Devon Michelle Hernandez

La Bruja

1. Ramona

“The Kaplan Meier Curve, in biostatistics, is the graphical representation of survival analysis during a study. A steeper curve  indicates reduced probabilities of survival for test subjects. Every step in the curve represents a subject who did not survive the study.” Ramona read aloud and closed her eyes. “Survival. Probability. There’s always some price to pay for envisioning the future. Even in research there’s a price to pay for progress and the future you want.”  She flipped to the next card, read, closed her eyes and visualized. The hours passed by, and her phone buzzed. The night bus was delayed again. Ramona wouldn’t make it home before midnight. Outside, it was sunny but frigid. Ramona had earphones on, but no music played. In this way, she could stay tuned into the noises around her without having to speak to strangers. 

At her stop the cold pounced like a beast surprising its prey after stalking through every road and highway. Ramona hugged her coat tighter and wrapped her scarf twice, then headed into the night. As she neared her neighborhood, she noticed a pool of viscous liquid that gushed from the gutters and rose to the pavement and onto the soil. It was difficult to judge the color of the liquid due to the darkness that filtered all light, but the intense smell of copper that reached Ramona’s nostrils reminded her of the labs and dissecting rooms at school. “Blood.” She said aloud. The blood pooled closer and closer as if seeking, as if reaching.

Above, the moon was sheathed in crimson, and the light of the stars was extinguished.   Ramona was not unused to strange things occurring, but the moment struck her with immobilizing fear, and she remained frozen, both willing and unwilling herself to move. Then a sudden change, the blood was no longer liquid. Its viscosity had increased and the pool no longer flowed. Instead it spread into tiny streams that slithered and crept like tendrils that crawled up her feet and held her in place. Ramona could only summon the advice she’d received from the long line of strong women that had raised her, the same lesson was passed from one to another.  They would say, “Whenever you’re scared, enojate! Get angry!! Who will hurt you when they’re too busy dodging your anger? Make sure your screams are louder than their will.” And so Ramona filled her lungs with rage, anger so hot it burned her skin as it coursed through her veins. 

“Que Putas?!!! Si no me dejas en este momento, te los meto por el culo!” The tendrils froze. Ramona whispered a prayer, Romans 8:31. “Well that’s what it’s called now.” Her madrina would say. “Back in the day it was just pages of words, there weren’t any chapters or numbers.”

Ramona watched the tendrils dissipate, and in the distance levitating above the city she witnessed the figure of myth and legend cloaked in black. Ramona turned heel and sped the opposite way, meditating and praying furiously, hoping to outrun the figure poised by the flickering street lights across from the hospital.  La Muerte, La Calaca, the endless night. Death neared. Words shaped like wind blew into her ears, “Me lláman Santa, las brujas follow me and pay their respects through rituals. They bestow upon me gifts and tokens. I receive  their art and sculptures of my likeness. Where is your worship? Where is your deference?”

In response Ramona managed to shape that rage into sarcasm. “You cannot be so powerful, if you need my devotion.” Ramona kept running, fumbled with her keys, locked the door and sat in silence breathing heavily after the exertion. Afuera la muerte la seguía, pero en su casa no entraba. There were just too many protections, too many things safeguarding the space.  Ramona reached her room and was met by the scent of cedar dust, incense, and heartbreak.  

Her home was filled with an assortment of goth accoutrement– skulls, ravens and black roses strewn loosely in what was mostly an aesthetic choice rather than a spiritual one. For craft, Ramona kept other things that poked through almost hidden, piedras y cuarzo, flores y cempasúchil, mucho tequila, la Virgen, oraciones, jarritas llenas de hierbas y medicina, manzanilla, rosarios, y esos conitos que quemas con la foto de los santos. 

