Edited by DJ_Neon_Lights, Kudzuhaiku, and TuxOKC.
Catherine found the Corner to be the same as it always was: boring, white, and filling her with the desire to not think about what she had just done. Her nose was runny. The wall bore the results of her using her hand to wipe her nose and having nothing else to wipe it on. As she stared at the corner of the living room which had on rare occasions served as a punishment, Catherine thought only of her changelings. She sniffled in misery, red-eyed from her stormy tantrum. It was not fair. It wasn’t fair!
She could hear the sounds of her parents cleaning up the living room, talking to each other as she partially blocked them out. Catherine was angry at her parents! The little queen had believed Daddy had thrown out her changelings on purpose. The house was only messed up just a little bit! The green stuff on the walls and the ceiling was coming off! The furniture wasn’t that bad!
“There are holes in my armchair,” Daddy said to Mommy.
The girl sighed and with deliberate slowness, turned to see what her father was talking about. From the corner of her eye, she caught Daddy plucking at the fabric of his chair.
“It’s ruined, honey. Just look at it! I think their horns did this. They had to headbutt everything. Why do they have to headbutt everything? And over a stupid television show!” He threw his arms in disgust and stormed off towards the kitchen. He stopped at the breakfast bar and leaned on the counter. “And look at the floor! Bea, just look at it! And the smell!” Frank made a helpless gesture towards the hole in his kitchen floor. “How are we going to explain that to the insurance company? Grease fire?”
“Sweetheart, please calm down.” His wife darted to him like ferret, encircling her arms around his arms and chest. She leaned into his back. “It was all an accident. These things can be fixed and replaced. It’s only money.”
The man rubbed the bridge of his nose with a thumb and forefinger. “Money we really don’t have,” Frank groused. “We just redid the roof and your car is still in the shop. We’re stretched thin, babe.” Then, Daddy did something Catherine had only heard him say a few times before.
He swore. It was not a loud declaration. It was the sort born from defeat, when a catastrophe shows its aftermath. Still, it was one of the four letter words Catherine had been told to never say. Bad words were bad and Daddy just said the mother of all bad words.
The girl’s reaction was immediate. She turned back to the corner and pressed into it, feeling the cool off white wall at the tip of her nose. Squeezing her eyes as tight as she could, there came a realization sparking in her mind the changelings had made Daddy upset. Jumping out of her room and yelling at her parents had resulted with Frank looking at his daughter with such a pale face and wide and twitching eyes. He clenched his jaw then, closed those scary eyes and took a very deep breath while Mommy acted. Beatrice had taken Catherine by the shoulders and guided her to her corner.
“You do not say such things to your father!” Mommy had admonished. She had then pushed Catherine into the corner. “Stay there and think about what you just said to your father!”
Now, thinking back, Catherine could not really remember what it was she had said to Daddy. It was coming back to her, slowly, as her own anger had subsided. The little girl sniffled again and wiped her nose again. Her forearm felt icky. Catherine felt like she was going to cry again, but for a completely different reason.
Dare she speak? Dare she say something to Mommy or Daddy? Daddy looked very hurt by what Catherine had said to him. Her thoughts reflected and reflected until she finally remembered her words spoken to him.
I hate you.
Catherine felt terrible. There was a hitch in her sniffle and tears began to fall down her little cheeks. She turned from her spot in the Corner, her hands listless at her sides, her shoulders slumped. “I’m sorry, Daddy,” Catherine said in a meek, tiny little voice. She hiccupped and wiped her nose again.
Frank did not react at first. The man still was taking in the damage to his home, heaving a great sigh followed by a defeated groan.
“My brother and I can fix that for you,” said a voice barely above a squeak. It quickly added, “I am so sorry about what my family did! With most of us still stuck in a hive mind mentality, what one does, the others follow! We’re basically unsupervised nymphs—”
“Get out.”
