"I'm being haunted."
Well, I'm a psychiatrist, and thought I'd heard it all from my patients until that moment. I shifted in my leather chair, and noted Lisa's words on my pad of paper. I made a conscious effort not to show any reaction to the strange thing my patient had just told me.
"What makes you think you're being haunted?" I asked, keeping my voice void of emotion.
I observed Lisa out of the corner of my eye as she sat in a leather armchair that matched my own. She certainly beautified my office. The sunlight streaming in through the only window reflected shiny golden highlights upon her light brown hair, creating an almost halo-like effect. Lisa was dressed plainly in jeans and a T-shirt, but it didn't matter, for she would be striking no matter what she chose to wear.
Lisa shifted on her chair just as I had done, and I wondered briefly if she was mimicking my movements. "I have strange dreams," she told me. "I dream of being followed. You know, pursued."
I hesitated, then said softly, "Actually, this type of dream is not uncommon. Sometimes unresolved issues from a person's past can materialize in the subconscious as feelings of persecution. The dreamer is actually trying to escape the past. This cannot be interpreted as a haunting, although you probably feel distressed by the feelings these dreams are causing."
She looked up at me, meeting my eyes for the first time in this session. "No, Doctor Keith. This is not something from my past. I'm dreaming of my present."
"Go on," I tried to encourage her.
She cast her blue eyes downwards once again, and her fingers nervously plucked at the arm of the chair. My office was casual, and I had planned it that way. I felt the formality that usually went with psychiatry had no place here. Although I had framed credentials hanging on the wall, everything else resembled a living room more than an office. Except that there was no couch.
"You were saying?" I gently prodded.
"A few weeks ago, I was dreaming the same dream over and over. Let me describe the dream. I hear strange sounds in the night. I open my front door, and I see that my front yard has disappeared. In its stead is a graveyard. The sounds are coming from somewhere in that graveyard. I follow the sounds until I reach an open grave. The grave is empty; dug up, but I know the sounds are coming from that hole in the ground."
Lisa stopped, and I waited. She continued, "In my dream, the headstone over the open grave has my name carved upon it."
She looked up and quickly sat forward. Her fingers grasped the arms of the chair and she said in a rush, "But I told you that the grave is empty! It's been dug up. There's a mound of dirt next to the open grave. The casket is gone. Someone took my body."
She sat back, and then spoke again slowly. "Now the dreams are getting worse. They're changing. I'm being haunted. Except I am being haunted by myself. In my dreams, I see an image of myself everywhere. In dark corners. In other rooms. In alleyways. I always see myself out of the corner of my eye. I know this sounds weird, but in my dreams, I'm being followed by myself. My body came out of the grave and now it is following me."
I waited, but Lisa was silent. I realized that it was my turn to speak. In most cases, the revelations of the patient were symptoms of the patient's problems, and were not to be taken literally. It was my job to interpret and then evaluate whatever I heard.
"Perhaps your feeling of being haunted by yourself simply means that you do not accept yourself," I tried. "Perhaps you have feelings of isolation from the 'real world' and those feelings are manifesting themselves into an alter ego. That would explain the fact that in your dreams, you are experiencing another version of yourself. Remember, dreams are products of your subconscious, not products of reality."
"Then I want to be hypnotized," she said. "You said I have an alter-ego. That means I have a split personality. Maybe the answer is in my subconscious, like you just said."
I said quickly, "I'm not talking about another personality. An alter-ego does not mean multiple personality. Multiple personality disorders are so extremely rare that I'd be willing to bet I won't see a real case in my entire career."
"What about my hypnosis idea?" she asked. "Would you do it?"
"What are you hoping to find? Your Id?"
"What's an Id?"
"Well," I explained, "the Id is an unconscious energy source derived from one's instincts, not from one's intellect. It takes one to a primal level. It makes one want immediate gratification of biological drives, such as sex, thirst and hunger."
Lisa shook her head. "No, my problem is my body...my ghost, I suppose I should call it. Not my Id. I want to stop the hauntings. I want a confrontation with the ghost that came out of my grave. I want to know how the ghost can be me when I'm me. And I'm no ghost; I'm alive."
"First you've got to stop treating this like it's real," I told her. "Dreams are not reality."
"Maybe not," Lisa said. "But suddenly it's not just limited to dreams. Lately I've been seeing myself when I'm awake. I told you that I see my own ghost lurking in dark places; I see it out of the corner of my eye, but when I turn around, it vanishes before I can get a good look. All this is happening when I'm awake. And sometimes, when I look in a mirror, I see it for a split second standing behind me. It always vanishes before I can really look. I'm telling you, I'm freaked out. I need to stop haunting myself. Help me, Doctor Keith."
"Well, I want you to understand what hypnosis is," I said. "Monotonous visual stimuli can put people in a trance-like state. Take the examples of people staring at televisions or the familiar 'highway hypnosis,' you know, when people drive on long stretches of boring roads without breaks. People go into a trance-like state."
I stopped, and then added, "Actually, the word trance can be misleading, because hypnosis is not technically a sleep or a stupor. It is a breakdown of the ego. It makes some people susceptible to suggestions."
"So how will you do it?" she asked.
"You've heard of the hypnotist dangling a watch in front of the patient. That's a monotonous visual stimulus. I use a device similar to the musical timer that keeps the beat, except mine doesn't make any noise. It's just a mechanized stick that moves back and forth."
"Let's do it."
"You'll have to sign a consent form," I warned her. "I assume no liability for anything."
"Let's do it," she repeated.
Suddenly I realized what she meant. "You mean right now, during this session?"
"There's still over a half hour left in my session," she pointed out. "And there's no time like the present."
I don't consider myself a spontaneous person, so I don't know what made me agree. But I did agree. I had her sign the form as I gathered my materials together. I set the stage, and then began to hypnotize my patient.
Lisa went under very quickly. Soon she was in a hypnotic state, still seated on the leather chair, with her eyes closed and a dreamy expression on her beautiful face.
I brought her back to her original dream; the first one she had weeks ago. I asked her to describe where she was and what she was doing.
"I'm in my nightgown," she began. "I feel the coarseness of the material, because the night seems to be cold, so I'm wearing flannel. For some reason, I'm in my parent's house; it's a big house, one of those Southern mansions. But I haven't lived here for over a year. I know I moved into an apartment. Yet here I am, somehow back in my parents' house in the middle of the night. I hear a noise, and I'm wondering, Where are my parents? Nobody seems to be home."
"What happens next?" I asked.
"I'm at the top of the stairs," she continued. "I can feel the smooth wood of the railing with my left hand. It's dark, but there's a night light at the bottom of the stairs. I can see well enough so that I know I won't have a misstep. Plus, I know this house. I've been up and down these stairs so many times. But something feels different right now about the house. Wait--I know what it is. Somebody must have turned the heat off. It's cold in the house, very cold; that's what's different. I pull my nightgown closer around me and I can feel how scratchy it is. And I'm thinking, I'm all alone. I hear a bad noise and I'm all alone."
"What's the bad noise?" I asked. "What does it sound like?"
