Curse Strings

by Rebecca Regnier

  “Clear,” Garrett DeWitt said, and I turned to Fawn.

  “Hopefully that does the trick.”

  “It’ll turn around. Thank you,” Fawn said.

  Garrett DeWitt made several conversational gambits in Fawn’s direction, and then finally he’d exhausted his supply of ideas. He was a werewolf with puppy dog eyes around her, no question.

  We said our goodbyes and I walked out to my Jeep with DeWitt. It was good to do a story, to do something in my normal routine, but other than helping set the record straight, I’d spent the last few days continuing to hideout.

  Sam, my friends, Agnes—all of them tried to lift my spirits, and I tried to make them think they’d succeeded. But it wasn’t happening. Maybe it never would.

  “Marzie, I’ve got a proposal for you,” DeWitt said as he closed the back hatch.

  “Yeah, what’s that?” My campaign for a photographer had stopped cold lately; everything I’d been so passionate about seemed hollow now.

  “I’m going to stick around and give myself the job as the photographer for the Widow’s Bay Bureau of Your U.P. News.”

  “What?”

  “Yeah, I can control my shift here, sort of. There are packs here, that maybe someday, I could be a part of. And there’s, well, I, uh, I like the people here.”

  I knew people meant Fawn when it came to Garrett DeWitt.

  “Is this a job interview?”

  “I guess so. But honestly, you do great work. I don’t want to interfere with it. I’m staying, one way or another. If you’d rather I hired you a photographer that’s not me, I can do that instead.”

  “No, of course not, you do pretty good work too.”

  I was glad that he was staying. And I was glad that Widow’s Bay was here to provide solace for him. I could only imagine what it had been like, living as a werewolf alone. He had a tortured soul and now he was finally finding out it didn’t have to be that way.

  “This is a special place, with amazing people. I’m honored to try to find my place here. Just like you did. Also, I have a lot of food to replace, I uh, well wolf me, was the food burglar.”

  “Oh, wow, yeah, you really do need to stay. Grady will get you sorted out on that front.” I was also glad that DeLoof hadn’t taken my food burglar story seriously, or there might be another person I had to visit in jail.

  “I’m already a lot better. Except something about fish tacos, well, there’s been progress anyway.”

  It was good to see Widow’s Bay through Garrett’s eyes I decided. He was so relieved to be here, and it made me happy.

  “Welcome to the Your U.P. News Widow’s Bay Bureau then. I didn’t get you a cake or anything, but I do have one bit of advice, get used to people calling it Up Your News.”

  “Nice, I kind of like that better. Uh, Marzie, I’m going to hang back. I have a question for Fawn, you good to go?”

  “Yep, I think Justin will be happy with our coverage, catch you later. And remember, we’re on call twenty-four seven. You don’t want to make the owner mad.”

  DeWitt chuckled and gave me a nod.

  I had a photographer: that was something. I’d pushed so hard for that, and it had happened, though I wondered what it would be like to work side by side with the owner, who might randomly turn into a werewolf that wanted to kill me.

  Never a dull moment, I guess.

  It was dusk by the time I got home. I’d gone through the motions of my day. I was taking steps to try to shake myself out of the funk I was in. It was only minimally working.

  I walked in and Agnes greeted me.

  You need to switch out your black for some spring colors. You look funereal and I’m tired of it. And a little Miss Clairol wouldn’t be the worst thing for that skunk streak.

  “Agnes, I didn’t think you cared anymore.” It was the first time in days she’d unleashed a fashion consultation. I’d almost missed it.

  When the coach criticizes you, it is because she sees potential. Don’t ever forget it.

  “Thanks?” I walked into the kitchen and, for a moment, nothing was out of the ordinary. Sam and Joe sat head to head, looking over a magazine.

  And then it clicked in.

  “Joe!”

  Brule had kept Joe away from us for almost two weeks. I ran to him and he stood up and hugged me. He was more solid, cold, but still, it felt good to hug my son.

  “Hi Mom.”