La Bruja, in this day and age, was a symbol of feminist glory, independence, and spiritualism but for Ramona, the title carried a complicated history. She was a hag, sure, but she also prepared cures for the sick. Ranch hands and owners from remote places in Mexico claimed that she sometimes stole the children in the villages and ate them, but would turn to her for good fortune, money or love. If the Bruja dwelled primarily in prayers and natural rituals she could be called a curandera. In Mexico, Catholic ritual had bastardized and integrated with Mayan imagery and Aztec lore. This in addition with Spanish superstition created the figure of la Bruja that Ramona was familiar with in her daily practice. This mixture of myth and legend seemed to dress the land in supernatural light. Ramona would never reach or understand  the origins of her beliefs and craft, even if she tried. The mix was far too homogenous to be pulled apart or separated. Ramona kept the faith, and the faith, in turn, kept her days filled in wonder, shaped the world in color, made simple things and days feel like gifts that unwrapped every morning.  

Ramona kept dark things too, but she would only employ those for the right clients at top dollar. She kept rooster beaks, amarres–pieces of hair or skin or teeth out of sight, festering, waiting for their destined owner to ring the bell. The right clients did not always arrive, and it was hard to keep her darker exploits secret. Ramona learned to be especially watchful for the wrong sorts that came into her shop entitled and arrogant, wishing to will the future into their ambitions.  

They were not easily deterred. With empty wallets and moved by rumors of her power and efficacy, several of the locals would resort to gifts, threats and even blackmail to ‘persuade’ Ramona. They would bring tall looming sculptures of Death with scythes, bottles of cheap booze, photos of her private life, or once, a bottle of baby’s blood. She could feel the darkness of those effigies, gifts, and abominations before they reached the door. Always some seemingly random incident would stop them before they entered. They accidentally left their keys in the car, or forgot their phones at home. Sometimes birds would peck them, and they’d immediately drop whatever they were carrying. Ramona watched them through the blinds, and would laugh and whisper, “idiotas.” While they were distracted, Ramona would walk outside and say a few prayers until the items were wrapped in flames, first slowly then passionately only cinders remained. She blew the ashes into the wind, with enough time for her customer to return remembering but mostly forgetting what it is that they held in their hands a few minutes before. It was obvious that they misunderstood the source of her strength and her work.

“¿Tú no rindes culto a la muerte?” They would ask after Ramona inevitably declined their invites to cults and meetings. “No people think that, but I pray to a Christian God, and my rituals are based on nature, La Madera Tierra. I speak with the saints, y rindo culto a los árboles y la naturaleza como los aztecas y mexicas.” They would respond with mouth’s agape. “Pero ¿Cómo funciona? Él te escucha?”

Sometimes, she tried to change the subject but after years of practice she had settled on a reply, “To me he does. Sometimes he doesn’t. The work is strange that way.” With their eyes glazed in fear, they’d question. “Y que? ¿También yo? No voy a la iglesia, y no me he confesado.” Ramona didn’t believe in evangelizing. She wasn’t a good Catholic, or deeply religious.  

She had once joined a protestant cult in the bible belt, and she nearly lost everything.  Ramona did not like to share but sometimes after a couple of cocktails would confess, “The Pentecostals wanted my soul and my wallet. They went after my soul first, because it simplified access to the latter. I remember they locked me up in cozy rooms and houses filled with snacks and adoration. Hundreds of them were crying and hugging and praying for you, whenever you felt sad, or mentioned that stuff was happening at home. I told them my deepest insecurities and fears. I almost left pre-med because of them. They spit me out eventually, the organization and the people. I didn’t have any money and I wasn’t good at recruiting. They took a big bite out of me, and then spit me out and when they did, it took several years to fill the holes,” Ramona pointed at several parts of her body, “Here and here, you can see the teeth, missing parts, forgotten memories from burned books. I promised to let go of all earthly connections for the sake of devotion. They abandoned me when I was no longer valuable.” Then she would cry. 

