The little blond boy lay sullen in his bed while his Mummy shouted at him. Again.
"Will you just lay down and go to sleep? I don't want to hear anymore from you or your brother! Stop causing trouble! He's trying to sleep!" She pulled up his rumpled dinosaur blanket he'd kicked off.
Caleb wasn't trying to sleep. Jareth could tell he was pretending to sleep. He usually did when Mummy came in to see what all the noise was about.
"Caleb was kicking me." Jareth muttered.
"How was he kicking you? You're in the top bunk!" Jareth tried to explain, but he was only three. The words just didn't come out right.
"Stop shouting at me. I don't like it." He grumbled. He didn't know why he always felt he had to argue back, but he did every time without fail.
"It's nearly midnight. Shut your eyes and go to sleep. Here's your teddy bear." Mummy put his ragged green toy in his bed. Jareth snatched and hugged it tightly.
"It's not a bear it's a goblin."
Mummy sighed.
"Just go to sleep. Goodnight Caleb." She bent down and kissed Caleb on the head, made sure his Tiger was under his arm, straightened his blankets and then turned with one last glare aimed at Jareth before leaving.
Jareth rolled over on his side and hugged his Green Goblin, adding a few more teardrops to the stains already on it. Caleb always teased him about it. Caleb had a beautiful white tiger toy to sleep with but Jareth had fallen in love with his ugly Green Goblin when he was a tiny baby and would never give it up.
"Goblins are scary monsters." Caleb would say. He was five. He knew everything. "One day that thing's gonna wake up and take you away."
"I wish the goblins would take me away." Jareth whispered. "Right now."
He squeezed his eyes shut and hugged Green Goblin tighter as he thought he heard the sound of thunder.