Xmas Spirit by Tonya Hurley Page A

to trick this stalker chick who follows them around into something crazy. She’ll probably do it just for a chance to get in good with them and my sister. I hope she doesn’t fall for it, but if she does, it will be her funeral. Exactly what she deserves.”
    “Harsh,” Prue noted.
    Scarlet’s opinion of Charlotte hurt her deeply.
    “I want to go home,” Charlotte said, tears beginning to flow. “Please!”
    “Whatever you say,” Prue agreed, sure she’d finally made the desired impression on Charlotte.
    They returned to Charlotte’s house.
    “Are you through?” Charlotte asked, gathering herself. “Because like I said, I have some shopping to do for my friend, and it’s getting late.”
    “Friend? What friend? Didn’t any of that get through to you? We’re your friends, Charlotte.”
    “All that will change once they get to know me.”
    It was apparent that the longer Charlotte stayed, the harder it would become to convince her to come back.
    Prue literally felt like she was talking to a stranger.
    “I hate to break it to you but nothing has changed for them, only for you. You might feel closer to Scarlet, Petula, and The Wendys, or even loverboy Damen, but you are still invisible to them. It was ghostgirl who changed them, who knows them, not Charlotte.”
    “Not true! Damen spoke to me on the street yesterday, and The Wendys have even invited me to sign a Christmas card for Petula. My name right under theirs!”
    “Don’t you remember how it was?” Prue explained. “You’ve told me the stories so many times I know them by heart.”
    “Yeah, well, that was then.”
    “No, actually, it’s now, Charlotte. This is then. Don’t you see? By coming back, you’ve undone everything.”
    “Well, good, because a lot of things needed undoing,” Charlotte sniffed.
    “I can’t believe it. You made so much progress. We all did,” Prue said, throwing her hands in the air in frustration.
    “It depends on how you define progress, I guess. I get a do-over and I’m not going to screw it up.”
    “They are mean and petty, Charlotte. They victimized you for your entire life. Hardly worth everything you did for them, let alone what you are doing now.”
    “They are good people, Prue, no matter what you say,” Charlotte said snottily, checking herself out in the hall mirror. “I know they are.”
    “This is worse than Virginia said,” Prue griped. “You are totally regressing. Caught up. It’s consuming you.”
    “You’re just jealous that I’m alive and you’re not. Maybe that’s why your eyes are so green,” Charlotte quipped, running her hands all over her face, arms, and legs. “Body envy!”
    The hurt in Prue’s eyes was obvious and Charlotte felt bad about saying something so insensitive, but she resented being criticized, being called out on her fantasies. Prue was tempted to spill everything. To explain to Charlotte how much her return to Hawthorne could mean for them all, the people she loved, or did once. But Prue remembered what Mr. Brain said and decided to go another route, one that might yield better results.
    “What about Eric?” Prue asked. “Are you willing to just write him off?”
    “Eric? I don’t see him anywhere. Do you?”
    This time the visible hurt was in Charlotte’s eyes. Prue’s tone softened. You get more bees with honey , she kept telling herself. Trying to stop herself from strangling Charlotte with her own two ghostly hands. “It was just a lover’s quarrel. Not something to change your whole death over.”
    “Not for you, maybe,” Charlotte argued as she headed for the front door. “But as far as I’m concerned, Eric is dead to me. You all are!”
    “You realize, since you are now alive, I could kill you?” Prue said, her voice trembling in anger.
    “And you realize that since you are dead, you can’t kill me? Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have some shopping to do,” Charlotte said, quivering in fear as Prue’s eyes turned to a fiery