“There is much life in your veins,
hija
. A very good sign of longevity, health and
fruitfulness.” As she spoke, the woman patted the top of Erica’s
hand, turned it over and then splayed her fingers.
Fruitfulness, as in child-bearing?
Erica
shivered when the strange woman ran a pudgy finger down the life
lines of her palm. “There is a man in your life, a tall, dark man
who is very attractive. You are in love with him, yes? Yet, you do
not know if he is honest in his intentions.”
“Yes,” she mumbled, “something like
that.”
“You must know this before you are able to
move further. Is he an honorable man? Does he wish to have a future
with you as well? All this may be revealed if you follow my
instructions.” With that, Madam Paola released Erica’s hand and
pulled herself out of her chair. For a large woman, the Santera
seemed surprisingly spry as she disappeared into the shadows.
“How much money do you have?” Sacha asked
from behind her.
“I don’t know, maybe a couple of dollars.”
Erica couldn’t recall what her wallet held right now. The sights,
the sounds, the smells of this
casa de mágico
had zapped all
of her senses.
“Well, the lady takes credit cards, so you’re
safe.”
Erica opened her mouth to balk at having to
pay for hocus pocus, but she give a little yelp instead when she
spied a skeleton mask hanging not two feet away, the grinning,
leering skull surrounded by a halo of bright parrot feathers. Next
to it, hung what looked like a stuffed scarecrow, though instead of
traditional features, this one sported large, black Xs for a mouth
and eyes. A large, economy-sized voodoo doll?
“Don’t worry, Paola guarantees her work. You
won’t be disappointed.”
Erica snorted. “And if this magic spell doesn’t do
the trick, do I get my money back? Should I ask for a receipt?”
When she felt Sacha touch her bare arm, she gave a start. Not one
to scare easily, she felt her skin crawl with goose bumps. This
place had suddenly rankled her nerves.
Twenty minutes later, the Santera returned
with a large, heavy rucksack. “I have the instructions here, along
with what you will need to perform the ritual. My friend says you
wish one for truth, another to reverse the effects of your
affections should you find your lover a deceiver of your heart.
Follow the directions closely, and it will not fail.”
“What do I do? Sprinkle the ingredients on
him, or make him drink a potion?”
The older woman laughed, a rich, hearty
contralto, though the slight eerie tinge to it made Erica shiver
again. “You watch too many
películas de horror, querida
. You
simply make your altar, just as I have instructed, and take the
walk in the sea. I recommend a metal tray to place your
offerings.”
Sure, it all sounded so simple in theory. A walk in
the sea? Offerings to whom? Erica tried to suppress her own nervous
laughter. She watched as Sacha took the sack from the voodoo lady,
its weight evident by the way he bent slightly at the knees.
“For you,
Eriqueta,
I make a special
price. Two hundred. If in a week’s time, you do not see results,
you must call me and I will rework the spell.”
“What if it doesn’t work, period?” Always the
conscientious consumer, Erica wanted some guarantees for two
hundred bucks.
The woman narrowed her eyes to points of
shimmering cobalt. The wide smile revealed stained, uneven teeth as
if Madrina Paola chewed tobacco for sport, or perhaps even
something more exotic like bat wings.
Erica fumbled in her purse. “Do you take
Visa?”
“Of course,
mija
. Even us Santeras
have to be practical.”
* * *
Since Erica doubted she could sleep, she
allowed Sacha to talk her into performing the ritual. Making a pit
stop at an all-night retail store for a metal tray, she helped her
friend lug the sack of goodies up to her apartment.
“We need mood enhancers,” Sacha suggested and
went to relight her prayer candles, and then selected a CD of
contemporary South American music from her collection.
Erica pulled out her ritual implements as
well as the instructions typed out on regular bond paper. “For some
reason,” she laughed as she read, “I expected this to be on a roll
of papyrus and written in calligraphy.”
“This is easier to understand,” Sacha
commented as he began to recite the list of ingredients so Erica
could gather them in order. “A package of seaweed strands and
herbal mix, a bottle of cypress oil, a vial of goat fat, a bag of
teosinte meal, two dried catfish eyes…” Here, he stopped and pulled
a wry face. “Well, we’re either making a love potion or tomorrow’s
dinner!”
