Later that night, Narcisa cried out in her sleep.
“Ai aii aiiiii aiiii Não-oo! Por que ele e eu não!? Why gotta be him? Ai aii! Is me who deserve to dead, no him! Aiii aiiii! God see all an’ he gonna come an’ get me! He gonna send de devil for punish an’ torment me forever! Aii aii aii aiiiii! Não-oo!”
When she awakened with a blood-chilling scream, I asked her what she’d been dreaming about. She said she’d had a horrible nightmare. Then she began telling me another twisted, tragic story from her twisted, tragic past.
She was only eleven or twelve, she said. She and her friends had a revolver someone had stolen from the military base in Resende. Bored, stoned-out kids with a gun, someone suggested a game of Russian roulette. Seemed like a good idea.
Narcisa, always in a hurry to die, went first, of course. She didn’t lose. She spun the chamber and passed the big, heavy pistol over to the next kid, her best friend.
Pow!
He lost.
As she told the story, I felt like crying. Narcisa played it off like it was no big deal. I was horrified . . . What a cold-blooded little lizard! Then I realized she was just fronting again. Whenever Narcisa talked about her past, she tried to act all cool and collected, pretending it didn’t faze her a bit. Nonetheless, little clues were always slipping out. I could tell when she cried out in her sleep, whimpering like a puppy in the rain. The memories were in there, a big festering open wound. Nameless fears and traumas brewed and bubbled below the surface, opening portals to hellish nightmare realms; the Dark Side, from whose angry depths hordes of restless, homeless spirits of the damned marched into her life and followed her around like an invisible mob of occult beggars.
The Shadow People. She’d been speaking about them a lot lately.
“Is like de big black vulto, Cigano! She very fast, all de time moving around de room! I can see it in de corner of my eye, an’ then, boo! She just go disappear! Boo! Like that!” She snapped her fingers. “But I can feel these thing is there always, looking me, playing with me all de day! An’ it make me to remember so many crazy thing I seen . . .”
“What kinda things?”
“Focked up thing, bro!” Her eyes grew wide. “Like de black magic womans in my town, sometimes they borned de clandestine baby in de home an’ don’ register it, you know, an’ then they go kill de neném for give it to de devil!”
I was in shock. No wonder Narcisa was so disgusted with life. “That’s fuckin’ insane!” I stared at her in horror. “You seen people sacrificing babies? Fala serio . . .”
“Juro, cara! These why I e’say fock you to these e’sheet backward place an’ I gone to de city for live with de punks. With them, de thing is different, got it? These punk anarchist peoples de most honest an’ authentic peoples in de whole world!”
I thought of the befuddled stoners of the Casa Verde and rubbed my chin. “Howzat, baby? What makes ya think they’re so special?”
“Is cuz all de time they rebel against de society an’ question ever’thing, Cigano. De e’stupid Catholic an’ Christian peoples, them de most ignorant liar of all! Hah! Fock, bro! I seen my own peoples do so much wrong thing.”
“What things?”
“All kinda crazy e’sheets, Cigano. Like my daddy, he was de black magic man, you know, an’ he use to take me to de Candomblé ceremony, an’ I seen all kinda black magic voodoo an’ Quimbanda works when I just a little geer-ool . . .”
“Your father was into all that stuff? Seriously?”
“Yeh, well, they e’say he convert to de Je-sooz when he e’stay in de prison, but is all bool-e’sheets! Hah! I know better! Is just for get de e’special privilégio in there by pretend to be with de Je-sooz peoples. Is like a big focking mafia, these e’stupid Jes-ooz organization, got it?”
I got it. I knew what Narcisa was talking about. I’d seen those fundamentalist preachers coming to the prison in Mexico, bribing, bullying and brainwashing inmates to get control of their minds. Those arrogant, self-righteous Bible-thumpers were always crowing about how some fairy-tale Jesus was the “only cure” for alcoholism and addiction. What shit!