The experience had sent her back to Catholicism equipped with the wisdom that love for people, and love for religion, were two seperate things. Both with varying levels of importance, and varying levels of ethical complexity just as goodness and evil can be difficult to discern. Ramona learned to compartmentalize her faith. God, the saints and the angels were all important based on their usefulness in Ramona's work, and whether the work could help her care for her community. Ramona’s faith in the work was scientific and also close to divine, but a priest would never say that, and it kept Ramona alive with a sense of purpose and a revived sense of self. 

“The bad things,” she would say to the now reformed Catholics, “Loss, accidents, money problems, breakups and all that, I know they will always happen, because the forces for that feel different.”

Ramona would feel their thoughts branching, creeping, escaping inward, rushing toward the secret shrines where people keep monuments to the dirt and mud inside them. Ramona knew the next question forming in their lips, bubbling over like a creek. “¿Puedes hacer que la gente muera?”

Ramona would stare them down, her energy kicking the nasty demons, waking these strangers to the darkness of their questions. They would laugh, become self conscious, and embarrassed. Ramona would respond. “No never death, no one can pay for that. But good things, I charge less for good things, because I can never guarantee that they will happen. Mostly they’re little things but I did have one guy that won the lottery. He died like a day after. As long as the things you ask me are attached to your faith I can help make it happen.”

This was mostly true, but Ramona would never admit that asking for wishes felt like flipping a coin inside of her– holding her breath, waiting for the results. So she hugged the women, comforted the men, and wept with the children. She would prescribe ointments, anointed oils, and lathered them in myrh and incense hoping that their dreams would come true. 

Friday night, the moon was full and filled with blood. The air was electric and smelled like burned chiles. Those were signs. They could mean a myriad of things. Ramona surmised it was likely an auger of foul things forming in time. Ramona slept. She had no dreams, but out there she knew, someone had tossed a coin and was waiting to see the results. 

II. Elena

The shop’s bell announced a new client, an old acquaintance. Elena walked in the door fashionably dressed in second hand clothes bought by the pound at La Segunda. The ensemble included a black loose t-shirt and ripped jeans with Mickey and Minnie embroidered on each leg.  Elena’s eyes were almost chocolate and her skin fresh picked pecans. As a child, Ramona learned to associate long hair with beauty because Elena’s hair was long and beautiful. “Hola prima como estas?” Elena waved cheerfully, as she wrestled a baby’s carriage over the door. 

Elena and Ramona were not related. Their moms had met through their dad’s work and only a few years later had participated in each other’s christening. Elena had babysat Ramona when she was a toddler. They were 3 years apart, but at the time it felt like a decade. Ramona remembered divulging details and jokes with the relentless energy most toddlers carry at that age, watching and waiting for Elena’s approval, or her laughter, and expecting her kindness.  Elena was an impressive 10 year old. She learned how to speak English before her whole family, and she was good at school and a natural athlete. Full photo calendars with Elena’s likeness in uniform were hung in restaurants and community establishments throughout the city to fundraise for her volleyball and baseball teams. Ramona imagined Elena going to college, slipping into a fancy suit, and walking to the White House. Elena’s parents had no imagination. 

At the age of 16, Elena’s mother, someone Ramona’s mother called “Comadre”, sold her daughter to a man for $5,000 so he could get his green card. The deal was made, the $5,000 came and went into broken evictions, grocery shopping and interest payments to the furniture store, but Elena’s marriage had remained. Her parents were irresponsible bastards. Elena had accepted her fate, balancing the alternative to her will. Her parents never had enough money.  Their mother had perfected the art of living above your means, and what was the alternative? Her siblings would go hungry. At that time and in that place, $5,000 was so much money that a temporary marriage with some strange man seemed harrowing but bearable. They had a child together. Ramona was thirteen when she heard about the details, and buried the rage and darkness of that consummation in the same part of her heart that accepted the experience that in a culture of machismo, and in her economic standing, women lead tragic lives and face tragic futures where no loving God ever interceded. 

