Black Hollow: One Man's Curse

by Jennifer Wedmore

  Raven paused with half the stack of notebooks in her arms, “Oh! You haven’t ever been introduced to the ghosts who reside here. Hold on, I will fix that.”

  Derrick watched her walk to the center of the room in the middle of his family. “Good morning everyone. I wanted to introduce you all to Matt, Jessup and Reggie.” She nodded her head at the ghosts floating above their heads. “They helped get the books onto the tables and gathered ones they think will help us.”

  From the right side of the room a voice called out “Why haven't they ever helped us before?”

  Derrick watched as one of the ghosts floated down to Raven, they had what appeared to be a conversation and she turned back to the family. “They have tried but you all aren’t really receptive to ghosts so you can’t hear them. Yelling at them, just upsets them and they ignore you. Except Jessup who is likely to play a prank or throw something at you.” Raven turned to look at him directly now, “By the way Derrick, Jessup is still upset with you… so beware.”

  Raven just smiled and started passing out the notebooks and pens to everyone. He grabbed the other half and started on the other side of the room.

  Twelve

  Raven was thrilled to have this many eyes going through the books, maybe together they could find something. If her cousin got her the book soon, it would be a big help. Raven realized she hadn’t told Derrick about the book yet, she spun around to tell him and ran right into him. His arms came up to catch her and her hands were caught between them. Her palms were flush against his chest and she could feel his heart racing. Was being this close to her causing it or just the excitement of possibly finding a cure?

  Raven stared into his eyes and forgot what she was going to say. Thankfully he was still capable of thought, his brain wasn’t mush yet. Raven winced when she realized what she had been thinking. Brains, Zombies, Mush... she started out generalizing based on what he was then referenced the curse. Stupid!

  “What was that look for, did I hurt you, it was an automatic reaction to grab you, so you didn’t fall.” Derrick looked worried and Raven didn’t want him to get the wrong idea.

  “No, No! You are fine, wonderful even.” Raven cleared her throat, “I mean, thank you, I didn’t mean to bump into you.”

  Raven became aware of everyone staring at them, she took a step back and looked around trying not to blush. Several smiles were aimed at them. Raven quickly turned and headed to an empty seat and grabbed a book. She glanced up after a moment, Derrick stood in the same spot staring after her with a small smile on his face.

  ***

  A couple hours later Raven looked up from the book she was reading. It was already lunch time; wow time really flew. She stood up and moved over to the table Derrick was sitting at, “I can’t believe the morning is already gone.”

  Derrick closed his book and leaned back to stretch. “Stephen went to the restaurant along with some of the staff to open for lunch, he promised to send back some food for us.”

  Just as he finished talking Raven’s stomach growled, “I guess that’s a good thing.” She laughed as she rubbed her rumbling stomach. In a louder voice she called out “Anyone find anything worth sharing?”

  A woman about seventeen, or she appeared around that age in human years, raised her hand. “I found how to give someone hiccups.” Derrick laughed, “Don’t let your momma hear you, she will skin you if you curse anyone from school.”

  He leaned close to Raven, “that’s my third cousin, Morgan she’s in high school.” Raven nodded, nothing else needed to be said, High school kinda sucked and cursing someone else would have been awesome! Well at least a mild curse, nothing major like a zombie curse.

  There she went, at least she didn’t stick her foot in her mouth verbally, internally she could hide her stupid thoughts.

  Derrick’s dad stood up, “The only thing I found was how to cure a bad case of fleas. Stephen said I needed to give that to the wolves.”

  Stephen walked in carrying bags of food just then, ‘Yep, have you seen them bastards scratching. If they don't have fleas then mange.”

  A laughing voice called out “I found the cure for Mange, we got them covered.”

  Raven shook her head, “I guess it’s good this town is full of good people, some of this could be really bad in the wrong hands.”

  Derrick grabbed her hand and tugged her towards the bags of food Stephen was unloading. “Remember the ghosts protect that information, they would never have given a book to us unless everyone was trustworthy and had good intentions.” Raven had forgotten about the ghosts and their duty to the library. She blamed it on Derrick, she focused on his hand in hers and how good it felt. She had never fallen in lust so fast before, but there was something that drew her in. He was gorgeous, and that helped, but he was smart, successful and most importantly, kind. He knew when to apologize and when to fight, he was just perfect.

  “Hey Raven, I hope you aren’t a picky eater. I brought an assortment of food and in case you were on a perpetual diet like some women... Grilled chicken salad, and an assortment of pastas. Dig in, I brought plates and utensils too.”

  Raven was shocked, Stephen had thought of everything! He even had an assortment of diet soda, regular soda and water for them to pick from!

  “It looks like I arrived just in time for lunch, you don’t mind if I join you, do you?” Raven was surprised to see Seraphine standing behind them. She never heard her come in, the woman was scary!

  “Please join us, are you here to help with the search?” She had no stake in the curse but from what she said the town helped each other. But if she was so powerful why hadn’t she tried to end it herself?

  Seraphine stopped next to Raven and whispered, “It’s not my cross to bear, I have tried to help where I can, but the time was not right until now.” Then she grabbed a plate and started filling it. Raven didn’t know what to think, had she said that out loud or did she really read her mind? Over her shoulder Seraphine added, “I set a package on the table for you.”

