Echoes in the Bayou (26 page)

"
You know what we are Kelly? I'll tell you," she
said using a southern accent.  "We are a couple of stupid, foolish
girls, playing around with a spirit board as if this were some type of game.
Now I think it's best that we don’t tell our men that we've been messing around
with this, wouldn’t you agree?"

Kelly
could only nod her head in agreement. "Ava, are you alright?
"

"Why
yes Kelly, I'm fine why do you ask?
"

"Because
you're talking with an accent and I know that you
don’t have an accent." Kelly leaned in closer. "Amelia?"

Ava
leaned her head back and let out a boisterous laugh. "Kelly it's me Ava, I
was just playing a trick on you; of course it's me silly." The southern
accent was now gone.

Kelly
released a nervous laugh. "Thank god,
I
thought that woman's ugly soul got into."

Ava
reached over and patted her friend's hand. "No worries there, but we
better clean up. I don’t want Magnus finding out what we've done," she said
.

"I'd
say that séance was a bust," Ava looked at her.

"Yeah,
but it was weird just the same Ava. Hey, do you get the feeling that you've
missed something? Like missing time, minutes? I feel like that, I feel drained too,
do you feel it?
"

"Me?
No I feel fine. You just need some sleep, come on let's just
leave this for the night, tomorrow we'll get up fresh
and take care of it." She let herself be led to her room by Ava and once
she was alone, she collapsed on the bed where she fell into a deep sleep.

"I
didn’t think I'd ever get rid of that annoying girl." Amelia said as she
made her way into Magnus's room. Although the room took on a different
appearance she knew that it was once her's. "Going to have to make some changes
in here in deed," she said. She was staring at the mirror that hung above
one of his dressers. "Too bad I can't change a thing about you, you nigga
whore, but there's no need to give myself away. It is nice to be in a young
body though and boy have I got a surprise for you."

Ava was
looking at herself in the mirror too, on
ly she
knew that she was still trapped and she began to scream and yell even louder
when she saw what Amelia was getting ready to do. Amelia continued to gaze at
herself in the mirror, and she was slowly removing her clothes when she caught
glimpse of John DuPonte. He was standing in a dark corner of the room.

"Well
what are you waiting for
sugar? Come and get
it," she said and laid upon the bed. John DuPonte said nothing; he simply
got in between her open legs and had his way with her. Ava was glad that
she couldn’t feel what was happening to her, but she could hear it, she covered
her ears and tried to drown out the sound of them having sex by screaming. She
screamed until her voice went hoarse and when it was over she cried herself to
unconsciousness.

The day
after the séance, sleep held the two women for most of the day and it wasn’t
until late afternoon that they awoke. Kelly was standing at the foot of Ava's
bed when she awoke. "I think Magnus and Steve are back." She was
panicking now and the two raced down the stairs and into the sitting room.
Magnus was sitting on the sofa staring at the table full of candles, and in the
middle of it sat the Ouija board.

"Hi
honey, we weren’t expecting you so soon."

"Well
that's obvious, A
va can I speak to you alone for
a minute?" He asked. She could see the anger in his eyes and the hurt.
"Magnus, help me!" She screamed out, but her screams were like a
boomerang, they flew around, made a circle and came right back to her. He
looked at her in such a way that she thought he heard her
.
Maybe I got
through
,
she told herself. 
"Magnus!" She howled his name repeatedly until a shield of fog
clouded her vision.
Amelia is passing out, which means that I am too
.
She tried to stay awake long enough to surpass
Amelia's fainting but it was useless, she watched as Magnus caught her in his
arms.

"Magnus,
there's something I have to tell you." Kelly stood helpless as she watched
her friend pass out. When he caught her, Magnus could feel her skin and it was
on fire. "What the hell happened?" Steve looked curiously at his
wife. And when she told them about the Ouija board and seeing the soul of
Amelia Montieu getting too close to Ava, both men looked at her in astonishment.

"Kelly,
how could you do that?" Her husband asked her and took a threatening step
towards her. "I thought it would be fun and so did Ava," she recoiled
and responded back.

"Yeah,
does this look like she's having fun?" Magnus shouted at her
.

"Hey
take it easy Magn
us, she's my wife and I'll deal
with her. I'm sure she meant no harm."

"I
know that Steve, but harm has come and I got news for you buddy, I
don't know how to fix this."

"She's
coming to," Kelly interrupted. Ava could see them all standing around her,
staring at her. Did they know? Did Kelly tell them? When was Amelia going to
speak? Things were a lot clearer now and she almost felt like she was back and
that Amelia was gone but it had been the fever, the sudden onset of sickness
had only weakened Amelia, Ava could feel her still festering inside of her.
Amelia stared blankly at him, but the fever was making her weak, neither she
nor Ava was able to communicate.

 
"Ava if you can hear me, I'm taking you
upstairs.  Kelly, Steve can one of you go and make a pot of tea? I need to
get her fever down, can you manage that?" They could hear the mockery in
his voice but understood where he was coming from.

"Magnus,
I'
m so sorry." Kelly put her hand on his
shoulder before following her husband into the kitchen. Once upstairs Magnus
gave her some aspirin and wiped her brow with a cold cloth. Within minutes
she'd fallen asleep.

Magnus
headed down the hallway to the front door, he needed to find Sinta; she was the
only one who would be able to help Ava now. When he stepped outside he couldn’t
help but notice that there was no wind, no breeze, and the bayou lie still. It
was as if time itself had stopped and he wondered if it had become that way
because Ava was trapped. She had been such an intricate part of the bayou,
Sinta had told them. He remembered how the house, and everything around it had
come alive when Ava arrived and now it looked as if the house and land were
holding its breath, refusing once again to grow.

