Dead to Her(37)
The woman from the square. The crazy lady with the stall. It was her. Marcie was right. Keisha understood then what this was. Not a rave. Not a party. A celebration. Of the power. Of what was called many names and what ran strong through Auntie Ayo and what Keisha had always run from. She ran and ran and always it found her. Even now across the ocean.
Above them, the old lady smiled, benevolent, at the crowd and then raised her cane, bringing it down three times, the drums in the forest matching her timing, boom boom boom! The crowd immediately dropped to the ground and banged their fists against it three times, an echo of a reply.
Behind the old woman were two figures, one to her left and one to her right, veils over their heads and shoulders. On the last beat, they raised their arms high.
“Are those live snakes?” Keisha glanced at Marcie. Her pale face reflected the flames as she watched, part horrified, part fascinated, the large serpents weaving themselves around the women’s arms. “Is that . . . ?” Marcie’s voice drifted away, smoke in the night, her face momentarily confused by something.
“Tonight we dance!” the old woman bellowed, the rich voice that defied her age commanding Keisha’s attention back. “We call on them to dance with us! The spirits! The ghosts! The great Doctor John, old John Bayou!” A cheer went up, a sea of arms rising above heads, bare feet stamping on grass. “The queen, the mother Laveau, and her daughters! Let the ghosts weave among us!” She banged her cane again three times, and the crowd once again echoed her, this time chanting as they did so, “Faith! Hope! Charity! Li Grand Zombi!”
Keisha felt the hum of it in her soul, this earthy religion they were practicing, part what Auntie Ayo believed, part something old and Southern, and part something all its own, and she gazed at the woman on the stage. She was not like Auntie Ayo. She was not hiding in secret, practicing dark, forbidden magic. This woman, this priestess, was worshipped. Adored. There was love here. Keisha could feel it. Perhaps this was the yin to Auntie Ayo’s yang. Good goes to good, and bad goes to bad. That made her shiver in the heat. Could this woman sense Keisha was wrong? Cursed? Damaged? An outsider, even in this crowd.
For a moment, as the crone scanned the congregation from on high, her ancient dark eyes, embedded in those fat cheeks, met Keisha’s own, and fire seared her veins. She was seeing her. Really seeing her.
The old woman laughed, throaty and amused, just as she had in the square when they had thought her mad, and then she lifted her arms, the cane held as high as the snakes behind her, the carved serpent handle gleaming bright, and called out, “Tonight he grants your hearts’ desires! Now Dansé Calinda! Badoum! Badoum! Bring the spirits joy!”
With that, the flames burst magnesium white, rushing skyward, and when they faded, she and the two women behind her were gone, as if they had been ghosts themselves. The music roared back to life, no drums this time but instead bursting from speakers, and Keisha felt a surge of energy.
There had been more in the punch than just rum, and from the slight rushing tingles on her skin and the smooth joy that filled her, she’d guess a dash of liquid MDMA. It should have bothered her that it had been spiked but it didn’t. Everyone had shared. It was communion wine. She felt blissful. At one with everything.
“What was that?” Marcie was startled, disconcerted, if a little hazy from the drink taking hold. “Voodoo shit? That woman from the square again.” She was looking around the bonfire as if willing the woman to appear. Those women with the snakes . . . I was sure that . . .” She frowned, confused, and drank some more.
“Stop thinking,” Keisha said, pulling her close and swaying to the music. This time she reached for Marcie, kissing her again, her heart alive. He grants your hearts’ desires! It was a sign. Everything was going to go just how she wanted. Billy would be dead soon and she’d be free and rich and have love. Maybe Auntie Ayo was wrong. Maybe she wasn’t cursed. Maybe she was blessed. She could feel it.
“Oh my God,” Marcie said. “Look at everybody.”
Keisha turned. Bathed in firelight, the revelers were still dancing, but they were also entwining, hands touching and pulling at clothes as mouths met, a hand on one person, lips on another, clothes peeling off and being abandoned as bodies became joined. Keisha’s mouth dried slightly, the heat she suddenly felt nothing to do with the fire or the night air.
“Aren’t you going to join in?” The voice made her jump, and she turned to see Daria, hand held in Jade’s as Laz drew them into the mass of people. She kissed him, and as his hand slid under her T-shirt, Jade’s joined it, pushing the thin fabric up, exposing her pale breasts. Daria broke away from the kiss to pull Jade in closer, one last grin at Keisha and Marcie, and then the three of them were on the ground, lost in their own moment, absorbed into the sea of flesh.
“Maybe we should go,” Marcie said. Her words were breathy and her eyes were fixed on the seething mass of bodies licking and sucking and sighing and fucking in front of them, lost in their own worlds, filled with sensory, heady pleasure, simply being and enjoying one another. If there was a God or the spirits, surely this was what they wanted from people. This joy?
Keisha gently kissed Marcie’s neck, tracing her tongue along her skin, breathing heat onto her until she groaned, her head tilting backward, eyes closed, lips slightly parted. Keisha’s fingers slipped under the straps of the delicate glittering dress and slid them down Marcie’s arms. “Maybe we should stay,” she whispered, as Marcie’s skin goose-pimpled under her touch. As they dropped to the ground, hands exploring each other, Marcie didn’t argue.