Will Do Magic for Small Change

by Andrea Hairston

  I fell to my knees. “The mighty Monongahela begged me to lie in her bosom and I refused.”

  “That river is a dead sewage drain. What people attend the spirit of that water?”

  “Why join you in a puddle of scum?”

  “To dance your final destiny.” Abla licked stone teeth.

  “Only Eshu knows our final destiny.”

  “Mère d’eau has abandoned you.”

  “We carry the mother of water within.” I teetered over the edge. “Change is always possible.”

  “Always? It’s never too late?”

  “Never.”

  “So, you’re a coward not daring to change.”

  “I can sacrifice. I can let go of one self to become another.”

  “A man who risked all for you hovers at the gate between life and death.”

  “You dare speak of Raven Cooper lingering in a coma.”

  “What can you do for him, broken as you are?”

  I spoke Kehinde’s words. “What is lost or cannot be found can be conjured.” I clutched my neck and felt Bob’s hoodoo spell, a prayer in a bag, hanging on a thin cord. The wool was worn, and its red color had faded to rusty brown. The scent of rum clung to the threads. The mojo was alive. I snapped the string and held it over the pit. “Ifa is the path for everyone and no one.” I waved the mojo at Abla’s empty eye sockets. “I don’t believe in you!”

  Abla shrank away from the mojo, fading into the mud as you Guardians came barreling toward the pit in your silver charger. Propitious. Abla’s infectious insanity churned my stomach. I did a warrior dance to calm my blood.

  Guardian Opal was at the hospital looking for the bridge to nowhere. I told her tonight was not the night for flying over the edge. She squeezed my hand and remembered things I thought I’d lost forever. A true Guardian, she reminded me of who I had been. Hope harasses us all, and grace humbles me. I know where to find Ariel. The tempest play runs for many performances. With the offerings I’ve received, I have enough cash for a winter season ticket. Although shipwrecked in a storm, I see the light that could bring me together.

  Dear Guardians, the telling draws us closer. Don’t you feel this? Each piece, each story is a bridge from nowhere over grief and pain right to Eshu’s gate. Who do I mean to be? Oath-breaker betraying the ones I love or Imagineer conjuring the future?

  I am in pieces, perhaps scattered across America. However, I am not over yet!

  Pittsburgh, PA, 1987 & France 1893

  Whoever undertakes to set himself up as a judge of Truth and Knowledge is shipwrecked by the laughter of the gods.

  Albert Einstein

  I am not a religious person but I do believe in magic, mysteries and deals cut at the crossroads under the full moon.

  Pearl Cleage

  CHRONICLES 18a: Paris Fables —

  Océane and the Aje

  “Motes in the eyes of God,” Bob proclaimed.

  Traveling from one end of the Old World to the other, La Vérité steamed over three thousand miles of ocean, yet traced only a fraction of the Earth’s voluptuous curves. The ship plunged into a foggy channel along a coast of France and, like light twisting through a prism, my story fractured into many stories. My eyes had been wrought from Dahomean mist, my skin from Ouidah sand. My mind was fashioned in Eshu’s maze, so France was blurry, real and not real. In this version of my story, Luigi’s troupe boarded a smaller boat, L’Aventurier, to glide down canals to the capital city of the Old World (or one of them — London was on the other side of the fog). The night before we reached Paris, no one slept. Wind off the shore tasted of mystery, danger, and novelty.

  Kehinde traced wayward celestial bodies. “Has the dance of the stars changed?”

  I smiled. “Bob tells me —”

  “What do I care what Bob sees?” Kehinde said.

  “He throws his spear with us.”

  “Bob drank no blood oath to us. He loves that rascal Liam as much as he loves you.”

  I was pleased to hear that Bob loved me. “Do you love me?”

  The question irritated her. “I don’t know how.”

  “Bob says the Earth tilts in the plane of the home star. It’s a whirling top listing a bit askew. I’ve felt this. We sail into a spring sky, not winter. Twilight is longer now.”

  “Bob is askew. He’ll betray someone.” Kehinde spoke from bitter experience.

  Nothing dampened my good mood. The aje threatened to zoom across inky water and leap onto bustling docks. “We’re about to arrive in Paris!”

  “Why rejoice?” Kehinde clutched my hand. “France conquered Dahomey.”

  “You waste no loyalty on former Fon masters.”