The whole thing disgusted me. The same globally financed McChristian churches were operating all over Brazil now too, conspiring with the most corrupt political forces in the country, like a plague of spiritual termites. For the church leaders, it was all about money, property, power and mass mind control. They even owned their own television networks, using their ill-gotten funds to spew out a hateful, twisted neo-Christian dogma, masking a dark, insidious hidden agenda. I’d seen Narcisa watching those obnoxious, suit-and-tie, pie-in-the-sky pastores on the TV. Their shameless double talk disgusted me. I despised how they weaved their underhanded, fear-based, moneygrubbing spell on the gullible masses.
As a traditional gypsy drabarni—a clairvoyant healer—my own Tia Silvia had been driven underground by those bigoted, sanctimonious assholes when I was a kid. In the ensuing years, the plague of so-called Christian churches had grown into a modern-day Inquisition, wreaking devastation on the spiritual life of the poorest, most vulnerable segments of Brazilian society. I knew exactly why Narcisa was so revolted by it, and wanted nothing to do with her own creepy Bible-thumping family background.
“Hah! More I think about about my focking family, bro, more I don’ wanna come from de e’stupid peoples I come from! When I was a kid, Cigano, I become de satanista. All de kids in my village hang out in de cemitério, for e’smoke de maconha an’ drink wine there, like de big cemetery gang. It was my favorite place, no e’stupid peoples for molest me in there. I never wanna go home no more, so I go e’sleep in de crypt together with de cadaver. Then I make de big pact with de devil an’ do all de ritual for call up Satanas, using de thing I teef from de tumba. Hah! I use to have de big collection of stuff we take out from de people’s grave!”
“Yeah?” I raised an eyebrow. “What kinda stuff?”
She guffawed. Coldly. Without mirth. “Hah! No so much de value thing, Cigano. You know, de cemetery worker, they already teef all that kinda e’sheet when de peoples go for bury, so I take it just de e’skull an’ bone an’ de teeth sometime, thing like that. I hide all de bagulho in de yard behind my mother house. Hah! I making all kinda magia negra in her home, doing de black magic right there, e’same time she go de e’stupid church for pray to de Jes-ooz! Hah!”
I shook my head. “Woah!”
“Poisé, merão! Sometime I even go trade de e’skull an’ bone to de bandido for a big bag of cocaina. De drug gang use to like all these kinda sinister e’sheets, back in the time before de drug boss all join de focking Je-sooz church like all de other e’stupid peoples . . .” She flashed an evil grin, reminding me how, in a typically surreal move, the evangelical churches had managed to convert even the drug traffickers.
Narcisa took another big hit. Exhaling slowly, she set her pipe down and looked around. A guilty, worried look flashed in her eyes, as if someone might be listening.
Then, she started yelling at the accusers. “Malditos! Shut de fock up! I don’ give a fock, porra! I didn’t do nothing to you . . . Don’ care if you de owner of de focking e’skull! You don’ need it no more so fock off! You finish here, got it? Delete! Thank you come again! Doiii—iing!”
As she ranted on, arguing with her invisible tormentors, I could feel a chill crawling up my spine, like Arctic Ocean water in a vein.
Narcisa was giving Doc just the ammunition he needed.
81. LUCKY CHARM
“AMULETS AND AMULETIC OBJECTS ARE THE RESULT OF THE PRIMITIVE BELIEF OF MAN IN THE EVIL EYE, AND ITS FAR-REACHING AND TERRIBLE POWER.”
—E. A. Wallis Budge
The next afternoon, as we rode through frantic downtown traffic, all of a sudden Narcisa stood up and leapt off the back of the bike, landing right in the middle of the street, like some crazy drunken kung fu ninja.
What the fuck? I pulled over to the curb and turned to look.
There she was, standing in the center of a
rushing stampede of vehicles, red-faced, yelling, cursing, spittle popping from her pissed-off gullet.
Shit! What now?
She began scurrying around in frenzied circles, darting between the speeding cars and trucks like some kind of crazed matador, holding her hand up in a futile attempt to halt the unheeding flow of speeding metal. Then, as I looked on in horror, she got down on all fours and started scrambling around on the ground.
Furious, she glared up at me. “Porra! Sua merda! Don’ just sit there, you e’sheet! Get off you e’stupid moto, porra!! Help me find it, go!!”
“Find what, ya fuggin’ freak show?” I called back, bewildered.
“Minha Mer-ka-baaa, porra!! My pen-dant, goddamn you! It fall off!”
