“You’re sure you want to go in there? There’s lots of spooky stuff in there,” I queried a bulldozer-clad Toby as I hauled him down the main street of Middleburg in his wagon on Halloween eve. (Dad makes a pretty awesome costume, but the materials tend to weigh down a 4-year-old.)

It was pitch dark. He was already a solid hour past bed-time and oddly brave with rivers of sugar coursing through his veins. “I definitely want to go,” said Toby with steel in his voice. We were trick-or-treating in a group with a few older children, who had scampered down the driveway of the house with the amazingly elaborate haunted house set-up in the front yard. I was unsure that Toby could handle the smoke, surprises and costumed people popping out from behind bushes. But his will must be obeyed, and being the “OKest mom” that I am, I wheeled him up the driveway.

Halfway up the driveway, we were side-swiped by a tall man in a mask revving a chainsaw and wielding it in the general direction of people. Toby blanched a bit, but said he wanted to continue. We rounded the turn to the front yard and made a little loop around the attractions—a smoky graveyard, a wolf-headed creature with red eyes, things hanging from tree branches. It was genuinely spooky for me. Toby’s eyes were about to pop out of his head.

“Do you want to go up to the porch and get some candy?” I asked him. “Nope,” he replied, shrinking down into his bulldozer a bit.

Then the kid dressed as a ghoul popped out from behind a bush and screamed unintelligible things right into Toby’s face. My bulldozer turned sheet-white.

“Mom, I want to be ANYWHERE BUT HERE,” he said to me quite firmly.

“Yes sir,” I replied and hot-footed him and his wagon-propelled bulldozer costume out to the driveway. We turned the corner… and were met by the chainsaw again. “MOM, THAT’S NOT SAFE. THAT’S NOT HOW YOU USE A CHAINSAW!!!” Toby told me. 10-4 buddy. We zoomed past the chainsaw-twirling demon.

At the end of the driveway, Toby considered us safe. He started breathing again. He told me he wanted to wait for the older kids. We were out of the “in-your-face” scaring zone, so I parked him and we waited a bit.

Then the guy dressed in rags started scraping a shovel up and down the asphalt driveway, kicking up sparks and making an alarming grating sound. I began wondering if I should have put Toby in pull-ups, because I think he might have pooped his pants.

“WHAT IS HE DOING, MOM??!!!!???”

I explained that he was just making noise to spook people, and Toby decided that was it, we needed to find a new neighborhood to pilfer candy from. We hightailed it back down the blocks to his grandparents’ house, where he had a glass of milk with Grandad, ate some cookies, and told them ALL about his night. If Grandma questioned my parenting skills before, that pales in comparison to what she must think after her dear grandbaby told her I’d wheeled him by a chain-saw wielding maniac.

Then came the car ride home. And the QUESTIONS.

“Why was that guy not using that chainsaw the right way?” “Why wasn’t he holding it safely?” “Was he going to cut people up?” “Why were there so many spiderwebs everywhere?” “Dad needs to teach him how to hold a chainsaw.” “And why was that guy scraping a rake on the driveway?” “Do you think there are going to be marks on the driveway from that?” “Do you think the people in the house are going to be mad when they see the marks in the morning?” “Why did it make little fires when he did that?”

Then the kicker, “Mom, why did we not get candy from that house?” I explained to him that he’d declined the offer to hit up the scary house for copious amounts of sugar, but he insisted I’d misheard him. “I was scared, but I wanted candy. I don’t know why you didn’t let me get candy there.” The scorn in his voice, dear readers. This from a child with about 5 pounds of candy on the seat next to me on the way home for his father to eat.

He has now asked me about 20 more times why I didn’t let him get candy from that house. I’m sure he’ll ask me 20 more times. Hey, I guess it’s better than “Why did you take me into a ridiculously inappropriate situation for a 4-year-old?” I’ll take a little candy grumpy. Twenty years from now, he can tell his therapist about the chainsaw.