“Refuse me and I curse you.” The duwende lifted his hands and wiggled his fingers at Santiago. “Do as I say and I grant you a wish.”
“Okay,” Santiago nodded. “All the boozing and rodent eating you want. I wish for a billion dollars.”
“Listen, estupido, I’m not as powerful the jinn. I can’t pull things from the air. A different wish.”
“Fine. I wish…” Santiago thought of his longtime friend Alejandra, the woman he desired for so long. “I wish for a woman to love me.”
The duwende let out an ugly cackle. “That I can do. Give me a name and an image.”
Santiago pulled his cellphone out from his pocket and went through his pictures. “Alejandra Castillo Flores” he said, showing the duwende Alejandra’s image.
The duwende lifted his hands high, spun around, and chanted in a strange language. When he finished, he gave Santiago a sly look. “In three days, she’s yours.”
The next day, Santiago bought whiskey and cigarettes for the duwende, who feasted constantly and noisily on the pests in the kitchen. Santiago didn’t ask where—or if—the mythical being shitted what he consumed, he just hoped the duwende went through with the bargain. Santiago would pour the whiskey into a shot glass and the duwende would guzzle it down, as if he were a normal-sized man drinking out of a bucket.
Drunk or sober, the duwende was foul-mouthed and angry. “My kind was once beautiful and majestic,” he told Santiago. “Your fucking computers, televisions, jet planes, and all the other phony, human magic destroyed us. You’ll get your wish, you selfish, stupid monkey. I promise you.”
The day came. Santiago awoke to the sound of someone trying to open the front door. He looked through the peephole to see the beautiful Alejandra standing outside, attempting to turn the locked knob. “Santiago, I love you,” she said. Her voice was a dull monotone. Santiago opened the door for her. She rushed in. Her eyes seemed to stare off blankly and her tongue hung out her mouth with saliva dribbling. She wrapped her arms tightly around Santiago and started licking his cheek.
“No,” Santiago said, “Alejandra, get off me. What are you doing?”
“I love you, Santiago,” she mumbled, with her tongue still out. “I love you forever.”
After struggling to pry her off, Santiago forced her down on the couch. “Stay there,” he said.
Alejandra did as she was told. She sat still with her face expressionless and unblinking eyes staring into nothing.
Santiago went into the kitchen. “Duwende!”
The duwende sat on the kitchen floor with a half-eaten cockroach in hand. “What?” he said. “Did you come here to thank me?”
“What’d you fucking do to my Alejandra? That isn’t her.”
“Yes, it is. And know she’s madly in love with you.”
“No!” Santiago shouted. “That isn’t her. You turned her into some kind of retard!”
The duwende bit into his roach and chewed with his mouth opened. “You mean she wasn’t retarded before?”
“Turn her back. Turn her back to the way she was. This isn’t what I wanted.”
“I can’t turn back a wish.” The duwende got to his feet and flung the roach morsel over his shoulder. “Typical of you spoiled humans, get what you’ve desired and still complain. Alejandra is yours now. You can do what you want with her.” He made an obscene gesture of thrusting his hips at the air. “You can have her day and night. Lucky for you, estupido. I only have dead rats to fuck.”
Santiago stepped toward the duwende and glared down at him. “You will turn her back, little man.”
“You think you can intimidate me? Take another step closer and I curse you, you ingrate.”
“You don’t scare me with that, duwende.” Santiago lifted a brow and grinned. “You think you’re so clever. You said there are men hunting you. Why didn’t you put the curse on them?”
The duwende was silent for a moment. His eyes darted around the room. “Well…it’s because…”
Santiago didn’t await an answer. He kicked the duwende and sent him soaring across the kitchen. One pound of meat and bones struck the wall with a smack. The duwende dropped to the floor, where he laid sprawled out on his stomach. He writhed and twitched.
“I curse you…” The duwende lifted his head and spat up dark red globs. “I…” more blood spewed from his mouth, “curse you…stupid monkey.”
Santiago walked over to his incapacitated victim. “Well,” he smiled, “don’t forget to wiggle your fingers.” His first thought was to smash the duwende under his shoe, crush all his little bones, but Santiago realized something… “I’ll make a fortune out of you. You’re a living fairytale creature, a rarity—this will be world news.” Santiago bent down and took the duwende by his legs. The being was a few inches shy of a foot, but still reeked fiercely of sour body odor and stale liquor.
The duwende hung upside down and motionless in Santiago’s grasp. “I curse…you,” he uttered weakly. “Your wickedness will…destroy…you…”
“Your wickedness has destroyed you.” Santiago swung the tiny man in a whipping motion, slamming him hard against the countertop. He then slammed him a second time, even harder, and this time, Santiago heard and felt the duwende’s bones snap.
Santiago examined the battered duwende. The duwende said nothing more. The oddity, the wonder of nature, was now dead. Blood dripped out his ears and nose. The broken body wasn’t too badly warped, Santiago thought, it was still in presentable form for the masses. Scientists and researchers from all over the world would want a piece of this discovery. “A wonder of nature,” Santiago said aloud. “I’ll be rich.” A billion dollars he had wished for. The duwende rejected him, yet the wish would still come to fruition. Perhaps not a billion—several millions sounded more realistic. He’d be able to leave his meaningless job and his rat-infested home behind. It all excited him—even aroused him a little.
Santiago went out to the living room. Alejandra was on the couch. She hadn’t moved an inch from where Santiago told her to stay. She appeared catatonic, but at least her tongue was in her mouth.
“Alejandra,” Santiago called.
She turned her head slowly to face him, indifferent to what dangled from Santiago’s hand.
“Go to my room, Alejandra. Remove your clothes and wait for me on the bed.”
Alejandra nodded, stood up from the couch, and went down the hallway to Santiago’s room.
Santiago decided he’d keep her.
Flesh Ravenous : A Zombie Horror Series -Book 2 Page 11
