Rusty nails can cause general harm.
Chilli flakes will cause the subject of your spell to become angry.
Honey, petals, heart-shaped charms can encourage your target to love.
Graveyard soil can drive someone away. Fresher the better.
Urine can help you gain power over your target.
Once you have your intention for the spell, pour that into the jar along with the poppet and the medium and then seal the jar tightly. It can make the curse more powerful to paint the outside of the jar so no light can get into it or to hide it in a dark place.
It may take many months for your spell to take effect and if you are putting negative energy into your jar, please consider how to improve the situation for yourself rather than trying to harm someone else.
To break the curse simply break the jar and discard the contents. But make sure you’ve cast a spell of protection, or you’re wearing a protective amulet when you do this, otherwise the spell can come back on you.
53
Raf barely looks at her as he walks from the doorway of their living room over to the sink where he fills up a glass of water. Erin came back from Caz’s and put Bobby down for his nap. Then she told Raf that there’d been another photo and could he come home so they could talk about it. She was hoping that he wouldn’t see the photo beforehand but his desk-mate, Sev, helpfully showed it to him.
Erin watches him drink the pint of water down in four bubbling gulps before rinsing the glass and putting it on the side. His not looking at her, not talking to her would usually make Erin broil with anxiety but she feels calm. She has no idea whether he’ll believe her about Xavi but she knows she did nothing wrong and now she has an answer to what’s being done to them. She and Raf can finally be united by a need to remove the malignant presence that’s been ruining their relationship. They will be able to get rid of Amanda, together, and move on with their lives.
Raf walks over to her and sinks his long legs back into the armchair opposite. He doesn’t look angry, he doesn’t look upset. He looks neutral, no emotion shows on his face, boredom, if anything.
‘You’re going to tell me that that picture is not what it looks like.’ He blinks his eyes slowly.
‘He’s called Xavi. He’s the security expert who’s been trying to find out who it is that’s taking these photos. The photo makes it look like we’re together but we’re not, and if you don’t believe that now, there’s not much I can do about it. But I know who it is that’s doing this to me and I know I can prove it to you.’ He flicks his eyes up to her. This is not what he was expecting. He was expecting apologies and simpering and pleas to forgive her for being such a dissolute and terrible partner but she’s not going to let emotion cloud this. A jar with a curse in is damning evidence. They will rip off the tape, she will show him what’s inside. He’ll see that the doll looks like his fiancée. She’ll show him the articles she’s found online, dozens of them, proving that Amanda’s trying to curse her. She’ll show him the sonnet declaring Amanda’s undying love for him. She’ll tell him that she saw Amanda coming back to their house in the middle of the night, probably on the first train, mere hours after Erin had been chased down the street and fell, nearly concussing herself. And, together, they will throw her out. Maybe Raf will take all of Amanda’s wacky bullshit and put it out in the street and they’ll watch the wind blow it into the sea and they’ll never have to see her again.
Erin stands up and extends her hand for Raf to follow her. He looks at her and there it is, the first hint at how angry he really is about the photo, a glint of jealous rage he’s desperately trying to style out with a chill exterior. He stands up, shaking his head as Erin makes her way to the doors into the garden. He pinches his eyes into his nose as if he hasn’t slept for weeks. He knows where they’re going so Erin marches out to Amanda’s studio before he can object. According to Sophie’s Instagram Amanda’s doula-ing for her today so she’s definitely not in. Erin opens the door of the studio, glances at the crystal grid, still on the table beaming its love energy towards Raf as he turns sideways to edge his way through the door. He seems giant in the tiny room, and from the way he sniffs the herbal air and casts his eyes over the brightly coloured throw that Amanda’s put up on the back wall, it seems like he hasn’t been in here since she arrived.
‘I need you to listen to me now. Do you see this?’ She points to the crystal grid. ‘I spoke to an expert and these crystals are designed to bewitch someone or to repair an old relationship.’
