Griffin

Chapter 5: The Curse

I missed the first period I made it to school 15 minutes late, I could have still made it to class, but I didn't want to.

Not today. 

I sit down under a big oak tree in the school courtyard alone.

I look down at my baggy jeans and my beatdown sneakers. A lump in my throat scratches the back of my eyes. 

A tiny leaf falls on my torn sneaker, I pick it up my vision blurred. With a shaky breath, I blink away the tears.  

My gut clenches and I sob. 

After a short while, I stop. That's how it works right? After a while, you get used to it, the disappointment.

I sit there quietly and stare at nothing.

The memory of how it all started drowned my vision. 

I walked into my father's study room, my mother already in the room with him. She stands facing out the window " Come on in, Elena" my father called out, I walked closer into the room. 

"Have a seat, there's something your mother and I like to discuss with you." 

I sit down and glanced at my mother who still has her back to us and saying nothing. 

"As you may already know, Gerald Godson was very gracious enough to personally pay our family a visit today despite how busy he is" my father smile.

"Our family and his family, well specifically my side of the family, have had connections with one another for many generations. What I'm about to tell you is the story that had been told to me by my father. The Godson family and my family were once very close to one another until the day we weren't. You see, one of my family from the older generations had taken something that didn't belong to us, it belonged to the Godson."

He glanced at my mom, but she offered no help. Her eyes remain out the window. 

"Ever since then bad things keep on happening to us, unexplainable things."

He looked at me with an awkward smile, I had never seen my dad like this before. I smile back to ease his discomfort. 

 "We believe the Godson had somehow...... placed a curse on us. I know it's hard to believe. At first, I didn't believe it either, but I had witnessed it with my own eyes, what could happen if we chose to ignore it. Do you remember my mother's funeral? She did not die from a heart attack, she was the picture of perfect health until her very last breath, the heart attack wasn't what took her from us.  The same thing with my grandfather and our lines before him. Their death had been sudden and hard on the family. And then there's me, I had been very sick before today." 

I don't know what to say to this, this is insane. 

There're no such things as curses, right? And to have them follow through generations? That's not possible, but I chose not to voice that out loud. 

" What did your family take from them?" I asked instead.

My dad turns to look at my mother, she still offered no help.

" We don't know." 

My father looked down at his hands before looking back directly at me, there was sadness in his eyes. 

" I'm telling you this today because the Godson had come to ask for their payment." 

I wring my hand so tight together that my knuckles turn white " Are we going to lose our home?" I asked barely recognizing my voice, they sound so small and far away.