  “Oh my gosh, are you okay? I’ve been worried sick.”

  “Literally bro, she’s been nuts.” I swatted Sam on the shoulder.

  “I’m good. It was weird, at first. But Etienne has helped me so much. I had a few nightmares, and stuff, but they’re gone. And I learned what agrees with me, and what doesn’t.”

  “So, we’re safe? You’re not going to rip out our throats,” Sam asked with a smile on his face.

  Joe shook his head no.

  “Beauty?” Sam was lightening the mood by being the same with his twin that he’d always been. The bond and language between them were intact, and eternal.

  I felt a weight lift off me, a little at least.

  “What do you think about this? The fire department has a night shift. I’m totally applying. I already talked to the Chief a few days ago. He said there’s even a night school training!” That brought up the other issue that had concerned me: daylight. My boy would never see daylight again. I winced at that thought.

  But then I looked at him.

  Joe’s eyes were bright and his face radiated optimism.

  “I think it’s a brilliant idea.” It was a brilliant idea, of course it was, because it came from my son!

  Joe had found a way to pursue his dream of being a firefighter, even in the face of whatever new challenges being a vampire would bring.

  It was classic Joe.

  “Hey, we’re going over the course catalog right now. And Brule said I could still eat, not because I have to, but because I want to, and I was thinking Sloppy Joe.”

  “Dude! Yes!” Sam sad, it had been a favorite when they were kids.

  “I know, right?”

  “Okay, you two finish up. I’ll go to the store and get the ingredients.”

  “Thanks!” Joe squeezed me again and sat next to his brother.

  “So, you’re going to have a six-pack and not need to work out for it, that’s just so unfair,” Sam said and they put their heads together, like they had when they were boys, and poured over the night class catalog.

  I walked out to my Jeep, feeling lighter, better, and maybe like the end of the world was a little farther off than I’d thought.

  Joe was very much Joe. And very alive, a different state a matter I supposed, but alive in all the ways that counted.

  And then I ran straight into Brule.

  “I trust you see; your Joe is still your Joe.”

  I looked at Brule with fresh eyes. He was still handsome, but there was something between us now.

  I was angry with him. I knew it was Brule who’d saved my son from a curse that I’d brought on us, but still. It was there. Things were different. I had miles to go to figure it all out.

  “He said you helped him.”

  “I will keep a close eye on him, to be sure he continues to develop in a healthy way.”

  “Healthy, and dead? Isn’t that an oxymoron?” I was mad, cruel even. I didn’t really like the way I sounded.

  “I am sorry you are still upset about what I did. But I did not want you to lose your son.”

  I nodded; I knew that was true. Brule stepped forward and put a hand on my shoulder.

  I stepped back. The complication of dating a vampire was one complication too many for me. My brain knew Brule had done what he could to save Joe, but my gut was still mad, distrustful, and just now willing to open up to him anymore.

  I could uncomplicate at least one part of my life.

  “I need some space. I appreciate you helping Joe, and I understand why you did it. But right now, well, I need a break.”


  “A break.”

  “Like Ross and Rachael, get it?”

  “No.”

  “Friends.”

  “You want us to be friends?”

  “No, like the show Friends, but yeah, I guess friends. I’m saying, I’m not going to be dating you anymore, or whatever we were doing.”

  “We were working toward a covenant of trust, commitment, and union, sanctified by binge-watching Queer Eye on Netflix.”

  “Yeah, that. We’re going to take a permanent break.”

  I broke away and continued to walk to my Jeep.

  “Marzenna, you may walk away from me, but you must not walk away from Widow’s Bay, or the pact of the witches.”

  I stopped and turned back.

  “I understand. This town needs all of us. My son now too, needs the ground here to be healthy or whatever you said. But I need to learn more. I was hasty with that curse and we paid for it. I know a lot less than I thought, and my powers are, well, more dangerous than I thought. Thank you for helping Joe. I have to go. We need ground beef and buns.”

