Stormwitch

by Susan Vaught

  “Stop it, y’all hear me?” Ray-boy yells through the rain and wind. “Get out of that car or I’ll shoot!”

  He points his gun toward Grandmother Jones.

  I pull Gisele beneath me and duck. Try to pull Crazy Sardine inside the car.

  “On the floor, Clay,” Miss Hattie shouts, pushing him from the other side. “Get down!”

  Grandmother Jones rolls down her window. “Put that gun away and come with us, child. Can’t you see that hurricane’s almost here?”

  “Mm-hmm.” Miss Hattie finally manages to get Crazy Sardine sitting down on the car seat. “You keep us here and we’ll all be dying together.”

  “Nobody’s going to die from this storm, you stupid coon.” Ray-boy pushes Miss Hattie aside and stands in the open door, pointing his gun into the backseat—and Crazy Sardine half falls, half jumps out of the car and hits him square in the chest. The two of them tumble away from the car.

  Ray-boy screams.

  I struggle to get out of the car, then strain to see through the growing dark, through the growing rain … and a gunshot makes my ears go numb.

  Gisele screams. And screams and screams.

  I see two shadows roll away from each other. The shorter one gets up.

  Ray-boy.

  Crazy Sardine is still on the ground. Groaning. Holding his leg. Shot.

  I shove Gisele back in the car and run toward him, carrying my bag. Wishing I could use it like a club, a club sharp with pasted shells and rock. A single blow to Ray-boy’s thick head.

  Rain hits me, harder now. Colder. I think about the pressure hoses at the marches Crazy Sardine talked about, and I refuse to slow down.

  Ray-boy runs at me, crazy-like.

  I drape my bag over my shoulder and raise my hands like I would to call the wind. He skids to a stop an arm’s length in front of me.

  “Ruba!” Grandmother Jones is yelling. “Ruba!”

  Ray-boy aims his gun right at my head.

  “P-put down your hands,” he says.

  For a moment, we just stand there, the boy with his gun and me with my hands in front of me like I’m going to hold him back.

  And then I lunge forward and push him in the chest.

  Ray-boy stumbles, but he doesn’t fall. When he throws out his arms to gain his balance, I snatch his gun from his hand, raise it into the air, aim toward the boiling sky over the ocean, and fire it until it clicks and clicks and clicks. Then I throw it on the ground at Ray-boy’s feet.

  He looks up at me, shaking and surprised. I can tell he can’t understand why I didn’t kill him.

  “Tonight, and only this night,” I tell him, “and for my Grandmother Jones, I forgive you and I won’t hurt you unless you make me. Now get over here and help us take my cousin inside.”

  Ray-boy makes no effort to move. He narrows his eyes. They dart back and forth like he’s trying to choose some other option. He chews his lip.

  Miss Hattie and Grandmother Jones arrive in time to give him two small pushes of their own.

  Not shoves. Just pushes.

  He stumbles forward, toward the house.

  “Go on, child,” Grandmother Jones says to Ray-boy in a voice like iron. “Help Sardis. If you’re big enough to make a mess, you’re big enough to help clean it up.”

  Behind her, Clay fights to hold Gisele back. She’s flailing like she wants to murder Ray-boy and leave his bones for the crows.

  I take her from Clay’s arms, dodging her blows as she screams, “Daddy! I want my daddy! Why did you hurt my daddy, you ole cracker booger-head? Why? I hope the storm kills your daddy! I hope you have to know how bad it feels!”

  Ray-boy stands still. He gazes at Gisele as if seeing her for the first time. Then his head droops, and he stares at his feet. Moving slower than slow, he bends down, picks up the useless gun, and puts it in his waistband. With a final, baleful glance at Gisele and then the storm, he seems to sag, to bend like a little tree in the wind.

  Does he understand what’s real now?

  That the storm’s here, and he can’t do a thing to stop it, no matter the color of his skin?

  Maybe.

  Maybe not.

  Whatever he’s feeling behind those narrowed, darting eyes, he helps Clay and Miss Hattie drag Crazy Sardine back into the house. I carry my bag and Gisele, who wails for her father almost as loud as the winds wails at the trees.

