She must have drifted off, waiting, because she didn't sit up right away when the light came on, and it hurt her eyes. "Shorty, you awake?" she heard her daddy say.

Todd checked the door, to make sure noone was around, and sat by Starr's bed. "Wake up," he told her.

"I'm awake," she said, covering her eyes and squinting. She was always glad to see her father, even if he didn't pick the very best times to visit her.

"We have to be quiet," Todd told her, "or your mom will come up here and make me leave. Okay?"

"She's talking to Uncle Max," she told him, dropping her hands. "She won't hear us." She tried to crawl over and give him a hug, but her father backed away.

"I can't stay too long," he told her. "I just have to know what your Uncle Max said when.."

Starr made a face. "I don't wanna talk about Uncle Max. You always wanna talk about Uncle Max."

"Because it's important!" He snapped at her. Then he started pacing around the room. It made Starr feel strange when he did that. She wondered why he was in such a bad mood. He always seemed to be angry when he talked to her, anymore.

She sniffled. "I don't know what Uncle Max said, I haven't listened to him. I went trick-or-treating."

"What'd you do that for?"

"Because it's Halloween!" she protested. "That s what you do!"

"Great. Now I'll have to find out myself." Her father balled up his fists the way he did when he was really upset, and Starr made a face.

"You just got here. And now you're gonna leave again. You never even asked me about my costume or where I went. I don't wanna talk to you anymore."

Starr lay back down on her bed and closed her eyes. She could feel her bed quiver, and then sink, as her daddy sat down on the bed with her. "Hey!" he said sharply. "Don't do that." He touched her hair; she pretended not to notice. His voice softened. "Okay, we can talk about other stuff. Your Uncle Max is boring anyway. Right?"

Starr couldn't see his face, the way Todd's expression melted into tenderness. She just watched their shadows on the wall, the way his bent over hers, and changed her mind. She sat up. "Okay," she relented.

Todd looked around. "Is that your costume?" he pointed.

Starr told him all about her costume, and the Halloween party, and trick-or-treating. Todd listened to her and responded at all the proper times, but looked a little distracted. "You can have some of my candy if you want," she finished up. "But not the Hershey bars." She watched him stand up. "You're not leaving, are you?"

"You have to go to sleep," he reminded her, seeming anxious. "I have to go."

"I want you to tell me a story," she commanded him, standing up as well to get his attention. "You never tell me stories anymore."

"Starr," he warned her.

"I want a story! A story!" She stuck out her lower lip, on the brink of either tears or a temper tantrum.

Todd rolled his eyes. "Okay, okay. A little bitty mini story, sit down."

"Okay!" She settled herself down and sits perfectly still, waiting. She knew that her daddy would give in, if she did like he said.This kid has got me pegged, Todd realized with some resignation. Well, it figured. Sometimes he thought she knew him better than anybody ever had. Grumbling, Todd settled himself down on the floor beside her bed and tried to think of a story to tell her. When he had first met Starr, and she was a tiny baby, he hadn't know a single thing about parenting. He was certain all along that he was probably doing everything wrong, even though he was being very careful not to mess her up. The one thing he had always been able to do was talk to her, the way he had never been able to talk to anyone. He could tell her stories. She was a kid; she would believe anything, and she seemed to enjoy his stories, no matter how weird they were. He grunted. "What kind of story do you want, Shorty?"

She thought about it. "Something spooky. With monsters in it. But not too spooky," she admonished him.

Todd thought it over, making a face. He was itching to find Holden, to finish putting his plan into motion. But Starr looked so hopeful, and she was so easy to please: all she needed was one little story. She liked things with happy endings, and with magic and all that stuff. But it was Halloween, and she wanted something spooky. and his idea of spooky was much too frightening for his little girl. It'd have to be something appropriate, only less stupid and made-up.

Starr watched him expectantly, with a hopeful smile. She liked her father s stories better than anything.

Todd began: "So, once upon a time, a really long time ago, there was a little girl who lived in a nice little town where everyone was happy all the time. And I mean, really disgustingly obnoxiously happy, where everyone smiled all the time and sang songs and played in the streets. They all looked like idiots, but nobody cared, because they were happy." He went on describing the town. Everything wasn't exactly perfect. There was a monster prowling around the town, gobbling people up, or at least that's what they said. They said that the monster was seven feet tall, and had fangs and wings, but no one was really sure what it looked like. The people lived in fear of the monster, who waited just outside at night to prey upon anyone who stumbled out of their houses.

Todd started describing the little girl. "She looked a lot like you, actually. She had pretty blonde hair, and pretty blue eyes, and was the nicest, bravest little girl in the world. She was really, truly good inside, not like a lot of the grown-ups who ran things in the town." The little girl had parents who didn't care about her, and one night when they weren't paying attention, the little girl wandered out of the house and got lost.

"She started walking down the road, because she didn't know where she was and there wasn't anything else to do. She followed the road, until there were trees all around, and it was getting darker and darker. She was really scared." Todd gave Starr a sidelong glance, noticing that she looked a little nervous. "Don t worry," he told her, and smiled comfortingly. She smiled back, bravely.

The little girl sat down on the road and started crying. There was no one around to help her, and she didn t know how to get home. She was crying so loud that she didn't hear anyone walking over to her, and when she looked up, there in front of her was the monster: "He was really, truly ugly. He had these burning red eyes, and a wrinkled face, with warts, and, skin that looked like it could peel right off." Todd made a comical monster face for Starr, who howled with startled laughter. Todd hushed her off and continued his description. "But, when she looked, she could see that it wasn't really his face. It was a mask. It wasn't a monster, it was a man, wearing a terribly ugly mask. He just stood there, staring down at her. When she looked at him, she wasn t afraid at all because she knew that he was really just a man."