"It sounds like moaning, except it is, well, sort of moaning mixed with sounds of the wind. I think the wind is blowing. I can hear branches of the old tree scraping against a window. Yes, that means it's windy outside.
"I'm starting down the stairs now. I can feel the wooden steps because I'm barefoot. I'm scared. I don't want to find out what the sounds are. I don't want to know. But I can't help myself. Something makes me keep walking down the stairs. I feel a sense of dread, of impending doom. But I am compelled to find the sounds. Something is waiting for me...something wants me. Something is out there. I need to find whatever is out there.
"I'm at the bottom step. Now I'm passing the night-light plugged into the wall socket. I feel glad that I'm not in complete darkness. There's some comfort in having a light.
"I'm reaching for the doorknob. I feel the smooth metal in my hand. I'm turning the doorknob, and I hear the creak as the front door opens. I look out. Where is the front yard? Oh my god, there's a cemetery outside! No, it's more like a graveyard, like those types they used to have in churchyards, small and run down. The tombstones loom out of the ground, and some are leaning over, and others are pitted and chipped. This must be a very old graveyard.
"I leave the security of the night light to step outside. I'm afraid of the dark, but I can't seem to help myself. I go outside. A rickety picket fence envelops the graveyard. One of the pickets is loose and it bangs in the wind, startling me, making my heart race.
"And now I hear the moaning again. Wait, it's a word; it's my name! Someone is calling my name, but it sounds scary, all weird, like someone is in pain."
She became silent, striking a pose as though she were listening.
"What's happening now?" I asked, coaxing her.
"I see someone standing over an open grave. He is pointing at the headstone. Oh my god, the headstone has my name carved into it! The date of my death is this year."
Aha, I thought, this is something new, something only revealed by hypnosis. Lisa never mentioned anyone else being in her dream before other than herself.
"Is this person standing over your grave a man or a woman? What does he or she look like?" I asked.
"He is a black man, dressed funny, like he's from Africa or somewhere, like he's a bush person. He has paint on his face. Actually, he looks like one of those Haitian Voodoo people that I've seen on TV. Yes, he looks like someone about to perform a Voodoo ritual. I look around, almost expecting to see a bloody chicken or something.
"The man is speaking. Mark of Guede, Loa of the Dead, curse this woman, the man is telling me. Oh no, he is pointing to my empty grave. What does he mean? Is this weird man putting a curse on me?"
At that, Lisa became agitated, thrashing about in her chair. I made the decision to take her out of hypnosis and therefore take her back to the present.
"You will immediately awaken," I commanded.
She stopped thrashing and opened her beautiful eyes. "Did I go under?"
"You bet you did."
"What did I say?"
"Not much more than you already know," I lied. I wanted to do some research on whatever a mark of Guede was before I discussed it with Lisa. I didn't want to upset my patient more than she already was.
"Listen," I added, "your time is up. Go ahead and make an appointment with Jenilee. She's my secretary. Make the appointment for next week, and we'll go into what you said during this session at that time."
"Now you're leaving me dangling," she said.
"Don't worry," I assured her, "everything is fine. I'll see you next week. I'm going to prescribe sleeping pills for you so you don't dream in the meantime."
"Okay," she agreed as she rose to leave my office.
Lisa had been my last patient for the day, which was why I was able to let her time run a little over. After she left, I began typing on my computer. I wanted to know if there really were things called Guede or Loa, or if those things were simply figments of an imaginative dream.
I got a hit on an Internet search engine. I hesitated, but then I opened the file and began to read.
Mark of Guede: The target of this power becomes marked for death. Guede is the Loa of the Dead and is usually the one whom Voodoo priests or priestesses address when they wish to curse someone. The Loa is the Lord of the Cemetery and has the power to command disciples to open the Gateway to Hell. When the Gateway has been opened, the person targeted for the curse begins to attract malicious spirits that follow the cursed person and torments him or her.
Well, that's interesting, I thought. And disturbing.
I wondered if Lisa had knowledge of Voodoo, or even practiced it, because that would explain why this sort of thing had entered her subconscious, surfacing to appear in her dreams. I jotted down a note in her file as a reminder for me to ask her.
But when I left my office for the day, I put Lisa's problems out of my mind. That is, until I received a frantic phone call at my home.
"Doctor Keith, you have to help me," Lisa pleaded, her voice soft.
I was greatly annoyed. "How did you get my home phone number?"
"I have a friend who works for the local phone company. I can't give you his name or he'll get in trouble."
"You bet he'd get in trouble," I growled. "Lisa, you can't call me at my home."
"Doctor Keith, this is an emergency," she told me, and I wondered why she was speaking so quietly.
I took the bait. I'll admit, I was curious about this very unusual patient of mine. "What's the emergency?"
"She's here," Lisa whispered.
"Who? Who's there?"
"My ghost."
"Lisa....."
"I mean it, Doctor Keith. My ghost is in my apartment right now."
"You can't be asking me to come to your apartment."
"Please come," she whispered. "I need you. I don't know who else to call."
"Lisa," I told her, "I cannot get emotionally involved with any of my patients. We need to keep this on a professional level."
"Please," she pleaded.
Against my better judgment, she broke down my barrier. I know it sounds crazy to have an attraction for a patient because it could land me in big trouble. I have since wondered if it was partially because she was so incredibly beautiful. I'm a psychiatrist, but I'm also a man. A very human man. And I'm single.
"Tell me your address," I said, "because your file is in my office. I keep no patient information at my home."
"Then you'll come?"
"I'll be right over."
I got into my car and drove towards Lisa's apartment. She lived smack in the middle of New Orleans, whereas I lived on the outskirts of the city. When I got to Lisa's apartment complex, I looked for her name on the outside of the gated building and found it. I buzzed the button under Lisa's name.
I began to feel nervous, because Lisa didn't buzz back to unlock the gate. I pushed the button again. And again I received no response.
Greatly disturbed, I went to the apartment that had the word Manager posted above the front door. This apartment openly faced the street, so there was no gate and no buzzer.
I knocked on the door, and within a few seconds, the door swung open. A bedraggled dark-haired woman of about thirty stood on the threshold. "What can I do for you?" she asked.
I explained who I was. "I'm requesting that you unlock the door to Lisa McDurmont's apartment. I'm responding to her phone call about a psychiatric episode that she had been experiencing. I have a bad feeling about this. We need to check on my patient."
Gaining the manager's cooperation, we both headed towards Lisa's apartment. The manager unlocked the gate, and I followed her to Apartment 17. I stood impatiently behind her as the manager unlocked Lisa's apartment. We then stepped inside together.
My patient was lying on the floor in a face down position, her limbs outstretched. The manager gasped as I kneeled beside Lisa's body and felt for a pulse. There was none.
Lisa was dead.
She was not yet cold, so I knew she must not have been dead for very long. And after all, I had just spoken to her twenty minutes before. "Call 911," I instructed the manager. "Use Lisa's phone."
Within minutes the paramedics arrived, but it was of no use. Lisa was definitely dead. A few more minutes passed, and then two cops from the New Orleans Police Department arrived. They questioned me extensively, and one said, "Probably dead of an overdose, although we can't be sure until the toxicology reports come back and the autopsy is performed. You said you prescribed sleeping pills? Let me check in her bathroom. Maybe the bottle's still there."
