February 22, 1942,
1830
Virginia
Before the sunset on my 16th birthday, I was to be home safe and sound from any danger that could enact the supposed illness my family always fretted about. I could never understand it. So instead of going home, I went out of the town and into the forest to relieve myself. It is not every day that you had to tell the love of your life goodbye, and the idea of being home where I would be doing absolutely nothing was not going to help me calm down, unlike being among the soft grass and the sweet smell of maple.
After hours of walking down the beaten path, I take a few deep breaths of the clean late-winter air, there really was nothing to be afraid of, Daniel would keep his promise, and he'd come home. The two of us would be married, and it'd be happily ever after. However, my mind soured again at what normally comes after a happily ever after.
Kids.
It's not that I don't ever want kids. Every woman becomes one, but, I was raised in a household where my parents cared too much about what I did with my life. I believe that I was a pretty good kid, and compared to the other girls my age, I was better behaved, my friends would go after men that treated them like nothing more than something to beat on, two of them having to be sent away to a home for months. Daniel and I, we were nothing like that, we'd go to movies, walks around town, and we'd even go to a cafe every now and then. My parents, however, couldn't seem to see that, always going on about how I could potentially fall under a preposterous curse that had been retold to children. My mother called it The Curse of Briar.
If I was to have a daughter, I could end up in a similar way. I don't want to raise her in fear of the worst thing to ever happen in a fairy tale. Reality trumps fairy tales, because magic like that was never real.
As I continued to wander in my thoughts, I walked into a field in the center of everything, filled with lavender and scotch broom. I was brought back to reality at that moment. There was never a clearing here before, walking down this path since I was 10 I knew the trails like the back of my hand. It didn't make sense. I turn on my heels to find my way back when I noticed that the sky began to grow dark.
Sunset.
"Shall my spell be broken, the daughters of Briar will fall" a disembodied voice that kept itself flat but modulated, began to echo in my head. I looked around in confusion before I took off running my skirt held high to keep myself from falling.
"They will prick their finger," the voice crescendoed along with many other female voices that cried and screamed as I ran.
"and they shall wake by true loves kiss," my heart raced as I ran off the path knowing there was a faster way through it all.
"A generation will come when true love will not conquer all." My lungs began to burn as my skirt tears and catch on many branches as the volume grows to be unbearable.
"And the dragon will rise again." Everything stopped and fell silent, as I reached a tall Willow tree. The sun's rays beaming in multiple shades. I rest my hand on the bark gently taking deep breaths as I try to calm myself down. As I sit up and back away only a few feet I feel a slight sting on my index finger.
"Ow." I wince as I turn around to find that my index finger now bled after hitting a thorn of a blackberry bush. I carefully remove it, holding back a slight laugh. I had to have just imagined it all. There was nothing after me. I looked up at the tree noticing a small brown owl staring at me and the world began to spin, the voices that were there before crescendoed again in a mourning melody as I lost my balance and the world around me dimmed into darkness.
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