“Yuck!” Giggling, Erica continued to line up
items until she held up what looked like a ball of wax. “What do I
do with this?”
“Let’s see.” Sacha quickly scanned the
directions. “You’re supposed to melt it in a double boiler and add
some of the ingredients in the exact order listed.”
Though she didn’t have a double boiler, she
did manage to rig together two pots, the larger one with water
along the bottom and started it to a boil on the stovetop. In order
to get them into the spirit of the game, she produced a bottle of
Sangria and her two good crystal goblets.
“We may as well make a night of it in honor
of our sacrificial lamb... or in this case goat.”
Erica couldn’t remember when she’d had this
much fun, almost like a girls’ night of activities, but instead of
curling each other’s hair or painting toenails, she and Sacha were
concocting some mysterious formula to make Nico Sloan bear his
soul, so to speak. Their herb selection consisted of Valerian,
borage, mug wort and nightshade, not your usual spice mix. What
didn’t kill him could conceivably induce veracity if not
vomiting.
Once she had the wax melted, Erica carefully
poured it into one of her clay casserole bowls. Next, she worked in
various ingredients including some of what looked like cornmeal
before the mix began to cool completely. By the time she finished,
she likened her blob to that of brain matter. Quickly dumping it on
her tray, Erica turned over the honors of adding the pièce de
résistance— the fish eyes—to her colleague.
“This is kind of fun,” Sacha commented as he
gingerly stuck the fishy eyes in the middle of their “brain.” He
added several turkey feathers for effect. “It’s certainly a funky
and bizarre way to spend an evening.”
“Now, are we supposed to say anything?” Erica
added two pillar candles to the tray.
Sacha consulted the directions. “In order to
call the spirit of the one you wish to enchant, you must circle
your hands over the offering twice and call the loved one’s name
three times.”
“Okay, here goes nothing.” Tensing, Erica
drew imaginary circles over her concoction and repeated Nico’s name
three times. Then for good measure, she did the same with Gianni’s
appellation.
“I want to make sure to cover my bases,” she
explained when Sacha gave her a quizzical look. “What’s next?”
“Believe it or not, we go to the beach, and
you walk in the sea twelve steps before you place the tray on the
top of the water, with the candles lit of course.”
“Of course.” Before they left, Erica went to
change into a white muslin shift as befitting the solemnity of the
ceremony.
A group of beach campers remained their only
witnesses but they seemed disinterested in the pair who made their
way to the shore. Instead the huddled knot of young men sat around
their bonfire, drank beers and played guitar. Strains of a
Brazilian ballad drifted along the air and out to sea.
As she allowed the incoming tide to lap at
her bare feet, Erica held aloft her altar tray with the lit
candles. Both flames licked and danced in the slight breeze. As per
instructions, she had added two star fruit, with a small slit in
the center of each, one to represent herself, the other to signify
the target of her spell. Next, she counted her steps as she sifted
along the sand bottom. The twelfth step brought the sea water to
her waist.
“Well, here goes nothing!” she proclaimed as
she placed her tray on the surface. Remarkably, it stayed afloat
and slowly drifted away. She turned back to Sacha. “Am I supposed
to do anything else?”
“Yes,” he called to her. “Do a back float and
splay your arms, then say his name three more times.”
Despite a nip in the water, Erica stretched
across the waves and allowed them to carry her along. She looked up
into the night sky, and for the first time, noticed how bright the
stars seemed, as if she could reach up and pluck them from their
dark velvet carpet. Conjuring up Nico’s face, his sensual lips, his
silky hair, and his gorgeous body, she murmured his name three
times. She did it again with Gianni’s moniker, although, she’d much
rather concentrate on the other Sloan, the artist, her wonderful
lover who had opened her bare and looked into her soul. How could
she truly believe such a sensitive, romantic man inhabited the same
body as that of her morally degenerate neighbor?
Maybe this was all a mistake, and she had
spent two hundred dollars for nothing more than a bunch of
disgusting materials. Of course, Erica would soon find out if her
spell and her prayers produced the answers she so desperately
sought. When she glanced in the direction of her sacrifice, she
found the tray had since sunk into the vast sea. Glancing skyward
again, she swore, for just a moment, she could see Nico’s beautiful
features in the large, three-quarter moon.
