Barbara Anton won a monetary award for this piece and a literary certificate for,  I Long To Be A Fallen Woman.
       We don't have the space to list all of her awards. She's currently raking in kudos for her plays which are being produced in NY and elsewhere. She's won many prizes for jewelry design, musical composition, painting, acting and writing, among others. Three of her short stories can be read in the two Ageless Press releases, Computer Tales of Fact & Fantasy Or How We Learned To Stop Worrying And Love The Computer and Computer Legends, Lies And Lore. She suggested the title for this collection of contest winners for which we thank her.

Barbara Anton  

DESPERATION

by

Barbara Anton (copyright 1996 All Rights Reserved)

(chapter 38 from unpublished novel, Egrets To The Flames)

      One desperate night, Vonda drove into Belle Glade's Harlem section to find the Haitian sorceress, Black Maggie. Maybe voodoo would save her life.
      She was frantic to find a cure for the AIDS that was devouring her. She mail-ordered potions, vitamins and teas. She pestered Doc Johnson for medications, drove to Clewiston's support group hoping to hear of a new treatment.
      Vonda even went to Mexico in search of a cure which only caused diarrhea, nausea and vomiting. She returned home more dissipated than before. But she hadn't given up hope. Not yet.
      She drove slowly up and down the dark, littered streets, asking everyone for directions to the voodoo queen, but they weren't about to tell a white lady where Black Maggie could be found.
      Vonda parked in front of Jacks, elbowed her way through the cutters and whores on the sidewalk, went inside. The noise of the reggae band, the laughter, the shouting, almost forced her to retreat, but she stayed.
      The sea of black faces melted into one giant wave that swelled and subsided. She gripped a table for support. A pusher leered as he snaked toward her.
      "Pretty white lily, you do be looking for me," raping her with his eyes?
      "I'm looking for Black Maggie," she reached into her handbag, took out a twenty dollar bill, "you know where I can find her?"
      The big black looked from the bill to her face and laughed. His laugh revealed white teeth, a mouthful of them, "You do be in big trouble, eh, lady?"      
      "Where is she?"
      "Cost you fifty."
      Without answering Vonda took another twenty and a ten from her handbag, gave him the three bills.
      He looked at the money, caressed it, folded it, slipped it into his pant pocket.
      "Tree blocks up," he said, pointing a long black finger, "dat way. Pink house on de corner. But Maggie no see you."
      "She'll see me," she turned and hurried out.
      The crowd in front of Jacks menaced her.
      "I got coke, lady, pure."
      "I be sweet as honey," a whore called out.
      The rest laughed raucously.
      A cutter grabbed her arm, but she tore free. Her head jerked back sharply when one of the whores tore the scarf from her neck.
      She ran to her car, fell in. The tires squealed as she pulled away in a sharp U turn. She saw the whores scuffling over her scarf, in the rear view mirror.
      Vonda parked in front of the pink house. Moonlight revealed black streaks of cane soot that had washed from the roof and escaped the broken drain. Paint was peeling around a window covered with a torn lace curtain. Cement steps leading to the door were crumbling away from a wobbly, rusted iron pipe that served as a hand rail.
      Vonda glanced warily up and down the street, then stepped out into the darkness. Please God, let her help me, she prayed as she went up to the door. She knocked three times before the door opened just enough for childish eyes to peer out.
      "What you want," the girl's voice was low and menacing.
      "I want to see Black Maggie."
      "She not here."
      The door slammed shut. Vonda kicked it in frustration. It cracked open again.
      "I tole you, she not here."
      Vonda opened her bag, took out a hundred dollar bill, passed it through.      
       "You wait here," the girl said.
      The door was slammed again, then shut and locked.
      Vonda shook with a sudden chill. She kicked the door impatiently. Then she heard heavy footsteps. The door swung open.
      Black Maggie loomed in the doorway. Her head sank into huge breasts that rolled, heaved under her stained caftan. Sweat that slid down her cheeks and negotiated her chins had been absorbed into the cloth of her caftan, changing the neck fabric color to a deep blood red.
      "What you want? Maggie don see no white women."
      "I'm sick. You've got to help me," Vonda's voice broke.
