Contest entries

NO REGRETS {entry} missed chances revisited

NO REGRETS

"There was once a chance I didn't take. One that could have changed everything," she mused, her eyes far away, looking out the window. She was an outline, a dirk silhouette against the stark white lights flooding the window. The high, seemingly endless window that reach from floor to ceiling. The drapes were heavy, like her dress, and I could see the faintest reflection of her face in the small square windowpanes that made up the whole of the window. "For me, for my family. And here we are still. Maybe if I had been brave enough, or smart enough..." The crackling of the open fire brought me back to the room, to the then and there. She was so far away, on the other side of the giant room, and it was easy to be sucked into the hypnotic notes of her voice. "I had a chance to break the curse, and I didn't take it."

When I'd heard about the Russet Mansion, the one on the hill overlooking the fifteen houses that made up the small village, I had been intrigued. When the gardener, Mr Brooks, told me about the lady of the house I had been fascinated. Over beers one night he'd told me all about the haunted mansion at the top of the hill, about the strange things that happened there - but how the pay was more than good, and he had no real complaints as the Lady herself was a gentle, and kind woman. It wasn't exactly what I wanted to hear from him; the dirtier and grimier a story was the better it was for me. I had called, however, and made an appointment. Last week the Lady, her name was Cecilia, and I had sat down for tea in her front drawing room. She had regaled me with stories of her father, uncles, and great uncles, all of them having gone off to war, all of them returning. Last week I had been sure the Russet Mansion's inhabitants had a string of ridiculous luck. This week, looking at the stiff shoulders of Cecilia herself as she stood by the window, I wondered about the luck, and the curse she was talking about. 

"Back when there were more witches in the world, when there was such a thing asmagic readily availeble to every Tom, Dick, and Harry," she turned, her aging features twisted into a mockery of a smile. "That's when someone in my very long line of ancestors decided to ask for a little love spell. He wanted the prettiest girl in all the land; she was bookish and soft spoken, and everyone adored her. Even he, despite his mostly brutish ways. But his quest for love lead him down the so called rabbit hole," shaking her head, she came closer to me, sitting down across the table from me by the fire. It was warm and safe here, but she brought a chill with her from the window, her bare feet sticking out from under all the layers of fabric. "Before he knew it, he had promised himself and half of his line to the witch and her children, offered us up as a way of balancing the magic." Her hands folded in her lap, and her watery, brown eyes met mine. "The curse is what took my brother. Magic isn't free, and it isn't right for it to be free. There should be a price when you ask outrageous things," the condemnation in her voice obvious. "When I met James, I could have broken it. I could have gone to the witches, to the council, to someone. I could have asked that it end, for I had found true love without the need for a spell to bind someone to me."

My hand moved hurriedly over the paper on my lap, and I nodded a few times for good measure. Then, as she stopped, I looked up again. "What happened?"

Her smile transformed from one of disdain to one of sadness, her eyes brimming with tears and they clung to her blonde lashes. "He found out who I was." Leaning back, another sigh slipped from her, and she shook her head. "I had not told him I was the soon to be Lady of the Russet Manor, and when he found out who I was going to be, he told me that despite his love for me, he could not die at the hands of magic. The stories they tell down in the village, they're all lies and mixed up rumors. No one that isn't in the blood line will ever, or did ever, die from the curse. I tried telling him, and then his answer changed." I could see her thumb tapping against her skirts, and I wanted to tell her there was always time still. She wasn't old, though older I supposed than she had been when she met the man she was telling me about. "He didn't want any children we might have to be cursed like me," and then the tears fell from her eyes, making heavy sounds as they hit her dress. "So I let him go, I didn't fight or take the chance to break the curse. He never asked if it was possible, if there was a way. There's always a way, you see," leaning forward, she smiled sadly. "There's always a way to break a curse, and the way is always love."

"He left, then. And you have been here, alone, all this time?" She nodded, her stiff shoulders slumping down a little. She looked so tired, so fragile. The dirty story I had come for, the one that would sell enough issues to keep the paper afloat for another month suddenly made me feel sick. Looking down at my notes, I shook my head softly. Tearing the pages out of the notebook, I tore them in half. "I'm sorry, I had no idea," I whispered, tearing them in half again, before turning to throw some of the pieces into the roaring fire. "Thank you, for telling me."

"Well. I wanted to take this chance," she said softly, a real smile on her strained features, making her look younger, and relaxed. 

It was the first time I realized just how beautiful she really was.