People stopped going to your great abuela for healing work. They went to Nicoinstead. Nico walked around his little shack like a tyrant, sucking up people’s personalpower like a vampire who needed blood. He knew exactly what to do. He was cunningand knew how to destroy people’s defenses. He would wear them down, making thembelieve that all their problems could be solved by some magical spell. If things didn’t goright, he would tell them that they weren’t pure enough and that they needed to pay himmore money so that he could do the ritual again. He knew that half the shit he did didn’twork, but he knew how to imprison the mind.
Nelly, he splits people’s souls. He crushes them into little fragments because heknows that if people are in pieces, they won’t have the strength to fight against hisbrujeria. Instead, you end up fighting against yourself, beating yourself up, feelingworthless, alone, inferior, abandoned, rejected, depressed, angry, and unloved. Nicowants this, because if you are whole, you are beyond his control. I wished that I hadknown this then; maybe things would have been different. I wouldn’t have left yourmomma for Nico and your great abuela would have lived a lot longer. Like I said Nelly, Iain’t proud of the things that I did, but you need to know everything.
One night, after one of our lovemaking sessions, I whispered to Nico that I had to goto the bathroom. He mumbled and turning in his sleep he replied that I had to go to theouthouse. I got up and put on my nightgown and walked outside barefoot. It was reallydark; a few stars twinkled, lending me some light.
I stopped when I came to an old rickety shack that was guarded by two of Nico’smost loyal hounds. I shooed them away and entered the outhouse. I covered my nose andheld my breath as I pulled up my gown. The smell was awful. I danced around, and thensquatted in the dark while I aimed to pee in the wooden hole. A long warm stream ofurine poured out. I sighed with relief, and instantly regretted it. How can Nico live likethis? I hurriedly adjusted my nightgown and underwear as I swung open the door. Iheaved with relief as I waved my hand in front of my nose, trying to dispel the lingeringsmell.
It was then that I spotted a familiar garment that was buried in the soil. I couldidentify it from anywhere, even in the darkness. I kneeled down on the ground andyanked on the top half of the garment, the soil loosened and I was able to pull it out of theground. I held the thing up with my both arms, my eyes widened with disbelief as Iimmediately recognize what it was. It belonged to your great abuela! It was her weddingdress.
Frantically, I began shoveling through the dark soil. I had to know what else he hadof hers. I dug through a massive pile of dirt to find, a wrinkled piece of paper with yourgreat abuela’s name scribbled on it. I dug further and spotted a long neck black bottle. Iexamined its contents; there was something inside of it. What was it? I froze, the hairs onmy neck stood up. There was someone standing behind me. I didn’t dare look back.Somebody shoved a black cloak over my head. I could feel the person’s legs leaningagainst the small of my back. He forcefully twisted the bottom sheath of the cloak aroundmy neck.
I started to choke; my breaths became short and raspy. The black mask worked like afilter, muffling both the air and my screams. I began to kick my legs in an effort to breakfree. I felt a strongarm grab hold of my midsection, another arm reached over my neckand they both worked together to pull me backwards. In one quick movement, I washoisted up and my body rested on a set of broad shoulders and a strong back. Myassaulter used his spare arm to harness me in and then began to run with as much stealthas fox in the night. I heard the barking of hound dogs, where they coming after us?
I could see brief glimpses of light through my cloak. Was it fire?
The man came to a crashing hold.
“Hey, I got her, where do I put her?” he said panting.
“In the trunk. But hurry, cause we got to get her out of here, fast.” said a man, whosevoice I thought I recognized.
He took a few huge steps and plopped me down like second hand luggage in theback of the trunk. “Let’s go,” the man said before he closed the trunk. I heard two doorsslam shut and then the car peeled off into the night.
Nelly, I had no idea where I was going, or who the strange men were. We drovethrough most of the night. I wanted your great abuela; I needed her to come and save me.I fell asleep and dreamed that I was seated a safe distance away from Nico’s shack.
“Burn the motherfucker down.”
There was a gaggle of men who all stood outside of the abandoned wood-shack. Thehouse stood on four measly stilts, the windows were broken and the inside had beenlooted.
“Nico, your ass is grass. You crossed way too many people in this town,” an angryman yelled before he launched a long neck bottle ablaze with flickering flames.
Another man furiously yelled, “Your put brujeria on Elvisa,” shaking his fist. Andthen threw a bottle filled with kerosene at the wood-shack. The bottle exploded uponcontact, unleashing dark unruly flames that started to devour the frame.
“And you took her daughter Maria. What kind of heartless shit is that?” Another manranted as he launched a wooden javelin tipped with burning flames.
The flames soared, and a dark cloud of black smoke began to rise. The men began tocheer as the one of the stilts collapsed, overtaken by violent flames. It was not longbefore the frame went down. It held on
