Monday, April 16, 2012

"What The Bones Say"

This is a story I started working on last month. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I have been writing it. I will be adding more chapters as the months go on. So stay tuned.





 (Gotta love this picture. I thought she was the coolest character out of ALL of the Pirates of the Caribbean movies.)




What The Bones Say





Angel woke up in a cold sweat. Third night in a row that she had a dream about being chased by some dark shadowy figure. She couldn’t see the face, she could just hear it breathing, and see white teeth flash in the moon light. What the hell was it? And why was it after her?

Rubbing the sleep from her eyes, she got up and walked to the bathroom still trembling from the nightmare that seemed more real than dream.  “No denying it,” she said.  “This is a message.”

After showering and washing away the evidence of the terror from her body, Angel got dressed and headed down stairs to her kitchen. Smelling fresh bacon & eggs cooking, hearing the Today show in the background, and listening to the sweet, soft humming of her BFF at the stove, she felt a little better, and quickly pushed the dream from her mind.

“Hey girly! I thought you were never gonna get up. Bon Dieu! You sleep like the dead.”

Celeste Monroe, her oldest and closest friend since like sandbox. Always had a knack for putting a smile on her face even in the worst situations. Now was no different.

“You ok, cher? You are awfully quiet this morning.”

Stumbling over her thoughts, Angel finally decided to start from the beginning and tell her friend what has been going on.  Celeste was a Hoodoo. Born and raised. She had a gift for divination and interpreting dreams. If anyone would know what was going on she would.

“I had a…dream last night. I was being chased.”

“Was he hot? Cause if he was, you should of let him catch you.”

“Nasty.”

“What? I’m just saying, if I was the one being chased by some hot guy I would find a way to trip and fall and let him catch me.” A big Cheshire cat grin crossing her full lips.

Sighing, Angel pulled out the chair at the kitchen table, , pushed a few stray locs out of her face, and started to recount her reoccurring dream, the large shadowy creature in it,  and the extreme fear she has been plagued with for the past three nights.

Turnign the stove off and moving their breakfast to a cool trivet, Celeste sat down at the table with her and thought for a bit before she responded to what was relayed to her.

“DO you think it was a dream or …?”

“Please don’t say it.”

Cher. You know you have a gift for visions, and if this is something that is gonna happen, and to you specifically, you need to face it and figure out what all of it means.”

Deep down Angel knew she was right. “I…I know.”

Getting up from the table she walked over to the window and watched the sun sparkle off the bayou water. Angel knew it was a “message.” A vision, and that if she didn’t figure it out in time, a life, mainly hers might be in danger.

Looking at Celeste, she nodded her head. “Yes, I do believe it was a vision. This just felt too REAL to be a regular dream. I’ve had enough visions in my life to know the difference. And THIS…this was no regular dream, mon ami.”
“Well then. Looks like we have work to do. Go get de bones.”


------------------------------------------------------------------------

Groaning like a child told to clean her room, Angel went and grabbed a small leather bag with the veve for Papa Legba,  lovingly embroidered on the front of it in silver thread. Hearing the click clack of its contents  soothed her. The bones never lied to her. They never hurt her. They may have told her truths that she wasn’t ready to hear yet, but she knew needed to be heard. Walking back into the kitchen she thought about a reading she gave 4 months ago. It was for a woman who was caught in a love triangle with her husband and his best friend. She loved both of them dearly, but was miserable in her marriage, and wanted to have the same passion and love in her life that she originally had with her husband, but with this other man.

Angel picked up the bones prayed to her guardian Loa & to Papa Legba to show her the truth that this woman desperately needed to see to make the right choice in her life.