He left the living room, but immediately returned. "The pill bottle's there, all right, but it's full. If there was an overdose, it wasn't from your prescription." Then the cop looked at me with a strange expression on his face. "Doc, maybe you'd better come and take a look at the bathroom mirror."
Curious, I walked down the hall to the obvious location of the bathroom. I stepped inside.
On the mirror, written in large letters with red lipstick, was a single word. The word was Ghoul.
I realized that the cop was directly behind me. "Doc," he asked, "what does it mean?"
"I have no idea," I told him as I stared at the word.
***
The next few days I found myself so busy that I never seemed to have the time to dwell on Lisa's death. But then I was drawn back to the case when I received word on the toxicology report. It came back negative. The autopsy revealed a coronary occlusion. I was stunned. How on earth could a young woman like Lisa have a heart attack?
Fear, I thought. Intense, sudden fright could indeed cause the heart to stop. It was rare, but it was possible. It was called being scared to death.
From what had Lisa been so frightened? Or from whom?
It was Monday morning, so I went to my bathroom mirror to shave. I had just stepped out of the shower, so I wore nothing but a towel. I lathered my face, a routine thing that I did every morning. I raised my razor to my face, looking at my reflection in the mirror.
I saw movement behind me.
Quickly I turned around, my heart racing. But I saw nothing. There was no one else in my bathroom.
I stood there for a minute, immobile. Then I turned back around to finish shaving.
And then I realized that I had related thinking I saw someone behind me to Lisa.
You're letting this get to you, I thought. You're playing into a patient's fantasies.
But why did Lisa write the word Ghoul on her bathroom mirror with red lipstick? Did Lisa even do it, or did someone else write the word?
Briefly I wondered if someone had been gaslighting Lisa; which meant that someone could have been playing tricks on her to make her question her own sanity. But I rejected that idea; because no one else could make Lisa dream those weird dreams but Lisa.
I finished shaving and got dressed for the office. I got into my car and began to drive downtown.
I saw movement out of the corner of my eye. From where? I looked into my rear-view mirror. Mother of God, someone was in my back seat! Why hadn't I looked in the back before I climbed into my car?
Panicked, I pulled the car over, amazed that I didn't suddenly feel a gun at the back of my neck. I put the car in park and jerked my upper body around so that I could peer into the back seat.
Nothing. There was no one there. No one was in the back of my car.
I was stunned. I sat in my car, which was parked on the shoulder of the freeway. Cars whizzed past mine, making my vehicle shake every time a car sped by. But I felt immobile, helpless with my fear, as I remained parked on the shoulder of the road.
Again I thought of Lisa. But this time, I thought of her because I felt very sure that it was Lisa I had seen in my rear view mirror.
I felt a tingling sensation in my scalp, as though all my hair was standing upright in their follicles. I decided that this would not be a good day to go to work. I put the car in drive and returned to the causeway traffic. But this time, instead of heading towards New Orleans, I took the first off ramp to turn around to go back home.
At home, still shaking, I called my secretary. Then I decided to consult my reference books. I searched my many bookcases until I found what I was looking for. The book was titled Psychology of Less Common Religions. I understood that Voodoo was considered a religion by many of its participants. Certainly it was less prevalent then, let's say, Catholicism or even Buddhism or Muslim. Maybe I'd find information about Voodoo from this book.
I did. I found a section on Voodoo and read:
With Voodoo, it is possible to create a juju zombie, or ghoul, which is a reanimated human corpse. A ghoul is created by means of Black Magic - usually evil Voodoo. Ghouls are among the lower forms of the undead, reanimated to serve their Loa in some way--by providing effective slave labor, protection, or solving vendettas by extracting revenge.
Creating the undead through evil Voodoo is really a form of possession of a body. There is a small window of opportunity--the victim cannot be dead longer than seven days if the spells are to work. The method of creating ghouls can be performed by retrieving hair from the dead victim in conjunction with Voodoo dolls, rituals, and evil spells.
There have been some rare occasions of ghouls temporarily retaining part of their mental faculties. For reasons beyond explanation, a ghoul's mortal persona is able to assume partial control over the ghoul's bodily actions. This rare occurrence has only been observed when a ghoul encounters situations that contain heavy emotional connections to his or her life when he or she was living. But ghouls are unable to resist the commands of the Loa for long.
I closed the book. That was enough to absorb for one day.
I didn't feel well, so I decided to lie down, even though it was still morning. I undressed down to my underwear and then got back into bed.
I began to dream.
I dreamed I was back in my office, and Lisa was my patient. I realized that this would be my opportunity to ask why she was haunting me.
"Are you a ghoul?" I asked.
"Yes." Her voice was flat, dead.
Ever the psychiatrist, I said, "Tell me about it."
"Did you know that Voodoo is alive and well in New Orleans? That's why I'm no longer alive and well."
"I'm aware of Voodoo," I told her, trying to maintain control of the direction of this conversation. "You say you're a ghoul. Are you haunting me?"
"You already know the answer to that," she said.
"Humor me," I said, "and pretend I know nothing. Tell me everything."
"Okay. I dabbled in Voodoo. Before I knew it, I got in over my head. By the time I came to you, I was desperate to find conventional ways out of my situation. I didn't tell you that I practiced Voodoo, because you would have scoffed. I had hoped that Voodoo was all a myth, that science could overcome superstition, and that's why I came to you. I had hoped that my practicing Voodoo was all a harmless game. But here I am among the undead. Voodoo is real; it is very real indeed, and it is certainly not harmless for a blundering novice like me."
"That doesn't explain why you were targeted to be haunted, and certainly doesn't explain why you were reanimated after death," I told her.
"The attraction for me to Voodoo was the power it promised. Imagine," she said in her flat tone of voice, "having the power over even life and death. But I made a lot of mistakes, and one of those mistakes was a big one."
"What was the mistake?" I encouraged her to continue.
"I hexed a lover who jilted me. Not the worst spell; not like wanting him dead or anything, just a spell to mess up his life for a while. Actually, I really never expected the Voodoo spell to work. But suddenly, the guy lost his job, his car broke down, and he was evicted from his apartment. Then when he got his car fixed, he got into a horrible accident and now he's in a wheelchair. So the spell to curse his lot in life worked," she told me. "Actually, this was the guy who introduced me to the Loa. The Loa was the one who cursed me and made me a ghoul."
"So that explains you. What about me?" I asked. "Why are you haunting me?"
"That I cannot tell you. The Loa commands my silence."
"There is still some of Lisa in you," I said. "That Lisa has compassion. Stop the haunting. And tell me why you're doing it at all."
"I can't tell you," she said. "But you can find out why yourself. Find the Loa. Once you know the Lord of the Cemetery, you will be able to protect yourself."
"How can I find the Loa?"
"Pray to Papa Legba."
"Who?" I asked.
"Papa Legba," she repeated. "I will tell you no more about Papa Legba."
"Why does the Loa want my destruction?"
