The Witch Moments

“What on earth made you to say that Angel?” I sneered with great irritation.

All my other friends, encircled before the bonfire, were watching our conversation with wave of confusion on their faces.

“Look Mohammed! Those are not my words. I knew that witch right from my childhood. I used to accompany my parents when they used to go to her, to cast off the black magic plotted against my father by his business enemies. She is not on this merely for money and anyone who meets her could always end up in saying that she got some supernatural power. So her words did not drive me suspicious” Angel’s monotonous words angered me further.

“Angel do you think that anyone who is in love with Aparna could do this for her? I don’t think so. As for me it would be better if we take her to Psychiatrist” I glanced at others for their look of approval.

“We cannot even convey this message to her father for we know he is always on his wheels around the globe over business trips. Why not to the faculties in University?” Jeena joined our conversation.

“No. No. it would become news. Let us handle it among ourselves” Nainar sounded warningly.

“Well then it is better if we could take her to the witch and remove the spell off her. That’s my stand. Anyone back me up?” Angel stood up patting the dust off her back. The other two sets of eyes were set on Angel implicating their yield to her idea.

It all started with the strange behavior of our friend Aparna who along with three of us form the group of Indians studying in Guadalajara, Mexico. Angel’s family got settled down in Mexico before a generation and she joined our circle with the roots of nationalism. Having hardly four months ahead to complete our studies, Aparna started acting in a strange way. She hardly talked with anyone and most of the time sat looking at the ceiling. She sat all the day as though she got deprived of all the physical actions.

The next day we four took Aparna to the witch. The place where the witch, Barbara dwelled was a well-known witchcraft market – Sonora Market. The shops were selling unconventional goods of all kinds; desiccated sloths and crows, seasoned scorpions, rattle snakes skin, Armadillo shells, teeth of unknown animals, skulls of varied sizes, needle bones, multi-hued candles, dried petals of hibiscus, boiling pots of Cauldron. To our dismay even the live animals like lizards, frogs, turtles and Iguanas are caged and displayed for sale. What a person will do with these creepy reptiles other than watching them at a safe distance? I wondered why the people go for the witchcraft lotions and potions still in this nuclear era.

The northwest corner of the market accommodated the old lady. Barbara opened the door, with a wicked beam on her face. Her freak old body emerged from the suffocating smog of incense sticks. The mixed smell of varied fragrances gave me nausea. I felt my intestine thudding up my vocal sacs. Her sunken eyes were probing us with curiosity. She looked at Jeena.

“Amor! Usted sigue siendo un virgen?” she chuckled.

Jeena was confused.

“What is she talking about Angel?”

“She is wondering that you are still a virgin” Angel translated Barbara’s coarse Spanish.

“What on earth bothers this bitch even if I’m not a virgin? Jeena bleated.

“Ssh… She knows English as well” Angel pressed Jeena’s hand.

Barbara’s long fingers with nails like tentacles pulled a rope near the sill. The “soon-to-boom” lantern flashed and dimmed subsequently. The inert panorama inside the house caught me off guard. Like the rest of us, I was gaping at the weird objects around the room.

The dusty floor was marked up with the footsteps of Barbara. A corner of the room was heaped up with innumerable human skulls. The magical tools perused by the Wiccan Traditioners are prevalent in the room indicating the deft hands of Barbara. The masculine objects like Athames are too located at a notch. The pentacle drawn on the altar faded down to peeling paint. A tripod in the center of the room had few posh chalices; one among of it was filled with red colored liquid. I guessed it for the ritual wine used by witches.

Barbara fondled us with crystal-embedded wand. We were bit reluctant to accept the blessings from a witch.

Barbara made Aparna to sit in a circle of five-pointed star drawn at the corner of the room. Aparna was sitting there as still as a statue of Buddha. Barbara knelt down before her and uttered some rhythmic lines, which were sparsely audible to our ears. Aparna closed her eyes slowly and at one moment, her body rested on the wall behind her.

Barbara dragged into the room another tripod. She placed it right in front of Aparna. Her wrinkled fingers grabbed two candles; a black candle and a white candle. She fixed the candles one on either side of the tripod in small stands.

“Black candle is male and white one is female” Angel whispered.

“Do candles have the gender?” Nainar wondered.

Barbara brought a deep plate with a heap of brownish powder; little strawberry leaves and rose petals.

“What’s that powder Angel?” Jeena caught up with the moment.

“Must be crushed Mandrake roots,” Angel sounded with confidence.

The old lady walked to us in an awkward gait.

“The spell cast on this girl was not done intentionally. It was made to win love from her heart. The practitioner, who performed the cast, missed a traditional gaze at the full moon. So the spirits were directed in a wrong direction” she paused.

“I can cast-off the spirits holding her. There is a possibility that it may have an adverse effect on the person who is in love with her in reverse. Should I proceed?”

“Sure Senora.We doesn’t have any objections “Angel gave the consent swiftly. I started feeling a knot in my stomach.

Barbara sat before the tripod and closed her eyes. She started mumbling again. She lit the candles and placed the plate between the candles. She turned back to us and thrown a look for a long second. She closed her eyes back and uttered the magical hymn loudly.

“We are a circle, within a circle

With no beginning or never ending;
Hoof and horn, Hoof and horn,
All that dies shall be reborn
Corn and grain, Corn and grain
All that fails shall rise again”

She blew off the candles in series. I could a see a rivulet of blood streaming down my nose. I started getting unconscious.

PS : One of the blogs published by me in sulekha.com back in 2005