October 1996
“If you go to see that woman again, Don’t come back!” The words bellowed out of Maritza’s mother as she pulled her hand back after Maritza attempted to hold it. “Associating with witches and Haitians in general, How dare you insult our family?”
“I’m sorry!” Maritza yelled. “I... she… she told me she would help me to control…”
SLAP!
Her mother struck her fiercely across her newly bruised face, causing a welt in her left eye.
She began to cry as she fell to the floor, waiting for someone, anyone, to comfort her.
Her mother simply looked down on her with disgust, turned her back, and walked away from the room… closing the door behind her.
Ten seconds passed when the cordless phone rang, it was Sierra who called, asking for her cousin, then upon seeing it was her on the line, asking how she was doing.
“I’m fine. I…” she then put her head down towards the floor and began to bawl uncontrollably. Sierra Listened intently and then said “I don’t really know what’s going on, but I’m here for you if you need me.”
“My family hates me. They call me evil. They say the devil’s fires spew from my fingers. Maybe they’re right. But I don’t want to be evil, I just need someone to teach me to control this. Madame Melfi said she could help me, so I visited her a few times. She helped me to control my inner rage. She told me my powers needed a boost of pure rage to open, and they opened when Gustavo first...touched me down there. It enraged me so much that this man who I trusted, who my family trusted, would do something like that to me.”
“I’m so sorry,” Sierra interjected, “But he’s gone so he won’t ever hurt you again.”
“He’s dead and everyone pretends he just left,” Maritza continued, “But I see him Sierra. He follows me. He’s not alive but he follows me everywhere I go. Madame Melfi told me… how... that might be part of my curse. The people I kill are doomed to follow me, to serve me. I don’t know why God did this to me, why he cursed me, why he makes fire shoot out of my fingers like some kind of extension of my rage, but I wish I could just die.”
“Oh my God,” Sierra asked, “Did you ever attempt to..?”
“Four times,” Maritza answered “Four times I attempted to kill myself. One time in front of Madame Melfi, to prove to her that I cannot die.”
Then to Sierra’s horror, Maritza described her newly healed wrists which showed skin that was previously ripped open with a razor of some sort. She described how her body seemed to not only heal abnormaly, but the pain seemed to lessen with each attempt.
“I’m not… normal.” She said as tears ran down her cheek. Sierra continued to listen as they slowly released each other’s misery onto the ether.
