Chapter One
Lola Cep

"Idon't know why you would choose this house. It's got bad history." Lola shuddered gazing up at the white house in front of her. She didn't know whether or not to laugh or cry. What? Did her parents think she didn't know about Freddy Krueger and all the evil that had dwelled under this very roof? And now it was hers to call home?

The strangely reserved students of her fourth period biology class had stared at her in terror and blanched when she told them she had just moved into the pleasant suburb of 1428 Elm Street. Evidently, it had earned itself a rather notorious reputation around Springwood. A small town who thrived on who was sleeping with whom and whose children were cutting class to smoke marijuana. The city still bore the deep running scars of the Freddy Krueger murders.

"No one will ever set foot in this house, and I was planning on throwing a big barbeque bash with Kurt." Lola sighed dejectedly. Kurt was the boy who had helped her open her jammed locker on her first day of school at Springwood High School and since then they had become inseparable. You could say they were something of an item.

From the corner of her eye (her driver's-ed teacher had always told her she had expert peripheral vision) she saw the roll of her mother's. Well, alright, maybe she was being a tad melodramatic-since the alleged child murder was long dead and gone. But it didn't change history, and it certainly didn't stop the shivers from running up and down her spine knowing the floor he once walked upon, she now did too.

Her mother jogged up towards the front door, painted a tarnishing blue, and unlocked it. They had lived there for already a full week and her mother acted as though she had lived there forever. She loved Elm Street.

"Your boyfriend won't drop by just because of some old myth? Please." Her mother set the bag of groceries she was clutching down on the floor. "Or urban legend, whatever you kids are calling it these days? Nice boyfriend you got there. Here, take this to the kitchen and put it away would you?"

Huffing, Lola ignored the remark made at her new love interest, and tucked a lock of her dark ("it's dusty brown, not mousy") hair behind her ear and got to work.

"Where do these peaches go?" She asked. She could hear her mother, the neurotic interior decorator bustling around the living room which had all been recently renovated with what decor could have been picked out by Martha Stewart herself. Didn't change the child murderer factor for Lola.

"For God's sake, mother!" She snapped and her mom peered around the corner, her bottle-blonde hair in a frizzy poof around her sweaty face.

"What was that, Lo?"

"The peaches!"

"Oh, just store them in the storage cellar downstairs. They'll be great for my famous Easter pies."

Did she hear her mother correctly? No. She had just been told to go and put something in the cellar, in the basement-and that didn't seem like anything a sane person would bother to do, let alone a mother burden it upon her only daughter. Taking a deep breath, she made her way to the basement door.

It was an ordinary cellar. Dusty, below liveable room temperature...a pack rat's dream. She didn't know why she had been panicking with the thought of being down here.

Screech...

She stopped suddenly and released her hand from the railing. She shrieked as she skidded down the stairs, feet first, and landed with a thud. Cursing, she rubbed her backside where she had landed.

Where had that awful sound come from?! She chuckled. It was all mildly amusing when she stopped to think about it. How edgy she was, thumping down the stairs on her ass and losing it over nothing probably but a small mouse. Basements always amplified the quietest little house creaking's.

"What are you doing down there? I just asked you to take down the peaches." Her mother called from her perch on the leather couches that she took such pride and joy in, when anyone who was anyone in Springwood knew it was faux.

"Right. Just dropping off the peaches." Lola called up and dusted off her cardigan. She swore as she surveyed the mess she had made. The peaches had flung from her grasp when she had tripped down the stairs and smashed over the cement floor. Peaches and shards of glass littered the ground.

Screech...

That dreadful sound! Like long plastic fake-nails tearing down a blackboard and...Oh god it was coming straight from the furnace! She made a mental note to put a hiatus on watching horror flicks with Kurt. The aftershock was too terrifying for her. It made her jumpy about mere mice and have to sleep with the hem of her blanket wrapped around her feet.

"I'm not scared of you! I've dissected you in bio!" She hissed into the darkness.

Determined to face her fear, she stomped towards the furnace and kicked it. Kicked it hard. It groaned as it creaked open, a plume of dust coughing out upon open. She gasped.