Her ears splayed out at the coldness in the man’s voice. Angela knew she was treading in dangerous waters. His anger was unpleasant. “You were wronged. Your family’s sanctuary was violated. My brother and I can fix this. Cabbage is very good at building things. His job was to maintain the structural integrity of the hive and the tunnels beneath it. I supervised him. He may be simple-minded, but he is very focused at his work. Please. Let us undo what we have done. It’s the least we can do!”
Catherine had spun around the moment she heard the changeling’s voice. Instead of finding the female, she found Cabbage at her back, sitting on the floor and looking up at her in absolute adoration. Leaning forward, he stretched his neck out and gave the little girl a great big lick to the side of her face. Caught completely by surprise, Catherine let out a squealed mixture of laughter and shock. The corner stopped her backwards stumble and she was grinning and giggling at the changeling wearing a happy face.
“Cabbage won’t leave her,” Angela said in a tired tone. Frank and Beatrice were staring at the two changelings and their daughter. Frank appeared torn between rushing at them and listening to what Angela had to say. Beatrice went for the broom she had pulled out earlier from the basement.
“Mommy! Daddy!” Catherine cried out. “Please don’t hurt them!” Her giggles had died the moment she saw her parents begin to move. She began to cry.
“Get out!” Frank had made up his mind. The state of his home made it up for him. He grabbed the broom from his wife and wielded it like a samurai sword, bristles out. “Leave us alone! What did we do to deserve this?” Beatrice was holding him back with nothing more than a light touch to his elbow.
“Honey,” she could be heard whispering.
Angela lay on the floor and placed her head upon her crossed forelegs. “You have full rights to be angry. I am sorry. Cabbage is sorry. Aren’t you Cabbage?” She tilted her head to lock an eye on her brother.
Cabbage nodded vigorously. “Sorry! Sorry! Sorry!” He stopped and seemed to fall into a moment of deep thought. “Potato!” His head turned towards the front door of the house.
There was a loud banging sound. It might have been knocking, a harsh rapping at the home’s front door. It was accompanied by a voice that could only be described as a banshee with a sore throat.
“Beatrice! Beatrice! Frank! What was that noise? I heard singing in your backyard! Were you throwing an unsanctioned party? We have a noise ordinance! Answer this door or so help me, I’ll call the police and file a complaint!” The door was pounded upon again, as though under siege by the Mongols.
“It’s her,” Beatrice groaned. A headache of a different sort began to take root behind her eyes. “I knew she’d show up. I just knew it!”
Frank dropped the broom. “What about them?” he asked, jabbing a finger at the changelings. Catherine held Cabbage in a protective hug.
“Who is it?” asked Angela as she tilted her head to one side. Her curious desire to know brought her to her hooves. She moved towards the door, tilting her snoot up into the air. Her nostrils flared. “Such bitterness. I can taste the bitterness. Such an unpleasant individual.” Angela scrunched her muzzle as she made a face. “Yeck!”
“Dud spud!” Cabbage agreed with his sister wholeheartedly. He sat up, tall, proud, and stern.
“What do we do?” Angela asked. Her eyes left the door and flicked between Beatrice and Frank for a few moments before falling upon Catherine. Before they could answer, she spoke to Cabbage with a chittering sound. He responded by chirping once and in a loud manner.
“Do you have a bird in there?” screeched the banshee with the sore throat. It was the penetrating sort of voice that could shatter glass. Angela could feel the vibrations of that horrid voice ping her horn and ripple down its length and into her skull. It was not a pleasant experience in any way, shape, or form. The sound traveled through her body and down her legs, where her holes caught them, giving off an unpleasant reverberation much akin to pins and needles.
The pounding on the door resumed.
“It’s Lindsey Crawford, our next door neighbor,” Beatrice hissed. “You two need to hide! She won’t go away and she will call the police if we don’t answer!”
The woman remembered a lot of the unpleasant things her horrible neighbor had done in the past. Underhanded things. Using the neighborhood charter and the city laws to her advantage. The woman believed herself to be the moral authority for the neighborhood. Having never had children herself, she absolutely hated them. She was the witch you did not visit on Halloween for candy.