‘Erin –’
‘Please.’ She goes to him and takes his hands in hers, grips them tight and looks straight into his shining brown eyes. ‘Please let me finish.’ He nods, the anger in his eyes replaced by an etch of concern. Erin slams open the cupboard door and reveals the Post-it, something shimmers in Raf’s eyes. He thinks I’ve lost it, Erin thinks, but she has to make her case.
‘“Let us not to the marriage of two minds admit impediments.” It’s a Shakespeare sonnet all about how once you love, you can never ever let that love go. It’s extreme. Too much. And it’s Amanda’s mantra.’
‘How many times have you been in here?’
Erin ignores him, undeterred. ‘You know voodoo?’
‘What?’
‘Voodoo, sticking pins in dolls and causing them pain.’
‘I guess.’
‘Well.’ She goes round to the sofa, bends down to her knees and reaches under. Her hand finds square metal legs. She sweeps again and only finds the edge of the folded mattress. Raf’s looking at her down his nose, expression blank. She gets her phone torch out and shines it under the sofa. The jar isn’t there. Nothing’s there. ‘There was –’ She stands up and goes into the bathroom. She looks behind the toilet, opens the bathroom cabinet even though there’s no way the jar could fit in there. She looks in the shower. She crosses the room, trying not to look at Raf who’s leaning out of the open studio door. Erin yanks all of the cupboard doors, high and low, she puts her head into the deep cupboard under the sink and rustles around the cleaning products. The jar isn’t here. She’s taken it. She’s hidden it.
‘There was a jar,’ Erin says.
‘Let’s go back to the house.’
‘It was a curse. There was a doll of me in the jar. I’ve googled it. It’s witchcraft.’
‘I don’t want us in here any more. Close the cupboards, make it look like it did and let’s go back to the house.’
‘She wants to take you away from me. She’s in love with you.’ His jaw tenses. ‘She’s always been in love with you, that’s what the poem means. She’s going to try and take you away from me. You and Bobby maybe. She put pepper in the jar, chilli flakes, it’s part of the spell, to make me angry. And there was some graveyard soil in there as well that was meant to drive us apart. She’s planned it all to steal you from me. Now she’s moved the jar because she knows I’m on to her. She knows it proves everything. That’s why she took the picture with Xavi as well. She’s the troll. She has to be. She knows we’ll throw her out now we know and she’s getting desperate.’
‘Get back in the house, now.’ Raf says it with such force, such authority that it silences Erin instantly. She almost sits on the floor like a young child. He goes out the door, holding it for her, and she walks past through the tunnel of his arm against the door frame and back towards the kitchen feeling the chilly vitality on her skin that she would have walking back from a big night out at dawn. Everything tingles, her pulse races.
‘She’s moved it.’ Erin sits on the sofa, hands cradled in between her knees. Raf’s in the kitchen, staring into the garden. ‘She knew I saw her getting back from London, so she moved it just in case I came into her room.’ Raf begins moving things from the drying rack and stacking them in a pile next to it. She leans over the sofa towards him, ‘I know you can’t see it. You still see her as a little girl so you can’t see how manipulative she is.’ There’s a huge bang as Raf slams the stack of dinner plates down on the work s
urface. He speaks as if his voice was being fed through a mangle, deliberate but strained.
‘You’re going to go and see someone.’
‘What?’
‘I didn’t want it to come to this but you need professional help. Perhaps go somewhere, away from us for a bit.’ Erin laughs. She’s knows it’s not the right reaction as soon as it comes out of her mouth but she can’t help it. He wants to section her. She’s never heard anything so ridiculous in her life. He’s shaking his head, anger turned to sadness now. He pities her. It suddenly hits her hard. He pities her because he thinks she’s gone mad. ‘I’ve been meaning to stage some sort of intervention for months now.’
‘An intervention?’ Erin stands up and walks to the corner of the room.
‘Smartphone addiction is serious. It’s just as bad as gambling, worse lots of people are saying.’
‘Which people?’ Erin turns, bites her lips. The incredulity is switching into indignation.
