On the outskirts of town, where the most unlucky or dangerous folks lived, was a house on a small, ordinary street. The folks there would end up falling into the stereotypical ways expected of them — some with more resistance than others. Typically every citizen there would have a weapons or drugs on their person as they made their way through their own territory.

However, she was a special case. At the prime ago of thirty-one, she lived in a small, broken house, with a home more broken. Sleeping beside her at higher was her husband — who was never home, and if he was, he was never polite.

She liked it when he was gone.

Not to say it isn't a problem, but that is what this little town does: it changes people. Nowadays, he was often too harsh and too menacing towards her.

With her husband gone, she lived alone with her step-daughter. She didn't know where this young girl came from, but she showed up at their doorsteps when she was seven years old.

Her and her husband had been married for eight years on that day.

Despite it, she loved her as if she was her own biological daughter, but now, she couldn't wait for the woman to leave.

The apple does not fall far from the tree.

Her step-daughter had the basic bad-girl vibe: the tattoos, the piercings, the black leather jacket, the rings, even the motocycle — which she must had stolen. On top of that, she was an abusive woman — and she hoped that her step daughter would never have a child.

In the beginning, they were actually very close. She was a nice girl who didn't have a disrespectful bone in her body, but like her husband, the two of them changed with the time.

The mother felt played.

She felt like a fool.

She was like the frog in the hot water story her mother would tell her.

She was sitting in a fantasy when she first saw her husband. Over the years, it revealed to be a nightmare. It was sitting in cold water, only to have someone cruel slowly heat it up. It was too late to leave when it started to boil; she didn't notice the change. She couldn't feel her skin burning till she was dead from the heat.

It was the pattern she experienced everyday, but today, she felt the water's heat as she got in. She finally sensed that something was wrong this time — before it was too late.

Waking up in her empty bed, she stretched. The ceiling was pulling her hands up as she moved her torso from side to side: she felt a nice pop in her back when she was done, finally ready to get up. Sighing, she sung her legs over the bed, knowing the day was harder than it would be before. Yet, this day would make the rest easier.

"Mother!" She couldn't cover her eyes in time when her step-daughter screeched. "Get over here, you old hag!"

Deciding to take her time, she took a couple minutes to get downstairs; after all, she needed to keep her composer. As she moved slowly, her daughter screamed the entire time. The whole neighborhood could hear the colorful words in the dense air — not that they would care.

"I'm coming," she muttered to herself, "I'm coming." She knew her daughter heard her as she went downstairs, hoping to silence the ringing in her head. When she reached, something hard hit her in the face.

She had gotten punched, socked, knuckled sandwiched — whatever you wanted to call it. She was ready for it, and her body followed the direction of her head. She slammed into the wall before snacking the ground, hard.

"After everything my Dad had done," her daughter laughed, "you can't even do as you're told." She kneeled down, a sinister smile curling on her lips. "You're dead to him, you know."

Something snapped, and just like that, the frog jumped out of the water.

She pushed herself up from the floor, and the daughter stared at her, expecting to go into the kitchen to make her her favorite breakfast: eggs and toast.

"Make them running, bitch."

She wasn't expecting this woman to grab her by her shirt's collar, and slamming her into the wall. She gasped as her back hit, her head bouncing off.

"I tried," the mother laughed, "and I mean, really tried." She stared at the small girl, who only used her kindness to for her wants and needs, who never took responsibilities. Tears laced the mother's eyes, but she was smiling. She broke: her mind collapsing from the inside.

She started to choke the life in her hands, and the daughter started to turn blue. The girl desperately started to claw her mother, but eying to free herself.

She couldn't get free.

"Please," she squeezed out, wheezing as the last of her breath left her mouth.

"Good night."

The body fell limped to the floor, and the mother felt a huge weight leaving her shoulder — and it was only seven in the morning. Her mother never felt this much freedom before; she felt so alive.

The body laid across the front of the stairs for the rest of the day, and the mother didn't move it till the sun faded across the sky.

Even before then, her mother didn't just leave her body to rot. All her frustrations and anger finally went out of her mind and into the physical world. It took three years for the police to find a body who matched the description of a girl named Ellie Mayor.

She was seventeen years old, with black hair and multiple offensive tattoos. She skipped school on a regular basis, and her body was almost unrecognizable.

Only one tattoo was untouched: the one with her name.

The remainder of her body was covered in dried blood. She had wounds on her dead skin, ones that would have needed stitches if she was still alive. Her face was bruised and rotting away as her hair was cut and dyed an obnoxiously pink color.

She was found naked, buried in the roots of a tree that was getting taken out by the new owner of the home. They never did found out who did it, but they found dead parts of a frog shoved into every single opening in her body.

Her body was cleaned of any evidence.

Not even the people in the shady town knew what happened. Most of them thought that the special case in town must have been buried somewhere on the property as well.

She was always smiling, the mother, in public. She showed her pearly whites under her red lips.

She disappeared as fast as Ellie Major did.

After she buried her daughter, she was quick to pack. In the darkness and loudest hours of the night, she left town, speeding on a stolen motorcycle.

Her old house was trashed, and she purposely started a small fire. By the time morning come, a small portion of the house was in flames. She couldn't help but smirk as she wore her daughter's gloves and leather jacket.

She didn't feel a single drop of remorse. She definitely felt absolutely nothing when her daughter died at her finger tips. She didn't have a single emotions when she took all the money and drugs she could find.

Actually, she did feel one emotion: joy. She couldn't stop herself from remembering how easily the knife slide through her daughters skin. She remembered leaving the weapons, cleaned and in the blacken heart of her daughter.

The police could never determined the exact case of death. It could had been from blood lost, chucking — or perhaps, the frog parts or even the knife in Ellie's chest.

Most importantly, they had nothing on the killer.

The mother was never found for her crimes, and because of that, she is free to roam. Often times, if she ever stumbles onto a family where the mother is being mistreated, she'll leave frog legs all over their property.

When the sky darkened, she would follow the same steps as she did for her own step-daughter, with the goal of hiding the body do well that it would take three years to find it.

However, that is just a rumor. Others say that the mother found her second chance of happiness. She married a lovely husband, who loved and respected her, and had well behaved kids. Others say she found herself in a mental institution, rambling about liking a seventeen year old.

In the end, no one knew where she ended up, but she was never seen again by her old neighbors.

Word Count: 1462