However, when Elena walked into Ramona’s shop that afternoon, there was no change in her warmth. The essence of their relationship remained the same. “¡Hola Elie!” ¿Cómo está el bebé?” Ramona crouched down to greet the newborn. “Hola Jacobito, ¿Cómo estás?” Elena responded. “Está bien, pero tiene cólicos. Even after he burps, I can tell he's still uncomfortable.”

“What do you feed him?” Ramona tested his heartbeat, and listened to his belly.  

“Just puree, you know, liver, carrots, beans and stuff like that. “ 

Ramona wondered aloud, “Suena a que está estreñido. He’s got a good diet. Buy him some te de manzanilla , put it in his bottle and we’ll keep an eye on him, tienes manzanilla?”

“No tengo.”  

Ramona searched through the cubbies and small drawers with herbs and remedies. In a paper bag she placed the chamomile and labeled it with a sharpie. She gave it to Elena. 

  Déjame ver algo.” Elena paced around the shop and looked at the new items. The shop, though small, was retrofitted with several shelves made of hardwood and cedar. Elena collected shiny rocks, like amethyst and quartz. She had a wall of candles with several saints including the not so saintly, like Walter Mercado. The kitsch always sold very well, and so Ramona kept items that made her laugh. There was a clear cabinet dedicated to all sorts of plants and herbs, rosemary, thyme, basil and venus flytrap. The room was wallpapered, or had been wallpapered bak in the 70’s and Ramona never changed it, so everything was yellow and stained. Some flowers poked through but you could hardly see them. Ramona always promised to clean, but there were always much more interesting things to read, or experiments to complete and the task was pushed into the future oblivion. 

Elena picked up the veladora with the Virgin Mary and placed it on the counter.  “¿Sigues estudiando?” Elena had been at her med school acceptance party. “Yes, it’s a lot of work, but I can handle it.” Elena looked happy. “That’s good, don’t give up. You’re going to make it. But prima, they let you do this? Isn’t medical school strict?”  

“What they don’t know can't hurt them, and I only open a few days a week. You gonna snitch on me?” Elena laughed. “No, no. Just wondering. You were always so smart. I remember when you did the dissections in middle school. I thought you were going to be scared, but you were so interested. I remember stopping by your class just to see if you were okay but the whole time your eyes were wide open, and you looked so… interested.  How much do I owe you?

“Nada.  Somos primas.” 

“Gracias prima”   

Elena was about to leave when she turned around and said, “Are you free this weekend? I want you to meet someone.”

“Meet who?” Ramona was intrigued. Ever since she married Pedro, Elena didn’t really meet with friends or go out. “No preguntes. Wanna go see a movie? We can go to the movies Saturday.” Elena said, smiling wide, eyes shining with mischief. 

Suddenly without notice, Ramona felt a shock of spirits– a sort of acidity she could taste in the air. The coin flipped, it rotated in the air. She felt the atmosphere announce the arrival of a moment. 

III. Movie Theater

Ramona arrived at the movie theater a half hour before she was supposed to meet Elena.  Elena was already waiting with the baby in a stroller and a man in a baseball cap. Ramona parked her car and walked over. The man in the baseball cap outstretched his hand, and smiled.   “Es Alfredo, te acuerdas de el?” Elena must have noticed Ramona’s surprise and introduced the stranger. Ramona and Elena both knew Alfredo. He had been a senior at her highschool, a bookish quiet guy that played in the school’s baseball team. 

Ramona inspected him from head to toe, and audibly whispered. “¿Elie, qué le pasó a Alfredo, ahora es guapo!!” Elena y Alfredo both laughed, blushing in good spirits. Elena was the first to speak.

“I met him at the grocery store, he was standing in line behind me and we started to chat.  We had such a good time reminiscing and he asked about you too, so I thought we could all go out and spend the day. What do you think?”

Ramona watched them interact. She noticed secret smiles and chemistry fizzing and bubbling, a wholesome shyness that hid secret intentions gathering over walls that couldn’t be overcome. Softly she whispered, “Estas jodida.”