  “I am impatient for a new world. I’ve seen enough of the old.”

  Melinga sucked honey from my fingers. I tickled her into chortles.

  “You spoil that child.” Somso chastised and praised me.

  “You neglect her,” Kehinde said. “Was it a son you longed for?”

  “I wanted a natural child, not a demon baby, fat and old at birth. All her teeth have come and so much wild hair. No child babbles at this age.”

  Kehinde smiled at Melinga. “We have enough grief. Why mourn miracles?”

  It was late afternoon when L’Aventurier finally dropped anchor in Paris. A gang of boats bobbed in murky water, scraping bottom in shallow water. Music from flutes and stringed instruments rode the breeze around drunken laughter, harsh commands, and friendly chatter. Horses tore muscles and sweated blood dragging cargo-carts. Land steamships made ingenious use of pistons, flywheels, and metal tracks. Chimneys belched vapors from burnt flesh and heavy metals. My nose dribbled mucous against poison gas barely diluted. A wall of houses framed the chaos. Glass windows glared the setting star into my face, a hundred red-orange eyes.

  “Blessings to Eshu!” I was first to race across the gangplank.

  Melinga cooed in my arms as I scooped up a pinch of Paris soil and rubbed it on my forehead and tongue. A thousand French people barged past us, bored by the wonders of their lives. A man, balanced on a hard seat between two wheels, wove through the crowd and whizzed past my nose. My heart ached to try his machine.

  “Maman,” a little girl poked my thigh, “qu’est-ce que c’est ça?”

  “What are you, the girl asks.” Bob translated a language I’d learned from Kehinde. He smiled at the girl’s mother(?). Was she one of the sweet French ladies tired of men making love with their faces? The woman snatched the child away as if we were poison.

  “Bienvenue to Paris.” Bob pulled a hat over his light eyes and, hiding in his own shadow, sauntered ahead.

  Liam tipped his cap. “Watch your step, your highness. Unruly decks make still ground unsteady under delicate feet.”

  Kehinde snickered. “You watch your step.” She flicked a finger at his grin.

  After a short march, we came to a market — stalls, pavilions, and tables under umbrellas. Vegetables, animal corpses, cloth, wood, and metalwork spilled onto dusty streets. Melinga squealed as a man let loose a bouquet of colorful flying orbs. He reached for the bags of gas floating off. I leapt high on aje muscles and snatched a green orb for Melinga. I tossed the man metal earned at Kehinde’s war masquerades aboard La Vérité. Bystanders gaped at Melinga gnawing the smooth surface of the orb.

  “An offering to the war god.” Kehinde pointed to a giant termite tower. “Let’s not forget where we are.”

  Melinga released her colorful orb; it spiraled overhead. Clouds dark as dirt raced in and exploded. Balls of hard water pelted us. Kehinde caught a big one and, despite her ill humor, grinned as it melted on her palm. “What is this?”

  “Hail!” Bob herded us into a pavilion.

  The crowd turned into a mob, banging through narrow spaces, stomping one another. Somso shook hail from her crown of braids and smiled thanks at the owner. Enchanted, he prattled French. Somso spoke good Christian English. At the market’s edge, a chestnut horse, rimmed in frost and carrying a sallow-fa
ced man, galloped toward an oblivious crowd. The rider tugged reins and sputtered useless commands. A robust woman on a two-wheeled vehicle halted between the horse and the unsuspecting crowd. A brave soul.

  “Océane, ma petite,” yelled a second woman on a two-wheeler. “Non!”

  “Oui.” Océane spoke soothing tones. Slowing down, the animal slipped on frosty pavement and slammed into her. Océane sailed from her seat and hit the stone road with a gasp. “Attention, Eloise!” Océane warned the friend behind her and scrambled to standing. She reached for the reins and missed. The horse trampled the wheels of her marvelous machine. A hoof grazed her thigh. Océane yelped. The confused beast lurched into her shoulder. Océane fell, hit her head on loose rocks, and passed out. The rider yanked the reins. Blood and foam dripped from the bit. Tiny Eloise dumped her two-wheeler and yelled for help as the horse pranced on Océane’s stringy hair.

  “The horse will dash brave Océane to bits.” Tears spilled from my eyes. Aje head, heart, and tail strained against the Taiwo-self, and I/we raced to scoop up Océane. The aje, exuding the scent of a predator, clutched Océane. The horse reared, eyes bulging. The sallow-faced rider clung to its neck as the aje belched fire. The horse turned and galloped away.