Angela stared at the door. She moved towards the hall, slinking as she went. “Cabbage!” she hissed at her brother. He stared back at her stupidly, his tongue lolling out to the side as Catherine petted his head fin.
Green fire engulfed him. When it fell away, in his place was a dog. Specifically a brown and black German Shepherd. He laughed with solid blue eyes before a green flash turned them to a soulful brown. Cabbage was still hanging his tongue out, laughing in silence. Catherine squealed in delight at the sudden big furball having taken shape in her arms. The dog was slightly larger than the changeling, but still smaller than the average Shepherd. Cabbage barked. It matched him perfectly.
The relentless assault on the door continued unabated. “A dog? When did you get a dog?” the horrible, shrill voice demanded.
Awkward silence followed by a pregnant pause was only interrupted by what lay on the other side of the front door. Cabbage did not seem to notice he was the focus of the attention.
“One moment!” Beatrice called out. She reached out with her fingers and pried the broom from her husband’s grip. “Honey. No beatings,” the woman told him. She then rose on her tiptoes and kissed him on the cheek.
Frank was ready to assault the door himself. The yelling matches between him and Mrs. Lindsey Crawford were legendary. The last incident had to do with leaves from a maple tree in his backyard falling into hers. The branches hung over the fence and she had demanded several times for him to trim his branches. However, she forbade him from setting foot on her property and would not let a tree trimming service set foot on her precious lawn. The old woman was, for all intents and purposes, impossible to deal with.
“Stay.” Beatrice patted her husband on the chest. Lindsey somewhat tolerated the woman. A few steps later, she was before the door, smoothing the front of her shirt before unlatching the lock on the door. Putting on her best smile, she opened it.
On the other side of the threshold and appearing as a blight on what should have been a beautiful sunlit Saturday, stood the smallest, skinniest, meanest woman that ever cursed a doorstep. It was once whispered if the Devil ever took a bride, Lindsey Crawford would get first dibs. The scowl upon her face was etched deeply with the wrinkles of a life of hard work. Her white hair was short. Her ears were like jugs hanging from a porch. Her light blue eyes carried no mirth, and were like the iceberg before it struck the Titanic. Lindsey Crawford was once described as an Irish woman forced into alcohol rehabilitation against her will. She also coated herself in enough perfume to kill a skunk.
Before Beatrice could say anything, the old woman shoved her way past her and into the living room. She glared at Frank, noting the broom in his hand with a sniff. The murder in his eyes came complete with a pair of tombstones with the letters RIP etched upon them.
“Get out of my house,” the man growled. It was pointless to make such a demand. After all, the changelings had ignored it. Now Old Leatherface was within his domain, lording over it like a conquering queen demanding her tribute.
“Your wife let me in,” she retorted. “What was that noise? What’s been going on? What in the world happened to your house? What is with this green… whatever it is? Why do you have a dog? It’s a large, vicious brute! It’s dangerous! Get rid of it. What is with the smell in here? Did a cow leave a pie in here?” Mrs. Crawford gestured with her arms, pointing with a bony finger wherever her attention took her.
“Mrs. Crawford,” Beatrice began, still wearing her smile. “We had a bit of an accident.”
“Are you cooking drugs in here?”
“No, we are not.”
Mrs. Crawford turned on Cabbage. “That is a big, vicious dog. Dogs of that size are not allowed in this neighborhood. It is against the association’s charter! Twenty-five pounds or less! You know the rules! Get rid of it. I will call the authorities and hold you in violation of the agreement you signed when you bought this house. You’ll drive down the value of the neighborhood! You’ll open the door for unwanted families to come in!”
The horrible, horrible woman glared at Catherine, who hugged Cabbage even tighter. The girl’s green eyes were wide with fear as she stared up at the tiny old lady. Cabbage, indifferent to the woman’s scathing personality, simply panted happily. He did not even bother to acknowledge Mrs. Crawford’s existence.
“He’s a stray we found,” Frank rumbled. “If you have an issue with it, too bad.” He white knuckled the broom handle.
