squashed pie off the floor. “Five-second rule!”

“It’s been at least eight," I point out between laughter. 

“Then they’ll never know.” He winks and hauls open the front door.

At the end of the drive, a dozen camera flashes go off, capturing him in his ridiculous costume. I grin. 

That's my husband. 

---

Justice

Song: I Put a Spell on You by Screamin’ Jay Hawkins (cover by Annie Lennox)

“Are you a groundhog?”

I stare down at the tiny Spider-Man on my porch. “I’m a beaver, buddy.”

“Why?”

“Long story.”

His twin, a pint-sized witch whose pointy hat keeps sliding over her eyes, frowns up at me. “Grandpa says you’re famous.”

“Nah.”

“He says you tip too much.”

“Your grandpa is a great barber.” I drop a full-size bar into each pillowcase, then a second for good measure. Behind me, Hope makes a noise that might be a laugh or a sob. Hard to tell with Marilyn.

The flashes at the end of the drive keep popping. I wave a paw at them.

Somewhere in New York, a photo editor is crying tears of joy at this. 

Faye, I'm guessing, not so much. 

“Your phone.” Hope fishes it out of her cleavage, since my costume came with zero pockets and one very large ass. “It’s Faye.”

“Read it to me.”

She scrolls, lips twitching. “‘WHY IS MY CLIENT A RODENT!?’ All caps. Then, ‘Never mind, it’s trending.’ Then, ‘Okay, it’s trending in a GOOD way.’ Then a link to a poll asking whether you’re serving beaver daddy energy.”

“What’s winning?”

“Yes. Eighty-four percent.”

“Knew it!" 

For two hours, Peach Springs comes to us.

Kids in sheets and capes, and one very committed inflatable dinosaur. Parents who pretend they aren’t there to gawk at the Wild boy in the rodent suit, but ask for selfies anyway. Asher drove past slowly, wound down his window, looked at me for a full five seconds, shook his head, and drove off without a word.

My phone buzzed thirty seconds later.

Asher
Mom would’ve loved this.

I read it twice, then shoved the phone back at Hope before she could see my face.

The bastard. 

By nine the candy is gone, the hand pies are a memory, and the photographers have packed up and gone home. Hope kills the porch lights and sinks onto the swing with a groan, kicking off her heels.

I try to sit beside her. The tail objects.

After the third attempt I give up and sit sideways on the top step, propped against the post like a drunk teddy bear.

Hope tucks her bare feet under her and studies me. The wig has slipped, and the beauty spot is smudged.

She’s gorgeous. 

“Okay,” she says, grinning. “Spill. Why the beaver?”

I’ve rehearsed this. I had a whole bit planned, with jokes. All of it leaves my head as she looks at me with that soft, amused grin. 

So I give her the plain version.

“That night in Capricorn Cove, I was in a bad place. Tired. Angry at everyone. I hadn’t been home in years.” I pick at a loose thread on one claw. “Then this beaver sits down in my dressing room and reminds me of home.”

Hope goes very still.

“It took me a long time to work up the guts,” I admit. “But I did it. I finally came home. And you were here.” I lift one furry shoulder. “I never thanked that beaver. Figured I owed her some solidarity.”

Hope presses her lips together hard. Her eyes bright and shiny.

“Hey.” I lean up toward her. “No crying! You’ll wreck Marilyn.”

“Do you know what I thought?” she asks, voice wobbling. “When that cat girl landed in your lap that night?”

I frown. "Cat girl? I don't remember a cat girl."

"There was a cat girl." She grins. "But that is the exact right answer."

I wrap a hand around her calf. "What did you think." 

She covers her face with both hands and speaks through her fingers. “I thought, ‘In a competition between pussy and beaver, the less hairy one wins.’”

I choke.

Then I laugh so hard I slide off the pole, and land flat on my back on the porch, tail squashed beneath me, wheezing up at the stars.

“It’s not funny!”

“Jesus, Hope!”

“I was heartbroken!”

I roll onto my side, still breathless, and catch her ankle. I kiss the inside of it. “Then let me settle this once and for all.”

She tilts her head to one side.

“The beaver won, sweetheart.” I kiss her ankle again, higher. “The beaver, your beaver, will always wins.”

She smiles, and my wife, the sweetest girl in Peach Springs, looks at me the way she did right before she ruined me.

“Get inside,” she orders. “And take that thing off.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Getting out of the suit takes longer than either of us expected.

“Where’s the zipper?”

“The back.”

“There’s no—found it. Oh no.” 

I twist, trying to see her. “What do you mean, oh no?”

“It’s caught in the fur.”

“Crap. Am I’m going to die in here? If so, bury me in the orchard. Tell the press I went out doing what I loved. Being trapped inside your beaver.”

She snorts, and we both laugh as she tries to free me.

“Hold still.” She yanks, fabric rips and cool air hit my spine. I wriggle free and let the whole thing drop to the living room rug in a brown heap.

Underneath, I'm wearing boxers and nothing else. Hope’s gaze drags over my chest, my ink, and lower.

“Oh,” she murmurs, a lot less amused. “Hello.”

I take her mouth before she can make another joke.

She tastes of cinnamon sugar and pumpkin spice. The wig goes first, then the pins beneath it, until her copper hair spills over my hands. I find the tie at the back of her neck and tug, and the white dress slides to her waist.

“Couch?” I ask against her throat.

“Too far.”

I lower her onto the heap of brown fur, kneeling between her thighs and push the dress up out of my way. “Tell me you want this.”

“I want this. I want you. Justice, please.”

My wife always gets what she asks for.

I lick her slowly, circling her clit until her heels dig into my shoulders and her fingers knot in my hair. She comes the first time with my name on her lips and her thighs shaking around my ears.

Then I kick off my boxers and push inside her, inch by slow inch, watching her face the whole time. Blue eyes. Smudged red mouth. A delicious flushed creeping all the way down to her breasts.

“More,” she breathes, hooking her legs around my hips. “Harder.”

I give her both. Fur bunches under her back, and she laughs and moans at the same time. I lose my rhythm and my mind and every thought that isn’t mine, mine, mine.

She clenches around me a second time and drags me over the edge with her.

For a while, neither of us moves.

“Well,” Hope says finally, staring at the ceiling. “Turns out it does make a decent throw rug.”

I snort into her neck.

She stretches for her phone on the coffee table, and her eyes take on a gleam I knew far too well.

“No,” I bark. 

“I didn’t say anything.”

“You’re thinking it.”

She thumbs open her notes app, grinning. “This is going in a book.”

“I swear to god, Hope, if Justin Savage ever wears a beaver suit in one of your novels, I’m suing H. Stone.”

“Good luck,” she says, already typing. “I hear she’s married to a very rich beaver.”