Cat Dubois' Odyssey to Enchantment

by BoJenn

  As he rushed to the door, Tammy spoke up. “Don’t trip over anything.” She laughed when he fell flat on his face before he got out of the classroom. Then, he looked back at her. If his looks could kill, he would've beat the living hell out of her. Tammy has to be a witch, he was sure of it! She had to be the one responsible for his stumbling face-first to the ground.

  The teacher returned, ready to end the detention and saw Ethan sprawled on the floor. “What’s going on in here?”, she asked.

  “She’s a witch! I’m outta here!” Ethan scrambled to his feet, getting his school things from the floor again, before bolting for the door.

  Without being dismissed, he ran out of the room, down the hall, and headed for home that Friday afternoon. His feet couldn’t move quick enough. The teacher dismissed Tammy, giving her a suspicious look. She couldn’t be sure if Tammy had tripped Ethan. “I thought you were nicer than that!”, she scolded.

  The Insecure

  When Ethan rounded the first corner away from school, he ran right into his previous tormentors, the school bullies. “Hey, fat boy! Where’s your girlfriend?”, they mocked.

  “Shut up! She’s a witch, you know.” With that single phrase, Ethan became their best friend.

  Using him, they wanted to know more about Tammy’s powers and interrogated Ethan whenever they could. Ethan told elaborate stories about Tammy. Much like the ridiculous stories the other children had gossiped about Cat, similar rumors began spreading about Tammy.

  “I saw her turn a live cockroach into a dead one with one blink of those evil green eyes” Ethan said. He told them he saw her with gold eyes, as well. “And that’s when real sorcery happened.” Ethan dramatized the story, his voice growing bolder, his eyebrows raised. Ethan’s eyes grew as he told the tales about Tammy.

  Secretly, he was infatuated with the young girl, but he knew deep within himself that Tammy would never like a fat kid, like himself, so he didn’t hold back from telling the other boys anything derogatory about Tammy. He made up lies that were trash knowing that the young girl would never think twice about him and negative attention from her was better than no attention.

  The boys loved the tales Ethan created, and he became popular with the boys and girls, who often later said, “Ethan you gotta tell the story about Tammy and Cat Dubois making spells by the fireside in the woods.”

  Ethan always obliged. “Yeah, but first I’ll tell you how Tammy became a witch. My dad told me.”

  “Sure, tell us.” The boys gathered closely to hear Ethan.

  “Cat made Tammy a witch when she went to her home that night when Tammy was gonna die. My dad said, Cat gave Tammy the mantle when she put her hands on her and prayed. That’s why Tammy recovered. It was an exchange of a soul for life.”

  “Oooh,” the boys teased. That’s scary!” They laughed and said, “Tell us more, fat boy!”

  “It’s true!”, Ethan exclaimed boldly. He was getting popular and his self esteem rose as he embellished the stories.

  “Go on, tell us about them making a spell.” The boys quieted. They were thinking of retaliating and just were looking for any reason to terrorize any witches in Glory Town.

  “It was a cold fall night. The fog was coming in. I was hiking not far from Cat Dubois’ farm.”

  “Alone? You’re too scared to be alone,” Cooper mocked.

  “No, my dad was hunting nearby. Cat Dubois hates hunters. She and Tammy were out there. They were sitting by a bonfire.”

  “Sure, Ethan. Right. I don’t believe you.” Dillinger accused him.

  “They were there. I swear it!”, Ethan defended. He made the sign of the cross giving his oath of honesty.

  “Come on, let him tell the story,” Taylor Snuttgrass insisted.

  The boys hushed since Taylor had town clout and it was a privilege to have him hanging out with the middle class gang.

  “Go on. Tell the story,” Cooper prodded.

  Ethan continued, “Well, the two witches had capes on. Cat Dubois wore a black one, and Tammy first had a white one on; then Cat Dubois took it off and put a red one over her shoulders. Then, they drank something from a shiny metal cup that was in the fire.” He paused for an interruption by Taylor.