IV. Dreams

Cochi. Cochtemiqui. Ramona floated above the rafters and followed the sun. The colors changed around her, she was bathed in light. Above and through she traveled, until she met Gods. From their ceremonial headdresses and gold drapings she could tell they were Maya.  Each one with and without a name. They spoke to her in nahuatl, and Ramona could understand. 

“We follow you, we watch your every step. You do not belong to Death. You do not belong to the Christ. You belong to us, you belong amongst our people and the flowers of May. Return to us, grant us your worship in sacrifice.” One being pointed to their heart and said, “You owe us the child that cries. The sacrifice of this boy will bring a new era.” 

“Why the boy? His mother will suffer. He is free of evil, I can bring anyone else. I can bring his father.” Ramona pleaded.

“Only the boy is worthy. Bring us the boy and his mother will experience a new life.” 

From the hands of all three a seed grew into a child, and fell into Ramona's arms. The child began to bleed and melted away.

Al despertar, Ramona was drenched in sweat, but the dream had not brought her distress, instead a warm feeling, like belonging settled in her mind, and she felt the slow repair of a loneliness she had not acknowledged before. Ramona had no idea what any of it meant, but there was a decision, a fork in the road that loomed above her coded in signs and spirits. 

V. Madrina

Ramona knew that her Madrina would have known what to do. She would have dressed in robes, burned incense, prepared herbs, and looked into the stars. The stars would have given her the meaning of Ramona’s dreams, and she would know what to say and what to do.  However she had passed away just the year prior, and in her passing, she had taken the remaining secrets of her craft, and left Ramona without guidance. Ramona had learned about the intersection of faiths through her Madrina. “Madrina como somos brujas, somos las esposas del diablo y todo eso?” Ramona would ask.

“Cierra el hocico! Del diablo? No seas pendeja, quien te dijo eso? I would never associate with the Devil.”

“No pues, we do magic?

“Magia?! M’hija no seas tonta, esto no es una caricatura, al diablo no le debes ni tus calzones. Nosotros somos CA - TO - LI - CAS. I received my power from God, su hijo Jesucristo, el Espíritu Santo, y a todos los santos. It 's the power of miracles not magic.”

“Pero y las limpias? Y el cuarzo?” 

“That is all part of the natural world, the good and bad spirits that rule our everyday lives, that’s what our ancestors taught us, la cultura Nahua, los Aztecas. Diablo, ni que diablo, go wash your mouth before I fill it with soap.” 

Ramona ran to the restroom and brushed her teeth, because she knew her madrina was not the type to make empty threats. 

Her madrina had also taught her about consent in her everyday life. “Ramona, you never have to do anything you don’t want to.  Our lot in this world is unique. Your gifts are a blessing, but they can also be a curse, so you get to choose what you want to do with it. Just don’t become a televangelist, eso si es del diablo.” Ramona remembered and laughed every time. 

What is a madrina? Well a madrina could be something very specific, someone who sponsored an aspect of your wedding, christening, or quinceanera, or someone who vouched to be your spiritual protector if anything happened to your parents. Sometimes it was none of those things.

As a child, Ramona imagined that the vow was made before a lawyer or a police officer, like a will or testament, but there was nothing quite formal or legal about the title. It was a simple vestige of older times when families could just as easily disappear or die without a social net to care for orphaned children.  

Her Madrina had been Ramona’s mom’s best friend since they were young. Florencia, and Jimena, Ramona’s mom, had grown up together in the same village in Mexico. Their parents passed away the same year in 1985 and they had subsequently faced hunger and tragedy.  Florencia had kept herself afloat through her craft, but watching Jimena struggle convinced her to move with her friend across the border. Both had found ways to thrive in the new country.  Florencia found that there was a need for miracles in this country, where money could not cure all the achings of the heart, and Jimena found work cleaning hotels and selling sconces through catalogue. It was honest work for both and supplemented their humble expenses. 