  Inside, I hand Gisele to Grandmother Jones, and Miss Hattie helps me find my cousin’s wound—in the left thigh. It looks like a giant cut instead of the hole I expected, and it’s deep. We bind it above and below with the same ropes we only just escaped, and I use a few of the herbs from my bag to slow the bleeding. Then I cover it with cloth strips from the towels Ray-boy tore to tie up Clay and Gisele when we first got here.

  Ray-boy stands pale and shaking in the kitchen as gusts of wind rattle windows despite the hastily placed boards. Somewhere in the distance, bigger winds howl. We hear low moans, like the sound of a haunting. Like the sound of death risen to speak.

  “We’ve got to get him to a hospital,” Clay says as I once more press a bloody towel to Crazy Sardine’s leg.

  “Can’t,” Grandmother Jones says, only she is yelling to outdo the wind. “Never make it in this weather. Besides, they’ll be evacuated by now.”

  “What about the air force base?” asks Ray-boy.

  I swallow my shock at the fact that he offered a suggestion.

  “Too far.” My grandmother rubs her chin.

  “We could hide in the basement,” Gisele says.

  “No.” Miss Hattie shakes her head. “There’ll be heavy surf coming in before winds that strong. We could drown down there.”

  “Upstairs,” I say. “High ground is safer than low, and we can use mattresses to cover ourselves. I’ve been through many storms like this in Haiti.”

  All eyes fall on me, and Grandmother Jones frowns. I clench my teeth and study her.

  “So be it,” she says at last.

  It’s nearly ten o’clock by the time Clay and Ray-boy manage to drag Crazy Sardine up the shiny wooden steps to the second floor of this mansion owned by strangers who are, I hope, safe from the storm.

  Safer than those of us left behind in their house, at least.

  Grandmother Jones finds the biggest bedroom, and Miss Hattie and I pull all the mattresses to that spot toward the back of the house. We have three big mattresses in all, and three box springs. I lash the box springs together by the handles with tight ropes until they look like a strange gray barge. Fragile. Good for minutes, or maybe an hour.

  “These won’t hold long if we have to float,” Miss Hattie observes, tugging plastic and fabric.

  “Maybe long enough,” says Grandmother Jones.

  We tie Crazy Sardine onto one of the box springs and cover him and Gisele with a mattress. They lie sandwiched between the fabric, tied tight, but loose enough to still breathe. I can see Gisele’s bright eyes through the shadows between the box spring and the mattress. They follow me as I move, left and right. Back and forth.

  Clay and I pile onto the next box spring while Ray-boy stands to the side, head down.

  Finally, Grandmother Jones gives him a little tap on the shoulder. “Go on. Lie down. I can’t cover you up if you keep standing there.”

  This seems to surprise Ray-boy so much he can’t say anything. He hesitates, glancing at the mattress. The winds give another huge howl, and that helps him decide. He crawls on beside me, and Grandmother Jones covers us with a mattress and gives us blankets to shield our heads if we need them when the time comes. The wind drives the rain hard enough to feel like nails, and anything flying around will stick straight through us if we don’t have enough padding. I grip one side of the fabric and hug my bag to my chest. Thanks to Ray-boy and all he’s done, I’ll have to wait until the eye comes now, until the spirit’s all the way here.

  It’ll be a harder fight, and dangerous. Fighting the storm in the eye got Ba killed. The winds can shift
so fast.…

  Grandmother Jones and Miss Hattie open the windows as my ears begin to hurt. My skin aches along with my belly. Those unboarded upper windows don’t stand a chance against the pressure of the storm.

  “Whatever debris comes through,” Hattie says, “I figure that’ll be better than flying glass.”

  They lie down on the last box spring, as if to sleep, and pull a mattress over them.

  “Ray-boy,” I hiss through my teeth. “This storm isn’t natural. You might not believe me, but you’re going to see bad things. Awful things. No matter what, don’t speak to any figure that comes. Let me handle it. I can stop it if you’ll stay out of things.”

  “What you talking about?” He stares at me in the semidarkness, his face oddly mashed by the mattress. His hair hangs limp near his nose, and he struggles to get his arm up and wipe it out of his eyes with one hand.