  Raven was curious what package she could have brought, she sent her cousin the address this morning, but it wasn’t possible to arrive that fast right? Raven walked over to the table, she heard footsteps behind her, she knew Derrick followed. The return address was from her hometown! Holy shit the book was here already, how?

  “Fate has a way of helping when needed.” Seraphine said as she walked by with a plate full of food and sat down at a table not too far away. Derrick leaned down to Raven’s ear, “She’s always cryptic, just nod and smile when she gets like that.”

  Raven chuckled under her breath and ripped open the box in front of her. “Derrick I didn’t get to tell you, but my cousin said she had been doing some research over the years. She was going to send me the information she had on Malachi and a book she thought would help!”

  Thirteen

  Derrick was stunned, after all this time did, they finally get a hold of the information they needed to end this curse once and for all? Something was finally going right for him and his family. Raven was amazing and the more time he spent with her the more he craved. He watched her across the library all morning, she flipped through books, took notes and not once did her concentration waver. She was as dedicated as his family, he knew she wanted her magic back, but all she talked about was ending the curse for his family. He watched as she pushed the box on the table and bent over to start looking through the book right away. His eyes were drawn to her backside, he couldn’t contain the groan that came out.

  Stephen slapped him on his back “Watch it cousin, or someone will think you are affected… and I don’t mean by the curse.” Stephen laughed and walked out the library doors.

  Derrick groaned this time silently, he was affected but not by the curse. Just a really bad case of lust, this woman tempted him like no other. It was more than her body though; her mind was amazing, and she was caring and generous and he sounded ridiculous. He shook his head and walked over to grab a plate of food. Raven ha
d moved into a chair and was flipping through the book as fast as she could. Derrick filled a plate with a little bit of everything and brought it over to her. “Eat and read, we need you at full strength.” Raven glanced up at him with a glazed look in her eyes. “Thanks.”

  Derrick walked back to the table to get more food, he grabbed his plate and started filling it. Movement behind him had him glancing back “Hey dad, are you doing okay?”

  “I’m fine, I really like your lady, son. You made a fine choice.”

  Derrick smiled and kept grabbing food, “You don’t mind her family caused us so much grief? I mean she would be a reminder every day of who and what we lost.”

  “She would be a reminder of all that is good, a reminder of the curse ending, of you finding love, of our family growing. She will be all those things for us one day soon. You have my blessing and honestly my encouragement. Make a move son. Don’t wait, life is to short even for us.” He grabbed some pasta and walked away, back to his table and Derrick’s mom. That was what he wanted in life, a partner like his parents, but he always thought it was wrong to subject someone to his curse. He knew they would never go through it directly, but was it worse to be the one standing on the outside, watching everyone you love waste away and there was nothing you can do about it? How did his mom do it? She knew her children, her husband and everyone around her was going to waste away and all she could do was wait and watch it. No, that was not something Derrick was willing to ask anyone to do for him.

  But now with the chance the curse would end, he could think about having children and a wife to grow old with.

  “Derrick, can you come here please. I need you to look at this book.” His head snapped up at Raven’s call. She sounded distressed, he set his plate down and rushed to her side. “What’s wrong?”

  Raven sat back in her chair and gestured to the book. “Look for yourself, please.”

  Derrick moved to the chair next to her and pulled the book close, “I don't understand, none of this make sense. Is it a different language?” Raved leaned forward again. “I don’t know, it's not one I have ever seen before. Maybe it’s in code or something?”

  Derrick flipped through the pages, but sadly they all were in gibberish. “Did your cousin say anything? Was she able to read this? Why would she send us a useless book?”

  Derrick couldn’t help his anger; their first solid lead and it was nothing but junk. He slammed the book onto the table, “Derrick there’s a note here, I didn’t see it at first.”

  Dear Cousin Ravenna,

  I found this book in some old boxes in my parent’s attic. I have never been able to read it and I was afraid to share it with others. What if it’s Malachi’s journal? Who knows what information it could contain and in the wrong hands, we could lose more than our magic.

  Maybe the town of Black Hollow will help you decipher it. The only other information I was able to dig up was some stupid rumor about Malachi’s wife. She was from the Ainsworth lineage, they married young but were never happy. I don’t know how the curse came about, or why it affected both families. Maybe you can figure it out.

  All the best Addie.

  Derrick looked up to see the whole family had gathered around. “Did anyone know Malachai was married to one of our ancestors?” Everyone shook their heads and glanced at each other. “This is where we need to start, we need to find out all we can about them. Search through family records, genealogy reports anything that will give us some information. We can meet back here tomorrow around this time.” Raven kept flipping through the book, he wasn’t sure what she was looking for. “I think I am going to try and talk to Horace, maybe he’s a bit more lucid today and we can get some information from him.”

  Raven closed the book, “I will look here and see if I can find anything to translate this book. Seraphine, can you read it?” Derrick looked around at the people standing in front of them but didn’t see her anywhere. “Did anyone see her leave?” No one spoke up, so he assumed that meant she left at some point, he had no idea why, but they had more important things to do right now.

