Warnings: Mild wangst...but not really. Just tender, tender Ginji.

Other notes: Dumb title may be changed without notice if I ever come up with something not horrible. And there is false advertizing in that there is very little Halloween involved. Thank you.

Ban spotted the orange envelope tucked beneath the windshield wiper of Miss Ladybug before he even exited the door of the Honky Tonk.

"Now what the hell could that be? A parking ticket, no doubt," he grumbled to himself as he came closer to his vehicle. "Hmm...but since when are parking tickets orange?" he second guessed himself and plucked it up from its spot to rip open the seal.

"Huh? A greeting card?" he wondered aloud once he had pulled the contents out, nearly losing his soggy tipped cigarette from between his teeth.

"What'cha got there, Ban?" Ginji cheerfully bounced up beside him with an inquisitive grin, leaning over Ban's shoulder to get a better look.

"Beats me..." Ban mumbled, looking over the mysterious piece of mail in total bewilderment. The front showed a picture of a jack-o-lantern with a witch's hat stuck on top of its goofy face. On the inside it read 'You've bewitched me!' with 'from your secret admirer' scrawled childishly underneath. "Pfft! What kind of crap is this?"

"What kind of crap is what?"

"This card! It's signed 'from your secret admirer'," Ban snorted in annoyance.

"So? What's so weird about that?"

"Ginji, you moron! Secret admirers are for Valentine's Day, not Halloween. Only a moron would send something as a secret admirer on Halloween. ...Ya moron."

Ginji frowned, although he knew Ban was just acting cranky because he was embarrassed. "I thought secret admirers could send notes any time they wanted to. There's no law against it."

Ban ignored him as he continued to rant about the stupidity of the card. "And look at this: 'You've bewitched me'. Oh haha, very funny. If I didn't know better I'd think this card was from Juubei."

"Aw, come on Ban. Why are you always so irritable? I'd be happy if a secret admirer left me a card somewhere."

"Well then, you take it," Ban said, shoving the card back into the crumpled envelope and tossing it over to Ginji.

"But it's not meant for me, it's meant for you," Ginji insisted, beginning to get a bit irritated himself as he pushed the card back over to Ban.

"But I don't want it. You said you did. So take it." Ban gritted his teeth and pushed it back across to Ginji.

"I didn't say I wanted it, I said I would be happy if someone left one for me. Why can't you just be grateful that someone likes you?!" Ginji nearly shouted as he sent the card flying back over to Ban.

Inside the Honky Tonk, Paul had just spotted the commotion taking place on the curb in front of his main entrance and heaved an irritated sigh. "What are those two jerks doing now? They're going to scare away my paying customers if they keep that up."

Natsumi went up to the window and peered out, noticing that the sudden game of ping-pong was over a familiar, yet terribly abused, piece of orange paper. "Oh no! I'll be right back Chief!" she called over her shoulder and bolted outside to stop the ruckus.

"You're the one that insisted I be grateful for it!" Ban growled and tried to snatch the envelope back from Ginji's fingers.

"There's no way someone like you should be allowed to have this in his possession!" Ginji snarled, gripping tightly onto the other end.

"But it's mine, so give it back!"

"Ban! Ginji! What do you two think you're doing?" Natsumi shouted, just as the terrible sound of thick cardstock riii~iiiping in two stopped both men in their tracks.

"Ya moron! Now look what you've done!"

"Stop calling me a moron! You're the moron if you can't even recognize the handwriting of the signature!" Ginji cried before slamming the tattered remnants of orange envelope down onto the hood of the car and taking off down the street.

Natsumi watched helplessly as Ginji flew past her, tears of frustration already welling up at the corners of his eyes. She turned back to Ban, who stood frozen to the spot with his jaw unhinged, just staring after Ginji's back disappearing around the corner.

"Ban!" Natsumi marched right up to him and gave him a swift kick to the shin. "How can you be so thick all the time?!"

He was too stunned by Ginji's reaction to feel the weak tap to his tibia, and so ignored Natsumi's assault and accusations of idiocy completely. He quickly turned and gathered the shreds of card lying scattered on the car, sifting through them to find the signature. A few moments later his cigarette finally fell out of his gaping mouth.

-:-

Ban once again took a seat at the bar of the Honky Tonk as Paul gave him a disapproving look over the edge of his newspaper.

"I had helped him pick out that card almost two weeks ago," Natsumi explained as he held an icepack to the welt that had developed on his forehead after repeatedly banging it on the sidewalk. "He wanted to confess his feelings to you for the longest time, but didn't know how. It was my idea to give you a card. He was really excited to see how you would react," she went on and Ban wilted more and more with each word.

"Well how was I supposed to know? It's not as if he's ever given me any hints that he…liked me."

Paul gave a loud cough and Ban shot him a glacial glare. Paul only cocked his eyebrow and disappeared behind his newspaper again.

"Something you'd like to share with the class, Paul?" Ban irritably spat out, misting the countertop.

"I didn't say a word."

"Yeah, well, I know what you're thinking!"

"Oh really? And what, pray tell, is that?"

"You're thinking that I'm a total idiot who can't see anything around me and that I wouldn't deserve Ginji even if he did ever forgive me! And I have a bad personality!" Ban shouted accusingly at Paul.

"As a matter of fact," Paul said, coming back out from his newspaper, "that wasn't what I was thinking, but I'm glad to see that you've realized that on your own."

"Oh?" Ban said, beginning to develop the first signs of a violent eye spasm.

"Actually I was wondering why you were sitting here feeling sorry for yourself when you should be out looking for Ginji."

The stool Ban had been sitting on clattered to the ground amongst a brief wail of misery, and he disappeared from the café without another word.

Paul and Natsumi watched as he ran down the street in the direction Ginji had gone. Thirty seconds later they saw him running back, cursing passionately as he jumped into Miss Ladybug to speed away.