"Because," Lisa's body said, "of something you did against the Loa. If you can figure out what you did, then you will know who is the Loa."
Then she said the most chilling words I have ever heard in my life. "Ghouls recoup vendettas and extract revenge. I am the ghoul that will kill you."
With those horrible words echoing in my head, I woke up from my dream. I felt a great sense of dread. I needed to find out about Papa Legba. At least that would be someplace to start. I got out of bed and threw on a pair of pants. Then I went back to the bookcase that held the book titled Psychology of Less Common Religions.
I opened the book once again to the section about Voodoo. I learned that Papa Legba was near top of the temple of Voodoo. He took the form of a demon. Legba was a protector, and he was the master of the crossroads between life and death, earth and Hell.
I read all I could about Legba. And that gave me an idea. I knew that on this night, there would be a full moon. I would pray to Papa Legba at midnight.
***
The night was clear. I drove away from the city of New Orleans, heading north on the Lake Ponchartrain Causeway. At the north shore, I headed east until I came to an unmarked parish road that turned into the pine woods.
The full moon's light shimmered on the narrow sandy road in front of me, and I was amazed at how the moonlight created such visibility, even though it was filtered by the trees. I slowed my car to about twenty miles per hour, and the trees' under story now seemed to close in upon the road. I swerved to avoid a large snake, and soon after, three deer leaped across the sandy road in front of me.
I parked my car on the shoulder of the one-lane, narrow road. I got out of the car, and noticed that the air was heavy with southern humidity. The dampness caused dew to sparkle on the roadside weeds. Crickets chirped merrily away, and a screech owl shrilled as it hunted in the darkness. The sounds of toads and frogs calling from ponds and small swamps to either side of the road created a musical opus.
I reached into the back seat of my car and extracted a live chicken from its cage. I held the squawking bird by grasping its feet and holding it upside down. With the other hand, I grabbed a hatchet that I sharpened just hours before. I stepped away from the car.
And there it was, right in front of me. The crossroads.
The crossroad I had chosen for the Voodoo ceremony was at the X-sign that signaled a railroad track crossing the tree-lined sandy road. I lifted the struggling chicken I held in my hand. I laid the bird upon the road next to the railroad crossing X-sign and quickly chopped off its head with the hatchet.
The chicken's body convulsed violently despite the loss of its head, twisting and squirming in my grasp as the blood spurted from its neck artery. I could see in the bright moonlight that its efforts were in vain, because the blood darkened the road directly underneath the X-sign as the red liquid quickly drained from the animal's body.
I felt shame and remorse for my actions. I had nothing against chickens. Still, live chickens were plentiful in a Voodoo-rich city like New Orleans, because that was the animal of choice for small Voodoo rituals. I knew that larger animals such as goats, sheep, or dogs were sometimes used for larger ceremonies.
I held the chicken down until all movement ceased. Then I stood up and went back to my car to retrieve an open coffee can. I turned back to the dead chicken and shook the coffee can so that the grounds created an axially symmetric pattern drawn on the road. I was drawing Voodoo symbols with the coffee grinds, directly on top of the chicken's blood, which had been splashed upon the ground.
I carefully placed the empty coffee can on the ground, away from the mystic symbols that appeared so dark upon the earth. The full moon cast its glow upon the scene, reflecting the macabre stage that displayed the construction of a Voodoo spell.
I began to chant. L'envoi morts, the sending of the dead. Open the gate between the human world and the spirit world. Papa Legba, come to me and show your presence.
I felt greater fear than I had ever known in all my life. Although it was night, the air was warm, and sweat trickled down my forehead, stinging my eyes with salt. I blinked and wiped my eyes with my sleeve, but I did not stop the chanting.
L'envoi morts, the sending of the dead. Open the gate between the human world and the spirit world. Papa Legba, come to me and show your presence.
I felt something. It was like a mild electric current passing through me. I felt the hair on my arms stand up in their follicles. My scalp tingled. I stopped sweating; instead, suddenly I felt very cold.
I knew that the spell was working.
Papa Legba was coming.
I was horrified; I was deathly afraid. I was trembling violently. But I knew I had to continue. I couldn't turn and run. I knew in my heart that this was my only chance to save my own life. This was my only weapon against the ghoul that was once Lisa.
So I stood there in the moonlight, bracing myself to meet face-to-face with a demon that held the key to the gateway of hell.
A fine mist seemed to congeal next to the X-sign, on top of the railroad tracks. The mist swirled until it began to form a shape. Then the shape became solid and I was able to view a demon in the moonlight.
It was more frightening to see than I ever could have imagined. The skin was reptilian, dark and shiny with scales. It was about six feet tall, and although the arms and torso were that of a man, the legs were that of a hairless goat. The creature had exposed male genitals, large and dangling.
The head was not human. It was an oblong shape, bare of hair, and the ears were long and slanted. Two small goat horns protruded from above the ears.
But it was the face that horrified me the most.
The face was human yet not human. The nose was long and pointed, just like the chin. The skin was dark and appeared leathery. But the eyes-my god, the eyes! They were large and long and were slanted upwards at the corners, and I swear they glowed red.
"Who is this that disturbs my peace?" the demon hissed.
I shuddered under his scrutiny. "Papa Legba, I have a request."
"I asked you who you are," the demon insisted.
I took a deep breath and tried to stand taller. "I am Keith Couvillion, and I am being haunted by a ghoul. I summoned you because I have a request."
"So I heard. State your request."
"I need to know the identity of the Loa who reanimated Lisa McDurmont."
"And you expect me to give you the name of the Loa?"
"Please."
The demon shifted his stance on the railroad tracks, and his eyes glowed a deep, blood red. "Would you scorn your Christian God?"
I was taken aback. "What?"
"I think my question was clear."
I hesitated, then said, "No."
"Then I will not give you the identity of the Loa," the demon said with anger in his voice.
I was frightened beyond my wits. I in no way wanted to anger a demon from Hell. I had bad feelings about what could result as a repercussion from his wrath.
"I will keep an open mind to anything you command of me, other than committing my soul to you," I tried, and then cringed. I was so scared that I couldn't think. If Papa Legba accepted what I said, what would he command of me?
"Are you worthy?"
His question startled me. I had no idea if I were worthy or not. Actually, I couldn't even imagine what he meant by worthy. But I took a chance and said yes.
"Then you will participate in a Voodoo ceremony," the demon commanded. "You will go to Lacombe Bayou at midnight Saturday night. The information you seek will be found there."
"Thank you," I said meekly.
"By summoning me, your soul is at risk," Papa Legba warned. "Now that I am aware of you, Hell is aware of you also."
Then the mist began to swirl around him once again. The demon began to fade from my view.
"Wait!" I cried. "I told you I will not scorn my God. How can my soul be at risk?"
But the demon was gone. He had simply vanished, gone back to manning the gateway to Hell.
I stood there for a moment, blinking in disbelief. Had I really been standing at a railroad crossing, talking to a demon? Apparently I had. If I believed in the Lord, how could my soul possibly be at risk? Did Papa Legba mean that I could wind up just like Lisa, a juju zombie, a ghoul?
