Carly, Born 1979 in Chapel Hill, North Carolina

Carly had been living as a single parent with her three daughters for nearly a year now. Though she had obviously never told any of them, they had all come from unintended pregnancies, and none of the relationships she'd had from their three respective fathers had lasted.

Melanie was the oldest, currently nineteen and home from University for the summer. Her father Micheal, Carly's childhood sweetheart, had been a decent enough guy but she had become pregnant with Melanie when she was only sixteen and given birth to her aged seventeen. Micheal had done the honourable thing and married her a year later, but they didn't have much in common and, before long, Carly was thoroughly bored in a loveless marriage and found herself swept off her feet by an academic from the West Coast, several years older than her, who was temporarily based in North Carolina for some research project or other.

They had an affair which lasted long enough for her to become pregnant with a second daughter, Ellie, who was by now sixteen and a highly gifted student. Knowing that the pregnancy couldn't have been his, such was the state of his sex life with Carly at the time, Michael left, though her and Carly never technically divorced and she and her three daughters still carried his surname.

Naturally Ellie's fathers career came first, and he moved out west again when his research took him back there, leaving Carly as a single parent for the next several years, with the occasional boyfriend or fling but nothing too serious. One of those flings was Matthew, a local dead beat, drunk and low level criminal who Carly nonetheless had intense sexually chemistry with. Inevitably she became pregnant again and Kylie was born. Kylie was now nine years old, an angelic looking child with a personality to match. She was sweet, loving and well mannered and doted on by her two older sisters.

Ironically, out of all of the three Janus girls parents, it was Matthew who stuck around the longest. His relationship with Carly was tumultuous and at time abusive, but while Melanie, Ellie and Carly's sister Mary all hated him, he was able to keep up the appearance of being a good father and loving husband in the eyes of Kylie. He was also a decent provider, even if Carly preferred not to ask where he got his money from. But eventually, after one he initiated one drunken fight too many, Carly threw him out.

Matthew did not take this well, making numerous threats against Carly and her two older daughters, as well as turning up drunk with a baseball bat at her place on more than one occasion. The police considered it a domestic dispute they didn't need to intervene in, and the matter only ended when, with Matthew having brought Holly and Maisie into the list of people he was making threats again, their normally mild mannered father John knocked him out cold.

After that he disappeared from the scene for a while. So it was an unpleasant shock when Carly had found him on her doorstep that evening, He was sober at least, but the sinister grin on his face told her this was going to be bad.

"Hello Carly, mind if I come in?"

"No Matthew, I have nothing to say to you" she folded her arms and tried to look assertive.

"Oh, I think you're going to be very interested in what I have to say actually" Matthew insisted smugly "You see, I found out all about your curse"

Carly immediately looked like she was about to pass out, which caused Matthew to laugh with delight.

"Fuck me, your face! So it is real!" he taunted her gleefully "Let's try it out though to be sure. Carly go bald"

Carly's hair instantly fell out. All of it. Matthew was now ecstatic with the possibilities for **** that were open to him.

"Mom, is everything alright?" Melanie called from upstairs.

"Carly, tell her everything is fine" Matthew whispered with a smirk.

"Yeah, everything is fine Mel, just get back to whatever you were doing!" Carly called back up the steps.

"This is going to be such a blast" Matthew rubbed his hands theatrically "All those times you made me suffer, now you are going to know exactly what that felt like"

"You really want Kylie to see her Daddy doing that to her Mom?" Carly asked, hoping the man could see some reason.

"She won't mind" Matthew insisted "Carly, from now on whenever any of your daughters see me using your curse on you, they will think you deserved it, and have no sympathy for you at all"

Carly took a deep breath on hearing this. That was low, even for Matthew.

"And what about when someone else calls the cops? You can only control me, not my sister, or John, or the neighbours. And whether or not you make them all think I deserve it, that still won't save you from heading back to jail"

"You'll make sure nobody says anything, because if they do and I end up back in the slammer, I'll tell one of my prison buddies about Melanie's curse. You meet some people with some pretty sick fucking minds in those places, I can tell you, and what they wouldn't do to a pretty nineteen year old like that once they get out. And I'll make sure to reveal her secret to someone who will be leaving there very soon"

"Okay, fine" Carly panicked "Just leave Mel out of it. I'll make sure you don't get in any trouble. Just do whatever the fuck it is you want to do to me"

"Oh, don't worry" Matthew sneered "I fully intend to"