“Always,” she assured me.

By the time I passed through the front doors of the assisted living facility, I was bursting at the seams to tell Mrs. Robinson that I’d been able to reach Jennie and actually talk to her. I was so excited that, after changing into my scrubs, I clocked in and raced up the stairs (better to avoid elevators after that morning’s close call with the SUV, I figured) to the third floor before starting my schedule. But when I reached her room, I heard an unfamiliar voice coming from inside.

“… in bed before eleven every night, you hear me? No more of these late-night movies.”

I knocked lightly on the door and cracked it open to find a beautiful woman sitting on the love seat in Mrs. Robinson’s room. She raised her head when I said, “Excuse me. Just checking to see if Mrs. Robinson’s ready to submit her dinner order.”

“You must be the one indulging my mother in all of her voodoo nonsense,” the woman snapped at me. When she stood, I saw that she wore an impressive business suit. Mrs. Robinson had said her daughter was a local newscaster, and I deduced that this was her.

“I, uh…” I didn’t know what to say.

“You leave her be! She’s just doing her job. She’s the nicest person around this joint,” Mrs. Robinson defended me.

But Mrs. Robinson’s daughter walked over to where I stood in the doorway. “My mother had a stroke five years ago, and she’s been struggling with neurological issues ever since. All of this voodoo stuff is bad for her health, okay? I don’t want to find any more eggshells scattered around this room—or matches or candles or essential oil or powders—or I’m going to talk to your manager.”

I nodded, stunned. Just as I was about to excuse myself, Mrs. Robinson called out happily, “So, you got through to her! Your sister! They aren’t happy about that. No, they aren’t.”

With a weak smile, I excused myself and took the steps back down to the first floor to begin my daily duties. Well, this was a frustrating turn of events. I had been counting on being able to ask Mrs. Robinson questions about how we might be able to use voodoo to banish the spirits harassing Mischa. As much as I was excited about having made contact with Jennie, the directions she’d given me on Christmas Eve had only made the curse jump from Violet to Mischa. I needed all the help I could get.

I couldn’t afford to botch an attempt to break the curse a second time.

On my ten-minute break, I called Mom. At first she flat-out refused to consider the possibility of my returning to Wisconsin before June, which was when the judge had approved me for a one-week visit at home. I reasoned that my spring break in Tampa was the following week, so I’d only miss one day of school—even if I stayed in Wisconsin through the weekend and attended the funeral on Monday. But Jennie was right; Mom only relented when I reminded her that Mrs. Portnoy had once been there for us.