      Black Maggie surveyed her for a few seconds. Her huge eyes bulged like two hard boiled eggs in a face as round and black as a skillet. The odor of yesterday's sweat mingled with the smell of heated wax from candles burning against unrequited love, haints, spells, and assorted evils.
      "Come in," she said.
      Vonda stepped in, her eyes drawn to a large crucifix that dominated the room. The Christ figure was black, the eyes piercing her soul. She jumped as the wind sealed the door behind her.
      She saw feathers, bones, pebbles, entrails, the tools of Black Maggie's trade, scattered over the table and floor. A bleached human skull leered in the flickering candlelight. The heat was unbearable.
      Vonda grabbed a straight back chair for support but it wobbled on broken legs. Hog jowls boiled on the stove. The odor mingled with the scent of incense burning in chipped saucers set around the room.
      "Please help me," Vonda pleaded.
      "What your sickness," Black Maggie asked?
      "AIDS," Vonda said softly.
      "AIDS," Black Maggie clicked her thick tongue and shook her head, "that big sick, woman, cost a lot to doctor AIDS."
      "Can you help me?"
      Maggie's eyes pierced hers, "Black Maggie help you. You need strong medicine. You got to do jes what Black Maggie tell you."
      She shook a fat dark finger in Vonda's face.
      "I will," Vonda promised.
      "Sit down."
      Maggie pointed to one of two chairs set beside a metal card table draped with a faded fringed scarf. Maggie fell heavily into the chair across from Vonda.
      "Gimme you hand," she said.
      Vonda held out her trembling right hand, palm up.
      "You right-handed," Maggie asked?
      "Yes."
      Black Maggie lifted a large red candle that burned on the table, held it over Vonda's hand for illumination. She studied the hand for several minutes, then frowned, shook her head dispassionately.
      "I cain't help you," she said.
      She folded Vonda's fingers back across her palm, pushed her hand away.
      "Please."
      Vonda's plaintive voice reverberated in the small stuffy room. The incense and the boiling pork were making her sick.
      Black Maggie sighed, shifted her enormous girth.
      "You got money," she asked?
      "Yes," Vonda said weakly.
      Black Maggie's eyes bore into hers. Then Maggie nodded, pulled a crumbling cardboard box toward her across the plank floor. She selected some small bleached bones from the box, dropped them into a black cup, shook them as she chanted,
      "Umba, adda, humba, hoon...Umba, adda, humba hoon....," the bones rattled in the cup, "Umba, adda, humba, hoon...."       
       Maggie cast the bones across the metal table. They clattered to a stop at the edge of the fringed scarf.
      Despite the heat a chill crept along Vonda's arms. She folded them across her chest.
      Black Maggie muttered as she studied the bones. Then she rolled her eyes to meet Vonda's, "Be bad," she said, "you be hexed bad. Maggie don know if she should help you."
      "Please."
      Vonda looked into Maggie's eyes, beseeching, her pale hands trembling in her lap.
      "Please help me," she begged.
      Black Maggie sat silently, studying Vonda, evaluating. When she spoke her voice was a low rumble, "You take ten one hunerd dollar bills, wrap dem in plastic, bury dem in de belly of a jes caught fish. Jes caught, you understand? You wrap dat fish in a newspaper printed on a day when de moon be full. You bring it to Black Maggie midnight tomorrow night. You hear what Black Maggie tell you?"
      "Yes, yes I understand. I'll bring it. I will. Thank you."
      The flickering light of the candles reflected off tears of relief that flooded Vonda's sunken eyes.
      Black Maggie planted swollen hands on her enormous thighs, positioned her felt-slippered feet, prepared to rise. With labored breath, she pulled herself up, shuffled toward the door. Vonda scrambled to her feet, eager to escape the eerie stillness of the candlelit room.
      Black Maggie opened the door a crack, peered up and down the street. Satisfied, she opened the door wide, "You come back like I tell you.Midnight tomorrow, bring what I say for you to bring."
      "I will. I will."
      Vonda stumbled out into the moonlight, gulping fresh air. She ran to her car, drove like a woman chased by devils.
      When at last she pulled into her parking lot, she slumped over the wheel and cried.
      Chip found her like that when he came out to walk his old coon hound, Fella. He gathered her into his arms.
      "What is it, Baby? What's wrong?"
      Vonda sobbed out her story.
      Chip bent down and kissed the top of her head.
      "I'll get the fish, honey, and the paper. I'll go to the bank for the bills. Don't cry. It will be all right."

