The Keeper of Happy Endings

by Barbara Davis

The female sex has always been troublesome for those in power, because we see things, know things.

People always find a way to justify their hate—and give others an excuse to fall in line. They put words in people’s mouths, plant them like viruses, then watch them spread.

There is a grief worse than death. It is the grief of a life half-lived. Not because you don’t know what could have been—but because you do. You realize too late that it was there for the taking—right there in your hands—and you let it slip away. Because you let something—or someone—keep you apart.

Over distance, over time, Whatever trials might come, May the echoes of these two young hearts Be forever joined as one.

But I’ve come to believe we create our own curses and carry them through life because we’ve been told it’s our lot. We’re taught to relive our mothers’ heartaches, to accept their sufferings as our own, and pass them on to the next generation, again and again, until one of us at long last says no, and the curse is finally broken. Because we’ve discovered a new kind of magick—the kind that comes with choosing for ourselves, with saying I will do something else, be something else, have something else.