Page 9 of The Book of Magic

Franny looked over her shoulder. She knew about Rafael, of course. Jet had been quite good at keeping secrets, but once, long ago, Franny followed her sister to the Plaza Hotel, although she’d never seen Rafael before. He was handsome, even at his age, and he was grieving as a husband would. “A man in love with Jet,” she told Gillian.

Sally shushed the two of them. “Must you?” she said.

Reverend Willard had been driven over from the retirement home so that he could officiate the service. There were so many of their shared relations in the town cemetery no one had ever counted them all. The Reverend was crying, even as he spoke. Jet had made it a point to stop by to visit him every day. She brought him oat biscuits on a regular basis, and, occasionally, a slice of her Chocolate Tipsy Cake that he wasn’t allowed to eat. Far too sweet, the doctors said, but life was short and getting shorter, and sometimes a person needed to simply enjoy himself. Jet covered the cake with a handkerchief when she smuggled it in, and brought along a fork and a napkin. She and the Reverend always laughed to think they’d pulled one over on the nurses, who, of course, knew about the deviation in the old man’s dietary regime all along, but who weren’t about to argue with Jet Owens, for as lovely as she was, the family had a reputation, and considering that the Reverend was over a hundred, it was best to let him do as he pleased.

The service after the burial was brief, due to Reverend Willard’s inability to stand for more than a few minutes at a time, and of course there was the appearance of the raindrops, the soft green shower Jet always called Daffodil Rain. And then it happened. The very last speaker, a plain-spoken second cousin from Maine who thought of herself as the family historian, read a letter composed by Faith Owens.

As the rain began, the cousin read Faith’s note in her flat New England speaking voice.

“We who are cursed in love are born to fight that curse in every way we can until the one among us who can break it appears. Until that time, we must love as best we can. Our fates may already be determined, but each day is ours to live as we see fit.”

“What is she talking about? Who’s cursed in love?” Kylie asked her sister. She was wearing the silver locket her mother had given her on her last birthday. Just last night, she had slipped in a small photograph of Jet, taken long ago when her great-aunt was a girl sitting on the rocks beside Leech Lake.

Antonia shrugged. She had been deflecting questions about her pregnancy all morning and was in a foul mood. Why did people want to pat your stomach, as if you were a dog? Why was the identity of the father so fascinating? “Your guess is as good as mine.”

Antonia often didn’t understand Owens family traditions, many of which seemed far more irrational than falling in love, a state of being she’d never experienced. Chasing a sparrow from the house every Midsummer’s Eve instead of simply checking earlier in the day to make certain the windows were closed; concocting soap in the dark of the moon when there was perfectly good bars of the stuff to buy at the pharmacy, brewing Aunt Franny’s special Courage Tea at family get-togethers; when store-bought tea bags were so much more practical; using the greenhouse to grow poisonous seedlings—such as belladonna, hemlock, black nightshade, and henbane, plants so toxic that Antonia didn’t think they should be grown anywhere at all. And now here was this message from an ancestor who was convinced that the reasons for unhappiness lay in the power of a curse.

“The letter was written in the 1700s, when people believed in nonsense,” Antonia told her younger sister. “I wouldn’t pay it the slightest bit of attention.” She knew that Kylie, a sophomore studying classics, was suggestible and sensitive, a reader of novels, which left her a target to wrought-up emotions. Right now, Kylie appeared overheated, her face flushed even though they were standing in the cool spring rain. She never revealed the skills she possessed, for her odd talents made her nervous. Her mother always looked at her sharply from the corner of her eye when Kylie seemed the least bit abnormal. She kept her uncanny abilities to herself, and never told a soul that she could glimpse an aura of color around individuals that revealed their personalities and their fates. Far worse, she could feel the pricking stab of other people’s pain, and therefore avoided crowds.

Kylie had tried to follow Antonia’s lead, for in a town where the Owenses were considered oddities, Antonia had always done her best to be superior. “Take that,” Antonia would say cheerfully when she was at the top of her class. After receiving her acceptance to Harvard as an undergraduate, she’d worn a crimson T-shirt for an entire summer, just to make sure everyone knew where she was headed once autumn rolled around. She had also made certain to write an announcement for the local paper when she was accepted to medical school.

