I went about the house that mornin’, movin’ from room to room with my rag and polish, cleanin’ like one of the old servants who used to walk these halls long before I was born. I didn’t mind the work none. Truth be told, keepin’ busy helped settle my nerves, kept my hands from shakin’ and my thoughts from driftin’ into places I didn’t much care to visit. Even when somethin’ in this house tugged at me, some old piece of furniture, some chipped bit of wood, some forgotten trinket, and pulled me straight into one of them visions, I didn’t flinch like I used to. The house been showin’ me its memories for years now. I done grown used to its ways.
Ever since I come back from the church and sat with Reverend Benoit, I been tryin’ to be honest with myself. Truly honest. And Lord, that ain’t easy. I ain’t as good as I been pretendin’ to be. I ain’t as pure as I wanted folks to think. It wasn’t just love and fear that kept me in this house with Liora. I could leave anytime I pleased, ain’t nobody holdin’ me here but my own heart. Liora might be obsessed with me, might be possessive in ways that make folks whisper, but she’d never lay a hand on me in harm. Not like she would a stranger. Not like she would somebody she hated. If I tried to leave, she’d cry, she’d scream, she’d bargain like a child beggin’ her mama not to go. ‘Cause no matter how grown she act, no matter how sharp her tongue or cold her eyes, she still just sixteen. Still a girl who needs somebody to love her without condition.
And me? I ain’t no saint. I got blood on my hands too. And I reckon it’s time I accept that.
I set the vase back on its shelf, wiped the last bit of dust from its rim, and when I turned, I saw him, the slave man’s spirit, standin’ in the corner like he always do, half‑there and half‑gone, lookin’ at me with eyes full of sorrow older than this house. I didn’t run. I didn’t gasp. I just walked right up to him, standin’ close enough to feel the cold air that always come with the dead. Spirits can’t harm nobody, so I knew I was safe.
“You shouldn’t linger in this place,” I told him soft, my voice barely above a whisper. “You, that woman, and the child… it’s been many years since y’all died at the hands of that old slave master.”
The man shook his head slow, like he was tryin’ to tell me somethin’ without words.
And before I could ask him what he meant, the world around me shifted. My breath caught in my throat as the floor dropped away, the walls melted, and I was pulled straight into a vision; one deeper and heavier than any I’d seen before.
Suddenly I was standin’ in the middle of the old plantation yard, the sun beatin’ down hot enough to burn, the air thick with sweat and misery. I saw Celeste Moreau, the slave mistress who took the surname of the white master who freed her. She stood tall, proud, beautiful in a way that made your stomach twist, her eyes burnin’ with a rage she didn’t know where to put. Newly freed, she turned her anger not toward the slaver who owned her, but toward the other enslaved Black folks. I watched her lash out at them, mock them, punish them, hurt them in ways that made the spirits tremble. Instead of helpin’ them find freedom, she reveled in their suffering.
The vision shifted, and I found myself inside the house, this very house, watchin’ Celeste move her hands over bowls filled with herbs, bones, roots, and powders. Her lips whispered incantations, her eyes gleamed with wicked intent. She lured folks to the home, men and women drawn in by her beauty, her charm, her promises, and used them in her rootwork. Hoodoo flowed through her fingers like poison. She cursed the house, cursed her bloodline, cursed every soul tied to the Moreau name. She fed the walls with pain, and the walls learned to hunger.
Then the vision changed again, softer but sadder. I saw the one person Celeste truly loved her son. A dark‑skinned boy she held close, protectin’ him with a fierceness she showed no one else. She had other children with the slaver, but it was that boy she cherished. And I watched him die. Killed by his own mulatto brother, jealousy twistin’ that boy’s heart into somethin’ cruel. Celeste’s scream echoed through the house, through the soil, through the spirits. His death broke her mind clean in half, drivin’ her deeper into madness, deeper into the darkness she had already embraced.
The vision snapped away, and I found myself on the floor, breathin’ hard, sweat runnin’ down my face. My hands shook as I wiped my brow. The slave man’s spirit was gone.
“It makes sense,” I whispered, my voice tremblin’. “Lord, it all makes sense now.”
Those who die in this house stay trapped in it. Those who bear the Moreau name carry its curse. Anger, hate, jealousy, suffering. All passed down like heirlooms.
And me? I ain’t born of that blood. But I’m caught in it all the same.
Not cursed by lineage. Cursed by choice. By love. By stayin’ too close to a girl whose darkness was born long before she ever drew breath.
