Helen Oyeyemi - White Is for Witching

White Is
for
Witching

A lso by H ELEN O YEYEMI

The Opposite House

The Icarus Girl

HELEN
OYEYEMI

HAMISH HAMILTON CANADA

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Published in Canada by Penguin Group (Canada), a division of Pearson Canada Inc., 2009.
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Copyright Helen Oyeyemi, 2009

All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

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LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA CATALOGUING IN PUBLICATION

Oyeyemi, Helen
White is for witching / Helen Oyeyemi.

ISBN 978-0-670-06857-9

I. Title.

PR6115.Y49W47 2009 823.92 C2009-902103-X

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I hold my honey and I store my bread

In little jars and cabinets of my will.

I label clearly, and each latch and lid

I bid, Be firm till I return from Hell.

G WENDOLYN B ROOKS , Selected Poems

White Is
for
Witching

WHERE IS MIRANDA?

ore:

Miranda Silver is in Dover, in the ground beneath her mothers house.

Her throat is blocked with a slice of apple

(to stop her speaking words that may betray her)

her ears are filled with earth

(to keep her from hearing sounds that will confuse her)

her eyes are closed, but

her heart thrums hard like hummingbird wings.

Does she remember me at all I miss her I miss the way her eyes are the same shade of grey no matter the strength or weakness of the light I miss the taste of her I see her in my sleep, a star planted seed-deep, her arms outstretched, her fists clenched, her black dress clinging to her like mud.

She chose this as the only way to fight the soucouyant.

eliot:

Miri is gone.

Just gone. Wed had an argument. It was dark outside. Gusts of wind tangled in the apple trees around our house and dropped fruit onto the roof, made it sound like someone was tapping on the walls in the attic, Morse code for let me out, or something weirder. The argument was a stupid one that opened up a murky little mouth to take in other things. Principally it was about this pie Id baked for her. She wouldnt eat any of it, and she wouldnt let me.

Why did you use the winter apples? She asked it over and over. Nothing I replied could break her monotone.

She said: Youve done too much now. I cant trust you anymore.

She shook her head and dropped to the disappointed hiss of a primary-school teacher, or a kid trying to borrow the authority of one: Bad! You are bad.

(My sister turned seventeen in a mental health clinic; I brought our birthday cake to her there.)

Miris accusations, her whole manner that night scared the shit out of me. She looked in my direction but she couldnt seem to focus on me. She was the thinnest Id ever seen her. Her hands and head were the heaviest parts of her. Her neck drooped. She hugged herself, her fingers pinning her dress to her ribs. There was an odd smell to her, heavy and thick. It was clear to me that she was slipping again, down a new slide. When she said she didnt trust me, I turned away rather than let myself get angrier.

I went up to my room. Miri didnt call after me. I dont think she came upstairs again. Or she may have, without my hearing. Im not sure. I heard the front door slam, but I thought it was just one of the guests coming home late. I stayed where I was, knelt on my window seat, smoking, seeing shapes in the rain, listening to all the apples in the world bouncing off our roof.

That last time I saw Miri, she wasnt wearing any shoes. Five months ago I took that as security that she would come back. And now I keep coming back to that in my mind, the fact that she was barefoot. That her running away was a heat-of-the-moment thing, unplanned.

A part of me knows that we cant find her because something has happened to her.

29 barton road:

Miranda is at home

(homesick, home sick)

Miranda cant come in today Miranda has a condition called pica she has

eaten a great deal of chalkshe really cant help herselfshe has been

very illMiranda has pica she cant come in today, she is stretched out

inside a wall she is feasting on plaster she has pica

try again:

IS MIRANDA ALIVE?

ore:

Probably not

eliot:

Ive been dialling her phone, the phone she lost months ago, as if she might have caught up with it somewhere. I wrote her a note and folded it in four and slipped it under her door.

I know shes not there.

But I wrote, Miri Im lonely.

I dropped the words onto the paper so hard that theyre doubled by the thin perforations around them.

I wouldnt have bothered trying to tell her, I wouldnt have written to her if

What I mean is, each act of speech stands on the belief that someone will hear. My note to Miri says more than just Im lonely. Invisibly it says that I know she will see this, and that when she sees this it will turn her, turn her back, return her.

Miri I conjure you.

29 barton road:

She has wronged

me I will not allow her to live