The Talk

“You have no idea how fucked you are, do you?” Holly asked, her voice monotone, almost robotic.

Brad was expecting a lot of things from this conversation, but not that.

“Not really, no. I have no idea if any of this is even real or if it’s just a massive prank somehow.” He admitted, then continued, “but how is that going to be the first thing you say? Assuming this is real, I would think… wait, before I go on, what are you talking about?”

“The curse, dummy” She replied, voice barely audible over the restaurant.

“I just had to make sure.” He snapped back, “Maisie said it was a big secret which now that I say out loud sounds stupid, of course you know about it.”

Holly finally relaxed a little bit and smiled at Brad tripping over himself. She seemed to be choosing her next words carefully. Just as she was about to say something, the waitress came over and took their order. As they were ordering, Brad couldn’t help noticing that her old spark seemed to be back, confident and calm as ever. It was a stark difference from when she first arrived.

“Alright, I’m not here to go into every little detail about this. I’ll leave that for Maisie. I’m here to tell you the things she doesn’t know about it. Things I meant to tell her before she decided how to handle this. Before she decided to tell someone. Before anyone ever found out…” As she spoke, her confidence wavered and she got quiet. It was finally sinking in for Brad that not only was this real, but the amount of damage someone could do with it. Hell, the amount of damage he could do with it.

He let Holly sit silently for a few minutes then broke the tension, “Holly, you've got to trust me, if there’s shit I need to know, then tell me. I’m in way over my head with this but if I have to figure it out for myself, it’ll probably go south faster than it would otherwise.”

Holly let out a defeated sigh, “It wasn’t supposed to be this way. My family has been dealing with this bullshit for as long as anyone remembers now. Maisie and I, we had a plan, Brad. A plan you went and fucked up. Don’t you dare try to sit there and play the victim. No one was ever supposed to know. All she had to do was graduate and we’d get out of here. I’ve made enough with my career that we were going to fly to an island and never look back. But you’ll never let her do that now, will you?”

“Holy shit, Holly, hold on.” Brad was on the defensive, “I didn’t choose this. Hell, up until a few hours ago, I didn’t even know this was possible! What do you mean I’ll never let her? What makes you think she’d even listen to m...Oh…shit” Brad stopped as the full realization of what she had said and his new position hit him. He leaned back in his seat then spoke again, softer, “I see your point. But how would that have worked? Islands aren’t exactly ‘women only’. Plus, what career? You told everyone you were away at college.”

“OK, we’re off track here. I need you to shut up and listen because I’m not repeating any of this, ever. Got it?”

Brad decided it was time to figure out what the hell was going on, so he merely nodded.

“OK, the basics are for Maisie, but here’s the thing. The stupid bitch, witch, whatever, never intended for the curse to be used by someone who actually gave a shit about us. Why we got cursed in the first place is lost to time, but she was pissed. Every single one of our ancestors who tried to beat the curse by finding a decent man who ‘would never use it’ always ended in one of two ways. The first, the one the curse prefers, was the men they chose turned out to be just as shitty as you’d expect and abused the hell out of it. The second is more dangerous. The ones that succeeded in finding someone decent were lucky, for a few weeks, a month max. But after that, without fail, the men have ended up dead. Car crash, kicked by a horse, cancer at age 20, a fucking refrigerator falling onto them from a high rise. I don’t know if it was always this way or if it has somehow transformed, but the curse is basically a living entity that must be pleased at this point.”

Holly took a second to catch her breath, so Brad jumped in, “So what? Maisie sentenced me to **** without even realizing it?”

“If killing the one who knew about it beat the curse, believe me, you’d be dead already.” Brad was about to argue, but instead listened, “No. What happens next is always the same. The curse compels us to tell the worst person it can find. Someone who will never take any mercy on us for trying to trick it. But we found a way to appease it, sort of.”

Brad was quick to jump on anything that didn’t end in his ****. Just this morning he woke up wondering why he tormented himself by hanging out with the girl of his dreams he never had a chance with. Now, he was in complete control of her with no intention to take advantage of that fact. Well, until he found out that meant ****.

“The curse wants us to be punished, forever. It wasn’t us to be used, exactly the way your mind imagined when I just said that. But its power has weakened over the centuries. We can’t beat it. But my cousin thinks she found a way to compromise with it. I’ll tell you how, but only if you promise not to torment my sister.” Holly was back to being serious and determined.

“Alright, I promise” Brad said, not sure if he meant it or not.

“You have to use the curse. You have to make her do things she doesn’t want to. There’s no getting around that. But I swear on everything I am, I will kill you myself if you go too far.” Holly started gathering her belongings to leave.

“One more question”, Brad stopped her, “How would your island plan have worked? Surely someone has found out about you by now and wouldn’t let you go. I mean, you said the curse ran through all the women in your bloodline, right?”

There was a brief moment of what Brad thought was pure panic that ran across her face, barely perceptible, “Well, yeah, of course mine was found out. Stupid boy. Shut up and focus.” She got up and left leaving him to pay the bill after all.

Brad could hear the tension in her voice that made him think she wasn’t exactly telling the truth. Could it be she was still free and hiding her secret? Could he make use of that knowledge? He had more questions than answers but he was determined to find out.