Breaking the Curse

Chapter 24

A/N: okay I thought I had put a certain piece of information in one of the previous chapters but I can’t seem to find it when I look back. Therefore! I will re-put-in this piece of information and plot in this chapter. If for some reason I have simply looked over where I have place this information and it is in one of the previous chapters this is my official apology. For those who have seen this information before you will know exactly what I’m talking about and if not then all is good. And then on the other hand I could have SWORN I already put some of this stuff in the story all ready.

And things did get better. On Sunday all three of my friends came over and we played some video games. Granted I mostly watched but hey at least we were having fun again. Mike did have a few slips like when he won he hugged me and said it was all for me. That stopped the laughing for a minute but we brushed it off and the party kept going. We played until late afternoon then people started to get tired of playing. We didn’t want to sit around and watch movies so people decided maybe studying for those last tests might be a good idea.

“Its good to se you guys aren’t fighting anymore.” Mrs. Brish said that evening over dinner. We were both sitting t the kitchen counter eating sandwiches while I took a break from studying.”

“Yeah. Hey I’ve been thinking about this summer. Maybe I could learn to drive or we can do something fun. I know mom and dad won’t have all summer to do stuff with me but maybe just you and I could. So far it doesn’t look like there are a lot of fun options for the summer.” I wasn’t really looking forward to summer. Turns out David and Wess were going to be away to different places and Mike would be away most of the time teaching summer camp.

“Well who knows maybe some great opportunity might show up. Your parent’s have lots of friends in places you could go visit. And you know accommodations can always be arranged easily. Maybe when your parents come home in a couple hours I will suggest we talk about what you can do. And if nothing else you and I can fly to Paris on a shopping expedition.” She laughed while taking another bite of her sandwich. It was a long standing joke between us. When I was small I’d always heard my mom talking about shopping in Paris, she had gone once with y dad before I was born. And of course I thought it sounded grand the way my mother talked about it so I wanted to go too. Mrs. B had continually promised me that one day she and I would hop on our own private jet and go shopping in Paris and drink tea under the Eiffel tower. Of course that wasn’t a very huge option in my future although it would be fun to go back to Europe.

We finished our dinner and then Mrs. B said I should go up stairs and keep studying. But who likes to sit for hours and study? Especially after dinner. So I flicked on the computer to check my e-mail instead. There was some junk and a cartoon from David that he had found on the internet. And then there was one from Edward.

“Jamie,

Got your last e-mail about your birthday and all your friends being mean and then chivalrous. I’m also sorry that you are bored (I’d written in my last e-mail that I was bored with life). So I thought to myself what is the point of my wonderful Jamie being bored all by herself when she could be bored with me? So I told me mother about the horrendous catastrophe waiting to happened and she has agreed to allow me to write you the following invitation.

Will you, Jamie, come to spend the summer with me?

My mother is willing and ready with pen and parchment, as well and a mouse, keyboard, and telephone, to talk to your parents about the idea. Part of the summer I plan to stay here at home getting ready for school but for the other part I will go to Germany to visit one of my friends who has a place up in the mountains and go to the beaches and take a couple trains around. My mom says we will host you for the summer here if your parents are willing to send you over.

Also the graduation party for my school will be held on my estates (well my father’s estates but I like calling them mine) and I’d like you to come if you can. Bring that nice dress from the ball in Paris. It will be on July twentieth, three weeks from now, if you can come. Please write me back as immediately as possible to let me know whether you can come so I can put you on my guest list. Talk to you soon.

Your very soon to be Lord and Master

Eddie”

And thus opportunity came knocking, and so did my mom. My parents had come home a little early tonight because they had been thinking the same thing Mrs. Brish and I were. And as it turns out the Duchess had already written a note to my mother about the possibility of me coming to spend the summer with them.

“So I take it you want to go?” my dad asked as we sat around the dining room table. My mom and dad were eating their dinner while Mrs. B was knitting and I was jumping around the room.

“Yes I want to go! They said all you’d need to do is get me a ticket over there and they’d do the rest.”

“Well of course we would give you enough money to get around Jamie. We aren’t so poor we can give you money to buy a train ticket. Besides even if they offered we should at least attempt to pay for things if we can.” My mom tried to explain very calmly but I know she was worried.

“I see no reason why not. I mean you’d be staying with friends and you do have an uncle in Europe if you had any problems you could go stay with him in Switzerland.” My dad used to live in Switzerland with his brother before he’d come here and met my mom. I hadn’t seen my Uncle in a long time.

