For Shits and Giggles [2024]

Chapter 43

The sun was setting through the Church windows, the sky was an orange, pink hue.

Gracie and Santiago stood at the top of the aisle facing each other, hand in hand. They'd lit candles up and down the pews, and gathered flowers from the gardens outside. Santiago placed a pink flower in her hair, and she placed a red one in the chest pocket of his jumpsuit. They were alone in the Church, except for the minister reading from the bible before them. He'd agreed to the impromptu wedding happily. They were barely listening to his words and stared at each other instead.

"Before God, I ask you to affirm your willingness to enter the covenant of marriage and to share all the joys and sorrows of your lives and your relationship, whatever the future may hold," said the minister.

Their smiles widened.

"Santiago and Gracie, have you come here today of your own free will to declare your commitment to one another?"

"We have."

"Do you promise to be there for each other in the good and the bad? To grow with, understand and respect one another during your life together?"

"We do."

"Then please face each other and share your vows."

They hadn't prepared any vows beforehand and looked shyly at the minister, who laughed, amused by the humors of young, wide-eyed love.

Gracie spoke first, "From that drunk kiss at Paola's party," Santiago blushed at the distant memory. "I knew in my heart that you were the one. I always knew. But I didn't know how to be honest with you. I was scared you wouldn't feel the same way, I guess. But I was wrong. The way that you look at me, it's unlike anything I've ever felt before. Like you're reading me, knowing me. I can't wait to spend the rest of my life with you."

Santiago tried not to get choked up, but he failed. His voice wavered, "I... I guess I am grateful to the Tree after all, because it brought us closer together. Hell, I spent so much time looking into your eyes," he laughed, "that I learned just how to read your mind. The colors, how your mood affects them. I did want to know you. I wanted to know everything about you. Because I loved you then, and I love you now. I'll love you forever."

Gracie's mind began to race. Wait, what?

"What beautiful words," smiled the minister. "Santiago, do you take this woman to be your wife? Do you promise to love her, comfort her, honor and keep her, in sickness and in health as long as you both shall live?"

"I do."

Gracie's smile faded from her face completely. Santiago looked at her confused.

"Gracie, do you take this man to be your husband? Do you promise to love him, comfort him, honor and keep him, in sickness and in health as long as you both shall live?"

"Stop..." she said, releasing his hands.

He looked at her in shock.

"What do you mean," she asked. "What do you mean, my mood? The color of my eyes?"

"Well, yeah," he tried to hold her hands again, "I figured it out early on. Brown means good, happy, your real eyes. But when they start to shift and glow... that means bad, the curse is making you say things you don't want to say."

She took a step back, away from Santiago, "You mean... that's how you could tell? How I always felt?"

He tried to take her hands a second time, but she dodged them.

"This entire time... this entire time... there was a way for people to know how I truly felt, and you just kept that to yourself?"

"That's not it," Santiago laughed nervously, taking a step forward with each of her steps back. He moved slowly, careful not to alarm her. "I just wanted to feel closer to you, it was our secret. Our connection."

The Church began to spin around her, she felt her entire life crashing down.

"So you wanted to play hero... you wanted to swoop in and save me, is that it? Save me from situations you could have prevented in the first place? I... I can't marry you."

"Please, Gracie, I love you. It was the tree," he said. "The tree made me an idiot, selfish."

"The Tree didn't make you lie to me," she yelled. "You knew how much I was suffering! You knew how to help me, truly help me, but you didn't!"

"But it's over now! It doesn't matter anymore, we're going to break the curse. We're going to be together!"

"What happened with Camilo... they didn't know that I wasn't happy with him, that I was scared of him... nobody knew to help me," she kept backing away.

Santiago dropped to his knees in front of her, "Gracie, don't do this. Please don't do this," he begged, "I'm so sorry, please. I love you. I love you so much it hurts. Don't do this."

She wanted to leave him there, begging on his knees. She wanted to run away. But the Tree compelled her to stay. She couldn't move her feet. So she said nothing.

"Say you'll marry me," he pleaded, "Say you'll marry me and we can figure it out together! Remember what I said? You'll never have to do this alone. Just say yes!"

She felt the word bubble up inside of her, the dreaded yes. The coerced, insincere agreement clawing its way up her throat and out through her tongue.

She didn't want this. She didn't want to marry someone who manipulated her; who had the power to save her but instead chose a faux, manufactured connection instead. He must've known that she wouldn't want a love like this. Or maybe, he didn't know her at all. Not the way she thought he did. She felt used, taken advantage of. Her body convulsed and a scream ripped through her chest. She screamed so loud that both Santiago and the minister jumped. Birds flew from the windowsill, passersby on the sidewalk stopped to stare at the Church. Gracie screamed with the rage and the frustration and the indignation of a woman robbed of her autonomy.

Her face turned a bright red as she screamed her throat raw, until saliva and speckles of blood spit from her mouth. The minister traced a cross on his chest, Santiago rushed forward wanting to hold her, wanting to comfort her. She refused. She reached up, digging her nails into her eyelids. She forced her fingers to rip the eyes from their sockets. They came loose with a sickly, wet pop.

This was always going to be her punishment. From the very beginning, from the moment Felix had made his deal. From the very first time he looked at her in lust, her fate had been sealed. It was a married man's contempt that cursed their town, that cursed her. It was a married man who betrayed his promise to be loyal and faithful. But it was her that the married man had slept with, and so it was her cross to bear. It was his sin that she needed to atone for. And it wasn't fair. God, it wasn't fair. But if all it took was her eyes to be set free, to release her from her perpetual retribution, she would offer them happily and with vigor.

Gracie's body collapsed to the ground. Her face and wedding dress were stained red with the blood pouring from her mutilated face. She heard a distant screaming as the world finally faded to black, maybe it was Santiago screaming. Maybe it was God. Her fingers released and her gouged eyeballs rested neatly inside of her open palms. She let out a dry, hollow giggle as she exhaled for the last time.