The Superstitious Romance

by Anastasia Alexander

  This memory remained in her mind as she sat up in bed. Dreaming about it last night left a desperate quality, not like the real event. In her dream she felt panicky, her heart raced, and a tremble went through her. She lacked the calm composure she’d had in reality. She struggled to block the dream and the desire to sob. It was then she grew cold, very cold. She tugged on her blanket to pull it up around her, but the quilt barely moved. Her eyes adjusting to the early dawn, she detected something lying at the end of the bed. The shadow moved and gave a faint sigh. The sigh was short and light like a kitten purring, giving a familiar feeling of happy days gone by. Her shoulders slumped in relief. Darlene.

  Camille slipped her stiff legs out of bed, the icy floor teasing her feet. Hopping onto the braided rug in the middle of the room, she paused to release a deep breath, fogging the air. “Geez, it’s cold,” she muttered, sliding the thermostat to ninety on her way out. The cabin’s chill wrapped around her as she flipped on the hall light. What she needed was a fire. She had never made one, but it couldn’t be too hard.

  Before worrying about that, she strolled to the window. Dawn struggled to break through the thick mist that swarmed over the vegetation. As she watched, letting the tranquil environment soothe the raw pain of the nightmare, someone suddenly slipped from the fog, the person still far enough way that she saw no distinctive features. The form approached swiftly, and soon Camille could detect that the early morning walker carried something long and slender. It could be a cane, a stick, or a . . . a . . . hatchet.

  She didn’t stay in front of the window to discover what it was. Instead she got into her jeans and flannel shirt, scrubbed a toothbrush over her teeth, and pulled a comb through her hair. That done, she hustled to start the fire. Unfortunately, the wood box was empty. She hurried outside, the dying, hip-high weeds depositing dew on her pants as she passed by on her way to the wood stack.

  She halted her pace, spying a man standing next to the log pile, whistling. Jackson, the man from the day before. Camille folded her arms neatly over her chest, approaching him. Today Jackson wore a cap and had at least two days’ growth of stubble on his face, giving him a wild, hardy appearance. She suspected the roughness would dissolve almost completely with a good shave. His firm, square jaw told of decisiveness and strength, yet his full cheeks hinted of vulnerability. His eyes, a deep chocolate color, showed a kind of hurt—or was it coldness? He possessed an attractiveness she couldn’t understand, but he didn’t appear to have an intellect she could admire.

  “Good mornin’.” His voice rang out like a brass bell. “I just came to chop yer wood. I noticed the stack was low last night.”

  She nodded, lifting a few logs in her arms, and then sensed her actions might be taken as rude. “I appreciate your offer, but you don’t need to bother. We’ve got it all under control.”

  “That’s all right, ma’am.” He put a log onto the chopping block. “This is what I’m paid for.”

  She glanced at his square stubborn chin. There was no use fighting him. She could see that right off. She gave up and started for the cabin, her arms heavy with logs.

  “Let me get that for you.” He rested the hatchet against the remaining stack.

  She resisted, not wanting to depend on any man again for anything, especially not a man that attractive. “No, that’s quite all right. I’m building a fire.”

  “I’ll do it for you.” He reached for the logs in her hands.

  She adjusted the logs, keeping hold of them, and was going to say, “No thanks,” but instead a short stifled yelp slipped out as a sliver shot deep into her index finger.

  “Are you all right?” he asked.

  She automatically stepped back, seeing worry on his face—or maybe curiosity. “Fine.” Balancing the logs, she dashed for the back door, which she fumbled to open as she felt the weight of his deep brown eyes. Heat rushed to her face. She gave an extra tug on the doorknob, and a log slipped from her arms, falling squarely on the upper part of her foot. She gasped, hobbled over the log, and shut the cabin door to suffer the pain in privacy. Soon afterwards, she dragged herself into the living room, wondering if Jackson would watch for smoke to come out of the chimney. If so, she aimed to quench any doubt he might harbor of her inadequacies.

