Love, or the Witches of Windward Circle

by Carlos Allende

  She swept the flashlight around and spotted a gray figure slide between two tombs in the direction she had last seen Heather go. Friend or foe? she worried. The flashlight slipped out of her hands, and the lamp broke when it hit the ground. Foe, most probably. She wasn’t going to wait to find out. She darted towards the south end of the cemetery.

  “Help!” Josie yelled, feeling her chest burning.

  The little woman raced behind her.

  “Somebody’s trying to kill me!” Josie continued screaming, tumbling over the gravestones, not once daring to look back at the person following her. “Help me! Help me!”

  She runs so fast! The little woman panted with despair.

  She ran like a young gazelle, with those long and graceful limbs that our little friend had fallen in love with, the limbs of a dancing fairy. The little woman wasn’t an African lion. With her stubby shanks, a heavy garden tool in her hands, and sixty years on her back, she could barely run at all. After a few dozen steps, she stopped chasing Josie. Her heart pounded so fast she couldn’t breathe. She wanted to sit down and rest, but she feared that the girl’s screaming would call someone’s attention, so she decided to run in the opposite direction.

  Still, it was a difficult race to the exit for poor Josie. She kept falling down, and by the time she reached the bars of the metal fence, she had lost one shoe and her hands were bleeding.

  “Help me!” she shook the fence. Where was the gate? “Help me out of here!”

  There was a gravekeeper, after all, a century-old–looking man with a thick beard that lived on the premises. The screams had awakened him and he now stood next to the fence, holding a shovel in one hand and pointing a light towards Josie.

  “What are you doing here?” the frightened man asked.

  Josie saw the gravekeeper’s face, partially illuminated by his lantern, a mask furrowed by age, like a field left fallow. She saw his beard, his penetrating blue eyes, which gave him a lupine expression, and the shovel that he had taken from his office to defend himself. Foe! the girl instantly decided, and tried to push her body between the bars of the fence. Her head went through, but her shoulders wouldn’t. She tried to pull back out, but she got stuck.

  “I’m calling the police,” the old man threatened her, but made no move towards her or his office.

  Josie pulled hard and freed herself. Drawing strength from nowhere, she climbed up the fence like a cat, and jumped over to the street side. She hurt both her feet with the fall, but didn’t stop running.

  Holding his lamp up, the old man walked back in the direction from which he’d seen Josie come running. He saw the hooded figure running to hide under the pediment of a tomb that resembled a little chapel.

  “Who’s in there?” he asked, getting closer.

  The little woman crouched in her hiding place.

  “Who are you?” the man asked. “What are you doing here?”

  The little woman squeezed her eyes shut, as if not being able to see could make her invisible. She clenched her hands around the handles of hedge clippers, ready to jump and kill this man too, if it became necessary.

  “Oh, my God,” the man exclaimed, getting closer. “You’re Antonia’s youngest daughter, aren’t you? What are you doing here?”

  The little woman opened her eyes. How could this man know her mother’s name? But she had recognized his voice too. She raised her head and looked into the old man’s eyes for confirmation.

  It was Harris, Victoria’s godfather.

  “What are you doing here?” Harris asked. “Why are you covered in blood? Did you kill somebody?”

  Who else are you going to trust, if not your family? The little witch nodded. Then, she began weeping. Oh did she weep! Like a Magdalene on the road to Calvary. Wouldn’t you cry and bawl had you just killed somebody? A life lost is lost forever. She had planned to commit murder, yes, but it is one thing to imagine it, to dream about it, to rejoice in the expected bliss that will come from killing your adversary, and a very different one to actually do it. She wept and wept as she hadn’t wept in almost fifty years, after her father, the little brown pup, had been killed by those mean coyotes. She wept until her tears dampened her blouse, until gasping for air became painful, and once her eyes had run dry, between sobs and whimpers and tremors, she told Harris all her misfortunes. She told him about her sisters, how cruel and evil and selfish they were, about President Buer, about how hard it had been to summon his name, about her dreams to be young again, and to be beautiful, and live the life that she never had given a chance to live. She told him about the black child that she had stolen as an offering to the Little Master, about Ms. Cummings, about the girl, and finally, she told him about having killed Heather.

