VOODOO BABY

 The doll glared at me from across the room. I hadn’t believed the old woman could construct life within a doll’s body, void of pulse, but there it was, a soldier waiting for its command.

The voodoo queen had warned me about the birthing process. It was dangerous and couldn’t be reversed. I didn’t have the same belief in her powers as the folk who lived on the islands. The legends ran deep, etched into the minds of the old, twisted by time, but then I saw the dull glow of its eyes shining on me, awakening for the first time.

Willful and demanding, like a baby’s first breath, it came into the world, gasping for air, wanting to live, needing to take life in order to save its own. Virgin lungs filled and wailed their hatred of the world.  It yearned for destruction and the demise of the person whose existence it was created to consume.

That person was Sarah. She had given up on our marriage; left it to rot on the vine. I wanted her gone, but I could never let another woman touch her. She was mine, until death does she part.

Part of the birthing process involved a photo of her. The voodoo queen had lain the doll face down on the photo, sprinkled swamp water and lizard blood on it. Her words laced with a heavy accent were unintelligible to me. Twenty-four hours, she whispered, and it would come alive and complete its mission.

The time had come. “She’s in the bedroom. Go get her.”

With a wink, the doll leaped from the shelf holding the knife I had supplied. Its plastic lips parted in anticipation of her blood. I could tell it wanted to suckle, drawing more than milk, pulling lifeblood. Eyes like cold, hard marbles studied me. I had never noticed how much we looked alike, Sarah and I, until I saw my image in the voodoo doll’s eye.

“Sarah.” It muttered her name as it released the blood from my jugular.