  It didn’t take her long to lay the logs in a closely stacked pile and form a pyramid design inside the grating. She found the three remaining matches. The first broke while striking it against the stones of the fireplace. The second took two tries to ignite, but the flame disappeared as fast as it ignited. Camille held up the last match and considered using lighter fluid. Grabbing her sweater, she headed to the garage to search for some. A brutally cold gust of wind greeted her, followed by the dust of the garage. She fumbled through dirty bottles, fishing poles, and old shoes. Wiping the muck from her fingers, she eyed a plastic bottle on top of a cabinet in the far corner. She climbed the shelf, disturbing the stale dust covering everything. Her nose twitched with a sneeze. She scrunched her nose and held the sneeze in as her grasp tightened on the shelf.

  The next thing she knew, she was on the floor, the rotting shelf having given way when she sneezed. Checking to see if she had injured herself, she thought of her son Richard’s comment about calling tomorrow to see if he needed to fly out. She sighed. He had once admired his mother, proud of her ability to take on those “Big wind-bags,” as he called her colleagues. Camille liked making her courses more interactive, cross-disciplinary, and hands-on, but doing so had caused a lot of static in the department. Every time Camille stood up for her ideas, she’d tell her son, loving to see his pride in his strong-willed mom.

  This had changed since the divorce. She felt rejected. Disposed of. Disillusioned. How could she continue? Was her success as a teacher and mother an illusion also?

  She brushed dust from her hands. Now even Richard, her former supporter, doubted her. He was becoming like Adam. She bit her lower lip. Just like his father! In fact, before Adam left, he made sure she knew how he regarded her. “You’re weak, and that revolts me,” he’d said. She remembered that moment well. She had gathered his clothes, thrown them on the floor, and sat on top of the pile like an angry queen bee. When Adam pulled his pants from under her, she frantically grabbed a shirt and clutched it. Adam stared at her with empty eyes, cocking his chin to the left, saying nothing.

  He tossed his pants to the floor with such an air of disgust: lips drawn tight and straight, his mustache forming a line above his thin lips, his circular eyes narrowed into dark brewing clouds, and his cheeks puffed into two huge sour balls. Camille knew this horrid image would never leave her. He, however, did leave. He stood there, letting his disgust seep into her before turning away from her and the pile and slipping out the side door, never to return.

  His sickened response to her desperate childish reaction to clutch onto all they had built, all they had shared, all the promised potential, made her realize Adam did not know her. He didn’t have the faintest flicker of understanding. He may have lived with her for twenty-six years, but he reeked of ignorance. He had committed the fatal flaw of thinking her love was a weakness. Someday Adam would understand that she was strong, sturdy, and most of all, tenacious. Then the regret and realization of what he had done would hit him. To prove her self-reliance, she had come to the wilderness. The first test of her ability to survive on her own would be to build a fire. She already had two strikes against her—dropping a log on her foot and falling from a shelf made two accidents. Superstition again. One more self-wounding injury to go; accidents always came in threes. She hoped she’d get the third one over soon and that it wouldn’t be too painful. She wiped her dusty hands on her pant leg and stood when the garage side door opened. Camille didn’t have to look to know Jackson filled the doorway.

  “I heard a crash,” his deep voice boomed. “Everything all right?”

  “No problems,” she muttered as she climbed a sturdy shelf. She snatched the lighter fluid and hurried by this nosy neighbor at wh
om she wanted to shout, “Go away!” She almost made it to the cabin when she noticed that she hadn’t grabbed lighter fluid after all; it was brake fluid. The thought of returning to the garage to face Jackson’s amused eyes made her flush. She charged on to find she had to tug on the back door again to get inside. Hoping that he had in fact left, she gave an extra firm push. To her horror, as the door swung open, a brown squirrel bumped against her leg and headed straight into the cabin. “Oh, no you don’t!” she yelled at the animal, hobbling after him. “Get out of here, you disease-spreading rodent.”

  “What in Hades is going on here?”

  She turned to see her daughter’s sleep-droopy eyes and tousled hair. “Help me get this squirrel out of here fast,” Camille said.