******
      The next night Vonda watched Maggie drawing the plastic wrapped bills from the belly of the fish. Maggie chanted over the money, blessed it, then shuffled to a battered garbage can filled with dirt. Ceremoniously, she sifted the dirt through her fat fingers as she chanted and moaned. Then she buried the packet of hundred dollar bills.
      "Cemetery dirt," she said.
      Vonda shuddered, looked away.
      Black Maggie came back to the table, boned the fish, then carried it to the kitchen area, laid it on a plate that she pulled from the pile of dirty dishes.       
      Good god, she's going to eat it, Vonda thought.
      Maggie turned toward her, grunted, "You come back tomorrow night. Moon be full den. Come twelve midnight, right at twelve midnight, you understand?"
      Vonda nodded.
      "Bring a black hen, a live one, and a scarf you wear."
      Vonda's hand flew to her throat, remembering the scarf ripped from her neck at Jacks.
      "And twenty hunerd dollar bills." Maggie watched for a reaction.
      Vonda nodded.
      Satisfied, Maggie swayed toward the door, opening it. Vonda stumbled through it into the darkness.

******
      The next day Vonda asked Chip to get her a live black hen. He looked at her with compassion, said nothing, came back an hour later with the chicken.
      Vonda watched the clock nervously. As midnight approached, she tied a scarf around her throat, stuffed the hen into a pillow case, tied it with twine, and took the two thousand dollars she'd gotten from the bank. She drove off
toward Harlem and the soot-stained pink house.
      Once again her knock was answered by eyes peering through a crack in the door, but this time the girl opened it without asking any questions. Silently she motioned Vonda to follow her to a small inner room.
      The walls and floor of the room were spattered with dried blood. Vonda shuddered, grabbed the doorjamb for support. She wanted to turn and run, but desperation held her.
      The chicken flapped wildly inside the pillow case. The girl took it from her, opened the twine, let the chicken flop into a wooden cage. It squawked loudly, shook its rumpled feathers, strutted indignantly inside the cage. 
      Suddenly Black Maggie appeared in the doorway. She looked from Vonda to the chicken pecking the bars of the cage, then back to Vonda.
      "You bring de money," her hard eyes bore into Vonda's?
      Vonda reached into her handbag, extracted the two thousand dollars. Black Maggie's eyes shone as her huge hand clamped over the money. She stuffed it into the pocket of her dirty caftan.
      "Give me dat scarf."
      Vonda pulled the scarf from her neck, handed it to her.
      Black Maggie lumbered over to the cage, reached in, seized the chicken by the feet, pulled it out. It flapped and squawked indignantly. Black Maggie gathered the wings, held the chicken in a vise-like professional grip. She looped the scarf around the chicken's neck, then rolled her dark eyes back in her head until only the whites showed. Loudly she invoked spirits and spit incantations. Her huge breasts rolled like bags of water beneath the caftan as she swayed hypnotically.
      She suddenly picked up a narrow-bladed knife and slashed the chicken's throat, beheading it. Blood spurted from the chicken's neck as it careened crazily around the room, spattering blood everywhere.
      Vonda screamed, leaped back, wildly brushing at the blood on her blouse, her skirt. Crying hysterically she ran toward the door.
      "You be gettin' better now," Black Maggie called after her, "you see. You come back. Bring more money. Black Maggie cure dose AIDS."
      Vonda ran to her car, leaned on it for support. Her stomach lurched, a cold sweat washed over her as she bent her head to vomit in the ditch beside her car. She wrenched the car door open, sped away.
      She never went back.


Table of contents

Back to cover page