VooDoo Follies

by Butler, Christine M.

  "Something like that, child. We may need more help than just the two of us, but I will check into that and have preparations made before you get here." I could hear the tension in her voice, there was something she wasn't telling me.

  "Auntie, what are you afraid to say?"

  "Seraphine, dear, I don't want the two of you to get your hopes up that Stephen will live again. I'm not so sure that can happen, or that it's a magic we should be messing with. Look what happened when you raised a zombie. Things can go wrong with magic, just as they can go right."

  "I understand, Auntie, I do. If all we can do is set Stephen's soul on it's rightful path, then I want to be able to do that much for him." I looked up into very sad eyes and realized I hadn't even asked Stephen what he wanted. "Auntie,"

  My aunt didn't let me finish, she cut me off with a quick good-bye, explaining she had a customer to help.

  "Stephen, I never asked what you wanted."

  "No, but I told you anyway."

  "You've never told me what..." a blush streaked across my face as warmth crept in. "Oh."

  "I'm not sure I want my soul to continue on its course if that means I have to leave you behind. Seraphine, I’m falling..."

  "Stop. Please, don't say it. Stephen, you're dead, what am I supposed to say to that? I can't even hold your hand." I tried to hold those beautiful blue eyes with mine, but his head was sagging, causing his hair to flop down once again.

  "If things were different..."

  "Yeah, I know," he all but whispered, "I know."

  ***

  Where There Once Were Two

  My dreams played out like a sordid soap-opera, and not at all unlike my current real life situation. Stephen and Trevor were both there, both vying for my attention, only in my dream world Stephen wasn't dead, but Trevor was. It was actually hurting my head to think about the two of them at this point. If Stephen weren't an unknown spirit, my choice would have become so much more complicated. The only thing holding me back from him was the fact that he wasn't really here.

  Somehow, in the wake of my own personal dramas I didn't see the point in going to school. I probably would have stayed home too, if Trevor wasn't on my mind. I just wanted to see him again. He made me laugh, and he was here, physically. I got dressed and grabbed everything I needed to head out the door. Stephen was there on the front porch waiting for me as usual.

  "Hey," I said to him.

  "Hi." He said back and then we were walking in silence once again.

  "Stephen, about last night,"

  "Don't worry about it, Seraphine. You were right. Besides, remember what I said about hanging around you because I didn't feel quite so dead and gone that way?" I nodded my head. "Let's not talk about it anymore okay? It's starting to make me feel like that."

  I was ready to pity him, and had to quickly wipe the look off my face. I knew what he meant and my pity would just make things worse. "So, what are you planning on learning in school today?"

  He smiled, realizing I was trying to change the subject and act normal again. "I was thinking I could go around reading all the latest gossip that gets passed around class. Then I can tell you all about it. You can be anti-social all you want, but there's no need to miss out on the drama that is high school!"

  I laughed at Stephen's enthusiasm on the subject. "Sounds like a plan, just try not to make me laugh in class, alright?"

  "I make no promises."

  "Oh hell, I guess I'm in trouble then!" I looked up at Stephen as he walked beside me, "So, now instead of just being the anti-social southern girl, I get to be the creepy kid who laughs for no apparent reason." I was warm again on the inside. It was the happy place that Stephen always sent me to. Talking to him was always so effortless.

  I sat through English class getting updates from Stephen, who had begun wandering around the class instead of staying perched on his windowsill. Every once in a while I felt a small tug on my hair coming from the seat behind me. I almost forgot that Trevor was there, because I was so wrapped up in Stephen's antics and the fact that Simone was apparently sleeping with Josh even though he was dating Rebbecca. I had no clue who Rebbecca was, but Simone was the perky little blond girl who sat two rows over from me. Josh sat in front of her, unwittingly passing the notes about his unfaithfulness between Simone and her friend Elise, who sat in front of him.

  I wrote on my own notebook, "wow, never knew how much drama I was missing by keeping my head down all this time." Stephen laughed as he read it.