Horns honked as cars screamed past her within a spider’s ass crack. Shaking my head, I got off the bike and stood there, watching the show. Pedestrians stopped on the sidewalk to gawk. Somebody said something about the “porra louca” crazy girl, and asked me if I knew her. I just shrugged and looked on at Narcisa scampering around in the road, wild-eyed, looking for her lost charm. Her Merkaba.
Narcisa’s cherished mystical icon was a small silver pendant; an unusual geometric form made of two interconnecting pyramids, resembling a three dimensional Star of David—a “tetrahedron.” She didn’t call it her lucky charm, but that was the gist of it. She’d picked it up on her ill-fated visit to the Holy Land, and she was obsessive about the thing. She never let it out of her sight.
Narcisa had always been obsessed with the secret sciences. I remembered the complex psychedelic forms she would draw in her notebooks when she was high; weird symmetrical renderings she referred to as “interdimensional portals.” She insisted those singular designs held the power to connect her with Alpha Centauri. And she believed her Merkaba pendant to be a powerful occult talisman.
Fascinated by her confusing explanations, one day I’d researched the subject, leafing through old books in the musty secondhand bookstores on the Rua da Carioca. The Merkaba, it turned out, was indeed referred to as a “divine light vehicle,” used by ascended masters to commune with higher astral planes. The odd geometrical form was said to represent the “spirit/body surrounded by counter-rotating fields of light”—spirals of energy, like the human DNA helix, which could transport a spirit-body from one dimension to another.
One book I read through explained that by holding the Merkaba’s image in consciousness, one could activate a “nonvisible saucer-shaped energy field around the human body, anchored at the base of the spine.” Once energized, this imaginary “flying saucer” was said to be a vehicle for astral projecting into higher realms. As I’d sat reading, I’d thought of Narcisa’s little alien song. “Can you show me where it is de exit to these e’sheet world?”
For Narcisa, the Merkaba was a one-way ticket home to Alpha Centauri.
Watching her pawing at the ground looking for her pendant, I recalled her telling me how every time she’d taken the thing off, some terrible disaster had befallen her. Denial was her middle name. And now, once again, poor Narcisa was the hapless victim of a cruel, inauspicious jinx; an unjust twist of unkind Fate.
Ironically, I’d just warned her that it was hanging from its frayed string by just a thread. I tend to notice little things like that. She’d hissed at me and told me to go fuck myself and mind my own fucking business. Now, there she was, crawling around on all fours in the middle of traffic like a bug-eyed hedgehog. Taking her advice, I minded my own business, even as I ground my teeth, seething with that special brand of resentment reserved for the ungrateful.
Narcisa finally located it; but not before it had been run over several times.
She stormed over to where I was standing, waving her damaged charm in my face like a dead frog. “Pronto! See it now? Is ruin! You happy, hein?”
I was almost curious. “Why should I be happy, Narcisa?” I eyed her coolly, smiling. “Here, lemme see that.” I took it from her hand and twisted it back into shape.
It still looked a little crooked, but not too bad. I handed it back to her.
She threw it into my face. “I hate you!! You make these e’sheet happen by think an’ talk about it! You manifest it!! Is all YOU fault!!”
Fed up with her mad metaphysical tantrum, I got on the bike and started it. “You coming?” I smiled.
Narcisa snatched the damaged Merkaba up from the pavement. As she stood there, holding it in her hand, I felt kind of bad for her. But there was nothing I could do.
“You have destroy my Mer-ka-baaa! I hope you get ass cancer an’ die!”
I spat on the ground and took one last look at her hateful face. Then, I gunned the throttle, pulled out into traffic and rode away.
As Narcisa’s hysterical voice echoed in my ears, I found myself wondering for the umpteenth time . . . When will this intolerable fucking insanity ever end?
Weird occult forces were closing in all around us. I could feel it.
I knew we were in desperate need of help.
82. HELP FROM BEYOND
“EVERYONE NEEDS HELP FROM EVERYONE.”
—Bertold Brecht
The ancient Negress was a striking figure.
Immaculate flowing white gowns. Long lace petticoats and skirts. Rows of heavy, colored crystal beads hanging across her bony chest. A spotless white cloth tied tight around her head. All the regalia of an elder spirit medium; a Mãe de Santo. A Mother of the Spirits. But it was her eyes that said it all. Those dark, glowing orbs had the glaze of the World Unknown.