‘You think I don’t see what’s been happening to you?’ Raf comes towards her but Erin backs further into the corner. ‘I was worried about losing you to everyone else, everyone you were sharing our baby’s life with, but it’s worse than I ever thought. It’s warped your mind.’ Out the window a middle-aged woman looks in on them. ‘I can show you the article I read, it can make you delusional. There’s some anonymous arsehole trying to ruin your Instagram feed and you’re convinced it’s happening in real life, in our real life.’
‘They’re here. They’re in town, following me around. She knows where I am at all times. Of course it’s Amanda. It has to be Amanda.’ Raf’s over by her now. He takes her face in his palms, rubs a finger on her temple, but he’s shaking his head. He grabs her into him and holds her tight to his body. Erin’s eyes dart around the room like a stunned animal.
He doesn’t even slightly believe me, she thinks. She sees her reflection in the glass of the painting, that painting she hates, and, does she see what they’re all seeing? Caz said she looked manic all the time, Raf thinks she’s delusional. Has she been so spooked by the threat to her online persona that she’s finding real-world threats that aren’t really there?
‘I believe you,’ he says.
‘You do?’ She pulls her head away and looks at him quizzically.
‘About the man in the photo.’
‘Oh.’
‘I don’t think your head’s in any sort of place for that kind of thing.’ Erin blinks. ‘I know you’d never do something like that to me. That’s why I love you. I love you and I want us to get through this.’ His hands rest on her shoulders now. ‘We’ll ask Amanda to go. As soon as you’re yourself again, we’ll ask her to go.’
‘Tell her to go now. Maybe she’s not the troll, but she needs to go now. If you want me to get better.’ She hates herself for saying it because she doesn’t feel ill, she doesn’t feel mad. ‘She needs to go now.’
Raf breaks from her and goes over to the door. He picks up some junk mail from the console table and begins scrunching it. He seems edgy, conflicted. He’s about to speak but it just comes out as an ‘ah’ sound. But then he does.
‘I can’t trust you alone with Bobby.’ His words hit her like a backdraught, forcing Erin to grab one of the large books on the shelf behind her for ballast. ‘Every time I close my eyes,’ he says, ‘I see you shouting at him on the verge overlooking Hilda’s Bay. He’s a baby and you’re screaming at him.’ He sits on the side of the armchair, facing the door, away from Erin as if he can’t say what he has to say directly to her face. ‘I – Do you remember the thing we watched on iPlayer a couple of years ago, you wanted to watch it, about postpartum psychosis?’
‘What the fuck, no.’
‘The look on your face in those pictures. You look like you hate him, like you hate our son. And now all this, threatening crystals, curses in jars that don’t exist for Christ’s sake. You want to know something funny?’ He turns round to face her, his shoulders slacken. ‘I’ve not been able to pay the mortgage the last three months. I’ve been missing deadlines because I’m so fucking stressed with all this, all this shit. You’re off spending hundreds of pounds a month on trains, still not earned a penny from any of the “work” you’ve been doing. So, I’d love Amanda to go, if it meant you’d suddenly flip back into being the woman I fell in love with, the woman I was desperate to have a baby with, but I honestly don’t think her going will make a blind bit of difference. This,’ he waves two fingers around his forehead to indicate her mental decline, ‘was on the cards as soon as you got pregnant. I could have stopped it but I was too –’ he punches his palm with his hand – ‘I was too indulgent of your –’ he indicates to the phone – ‘your ridiculous social network crap. I can’t leave him with you. I’m sorry. Not now. It wouldn’t be responsible.’
‘I’ll give up Instagram,’ Erin blurts out, not knowing if she means it.
‘Really?’ Something clears in his expression. She knows that this is what he wants. This is what he’s always wanted. He’s never said it, he’d never set himself up to be called ‘obstructive’, but she knows he’s jealous of the people that follow her online, she knows he wants to guard what they have from the world rather than sharing it. She doesn’t want to give up Instagram but she’s scared. She realises how scared she must be of Amanda, or perhaps it’s of what’s happening to her, because for the last six months, nothing has been more important to her than social media, not even her son. And it hits her how appalling that is. ‘I’ll give it up but Amanda has to go.’
