It's been weeks since I last saw Rafael. Calling him father sounded weird now. But as much as I was head over heels for him, I had to focus. I knew that he loved it when I got good grades, and one time he mentioned jokingly that he likes that I was smart. I had to get this degree if I was going to impress him. So that motivated me enough to pursue the course with dedication, and so far I was doing just that. I was getting straight As on my tests and I was already student leader in the class. I grew a bit quieter, and a little more reserved than I usually was but it was because I was putting my entire focus on my studies. And I hoped that soon Rafael would see me. I was getting a bit concerned because this was the first time that he had spent this long without meeting me. Part of me thought that just maybe, he was feeling disgusted by my presence. But I didn't care. I wanted him even if he didn't want me. I wanted him desperately. Although I had managed to keep a quiet life, there was always that one group of girls that weren't impressed with me. Most probably because they had an intuition that I was stealing their boyfriends.
As I was eating quietly, while studying biochemistry, they approached my table, and I immediately knew that they wanted to cause trouble.
"Hey there nerd." Stella, their self declared leader said trying to act sassy. I just looked down and continued with my meal.
"You don't get to ignore me shitface." She said tearing the book from my hands and throwing it to the floor. I take a deep breath and head down to pick it, when she made me trip and fall on my face. They burst into an annoyingly high pitch laughter as I sighed again and took the book from the floor. I felt my anger reach its limit, but before I could take a step, I remembered Rafael and how I wanted to impress him, so I just let the tears flow.
"Aww, little miss weakling is crying. Who are you gonna tell, your parents? Oh they abandoned you. Your brothers? Oh wait they're after you. Oh your priest? He's just....." Before he could say anything about Rafael, I shot her a death glare as I got the sudden serious urge to rip out her tongue and shove it down her throat. With that she stayed quiet, but I had had enough and one more word from her would have caused her a mountain of trouble.
"Finish that statement, I dare you." I whispered, my voice trembling in rage. She just looked at me, eyes widening as her friends immediately froze, with that she left without saying another word.
As I went to bed that night I couldn't help but think about the events of the day. I tinkled with my rosary as I remembered that when I had walked into the church, Rafael had given it to me and asked me never to take it off. I've never questioned Rafael's decisions so I never took it off and I never asked him why. As I was still lost in my thoughts, the girls who had confronted me earlier walked into my room and shut the door.
"You're flying too high bitch, someone needs to clip those wings ."
Before I could process what was happening, I felt a sharp pain on my stomach as Stella drove a pocket knife through my stomach. I slowly raised my eyes to look at her, still in shock. She then stabbed me again and saw that I was still not screaming nor crying.
"Ah, well you think your tough. What gives you that strength is it your God?" She says laughing with her other friends.
Just then she grabbed the rosary around my neck and I immediately tried to get defensive although at this point, the other two girls who were with her had held my arms in place and I wasn't able to do much except wiggle like a tiny worm. When she saw that she was finally hitting a nerve she started pulling on it.
"No, please Stella, don't." I whimpered amidst chocking on my own blood.
She smiled wickedly and ripped it off.
"This is not just a normal rosary, it has a medallion. I wonder what happens when I break it " she says looking at me with a sinister smile.
"No... Please....." I stutter. Ignoring my pleas, she hit the rosary down hard and the medallion broke. With that, the weather changed as a thunderstorm hit almost immediately and the air around us was replaced with a thick red smoke, and the aura was deathly. Suddenly, all the smoke entered into my mouth and I could feel it levitate me as I shock violently due to its presence clashing with that of my spirit.
As it finished taking my body, I slowly passed out, and that last thing I saw was the look of terror on the girls faces.
When I came to, I was in a hospital bed and May was sleeping next to me, while Rafael was sleeping on a seat right across the room.
"May, Rafael," I say weakly and surprisingly, Rafael heard it first yet he was further. As he rushed to me, May woke up and they both immediately hugged me.
"Thank heavens you're awake Jasmine, I would have been devastated if anything happened to you." Rafael said while hugging me.
"I'm so sorry Rafael," I start while crying, "I tried to get them to stop, but they ripped off my rosary and it broke and then...."
Before I could utter another word I felt some other spirit within me suppress my spirit,then take control of my mouth.
"And then what?" Rafael asked, concerned and eager to hear what I had to say.
"I don't remember. My mind goes cloudy after that." I reply, but in real sense it's the spirit inside me talking.
"Did you see a spirit?" He asks me.
"I don't know,all I saw before I fell was the girl's faces.
"It's okay. They are all in jail now, and you are coming home with us, okay?" May says taking my hand and I nodd.
"Can I go to the washroom?" I ask standing up. Rafael helps me and I head to the washroom. I wash my face and look in the mirror. There I saw her for the first time. She was like me, but she had cracks on fer skin, through which rays of red creeped out. Not blood red, but lava red. Her hair was bloody and fell to her face and ther neck had a huge scar suggesting she was beheaded in her previous birth. I was scared but she gave me a surprisingly reassuring smile.
"Don't worry I'm Layla. Your great, great, great, great great great grandmother had made a deal with me and now I'm here to collect." She said still smiling.
"So you're here to kill me?" I say in fear.
"No, no, no, no, no, no darling. I just need you to get revenge on my behalf." She said ever so casually.
"So you want me to kill someone?" I reply.
"No, I just want to ruin someone's life. That's all."
"But why get revenge to them for something that their ancestors did. It's not their fault."
"No questions asked was the agreement." She says.
"But what about me, my life, my studies?"
"I will not affect your studies in any way. But you have to stay quiet and not inform anyone about me."
"Okay. Who's the person whose life you want to ruin?" I ask
"That priest." She says pointing at Rafael.
"No." I say sternly. "Anyone else but not him."
"There's no going back on the agreement."
"But I love him. I can't hurt him." I say to her. Now you can kill me and take my like but there is no way in hell that I'm....."
"Six hours." She said.
"What?" I exclaim.
"You have six hours to decide whether you will ruin his life here, or I will ruin his life in the underworld, because he will die eventually. And when he does I will make sure that he will suffer and rot in eternal damnation. I'll be waiting."
With that she disappeared as soon as she appeared and my reflection stared back at me. Well thank you Great great great great grandmother for screwing me over. I said sarcastically in my head.
As I walked out of the toilet, I was met with an excited May blabbering about how I was being discharged and she was so excited to stay with me. I smiled at her but my train of thought was somewhere else. Somewhere darker.
"What do you want us to do once you get out of here?" She asks, as she finished packing my stuff.
"I just want to rest, please." I say as the realization of what I had gotten into dawned on me. As I looked at Rafael's eyes, which were full of concern for me, a tear fell from my eye. How was I going to help him? With the tear, they all looked at each other. The drive back home was faster than I remembered, or maybe it was because I was on a countdown. When I arrived and locked myself in my room, I started running all possibilities and I calculated contingencies for every single outcome. And then suddenly, out of nowhere it hit me like a high speed electric train.
Just then, the spirit appeared as an apparition in front of me.
"So I guess it's eternal damnation then?" She asks with a sinister smile.
"I've figured out a way for both of us to get what we want." I say still in thought. I knew what I had planned would get Rafael to hate me forever, but I had no other choice.