You try and scream, but can't because, well, you're a pumpkin and you have no mouth. You're so round that you can't move an inch. The only thing you can do is sit here by the side of the road, all bright and orange, hoping to get picked.
The hours fall into days, the days fall into weeks. You are rained on, eaten at by bugs, and a wolf even comes up and licks you once, but it just snuffles and then pads away. You're bored out of your mind after a few weeks and are about ready to give up all hope when you hear footsteps down the path.
"Hey, Beth, there's one. Look how big and round it is! It'll be perfect for the competition!" a man in a red sweater says, walking over and looking at you. A young woman with blonde hair appears beside him and she smiles. "Yeah. That's just right. Can you be dear and pick it for me?" She says. The man nods and reaches down, grabbing your smooth orange sides. Then, with one swift motion, he plucks you off your green mother stem, leaving you held in his hands, unable to tell him you were once human.
"All right! Back to the car!" the man says, carrying you under his arm. He tosses you in the back of a pickup parked near the maze entrance and the woman gets in on the passenger side. He stars the car and rattles off down the road. On the journey, you are jostled, rolled, and struck by the walls. But there's not a thing you can do about it. A few hours later, the truck stops in front of a suburban house. The man reaches into the back of the truck and picks you up, carrying you into the house.
The woman follows behind him, instructing him to place you on a dining table covered with butcher paper. The man nods and sets you down. She looks at you and smiles. "It's perfect." She says again. And then, smiling, her and the man leave the room.
You sit on the table for hours, watching as the sky outside the window turners from gray to navy blue to black. Finally, the door to the dining room door opens and the man and the girl walk in along with several other people, all of them carrying pumpkins.... and knives. The girl sets the knives down and says, "All right, welcome to the third annual pumpkin carving contest! The best pumpkin gets a ribbon and an award. OK, is everyone ready? Let's go!"
The other people cheer and begin carving into their pumpkins. The girl picks up the knife and you wince, ready for the pain, but as she cuts off your top, all you feel is a cool sensation. She reaches in with a huge spoon and scoops out all your stringy guts and seeds, tilting you all around as you can do nothing but sit there. When she is finished with that, she takes a smaller knife and begins carving into your side.
You have no idea what image she is carving into you, but you hope it's something flattering. She sticks her tongue out as she carves and hacks away at your bright orange exterior, until, about twenty minutes later, she steps back with a smile. "There! All done!" The others crowd around you and ooh and ahh at whatever she's carved into you.
Then everyone grabs their pumpkins and puts them on the front stoop. They grab tea candles and matches and light you guys up. Everyone steps back to admire their handiwork. Then, laughing and cheering, everyone goes back inside for drinks, leaving you alone in the dark on the front stoop.
But that's when you begin to feel weird. You start to feel hot, at first thinking that it's from the candle inside you, but then you grow cold too. Your shell seems to be pulsating, bubbling, and projecting a bright orange light. You feel sick. What's happening to you? You see another pumpkin sitting near you, with an image of Dracula carved into it.
Suddenly, the pumpkin turns jet black. The whole thing begins shaking and rattling, twisting around on the porch, until with a loud POP the thing explodes in a shower of pumpkin flesh. Standing on the porch where the pumpkin was is a vampire, with dead white skin and blood red lips. It licks it's fangs and runs off the porch into the night.
That's when you turn a color you can't see. You begin rolling around the porch, twisting and rattling, feeling as if you're being squeezed with an immense pressure until finally, with a loud POP, you explode into the form of which the girl carved onto you.