Raf looks down at the floor, then up to stare out at what’s become Amanda’s lodging. Her lair where she’s hiding a curse – Erin’s sure she’s hiding a camera too, although perhaps she’s moved it all somewhere else now she knows Erin’s been in there. She tenses her forearm, she’s lost weight in the last month and she can see the tendons vacillate as she does. Her phone buzzes on the hall table between them. Raf looks at her, challenging her to check it, but she doesn’t even look down, holding his eye.
‘Delete the app,’ she says, trying to appear as if it means nothing to her. A smile sneaks into his eye and it’s like she’s passed an elaborate test he’s been playing. He walks over to her phone and picks it up. Presses her code. Deletes Instagram.
‘I’ll ask her to go,’ he says. Erin tries to look grateful but all she feels is relief. Whether Amanda’s the troll or not, whether Erin’s going mad or is the only sane one, her going is the only way for things to get back to something like they were before. But, as Raf slides her phone into the pocket of his coat, somehow, this doesn’t feel like a victory.
54
FROM: [email protected]
TO: [email protected]
RE: Great news to brighten up a tough day
Hi Erin,
We did it. We broke 100k followers. I know the circumstances aren’t what anyone was expecting but you should take heart from knowing that even with someone out there trying to smear you, people haven’t stopped wanting to follow your and Bobby’s journey. The way you’ve responded, with grace and charm, is a huge component of this, so well done you!
I’ve already had some really interesting brand enquiries but was holding out until we reached the 100k mark because it gives me a much stronger negotiating position. Because it’s come quickly I’m going to only raise our per-post fee to £800, BUT both Debenhams and Peacocks have offered a full-scale campaign that I’d been putting off telling you about, we wouldn’t be able to do both but I’d hope to be able to play them off against each other and I imagine we’d probably be able to get 25–35K if you were happy to do an exclusive tie-in for the season. Anyway. All to be discussed.
Also, a heads-up, a few of the online gossip mags have run with the story, but so far we’ve managed to put off tabloids. I’ve waved my magic ‘fuck-off’ wand at them! It won’t even be light drizzle in an espresso mug by next week, and it gives me great delight to declare that BRAUNEforBRAINS is now a MACROINFLUENCER!!!!
/> Speak soon.
Grace
X
FROM: [email protected]
TO: [email protected]
RE: Re: Great news to brighten up a tough day
Are you free to chat today? Let me know when works for you.
Best,
Erin
X
55
‘You won’t recover, Erin.’ Grace’s voice sounds like a flat clarinet through the phone’s speaker. This is the first thing she’s said after Erin rambled on to a silent phone line about how she was going to take an extended break from Instagram in light of the trolling. Raf gives a crocodile smile and shakes his head at the phone that stands on the console table between them. ‘It makes it look like the troll is right about you. That you’re cheating, drinking too much, not being a proper mother.’ Grace lets the words hang among the dull fizz of static on the line. ‘And we all know that’s not true. Is that what you want people speculating? Because that’s what fills the void, Erin, speculation, gossip about why you decided to throw it all away.’ Erin hasn’t heard this tone from Grace. She didn’t think that her agent would be happy about her decision but she hadn’t expected this.
‘Grace, it’s Raf.’
‘Your idea I presume?’
‘I understand this might be difficult for you professionally, but you don’t have children, do you? Someone’s threatening my family –’
‘There haven’t been any threats.’
‘Is there nothing you people won’t say to make money?’ Bobby looks up from trying to climb up onto the sofa at his father’s forceful tone. ‘Someone’s following her when she’s with our baby. Your so-called security expert knows bugger all, no one on your side’s doing anything. Has anyone even called the police yet? I wanted to when I first found out, which, by the way, I do not appreciate you telling my future wife to hide things from me, but you told me not to bother, but now things have escalated, it seems insane they haven’t been contacted. Look, I’m so sorry this is going to cut your bottom line but, you know, I’m sure you’ll be OK sitting in your million-pound house –’
The Family Friend Page 22