Inside the furnace lay a bundle of rags, bound around an object of some sort. It could be infested with rats.

"Don't...be...scared, Lola." She hissed to herself through clenched teeth. She got a firm grip around the rags, careful not to put pressure on its contents should it start squeaking and squirming at any moment, and pulled them out of the furnace, slamming the door with a bang and another cloud of dust.

She realized her heart was pounding like a drum, and wouldn't be surprised if it awoke the dead.

She plopped down on the ground. She thought of her old home in sunny California, her condo steps away from the beach and even closer to her favourite pizzerias and night clubs-where they didn't even ID you at sixteen, seventeen years old. Pure paradise, and no reason not to wear a bikini all day long. Now she was here in small town Springwood, Ohio where the greatest cause to celebrate was when the 5-theatre Cineplex expanded to a ten theatre. Here in the house of a deceased murderer- okay, so that part was kind of cool.

The seventeen year old crossed her legs and carefully opened the bundle.

AH HA! She should have been much more scared. But somehow, not having a host of diseased rats leaping at her face made it much easier to stomach what the bundle of rags did contain.

Awesome. A grin slowly spread across her features.

A heavy faded brown leather glove...with knives for fingers. In her own hands...She remembered the kids at school telling her the elaborate and gory tales, each trying to outdo the other's. The craftsmanship that had been so carefully put into the construction of his instruments of torture. Fred Krueger's murder weapon in her very own hands. Evidence of years' worth of murders. So intriguing- just like a movie.

She shoved them in her pocket and tore up the stairs.

"Whoa Nelly! Is it that scary down there?" Her mother laughed, dusting off the DVD shelves.

"It's sweet down there. You know...year's worth of fascinating history." She said with a smug smile towards her mother's puzzled face, who had thought Lola had been terrified only moments ago. She lived to perplex her parents.

Lola couldn't settle down that night. She couldn't stop thinking about the glove stashed in her underwear drawer. All night she had examined it, weighing it, absentmindedly fingering the intricate hinges, the glinting blades...Her math assignment and the free verse she had to write in English long forgotten.

Smiling, she shuffled under the covers, blew a kiss towards a glamour webcam photo of Kurt, the beloved boyfriend, and snapped her eyes shut.

Wait. Hadn't she just drifted off to sleep?

Well then why was she walking alongside a graveyard? The very sight of graves chilled her to the marrow. Graves weren't just where the dead rested and the paranormal stalked. It brought killer zombies that lunged through clumps of dirt to be liberated and free to snack on people's innards. She was probably getting ideas from that Night of the Living Dead rip-off she and Kurt had watched on the Movie Channel...but she still didn't want to think about it. But of course, she was dreaming.

Just fabulous! I am having a bloody nightmare! Some blood-hungry zombie would jump out of his grave and eat her brains for lunch any moment.

She began singing out loud to put her mind off her worries. She was terrified. "Tainted Love...Oh oh oh oh tainted love. Now I know I've got to-run away, I've got to-get away..."

"Stop singing. You're awful." A deep and monstrously echoing voice bellowed from the shadows. It had to be a ghoul- you didn't need to take Horror Movies 101 to know that zombies couldn't talk. She was more scared of a pillow. True though, this ghoul had spice. She was totally off key.

"Touché. I guess I won't be auditioning for American Idol anytime soon."

"What?" The ghoul stepped out. But it wasn't a ghoul. It was...it was him. His body scarred with horrible burns. The brim of a fedora low on his face. Freddy Krueger...but how could that be? She didn't know exactly what he looked like...how could she dream him in such vivid detail?

Her breath caught in her throat. She recognized instantly, the four menacing blades he wore on his fingers. Playing around with that glove in the cellar must have infiltrated her mind with poisonous thoughts, now she was dreaming about him. Wicked. She could discover a decade's worth of secrets!

"Aren't you a little early this year, Santa Claus?" She spoke loudly to disguise the tremble in her voice. She knew it was a bad- very bad idea to sass the man up, but she couldn't help herself. Talking back to adults was a very bad habit for her. Especially her math teacher.

"Santa Claus?" Krueger demanded angrily.

"Well I only thought...I mean with the red and green sweater and all..." She gestured to the out of style sweater. "It's very festive."