  “Oooh! Scary!”, Taylor teased. “Go on with this girl-story.”

  They all laughed. “Yeah, watching girls, you sissy!”

  “Then, like I said, they danced” Ethan said. “Going ‘round and around the campfire. It looked like a ceremonial passage. Tammy joined her that night. I know it. Cat put a wreath of vines on Tammy’s head and kissed her cheeks, one side then the other.”

  “That’s not a witches tale! Taylor objected. “Where’s the magic?”

  “I’m not done yet. That’s not all!”, Ethan protested.

  “Then, what?”, Taylor pushed him. “Get to the point, fat boy.”

  Ethan swallowed. “Then, I saw Cat turn Tammy to the North, the East and then South and West. She pointed into the woods and, all of a sudden, a white wolf came up from the path.”

  “A white wolf? We don’t have white wolves in this area, stupid.” Taylor scoffed.

  “I swear it!” Ethan cried, trying to be a man like the other boys seemed to personify.

  “Swear on your mother’s life?”, Taylor dared Ethan.

  Ethan thought about the dare. “On my mother’s life. I swear.” His two fingers were crossed.

  “You’re a liar! You said there was fog? SO, how could you see a white wolf, ignoramus?”, Taylor said. “I see it in your eyes.” Then, Taylor turned and left the other hellions, getting away from the trouble he sensed was beginning. Taylor didn’t say things about anyone. He didn’t have to. “Stupid story,” he said as he walked away. His family was above gossip, and Cat Dubois meant nothing to his family anyway. She was a nobody like everyone else in Glory Town. After all, they—”The” Snuttgrasses—were educated and his family had taught him that the rumors of Cat Dubois were conceived by ignorant superstitions conjured by mountain hillbillies. Taylor had learned well that the elite, as they, believed such tales began because of boredom and menial living.

  “You pissed him off,” Cooper sighed in disappointment. The boys liked to impress Taylor if they could, and, now, they had lost his interest.

  This was how Tammy’s reputation of being a witch really began. Her parents didn’t even know about it.

  But, one afternoon, when Teacher Zickle’s dress hem crept up and revealed a black girdle supporting her endowed hind cheeks, the children giggled. Teacher Zickle had her back to the class standing at the blackboard, and it was a sight to behold. Tammy watched the incident—speechless and staring—as it occurred. The kids knew it was Tammy because Mrs. Zickle had just scolded Tammy for being late to class.

  Mrs. Zickle was unaware of the incident, though; and Tammy knew she hadn’t pranked the teacher. However, she had seen Ms. Dubois walking away from the schoolyard and she figured that it must have been Cat defending her by lifting up teacher Zickle’s hem. Tammy had smiled which, in turn, made the kids suspect her.

  Tammy also heard the tales of Cat Dubois being a witch. She always wondered, but never really knew, for certain. However, she liked to imagine the rumors were true; and Cat Dubois, did, in fact, look out for her well-being. She liked to believe this. It made her smile and have confidence.

  “How’d you do that?”, one person asked after class. “You are a witch, aren’t you?”

  “No, I’m not. Who said that?”, Tammy demanded.

  “Everyone knows after Cat Dubois prayed the witches’s prayer over you, you changed,” the student replied.

  “That’s silly.” Tammy chortled, being amused and flattered at the same time.

  Later, matters grew worse when Taylor made fun of Ethan in front of the other kids at school. He caused them to hear the tale of Cat and Tammy and the white wolf, which built to other stories, which grew into other fables and myths; and Cat Dubois became a subject of a legend; and Tammy Johnson was her protégée.<
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  Even though Tammy rarely saw Ms. Dubois, this was the beginning of the Tammy tales and lies spoken boldly by a person who lacked benevolent character.

  Jealousy, and fear of the unknown, sparked a huge fire of gossip. Such is typical for small towns to have scapegoats and careless hateful, conversations about their victims.

  Tammy found humor in Ethan’s tales. She knew he told the others because he feared her. And, this fact was empowering to young Tammy. Just as Cat had also found humor and power in the rumors from the gossip queens, the same was true in Tammy’s case.

