Hello, Everyone! I'm still currently writing this one, but I hope to keep up with it. Please leave a review, and follow to hear when I've got new chapters up.

Three farmers stand by one's truck in the fall breeze. Another farmer drives a tractor, collecting sorghum from his fields. The three watch, ready to help in any way. Harvest is the farmers' equivalent of a party. They pass beers around and talk loudly.

There's a house across the field, neatly nestled in woods. The yard extends into the sun of the grassy part of the field. The farmers look at the house and discuss the inhabitants. None of them really know much about their newest neighbors, despite their living there for two and a half years. In this sort of country where everyone knows everyone all their life, it's bizarre to have someone that new around.

The back door of the little warm cabin creaks open and a woman and a little girl step out. The woman carries a plastic basket of laundry. The little girl carries a wooden sword. As her mother hangs the clothing on the line to dry, the child swings the toy, slashing at imaginary enemies.

The farmers don't know enough on the subject to tell, but the girl is using professional moves. Her swings are calculated and powerful. The farmers all watch the pair. The woman says something. The child laughs. The sound echoes over the field, even over the noise of the tractor nearby.

"That woman," says one of the farmers, opening his third beer, "I'd take her home if I didn't have Alice."

Another farmer whistles. The angle the woman gives them now as she bends for her laundry makes two of the men stare and laugh. The other shakes his head, knowing what their thoughts must be.

"I wouldn't talk about Ada like that if I were you," he says, "That family is... Well, I wouldn't say bad news..."

"What are you talking about, Bill?" One asks, a joking tone in his voice, "I'm sure they're perfectly fine. We just don't know them. And I would sure like to." He elbows Bill.

"Stop it, Walter," he says back, "And I can see you laughing Jim. I swear that woman and her husband both come into the gun shop at least once a week and buy guns and bullets. There's something not right about that, you must admit."

"Well," says Jim, "They own a hundred and fifty acres. You expect them not to go hunting?"

"Maybe so, but I don't like it is all," says Bill, "I'll just leave them alone and they'll leave me alone. Except to buy my guns."

The woman picks up her empty basket and takes the little girl by the hand. They enter the house again.

The conversation of the farmers moves on to another topic.

Inside the cabin, the little girl puts her sword away. She stores it under her bed, and she keeps her Nerf guns in her closet. She tried to make drawers like the ones her parents have, but it's mostly cardboard and zip ties that her toys fit into. While her mother cooks something in the kitchen, she sneaks into her parent's bedroom and tries on her daddy's clothes.

She doesn't notice that the kitchen has grown quiet. Her mother, on the other hand, had noticed that she had.

"Cassie? What are you doing?" she says at the doorway. The little girl jumps.

"I was playing dress-up."

Cassie has a large plaid shirt practically wound around her. The sleeves pool on the floor. Her father's shoes are boats that her feet could sail away in, along with a crew of other similar-sized feet. In one hand, she holds her only real weapon, a small iron knife. In her other she holds a wooden pistol with her name carved in it.

"Momma," she says, her green eyes looking up sadly, "When will daddy be back?"

He mother smiles. "It shouldn't be long, sweetheart. He's only been gone a couple of days."

"But it's been very long days," she whines, stepping out of the shoes and dropping the shirt off her arms.

"I know, love. Come for supper, alright? I'll tell you a story."

The girl's eyes widen and she tucks the knife into it's sheath and runs to put her toys away. When her mother turns from the stove with their plates, the girl sits, ready, at the table.

Her mother raises her eyebrows. "Did you wash up?"

"Yes, momma, before dress-up. Because I could smell you cooking."

Ada laughs and shakes her head. "Now you have to do it again, silly. Shoo!"

The girl giggles and runs from the room.

It's been a while since Ada's heard her daughter laugh. Since her fifth birthday, the girl had been quiet. Maybe it was just her personality growing in, but Ada thought it might be because Sam had been away so often.