My knees threatened to buckle underneath me. Somehow I felt that I had narrowly escaped death, narrowly avoided being smote down by a demon from Hell. I trembled, more with relief that I was still alive than from fear. My mouth was bone dry and tasted of pennies. Sweat began to bead on my forehead once again.
I looked sadly at the chicken's head, severed from its body at my hands. I kicked the Voodoo symbols that I had drawn with the coffee grinds, smearing and spreading them into an undecipherable mess. I tried to erase the evidence of my macabre deed. I picked up both the chicken's body and the head, and threw them into the weeds. I knew animal scavengers would dispose of the remains.
I got back into my car and started to drive home, feeling incredibly drained and tired.
***
The days passed, and the weekend drew near. I couldn't go to work at all during those days of anticipation. I was a mess of nerves. I called my secretary and told her to cancel and reschedule every appointment with my patients that I had that week, and told her I was sick. Actually, I was sick. My nerves jangled and my stomach felt acidic. I had heartburn and I couldn't seem to eat much.
I called Jenilee. "Cancel and reschedule every appointment that I have this week"
"Why?" she asked.
I felt very stressed, and was in no mood to deal with a secretary questioning my instructions.
"That's none of your business," I snapped. "Just do what I say. Is it so difficult to understand English?"
"I only understand nice English," she snapped back.
Why, oh why, did she have to start in on me now? "Jenilee, I don't believe you need to know why I can't make my appointments, but since you believe you need to know, I will tell you that I am feeling sick this week."
"All week?" she persisted. "Don't you realize that some people may be in crisis, and might need to talk to you now? What if someone goes and commits suicide or something, because you are sick and they feel all alone and so they get desperate?"
I took a deep breath to try to stop myself from screaming at her. "I seriously doubt that any of my patients will jump off bridges this week. Now, do as I say and cancel those appointments. And, if you think you can handle talking to those poor desperate patients, try to reschedule them so that they don't feel so all alone."
There was silence on the phone.
"Do it," I growled.
"Okay, Doctor Keith," Jenilee spoke softly. "I'll reschedule all of your appointments right away."
"See that you do," I told her and hung up the phone.
Afterwards, I wondered why I had been so rude Jenilee. Yet it just seemed that she grated on me, and goaded me into anger. After all, who was the boss and who was the secretary here? I never hid my ill temperament towards her very well and in this particular incident I had been too upset and nervous to keep from losing my temper. Still, I knew it was no excuse for my behavior, because after all, I was a professional and was supposed to behave like a professional. I told myself I would apologize and make it up to Jenilee just as soon as things calmed down in my life.
And so the week passed at an excruciatingly slow pace. Finally it was Saturday night, and when the clock struck eleven, I got in my car and drove to the Lacombe Bayou swamp.
I drove until I came to another sandy road to nowhere that wound through the pines, dense kudzu, and under story brush until it paralleled the levee bordering Lacombe Bayou. What looked like an ill-kept farm road went over the levee, and ended on the other side.
I parked the car and walked slowly into the swamp along a narrow trail that seemed better suited to deer and hogs than people. I was glad that I had brought a decent flashlight to help me see the various snakes so active at night this time of year.
Grasses grew on slight elevations, and an occasional hummock supported the growth of low bushes. The trail wound along on what passed here for higher ground, and to either side I could see the shine of water in the flashlight and dim moonlight. The water seemed shallow; less than a foot deep.
I walked further and entered a more elevated part of the swamp where the soil supported the growth of increasingly dense forest, the tree branches festooned with Spanish moss that hung in eerie-looking clumps. The air was warm and heavy with moisture. The moon was only a tiny crescent, so I was completely dependent upon the light of my flashlight for visibility.
Suddenly I realized I could hear the sound of drums. As I walked further, I began to hear some sort of singsong chanting, and I realized I was hearing another language, possibly Haitian Creole.
I followed the sounds to a clearing in the swamp. The Voodoo practitioners found raised ground, because they were on dry earth. Obviously they must have, at one time or another, cleared the trees and the underbrush from their Voodoo 'temple.'
There were about twenty participants, a mixed group of whites and blacks, although the blacks were the majority. There were about six persons who were beating on all sizes of drums. The drumming was rhythmic; and each musician played their instruments at different tones and pitches, yet it all seemed to somehow merge into a very exiting sound.
The ratio of men to women seemed about equal. The black women wore colorful dresses accompanied by likewise colorful turbans on their heads. The white women wore similar dresses but had nothing on their heads to cover their hair, which swung side-to-side with the rhythm of their dancing.
The men were shirtless despite the fact that it was still only spring; but that night, the temperature was warm and humid.
Suddenly a man spied me, and began to walk towards me, beckoning me to step forward. Here was the black man of Lisa's dream. His hair was wild, in semi-long, kinky dreadlocks. His nostrils were flared and his chin jutted firmly outward. He resembled a bush person, dressed oddly. But odder still was the paint smeared on his face.
"My name is Macumba, the bokor. I know who you are, Keith Couvillion," the man told me, speaking loudly to be heard over the drumbeats, "and I know why you have come."
I stepped into the light of the fire that had flickering flames, which gave the scene a grotesque, eerie appearance. "Why have I come?" I asked the bush man, to see what he would say.
"You have come to be mounted," he told me in his deep voice.
"What are you talking about?"
"Mounting is possession," he informed me.
A chill ran down my spine. "No thanks."
"It's a temporary thing," the odd man assured me. "You will gain the knowledge you seek."
"How do I know it's temporary?" I asked.
"You don't." At that, he laughed, and beckoned me to join the circle of dancers, all illuminated by the fire.
I thought to myself, What have I got to lose if I participate in this Voodoo ceremony? I just might die here, but I will die for sure at the hands of a ghoul when Lisa comes after me.
I didn't underestimate the power of Voodoo. After all, I had seen with my own eyes what its magic had done to Lisa.
I realized the dancers were circling a goat that was unhappily tethered next to the campfire. The dancers moved slowly and seemed to be dazed; I briefly wondered if they were drugged. The goat bleated pitifully, but no one paid attention. I knew what would be the goat's plight.
Macumba led me to the dancers. With a wave of his hand, the dancers moved away from the goat. The drummers continued the rhythmic beat. Macumba stepped back, then leaned over to pick up a sack from the ground. Just as I had done on a previous night, Macumba began pouring the sack's contents onto the ground, creating mystic symbols. Only he wasn't using coffee grounds; the powder appeared to be cornmeal. I knew that Voodoo symbols could only be drawn with coffee grounds, cornmeal, or flour, all substances that could be consumed.
"Cut the goat," Macumba commanded, and a black woman stepped out from the dancing circle. She picked up something from the ground that gleamed in the firelight. I realized it was a very large knife, almost the size of a machete.
A man stepped out of the circle of dancers and picked up some sort of urn or clay vessel. He too approached the goat.
Suddenly the drums were silent and the dancers stopped moving. All were stock still; watching.
Both the man and the woman approached the goat. The animal must have sensed impending doom, for it tried to struggle, but the tether was very short. There was no escape for the goat.
