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My jaw goes slack, and the hair on the back of my neck raises. "He died in The Room of Atonement, too? How do all these kids die in this fucking room and no parents have done anything about it? Shouldn't there be some… school investigation or something? Figure out how these deaths keep happening at school?" I feel like a part of me is going crazy. What the hell is going on here, and why do I feel like the only normal person?
Piper's eyes are watery, but there's a darkness that glows beneath the irises, just like I see in everyone else in this town. Like the darkness is a poison and it's leaked into her pores. "Think of a curse. You can put a curse on a person, right? You don't curse their hand, or their face, although in a way, I guess you could. But usually, when you curse someone, you curse that entire person, and everything about them. That's this town. The moment you cross the border into this town, you step into the curse. North of us, when you step out of this town, you are out of the curse. South of town, you’re out of the curse. But once you're here—in here—a part of it never leaves you. The curse extends to our homes, our food, the school we go to, and unfortunately, every person we speak with. The moment you came to live here, Vera, you became a part of that curse, too. Talking to people about the deaths won't do anything, because this place is nothing but death. All the way to six feet under with all the skeletons rotting away in their coffins."
My palm falls against my chest. "I'm… cursed?"
All three of them nod.
I laugh. "Well, how do I get un-cursed?"
Piper shakes her head. "You don't. If you ever happen to leave here, which happens to very few people, you'll always find your way back. The curse lives and dies here."
"What is the curse? Who put the curse on this place?" I fall back on the couch, feeling like the prologue of this town is finally being revealed. It’s all been such a mystery. But now maybe I can finally get some answers.
"Folklore," Blaire groans, falling back onto the couch. "I fucking hate these stories."
"I guess I don't really know the full story. I've heard a ton of different half-assed theories that don't really make any sense, but there's one that I've heard many times, the most believable story," Piper says, grabbing the box from Hazel and sitting down on the floor.
It’s an ancient thing. Not the Ouija board you’d buy at Target. This one is in a plain black box. It’s thick, made out of some type of leathered material. There are scratches and indents across the surface, which makes me think it’s not new, but weathered from years of use.
I lean forward, my elbows on my knees. Suddenly, going home is the last thing on my mind.
She opens the box, taking out the board and setting it on the blanket. "Scorned lover. Dead child. Same old, same old."
I shake my head. "No, I actually don't know what you're talking about.Tell me," I urge.
"Let me tell it." Hazel sits down next to me, grabbing the planchette from the Ouija box. "Apparently, like, one million years ago, there was a train track that went straight through the middle of this town. Some people say the tracks are buried deep beneath the ground, but I haven't found any truth to it. Anyway, a young couple had a small child, and one day, while the husband was at work, the wife had a man over. She was seemingly cheating on her husband. Well, while they were fucking like rabbits in the bedroom, the kid got outside and made his way to the train tracks.
“The husband ended up coming home from work early that day. He found them in bed together and stabbed the guy, who bled to death on the bed as he made the wife watch. It was only after the guy was dead that he realized his son was missing. He left her and her dead lover on the bed and went out, searching for him. But he never came home. Some people say he jumped off the cliff after he found his boy. Others say he got hit by a train, too. Others say he just left. But people say that sometimes at night, you can hear the train honking, warning away the boy and his father. You can see the glow of the lantern the dad was holding as he searched all night for his son.
“No one ever saw the son or the father ever again. Whether their bones lay in Castle Pointe or something supernatural happened to them, or if they just fled from the slutty mom, they’re gone, and they were never seen again. Though, the most legitimate rumor is the dad saw the son being hit by a train and he lost his mind, killing himself, too.”
I can barely breathe. “What did the mom do?”
“The mom went crazy after that. Never left her house. Apparently got into some dark shit, black magic and stuff. Some say she went schizophrenic. Others say she was just grieving. Either way, people say it's her that put the curse on this town. That she believed Castle Pointe held an evil, and she wanted to keep that evil contained. But at the end of the day, all she did was poison it with a spell that leaves us all trapped in this hell."
My eyes are watering, and my heart beats a mile a minute as I digest her words. I don't want to believe it. It just sounds like another horror story, something that I'd hear around a campfire or watch alone at home on Tubi. But I know there's a truth in her words. I can feel it, as they wash over me, the realization. The absolution in her words.
"What happened to the lady?" I whisper.
"She hung herself," Piper says.
Hazel scowls at her.
I blink. Then blink again. "What?"
They give each other a heavy look, and then Piper turns toward me. "She hung herself in The Room of Atonement. At school."
Ice-cold dread washes over me at her words. The room I was trapped in. The room that I heard voices, felt fingers on my skin, and got a wicked scrape on my back in. She hung herself inthatroom?Get the fuck out of here.
"No way," I whisper.
They all nod.
I shiver, feeling colder than I’ve ever felt in my entire life.
"So, what do you say?" Hazel asks after a few moments of silence.
I shiver, whiplashed from the entire story.