“I don’t know…I don’t feel right letting you go alone. Mrs. Brish what do you think?”

“I think that she’ll be more than fine by herself. It also means that maybe I can have myself a vacation. Who knows, maybe I’ll go to Hawaii and spend some of my savings getting a nice tan.” She winked at me over her knitting and smiled.

“I’ll check tomorrow with the travel agent to see how much the ticket would cost.” My dad offered. “Then your mother and I will discuss it further and decide. Maybe it would be better if you went next year after you’ve finished all your school.”

“But dad! Next year I have to get ready for college, you know that. Besides I want to go this year. I’m plenty old enough and you know I’m not going to run off and do anything stupid. Besides you said yourself I would be staying with friends.” I was playing every card I had and even ones I was making up.

“I said we’ll talk about it. If the ticket’s are extremely expensive this time of year than no way. But I have to check first. Besides I don’t think your mom’s too comfortable with the idea of letting you go for the whole summer. But no more arguing.” He stopped me just as I was about to say something. “We’ll know by Wednesday, okay?”

“Fine.” I would just have to wait. But I did write Edward an e-mail back letting him know what was going on before I went to bed. If I could go to Europe for the summer that would be perfect. Sure I’d miss seeing my friends for the short time they were around but I’d have all next year with them so I wasn’t too worried.

On Monday I was so caught up in the first whirlwind of tests that I almost forgot about the whole thing. But on Tuesday I just couldn’t keep my mouth shut. Over lunch I spilled everything. From Eddie’s e-mail to the thought that I might actually be going back to Europe for the summer they knew everything. But I had brought bar cookies from Mrs. B so they didn’t mind.

“So wait, you’re going to go to Europe to spend the summer with some guy?” I don’t think I need to say who asked that particular question. Only this time he didn’t sound too upset like he’d done so before.

“Yeah, but we’re just friends. I wish you guys could meet him he’s a lot of fun.” I really did wish that we could all go together as a group but of course that wasn’t gong to happen.

“I’m sure he is, just don’t forget to come back okay. We’ll die without you.” David made a dramatic wave of his arms and leaned against Mike’s shoulder. He’d already picked up on the fact that while we had gone back to being friends Mike still liked me just like before. It was his biggest joke now. Mike pushed him off and Wess and David laughed while Mike scowled just a little. But he loosened up and was soon laughing along. I think he realized before that they were going to make fun of him for liking me. What can I say it was very hard not to.

“You need a ride home today or is your knight in shining armor coming to pick you up today?” Wesley asked as we gather together all of our lunch things and got ready to head off to class.

“Actually Matt is coming to pick me up today. He’s leaving for Paris Monday after next. He wanted to get together before he left.” David fluttered his eyelashes and I braced myself for what was about to come.

“Oh Mike! Isn’t it just so romantic? Hey! Maybe if you…”

“Shut up! Maybe if you shut up I’ll spare your face.” Mike growled getting up from the table. He brushed some imaginary crumbs off his shirt and picked up his tray. “Jamie, have a good afternoon I will see you later. Wesley, see you in English. David, see you in hell.” He said very calmly and politely as he walked away from the table. After a few seconds the inevitable laughter sprung up and we all left the table with big smiles.

That afternoon I waiting by the school driveway for Matt. He came up in what I assumed was his parent’s car and I hopped in.

“How’ve you been? It seems like weeks since I last was you.” Matt said was we drove out onto the road.

“I’ve been…okay I guess. Things have happened but I’m okay now. It does seem like a long time since we’ve seen each other.”

“Good, I thought we could get ice cream. I haven’t gone out for ice cream in like two years and I really wanted to do it.”

“Same here, I’m all for it.”

“Then I thought after all that cold ice cream we could bring our lips back to life by making out like mad on a park bench in front of a beautiful sunset.” Oh God it sounded like he was serious! Oh, wait. He’s chuckling, good.

“I’m all for the ice cream part.” I reiterated. “So, how’s your last week of school been?” I asked moving the conversation right along. He told me about his tests and how he was getting all ready for graduation.

“You’re coming to graduation right? I wasn’t able to save you a seat of honor but hey I’m sure you don’t mind right?”

“I don’t need no seat of honor Matt. Besides where would I sit next to your parents? And what would they say? Oh who are you? Hmm, never heard of you before. You’re what to our son again? Oh… you don’t know either, interesting.”