The man kneeled, but the woman made a single swiping motion with her arm, and the knife deeply slit the throat of the animal. Choking and squirming, the more the goat struggled, the faster the blood spurt from its neck artery. Then I realized what the man was doing. He was capturing the blood, filling up his urn.
Then the goat fell to the ground, and the woman dropped the knife. The man stood up and held the blood-filled urn to Macumba.
Macumba turned to me and held up the urn. "You must drink."
My stomach threatened nausea, but I was committed to participate. I had made up my mind the week before that I would do whatever it took, except of course, relinquishing my soul to Lucifer.
So I took the urn and raised it to my lips. It smelled like raw meat. When I drank, I was surprised at how warm the blood was, and how the taste was so coppery. I closed my eyes and gulped two large swallows. My reflexes kicked in, and I couldn't help but heave. I lowered the urn, kept my eyes closed, and took some very deep breaths. My stomach settled. It would keep the blood down.
The drumming began again and the dancers picked up the beat. Macumba reached for my hand as he began dancing, and I found myself joining in. Macumba continued to hold my hand, and he and I danced side-by-side to the rhythmic beating of the six drums. I began feeling lightheaded; dazed, and it was as though I was looking at myself from afar. I felt drugged and wondered if the goat had been drugged, with an unknown substance circulating in its bloodstream. Or perhaps there had already been a drug placed in the bottom of the urn, and it had merged with the goat's blood.
I can barely remember what happened next. I fell to the ground, but felt no pain. My mind was no longer my own. I felt bewildered, but then my mind cleared. Except I was no longer alone within myself.
And then I knew. I knew the identity of the Loa.
It was Jenilee.
***
I woke up, groggy and confused. Where am I?
I sat up, blinking my eyes. It was daylight, and from the position of the sun, I figured it was around noon. Again, I wondered, Where am I?
Then I remembered. I had participated in a Voodoo ritual just hours before. I looked around. There were no signs of any ritual. Had it happened at all? Had it really happened?
But then I noticed a scorched patch on the ground. And when I looked to where the goat's blood was spilled, I observed that the ground had been cleaned with what appeared to be broom marks.
There were no symbols made of cornmeal; the mystic marks must have been also cleaned up somehow.
Then it hit me. Jenilee. Jenilee was the Loa. Why? What had I done to her? Why did she want me dead?
I honestly didn't know.
I would have to confront her to find out.
I stood up, shaky at first, so I didn't move until my nerves calmed down somewhat. Then I walked back through the swamp until I reached my car. Getting in, I turned the car around, barely making the turn on that narrow road, and drove back towards my office.
I was driving on the compacted sand through the tree-filtered sunlight, when suddenly there was a movement on the road right in front of me. For a split second, I thought it was a deer, but then I realized it was a person. I hit the brakes.
Lisa had run across the road.
She was following me.
I sat in my car for a few minutes, trying to collect my wits about me. I wiped my forehead with my sleeve. When my heart began beating normally once again, I put the car into drive and resumed my trip back to my office. I needed to confront Jenilee if I wanted to end this ordeal.
I presumed it was Sunday, so my secretary would not be at work until the following day. But I knew I had an employee file on Jenilee; I would look up her address and pay her a personal visit at her home.
As I drove, my mind was asking a question over and over, Why?
Why would Jenilee want me dead? What had I done to her?
I tried to think about it. Could it be because I had so often been rude to her?
Nonsense. If people killed people just because they were rude, then people would be killing other people on the streets every day.
But....weren't they? Statistically, there were a lot of murders in New Orleans.
My thoughts drifted to Voodoo. What was the connection between Jenilee and Voodoo?
Voodoo presented equal opportunities for men and women, African-Americans and Caucasians; all could participate. The misconception was that Haitian blacks only practice Voodoo. But in New Orleans, a houngan or mambo could be your next-door neighbor. Jenilee was a blonde Caucasian with blue eyes. Despite her appearance, I realized that Jenilee must be pretty immersed in Voodoo to have become so powerful as to be a Loa. I would have to be very, very careful as to how I approached her.
Once I reached my office, I found the employee file on Jenilee. I jotted down her address and then left to drive to her house. It wasn't far.
My nerves jangled as I drove. I was so afraid I would see Lisa lurking in my back seat. I was even more afraid to be on my way to confront a Loa.
I found her house, a small cottage, and knocked on the door. I hoped and prayed that Jenilee was home. I wanted to get this over with.
She was home.
Jenilee opened the door. She looked at me, then took a step backwards.
"Doctor Keith," she said, "I'm so surprised to see you here. Come on in."
I entered her small living room.
"Why are you here?" she asked as she shut the front door behind me. "Is something the matter?"
I turned around to look closely at her. I wanted to gauge her demeanor; to decide if she could pose any threat to me. She shifted her gaze away from me under my scrutiny, and her face flushed. I felt dominant because of the submissive way she did not make eye contact. That gave me the confidence to proceed.
"Jenilee," I got straight to the point as I sat on a wicker rocking chair, "I need to talk to you about Voodoo."
She smiled as she sat on her couch, across from me. "Okay, Doctor Keith. But guess what? I know that you know about me. I know that you've been mounted."
"Then why the innocent act?" I asked.
"Just messing with you," she said. And this time she met my gaze. I saw her pupils dilate with hatred.
I felt a stab of fear. Had I misjudged her a moment ago? Was I not so dominant in this situation after all? Could I have been too hasty in my confidence to enter her house, to be alone with a Voodoo Loa?
I plunged ahead, trying to regain dominance. I knew it was vital that no weakness could show on my part. I wanted to put Jenilee on the defensive, so I made myself sound accusatory. "You are the Loa. You. But you have absolutely no reason to target me."
But Jenilee was having none of it.
"First," she told me, "you'd better get your facts straight. I am not a Loa. You misunderstood. What I have done is taken vows, and I'm now married to my special spirit. That gives me the power of a Loa. The Loa is not human, but a spirit. I have the spirit and the power of a Loa."
"I am not seeing the difference," I said.
"Let me set you straight, then. You see, when the slaves were brought over to Haiti from Africa around 1500, their Spanish and French owners forbade them to practice Voodoo. The French forced Catholicism on the slaves."
I didn't know why I was supposed to care about slaves and the Spanish and the French, but I was trying to act like a psychiatrist. So I said what I would say to encourage any patient. "Please continue."
Again, Jenilee was having none of it. "Shut up and listen," she snapped. "We're not in the office now, Doc. We're in my home. And I have the power of life and death over you. So knock off the condescending bit. You'd better listen to me, so you know why you are going to die. Because oh yeah, you are going to die."
Then she continued, "I am trying to explain the history of Voodoo. The French wanted to keep the slaves under control. So the slaves went along using the Catholic religion as a cover-up -- adopting the Catholic saints and symbols -- and then worshipping their Voodoo spirits under the facade of Catholicism. So a lot of the Voodoo spirits to this day are associated with Catholic saints. Erzulie is associated with the Virgin Mary; Ougon with St. Jacques, and others. Papa Legba is associated with St. Peter, because in Cat holism, Saint Peter is the gatekeeper. Legba is the gatekeeper of Hell."