  I was rambling, incoherent, and forgot to add that I also needed to get potato chips. The boys love potato chips with Sloppy Joe.

  I got in my Jeep and drove to the market.

  Brule didn’t follow me, or rather, didn’t show himself if he was following me.

  I sensed he was still watching me. But I didn’t see him. I never had.

  Chapter 21

  Things were relatively quiet. Sam helped around the house while Widow’s Bay and all of the Upper Peninsula prepared for the five seconds of summer owed us by Old Man Winter.

  I mean, it was a frozen wonderland for ten months of the year, but for a brief moment in July and August, Widow’s Bay was hot! Everyone was looking forward to it.

  Joe got into the night school firefighter program, which was no surprise. He mostly lived at Samhain, for now, so he could learn from Brule. But he was home enough, to check-in, to connect with his brother, and to assure me that he was okay.

  I kept raw meat in the oven, just in case.

  I stayed away from Brule, and he stayed away from me, as I asked him to.

  And there was the DLC. We had another festival to plan. The Benevolent Order of the Bucks, led by Ridge and Phillip Lockwood, had been relatively quiet in the wake of Beltane Bash.

  “They’re planning something, you can be sure,” Pauline warned us at the DLC meetings. And I didn’t doubt that she was right.

  Pauline and Candy had a new festival plan brewing. Fawn’s business had slowed but the animal patients were returning to the clinic. She was the best vet in town; it was inevitable even without my news story.

  Mario and Tatum had The Frog Toe running at full speed again.

  And Georgianne had been researching the history of Widow’s Bay, making sure she understood more about all our powers. She constantly tried to reassure me that I didn’t cause the attack on Joe, but I believed it was my fault.

  And nothing she said could change that.

  I hadn’t done one spell, flown on my broom, touched my wand, or even gazed into the cauldron since the moment we uncursed Weston Redman.

  I felt paralyzed with doubt.

  What if I was using my powers selfishly, even if I didn’t mean to. What if I chose the wrong spell?

  Did the magical ecosystem need me more than say, an average citizen or my own kids? Would I be spared because of it?

  Did one wrong word in a spell mean someone died? Or grew a third eye? Or any number of horrible things?

  I felt responsible for what happened to Joe, and I didn’t want to risk ever having it happen again.

  Everyone, including Joe pointed out that he was fine.

  Joe was doing okay, and Sam was thriving. All the people I loved were fine, just fine. And I didn’t want to be the reason they went off track. If I could just quietly tiptoe around magic, spells and curses, maybe I could keep things on an even keel.

  Finally, Aunt Dorothy had had enough.

  She came to the house, where I was moping around the den, for the millionth hour in a row.

  “This won’t do.”

  “What?” I pretended I was oblivious to her concern.

  “You sit in the back at DLC meetings, you bow out when spells are needed, for goodness sake that Heisenberg woman had had to step in multiple times for you!”

  “Let her have it, if she wants to be a witch so bad, let her see how it works.”

  Aunt Dorothy sat down next to me on the loveseat. And she took my hand in hers. Her skin was tissue-thin, but her fingers, her tendons, even her knuckles, were straight, and still strong.

  “Did you ever talk to your mother, about your powers?”

  “Uh, no, I mean sort of the opposite.”

  “She had this moment you’re having right now.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “She is nearly as powerful as you.” I found that revelation rather hard to believe. My mother did not like magic, or spirituality, or anything that she deemed, nonsense.

  “What happened?”

  “She was afraid, still is afraid I suspect, about what she can do. She had a spell go wrong, and a friend of hers was hurt. A tree actually fell on the poor girl.”

  “Oh my God. You’re convincing me that ending my magical journey is perhaps the best idea ever.”

  “No, it’s the opposite.”

  “Your mother’s mistake was to stop learning. She’d shunned the education I tried to provide. She refused to learn the meanings, the traditions, and she thought the DLC was old fashioned.”

  “How did the spell go wrong?”