“Don’t be silly, they’d be cool with you sitting next to them. I really do need to introduce you to them before I leave so you can read my letters together with my mom over the summer.”

“Speaking of the summer I might be going away too.” We were almost to the ice cream place near the park which is where I assumed we were going.

“Where too?”

“England, I’m hoping to go stay with friends there. The same family we met in Paris that weekend.” I hoped he wouldn’t remember that the family I was talking about had a son my age.

“Is that the same family who has that son you were hanging out with when you and Leslie were in France?” shit he has a good memory.

“Yeah, they don’t have any other kids so the mom was very excited at having me over for a while. She says she wished she could have had a daughter too.”

“That’s sweet. Well here we are.” We both got out of the car in front of the old timey looking ice cream parlor. When we had both walked around to the front of the car Matt took an extra step over and took my hand. After all the drama this weekend it was good to have a nice solid hand holding mine. I just wondered whether that made it a big serious deal or whether I just liked holding Matt’s hand.

“How about we get something to go and walk around the park with it. Then we can find that nice bench facing the sunset I told you about.” He suggested.

“Sure Matt, that sounds fine.” We went inside and Matt asked me what kind of ice cream I wanted. I told him and he ordered a pint of it before I could stop him. Then he took two spoons and insisted he paid for it. I told him he should save his money for France but he said there would be no more questions and he paid. Then we walked through the park till we found a nice empty bench and we shared the pint of ice cream.

“Have you thought any more about ‘us’? I don’t know but I just don’t know what to think.” Matt said as we sat on the bench eating our ice cream. I was pretty sure he’d bring it up but I wasn’t completely ready to answer him.

“I don’t know either. Matt I don’t think I’m ready for this.”

“Ready for what Jamie?”

“To be an ‘us’, to have to worry about you in another country. I mean what happens if while you’re gone we both realize that we’re not right for each other and we’ve found someone else? I don’t think breaking up over the e-mail sounds too good to me. And don’t tell me you’re sure there won’t be anyone there that you like. You’ll be making new friends, having fun, meeting lots of girls. And I know they’ll be pretty and they’ll love you of course…” Matt made a small huffing/snort/laugh. It was really cute and I wanted to just hug him.

“You’re right…you’re absolutely right. And you know what?”

“What?”

“I like your answer a hell of a lot better than mine. I was going to say that we should just break up before it got started and then when I came back we could pick up where we left off.”

“Well that’s not a bad idea but think about it. When will you come back? I’m only seventeen for crying out loud and sometimes I feel like we’re talking about getting married. I don’t think either of us should feel tied to someone else when next school year comes around. Or this summer for that matter.”

“I love you… I wish I could just put you in my suitcase and take you with me. But hey, how about before I go we get real romantic so that I can go to Paris looking to fix my heart? How’s that sound?”

“It sounds great Matt, just great.” I smiled. I was going to reach for the tub of ice cream but he pulled his hand back and put his own spoon in. I was about to protest but then he held the spoon up to my mouth.

“I am going to pour my heart out for the next two weeks Jamie. Enjoy it now while you can.” He said while I let him put the spoon in my mouth. I let it welt in my mouth for a second then swallowed it. Only two seconds after a found that Matt wasn’t kidding about warming up my cold lips. He skooched up close to me and put his spoon had around my shoulders and pulled me in for a nice kiss. His lips were just as cold as mine from the ice cream but that soon changed as he pushed against me more and more. Automatically I just wrapped my arms around his middle. When he finally stopped kissing me I put my head against his chest and we sat there until the sun set.

Everything was finishing up so well this year. It had started out so rocky with Charles and all the problems he’d caused. The curse was lifted, I felt, and here I was sitting in a park watching the sunset while being held by a fantastic guy. Who knew things could turn out so well in the end. I hadn’t lost a friend after all, I had my heart broken and fixed and in a few weeks who knows what might happened. All I can imagine is that it’s going to be absolutely wonderful.

The End

A/N: Thank you all for reading I love all of you. And yes this really is the end of the story now. I will get started immediately on the next chapter in Jamie’s life which I hope will be as good a ride as this one was. Thanks again everyone and please leave a review and let me know everything you thought or are thinking. I will hopefully get to print this off and completely edit everything for mistakes and plot problems but that won’t be finished for a while so again forgive me for my mind is a simple one and I make mistakes probably more than the average person. Selamat jalan, happy travels from this page.