Jennie leaned back in her bed and sighed. So many questions were running through her head. What does Freddie know? What does my mom know? Why is Catherine so insistent on my being dead?

She knew that if she dwelled on these questions, she'd age about fifty years. So, she just sat and waited, knowing full well she would not sleep tonight.

***************

Freddie walked out of Jennie's room and down the hall. It was cold, but he didn't notice. Freddie was always cold. He had stopped shivering in the night long ago.

Now he was angry. He was getting angry increasingly often, lately.

It was devastating for him when anyone moved into the house, simply because he was so helpless about it. He could never stop his mother from her murderous schemes, and she knew it. She knew it and she used that knowledge, flaunting his inability to do anything in his face and the faces of her victims. If he heard one more dying scream accompanied by the words, "You failed, Freddie," he felt sure he would be torn apart by rage and despair.

Not this time. He refused to let Jennie die. Absolutely refused.

But hadn't he said that a thousand and one times before? No, it would be different this time. This time it wasn't a stranger. This time it was Jennie.

She had grown up next to him and now was caught in the same curse. Of all the people he would have protected, kept out of it with any price, Jennie! Catherine couldn't have planned it any better.

He was standing in front of the house now. There was a sliver of moon in the clear summer sky, just enough to illuminate the yard. Just enough to illuminate how empty it was.

"Mother!" he called. "Show yourself! I know you're there!"

He thought he caught a faint glitter out of the corner of his eye. He turned slowly.

Nothing.

"Not again, Freddie," said the familiar mocking voice on the opposite side.

He spun around, starting just a bit. "Go on," he said lowly. "Tell me what you did."

"You appear to know more about whatever I did that I do," Catherine said caustically, eyebrows going up. "What did I do?"

His lips set in a thin, hard line."Think a little harder. Jennie's mother. You did something to her."

"Jennie's mother, eh?" Catherine smirked. There was no denying the note of mixed triumph and pride in her voice. "So you finally figured it out!"

Freddie just blinked.

Catherine leaned in, putting her mouth by his ear. Freddie, like a statue, didn't turn to look at her. She whispered, "Why do you think that her father was the only one who tried to convince Jennie you don't exist? You really don't think it was just because she was the only one who talked about us, do you?"

Freddie opened and closed his mouth. There was a silence of crickets and intense thought. "You didn't."

"Your words appear to come faster than your thoughts," commented his mother, "or you would have guessed before you confronted me." She drew herself up. "Well, I did, and there's nothing you can do now."

 "Most mothers embarrass their children in front of their friends. You try to kill my friends in front of me."

"My, my, my," she responded sarcastically. "How do you get through the day?"

The white hot fury that was consuming Freddie pulsed through him, growing hotter by the minute.

"Why? Why her?"

Catherine turned to him, about to remark sarcastically again, but her expression changed when she saw him. His face was now contorted with hatred. Hatred that was directed at her.  When he spoke, his words seemed to be made of ice.

"What sick pleasure do you get from destroying everyone I love?"

He started walking toward her. She couldn't help but back away.

"How many people have you killed? How many more need to die before you're satisfied? How many?!" he screamed at her.

She tried to regain her dignity, but couldn't under the fierce glare of his eyes.

"Listen very carefully, because you'll only hear this once. One chance. That's all I'm giving you. Let them go. Jennie, Emma, anyone else who moves into this house. You will let them live."

He had her backed into a corner, now. She wondered how he could've done that, what with her being a ghost and all, but he continued, shattering her thought.

"Because if she gets hurt...if anyone else gets hurt...there is nothing in the universe that can protect you from me. Nothing."

Catherine, for the first time in the course of history, was scared of her son.