  “Remember what happened in the woods? At the church?” I gaze at him without blinking. “You were right. I’m a juju girl.”

  He smiles with half a mouth. Nervous. “Don’t be trying to scare me, girl.”

  “My name is Ruba, and I can save you from what’s coming. It’s up to you.”

  “I ain’t trustin’ no—” Ray-boy starts.

  “Coon,” I growl. “Jigaboo, darkie, pickaninny—whatever you want to call me. You think those names make me less than you? You think calling people names makes you strong? Well, go on, strong man. Get out there and stop this storm.”

  “You’re crazy,” he says.

  “She is,” Clay agrees from Ray-boy’s other side. “But her name is Ruba. Say it.”

  Ray-boy turns his head to glare at Clay, then back at me.

  “Say it.” I stare right back at him, refusing to lower my eyes. “Then don’t say another word till this is over, if you want to live.”

  Ray-boy’s mouth opens. His face turns purple-red. I brace myself for the swearing. The insults. The words of hate and loathing I know live within him.

  “Ruba,” he grunts, and turns his head away from me.

  We lie without moving as the storm and its spirit finds the coast.

  Lights flicker and go dark.

  Around half past ten, shrouded by the unforgiving Mississippi night, Hurricane Camille slams ashore in Pass Christian.

  The wind roars like a monster from time before time.

  Around us, the mansion rattles and shakes, a doll-house in Camille’s cruel hands. Branches and bricks and dark shapes thunder against the house while trees crack and split to toothpicks. A branch crashes through the roof near where we’re huddled, and rain pelts the walls.

  I clench my bag to my chest and hold my breath. The roar in my ears feels almost unbearable, but if I start my chant too soon, I might get knocked down or drowned, and all will be lost. Now that the beginning’s past, I have to wait for the eye.

  Through the wicked gales I hear a more sinister noise. A slapping, a gentle slapping, steady and sly.

  “What is that?” Clay hollers in my ear.

  “Waves!” I holler back.

  I see the horror in his eyes as the truth swallows him. The Gulf of Mexico has broken her bounds, and she’s knocking on our door. The ocean has surrounded the house.

  Seconds whirl by. Minutes. Windows shatter. Through the unceasing scream of the storm, I hear water pouring into the house. Flashes of lightning show me torrents of rain through the open windows from my vantage point between the mattress and box spring, slamming toward earth but never reaching it, swept back up in the wind. A small space exists between rain and water, an impossible space, made by sheer force and danger.

  I can hear an upstairs wall ripping away, and immediately my hair is nearly pulled from my head. The wind sucks at us so hard the mattresses start to move.

  Around me, mouths are open, yelling, but I hear only the wind. I chew my lip and my exposed side stings from rain. My teeth chatter.

  Another chunk of the house blows loose, and the structure rocks sideways, dipping like a carnival ride.

  At that moment, I hear drums, and above those, a round of horrible, unnatural swearing.

  The spirit in the storm, the evil. It’s here.

  It’s time for me to fight.

  I battle the mattress to loop my bag about my neck, scoot out from under the protection of the fabric, and force myself to my feet in the now-unsteady mansion. No one sees me because they have their heads covered, sandwiched between the mattresses and box springs.

  It takes all my strength to stand, and more strength than I believe I possess, to raise my arms above my head.

  I start the chant.

  “Circe and Ruba Cleo, I call on you, my foremothers. Protect me. Antoinette and Arielle, give me the strength of our people before white men and guns and steel…”

  The song floats soundlessly against howling gusts as my fingers reach and my hands turn in circles, working the spell. From my bag, I add spices to the wind, and I turn my hands some more as I chant.

  Time seems to spin to a stop between my palms, but my muscles tighten from the pressure. I feel like I can barely move.

  How can I do this on my own?

  The wind howls on, heedless of me and my efforts. I can’t hold the spell. It breaks as my hands drop and my arms fall to my sides.

  But I keep chanting.

  I chant the names of my foremothers until my jaw locks and I try to lift my hands again, to tame the winds. To stop them, at least in the space where I’m standing, and where my family and friends and Ray-boy huddle between the mattresses and box springs.

  Nothing happens. It isn’t working!