  "You don't know the half of it!" He said as the bell rang and people started to scramble from the classroom. As I was getting my stuff ready to leave I heard Trevor clear his throat behind me.

  "Seraphine, can I talk to you for a minute?"

  "Sure," I said turning around to him as I stood up. "What's up?" I started walking toward the door slowly with Trevor trailing at my heels.

  "I was wondering if you were doing anything this Saturday?"

  "This Saturday?" I questioned. "Not that I can..." My thoughts were thrown off mid-sentence as I watched a desk scoot forward slightly, right into Trevor's way. He tripped over it before I could warn him. While he was distracted, getting himself up off the floor, I thought I could whisper a warning to Stephen. "Do that again and I will put a voodoo hex on you."

  Trevor laughed, "Shouldn't you be trying to protect my clumsy butt instead of putting a hex me?" He laughed some more. "You're a funny girl, Seraphine, what kind of freak messes with voodoo anyway?"

  That stopped me short. "This kind of freak." The words were out of my mouth before I knew I had spoken them. The damage was done though, Trevor was backing away from me slowly.

  "What was that with the desk then?” He questioned as the panic showed through his eyes. “I knew it moved out of nowhere!"

  "That wasn't me," I protested.

  "Well, you just said you were going to hex me."

  "I wasn't talking to you." He looked around, eyes a little wider than they needed to be when he realized no one else was there. At least, no one he could see. My heart sank. He had been asking me out on a date only moments ago, and now he was looking at me like a side-show freak in a carnival. Trevor literally scrambled out of sight and I was left standing there in the classroom alone. Well, not alone, Stephen was still there, looking rather smug.

  "Are you happy?" I started yelling at him. "He was the first person here in a year who actually spoke to me, let alone asked me out and now he thinks I’m a freak."

  "Seraphine," an odd look passed over Stephen's face. It was the same look I tried to keep off my face in front of him earlier. It was pity. "Wait, no one has ever spoken to you here? That can't be right."

  I didn't bother telling him that it was exactly right. Not one word had been said to me, by a student anyway, since I came to this school.

  "Well, at least you know now, how he would have felt about the voodoo, you know, before he broke your heart."

  "Better to have a broken heart and know what it feels like to go on at least one date with a living person before I graduate high school!" I left Stephen standing there, knowing my words were like a slap in the face to him. I didn't really care just then if it hurt, because I was hurting inside. Trevor was the first person to talk to me, to be nice to me, and he was the first person who ever attempted to ask me out on a date. Now, all that was gone in the blink of an eye because my crazy, jealous, spirit bound friend decided to slide a desk in front of him. I wondered briefly how Stephen had managed to move the furniture, but then I dismissed it. Stephen had just ruined my one chance at normal, I didn't really care how he moved the stupid furniture. It was hard for me to comprehend how I could have possibly started my day out with two amazing boys and ended with me alone again.

  *** One week later***

  "Hey Auntie Perrine! I've missed you." I looked at her image in my laptop, thankful to be able to video chat with her this time instead of talking on the phone.

  "I've missed you to, Seraphine. Is Stephen around, I
think I may have some good news for him."

  "I'm not sure it will matter anymore, Auntie. I haven't seen Stephen in more than a week." Tears were threatening to spill down my cheeks as I talked about him. "I really hurt him, and even if I could have been nicer about it..."I paused and wiped at the tears that had begun to spill, "it would have always come down to the same thing. He's dead. I'm not. We can't be together."

  ***

  The VooDoo Follies

  Part Four: The Witch

  Original Publication Date:

  Sept. 6, 2011

  I am Seraphine LaLande, voodoo priestess in training...

  Fat lot of good that does me when my best friend, who happens to be dead, is nowhere to be found; the living boy of my dreams is now my number one tormentor; and now there's a witch who wants to meddle in my love life.

  One stupid spell really can't be all that bad can it?