"But," Starr protested, "Why was he wearing an awful mask? Was it Halloween?"

"Shush." Todd thought to himself that story-telling was much easier before Starr started asking questions. "He was just going about his business, and he didn't want anyone to bother him. So he wore an ugly mask, and they all stayed away." The monster/man spoke to her through the mask, in muffled tones. He lived in the woods, outside of the town, and he had heard the little girl crying. The monster gave her a handkerchief to blow her nose on, and a coat to keep her warm, and the little girl stopped crying. She was a long way from the town, he told her, and they could go back to his home until it was morning.

"So the monster, he took the little girl home with him, to his huge stone home in the woods. The little girl wasn't afraid of the monster, even a little bit, even though he was much bigger than she was and really scary-looking. She liked him, because he had been kind to her. When they got to his home, he lead her to a room that she could have all to herself, and she went to sleep."

The little girl stayed in the monster's home for many days. There were many wonderful things there, that he had found in his travels. There were magical things, like books that said different things every time you opened them, and birds of many colors who slept on the roof and perched on the windows. Todd threw in a few other things that Starr would like, a unicorn that lived beside the castle, and beautiful clothes for the little girl to dress up in. She was very happy there. The monster gave her everything she could want, fed her wonderful foods and treated her like a princess.

Todd's expression changed as he remembered the other part of the story. The little girl's parents were really worried when they realized that their daughter was gone. They thought that the monster had carried her away, and they convinced the other people to help them look for it. They had lived in fear of him for too long, they said. It was time to hunt him down, and rescue their wonderful little girl.

Starr interrupted him here. "I've HEARD this story, Daddy."

He bristled. "You have not! Where did you hear this story?"

"Tee told me. A long time ago, before she left. The monster, see, he's really a handsome prince, and he's nice. They try to take her away from him, but in the end everybody knows that he's good after all, and they live together forever. Like in the movie, remember?"

Todd clenched his jaw. "That's not this story."

The people marched into the woods and found the stone castle, where the little girl was staying with the monster. They surrounded it and shouted for the monster to come out and face them. Bitterness crept into Todd's voice as he continued. He came out, wearing his mask. They demanded to know where the little girl was. He told them that they couldn't have her, because she was happy there with him. But, they were many and he was one, and they chased him with their weapons.

"The little girl's family came into the beautiful castle, and they found their daughter. They were all.. really happy."

"The people from the town, they marched into the castle with torches and spears and shouting, and they cornered the monster. They beat him and tied him up, and took him out of the castle so that everyone could see him. His mask.. the monster kept his mask on, trying not to let any of them see his face. But they wanted to see. They tore off his mask so that everyone could see what was underneath."

"..." Todd trailed off, and Starr froze in anticipation.

"It was hideous. The little girl hid her eyes when she saw how awful the monster really was. The face beneath the mask was even more ugly than the mask he had been wearing all along. She and the town people thought he had only been wearing it to frighten them, but they were wrong; he wore it to cover up his ugliness with more ugliness. His true face.. it was just wrong in every way, as if someone had reversed everything that a face was supposed to be and made it the opposite. It was more horrible than any of them could have imagined. Some of them screamed, and ran away after just one look. But they would remember that face, they would think about it and dream about it for the rest of their pitiful lives. Some of them stayed and looked, in weird fascination. They couldn't help it. How did he get like this, they wondered. How could anything human look that way? And the others, well, they were so angry when they saw him, that monster and his horrible face, that they took up their spears and knives, and they destroyed him. So that he could never frighten people or take away little girls again."

"..."

"Then the little girl and her real mom and dad took over the castle, and they made it even more wonderful and beautiful, and let all of the people in the town come and see it. Everyone came to look, now that the monster was gone, and it was safe. The little girl was the princess of the castle, and she had all of the friends, and toys, and beautiful things, that she'd ever wanted, and she lived there with everyone she loved forever and ever."

"And that's the end."

Todd looked up at Starr, and saw her frowning. "That's the end?" she asked, in a small voice.

"Yep. That's it. So now you have to go to sleep, Shorty." He stood up and started tucking her in again.

She looked up at him quizzically as he stood over her. "But that's not how it s supposed to end up," she told him.

"That's what happened," he said firmly. He brushed his hand across her forehead. "Go to sleep."

"But what about the monster?"

"What about him?"

"He gave her all those things! And he didn't get a happy ending!" She made a pouting face. Starr was very particular about some things. She knew that the way her daddy had told her the story, it wasn't quite right. She didn't like it.

"He's the bad guy," Todd told her. "He doesn't get a happy ending." He looks over her sad expression, and tries to cheer her up. "The little girl gets the best ending of all though, she gets the castle, and the books, and her own unicorn, and all that other stuff."

She still looked skeptical. "Well okay. If you say so." Then she brightened a little. "She did get her very own castle. I wish I had a castle, and a unicorn. There are real castles, right?"

"Sure, there are real castles. I'll take you to one someday. Maybe.." He smoothed her hair with surprising gentleness. "And if I ever see one of those unicorns running around, I'll get you one of those too." He glanced around quickly, to remind himself that there was noone around to hear what he was saying, except Starr. "Anything you can ever want, you'll have. Cause you're my own little princess."

Starr yawned, and Todd stood up.

"Goodnight Shorty," he said quietly, backing away from her bed. He missed having her around so much. But he couldn't keep her with him anymore. This was the way things had to be.

"Goodnight Daddy," his little girl murmured sleepily.

Todd slipped out of Starr's room and went back to doing what he did best: messing things up for everyone. It was shooting himself in the foot, of course. After all, that's what monsters do. They don't get to keep the little princess, they don't get to love or be loved. There was no handsome prince inside this beast, and there would be no happy ending. Not anymore.

The End