Kylie had tried; she had done her best to be ordinary, but that charade had always ended in failure. At one point, when she was already too old for such things, she had joined the 4-H and raised a calf for an entire season before realizing that its prescribed fate was to be sold to a butcher. She and Gideon had stolen it and brought it to an Audubon preserve where it still resided; having reached the weight of half a ton, Beanbag, called Beanie by most, had become a great favorite with the children who visited, offering handfuls of grain and stalks of grass. Kylie and Gideon still laughed about that day, how they’d risked getting into serious trouble for the sake of a calf, how he’d never thought it peculiar that she’d wanted to steal it, no matter the consequences.

“Did you ever hear Jet mention a curse?” Kylie asked her mother.

Sally was not a liar by nature, but when it came to the curse, she had her reasons for never telling her daughters about that particular portion of the Owens history. Once you knew, you could never act freely in the world again. Let them have fun and be young; there would be time enough to live in fear.

“Let’s not talk about family gossip on the day of your aunt’s funeral,” Sally insisted. She went up to the cousin from Maine who thought she was so clever and hissed, “Bring that up again, and you won’t be speaking much.”

Sally could feel her frantic heart at the very mention of the curse. You can hope that the following generations will be immune to whatever plagued their ancestors, you can do your best to keep your children safe, but you can’t entirely change their fate. The only ones with the potential for doing so are the individuals in question themselves, according to the choices they make. Sally had insisted that Gillian and the aunts never mention the curse, and because of this rule, her girls had grown up without its threat hanging over them. But what is meant to be will be, and truth has a way of revealing itself. It’s said aloud at the most unexpected time, when defenses are down, when Honesty Cake is served, cut up on a platter, there for anyone to taste.

Antonia and Kylie walked side by side on the way home, wearing black coats, holding up wide black umbrellas to protect against the pale spring rain that was spattering down. The world was dizzy with new leaves and the scent of the rain, sweet and fresh and green. It was their task to get to the house and set up lunch before the mourners arrived. It was the sort of damp, soft weather their aunt had always loved. The striking canopy of leaves opening above them could not console the sisters as they walked back to Magnolia Street. Rather, they were even more shocked postfuneral that their aunt had been taken from them. Kylie was hunched over, a habit she’d acquired so that she didn’t seem as tall as she was, nearly six feet, the same height as her imposing aunt Frances, who, in her eighties, still frightened people in the neighborhood when she walked along Main Street. Franny, however, didn’t seem the least bit fearsome now. She stood holding a bunch of rain-drenched daffodils. They were Jet’s favorite flower and for years children in town had called Jet the daffodil lady, for she grew hundreds in the Owenses’ garden and always brought a bouquet tied with blue ribbon when she visited Levi Willard’s grave. Witches were said never to cry, but Franny’s face was puffy and she wore sunglasses in the rain. She could not imagine the world without her sister, who had been wounded terribly in her youth and had still managed to love more, not less.

After the service, Sally came to take Franny’s arm. It was a good thing, for the world had shifted and now seemed a trickier, more slippery place. Franny accepted her niece’s assistance as they trekked over the sodden ground. She was glad that one of the Merrill brothers—George, Franny thought his name was, after all these years she still got them confused—had come in his truck to drive her home, for the path was soggy and Franny felt off-kilter. Her knees were soft, as if she might collapse, not that she was the sort of person who would ever do so. Somehow, while her back was turned she had become old and had lost her husband and her sister and her dear brother, Vincent.

Once home, Franny went up to her large bedroom and closed the door before any of the cousins could trap her in conversation. Long ago, her room had belonged to her aunt Isabelle, who had always favored Franny and had insisted she be the next occupant of the best room in the house. Franny recalled getting into bed beside her sister after her beloved Haylin had passed away. She remembered how Jet had held her hand, and how the telephone had rung and dear little Sally had been on the other end of the line insisting that she and her sister, Gillian, were coming to stay. That is how love worked, Jet had assured Franny. It arrived when you least expected it. But what happened when it disappeared, Franny wondered as she lay in the old bed that had long ago belonged to Aunt Isabelle.

She could hear people filing into the house. The brass bell, a family heirloom set beside the door, rang as guests came up the bluestone path, bringing casseroles and Bundt cakes to be set out on willowware platters. Soon, the family was all accounted for. Gillian and that Ben Frye, whom she never wanted to introduce to anyone, but who was always ready to perform a few magic tricks if any children were gathered. Kylie and that tall fellow Gideon Barnes, a friend of hers who had been hanging around ever since they were twelve. Antonia and her med school pals, those two handsome men, Scott Morrison and Joel McKenna. Members of the library board, and neighborhood women Jet had invited into their home, no matter the weather, at whatever hour they knocked on the door in search of a cure. Franny didn’t care to see a single one of them, so she stayed where she was, stretched out in bed.