Not so much as he could be, but he still was approaching a day away for every one at home.

"It's only until this is over," he promised, "Dean needs me. And Cassie needs you."

Ada even proposed taking Cassie with them and hitting the road again, but she knew it was an incredibly selfish and impossible proposal. Their daughter needed to be safe. And sometimes that meant that Sam would go out for days at a time.

She knew, too, that eventually, in maybe a month or so, this would pass. Dean would go home, Sam would come home, and it would be quiet for a time.

Is it awful that those aren't the times she longs for most?

Cassie's sock feet pad back and the two sit to eat.

"Did you put mayonnaise on this?" she asks, lifting the bread to look into her sandwich.

"No," she says, "Only on mine."

"Oh good."

The girls stares, eager, at her mother.

Ada smiles. "Were you waiting for something?"

The girl looks offended. "My story?"

Ada feigns remembrance. "Oh! Of course! Your story!" She puts down her sandwich. "Have I ever told you about the day Sam and I met?"

"Sam, meaning my daddy?"

"Yes, your daddy."

"No, never ever."

"Well." Ada looks left and right. "It's kind of a scary story. And it's a big secret. Can you keep our secret?"

"Momma, of course. I already keep lotsa secrets."

"Of course you do. All right. When I was younger, I was haunted by a ghost."

"Really, Momma? Why didn't you run away?"

"No more interrupting sweetheart. I did try to run away. I ran away from my home and my parents. I was twenty two, so the police didn't look for me. My parents didn't either. I ran and I ran. I drove halfway across the country before I realized the ghost was with me the whole time."

The little girl has breadcrumbs on her chin. She stares at her mother, silent.

"You see," Ada says, "When I was a baby, my grandmother gave me a necklace with her own hair inside. When she died is when the ghost showed up for the first time."

"I bet the ghost was your Grammy, momma."

"I think so too. She was just a little girl, though, so I didn't know who she was for a while. I also didn't know that she was protecting me. It's not safe for a twenty two year old in a big city like Washington D.C., especially not in the kinds of places I would stay. My grandmother would kill people who she thought might hurt me, even if they wouldn't. She killed my boyfriend because we had a fight."

Ada looks at her daughter. "You know daddy hunts monsters, yeah?" The little girl nods.

"Well, when my Grammy started killing people, daddy and uncle Dean heard about it. She was killing so many people, they heard about it even though it was a big city. You see, my grandmother had a stroke, so that's what she was doing to people. I begged my Grammy to stop, but she didn't."

"Momma, may I intrupt now?"

"What is it, Cassie?"

"Whatsa sroke?"

"A Stroke. It's when someone's blood doesn't get into their brain just right. There's a little block in it."

Cassie nods like she understands. "Keep going."

"Well, first they thought I was doing it, through black magic or something. So they figured out who I was and they found me asleep in my car."

Ada smiles.

"I freaked out. But they told me everything eventually. And it actually calmed me down. An explanation for what I'd been going through. Well, your daddy and I, we liked each other."

Cassie grins. "Did you kiss?"

Ada laughs. "Oh, yes. We definitely kissed. Then, when they said they had to go, I told them to take me with them. They didn't of course. It was to keep me safe. But I knew about ghosts and monsters, so I figured out how to keep myself safe from them. How to keep others safe. And when you have the same job as someone, you meet them eventually.

"Three years later, I was twenty-five. I sought them out, found them." She smiles. "I gave them Hell for leaving me behind."

"How did you give them Hell, momma?"

"Don't say Hell, it's not a good word for little girls."

"But how?"

"I trapped them. Left them all the signs that it'd be a demon they were hunting. Then, I didn't let them see my face. When they had me in a demon trap and tried to exorcise me, I walked out of their circle and had a big reveal. Biggest rush I've ever had in my life."

Ada looks at the sunset out the window.

"It's getting dark. I should go close the chicken coop." Ada stands. So does Cassie.