He seemed to be smiling at her, one eye
closed in a perceptive wink, as if to say, “
Querida
, please
believe in me!”
By the time she waded back to shore, as wet
and limp as seaweed, Erica took Sacha’s welcoming hand. He looked
excited, with moonbeams in his own eyes. “The guys over there by
the bonfire invited us over. I told them what we did, and they
thought it a real riot! Come on, Rica, and let’s get you dry!”
Why not? She smiled when she realized it had
to be close to two in the morning. Perhaps, Craig wouldn’t buy her
excuse for being late in the morning, but a gal did need her sleep
after she spent all night conjuring magic spells in the name of
true love. True love... Did it really happen? Sacha believe in
it—so did Maritza and probably most of the world—but Erica had yet
to be convinced that love and magic not only existed but could
coexist as well.
* * *
Awakening, she found herself prone on the
beach, the morning sun beginning to peep over the thin blue line of
ocean horizon. Rising on her arm, she spied an old blanket draped
over her. What had happened? Her head felt like lead, and every
time she blinked she felt another needle stick through her eye.
Erica glanced over at her sleeping companion. Sacha, too, stirred
from his fetal position in the sand.
“What happened?” she croaked, her voice
coarse and ruddy from an all-night of something.
“Oh, darling, don’t you remember?” Sacha sat
up, stretched, and remarkably, looked no worse for wear. “We had a
ceremony, and then a party afterwards.”
“Oh, I think I remember now.” Erica recalled
their evening around the campfire with a few old friends. Well,
after a couple of swigs from the tequila bottle, everyone seemed to
become quite companionable. Singing had been involved as well as
guitar music and storytelling. Before that, it had been something
to do with rituals and magic spells. It hit her then— the tray, the
candles, the blob of wax, the walk in the waves. Erica Rael had
walked into the ocean in order to exorcise her ghosts, or more
importantly, ferret out the truth from the man she thought she
knew, and even loved.
“I need to catch a plane!” she cried as she
struggled to her feet. “I booked a nine o’clock flight to La
Guardia!”
“You’ll make it all right, darling,” Sacha
tried to soothe. “It’s only about six-thirty now.”
The act of standing made her dizzy for a
moment until Erica regained her equilibrium by placing both hands
on either side of her head. “You will explain to Craig for me,
right?”
“No need to worry,
querida
. I got it
all covered.” After rising, Sacha brushed the sand from his slacks.
“Oh dear, I think these babies are ruined!” Glancing further, he
wiggled his naked toes. “Now, what happened to my clogs?”
“Never mind that, I’ll buy you a new pair.”
She grabbed his hand. “Let’s go! I still have to throw some things
together, and I need you to drive me to the airport.”
He gave an exaggerated sigh. “Darling, you
sure can act more like a drama queen than a drama queen, but don’t
get your panties in a ruffle! I’ll get you to the airport on time
so you can rendezvous with the man of your dreams.”
“Forget about the dreams! I just want to know if he’s
actually the man!”
* * *
With her map in hand, Erica started out from
the Amtrak station and headed in a southwesterly direction. She’d
been informed that the Sloan Gallery was only two blocks away on
Broad Street, easy to find on foot. At least the day proved
pleasant with a hint of a sea breeze. Somehow the variance in the
air pressure from Miami to NYC helped to clear her head, and she
felt revitalized. The train ride from New York to Bridgeport had
been uneventful, but it proved an added assurance that her schedule
remained as planned.
Twice Erica stopped and glanced at her cell
phone. Perhaps, she should call Nico after all and let him know of
her arrival. What if the gallery was closed? A good pep talk kept
her moving forward. She could deal with any obstacles as they
arose.
She found the gallery easy enough, a brown
and red brick structure with two large shop windows. The blue
display panels featured various paintings, framed photographs, and
plaques with the artists’ photos and bios. She stood for a minute
to admire the artwork, everything from an acrylic landscape to a
large op-art poster with brilliant rainbow hues.