Sally looked for Franny, who was nowhere to be found. She came upstairs to check on her aunt, passing by Maria’s portrait on the landing. She stopped at Franny’s door and called her name, but there was no answer. When Sally pushed open the door a crack and spied the rumpled figure in bed, she felt like breaking down. But as always, she pulled herself together and asked if Franny would like a sandwich or a cup of tea. Franny failed to answer; she had the blanket pulled over her head and pretended to be napping. Thankfully, Sally let her be so that she might grieve alone.

What happens next? Franny wondered. How do I walk through this world without my sister beside me?

Gillian was in the kitchen, putting the finishing touches on a Chocolate Tipsy Cake. Ben was helping her, measuring out the rum to mix into the last of the frosting that would be piped into a decorative border. He was concentrating hard and his face was smeared with chocolate and he was still just as handsome as he’d been when Gillian first met him, which for some reason made her feel like crying. There was a chill in the house and Gillian had the shivers, caused by both the cold and her raw emotions. “Can you find me one of Jet’s sweaters?” she asked Kylie, who seemed lost and in need of an errand to run.

Kylie took the stairs up to Jet’s room, pausing before she opened the door. Jet had been the one Kylie had always turned to, in good times and bad. She forced herself to go forward, into the lovely large room with floral wallpaper and white painted furniture. Jet had been a great reader, and there were books piled everywhere, even on the bureau. Kylie found a sweater for Gillian to wear, black cashmere with pearl buttons, a cardigan so carefully stored away it looked brand-new. The windows were old, green glass, but it was possible to see the lilacs when Kylie looked out, her eyes brimming with tears. The Poems of Emily Dickinson remained open on Jet’s night table. Without thinking twice, Kylie took the volume, her aunt’s favorite, knowing it was Jet’s habit to read one of the poems each and every night, as if the words of that great poet equaled a prayer. Perhaps it was a habit that Kylie herself might acquire.

Rafael Correa had never been to Magnolia Street and he wanted to see where his darling Jet had lived. He walked through the gathering of Owens relatives and the neighbors who were indebted to Jet for the help she provided in their times of need. He noticed a blond woman in the kitchen wearing a sweater that had been a birthday gift he’d given Jet one year, long ago. Rafael remembered choosing it at Saks, something that would, in some small way, let Jet know what she meant to him. She’d worn it that very night, when they went to the Oak Bar at the Plaza Hotel. Their room was always reserved under an assumed name, often E. Dickinson but, occasionally, when Jet was feeling perverse, registered to N. Hawthorne, a distant relation.

At first, Rafael had been jealous of Levi Willard, even after Levi had been dead and buried for years. He’d wondered if Levi was the reason Jet could never fully commit herself to him, but in time, he’d come to understand it was because of a family curse that she feared. She’d been a dark-haired girl when they were first together, barely a woman, gentle and tender, yet she’d warned him to be careful on the night they’d met. “I’m dangerous,” Jet had said. It seemed far-fetched. She had a heart-shaped serious face and silver-gray eyes and she cut her own pitch-black hair so that it was always choppy. He’d been madly in love with her in no time, but he made a solemn promise to never say so, a vow he now regretted. He would say it out loud, he would shout it, but what good would it do?

He stopped in the hall to observe the portrait of the Owens ancestor Maria on the stairwell, staring back at him with her clear gray eyes. Despite her gaze, which seemed to track his movements, he went upstairs when no one was looking. That scruffy little white dog who’d come to New York with Jet on her last visit had been ignored ever since her death and now tagged after him, shadowing him to the topmost stair. Annoyed, Rafael did his best to chase it away. “Go on, scat,” he told the dog, but there it was, escorting him along the second-floor hall, gazing up at Rafael to make certain he was following along.

It was easy to tell which was Jet’s room, for she had often described it to him in great detail as they lay side by side in their hotel bed. There were the windows made of wavering glass that overlooked the garden where the daffodils bloomed in bunches of yellow and white. He could see the potting shed and the greenhouse.

When we were young, we were taught to beware of the plants that grew there, Jet had whispered. But of course, that made us all the more interested.

Along the porch, twisted branches of wisteria wound up toward the roof, thick with purple buds. The dog had made itself comfortable on the carpet despite Rafael’s admonitions that it should get out. He had no choice but to ignore the wretched little thing. Daisy, Jet had called it. She’ll watch over you, she’d said.