Cursed Waters

5

The first time Millie realized she was the cursed one out of her sisters, she was at her parents' funeral, standing next to her uncle, Drew. She hadn't meant to show him her hip; after spending a week in the hospital, she'd just thought it was a scar. But it'd been burning all day, and she'd hiked up her top to look at it and possibly scratch the crap out of it.

"Millie," Drew had said and grabbed her wrist as she reached for the scar. "What is that?"

"Scar." The then-younger and far more innocent Millie had raised one eyebrow. "Duh."

"No . . . oh God, no. Angel! Come here!"

At that exact moment, Millie hadn't understood it. It had been later, after her older sisters had crowded around to see the filigree shaped scar; it was after Drew sent a picture to all her still-alive family members, after she'd been poked and prodded at for almost an hour — after all that, she realized what this meant.

She remembered the same weird looking thing on her mom's wrist, and Millie remembered her mom's sad look when she'd asked, numerous times, what is this?

Millie was six the first time she realized she was going to die.

--- 

There were a lot of reasons that Millie should've been freaking out — Sam's hysterical blabbering, for one, her sisters for another, not to mention her uncle and the fact that there was a rather large shard of glass sticking out of her abdomen.

But there was only one reason for her insane, mind-reeling panic.

She was waist-deep in water.

She was thinking about her parents and her great aunt Mildred and she was thinking about Angel and her sisters and God, wouldn't it just be amazing, if she died less than five miles from her house, in the freaking lake? At the very least, you'd think the curse would take her in the ocean, like all the people before her. 

"Oh my God," Sam said, putting his hands to his face. "Oh holy shit, Millie, oh holy shit."

"Sam," Millie started.

"No, holy crap, Millie, my whole windshield is sticking out of your stomach."

Millie tried not to roll her eyes — and failed. "Sam, listen..."

"Oh God, what did I do? I fell asleep, didn't I? Millie, I am so sorry, I don't know what happened —"

"SAM!" Millie snapped.

He stopped. "What?"

"Could you please stop babbling for a second and listen to me?"

"Yes, sure, of course, yes." Sam nodded vigorously. "What is it?"

"I need you to move me."

Sam's face froze. "Move you...where?"

"Anywhere away from the water, please."

"Millie..." Sam frowned. "Look, I'm not a doctor. What if I hurt you?" He looked up, squinting through the now-dry air. "On like every medical show ever, they say not to move the body."

Sam kept talking, droning on and on about medical shows and CSI and something about a detective, but she couldn't listen any longer. Every moment, every night she spent under the water, trying to breathe, all came down to this very second. She was going to die in muddy, lake water because Sam fucking White couldn't grow the balls to save her or at the very least prolong her death.

"I'm cursed." Millie squeezed her eyes shut. "I'm fucking cursed, I swear. The universe hates me, God hates me, everyone hates me, and so this is it. This is the curse coming to take me, right, universe? This is the end of Millie Clearwater? This is what you've been leading up to, for eighteen years? Well, let me tell you. This is a huge let down. A lake? I swear, you could've done much better."