Chapter Five
Daisy
I blink my eyes open to find myself in the living room, lying on the couch with Grannie’s itchy crochet blanket covering me.
Voices come from the kitchen, hushed but not quite whispers.
“You’re awake,” someone says.
A man comes into my view, looking down at me. It takes two seconds for me to recall who he is—Gus. And what he is.
“You’re a—”
“Please, don’t say it.” He flinches, holding his hands up. “I hate when that sound comes out of me.”
“This is unreal,” I say, bringing my hand to my forehead. “This can’t be real. I’m dreaming.”
“Unfortunately… you’re not.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Let me get you some water.”
He walks to the kitchen as if he’s been here a million times before. It takes him longer than it should to get water, and I assume whoever else is in there is talking to him. So, I throw the blanket off me and go in there after him.
The three chicken-men surprise me… but what really surprises me is Charlie in here with them, sitting at the table like they’re old friends catching up.
“Charlie?”
“How are you feeling, Miss Daisy?” he asks.
Gus hands me a glass of water that I don’t take immediately.
“Very, very confused.”
“I can see why that’d be. Drink some water. Sit down. Let’s talk.”
He pats the table across from him.
I take the glass and sit at the table. Gus moves to stand by the other two men that are leaning against the counter by the sink, neither of them looking happy.
They’re all roughly the same size, but the one with the reddish brown hair is the tallest by at least an inch—and he looks the meanest.
Gus is the most familiar to me at this point, and the shortest out of the three of them—again, only by about an inch or two.
His blond hair is long enough to tuck behind his ears, and his eyes are as blue as the ocean.
The other man, the one who is newest to me, has brown hair so dark it almost looks black, except for the parts shining in the light.
His eyes are green and cautious. The three of them are very much in shape.
They’re all dressed in light jeans and T-shirts.
“This is going to be hard to hear,” Charlie says, pulling my attention.
“Um… okay.”
I sip the water, the coldness helping to settle me a bit.
“It’s going to be hard to believe, but I promise you it’s the truth. I wish Agnes woulda told you all this before she passed. I didn’t wanna hafta be the one to do it, you know.”
“What is going on?” I ask. “Just tell me.”
He looks me in the eye and begins to explain.
“These boys here? This is Wade, Gus, and Rhett. They grew up in this town. Their families lived over by the creeks, in those big mansions.”
“The ones that are empty?”
“Yes, that’s right,” Charlie says. “You see… your Grannie was a stern woman, and well, these boys' grandparents were the ones who tried to take her land all those years ago. They were just as stubborn as she was, except they had money and they liked to use that. They wanted Grannie’s land and—”
“Oh, here we go,” Wade groans.
“Stop it, Wade. You know it’s the truth,” Gus snaps.
The other one just keeps watching.
“You wanna tell the story then?” Charlie asks, looking over his shoulder at the men standing there.
They don’t answer, so he turns back to me.
“Anyway… they wanted the land. Agnes wouldn’t let them have it.
They pulled some strings to take it anyway, and Agnes didn’t like that. So… she cursed them.”
“Cursed them?” I question, a smile forming on my face. “Like a witchy curse?”
“Yes, Miss Daisy. Like a witchy curse,” Charlie says seriously.
But how can he be so serious? Magic isn’t real.
I start to laugh. “Good one, Charlie. Really. Great joke.”
“This isn’t a joke, Miss Daisy,” he says.
“Of course it is. Curses aren’t real.”
“They are,” Wade growls, his expression darkening even more.
My smile falls.
“It is real,” Gus says. “Agnes cursed our families. All the men turned into… well, you know… the animals you saw us as.”
“Chickens?” I blurt.
“Ba-cawk!” Gus screeches, slapping a hand over his mouth and groaning.
“Sorry,” I say, cringing. “I have to get used to that.”
Used to that? Why would I get used to it? This is obviously a big joke. It can’t be real.
“Okay, so what you’re saying is that you can turn into—”
Gus waves his hands, slashing them through the air.
“Uh… those birds that lay eggs?”
“Ba-cawk!”
It comes out of Wade’s mouth this time, and everyone falls silent. His expression turns furious, and he clenches his teeth so hard I don’t know how they haven’t broken. No one says anything about it. It’s ignored. We don’t talk about it.
“We have trigger words,” Gus says quickly. “It’s part of the curse. Anyway, so yeah… all the men in our families turned to those birds. And we’re stuck living here on the farm.”
“Forever?”
“Maybe,” Gus says, with a slight shrug. “We can’t leave. We’ve tried.”
I look from them to Charlie. Back to them. Then to Charlie again.
“This is absurd.”
“Yes, Miss Daisy. It sure is,” Charlie says. “When I learned about it myself, I thought it was crazy talk. Thought Agnes finally done lost her mind. But then I saw it with my own two eyes, and well, seeing is believing, they say.”
Narrowing my eyes, I turn my gaze back on the men.
“Do it, then. Let me see it. Right now. Come on.”
Gus and Rhett share a look. Wade stares at me like he’s about to attack. Gus shrugs and steps forward.
And then… feathers sprout from his skin. He starts to shrink. Limbs contort. And then… he’s a chicken. A head-bobbing, worm-eating, egg-laying… chicken.
He walks up to me, pecking at my boot.
“Holy cow,” I mutter.
Then everything goes dark again.