  Fourteen

  Raven watched everyone leave the library and couldn’t help the feeling of dejection that took over. She saw the same look on each of their faces and it weighed on her. That one letter had given them hope but one book took it away. If there were records on Malachi and their ancestors surely someone would have come across it before now. Raven looked around the library, but she didn’t really see it. Her mind was a jumble of thoughts and feelings. But Jessup got her attention when she saw him float by, he was staring at her. Before now he only came around when the others did, and never made eye contact. He was acting strange.

  Raven got up and followed him, he kept staring as he went down a row of books. Raven stopped to see if Reggie and Matt were close, maybe they could tell her what was going on. “Jessup? Am I supposed to follow you? Are you going to prank me?” Raven figured there was only one way to find out, so she kept going. He led her to a section of the library she hadn’t explored yet. By the amount of dust no one had been back there for a while. He kept going, finally coming to a door and disappeared behind it. Raven was a bit nervous, no one had mentioned this area, could a ghost hurt her?

  With a deep breath, Raven grabbed the door knob and pulled. Nothing happened, the knob had turned but the door was stuck. Raven pulled as hard as she could and ended up falling on her ass as it gave way and opened. Jessup floated on the other side and just watched her. “I swear to all that is holy if you did that on purpose, I will get you back!” As usual Jessup didn’t reply, Raven sighed and got off the floor. Jessup floated farther in the room and turned back to look at her. For a ghost who didn’t say… well anything, he got his point across quite well. Raven went through the door and looked around. It looked like a small study cubicle, the walls were a bland beige. There was a table with a few chairs around it, on it sat a book. Jessup looked at the book, then back to her. “Okay, I can take a hint.” She walked over to the table, bent down and blew some of the dust off the cover. Once the dust settled, she could see the title A Grand History.

  “Jessup I already have a book to translate, is this one going to help me with that?” Jessup shrugged and floated away. Raven grabbed the book and stomped her way back to the table she had originally been sitting at. She grabbed the journal her cousin sent and the second book from the secret room and walked back to the office to get her bag. She needed a break and out of the library for a few hours. She decided to run by her apartment and drop the books off, they were heavy and carrying them for any amount of time would become tiring. She needed some time to think and hopefully she could find Seraphine, she really wanted to know if she could translate the book.

  She walked down the steps and across the street to the apartments. Just as she reached for the door it opened. “Excuse me, I hope I didn’t hit you.”

  Raven jumped in surprise, “No, but you did scare me! I just moved in, I’m Raven Burroughs.” She held her hand out to the guy in front of her. Raven tried not to stare, and she knew she would run into all kinds of Paranormals here but what was he? He appeared to be covered in fine silver scars. It didn’t detract from his looks at all, rather enhanced them actually.

  “Ah yes, I’ve heard about you. My name is Adam, I run the paper. Silver mentioned running into you the other day and asking you for an interview.” They both glanced down to the boy standing next to him. “This is Alex.”

  “Whew, I was afraid I was infamous in Black Hollow already. Hi Alex, pleasure to meet you.”

  Adam threw his head back laughed “Yea maybe, but only for your help breaking the curse. The whole town is rooting for you guys. The Ainsworth family got a raw deal and it’s about time for it to be fixed. If you’ll excuse us, we have reservations for an early dinner. Nice to meet you.”

  Raven muttered “you too” and walked inside and up to her apartment. It was a bit early for dinner, but suddenly exhaustion hit her. It had been a very busy and str
essful couple of days. She decided to go to the closest restaurant or place that served food, pick something up to go and head back to her apartment to relax.

  Raven knew if she sat down, she wouldn’t get back up, so she dropped her bag on the table and headed back out. Outside the apartment she looked around and decided to walk toward the center of town. She had already explored to the south some so this time she decided to head straight and see what was up that way.

  She passed the movie theater next to her building, that was going to be an awesome way to relax after they broke this curse. When she came to the crossroads, she looked around and decided to keep going straight. Ahead of her she could see a pet store and across from that a shoe store. This town really did have everything you needed. She kept moving and heard the sounds of games before she even saw the arcade. The smell of candy floated in the air and she glanced across the street and saw Alizon’s store. Next to that was the Fire station, in a town like Black Hollow, she was really curious what type of creatures worked there.

  A bit farther she saw just the place she needed, Fireside Grille, the smell coming from there was amazing! The closer she got the more she saw of the restaurant, she feared she wasn’t dressed nice enough for this place, but she wasn’t willing to forego the smells coming from inside. “Oh, excuse me, I didn’t see you there.”

  “I’m sorry, I was in a food smell coma and not paying attention. I seem to be walking into people a lot lately. I’m Raven, newbie in town and drooling over Fireside Grille.” Raven figured if she sounded awkward maybe the pretty lady in front of her would forgive her for trampling on her. She really needed to start paying attention as she walked.

  “Well, it’s a pleasure to meet you. I seem to be on my own for dinner tonight, would you care for some company? I just moved here and really don’t have any female friends, so this would be a win- win.” Raven stared at her, should she say yes, when she hadn’t given her name yet.