The woman harrumphed. “I will call the associate board members and file a grievance. You have until Monday to get rid of the dog.” Her wrinkles rolled as she worked her jaw, her eyes roaming towards the direction of the kitchen. “What is that smell? It’s horrid!”
It wasn’t as bad as it had been, but Beatrice still tried to remain diplomatic. “We had a bit of an accident while cooking. It will be fixed. Don’t worry about it, Mrs. Crawford.”
She glared at Beatrice with such malice as to turn the sun into a cold, dead lump of rock. “See to it you do get it fixed,” Mrs. Crawford commanded. She sneered. “I was against letting you and your family move into the neighborhood. Get rid of the mongrel. Stop being an eyesore to this neighborhood! I’ll be watching!”
“You’re always watching,” Frank said humorlessly. “Always being a cantankerous old bi—”
“Frank!” Beatrice snapped.
“—ddy.” Her husband fell silent, but glared at the old woman.
“I promise you, we’ll have everything fixed.”
Mrs. Crawford gave the woman a lofty glare. “See that you do. What was with the singing I heard? It came from your house and moved through your backyard and into the woods. What was that?”
“I can’t say.”
“Can’t? Or won’t?”
“That’s private.”
“I can find out.”
“I’m sure you can, Mrs. Crawford,” Beatrice replied with practiced calm. “I’m sure there is a lot of privacy you enjoy violating simply because you live such a sad, miserable life of making others feel as miserable as you always do.”
The old woman chuckled, if a mummified corpse was capable of such an act. “It must be so nice to have the perfect family, Beatrice. Well, I must be going,” she announced with grand airs and a huff. “Do clean up. Get rid of the dog. There’s something going on here and I will find out.” Without further adieu, Mrs. Lindsey Crawford departed like a mummified Egyptian queen.
Beatrice saw her out the door and even waved farewell before closing the door.
“She’ll call the cops,” Frank seethed. “She’ll do it because she thinks we’re doing something illegal. They’ll see the hole in the floor and they’ll get suspicious! She heard the changelings. I knew she’d hear them! Bea! What are we going to do?” Desperation was in his voice. “She’ll go to the association and take our house!”
Angela returned from where she had been hiding. “I would like to help. I am a structural engineer and Cabbage can repair almost anything if given the right direction. We can have that hole in the floor patched and looking like new. A little bit of materials, a little bit of magic…”
“Potato!” cried the changeling-turned-dog.
“What about the green stuff all over the living room?”
Angela poked at a pile of the stuff that had fallen from the ceiling and on to the floor. “Oh, this is just a sort of goop we changelings can make. It’s usually harmless and easy to clean up. It’s primary use is as a sealant and mortar for building. I think what happened was my brothers and sisters got excited and were inadvertently secreting our goo.” She held up a hoof and pointed at one of the larger holes in her leg. “It comes from here.”
“That’s disgusting!”
“No. It’s natural. That old hooman… now that was disgusting!” Angela shuddered.
Frank, meanwhile, was lost in thought. “Can you really fix everything?”
“Yep! Part of being a changeling is learning to adapt to your environment.” The changeling flit her wings and adjusted her stance, leaning towards Frank. “And we seem to share a common enemy,” Angela whispered. “This… old hooman. She is a problem you have had for a while, am I right?”
Beatrice held up her hands. “Whoa! Whoa! Whoa! What are you suggesting? If you think I’m going to let you hurt someone simply because they’re unpleasant and about as friendly as an irate water buffalo, you’re sadly mistaken!”
“Oh no! Nothing like that!” Angela fell on her haunches and flailed her hooves at the human as if waving off the implications. She mirrored Beatrice with uncanny similarity. “We can keep an eye on her and deflect her attention. We’re civilians. We’re not soldiers! The very idea of harming another being feels all sorts of wrong. It’s one of the reasons why we left Mother. She could be very cruel at times.”
Frank cleared his throat. “So… is that why you guys left her?”
“All we need and want is love, Mr. Hooman.”
Cabbage piped up. “All together now!”