  Harris let her talk. He understood, he said. He also had made terrible mistakes and hurt people.

  When she finished, Harris asked her to take him to the corpse.

  It was a grim spectacle. The little woman had stabbed Heather in her back first, and then through her mouth, so she would stop screaming.

  “I’ve done worse,” Uncle Harris consoled her.

  She looked down at her feet. Her shoes were covered in blood stains.

  “We need to get rid of the body,” Harris advised.

  The little witch nodded. They each grabbed a leg and dragged Heather’s body towards his office at the north end of the mausoleum.

  “Part of me feels the obligation to stop you,” began the werewolf. “The other part, my feral part I suppose, feels enticed to tell you to do as you please. Follow your dreams, whatever they may be. We only live once, don’t we? Look at me. I have to eat human flesh. I cannot fight my true nature. Who am I to judge you for what you do? You want to be young? Good for you. If that’s what your heart desires. As long as nobody knows what you do, keep doing it. If you’re discrete, you won’t be punished. I learned that from your mother. Now if someone else gets to know, well, then you’re in danger. That’s why I live in a cemetery, so I can scavenge the tombs at my leisure. Nobody cares for the dead. No one cares to check if the bodies are missing. And I don’t want to hurt people. I just want to eat them. Once they’re buried, they’re mine. So long as the grave looks intact, I can keep my business secret. I never go hunting anymore. I don’t have the need. As long as I keep my fridge full, I know I won’t have the urge. They’re not always fresh, but—maybe you’ll find this disgusting—once the body starts to decompose, it is more appetizing. Anyway, nobody cares about the dead, but police will care if a living body goes missing. You need to be more careful.”

  The little woman agreed with a sniff.

  “How are your sisters?” Harris asked, after a short silence. “I used to spy on them, you know? Watch them wait for the electric car. After what happened…I was too embarrassed to contact them. I stopped years ago. Are they fine? How many years has it been? I’ll be eighty-six in December. Magnolia would have been eighty-four. Last time I saw you, you were in your early twenties, remember? How old are you now? You must be in your sixties. Your sisters are older.”

  “We better cut off the pieces here,” he said, once they reached the entrance to his office. They dropped the body. “It will be easier to wash off the blood from the grass. I’ll go change into more practical clothes. Meanwhile, take off her clothes. Take her shoes, if they fit, and anything else you can use. I’ll burn the rest.”

  He entered the building. The little woman hurried to do as told. Probably the shoes wouldn’t fit, but she still compared the soles to her own; they would be an improvement. Every once in a while a long sniffle made her whole body tremble. Heather’s shirt was ruined. The skirt and her tights were too big. The blood stains wouldn’t come off, anyhow. She bundled up the clothes and left them next to the body. Poor Heather, she thought. Waiting to be cut in pieces.

  She found the car keys in one of her pockets. She had forgotten about the car. What was she
going to do about it?

  Harris came out wearing an old butcher apron but without a shirt. He held a bucket in one hand and an axe in the other.

  “Step back,” he said, raising the axe. The silver hair on his back made him look like a specter. “It may splash a little.”

  With just one hit, he chopped off Heather’s head.

  He picked it up by the hair and put it inside the bucket. “Maybe not the one that you wanted, but still a head,” he offered it to the little woman. “You think you can use it?”

  The little witch nodded, embracing the present.

  “You better go now,” Harris added, reaching again for the axe. “I’ll take care of the rest. In a couple weeks, she’ll be my dinner. Your sisters don’t know you’re here, do they?”

  The little witch shook her head.

  “That’s what I thought. Don’t tell them that you saw me. I won’t tell about you, either. It’s better that way. Good luck,” he said, and let the axe fall upon Heather’s left foot.