  Tragically, human storms begin in quiet grey areas. They are often spoken or whispered in dark places to hungry receivers who long to set matches to the fires of discord. The whispers of gossipers are well-hidden from honest judges or those who discern fairly. The label of “witch” started in Cat and Tammy’s young lives because of pride, jealousy and fears of the unknowing.

  Memories of Childhood and Daniel

  Sitting on her porch swing, one late afternoon in summer, Cat reminisced, again, of her childhood and Daniel. She closed her eyes. The sun warmed her face as she looked to the west and the sun began to lower. Beneath her eyelids there were flashing lights similar to slow-motion firecrackers with no sound. Then, very clearly, she began to see images of spiritual faces —a majestic lion with beautiful eyes, and a glow of light that was nothing of the earth and nothing manmade. The beauty of the lights and the calmness of the moment quieted her inner soul. There, in the stillness, she listened to and heard and saw her childhood relived. She recalled a period of time when she talked to God in her dreams. He sent whispers in her little ears. The image of a fatherly figure leaned over and delicately whispered his happiness that she took the time to seek Him daily. He was so pleased.

  She never said to herself, “Oh, this must be God speaking to me.” He spoke so often that it was commonplace to her. There were no goose bumps or “Aha—moments”. His conversations were soft, loving, insightful, and so succinct. He showed her how the flowers and animals communicated. The flowers spoke through vibrations, while the animals used their senses and their minds and eyes. Life on earth and the universe worked in a vibrating, synergistic motion; and everything had a note—a musical note—and, all together, the universe performed a never-ending symphony.

  Out loud, with her eyes still closed she recited a verse which she learned so long ago—”When the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy.” Breathing a sigh of peace, she said, “It is beautiful, Lord.” She took another satisfied, peaceful breath.

  The spirit of the moment took her back to a conversation she and Daniel had about how life evolved around the vibrations. The images fluttering behind her eyelids continued to astound as her imagination zoomed back to that time. She had explained to Daniel that the breath of life was similar to other things.

  “There! Watch Daniel. There they are.” She had pointed to the sky.

  “Swirling patterned music of many kinds, creating joy, flowers, plants, birds and all substances found on earth and across the universe. All are glorious manifestations of God’s calculus, geometry and algebra, which come together in patterns that collide making every living and inanimate creation unique. No two are alike in any life form; but, on the other hand, they are so much alike because of the creator who spun his brilliant handiwork and made them all by his one thought.

  Algebra gave the dimensions design and the design gave way to reality. The geometry brought forth the masterpiece and calculus caused the planets and galaxies to vibrate and swirl in their movements, making time and space constant, and with infinite ability.

  “It’s so wonderful,” she recalled saying to Daniel. “Do you see it too?” She spoke aloud, now, as if Daniel were present.

  She opened her eyes to see that, once again, her mind had fooled her, and it was a vision of the past. Quickly, she closed her eyes and went back to the vision. There she was again. Her mind took her to any place she wanted to be.

  “Look Daniel!”, young Cat said, speaking again as if he were sitting right beside her on the swing. “We were ten, then. Look at the flower. What do you see?” The vision she recalled was of springtime, on the side of the west mountain, behind the Dubois manor.

  “I see a flower with a bumblebee!”, Daniel had said.

  “Yes, it is a flower with a bee; but look deeper; look inside,” Cat had said, patiently.

  So, Daniel had looked again. “Okay. I see the inside of a wild mountain flower.”

  Cat sighed as he had poked fun, giggling at her. It was hard because he had not seen what she had seen, but he was willing to try.

  “What should I see?”, Daniel had asked.

  “Life. The inside of a flower’s life—the veins, pollen, the life force that causes it to be,” Cat had explained. “Look again.”

  So, again, he had peered, looking deeper than before. He wasn’t sure what he should have been seeing, but he did try to observe what Catherine had seen.

  “Do you see anything that you didn’t see before you judged it as a simple wild flower?”, she asked.

