A Few Words on Curses
File 36, of the ████ report, ███, Indiana. Heading south
The Radio Man sits in the passenger seat of William Burroughs's 2004 Honda Accord while the sedan drones its way down gravel paved country roads. The dry summer heat pairing hideously with the manure and horse shit. The car’s ac does nothing to fight the heat, mostly because it’s broken. William forgoes his suit jacket yet sweats through his dress shirt. Johanna stubbornly remains in his leather jacket.
Bored already of counting bean fields and horse buggies Blant leans back in his seat asks his cohort.
“So how much do you know about monsters?” as the words leave Johanna’s mouth William smiles. He doesn’t get the chance to talk about this often, obviously.
“I’d reckon I’ve read a good portion of everything that's written down.” Burroughs waves, “No first hand experience, I’ll admit that. But I've done my research.” A large tractor pulls to the side to let them pass on the narrow road.
“Alright then. As long as your not floundering once we get there.”
“Oh I know! Quiz me.”
“Na.”
“Come on. What else is there to do?”
Blant closes his eyes. Kids got that much right he thinks.
“All right then. How are monsters formed?”
“Easy, Curses.”
“And curses are?”
“A Curse is formed when someone consciously or not weaves together an enormous amount of Hate that manifests as a malevolent entity that corrupts its surroundings”
“Close enough.” The car enters a town. Two houses and a gas station blur past. The car then exits the town.
“Only close?”
“It doesn’t have to be hate. Anything will do. Tremendous grief, insatiable envy, or ungodly disgust all work. Any feeling felt strong enough that wishes to change the world. Positive ones top, man. Call those ones blessings if you want but they do the same thing. Sit and work their way slowly into everything around them warping anything that stays too long into tools to serve them. Rage against a neighbor deforms the neighborhood ‘till nothing left.”
They drive for a minute in silence. They pass a cow. William breaks the silence.
“How do you stop them.” Burroughs waits for Blant to reply. The radio man smooths back his hair and takes time to collect his words.
“It's a lot of work. You either feed the curse everything it stands against. Throwing symbols and confessions of love into a curse of hate or you have to beat them at their own game. Drown them out in your own emotion. Prove them nothing next to a greater source of rage or want and they’ll dissolve into nothing. Satisfied that there’s a greater source of change working in the world.”
Johanna ends the lesson there content to keep the third method to himself for now. A last resort but an option he knows all too well. When all else fails place warning signs, leave the wretched magic be, and just hope nobody's stupid enough to bother it again.