  “What?”

  “A squirrel’s in the living room,” she said. “Help me chase it out.”

  “No way.”

  “Darlene.”

  “No. That’s gross. You do it.”

  “Come with me then,” Camille said. “And I mean it. No lip. We have to get it out of here or I’ll never be able to concentrate on my book. It’s like living with a mouse. I’ll go absolutely crazy.”

  “I know, Mom. We’ve done that before. Remember?” She followed her mother into the living room. “You screamed at all times of the day, whenever he decided to . . .”

  The squirrel was perched on the couch, his eyes focused. It took several seconds before the shock wore off Darlene and she screamed loud and full. The creature darted behind the couch.

  “Get a broom,” Camille said. Darlene hurried into the kitchen while Camille tried to coax confidence into herself, fast. She felt as if there were a hidden camera watching her, betraying her every step to Richard and Adam and perhaps that Jackson guy. She wouldn’t prove them right.

  Her heart pounded loud, rapid, and strong as she peeked under the couches and chairs, filled with fear that the squirrel would latch onto her face any second. It didn’t take long for her to find the creature hiding beneath the plaid couch along the south wall. The beady eyes of the squirrel darted around in acute awareness of the danger surrounding him. Camille’s eyes connected with the creature’s for a brief, unnerving second. She stifled a scream, fighting her revulsion. Immediately she set to work building a barricade with the moving boxes, but unfortunately, all that served to do was give the squirrel an obstacle course to exercise in. He made it through the obstacles and darted straight behind the refrigerator.

  “It’ll chew the wires and start a fire,” Camille said to Darlene, straining to move the brown refrigerator. “Help me.”

  “Move away,” Darlene said. “Let muscle woman go to work.” She flexed her biceps, grabbed the appliance, and rocked it from the wall. The squirrel ran for the space between the oven and the cupboard. Darlene flexed once more and moved the stove, only to have the squirrel dash upstairs.

  “Our rooms!” Darlene yelled.

  Camille sat on the dining room bench and asked, “What can he hurt up there?”

  “I don’t want to share my bed.”

  “I say we give up until we get back from the store,” Camille said. “We can ask how to get rid of it there. All we’re doing now is making a big mess.” They looked around the place, scattered with boxes, clothes, pans, and the out-of-place oven and refrigerator. Darlene slumped onto the stairs. Camille hunted for the last match. She held it up. “Ready for the toasty fire?”

  “More than ever.”

  Camille struck the match, and after three tries it flared. The fire raged on top of the log but died once the paper vanished.

  Both of them groaned. “We’ll go to the store for lighter fluid and matches after breakfast.” Camille forced cheer into her words, rummaged through the boxes until she found the oatmeal. “You can go back to sleep if you like, dear.”

  “Why don’t you get that guy Jackson to come and make us a fire? I bet he could fix the broken heater, too.”

  Nervous tension flushed through Camille. “We know nothing about him. Besides, I can do it myself. So what’s the verdict? Bed or store?”

  “Go for a walk to the cabin a little ways down from here and ask for help.”

  “Enough of that.” Camille took a long breath before asking, “Bed or store?”

  “I want to see what a country store is like,” Darlene answered.

  “You want adventure, do you?” Camille arched her eyebrows, relieved to change the subject.

  Darlene laughed. “Anything will be an adventure if I’m in the same state as you on Halloween or Friday the Thirteenth. Lucky me gets to have both holidays less than two weeks apart.”

  “So you do know about that?”

  “How could I not know with Richard raving on as he does,” Darlene said.

  “Richard.” Camille sighed. “Sometimes he worries me.” Her efforts to scoot the stove toward the wall failed, even with Darlene jumping up to help her.

  When they finished, Camille ushered her daughter away, knowing how long it took her to get ready. Camille would have breakfast cooked before Darlene was halfway done. She placed a pot of water on the stove, glad that it was electric, and decided to start the fire by lighting a paper with the stove burner. Shaking her head in dismay, she wondered why she hadn’t thought of it before. She blackened several pieces of paper, but each spark died without producing a flame. She twisted more paper and put it against the burner. Still nothing. Maybe the dampness of the wood prevented a fire from starting. She set the logs out along the hearth to dry.