Two years after they arrived, Jimena met Fidel. The story of their meeting was whispered to Ramona during a late car drive to the border. “I met your father, a little after we got to this country,” Jimena murmured to her sleepy daughter. “He was handsome, charming, and so funny. All the girls in the neighborhood were in love with him, but he married me. We never even kissed until I said I do. I remember that no one believed that, they called me a whore but your father was my first and only.”

Ramona remembered her father as both whimsical and cruel. He restricted his mother’s life and coerced her with loving gestures. Ramona remembered drunkenness, and singing, and dancing that quickly turned to violence.  At the age of 14, he disappeared. 

This is what Ramona remembers of the disappearance. During a separate trip to the border,  Ramona drifted in and out of sleep in the backseat of the family’s Old’s Mobile while her mother, and madrina spent a long visit with a curandera. Ramona saw the sky’s shade turn from pink to black and witnessed the creep of orange street lights into the backseat. Ramona dozed off, and was awakened by whispers and the purring of the vehicle’s engine as the car began to move. In her memory she could hear the voices of immigration cops, then a long drive home, and her madrina carrying her into the house. Ramona could have walked up the steps on her own, but she pretended to sleep. When her madrina held her in her arms, and carried her to her room Ramona was filled with the scent of powder and roses. That night Ramona dreamt her papá came into her room and said goodbye.  The next day he was gone. 

When Ramona asked, her mother said, “Your father is on a work trip, he'll return soon.”  Ramona cherished the new found peace in the household. She could stomp from floor to floor without anxiety. In fact, the fear of losing said peace, was the impulse that ultimately drove her to stop asking questions in case her father was like Betelgeuse– meant to return at the mention of his name. 

No one noticed Fidel’s disappearance until Ramona’s mom went around the neighborhood asking every family member, even people who didn’t like her dad, if they had seen or heard of Fidel. No one knew any information. Some whispered about his disappearance but no one dared to question her mother. Ramona would overhear them whispering, “Jimena sufrió demasiado, y la verdad es que nadie extrañaba mucho al hombre.”

Her madrina’s funeral was  a large event filled with people from all over, including neighboring cities. All had arrived to pay their respects, grieve, then celebrate the passing of a formidable and well loved woman. Ramona wore Florencia’s last gift, a white wedding dress that her madrina never wore. Jimena, a conservative and traditional woman would have screamed in horror to see her daughter dressed in white to a funeral, but this had been Florencia’s last wish and for her beloved friend, Jimena would have sent her daughter naked. The bond between them owed that much respect and devotion.

The night after her dream, Ramona stood before the small altar made after her madrina’s passing. The altar had flowers and candles and a few photos of the two together. She kneeled and prayed. “Madrina, am I dreaming? Is this reality? How do I know that what I saw was not a hallucination or the secret wishes of my heart? It felt so real, belonging like never before. But they are asking me to kill a child. But Elena, she’s suffered so much, she deserves to live a new life. She was only 16.” After an hour of silence Ramona looked at her hands and droplets of red copper formed and dripped through her lifelines.  Ramona was now certain.

VI. La Muerte

“So then you’re going to kill the child?” Death loomed above her, their voice emitting no sound except for the rustle of dying leaves. It was summer, but the trees and bushes around Ramona were changing color, shifting and falling. Death had summoned fall. 

“It’s not murder, it’s sacrifice. You wouldn’t understand. Elena would never remember, and it would give her an opportunity to start over.” The wind became chilly.  “A new start would not guarantee her happiness. You’re not afraid of the consequences?”  

Ramona responded without hesitation. “Our ancestors sacrificed all the time. The Gods spoke to me in a dream. If I sacrifice the child, I know the gods will awaken and they will do their part.” 

“How can you be certain? This is a gamble, rolling the dice. What about the child? Have you no guilt? Those Gods, they come to you in dreams, but they do not tell you the cost of your sacrifice and the cost of granting your prayers.” 