She took a breath, and then said, "Ougon is the strong, dominant, and prophetic warrior spirit. He is my Loa. By accepting Ougon's spirit, I accept the power he gives."
"Can I speak now?" I asked.
"Feel free."
"What do you perceive I have done to you, that is so bad, you feel you need to have me cursed? I know you sent a ghoul to kill me."
"You bet I did."
"So tell me why. What do you think I have done to you?"
"It wasn't me you ruined," Jenilee said, "it was my boyfriend."
"Interesting choice of words.....you say I ruined your boyfriend. How did I ruin him?" I asked. "As a matter of fact, I don't even know who he is. So, who is your boyfriend?"
"You mean, who was," she spat.
"Okay, who was your boyfriend?"
"Ron Hanson. I loved Ron more than I loved life itself," she told me. "We were going to be married. But he had some emotional problems. I tried to get you to accept Ron as your patient. But you wanted him to go somewhere else, because you said Ron was too close to one of your employees, and of course you meant me. But employee? Ha! You always treated me like a slave. Just like the French treated the Africans in 1500. That's how you treat me every day. And when I asked you for a raise last year, you turned me down. See, slaves don't get paid very well."
"You have two separate issues here," I pointed out. I felt that the hostility Jenilee displayed was pushing her into a manic state. I tried to bring her back into the present, to discover the real reason for her rage. "Are you talking about your boyfriend or your employment with me?"
"Oh, I have lots of issues with you. But let's get back to Ron."
"You feel that Ron is relevant to all of this? Is he the center?"
"You wouldn't take Ron as your patient. I begged you. I really begged you. I knew Ron was in crisis. You see, I met Ron when he was in the same mental institution as I was."
"What!" For a moment I was shocked, and then it dawned on me that of course it would make sense that Jenilee had previous episodes of mania. I was not surprised that her previous episodes may have been severe enough for her to be institutionalized. This sort of thing didn't happen overnight. It hit me that I was dealing with a very mentally disturbed person. Certainly she was paranoid. Did she have a dissociative disorder? I was tempted to try to diagnose her on the spot, but then I realized that what I really needed to do was to keep her calm.
I would have plenty of time to diagnose her later.
If I lived long enough.
Going into my psychiatrist mode once again, I prompted, "Why don't you tell me about yourself? I'm a good listener. When were you institutionalized?"
"I'd only been out a couple of days when I started applying for jobs," she told me. "I know how to bullshit people. So-called sane people like yourself are the biggest fools. You were too busy to really look at me."
"Jenilee, I can help you," I tried.
"No Doc, you don't get it," she said. "I can bullshit sane people, but when sane people try to bullshit me, it doesn't work. Don't try your psycho-babble on me."
"What happened to Ron?" I asked, to bring her back to her story.
"He killed himself. Shot himself in the head. Want to see the mess? It's in the other room. I cleaned it, all right, but you can still tell that someone lost his brains on the wall if you look real close. Speaking of looking, I was the one who found his body."
"That must have been very traumatic for you," I said. A new thought hit me. "But what does this have to do with Lisa? Why did you do what you did to her? She has nothing to do with me."
"Maybe not with you," Jenilee sneered. "But it was her Voodoo spell that caused my boyfriend's accident. Oh! Don't think I don't know all about Ron and Lisa. Ron was too good for Lisa, but she took her revenge anyway. Well, I sure turned the tables on Lisa, didn't I? She should not have dabbled in Voodoo against a master, which is what I am."
She stood up and reached for a jar on the coffee table. "And now it's your turn. You're the last one I need to punish."
Suddenly Jenilee snaked out her hand and slapped something wet onto my bare arm. I recoiled instinctively, touching the sticky spot on my arm above the elbow. I had thought the jar on the coffee table was a candle. For a moment I couldn't comprehend whatever else it could be.
I stood up. I could smell a medicine-like scent, pungent and sour. "What did you put on my arm?"
She laughed. "It is tcha-tcha." Slowly Jenilee replaced the jar on the coffee table.
"What the hell is tcha-tcha?" I felt sweat break out on my face, beading into droplets that trickled down my forehead.
"Notice there is none on me, only you."
"I asked, what is it?" I seemed to be having trouble focusing, or was it the sweat in my eyes that caused the blurring of my vision?
"It's a member of the legume family, Albizia lebbeck. It has pharmacological activity due to a group of glycosides known as saponins. The symptoms of tcha-tcha poisoning include nausea, vomiting, excessive secretion in the respiratory passages, and pulmonary edema. Why Doctor Keith, you could drown in your own fluids. Tcha-tcha causes death by filling your lungs with fluid."
Now I was truly frightened. The room seemed to get brighter as I felt a panic that was suffocating to me. Or was it the tcha-tcha causing me to have trouble breathing? Which were the real symptoms of the poison and which were psychosomatic? What good was being a psychiatrist if I couldn't even tell the difference about myself?
Badly shaken, I began to walk towards the front door. But I saw movement out of the corner of my eye. I turned towards the movement so I could see it.
Something was coming down the hall into the living room.
Something hideous; it registered upon me that this horrible thing must be Lisa.
But she looked so different; Lisa was dead, she was decomposing. What had happened to the Voodoo spell to resurrect the body out of the grave in this macabre necromancy? Did the power of Voodoo not extend to the physical preservation of the ghoul it creates?
I knew it was Lisa, but she looked like something that I could describe only as a creature. The creature was formed like the human Lisa was but seemed smaller and withered now. Parts of the skull showed through the hair and the bone gleamed, reflecting the room's light. What was left of the hair clung to the disintegrated scalp in patches.
I couldn't see the face very clearly because it was shadowed in the hallway; still, from what I could make out, the skin appeared as though it were sliding down towards the chin. One opaque eye still remained, deep within the socket, but the other had sunk down into the skull, leaving a black cavity in its wake. The lips were receded back from the mouth, accentuating the teeth and making the Lisa-Ghoul look as though she were snarling.
The arms were flailing in front of her, and long, bony fingers were trying to grasp the ground in an attempt to pull itself out of the excavation. Sinewy cords of muscles hung loosely from the forearms underneath the unraveling sleeves of the burial gown that she had worn when placed into the grave from which her body had been robbed.
I couldn't catch my breath. I was too frightened to move, rooted in place, frozen with horror and fear.
Was the Lisa-Ghoul coming for me or for Jenilee?
I didn't want to find out.
Adrenalin hit me, and I jerked into action, running to the front door. I grabbed the doorknob and tried to open it. I shook and shook the doorknob before I realized that the door was locked.
"Dead bolts can lock from both the inside and outside," Jenilee said. "I have the key, not you, Doc."
I couldn't believe how calm Jenilee sounded. Didn't she see the hideous ghoul coming?
And that's when I realized why Jenilee was so calm. The ghoul was coming for me, not her.
"Jenilee, think about what you're doing," I pleaded. "This is murder. You'll get life in prison."
"Big deal," Jenilee scoffed. "Life without Ron is no life anyway."
The ghoul that was Lisa was coming closer.
