A week has passed since I had that nightmare, or vision, or whatever it was. Nothing crazy has happened since then; Mama’s ghost hasn’t done anything to upset me. She’s probably just taking her time with me–starting slowly and gradually building up, knowing that that dream, or vision, would be enough to disturb me for at least a week.
As I’ve walked to work and back home, I haven’t even seen that man trying to get my attention. Didn’t Mom want me to talk to him, according her her taunts, speaking through other people’s mouths?
Anyway, I’m in the Pet Valu store now, at the cash register, waiting for customers to come in. My aunt is using the washroom at the moment.
This is so stupid–me continuing to work here, when Mama left me so much money that I could just stay at home and never need to work again! If Aunt Jane wants to take over Mom’s business, for a way to pass the time, that’s her business; but she could easily hire someone to replace me…why won’t she?
I just heard the toilet flush in the back. She can come back here and be bored at the cash register while I face cans, or something. Here she comes.
“I can take over here, Roger,” she says.
“Good,” I snort, then step aside for her.
“Why the grumpy attitude?” she asks me with a scowl.
“I’m sick of it here,” I say. “Why don’t you find someone else to do this job? I don’t need the money. You know Mama left me enough to live on.”
“I already told you why, Roger. Your mother told me months ago, when she felt her health declining, that she wanted you to continue working, in spite of the objections she predicted you would make, so you would stay in contact with other people. That’s why I agreed to take over the pet food store when she died. We worry about you, Roger, that is, the whole family does. If you quit your job here, you’ll just sit around at home all day and all night, doing nothing but watching TV or wasting time online–probably looking at porn or something–avoiding people, and just rotting away in isolation. Having this job keeps you around people. It keeps you functioning on at least some level of normality. It’s good for you.”
I groan in annoyance at all of these words. The last thing that interacting with people has ever been is good for me; but try to convince my aunt to see the truth in that!
“I guess I’ll go face the cans,” I say with a sigh.
“Actually, there are some bags of Iams at the back,” she says. “They’re too big and heavy for me to lift. I need you to pick them up and put them under the older ones.”
“OK.” I walk over to the back.
At least I’d managed to talk her out of moving in with me, back when she suggested the idea…to watch over me, and make sure I “wasn’t doing anything foolish.” Her living in the apartment with me would be beyond awkward.
Just as I’ve been thinking about her interfering in my life, think of the Devil, and she appears.
I’m putting the older bags of Iams dog food on the two new bags I got from the back, and she has just arrived. I can feel her standing behind me.
“I’ve been meaning to ask you, Roger, if you’ve talked to your father yet,” she says, causing me to groan in annoyance. “A few days ago, he told me he tried to get your attention when you were coming here or going home, and you just kept ignoring him, so he gave up trying. Have you spoken to him since then?”
“Of course not,” I say, then hiss between clenched teeth, “And he’s not my father. My father is dead. And even if he were alive, my real father couldn’t be such a foolish looking fellow as he.”
“How can you be so sure he isn’t your father if you never even find out? Why would he pretend?”
“Because he’s delusional, of course!”
“Roger, you’re hardly the one to be judging the mental stability of others, with your tendency to see and hear things. Don’t project your faults onto others…and don’t talk to me in that tone!”
“If you don’t like the way I talk to you, then just fire me!”
“You’re not getting out of this job, and out of the social world, this easily. You are going to meet him sooner or later, even if I have to bring him over to your apartment.”
“Oh, God, just leave me alone, would you?”
“Just get back to those bags, and watch your mouth,” she says, then walks away in a huff. “Impossible kid,” I hear her say under her breath.
Yeah, impossible “kid.” Mama always used to call me a kid, even well into my adulthood. I heard her call me that a few times even days before she died. I was never an adult to her, because she didn’t want me to be one. I had to remain a child in a man’s body for her, so she could control me better. She ruined my life with her witchcraft, and she seems to have come back to life in the form of my Aunt Jane. Or perhaps her spirit is possessing my aunt…that could be it!
Either way, I’m no freer than when Mama was alive.
Maybe this is it: maybe she’s using her magic in a subtle way. Could Mama’s spirit be worried that I, having learned a little magic of my own, might learn more, develop my skills at it, grow in power, and thus be a threat to her? It’s possible…unlikely, but possible.
Perhaps I can make it less unlikely if I really do make more of a study of the magic arts. In any case, she’ll keep persecuting me, and causing more and more mischief for the rest of the world, regardless of whether I try to stop her or not…so I’d better try learning more.
After work, I’m going back to the library.
*************
Here I am, at a table with a dozen or so books about how to communicate with, influence, and protect oneself from the spirit world. I’ve already spent several hours jotting down notes in the hope that they’ll help me against Mama.
I have no way of knowing if any of the books I’ve chosen are authoritative or if they’ve all been written by quacks and charlatans. If they’re any good at all, have I written down the better information from them, or have I just written down a bunch of useless nonsense?
In any case, what I have learned has at least given me some hope that I can stop Mama. It will improve my chances of sleeping tonight, if it doesn’t do anything else for me.
It’s getting late. I see nothing but black out that window over there to my right. I’d better put these books away and go home. I can read more from them tomorrow, and I can find more information online on my laptop, if I feel like it.
**********
I’m walking on a sidewalk with the library behind me, lampposts giving me some light in an otherwise starless, black night. It will be at least another ten blocks or so before I reach my apartment. The darkness is ominous.
A few of the spells I read about looked as if they could be effective. In my living room, I can use a piece of chalk or something to draw a magic circle on the floor, draw a pentacle in it, and chant the verse I wrote down to sanctify it.
If the spell works, that is, if it keeps Mama out, I can get my sleeping bag and sleep there, with the TV and my laptop handy to keep me entertained.
As for when I need to leave that zone of protection, another thing I learned from those books is that I can get an amulet or a witch bottle, something I can take with me anywhere for protection against Mama’s ghost. I hope buying such things won’t gouge out too much of my money.
I could fill the witch bottle with my urine, hair or nail clippings, or maybe with rosemary or red wine, if I find pissing into it to be too disgusting. I could bury the bottle in the dirt on the front lawn of my apartment building; I’ll do it at night, so no one sees me and tries to stop me.
The amulet could be a necklace of some kind that I can wear everywhere, never taking it off, for extra protection. I could buy a sachet, or Chinese xiangbao, to ward off Mama’s evil. All of these extra precautions should keep me safe; if none of them work, I really have no idea of what I’m going to do.
Hey…are those footsteps I’m hearing behind me? At this time of night, there are few pedestrians walking about, and there were none on the sidewalk as I left the almost-empty library, and I haven’t seen one person walking here since. Am I imagining the footsteps? Dare I look behind me?
Those aren’t my own footsteps, are they? Is my mind exaggerating the sound, making an imaginary echo? I’ll keep walking and listening: a pair of footfalls, or two pairs of them?
I’m hearing two pairs–no echo.
There’s no way I’m going to stop walking. In fact, I’m going to start walking faster, with long strides.
The person behind me is doing the same thing.
He…or she…sounds really close behind, too.
“Roger, please,” the male voice behind me says. “Can I have a minute to talk to you?”
Oh, God. It’s that guy again! Fine, I’ll talk to him. I’ll tell him to go away, as rude as I can be.
“Listen, buddy, can you fu…?” I begin as I’m turning my head back to see him. But what I end up seeing–illuminated by a nearby lamppost–is a man’s body with the head of a blue elephant!
“Roger, I can prove to you that I am your fa…” he begins.
But I’m already running, screaming, before that thing can finish its sentence.
Infinite Ocean 