Sinner, p.1
Sinner, page 1
Sinner
SANTA MUERTE
BOOK ONE
CAROL JAMES MARSHALL
Copyright © 2023 by Carol James Marshall
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Editor: unexpectedpaths.com
Cover Art: Victoria Cooper Art
Por mi madre Lucinda y Doña Lupe.
Que descansen en paz.
For my mother Lucinda and Doña Lupe.
May you rest in peace.
Creo y no creo. - Doña Lupe
I believe and I don’t believe. - Doña Lupe
A Message from Carol James Marshall
I wrote the Santa Muerte series to represent who I am as a Latina. I am not English. I am not Spanish. I am a mixture of both.
I am Mexico, but also America. Therefore, the Santa Muerte series represents my bilingual worldview. There is plenty of Spanish in the Santa Muerte series but I believe I do a good job of paraphrasing what was said in Spanish, in English usually within the paragraph.
Culturally in most Latin American countries, a witch's spell is called a “trabajo,” “a work.”
In the Santa Muerte series, I use the word “trabajo” to mean “spell.”
The way La Santa Muerte is depicted in this series is my own interpretation. I acknowledge the many different opinions of those who worship her, and I respect their views. However, this work of fiction is mine alone, and La Santa Muerte has been shaped by my imagination.
Contents
Untitled
1. Av Reforma, Mexicali, Mexico
2. Catedral de Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe
3. Calexico, California
4. Malvada
5. Mi Cariño
6. Babosa
7. Viejita y la cabrona
8. Confia en me
9. Te la presto
10. Se ve bonito
11. 300 PINCHI Snakes
12. Desgraciada
13. Su Gente
14. El Tiempo es Maldita
15. Like Nothing
16. Que lo sapes
17. Perdóname
18. Brujita
19. Leyenda de Mal
20. Las Chismosas
21. Mátala
Sneak Peak of Vessel Book 2
Preview Vessel Book 2
Preview Vessel Book 2
Preview Vessel Book 2
About the Author
Escucho voces cada vez que apago la luz.
Cuando me cuestiono lo que no te cuestionaste tú
Por eso a veces los versos que escribo hacen que a Jesús se le salgan los clavos de la cruz
- Pecador Residente
I hear voices every time I turn off the light
When I question what you did not question
That is why sometimes the verses I write make Jesus’ nails come off the cross.
- Sinner Residente
Chapter 1
Av Reforma, Mexicali, Mexico
Matea
9 years old
Mexicali wasn’t home for Matea. It was a town she visited when her mother felt like it. Matea’s mother Amparo was a woman of whims.
On a whim, Amparo would take Matea to Mexico to visit her abuela. On a whim, Amparo, with Matea in tow, would head back to the United states. It was as if Amparo could never reconcile that her home was no longer Mexico. Mexicali was a sore bruise on Amparo’s chin. Something she didn’t want to look at but felt good when rubbed.
Matea’s childhood was a back-and-forth procession on the streets of Palmdale, California, and the streets of Mexicali, Mexico. Her mom’s whim-filled yoyo life left young Matea feeling unsettled and unfinished, like a raw piece of wood.
The not here nor there wasn’t what Matea believed she needed at that age. Little girl Matea wanted and needed to settle in one spot so she could finally blossom into whatever it was she was to become.
And what she was to become scared Matea. She wasn’t like her cousins. She wasn’t like the girls at school. Her cousins could content themselves with running along the beaches of San Felipe, Mexico, singing songs loudly along the shoreline and loving the attention they got from all who heard them. The girls at school would smile and nod with an appreciation of whatever the nuns told them. The girls at school believed the nuns to be holy, saintly, blessed.
Matea didn’t want to sing in public, and she believed the nuns looked like penguins that had been left in an oven too long, their meat dry and shriveled.
Matea knew things before they happened. She saw things others did not. Matea felt as if she was constantly being pulled but never knew to where. This left her feeling tired but mostly terrified of what she could blossom into.
What does a girl who envies the creep and darkness of a shadow become?
Matea will not say or think the words of religious teachings. Those words did not mean anything to her. Those church words are for weird people Amparo takes Matea to on one of her whim-driven adventures.
Those words are not for her.
This Sunday, Amparo’s whim took them back to Mexicali, and Matea, knowing where her mother is heading, does everything possible not to reach their destination.
Matea whines and walks too slow while begging for pan dulce. When her mother is undaunted by her actions, Matea schemes for what to do next, her eyes dancing up and down the street at all the vendors.
Matea dead stops at a vendor selling plaster statues of saints. Matea pulls her mami’s arm, pointing to a statue of a skeleton, holding flowers, with a crown on its head.
Still doing her best to delay the inevitable burden of attending mass, Matea says, “Mira, she looks like the Virgin,” while pulling her mother towards the statue. Matea reaches for the statue of the skeletal woman even though she hears her mother exclaim, “Ave María Purísima!”
With the word “Purísima” still dangling from her tongue, Amparo yanked her daughter away from the skeletal statue but not before Matea’s pinkie finger grazed it, and that touch, that slightest bit of contact between Matea’s skin and the smallest edge of the plaster statue was enough.
Matea felt a sharp electric prick run through her body.