  “Your mother tried to abolish the DLC, she set out a spell aimed at disbanding us. She thought if the group was gone, a lot of the magic and history would go with us.”

  “She tried to kill you?”

  “Heavens no, she isn’t a monster, she was trying to make everything normal. Or her version of it. Her spell caused a tree to come crashing down near where we were meeting, in the end I counter spelled it and we were okay.”

  “Would it have worked? If she knew what to do?”

  “You can ignore your powers, pretend they don’t exist, or like you move to the big city. But who you are doesn’t change, this denying of who you are, it turns you bitter, and also causes terrible frown lines.”

  I laughed at that; no wonder mom was addicted to injectables.

  “What happens to the Yooper Naturals, if I quit, surely they’re fine right? There are plenty of witches who can step in, Heisenberg isn’t the only one waiting in the wings.”

  “I don’t know for sure, what will happen. But I suspect Alvarado wins, eventually, if you’re not here to be The Liaison.”

  “I don’t want to leave. I want to make sure Widow’s Bay thrives, for the coven, and for my son, and everyone.”

  “I know.”

  “But I don’t feel it right now. I am insecure about how to be the witch I’m meant to be. Does that make sense?”

  “It does, and you can have some time to figure that out. I think you need you to take a walkabout.”

  “Isn’t that what they do in Australia or something?”

  “Yes.”

  “I don’t want to go to Australia, I’m just in a funk.”

  “No, your walkabout is going to be right here.”

  “What?”

  “You need time off work, time away from the boys, and even time away from the coven. Your powers are strong. Our need for you is great. But if you keep questioning yourself, and doubting yourself, you’ll be no better than Lottie when you get to be my age.”

  That was like a bucket of cold water on my head. I didn’t want to grow bitter or afraid or vengeful.

  “You’ll get in touch with the land, nature, our place in the universe. And you’ll come back stronger and ready to do your real job.” She didn’t mean reporting. I knew that.

  “I had Agnes pack you a bag. You’re leaving right now.”

  “But
, uh, what?”

  Aunt Dorothy stood up and led me outside to the front yard.

  “And look, I even hired you a trail guide.”

  Standing at his truck, with a broad smile and an outstretched hand, was Grady.

  “Come on, Marzie, let’s go camping! Your cat/dog Sherpa brought out your bag.”

  I looked at Aunt Dorothy.

  “He knows what to do. And so do you. A few days away, real sleep, fresh air. I promise, it’ll do wonders. Don’t worry. I’ll cook for Sam; he loves my breakfast casserole.”

  I walked to the truck, zombie-like. I wasn’t sure about this plan.

  “And Marzenna, understand, when you come back, you will be fully back. I will not tolerate this self-doubt one more second. Get it out of your system.”

  Aunt Dorothy was no longer an old woman at that moment. She was tall, commanding, and formidable. She was serious. And it was an order.

  “Yes ma’am.”

  “And I packed you some light reading,” Aunt Dorothy enfolded me in a hug, and then stepped back and walked up to my house. She didn’t look back. This was apparently non-negotiable.

  “Come on, witchy poo. Let’s go get your mojo back.”

  I didn’t know how camping in the U.P. was going to accomplish mojo re-acquisition.

  But I was tired, more than physically tired. I was sick of feeling like a failure.

  I was holding on tightly to the guilt that I’d cursed my own son when I’d cursed that jerk Weston Redman.

  I looked at Grady, with his easy smile, and seemingly clear vision of who he was and why he was in this world.

  I needed to bottle that. I shook my head and resigned myself to the fact that I was taking a little walkabout, like it or not.

  “Where to?”

  “I know a place that’s guilt trip free.” Grady smiled at me and put the truck in drive.

  I leaned my head on the window and watched the town fade behind me.

  It was time to look ahead. I took a deep breath.

  It was time to cut the curse strings.

  The Witch That Got Away

  As Grady drove us into the wilderness that both protected Widow’s Bay from the outside world and served as the perfect hiding place, I examined the book that Aunt Dorothy had given me.