  What if she took the car? the little woman wondered as she scurried away, clenching the car keys inside her pocket. She had never driven before, but—could it be that difficult? She had ridden with Ms. Cummings many times. And with the Bells. And with Dr. Nishimura’s wife, a few times, to pick up groceries. It would be worse if someone found the car abandoned, wouldn’t it? Someone may call the police. And maybe, she thought, if she hurried up, if she drove, she could still make it to the house before the girl and get the head that she actually wanted. She had taught herself how to summon a demon. And she had stolen a baby. And she had just killed another human being. All by herself. President Buer was right. She was evil and rotten inside, but she was smart. Driving a car shouldn’t be too difficult. She knew how to start it. And short people drove too, didn’t they? If she adjusted the seat, she would be able to reach the pedals. Mrs. Nishimura was not much taller than she was and she drove every day. As far as she knew, she had never had an accident.

  The most difficult part was to make a left turn. She had to stretch one foot down on the accelerator and pull the wheel with both hands to one side while stretching her neck all the way up, for she could barely see over the dashboard. It took her almost as long to get home as if she had been on her bike, but she made it alright. It helped that it was late and there was almost no traffic. Parking was easy.

  “Saint James the Just!” President Buer welcomed her at the door wearing the sheath dress that Josie had stolen from Sears for her dinner with Richard and a crocheted shawl from Victoria. “You were supposed to behead a girl, woman, not bring back an automobile. What happened?”

  Josie hadn’t arrived yet, the demon confirmed. After making her familiar aware of all that had happened (she noticed that President Buer flinched at the mention of Harris, but restrained himself from making a comment) the little woman seized a rolling pin from a drawer, stepped back outside, and crouched below the flight of stairs, ready to break Josie’s neck the moment she came back.

  Her hands were shaking. She was covered in sweat, and she needed to pee, but she wouldn’t leave her spot. Not when the girl could show up at any moment.

  The demon took the head from the car, pulled out the eyes and the tongue, to have them as a snack on a piece of toast the next morning, and put the rest inside the freezer for his mistress to use later. “I’ll be in the shed praying for you,” he said, “in case you need me.”

  18

  In which we attend a private poetry reading

  Alas, Miss García wouldn’t be back at the house that night.

  She had kept running for almost a block before she realized that she had lost one shoe and that it would be easier to continue if she got rid of the other. She took it off, but kept it in her hand. Those were nice shoes. She shouldn’t have worn them to a cemetery.

  After a while, she slowed down. The old man hadn’t followed her. There was no soul around, no cars passing. She looked at the street signs: 10th and Pico. Should she go to the police? The station was less than a mile further down, by the beach. What would she tell them? What would she say when they asked her what she was doing inside a cemetery? Should she go back instead and look for Heather? Maybe she needed help. If so, it would be best to go to the police and explain what happened. But what if she got arrested? She didn’t want to spend another horrible night in the pen. She couldn’t tell the police what she and Heather had been up to. She rubbed the sweat off her eyes. The scratches on her hands and knees stung badly. Probably it had all been a stupid joke. Heather loved to make stupid jokes. She put her hands inside Heather’s jacket pockets and felt the small tin box where Heather kept her weed.

  She heard the wail of a siren. The heat. They were going to the cemetery. The old man had threatened to call them. Should she wave them down and get their attention? She pulled out the tin box, ready to get rid of the evidence—but what if they could tell by the smell in her clothes that she had been smoking? What if Heather was indeed dead and they concluded that she had murdered her in a drugged frenzy? That’s what squares thought of pot-smokers, that they were capable of committing a crime after just one hit. She hid behind a tree and waited until the police car passed. If Heather needed help, they would find her.

  She scurried down a side street. She couldn’t go to the police, not if it meant ending up in jail again, serving time for a crime she hadn’t committed. Please, God, let it all be a bad joke. It had to be a joke. Heather was perfectly capable of pretending to be attacked, just to make fun of her. But what if she was dead? She wasn’t, she couldn’t be, but if she was…well, she didn’t like Heather that much, anyway. She was abusive and rude. She shouldn’t have asked for her help in the first place. She should have gone alone to the cemetery.

  A feminine voice interrupted her thoughts.

  “Josie!”

  A white Pontiac pulled over to the curb. Inside were Noelia, a roundish girl from Costa Rica for whom Josie didn’t care much, and her American husband, George, another fatty. She knew the couple from the Gas House Café.