The bones were thrown. They bounced around for a couple of seconds before landing in their  ordained pattern. Two strong yeses, two strong no’s. A decision to be made. One not to taken lightly. She picked them up again, shook them and let them fly onto the table.  Three no’s and one strong yes. If the woman stayed with her husband and waited out this storm in their marriage, there will be much happiness in the end. A third and final roll. Three yeses, one strong no. If she went with the other man, her husband’s best friend, she might be happy and content for a while (a honeymoon period), but in the end, it would fall apart. Her world would be torn  apart, and so would his.

Angel got a thank you card from the woman two weeks ago. She stayed with her husband. They went to counseling found the root of their problems, and are now happier than they have been in years. Her affair with the other man? She ended it that night she left Angel’s house following the reading. Her lover evidently moved on to another woman, and his wife found out. Left him, took their children, and most of his money in the process. Angel chuckled thanking bon Dieu, that this woman actually listened to the advise the loa were sending her through the bones, and not doing like some of her other clients do. Ignore the truth given, and end up worse off than what they were to start.

Sitting down at the table, Celeste approaches her with a fragrant cup of tea. “This will relax you. Help you to see what needs to be seen.”

While sipping the tea, her best friend cleansed her with the smoke of a burning sage bundle, and prayed for insight and protection for them both.

“You know I have a difficult time doing readings for myself. I can never see past my own damn cloud of emotions and thoughts to see what is spelled out right in front of me.”

“It takes time and practice. You know this.”

“Time and practice…I have had the past 10 years, worth of time and practice. You would think I would have gotten the hang of this by now.”

Shaking her perfectly cornrowed head, Celeste gently grabbed her friend’s hand from across the table, patted it and gave a warm motherly smile. “It was 10 years of off and on spotty practice. If you had practiced everyday like ma-tante was trying to get you to do instead of vi-key-vi, -half assed- you wouldn’t be having this problem now.”

“I know. I know. Well, I guess I better let these bad boys fly and see what was after me and what it wanted.”

Picking up the bag, Angel poured the bones into her hand. The energy in them sparked through her fingers like they were made of pure electricity. Hmmm… she thought. These have never felt like this before. Normally they would feel like a warm pulse or, heartbeat in her hand, but this was sharper. Almost painful.

“C-, touch these and tell me what you feel.” 

Celeste reached for the bones in her hand and was about to grab them, when a large blue white arch of energy shot out and shocked her.

Merde! Fuck that hurt! Have they ever done that before?” Rubbing her injured hand and bruised ego.

“No. Never. I haven’t cleansed them in a week or two since my last client was here. Maybe they just need a bit of the smoke.”

“Maybe.” But , Celeste felt like it was something else that was causing the bones to go haywire and arch energy like that. Something dark.

Picking up the sage bundle, Angel prayed to La Sirene asking that her cool waters would cleanse the bones of any negativity, and she asked Papa Legba to close the door on any negative spirits that might be causing the problem.

“Ok. I think they are ready. Let’s try this again.”

“You go right ahead. I am keeping my hands to myself. And be careful, cher. I have a bad feeling. Something is not right about this.”

“So I shouldn’t do this?”

“No, you have to. I mean I have a bad feeling about this whole situation. Your bones have not reacted like this before, and I find it no coincidence that they seem  booby trapped since you started having this dream.”

Angel bit her lip, mulling over her choices. “Can’t you do a card reading for me? I mean we would get a more detailed picture of what is going on.”

“I guess we can.” Getting her cards from a secret drawer built into their herb cabinet, she jumped back and gasped as first smoke then flames burst forth from the drawer instantly incinerating all that was inside of it.

“What the hell?!!!”

“Get the fire extinguisher!”

Angel came running back from the pantry with the extinguisher.  After four to five blasts, the fire was finally put out.

“Well looks like cards are a no go.”

“Get the holy water, the exorcism incense, and the white chalk. We are gonna get answers, and we are gonna get them now.”

The deadly fire in Celeste’s eyes showed that her friend was not only pissed about her favorite tarot deck and other sacred items being turned into ash, but that she was determined to find whoever or what ever it was that had invaded their private space and declared war.
 

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