Mãe Caridade—or Mother Charity—was a high Macumba priestess. A seasoned initiate of the time-honored Afro-Brazilian mystical arts of the Umbanda and Candomblé, the wise old shamanic healer was a living channel into a complex web of esoteric forces and occult powers of the spirit world.
I’d been invited to her terreiro by Luciana after calling the day before, lamenting about Narcisa’s latest meltdowns. Narcisa had been on the warpath for weeks now; violent, unreasonable, irrational, bloodthirsty, insane. She’d been running in especially bad company over at the Casa Verde lately too. At my wit’s end, fearing for both our lives, I told Luciana over the phone that I was losing my fucking mind. Things were getting worse by the day. I could feel the darkness closing in. And still, I couldn’t give up on trying to help Narcisa.
In desperate need of spiritual orientation and guidance, I jumped at her invitation to go to the gira the following afternoon.
My old friend showed up at my door just before noon. She gave me a firm, warm hug, and we went downstairs for some sweet black coffee.
As I told her of my latest woes, Luciana reached across the wobbly wooden boteco table and took my hand. “Poor Ignácio.” She smiled. “I know just how you feel, baby. Love’s brutal when you got a broken picker. But what else can you do? You can’t just run out on her now . . . You really care about this Narcisa, huh?”
I nodded.
Sunlight streamed through Luciana’s jet-black hair. Her kind, loving smile was like a sunrise at the end of one of Narcisa’s all-night horror missions.
“I really been wanting you to meet this Mãe de Santo, baby.” She patted my hand. “I got a feeling she’s gonna be able to give you some real help. God knows you deserve it, Ignácio, after all you’ve done for this poor girl.”
“I just don’t know what to do anymore, Lu.” Tears welled up in my eyes.
Luciana kept smiling. “Everything’s gonna be all right . . . You ready?”
“ ’Bora então.” I nodded. I blew my nose with a thin paper bar napkin, then we got on the bike for the long ride out to the remote Umbanda center.
An hour later, we were cruising down a winding two-lane highway, way out on the outskirts of town. After passing through a tangled clump of septic-smelling rural favelas, we were deep in the country, surrounded by green hills and jungle. As Luciana pointed the way, I followed a steep, narrow dirt path up to the secluded hillside sitio where Mãe Caridade was holding session.
“
You know how the gira works, right?” Luciana rubbed my shoulder as we approached the hidden outpost. “I know it’s not your first time at a terreiro, but . . .”
“I guess it’s been a while, huh, Lu?” I grinned.
I thought back to the different ceremonies I’d been to with my Tia Silvia as a kid and all the other centros I’d visited with Luciana. But that had all been a long time ago, back when Luciana and I were just Narcisa’s age. Even then, we’d been seeking spiritual relief from the Curse. We’d never gotten far, though. Neither of us had been able or willing to face the true source of our mysterious “existential dilemmas”—our own ravenous drug consumption. Maybe things would turn out better this time, I mused, now that we were clean and sober.
“You still remember, right, Ignácio?” Luciana’s voice drifted into my thoughts. “You know how when the drumming and singing stops and the spirits incorporate in the mediums? Just pray, and always remember that they come to help . . .”
I nodded and sighed. “God knows I could do with some help, Lu.”
“Just tell them what’s going on, if they ask. Sometimes, they already know why you’re there. It’s pretty incredible. They can give you real good insight, tell you all the kind of things you need to know about, especially coming through Caridade.”
“Tell me about her, Lu.”
“Caridade? She’s the one who incorporates a Preta Velha, an ancient African entity called Vovó Catarina de Angola. This woman is the real thing! She was born in old Africa, in Angola, and was initiated into the Umbanda as a little girl. She’s really old. Nobody really knows just how old she is, but they say she’s over a hundred, and she’s been helping people all her life. Caridade is pure love, Ignácio! Closest thing I’ve ever seen to a real saint. She just lives to help others. You’ll see . . . I’m so glad you’re here, baby!” She gave my arm an affectionate squeeze. “God knows you can use more than just human help now.”
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