Storyteller's Curse

“I curse that which you value the most. You’ll never write another book again.”

Zalia stared at the blank page before her, unblinking. It had been five months since those words had been spoken and ruined her life. The cursor blinked in and out on the white page, taunting her. Zalia’s mind whirled with the words she wanted to put on the page; her fingers remained positioned on the keyboard, but she couldn’t bring herself to actually type... not after what happened with her last novel.

“Come on, type Zalia, you’re overthinking. That dream wasn’t real, I’m not cursed.” She muttered to herself, trying to convince herself to put her thoughts to paper. But her fingers still refused to move. Despite how crazy it all seemed, there was no way last time was a fluke. Once was a fluke, twice was a coincidence, but thrice? Thrice was evidence. Evidence that she was cursed, that she shouldn’t keep writing.

With a sigh, she removed her hands from the keyboard and wrapped them around herself, feeling a sudden chill in the air.

“The next time you write a book, be warned, if others read it... Every immoral thing in it will come true. That is my curse on you for breaking my rules.”

A shiver ran down her spine, and she shook my head. No, that was a dream, it just couldn’t be real... but then why... why had it come true three times? Zalia pressed her palms to her eyes, rubbed them, leaned back in the chair, and pushed away from the desk where her laptop stayed open on the blank page. With a sigh, she got up and closed my laptop. There was no way she could convince herself to write toady, not with the news from yesterday lying heavy on her mind.

Zalia walked to the kitchen and opened the fridge to see what she had. A carton of milk, some bread, cheese, thawed chicken, and a few vegetables that needed to be chopped up so she could cook them later. She didn’t have the energy to cook an actual meal, so she grabbed the bread and went to the cupboard to pull out the Nutella. As she made her sandwich, her thoughts drifted to the news that had been playing on TV all day yesterday.

“I’m here at the school that was burned down. No one knows who did this, but the police are on the scene investigating. So far, 74 bodies have been identified, but we have reports that there are more being uncovered as the authorities are going deeper into the scene. People are speculating why this school was targeted, but nothing official has been released yet. Rumors are that the target was the school’s principal, and everyone else was collateral. Parents are blaming the superintendent of the school, saying she’d been given a warning and didn’t act on it... I just got an update: more bodies were found; the death count now is 82 and counting.”

82 people. And counting. They hadn’t identified all the bodies yet. If it was going to follow the events of her last book, that number would shoot up to 178 by the end of today... the majority of those would be children. 143 children ages 5 to 18, 28 teachers and staff, and seven unidentifiable bodies burned so badly no one would ever know who they were. Those seven had been the real targets; the rest were, as the reporter said, collateral. The whole thing had been planned this way; the pyromaniac killer had drawn those seven to the school on purpose with the intention of no one ever being able to identify them. And no one would realize it until the next hit.

“I should have played it safe... I shouldn’t have written about a pyromaniac. What was I thinking?” Zalia gritted her teeth as she threw the butter knife into the sink and placed her hands upon the counter while glaring down at her sandwich.

If the events of her book were to continue coming true, the next hit would be a mall late at night. The pyromaniac would burn it down, killing 75 people, though their actual targets would be long dead before the fire. It would be the third fire in two weeks, and that is when the police would realize a pyromaniac was on the loose. They’d start building a case and re-examining the sites, they’d find evidence left behind, and working with the local populace, they’d identify three suspects, one of them would be the killer who never hid her proclivity for fire. The killer would feel like she had no way out and would take her own life by burning herself in the police station along with 12 others.

“What is wrong with me? Why did I write so much needless death in this book? I must be insane!” Zalia should have stopped after the first time, but she didn’t want to believe it; she didn’t want to believe the things she was writing were coming true. No major news organization had picked up on it yet, but it was only a matter of time before everyone would make the connection that the events happening were eerily similar to what she’d written, with minute differences. She’d seen chatter online regarding her last two books; some readers had commented that a few events in the books had shown up in the news. Others joked that she had obsessed fans who wanted her books to gain attention and were making the bad things come true.

Zalia felt tears spring to her eyes as her mind whirled with the possibilities. When the connection to the books and the murders would be made, would she be pulled in for questioning? Surely not... she was just the writer; she had no control over how people reacted to her books. There was no way to prove she caused everything beyond writing down the events before they happened. It would probably get chopped up to fanatical readers. Legally, she shouldn’t get into trouble.

But... it was still her fault. She knew about the curse, she just didn’t believe it. It took her three books to actually start believing it. Three books... and countless deaths. “I’m truly a despicable person...”

She slid down to the floor and leaned her head against the counter; she could feel the tears falling down her cheeks. She had to face reality. Her writing was cursed; she had to stop. Legally, no one was likely to stop her, but morally, she needed to stop herself. It was time to end her writing career. She chuckled to herself despite finding no actual humor in the realization. ‘I’ve had a good run’, she thought to herself. Seven years and eighteen books published. Now it was time for her to find something new to do and put away the proverbial quill.

But what about her fans? How was she to explain it to them? Saying she was cursed wasn’t going to go over well. Did she even have to explain? Maybe she should just disappear and never make a statement. She never used her real name for the books, and when she did fan signings, she had a mask on. No one knew her face beyond her eyes; only her editor knew what she looked like.

Thinking of her editor, did he realize what was going on? He hadn’t mentioned anything for the last two books. But surely, he’d noticed? He was a clever man and picked up on things quickly; there was no way this would escape his notice... Maybe he’d been in denial just as she was?

She sighed and wiped away her tears, getting back up to at long last grab her sandwich and eat, “I suppose I need to call him and let him know I’m retiring. I’m sure he’ll agree it’s for the best.”