Denise Swank: The Curse Keepers

I jerked upright, suppressing a groan. “ What ? No!” Holding up my hands, I shook my head. “Nothing like that happened. I just wondered if perhaps you felt a little short of breath.”

The older woman placed her hand over her heart, her chest rising and falling in short pants. “I didn’t this afternoon, but now I am. What were we exposed to?”

I shook my head again. “No! You weren’t exposed to anything! It was nothing. I had an asthma attack is all. It must have been the pollen.” My smile was now cemented onto my face.

The woman’s shoulders slumped in relief. “Well, why didn’t you say so?”

Myra approached from behind and placed her hand on my shoulder. “How are you doing this evening, Mr. and Mrs. Crabtree? I see you’ve met my daughter, Ellie.”

They gaped in surprise. Myra was second-generation Chinese, and you couldn’t find anyone more Caucasian looking than me—fair complected, freckles on my nose, and long dark red hair. Some days Myra was ornery enough to let the guests puzzle it out. This must have been one of those days. “So where are you two planning to go for dinner?”

Mr. and Mrs. Crabtree were still trying to figure out our genetics.

“If you’re looking for seafood, I highly recommend the Carter House on Highway 10, headed toward Nags Head. Their own employees often catch some of the seafood they serve.”

“Is that so?” the man asked, squinting from me to Myra. It was obvious they wanted to ask about us, but politely refrained. “Sounds good.”

Myra took a step backward toward the office. “If you’ll excuse us, Ellie and I have something we need to attend to.”

They waved us aside, and I cringed. Was I in trouble? Myra usually understood when I was late.

She led me to the small office and lowered her voice. “You and I both know you’ve never had an asthma attack in your life. What’s going on?”

Leaning into the door frame, I screwed up my face and gave a half shrug. “It was nothing.” I paused. “How’s Daddy today?”

Her eyes narrowed in suspicion as she studied me. Then she shook her head and smiled. “He’s better today, actually. He was asking about you.”

I forced another smile. I’d done quite a bit of that in the last few hours. “It looks like things are under control here. How about I go fold towels and talk to Daddy?”

Myra knew I was up to something, but Daddy’s good days were fewer and far between so it was hard for her to call me on it. “I left him in the screen-in porch. He was watching the neighbor’s dogs.”

“Thanks, Myra.” I kissed her on the cheek and spun around.

“Ellie…”

I turned around, surprised at the worry in her voice.

“You know you can talk to me about anything, right?”

I smiled again, and this time it was genuine. “Of course, Myra. And I love you for that.” I gave her another quick kiss and bolted out the back door before she could ask any more questions. Myra knew about the curse, but Daddy had the answers I needed.

I walked across the yard to the main house and grabbed two baskets of bath towels from the laundry room, carrying them through the living area to the porch off the front of the house. Daddy sat in a rocking chair, staring out toward the sound. You couldn’t see it from here, but we were close enough that you could smell the salty air and feel the breeze.

“Hey, Daddy.” I sat in the chair next to his, dropping the baskets in front of me with a loud thud.

He turned to face me, his gaze wavering before it cleared. A smile lifted his mouth. “Hey, Elliphant.”

Tears burned my eyes. He hadn’t called me that in weeks. He hadn’t recognized me at all in days. “I miss you.”

His eyebrows arched in surprise. “Did you go somewhere?”

I suppressed a groan, annoyed with my stupidity. Making comments like that only confused him. “No, Daddy. I’ve just been so busy I haven’t had time to stop by and see you in a few days.” Which was a lie. I’d seen him every day for the last six weeks.

He sat back in his chair and rocked. “Oh.”

The soft rhythmic creak of his chair filled the space around us, and I leaned my head against the wood slats of the rocker, closing my eyes. Nostalgia washed over me, hot and sweet. Funny, the more you want things to stay the same, the more they change.

“How’s the New Moon?”

My eyes flew open, and I sat up. Daddy was having a really lucid day. “Oh, you know. It’s a job.”

“I told you that you should have gone into archaeology like your mother.” He winked. “Then you could play in the dirt for a living.”

I nearly burst into tears. I used to spend hours playing in the dirt when I was a little girl, before my mother died, digging for the Lost Colony of Roanoke. I was sure that Momma and the rangers at the visitor center had it wrong. The colony was probably in my own backyard, even though Daddy used to tell me that I could dig to China and never find it. Daddy hadn’t mentioned the memory in years.

“Daddy, I need to ask you about the curse.”

His chair stopped, and his hands tightened on the edges of the curved arms.

“I’ve forgotten how the curse is broken. Can you remind me about that part?”

His rocking resumed, and he focused on the dogs playing in the yard. “I thought you gave up on that nonsense years ago.”

His words pierced my heart. I had given up on the nonsense years ago, but the curse was his entire life, his legacy passed down to me. If I had only known how little time I’d have left with him, the real him and not the shell of him I saw every day, I wouldn’t have been so callous about dismissing his stories as nonsense. I would have at least pretended.

“You felt it too,” he whispered.

My heart jolted as my breath caught. “Felt what?” I whispered back, terrified of his answer.

“It opened. I thought I’d dreamed it.” His face turned to me, fear in his eyes. “It happened.”

The hair on the back of my neck stood on end. While Daddy never doubted the curse’s existence, he’d never once claimed that it had broken. I pushed aside my terror and patted his hand. “Don’t be silly, Daddy. That curse has held for well over four hundred years. Why would it break now?”

Confusion flickered in his eyes again. “The two Keepers would have had to have met.”

Oh, shit on a brick. I had trouble catching my breath, but this time not from possible supernatural causes.

His eyes bore into mine, more lucid than I’d seen him in months. “Did you meet the other Keeper today?”

I snatched a towel out of the basket and started folding. “How in the world would I know? We don’t even know that there still is another Keeper, let alone what he looks like.” My mind backtracked to the few memories I had. “Besides, even if I had, how would that break the curse?” I fisted my hand to hide the mark.

“You would have to touch the other Keeper.”

The towel in my hand shook.

“Did you touch the other Keeper?”

“How would I know?” But my defensive tone gave me away.

Excitement filled his eyes. “Who was it? A man or woman?”

“Daddy… we don’t even know…”

“Ellie.”

I took a deep breath and bit my tongue before I blurted out this is crazy . “Man.” I turned my attention to the next towel.

“Old, young… Did he look Native American?”

I folded my hands on the towel on my lap, avoiding eye contact with Daddy. “Man, young. About my age. It’s hard to say if he was Native American. He had dark hair and eyes, but you know the Lumbee Indians are so integrated with Caucasians and African-Americans that you can’t always tell.”

“Do you think he was Lumbee?”