Was there nothing I could do?
I turned to face the ghoul. I found I couldn't look at her and I averted my eyes away. I still felt the stinging sweat in my eyes and now I felt nausea in the pit of my stomach. Was it fear making me feel so sick or was the poison of tcha-tcha snaking through my system?
"Lisa," I tried to talk directly to the ghoul, to look at her, to view the hideous being she had become. "Sometimes zombies retain some of the mental faculties they had when they were alive. Lisa, I know you're in there. Your mortal persona is able to assume control over the ghoul's bodily actions. Lisa, help me! Please, for God's sakes, don't hurt me! I'm begging you! You know inside that this is wrong. Don't do this."
Lisa hesitated. I felt hope. Could she have heard me? Could what I said be true, that there was really some part of Lisa left in this horrible ghoul-thing?
Or was everything I read about Voodoo zombies wrong? So much depended upon everything I read being right! My very life depended on it!
"Please Lisa," I heard myself babbling, "you were, are, a good person. You would never have hurt anyone when you were alive. Don't hurt me. You can resist Jenilee's power. Stop now!"
"Kill him!" Jenilee screamed.
But Lisa didn't move.
And then came my salvation.
"Go, Doctor Keith," the ghoul that was Lisa said. Her voice was rasping and hollow.
And then I saw that Lisa held a key in her bony hand. She threw it on the floor.
"Thank you Lisa," I breathed as I scooped up the key to the front door.
"No!" screamed Jenilee.
"Yes," came the eerie voice from the ghoul.
"I have power over you!" Jenilee screeched. "Kill him!"
"I am stopping you," Lisa rasped at Jenilee. "Your boyfriend killed himself not because Doctor Keith rejected him. He killed himself because of what I did to him. Yes, it was my fault. But you have already punished me. So I need to stop you. And ghouls extract revenge. You should have known that before you unleashed me. Now I'm going to take my own revenge out on you for making me a ghoul."
I unlocked the front door with Lisa's key. I took a second to look back. Lisa was approaching Jenilee, the ghoul's arms held out as if she were going to grab her.
Jenilee tried to run towards me. Quickly I went outside and slammed the front door behind me. I put the key in the lock and locked the door. I could hear Jenilee screaming as she pounded on her own front door.
I hesitated for a moment. What was I doing?
If I left now, Jenilee would be killed. Did I want that?
I hated myself for my indecision. Run! My inner voice shrieked.
But I decided I couldn't let Jenilee die.
I inserted the key back into the lock. I didn't know what I was intending to do. Here I was, about to go back and face the spirit of the Loa that I had been running from all this time. But I couldn't have Jenilee's death on my conscience.
I would try to save her.
"Come on!" I cried when I opened the door. "Jenilee, I'll take you out of here!"
Jenilee burst out the door and ran to my car. I quickly peeked inside her living room. Suddenly I stood still, gaping in shock.
Lisa began to fully decompose, right in front of my eyes. It was as though what had begun was suddenly accelerating at a wild pace.
The skin peeled from her bony fingers, exposing the knuckles, and her yellowed, hawklike fingernails extended out. Her eyes sunk into her head and her lips receded. Her hair fell out in clumps.
And suddenly her whole body caved inwards, underneath her clothes. It was an implosion into itself, as it stood crumbling while the torn burial gown shook with movement.
Then Lisa's crumbling body fell to the floor. And yet it was still not done. The decomposition accelerated. Finally, the clothes only covered bones that rapidly disintegrated. The clothes became ragged and frayed, then also began to disintegrate.
Finally there was nothing left on the floor except the memory of what Lisa was.
It had all happened within a matter of minutes. Lisa had disappeared. I studied the empty floor. I hoped that Lisa had finally gone back to the grave from which she had risen. She deserved peace.
Because I understood that if a zombie resisted the Loa, then it would be the only thing that could break the reanimation spell.
Suddenly I shook myself into action. What was I standing there for? I had a medical emergency! I had been poisoned. I needed help, now.
I ran outside, slamming the door behind me. "Let's go!" I shouted to Jenilee. "Get in the car!"
She just stood there, by the passenger side, appearing dazed.
I ran to her and jerked open the car door. I shoved Jenilee roughly onto the seat, too rushed to be gentle with her. She didn't resist. I realized that she was in a submissive state, bordering upon catatonia. I decided that Jenilee was in shock. Whether it was because her evil plan failed or because she witnessed the decay of Lisa, I wasn't sure.
Jenilee's state of mind didn't matter to me right now.
Instead, what mattered very much to me was my medical emergency. I had to get to the hospital immediately, while I could still function well enough to drive. And drive I did. Frightened, wiping sweat from my eyes and trying not to vomit onto my own lap, I pushed the gas pedal down hard. I weaved in and out of traffic, almost hoping a cop would red light me so I could get his assistance. None did.
I drove to the hospital emergency room, Jenilee sitting silently at my side. She didn't seem angry anymore, just silent with shock. I was quiet too, wondering how long it would be before the tcha-tcha took complete affect and I would die. Already the skin on my arm was burning and I was shaking badly.
Finally I reached the hospital's emergency room. I left Jenilee in my car, ran inside the hospital, and yelled that there was a mental patient outside in the parking lot. I told the hospital staff that I was a psychiatrist and that the medical team should take Jenilee to the psyche ward.
Then I ran to the admittance desk. "I've been poisoned!" I screamed at the nurse.
She sat straight in her chair. "We need you to wait in the lobby until it is your turn to be evaluated for your medical emergency."
But that is when my world went black. They told me later that I had passed out right then and there.
***
I spent two weeks in the hospital, recovering from the tcha-tcha poisoning. The hospital treated me with charcoal, hydration and muscle relaxers. My limbs had stiffened up the first week and although most of the stiffness went away, I still needed physical therapy for a couple of months to regain flexibility.
Jenilee was committed to another mental institution. I am hoping she will get the help she needs. I cannot help her; it would be unethical for me to be her therapist. I would be biased against her.
But today I am fully recovered. At least, physically I have recovered.
Mentally I am not quite the same. Now I knew how it feels to be mentally unbalanced.
Because I still see things behind me when I look into mirrors. And I swear I still see people in the back seat of my car when I drive down expressways. Of course, when I turn around to face my tormenters, nothing is ever there.
So, I still have emotional trauma, even to this day. Which is why I am seeing my own doctor. Imagine a psychiatrist going to a psychiatrist. But that is exactly what I am doing. I acknowledge that some things in life are too much to deal with alone. Even for me, the man who was once so exalted inside my own mind.
But there is one thing that gives me more problems with sleeping at night than anything else.
I remember the demon, Papa Legba.
And I remember what he said about being aware of me.
I remember that Hell is now aware of me as well.
Jeani Rector grew up reading Stephen King novels. Halloween is her favorite holiday. Her two children sing "The Rector Family" to the tune of The Addams Family. It is all in good fun and actually, most people who know Jeani personally are of the opinion that she is a very normal person. She just writes abnormal stories. Doesn't everybody? Visit Jeani at www.afterdarknovel.com.
© Jeani Rector
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