The shadow ring bursts upward, forming a column of smoke with me in the center.
The world goes black.
When I open my eyes, I am on the ground.
Kneeling.
Shadows wreath the inside of my house, hanging over every surface like a widow’s shroud.
A dark shape materializes in front of me. In seconds, the stench of rot and exposed sewage thickens in my nose, slithering wetly to the back of my throat.
There have been several times in the last few months that I’ve experienced terror. Too many to count. But if someone summed up all the fear I’ve lived through, tallied up every scream and whimper, collected each stone of dread in my gut—it wouldn’t come close to this. Every awful moment would still pale in comparison to the visceral terror swallowing me whole.
I have seen this creature before.
In another time. Another place. Another Haikal.
As it had the night I witnessed my grandmother’s death, time thins around me. The shadows slither over the floor, brushing over my skin.
YASMINA MANSOUR.
My lungs seize, collapsing beneath the wrecking ball of a scream hammering in my chest.
It’s my own voice.
I CAN GIVE YOU WHAT YOU DESIRE MOST.
I try to unclench my teeth, but they won’t stop chattering. A shadow wraps itself around my neck, and I hear the faintest echo of Rainie’s voice.
“Come see what I wrote, Mina!”the phantom voice calls.“Quick, before Mrs. B comes out!”
Second grade. Rainie had to give herself a red card after Mrs. B saw the string of profanity she’d written in chalk on the playground.
YOU CAN HAVE A LIFE. YOU CAN HAVE THIS ENTIRE TOWN.
The dark shape leans, and before I can faint, heat explodes in my head.
And finally, I understand what my mother’s journal meant.
The shadows are its vulnerability. They come with the curse, but they cannot be controlled by it.
The shadows pin us to reality. They show us what was, and most importantly—what could have been.
The curse shows you a dream. It shows you what could still be.
Under its touch, a life unfolds before my eyes like an unraveling roll of thread. I see rain pounding our house, but not a drop makes its way inside. The roof, finally fixed. Baba sitting on the couch, reading the newspaper while a pile of pistachio shells gathers on the coffee table.
In my room, the metal door is gone, as are the yellow stains on the ceiling. It’s been transformed into a space I couldn’t have designed in my wildest dreams. Colorful and cozy, a place I could dance or study or lounge inside for hours on end. Our house wouldn’t be a villa, but it would be the envy of everyone in Ward.
The thread turns, and I see Jesse leaning against his car, boots crossed at the ankle. Waiting for someone.
In front of him is a small dance studio bearing my name.Mina’s Moves,a name so incredibly silly that I fall in love with it immediately. I watch myself run out of the studio with a large bag and light up at the sight of Jesse. He slings my bag over his shoulder before pulling me in for a long kiss, laughing when I playfully shove him away to gesture at the sweat on my face.
Another twist of the thread, and I’m in Alexandria. Sitting on a thick carpet while a pretty woman braids my hair, both of us fixed on the television, where the soap opera we’ve been tuning into daily after dinnerplays the mid-season finale. She’s my aunt, my father’s second cousin. Baba comes out with a tray of tea, passing me one while he pretends not to be avidly watching the soap. He hands the next two cups to his mother and father, who argue with my cousins about their grades and the upcoming nightmare of senior year exams. Another cousin splashes sharbat over a tray of hot kunafa, the sizzle of syrup on hot shredded dough momentarily distracting everyone.
The thread could go on forever. It could show me every moment of my life until the day I die, and I know it would show me the most beautiful things.
For the first time, I understand why Bamba cursed herself. How she didn’t look hard enough through the mirage to see the monster behind it.
