A Witch's Curse

by Nicole Lee

  Rose was able to look past the domestically induced timidity within once and ask her mother why there were always so many ‘fathers’ entering and leaving every single week. Karen was washing dishes at the time, preparing to make her infamously terrible tuna and vinegar sandwiches. The weather channel was on mute in the corner.

  “Honey, life is too short to go through it without keeping your choices open. Trust me. You’ll know that one day.”

  “Why can’t you just go back and stay with Dad?”

  Not within a single second after this phrase was spoken, her mother unleashed the kind of angry scream that not even someone who was being caustically murdered could create. She began throwing plates, silverware, and spatula’s at the adjoining wall. They broke into fragments on the already dirty floor, before she turned around and positioned herself on her knees, getting closer to her child.

  “Your father is scum.”

  “That’s not true,” Rose said. “Damian is sweet.”

  “No one can ever utter condescension to me in any form. Understand?”

  “Mommy, I wasn’t trying to-”

  “Shut up. Go outside.”

  Rose walked into the backyard, already feeling the tears well up. Distant barks could be heard. She was handed a pail of water soon after that.

  “Go and hydrate Bill’s dogs.”

  “Who is he?”

  “Bill is a wonderful man who will be staying with us for the night. Now walk into their pen.”

  She felt herself pushed so hard that the shove almost pummeled her to the ground. Regaining her balance, she walked to the white gates, staring at two of the ugliest pit bulls she had ever lain eyes on. The front was unlatched by Hemera, who readily kicked her into the small and foreboding arena.

  The following ten minutes turned out to be a blurred repressed memory later on in her years, one swimming with pain and frustration at not being able to break out. It was far from being the animals fault that they were not properly trained to be civil towards kids, nor could the blame be put on them for digging their claws into her skin and tossing her around for being an intruder in their space. It was Karen’s doing.

  Once she was back inside of their house, she grunted and fell onto the floor. Her scratches and wounds, soon to be scars in due time, were still fresh and laced with injurious hurt.

  “You did a poor job,” her mother said. She was standing above Rose with both arms folded. “Now, get in the chimney.”

  “No! I promise I won’t do it again, I swear. I’ll call Dad a bad man every time if you want me too, just don’t make me-”

  “I said get in the chimney, Rose. Don’t question me. When I say to do something, you should do it without thinking.”

  Crying, feeling as if she was about to pass out from the agony, stress and heat, she walked over to the hearth, pushing the metal mesh covering out of the way, crawling into the coal dust covered space. Her mother pulled out a wand and spoke a few words calmly to herself.

  A barrier made of stone appeared before her, making escape from the fireplace impossible. Rose slammed her fists on it until welts formed.

  A few seconds passed before she then noticed the peep hole. Hemera’s eye was the first and only view she had when gazing through it.

  “Be sure to take small breaths, little one. There isn’t much air in there. I’ll leave you for a day or two. Now think about what you have done.”

  It was another two days of tending to her own wounds clumsily, starving, and dehydrating until she was let out.

  “Never tell anyone about this,” Hemera said the day she dropped her off at her Dad’s house. “Never.”

  Rose went screaming into Damian’s apartment.

  Back in the Bell’s house, Hemera seemed to slump only a little further down against the wall after hearing this story.

  “You don’t do things like that to a kid,” Rose said. “Magic can‘t even help me forget that memory, and believe me, I‘ve tried.”

  “Sometimes spoiled brats have that coming.”

  “You think I deserved it?”

  “I don’t think,” Hemera said. “I know. You almost ruined my life, Rose. You became a nuisance when I was well on my way to attaining that one thing every man, woman and child dreams about, the right to live as long as the heavens themselves.”

  Rose shook her head and then leveled her hand outwards. “There is no changing you. You will always be what you always have been. A delusional and narcissistic witch.”

  “What are you doing?”

  “Have another great time in the middle of nowhere, Mom.”

  Karen opened her mouth to shout something in defense, taking a step forward to physically retaliate. However, by then it was no use. Rose had already muttered the spell after closing her eyes for a quick second.

  By the time she opened them, Hemera was gone.

  She went back downstairs, peering over her shoulder every couple of seconds, despite how she knew no one would be there.

  “Rose,” Julia said triumphantly when seeing her, standing up and clapping her hands together enthusiastically. “Dinner is finally served. I know it’s getting late, but won’t you stay?”

  Rose could not think of anything to react with. She was too tired for that prospect to sound tempting. Her appetite was lost.

  “Actually Mom,” Grady said, sensing her disdain at the notion of being kept here any longer while wiping his hands discreetly on a napkin and throwing it on top of his plate, “-I think I better drive her home. SAT’s for the end of the semester are coming up. We’ve put off studying long enough.”

  They made their goodbyes after having a final toast.

  The four walked to the front. Rose stepped inside Grady’s vehicle and then checked the back seat to make sure no one was there. While pulling out of the driveway, she waved at his parents.

  “They’re nice,” she said when they were on the highway. “Maybe I will move in.”

  “Really?”

  “A few years from now,” she said.

  Rose could not bring herself to tell him the reason why it would have to wait. Moving in would be too unsafe with the way things were now.

  “Who’s to say I’ll live there that long from now? And by the way, was something wrong up there? Did you trip on something? We heard a lot of noise, and you were gone a while.”

  “No,” Rose said, smiling as she gazed out the window. “Everything’s fine.”

  She wanted to end that sentence with the words right now.

  THE END