Read Online The Rosemary Spell by Virginia Zimmerman - Free Book Online Page B

and more blank. She keeps turning.
    Adam says, “It seemed like there wasn’t any more writing in the book, and then there was . . .” He trails off, confused.
    The image of blotchy cursive haunts me, but what did it say? “Writing appeared,” I affirm. “And then it was gone.”
    Constance nods sympathetically as she turns page after page. “Yes, it happens like that.”
    â€œ
What
happens?” Adam and I ask together.
    She keeps turning pages. “Nothing and more nothing, and then words come and you remember . . .”
    â€œWhat?” Adam asks. “What do you remember?”
    â€œNothing,” she says in a monotone. “It disappears.”
    â€œIs she describing the diary or her mind?” I whisper.
    A yellowed page rests against Constance’s palm. “So old,” she murmurs. “You can feel that this page was once something living. It has life in it still, but also decay.”
    â€œYou remember the book,” Adam observes.
    â€œThe false codex,” she murmurs. “How could I forget?”
    â€œWhat’s a false codex?” I ask.
    â€œA foolishness more than a lie,” she sighs. “If there is a bear in Shakespeare and here is a bear, would you conclude that it must be Shakespeare’s bear? Of course not. Foolishness.”
    â€œBear?” I frown at Adam. “Where is there a bear?”
    She tips her head up and searches my face. In the searching, she seems to lose her way, and her eyes drift to the dish at her side. “Would you care for some candy?” Her arm extends toward the dish.
    â€œNo, thank you.”
    â€œRosie, look.” Adam points to the open book. My notes, unchanged, easy to read, sit at the top of the page.
Juvenilia. Mom died in flu pandemic.
    â€œIt doesn’t make any sense,” I exclaim. “What I wrote is here, but the other writing . . .”
    Constance presses her skeletal hands against her eyes and breathes out, a long slow exhale. “Void and nothing,” she says through her breath.
    â€œWhat is that?” I ask. “What does that mean?”
    She doesn’t respond. She starts turning pages again. Slow. Steady. The only sound in the bright room is the gentle movement of parchment, a dry sound, like dead leaves.
    â€œMy hands remembered the way,” Constance says, quietly triumphant. Her bony fingers scrabble against the page.
    â€œIt’s folded in!” I cry out.
    Adam and I huddle over the book. I reach into the crease of the binding and fumble for an edge. Find it. I peel the page open. Like one of those foldouts in a little-kid book that opens up to show a bigger picture or a map, only there’s no picture here.
    There are words. Six lines of faded handwriting. A poem.
    â€œI’m sorry,” Constance whispers.
    â€œNo!” Adam grins. “This is amazing! Thank you!”
    The poem is in the same old-fashioned writing as the list of herbs. It will take some work to figure out what it says.
    â€œDid you write this?” I ask.
    Constance shakes her head. Her green eyes swim with tears. “I’m sorry. I knew better.”
    â€œIt’s okay,” I reassure her, though I’m not sure what she means.
    â€œMy hands remembered the way,” she says again, and she turns her hands over and stares at them with wonder.

Six
    I N THE CAR, Mom pumps us for information about the visit.
    â€œYou were right,” I tell her. “Her memory is really bad. She was nice to us . . .”
    â€œKept offering us candy,” Adam interjects.
    â€œBut she didn’t make any sense. She said this really weird thing about a bear in Shakespeare—”
    â€œDid she?” Mom perks up. “That actually does make sense. There is a bear in Shakespeare.”
    â€œThere is?” Adam and I exclaim in unison.
    â€œYes, it’s in
The Winter’s Tale.
You know there aren’t a