  ***

  The Doll and The Witch

  I wished for things to go back to normal, and for the most part, that's exactly what happened. Stephen was gone. I was back in class and back to being ignored by everyone. The most meticulous notes in U.S. History belonged to me.

  "Psst," I heard Trevor trying to get someone's attention, but I didn't think it would be me. It had been two weeks since the incident. Two very painful weeks without Stephen, and in which Trevor rose up the high school social ladder while refusing to acknowledge my existence.

  "Psst," I was happy to keep my head buried in my notes, avoiding what was going on around me until a pencil hit my head and humiliatingly stuck in the curls of my hair. I turned a bitter stare back at Trevor, who held something up for me to see. At first, what he was showing me didn't register, but as he began stabbing the paper with a pencil I realized what it was. His new best buddy Brad was pretending to be hurt with each stab. It was supposed to be a voodoo doll. He took notice when it dawned on me, his grin - the one I had loved to see just weeks ago - grew wider with the disappointment on my face as his new friends burst out in ruckus laughter.

  I untangled the pencil that had been lodged in my hair and tossed it back at Trevor, "I think you dropped something," I said. That was the end of it. I refused to give them any more of a response, despite the fact that it was taking every bit of strength in my body not to run crying from the room. I sat in silence, as usual, for the rest of the class listening to the occasional snicker from behind me. Instead of throwing myself into my notes as I most often did, I spent the rest of the class trying to hold back the tears that threatened to spill down my cheeks and give me away. I wished Stephen had been there, sitting in his windowsill. He would have done something to make it all backfire on them, or at least done something to make me laugh and feel better about things. He wasn't there, though, and that was my fault. A part of me felt I deserved this. It was small retribution for the hurt I had caused, even if I didn't mean to.

  Thankfully, mercifully, the bell rang and students filed out of class before the first tear fell. I wiped them away with the sleeve of my hoodie and gathered my things to leave. As I was heading out the door of the class room someone tapped me on the shoulder. I jumped, hating myself for being startled so easily and for obviously crying in the room before everyone had gone.

  "Seraphine?" The petite raven-haired girl behind me spoke with such a soft voice I almost missed the fact that she had said my name.

  "No offense, but I need to get going," I said to her, not liking the look of pity she was wearing for me.

  "Sorry, I didn't mean to... can we... I just wanted to talk." She shuffled her books around a bit, looking somewhat awkward standing there. "I just thought, you know, we have things in common."

  "Oh," I said, taking my frustration out on the girl, "so you're a freak here too, then?"

  "That's not what I..."

  "No, I didn't think it was, look," I paused realizing I didn't know her name.

  "Tina," she supplied for me as a smile crept along the lines of her mouth.

  "Tina, I have to go and I am obviously in no mood to talk."

  "Can we get together after school some time?" She was calling out to me as I walked away. I hated being rude and ignoring her, but I was not going to be able to hold back the rest of the tears that wanted to escape.

  "I'm a witch," she blurted out a little too loudly.

  "Shhh," I turned and grabbed hold of her elbow walking her closer to the lockers and out of earshot of everyone. "Do you really want them holding up voodoo dolls for you too?"

  "They already know about me. I've been out of the broom closet since middle school. Most of them don't care anymore, aside from the Hermoine jokes I hear when I get answers right in class."

  "Yeah, they're a clever bunch!" I thought about it a moment, "hey, I've heard them call you Hermoine before. I thought it was just because you were smart."

  "We should get together sometime. We could compare notes, you know - you're voodoo dolls and my know-it-all wizarding jokes. We could have a laugh over their lack of inventiveness." Her smile must have been infectious, because for the first time in two weeks I felt myself smirking too. Then I thought of the last time I smiled, with Stephen, and my heart sank. It must have shown on my face.

  "You know we can fix that."

  "Fix what?" I looked up at Tina, puzzled now.

  "You know," she nodded her head back towards the classroom, "that whole mess, it can be fixed with magic."