 
 "Miss Ava in dat dark place ain't she
Mister Magnus?" Sinta had appeared and Magnus thought nothing of it, he
had something more important to think about and that was Ava.

"Yes
Sinta an
d you've got to help her, please tell me
that you know how to help her," he put his hands on her shoulders and
pleaded with her.

"I's
done summoned sum help Mister Magnus but help arrive when she good and ready
and not a moment too soon so we's got to be p
atient
Mister Magnus. Ava done fallin ill because I done preform a ritual to makes her
dat way.

 
 Sinta could tell by the way that he looked at
her that he misunderstood her intentions.

"Mister
Magnus, I knew that Miss Ava was goin to try and c
ontact
Will Jr. again, so whilst I summon up help, I ask the loa to put da illness on
both Miss Ava and Miss Amelia, you sees dat way, neither one can hurt da other
cuz if Miss Ava fight Miss Amelia, then a piece of Miss Amelia will stay inside
Miss Ava forever and we don’t want dat do we Mister Magnus? So you do me favor
and trust an old woman, I's knows what I's doin."

 
At the moment he had no reason not to trust her, she
had gotten them this far and had not let them down.

"Okay
Sinta, I tru
st you."

When the
two headed back inside the house, Steve and Kelly had already gone upstairs to
check on Ava. She'd woken up but the fever had not broken. Nothing but moans
escaped her mouth as Kelly held the mug of tea near her trembling lips.
  They slipped into the room and made sure that
she was resting comfortably.

 
"Maybe we should get her to the hospital,"
Kelly said.

"No!"
Sinta shouted. She told them that if they were to take Ava to a hospital, the
doctors there would surely keep her
overnight if
not longer and that once they examined her would find that there was nothing
wrong physically but she might be evaluated mentally and that wouldn’t be good
given the circumstances. "We's don’t want to sees Miss Ava locked up in
sum crazy place," she told the group. And she was right; at least that's
what Magnus told them. For the time being he said, Ava wasn’t going anywhere.

They hadn’t
noticed that Ava had been shaking her head so violently that a pillow had
fallen onto the floor. Magnus replaced the pillow and while he was close to her
he straightened the comforter and smoothed the handmade quilt that Ava had
bought, over the end of the bed.

"Thank
you." It was the first words that had come out of her mouth since she
fainted
and they were music to everyone's ears.

"Ava?
Can you hear me?" The words were short lived, he watched as her
eyelids  fluttered and then closed, she had once again fallen asleep.
Magnus stood near the foot of the bed. "Kelly and I were talking and well,
if it's alright with you Magnus we'd like to stay until she's better,"
Steve said, his head turning towards the bed.

"That
will be fine," Magnus replied. "And Kelly? I'm sorry I snapped at you
earlier, I was upset.
"

"I
know you were Magnus, n
o need to apologize. I
shouldn’t have forced her."

Magnus
chuckled lightly. "No one and nothing can force Ava Montgomery to do anything
she doesn't want to do, isn’t that right?" he leaned down and kissed her
.

Kelly
pressed a comforting hand on his arm bef
ore
leaving him alone with Ava.

That
night Magnus dreamed of Ava, he dreamt about how good it felt to have her in
his arms. He rested his head on her shoulder while he drifted off to sleep
again.  "We'll find joy again Magnus, when help arrives we'll be
together again. You and I will live a long and happy life." He woke up
with a frown, he knew that he had been dreaming, but the dream was so vivid
that he wanted to believe that it was real, that Ava had found a way to
communicate with him.

 
He watched her as she slept; when he kissed her
forehead he breathed a sigh of relief. The fever had gone down some and he
hoped that when she awoke, she would be able to talk to him; he missed her and
her touch.  "Ava," he quietly called out. "Come back to me."

A low
moan escaped her lips but that was
it, he knew
that she was fighting to keep from losing herself to Amelia.

 
For a long time after he'd woken up, he sat in the
dark wanting to hold on to the feeling of her presence. Eventually it faded and
he fell back asleep. The next morning he climbed out of bed, but not before
checking on Ava. She was lying next to him and she was still asleep. Sinta had
told him that sleep was good for her because the time was coming that she would
need her strength. He traipsed barefoot across the hardwood floor of the room
and looked out the window.

He could
see Sinta heading towards the shanty in the bayou and wondered if she was going
there to summon more help, he hoped so. He could see, even from the window that
the bayou too was waiting for help to arrive. The wild flowers were drooping
and the sounds of all the creatures of the bayou had ceased. The plantation and
the area around it had stopped living and breathing the same day that Ava had
become possessed.

Tears
flowed down Sinta's face as she made her way to the bayou, she wanted nothing
more than to free Ava and Celeste but she needed Sophie to come and help.
"Chère, when are you coming?" she spoke to the air and it seemed to
ferment around her. She wanted nothing more than to get rid of Amelia and John.
The two spirits had managed to interfere in both Ava and Magnus's life and it
was becoming more and more serious as the days passed by. If she wasn’t able to
rid the house of the evilness and free Celeste by summer's end, she knew that
Magnus and Ava would forever be held captive by the curse.

It
occurred to her then that neither Ava nor Kelly while preforming the séance and
using the spirit board had closed it. It was very important to close the
ceremony and say goodbye when finished asking questions. Sinta had always been
opposed to using a spirit board. She remembered Sophie telling her that they opened
portals to worlds that shouldn’t be opened and for that reason alone she was
cautioned never to use one. Ava and Kelly thinking that they were doing good,
had more than likely opened a portal, letting Amelia in and if they didn’t
close it, Amelia might be able to bring other malevolent forces through.
Thank god they both ill, I've gots to close dat
portal,
Sinta thought to herself and made
haste back towards the house.