Vanessa and Valarie Von Bleut walked into the revamped shed where their group rehearsed, bubbling with excitement. “We have a gig!” Vanessa shouted, grinning, with Valerie echoing the grin behind her. The other ‘Vees’, Velma, Vera, Veronica, Victoria and Vivian, all jumped up, shouting and doing a silly happy dance. They were all cousins, the Von Bleut sisters were identical twins; Velma and Vera were sisters, as were Vivian and Victoria. Their fathers were brothers and had married sisters, so the family resemblance was strong.
“Where – When – Who?” the questions poured out as the other girls began to settle down, turning to look at Vanessa. “We’ve been hired by the Saturday Night Club to entertain at a Hallowe’en party on Wednesday the 29th. We will be strictly entertainment; the Busy Bees are going to play for the dancing and the grand march for costume judging. We need to start practising right away!”
“I have a list of pieces that I think suit the theme of the evening.” Valarie said. “We start with the Monster Mash, making it spooky rather than funny, then Somebody’s Watching Me. After that, Nightmare on My Street, followed by Dragula, and for the last one, It’s Too Spooky For Me. The party starts at 8 pm and goes until 1 am, with dancing starting at 8. We do our thing between dances, and will have about ten minutes per song. The last dance will be after It’s too spooky.”
“What are we going to wear, and what will we call ourselves?” Victoria wanted to know. ‘The Seven Vees’ just doesn’t have the right zing.”
“I have an idea,” Velma said. “Why don’t we go as Goth Vampires? We are all different shades of blonde, with fairly pale skin. If it’s a costume party, we’d fit right in.”
Veronica grinned, and said “if we do that, we could be ‘The Vibrant Vampires!’” She giggled and the others all gasped and enthusiastically agreed.
“Wow, that’s perfect!” Victoria laughed. “Lots of black, but...” she paused, “what about our lips? Goth girls use black lipstick, vampires have very red mouths – how do we do ours?”
Vivian frowned a bit then said thoughtfully “We could use both, mix black in with the red and make it a really dark red. I think that would work.”
The others looked at each other and then grinned and nodded. “Perfect,” Veronica laughed. We can break off some of each colour, mash them and mix them. We’d have to apply it with our fingers, and keep some with us for touch up.”
“We could use a bit of olive oil to make the mix more liquid and use a brush. And put it in a sealable, air tight bottle. That way we wouldn’t have to try to apply it in a hurry and then have to clean our fingers. We don’t want to get it all over our instruments.”
Everyone agreed, and Vera said “If we are to be ready by the 29th, we had better start work. I know Monster Mash, played for laughs, but how to make it spookier will need work, and I don’t know any of the others. I’ve heard them of course, but haven’t played them.” She turned to her keyboard and played the first few bars of Bach’s Fugue in D Minor.
Laughing, the others settled down with their instruments as Vanessa stood at the microphone, taking a breath as she thought of how to make Monster Mash spooky. Then she remembered Bobby Picket's version. Giggling, she said “hit it, girls!” and took on a serious, slightly frightened expression.
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