  Seated in the back was Eva, lost in a heroin daze, her ear resting on her left hand and her shoulders moving to the rhythm of the jazz music coming from the radio.

  “Where are you going, walking alone this late at night?” Noelia asked Josie. “You’re going to get raped.”

  “I’m going home,” Josie ventured timidly.

  “Why are you barefoot?” asked George.

  “I lost my shoes.”

  “You’re holding one of them in your hands. Are you high?” Noelia asked.

  “No,” Josie said.

  “We are,” Noelia laughed. “We did cocaine, we smoked pot, and we’ve been drinking a lot. We’re going to Larry Lipton’s house. Jack Kerouac is there. Want to join us?”

  “Who’s Jack Kerouac?” Josie asked.

  “A writer,” George responded. He winked at Josie. “They’re having a poetry reading tonight.”

  Josie looked at Eva in the back seat. The blonde girl looked back and smiled. Was she making fun of her because she was barefoot? Probably. She wouldn’t want to share a ride with her in a million years. Then again, the fog seemed to be getting thicker the closer she got to the beach. Sitting next to her worst enemy was safer than continuing to walk alone at this hour. She opened the car door and stepped in.

  George drove on.

  “You’ve never heard of Jack Kerouac?” Noelia asked, turning towards the backseat.

  “No,” Josie pouted.

  “He’s written a lot of books,” Eva explained.

  “Books are for stupid people,” Josie muttered.

  Eva chuckled. She pulled her cigarette box out of her purse and offered it to Josie. The girl spurned her offer, turning her head away.

  “What was that?” George asked.

  “Books are for stupid people,” Eva quoted back. She put a cigarette in h
er mouth and the box back in her purse.

  “They are!” George laughed. “I cheer for that.”

  He took a mouthful from a bottle of vodka that he had been holding between his legs and passed it to his wife, who immediately passed it to Eva. Eva took a gulp and offered it to Josie. Josie looked at the bottle and gave the Polish girl a withering look. She was not going to drink from that bottle and share her disgusting Jewish gerMs. Who did that stupid kike think she was? Then again, she needed a drink desperately. She grabbed the bottle, cleaned the mouth with her sleeve and took a long swig. She returned the bottle to Noelia. It felt good…terribly good. She wished now that she hadn’t rejected Eva’s offer of a cigarette. She really could use a smoke. She needed one so badly. But she was not going to ask for one, she thought, pursing her lips. She still had some pride. She would wait until she was offered again.

  “You still haven’t told us what you were doing walking alone on Pico,” George said.

  Josie responded with a moan. “It’s a long story,” she added, trying to smile. “I prefer not to talk about it right now.”

  This Kerouac must be famous, Josie reckoned, as she and her friends squeezed through the crowd into the living room of the Lipton’s residence at 20 Park Avenue, a few steps from the beach. She was still worried about Heather, but since she was there now, and already getting buzzed, she decided to do her best to dispel the thought that something bad had happened to her friend. I’ll bet she’s home by now, she consoled herself, laughing her ass off that she scared me.

  The Lipton’s house was a two-story, turn-of-the-century craftsman. Like the building, the furniture was outdated, but strange art pieces here and there and the abundance of filled bookshelves proclaimed the sophisticated nature of its tenants. Half the crowd wore glasses, and only the women lacked facial hair. Lots of turtlenecks, black sweaters, and sandals. Only a few ties.

  Larry Lipton sat on a big chair in the middle of the living room, like a minister conducting a council. A man wearing shorts and a military coat stood in front of him, facing the crowd, reading a poem. Josie wasn’t particularly keen on Mr. Lipton. She didn’t understand his sense of humor, nor the reason why he spoke so highly of poets who couldn’t write a line that made sense, or two that actually rhymed. She really didn’t like coming to his house that much. She respected his self-appointed authority as the head of the beatniks, just as everyone else did, but that nonsensical, boring poetry shit! She’d rather stare at the empty walls of her bedroom for an entire day than suffer any minute of it.