  Océane had no broken bones. Her brain had been shaken and patches of scalp were missing hair. Several gashes on her thigh and forehead oozed blood. The aje stopped the bleeding and cleansed wounds with tongue and tail. The tail kept vanishing. Eloise sat nearby, transfixed. The rain subsided, and the aje withdrew. Alert again, Océane clutched my free hand, human and sweaty now. Melinga grabbed Océane’s long nose and babbled Yoruba.

  “Merci beaucoup, Madame,” Océane said softly. “Vous êtes courageuse.” She kissed Melinga’s fingers, then mine.

  “Non, le cheval… horse fears aje,” I replied. French was not my friend. “Not brave.”

  “Si,” she insisted. “Vous êtes très brave.”

  A parade of sneering men with broken teeth and stringy mustaches stormed us. Rough arms snatched Océane. Several spit sour words at me, as if the cloudburst and wild horse were my fault — a trick played by une Africaine sauvage. The aje wanted to blast them to ash and smoke. Waving her cutlass, Kehinde pulled me back into the pavilion. Across the road under an umbrella, Liam whistled. He longed to see Kehinde’s warrior dance. Captain Luigi had banned weapons on shore. He’d confiscated knives from a few men but hadn’t searched Kehinde.

  “You always cause a commotion.” Somso chastised us in Igbo and smiled at the pavilion’s owner. He gave her a bag of nuts. She offered him a brass bracelet. He wouldn’t take it. “It’s all I have.” Somso placed the trinket on an altar at the center of the pavilion. An image of the Jesus orisha smiled down at her.

  Outside, Eloise talked with several men spoiling for a fight. Océane was silent, dazed. My French was insufficient to follow the heated exchange. Kehinde brandished her cutlass and knife. I looked to Bob. He hung his head.

  “Why are they so angry?” I peered at Océane. “Her mind is a little bruised. She should stay awake. Sleep is too much like death after a hard knock on the skull. A few tiny creatures attempted to make her cells their slaves, But I took some hostages and killed virulent ones. Brave Océane will be fine, I swear this.”

  Frenchmen charged toward the pavilion. Bob and Kehinde blocked their path.

  Kehinde spoke Fon. “They are fools. You look ready to eat bullets and belch a gout of flame.” Waving her cutlass, she distracted the smoldering aje. “Listen!” The startled crowd stepped back. Kehinde danced and sang in Fon:

  Dagger in my mouth

  I climb the rock face

  I drive the wild pig

  Out into the open

  My tough skin is better armor

  Than the bristles of the porcupine

  If I have lost my ax, gun, or cutlass

  My teeth are sharp enough

  To tear my enemies apart

  My fingers are stronger still

  Iron claws to defeat you

  Kehinde severed spectral heads and stomped phantom hearts. She tossed a gossamer cloth and sliced it to ribbons before it hit the ground. She shaved a few hairs from Liam’s curly beard. He laughed, and the mob became an audience marveling at the Ballet Amazon and Voodoo. Kehinde back-flipped over the battered two-wheeler and landed with her cutlass raised high. It glistened in now gentle rain. Mud-splattered men grumbled and dragged Eloise and Océane away. A red fruit splattered at Kehinde’s feet. She skewered the fleshy remains as the audience clapped and dispersed.

  “These people make no sense,” Somso muttered my exact thoughts.

  “They make their own sense, and we offend it,” Kehinde said to me. “What did I tell you?”

  “You’re a fine doorful of a woman.” Liam glared at the Frenchmen. “What would you expect out of a frog but a croak?”

  Kehinde flicked the red fruit from her blade. “Are you so different from these frogs, Irishman?”

  “Madame, you cut me to the quick.” Liam clutched his heart and strode too close to her. “Is a dragon a seahorse?”

  Kehinde poked his chest with the cutlass and drew blood. “Even a dragon brushing against thorns will tear its wings.”

  “You keep company with angels, milady.” He kissed her cheek quickly and retreated.

  “French victors still fear our pagan spirits and savage hearts,” Kehinde said.

  “No one will wrestle us to the ground,” I said. “We will be bold here.”

  “They cut off the heads of bold ones with a guillotine, in a plaza not far from here.” Bob gestured toward the center of the city. “The French mob begged for more blood.”