  "I don't know about your style of magic, but mine is a very fickle thing. One wrong move and you're chasing zombies in downtown Baltimore." I wasn't actually kidding, since that did happen, but Tina was laughing at me nevertheless. "No, seriously!" She just laughed harder at that, so I gave up. "Okay, maybe we can get together and compare some time then."

  "Sure, what are you doing this afternoon?" I stared at her vacantly, trying to think of what I had planned for my afternoon. More sulking, maybe? She didn't need to know that though. She took my silence as her answer. "Great, this afternoon then, I'll meet you out front and we'll head over to my house for some brownies and magic."

  "Okay, see you after school then." I left for my next class, feeling at least a little better.

  ~...~

  I found Tina standing next to an older 1970s, black Volkswagon Beetle in the parking lot after school. "Hop in." Tina said as she jumped in the driver's side. As much as I wanted to be able to share my magical world with another living, breathing soul; I was also scared. There was an anxious nervousness rolling through my stomach that I couldn't quite put to rest. I wished Stephen were here to tell me I was just being silly and then I quickly regretted thinking of him. I missed him and I was only just beginning to feel how completely I had begun to depend on him since everything that happened with Adrianna and my zombie raising escapades. I looked over at the girl in the driver's seat as I climbed in. She was all smiles and chattering on about the song that was now playing on the radio. "I wish she'd just crawl in a hole and die somewhere. I can't stand her or her supposed singing abilities." I barely registered who was actually singing, never mind the commentary that Tina was spewing throughout the duration of the song. Before long, we were pulling into one of the row homes closer to the city. I looked at Tina questioningly.

  She shrugged as she said, "I know, it's out of the district. We had to move out of my Aunt Jess's house because she got a new boyfriend who didn't want us there spoiling their privacy. So, here we are. I just drive back and forth, but no one is supposed to know, so please don't say anything." I was shaking my head no, that I would not ruin things for her as she continued on, "I just don't want to go to the city schools. There are far too many people roaming those halls for my taste, and let's face it, it's hard enough to get teachers to notice you in Rosedale. It would be a nightmare in the city schools."

  "Why would you want them to notice you?"

  "Oh," she said smiling at me as we both got out of the car. "I forgot, you're the ghost in the classroom." I must have paled noticeably, because she quickly corr
ected herself. "No, I mean, well, you don't mind being invisible. I need to stand out because I need some good recommendations for scholarships. Do you have plans for college?"

  "Oh, huh, I hadn't thought about it."

  "You're a junior right?"

  "Yeah, but I had just planned on going back to New Orleans and helping out in my Auntie's shop or something. I don't know."

  "Oh." That seemed to stifle the rest of our conversation until we got into Tina's house and I walked into the bedroom behind her.

  I stopped walking and stood gawking at the room instead. I imagined this is what people must have thought my room should look like since I was into Voodoo. "Wow," was all I managed to articulate as I took in the black walls with red trim and lace black curtains flowing over what looked like red velvet. Everything, and I do mean everything, in Tina's room appeared to be red and black, with black being the predominate color.

  "Oh, I sometimes forget it can be shock to see for the first time." She smiled at me and then dropped her book bag off in a fuzzy, black chair across the room. "Mom let me do what I wanted with the place when she bought it. I was poking around a bit while she talked and came across a black book with red lettering on her dresser before I realized what I was doing; I was picking the book up and examining it. "My Grimoire." Tina said as she walked over to me. She grabbed the book and opened it so I could see a random page. "All my spells and their results are in here. Well, most of them anyway." She handed the book back to me, so I began flipping through the pages. There were spells for luck, vengeance, and of course - love. I shook my head when I saw the many pages Tina had dedicated to love spells.

  "My Auntie Perrine once told me dabblers never fair well. My mom, the only thing she had to do with voodoo, had to do with finding true love."

  "Well, how'd the dabbling work for her?"