  “What do you mean by judging it?”, Daniel had said, looking at her, and being confused.

  “We judge the outside of people and things; but, if we find something ugly, we look no further than the outside. But, if we look again and again, we see their world. Their world is just as alive, with pulses of electrical energy and movement in the veins—their colors are alive! A whole other world exists where we never imagined, and there is life everywhere,” Cat had described as graphically as she could.

  “How do you know so much?”, Daniel had asked. “Did your parents teach you?”

  “No,” Cat had answered; “Sometimes I dream about the insides of flowers and trees; or I see how an animal feels. I know it because I become it, for a moment; and then I feel what it feels.”

  “You’re empathetic too much.” Daniel had reached out and stroked her honey-gold hair with reverent admiration. Cat had an aura of light, white-gold around her head when Daniel looked at her. She had smiled at him. Her hands and arms had moved as graceful as a ballerina when she explained growth and development of simple, plain life. She had expressed herself using her arms and her face, especially her beautiful eyes.

  “You should teach biology someday,” he said. “You’d be great at it.” Daniel had learned more about the origins of life from Cat than from hours in classrooms.

  She had smiled again, quaintly, saying, “There is so much more to know. This is minute on the scale of life. Our lives are smaller than an ant’s life in comparison to the infinite universe.”

  “How do you know this?”, Daniel asked again. He had looked at her so curiously, knowing that she was not an average kid—certainly not one from Glory Town. He had asked her, “Where you came from, they must have had super advanced learning?”

  “I don’t remember anything about where I came from,” she replied.

  “Nothing?”, Daniel had asked.

  “No, nothing.” Cat had turned away toward the setting sun. “Sometimes I wish I did remember; but then there is something that tells me not to try—to just keep going forward, not backward. It’s like a message that reminds me, ‘It’s not important.’” The smile she had shown then shone like an angel’s. “Let’s go on the meadow!” Cat had said, running off toward the goldenrod growing on the side of the hill.

  It was then that Daniel had determined, for sure, that Catherine Dubois was different than other people in Glory Town. This was why he had stayed around her; he had always learned something new.

  The vision of Cat’s memories went on and on into the summer twilight.

  Daniel had run next to her onto the field of yellow flowers. They had jumped and run in circles while lifting their hands and waving their arms in glee of that moment, so long ago.

  Cat smiled, remembering how sweet life was with Daniel. He made all the meanness disappear. He made living in Glory Town friendly and endearing. T
he memory faded as the sun descended beneath the horizon. She sighed when the light of day followed the sun and it was dark. It was a metaphor to her recollections of childhood and Daniel, and the fact that he was gone like the sun.

  Cat stayed in the daze of those wide-awake dreams. Almost like sleep-walking, she wandered into the kitchen and made some hot tea. She decided to go back and sit to rock in the rocking chair on the other side of the porch, sip her tea, and wait for the moon.

  The rocking chair moved with the rhythms of her contemplative thoughts—back and forth, back and forth. Then, she remembered another time—a night when the first disturbing phone call had come—the time when someone on the other end of the phone had asked if she was, in fact, “a witch?”

  There had been someone cackling on the other end of the phone. Cat had slammed it down when the inquisitor hung up. She flashed back to having been that child who had tried to explain to herself why people were labeling her as a witch. She had wanted to justify herself, as if she had to, at that time, more than at the present moment. She had felt she must explain; but no one had really wanted to hear or cared to listen. But, she had tried anyway.

  Cat remembered the explanation she had formulated with no effort, since it was all true; and she spoke aloud from her rocking chair where she sat this night, as if her thoughts were still alive, still so compelling in the need to tell someone, anyone. “It was at night, when I was a child of five or six, and I dreamt someone—a girl—was sick and needed my prayers. God’s angels always told me when another child was sad and needed a friend. With that knowledge, I went quickly. I followed the dreams and whispers of God.” Cat spoke her explanation aloud into the wind. “They just don’t understand. Why am I so alone? Please, God send someone, please!”