  “In Christian, civilized lands, we shouldn’t speak of taking heads.” Somso held up the crossroad talisman. “Many love Jesus here.” She touched the talisman to my cheek. “I won’t close my heart to Frenchmen. We agree for once, Wanderer, let’s be bold.”

  The streets were an orderly stream of traffic again. Kehinde put away her blade. Somso strode ahead. Rainbows glistened in humid air. A swath of black lingered in the sky near the termite tower. Lightning arced from the cloud’s dark heart. Melinga clapped and drooled against my face. As a silver zigzag tore through the atmosphere to the tip of the metal tower, the aje longed to gather Kehinde, Bob, and Melinga into the circle of its being and escape Paris. We could spread through the spaces between things and discover the new worlds Kehinde desired. That was my last coherent thought before bolts of high voltage cloud electricity ripped into me.

  According to Kehinde, giant sparks were headed for her, Bob, and Somso when the aje swallowed the white hot spears. According to Somso, rogue bolts pierced the ground around us, and I used demon fire to shield everyone. Bob only remembered me shoving him to safety. Liam claimed he was blind and deaf in the lightning and thunder. He recalled cold claws throwing him down. In all versions, after saving everyone from a deadly strike, I emptied my stomach and fainted standing up, arms locked around Melinga, blue fire twisting from bloody nostrils. My skin turned cold and hard like polished river stone. Feverish sweat drenched my garments. The French mob gave me a wide berth. Only children, dogs, and half-wits stopped to stare at the African aje-statue who clenched a squealing baby in its talons. Kehinde kept these curious few at bay and whispered in my ear:

  My teeth are sharp enough

  To tear my enemies apart

  My fingers are stronger still

  Iron claws to defend you

  I released Melinga and collapsed. Bob and Liam argued about what to do next.

  “No French doctor,” Kehinde insisted. She lifted me up, claiming I was light, airy, and sweet smelling, despite a stone statue appearance. Bob led us to a friend’s house.

  Hearing the lightning tales, Luigi applauded my devilish Voodoo and insisted I show off savage magic on stage in France and Chicago. I pretended not to speak Fon, English, French, or Igbo whenever he harangued me. Somso promised wild, savage magic for me. Perhaps this is why Luigi w
as loathe to abandon a sick performer immediately. He dreamed of the spectacle we could create and the bags of money he would make, if I survived…

  Baron of Badass

  Marie lounged on Sekou’s bed with The Chronicles in her lap opened to a video-image of the Eiffel Tower in an electrical storm. Blurry or blank pages came after that. Marie chanted if I survived, eventually jumbling up consonants and vowels. Silver platform shoes, size 6 ½ and very retro, dangled from fidgety toes. It’d take the Jaws of Life to extract that girl from her tight black jeans. Her shirt was black quicksilver, hugging tiny breasts then flowing over seriously narrow hips and zero booty. Yellow letters on the front declared: A quantum leap is a very, very short distance. Cinnamon chuckled reading this. Marie didn’t do ornaments or jewelry except Oshun’s comb, a crown of peacock feathers rendered from wood and blue-green glass beads that held waves of black hair out of her flushed face. That was a gift/share from Cinnamon. A bit of the Wanderer for them all…

  “Wow.” Klaus left his mouth hanging open.

  He sat next to Marie, close, his leg, hip, and shoulder touching hers. Cinnamon vacillated from jealous to excited. Klaus wore a frumpy gray tee-shirt and black jeans. Not wrinkled or dirty, just blah. Hunky guys got away with being blasé and anti-style. Klaus’s muscles required no decoration. His hair was disheveled. Lank wisps curled over his eyes. His lips were as pale as ice. High cheeks burned bright orange and made Cinnamon feel warm. She’d never looked at people with her whole body. It was amazing what there was to notice.

  “Wow.” Klaus didn’t mind repeating himself, didn’t mind sounding stupid or too impressed. He got away with everything. “Griot Joe is Taiwo in 1890s Paris. How did he get so twisted up, hobbling around with a supermarket cart?” Klaus would definitely be game for solving the Wanderer mystery. Marie too. Cinnamon simply had to ask them. Since when was she such a scared rabbit? “The Chronicles blows me out.” Occasionally Klaus lost English at the prepositions. Cinnamon didn’t correct him. Blows me out sounded good.