curse that book

I got hold of a spell book with some curses in them. Thirty bucks from a gnarled old lady with a humpback. Her makeshift rack on the street bend near my apartment had small boxes full of them old books. Like she was moving, and that afternoon of my day off was her rummage sale day. Curses, huh? I almost ran back home, my long hair getting dishelved by the wind. Smells like it was going to rain. Dead leaves all around falling like confetti, like one big sudden autumn. I don't remember our street having so many old trees. Never mind that. How many people do I hate. Wonder if I have to buy candles? Hope this book doesn't make me yell Latin at the turn of twelve, and in front of a mirror at that. Har har. I fumble for my keys.

Dog-eared and with some pages torn off, the pages remain thick, like it absorbed all the sweat and dead bugs of the last half century. I've seen dead books like these in my school's library, in the section the nuns told us not to visit. Of course I snuck in there whenever I could. I always thought the nuns hid porn up that attic, and not the History of the Holocaust with so many nude pictures of dead Jews. Or several copies of Salman Rushdie's' Satanic Verses, which was a good story, really. I even found some autographed copies of Bertrand Russell's Why I am not a Christian. A nun or two long ago must have been a vehement secret fan of the atomic era enlightenment period. Never mind that. I slid out of my shoes, unzipped my skirt, got out of my blouse and bra, and walked barefoot to the kitchen in my undies, holding the book with two hands. Naked offering here I come. I hope there was one. I pulled up a chair to examine my find.

It should smell ancient, like it belonged to a previous world, but it doesn't. I sniffed it, the way I sniff newly bought books from Powerbooks and National Bookstore. Smells of disuse, this book, but not age. I opened it and flipped the pages, hoping to see a bookmark or a dead rose or bugs or a sheaf of small paper, maybe a sepia picture. Nothing. What kind of paper did they use here? The pages are coarse, rough on some parts, but the handwriting is legible--longhand from a time when notes revealed the soul. The words were carefully chosen. The strokes are elegant. That's what I thought. The spine is hand-sewn. Lovingly. I'm beginning to like this book. I grabbed my cell and text'd Angela--she lives next door. "Come over here now. Get a load of this." A knock on the door. I grab a bathroom towel and cover myself up. If my landlord, that maniac Mang Ramon down the hall, could see my like this, he'd mention marriage again. For the third time.

"There had better be a single man inside, or you're dead!" Angela yelled after banging at the door, and again more banging, louder this time. Knocks aren't enough for this woman. I let her in, long loose shirt with no shorts underneath and all. I know so. That's how we dress after school hours. Like sluts within reach. Ah the freedom. Long skirts and tight blouses in a private school within earshot of nowhere. If a woman lusted in a forest but there was no man around, does it matter? Never mind that.

I showed the pages to my co-teacher/ neighbor / best friend without telling her what the book was about and she said she didn't know I could read German. I yanked the book away from her and looked at a particular page.

"That is not German," I said, pointing to one line of script.

"Really?" Angela said while tugging at my towel. "Say it out loud, that line."

"Fine. Stop yanking my towel away."

I cleared my throat: "When you have foreseen the gestures yourself, the soul-itch clings to the reader." Angela smiled that smile she throws at preschoolers who thought they had outsmarted their teacher.

"Ah-huh." She nods and thumbs her cell, then aims it on a page of the book in my hand. She shows me the digital image while feeling my forehead with her free hand.

"I'm not sick, Angela. See here those words are... German." I flick her hand from my forehead and stare at the page, and then stare at the phone's colored monitor again. "But I know what it says, I can read it here--"

"Read the thing on my cell, not the book."

"I can't."

"What is this book about anyway?"

"Curses."

"It has nothing written on the cover. How do you know?"

"I... I.. I just know. The old lady must have told me it was a book on curses."

"What old lady?"

"Down the bend, near the bakery."

"I got home after you did. I heard you lock your door. I passed by the same bend. There was no lady there."

"But... but...," I flipped the pages and I could read them, I really could. Or at least I didn't feel like I didn't know what the lines of script meant. I felt at home with this.

Angela walked up to me and extended her hand, asking for the open book. The book suddenly closed itself shut, and I jumped back, startled, dropping it on the wooded floor. My single old maniac landlord that evening must have had the time of his life pacifying two mestiza's barely clothed. We screamed as we ran for the door. We screamed as we ran down the hall. Along the way I dropped my towel.

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I'm still working on this...