  My family… my family…

  A flash of white catches my eye, and I stare at it as I finally manage to raise my arms over my head. Teeth … a smile.

  For a moment, I fall silent.

  Gisele. Peering at me from under her mattress. She is smiling.

  I smile back and pry open my unwilling mouth, and I start the chant over again.

  “Circe and Ruba Cleo, I call on you, my foremothers. Protect me. Antoinette and Arielle, give me the strength of our people before white men and guns and steel…”

  I turn my hands in slow circles again, and a glow flickers in my fingers. A circle. A small bubble. It swells and grows, expanding to cover me, and then most of the room, from the floor to a few feet above my head.

  Soon, I stand in light and silence. The bubble spreads a little farther, first left and then right. Up and then down. All around the room it travels, blocking out the storm until the only sound is my voice raising the chant.

  “Is it over?” Crazy Sardine mutters.

  “No, Daddy,” says Gisele. “Ruba’s sending the wind away.”

  “My God, Maizie!” Miss Hattie’s voice trembles. “What’s she doing?”

  Grandmother Jones doesn’t answer.

  I know she might not forgive this. My conjuring might split us down the middle. The juju. The old magic of Dahomey’s Fon, the proud Amazons. But if she’s alive to throw me from her home, so much the better.

  Clay and Ray-boy lie behind me, motionless under their mattress, caught in the web of my spell.

  My bubble closes and gains its full strength, and not a moment too soon.

  I see the walls of the mansion shake, then watch as the great house starts to move beneath us. The bubble keeps us still, keeps us protected, but my senses feel the shuddering, hear the splinter of wood and crack of stone as the mansion loses its battle with the wind and the wild, angry ocean.

  In moments, the big house washes completely off its foundation. It sweeps out from under us, falling into heaps of boards and debris, captured in the waves—but we stay suspended in the air. We float easily in the bubble I made, hovering above the spot where the house once stood. We barely bob at all, despite the water and the wind.

  So far, my magic is holding. One slip of concentration, one moment of doubt… I push away such thoughts. Keeping one hand raised toward the stars, I use the other to twist my
bag off my neck and open it.

  “Help me,” I say to Gisele, and she wriggles from beneath her mattress.

  She nods.

  With her assistance, I keep my hand raised but manage to strip off my cotton dress, and once more I hear Miss Hattie. “Would you look at that tattoo? I’ve never seen anything like that. Covers half her leg—all the way to her waist! It’s a blue alligator.”

  “Crocodile,” says Gisele, and she helps me into my war tunic. Shells and bones clatter against my skin, Amazon armor like my foremothers wore. “And don’t talk to nobody but Ruba. Nothing, nobody, okay, Miss Hattie?”

  I hear Grandmother Jones begin to pray.

  “Can Mrs. Jones and Miss Hattie talk to God, Ruba?” Gisele asks as she fastens the tunic. “Would that be okay?”

  I nod. “Just don’t talk to anything in the storm. Everyone will have to trust me for that.”

  The drums grow louder.

  “She’s coming, isn’t she?” Gisele shivers as she loops the last shell-anchored tie. “It’s not a ghost this time, like you’ve fought before. It’s that witch you talked about. The one who wants to kill you.”

  “Yes,” I tell her, feeling tightness in my throat, my chest. “I’m afraid Zashar herself is in the storm. Just a few steps away from us.”

  17 August 1969

  Dearest Ba,

  It seems only right to talk to you now. If I dared to pull out my journal, I’d write this down. Somehow, I think you’ll be able to hear me, though. Even if I’m speaking only in my mind.

  I’m standing before the eye of the storm. It’s almost here.

  I’m wearing my war tunic of bones and shells. My body is drenched with palm oil, and I’m girded with my war belt. My machete hangs at my waist, and my bow and quiver are slung over my shoulder.

  Gisele has placed my white cap on my head.

  As befits a palace guard, an elite protector of Dahomey’s finest king, I now stand fully dressed for battle. The blue crocodile slides up my leg and sits above my brow, as if sewn on my cap, waiting.

  My hands make fists. One raised. One by my side. King Agaja’s necklace lies at my feet, in case I need his memory to keep my courage.