"What are we going to do?" Aunt Sandy paced back and forth. "If the curse really is getting stronger then we are all in danger."
"Discovery will be inevitable," Molly's mom said.
"Forget discovery," Aunt Sandy said. "With the curses that Tommy and Billy have we could all be dead in a week!"
Molly rocked back and forth on the couch. The raised voices were making Molly anxious. Aunt Sandy was trying to keep her voice down, but she wasn’t having much luck.
Billy was sitting in the far corner of the room, curled up with his knees pressed to his chest. Molly had never seen him look so depressed. He stared at a blank spot on the wall, unmoving. Aunt Sandy just paced back and forth, almost ready to pull her hair out. Molly's mother sat on the couch next to her, ringing her hands.
"What can we do?" Molly said. She meant it as a rhetorical question but when she heard it out loud it became a real question in her mind. No, really, what can we do? Can the curse be broken? Or is there something that's changed that made it worse?"
"Meghan," Aunt sandy snapped at Molly's mom. "Didn't you tell her the family history?"
"I told her the basics, the story of JohnGroder and how the family split to keep hidden after a generation." Molly's mother leaned back on the couch. "I didn't feel that she needed to hear the details of every single person's life."
Aunt sandy rolled her eyes and turned to Molly. "John Groder put the curse on our family out of anger. It wasn't to teach us a lesson, like in a fairy tail. It was meant to make us miserable and then kill us. Personally, I don't think he meant for more than a generation to survive. But we'll never know for sure.That was more than a hundred years ago."
"I think we should look into it," Molly said. "We don't have any other choice."
"I can't go," Aunt Sandy said. "Tommy is too young to travel to New York. And Billy..."
"Can speak for himself," Billy said from the corner. "I agree with Molly. We need to at least look into the possibility that the old estate or offices will hold some clue."
Molly's mother put her hands up. "I think the kids are right. The only place answers are to be found are High Falls, New York."
"And who's going to take them?" Aunt Sandy asked.
"Not me," Molly's mother replied. "I don't want to go digging in the past.
"We'll go on our own," Molly said. "Billy can drive. I'll act as copilot."
"Nonsense," Aunt Sandy said. "It's over three days of driving each way. Meghan, you are going with the kids, and for once in your life, you will be responsible."