"Do I need to wear a fucking goalie mask to get my point across?" He glowered.

She knew underneath her calm and collected front he could smell her fear. Could he read minds too? Could he know she was lying?

"Why am I here? Is this your lair?" She asked with an eyebrow poised. She could feel herself begin to quiver as he took a slow stride towards her, his blades poised at his side. Didn't dreams know to equip you with your own weapons? As she thought of the set of blades hidden in her drawers.

"No. That's where my boiler room comes in- but your biggest fear is...?"

It clicked. "Buried alive." She whispered, and cringed in fear when he nodded darkly, a sinister grin playing on his lips.

He pointed a knife to the shovel lying beside a dark, empty grave. The epitaph read:

REST IN HELL
LOLA CEP
1987-2004

"Bingo, bitch. That's what I plan on doing to you. Slicing you up just enough so you feel the life slowly draining from your body. Burying you alive while you die lying in your blood. Now run!" He cackled.

"I don't see the humour in that Mr. Krueger. I'm sorry."

Mr. Krueger? He could almost pass for a gentleman (almost).

"It's Freddy. And you'll remember my name- even in your death!" He lashed out towards her, his reflexes quick and swift-but hers quicker. She leaped backwards as he swung through midair.

"Temper, temper! Two words for you bucko: anger management. I'm serious Freddy. Dead freaking serious. We can be friends."

"What?" He snarled. But it was oddly amusing. It infuriated him that she wasn't screaming and crying, begging for him to spare her life while her skinny body shook in her see-through nightgown. Running, and tripping over her feet, sinking into quicksand. He loved the rush of power and testosterone he got when the kids cried out...made him feel so macho.

She stuck a hand out in a peace offering and he tore his blades across it.

"Ouch!" She reeled back. Only slight damage done. A spot of blood, a tiny cut that would hurt like hell if she got anything salty in it, but she was more angry now. Her frustration was beginning to show. "I've had hangnails that hurt more than that!" Yet why was she was provoking him? Surely he had anger issues much deeper than hers...

"Right."

"You know, I could help you. I could give you some wardrobe tips you'd never forget. I mean, I'm no Coco Chanel...the pants are okay for a man your age, but the shirt has got to go-"

"SHUT UP!" He roared and Lola jumped with fright.

"I-I'm sorry." She stuttered. Only something she did when she was beyond her ordinary frame of mind. "I j-just wanted to b-be friendly."

"W-well I-I d-don't!" He mimicked in a falsetto, strangely identical to Lola's.

"Look sir, let's start over, okay? Freddy? No hard feelings. Seriously. I'm Lola. Lola Cep and I really don't see why so many people live in fear of your destruction. Without the burn scars, you'd be a perfectly normal looking man. How old are you anyway?"

"I'm Freddy. Freddy I'm-going-to-rip-out-your intestines Krueger."

"T-that's...an interesting middle name." She forced a smile.

"You live in my home now. One of my playgrounds. Nancy's home. Jesses' home. Lori's. This is even better than I thought." Nancy, Lori, Jesse. Ex-lovers or mistresses?

"Nancy?"

"She is not an ex-lover." He scowled. "I killed her back in '87." He smiled as if the memory of her death gave him great pleasure.

"Jesse?"

"Well he…he got away." He trailed off, mumbling almost inaudibly and averting his eyes.

"Lori?"

"Fuck off with the questions!" Lori hmm, must have got away too.

"That's right. You lived in 1428 when you were alive too...can't blame you, I mean, it's a relatively nice house, great for settling down with a family-" She was cut off in mid- sentence when she felt something hard land on her chest, almost knocking the wind out of her. Freddy looked confused. It apparently wasn't his doing.

Then, she was awake. She peered into the wide yellow eyes of her cat christened Shadow, her fluffy mound of a black cat. He had jumped on her chest. It was enough to make a big enough impact to wake her up and in turn, save her life.

"Thank you, Shad," She whispered stroking his fur, "I was really making Krueger mad. Who knows how mutilated I would have been by now, huh?"

She could tell the cat didn't care, but she knew he would had Freddy gotten his claws into her.