  Darlene came out of the bathroom with a tube of foundation in her hand. “Mom, why is thirteen considered unlucky?”

  “People say it’s ’cause there were thirteen people present at the Last Supper. But the fear of thirteen was around long before that. Romans believed it symbolized death, destruction, and misfortune.”

  “What does the Friday have to do with it?” Darlene asked.

  “I’m not sure. All I could learn about it was that Friday, May Thirteenth, was the worst day to get married.”

  Darlene returned to caking on her makeup, and Camille searched for a loaf of bread. She should’ve taken more care in her packing, but this temporary move had come on quickly. The day she decided to go to Island Park was the same day her friend Oriana had called to offer the cabin, rent already paid. Camille had protested, but Oriana’s daughter was pregnant, and the doctors had discovered a serious birth defect. Oriana and her husband felt they needed to stay with her. Oriana had begged Camille on the other end of the line. “Please, Camille, use the cabin. I’d like to think something good came out of this.”

  “What do you mean?” she had asked with a stifled, confused voice.

  “You need time away. You’re on sabbatical to finish your book anyway. It’ll be healing for you. Just think of this as your opportunity to become the person you’ve always wanted to be.”

  Then and there she sealed her fate for the next two months.

  “Mom?”

  “Hmm?”

  “Wouldn’t the fact that witch covens always have thirteen people be another reason for the unluckiness of the number?”

  Why didn’t Darlene stop with these questions? “Maybe. Breakfast is ready.”

  After the prayer, they poured milk into gooey oats. Camille ate several bites before noticing her daughter studying a spoonful of steamy cereal. “What are you doing?”

  “Looking at the black specs floating on top.”

  “What?”

  “I swear, there’s a weevil lounging next to my oat.”

  Camille spat the cereal onto the table, pulling her bowl closer for inspection and finding brownish dots lying against several of her oats. Bolting up, she said, “Gross, they are weevils!” She dumped her bowl in the sink and gagged as she splashed a handful of water into her mouth.

  Darlene burst into laughter.

  “It’s not funny!” Camille’s protest was emphasized by the ringing of the phone.

  Darlene picked up the phone, saying, “Ah, Mo
m, it’s just protein. Hello,” she said into the receiver, grabbing the pot. “Oh, my heck! There’s thousands of them! Mom, didn’t you notice?”

  Camille stared blankly at her daughter. “I—I don’t know. I must not have been looking.”

  “What? Oh, Mom made breakfast with weevils added for spice.” Darlene peered into the cereal box. “Gross! They’re crawling all over the place! How old is this cereal?”

  Richard was on the other end, Camille realized, feeling like a deflating, worn-down, used tire.

  “Sick!” Darlene shuddered. “They might crawl out of the box. What if they get into our other food?”

  “Throw it away outside,” Camille mumbled.

  “Think it’ll attract bears? I heard somewhere bears are attracted to any food left outside.”

  “I don’t know,” Camille said, slapping the table. “Which do you want? Weevils in your food or bears in the trash?”

  “Mom!”

  “Well?”

  “The bears. I always wanted to see one in the open.”

  Camille grabbed the cereal box with the tips of her forefinger and thumb and rushed toward the door, leaving her daughter’s excited chatting behind. She hustled toward the garage, the fresh wind gently brushing past her as she scanned the yard for Jackson. Nothing but trees, weeds, and clouds. He must have finished chopping the wood and gone home by now.

  “Good,” she said.

  Halfway around the back, she paused and listened. Nothing. Where was nature’s music? The rippling of water splashing onto the shore? The pleasant chirp of the birds? Maybe there was another squirrel lurking behind a tree waiting to attack. It had seen the success of its family member, enjoying the comforts of a freezing cabin, stocking up on crunchy weevils.