“You don’t have any guilt when you take the souls away. It is your job, your duty. I need to follow through. I have my reasons, but the risk I’ve taken will reap its own rewards. I’ve been tasked and must follow through.” 

“I am in charge of the realm of death.” Said Death, fishing for compliments and loyalty.  Ramona was unaffected. “What about you? Larga dressed in cloaks and bandages, brandishing that scythe, cutting down the world and reaping your harvest. I am not yours. My life and death are of a different realm.” Around Ramona fruit ripened, and rotted, their pieces and seeds turned to dust as they touched the ground. “I can kill the child for you. Your hands would not stain, your heart would know no sin.”  

Ramona didn’t waver, “It has to be my hands.”

Death spat with anger, “Sacrifice for them, and they will resort to their tricks, mock your sacrifice and take you instead. I will bid my time until you return, prepared to scrape your remainders from the ground. You will wish you had begged for my assistance.” Death disappeared behind the veil, and Ramona began her preparations. 

Ramona collected amaranth, obsidian stone, y la estatua de Chacmool. She spoke to Tlaloc at night and prepared for sacrifice, then asked Elena to babysit for Jacobo in three days. 

VII. El Niño

Ramona kneels by the playpen and studies the boy’s beautiful face. He would be the joy of the Gods. Then she stood up and prepared the baby’s bottle. She poured a small drop of the liquid onto her skin to test the heat. “Don’t worry you won’t feel a thing.”  She called to the child that was running trains in his playpen.

“Here I have your bottle.” Ramona held the toddler to her chest and embraced him fully.  The child was overwhelmed by the strong embrace and mumbled, “Tia nona me huele.”

“Aunti Nona, it hurts.”

Ramona softened her hold. She felt the dumpling skin, warm and tender, so frail. He would not fight. Ramona ran her hands through black curls. This little boy carried no blame. She hoped that in another life, he would have chosen a new beginning for his mother even without her meddling, so she asked.

“¿Quieres que mami sea feliz? Si, Si?”

“Do you want mommy to be happy? Yes?”

He babbled, “Mami Feliz, si”

“Mommy happy, yes.”

“You don’t know what you say..” Ramona could not explain the anger that overtook her all of a sudden but it was probably fueled by fear and not at all this child’s fault. She was losing her nerves, so she embraced him again, called to the spirits and started over. She grabbed the baby’s bottle and watched as he drank by gulps. Fully sated and tired, the baby slept after.  Ramona lifted his arm and let it drop. He would not wake while she worked. Speaking to the unconscious body, Ramona whispered, “I promise you won’t feel a thing.”  Ramona could not stop the tears that pooled in her hands. 

She pressed the obsidian knife to the supple skin and sliced the chest. Crimson spilled upon the stone. Her hands soaked in ruby liquid, worked quickly, efficiently. She’d practiced similar procedures in medical school. She beheld the child’s beating heart and sawed through bones, cut through veins and arteries, cartilage scraping through tissue and sinew. The work solidified in a steady rhythm stealing all identity, masking all humanity. Ramona held the small heart in her hand, and while it beat, raised it to the Gods.

Delicately she collected and cleansed and purified all the remains then placed them in a vase and walked for hours to the neck of the river. She stood by the bank, and prayed. Ramona danced and disrobed. Naked before the moonlight Ramona sang.

“Flowers are our only garments only songs make pain subside,

Diversas flores en la tierra,

Ohuaya, Ohuaya

Perhaps my friend will be lost,

Mis compañeros desaparecerán,

When I lie down in that place of song and of life

Giver

Ohuaya, Ohuaya

Does no one know where we are going? 

Do we go to the God’s home or

Do we live only here on earth 

Ohuaya, Ohuaya”

With her arms around the vase, like holding a child to her bosom, Ramona walked and step by step, slipped into the river. She stood with the water rushing at her chest, and searched the wind for the coindrop, the familiar ring of fate.