In pain, Matea yelped, knowing she did not imagine the zap. She knew the statue shocked her on purpose, but she couldn’t tell her mami that. Matea knew confessing her true thoughts to her mami would only mean more time in church. More time in church was not what Matea ever wanted. Church felt wrong, like sour candy that never gives itself over to sweet. Church left her skin feeling prickly. Every nerve in her body pounded at her, trying to will her to get out while she still had breath in her lungs. At mass, Matea was plagued by an inability to breathe properly and a feeling that everyone in the church had their eyes glued on her. At any moment during mass, Matea felt the churchgoers might point their fingers with a knowing smirk and declare, “You don’t belong here.”
Matea knew they were right. She didn’t belong in church. Something was wrong with her, and church couldn’t cure it. If only she could tell her mother this. If only Amparo would understand.
As her mother dragged her away from the stand, Matea looked back at the statue. The skeletal woman pointed her boney fingers at Matea, and the lingering sensation of the electric jolt stroked Matea's brain. Matea’s eyes darted to the vendor who met her gaze then nodded as if to say he knew all her dirty little secrets but would never tell.
Chapter 2
Catedral de Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe
Mexicali, Mexico
Matea
14 years old
Matea was hot. The summer heat of Baja California was cooking her brain. All she had on her mind was the cool breezes of an air conditioner lapping at her sweaty skin. Instead, she was once again stuck in the prison of church, roped by one of Amparo’s whims.
Church was still an uncomfortable place for Matea. A place that was too tight, too overwhelming and always overloading her senses.
Today in mass, the sting of incense on a hot summer day made her eyes water. La Virgin de Guadalupe stared down at her accusingly, and Matea was on the edge of anger or despair, she couldn’t decide which. Matea couldn’t help but feel that the Virgin had X-ray vision, as if La Virgin knew all that she struggled to keep hidden and would soon point her delicate white fingers at her.
The feeling of melting mixed with nausea danced its way over Matea’s body. Matea felt sick. She badly needed to leave, but it was useless to tell her mother.
Today in church as always, Matea’s mother sat right next to her. Too close to Matea. As if clinging to her daughter comforted her or maybe she thought she should be close enough to control Matea’s behavior. Amparo sitting so close to her felt like everything in this church--as if it was made to suffocate her.
Matea stole a look at her mom. Amparo was engrossed in prayer. Matea swallowed and looked away, uncomfortable that her mother seemed to enjoy praying.
Amparo swayed when she prayed, and no matter the time of year or setting, seeing her mother's delight in praying made Matea uncomfortable. It was as if praying gave her mother some sort of joy. Matea didn’t understand it. When Matea prayed, she felt nothing. Her prayers were a dead-end road in a forgotten town.
Matea longed to feel anything when she prayed, yet nothing ever came. It was as if no one picked up the other end of the phone call. Jesus was not answering, so Matea stopped calling. She had been pretending to pray for years, and Amparo seemed none the wiser.
With menstrual cramps biting at her back and legs, Matea sighed looking from side to side as Father preached on. How could he stand his robes in such heat? The AC at the church did nothing to help the inferno of Mexicali in June.
Catching herself rubbing her hand, Matea looked down at it, noting that she was once again rubbing the dark smudge left there by her half-second touch of a Santa Muerte statue 8 years ago. The smudge never hurt. It could not be washed off, no matter how much she tried. It looked like black ink had spilled on her hand and had not been scrubbed off. The smudge was harmless. Nothing but a stain, but it still had a presence, like a portwine stain on someone’s face. People couldn’t feel their portwine birthmarks, but they felt its presence.
The black smudge on Matea’s hand was an echo of something or someone that haunted her.
Matea knew who had marked her. She had known from the moment it happened, but she wouldn’t acknowledge her.
In acknowledgment there was power. Matea knew if she acknowledged it, then she’d be lighting the fire she feared would engulf her.
Besides, how could she give power to something that Matea knew wasn’t true? All of her mother’s beliefs be it in the church or the brujas was something Matea had to endure in her life, but she could not believe in either of them.
What Matea believed was her ideas. The things she saw. The things she felt. The things that sometimes happened after she wished them. She was wicked, and her brains were twisted that was the truth. That was her secret. It wasn’t fair for la Virgin to peer down at her with such judgement, hidden under the demeanor of warmth in her loving face.
Matea knelt to pray along with her mother, as expected of her. She closed her eyes and hoped to have something spark within her. She felt something slide across her ankles. Not scared of the sensation but annoyed, Matea took a deep breath. She knew who the visitor was and knew it would have friends.
Matea glanced at her mother, whose eyes were squeezed shut, and dared a glance behind her. Matea watched a rattlesnake, forked tongue “tasting” the air, slither toward her mother’s feet.
Rolling her eyes, Matea refocused on pretending to pray, hoping they’d be done and back to sitting soon. Matea felt no worries; her mother wouldn’t feel the snake slide over her feet.
Matea had been visited by the snakes many times now. No one felt or saw the snakes except her. Hearing Amparo finish her prayer, “. . .sino que líbranos del malo. Amen,” Matea sat up, pushing a rattlesnake off her seat on the pew.
Amparo raised an eyebrow at her daughter then and gave her a look that Matea knew well. The don’t-be-strange-in-church look.
Most of the time Amparo ignored Matea when she yelled at something she couldn’t see or kicked at something that wasn’t there, but in church, Amparo was extra vigilant, as if she too didn’t want La Virgin to see her dirty secret of a daughter that wasn’t normal.
Matea’s head swam. Rattlesnakes now covered the floor of the church, slithering up pews, draping themselves on people's shoulders. She noticed one slip its head under the black veil of an elderly woman who was at mass whenever Matea was there.
All the parishioners watched the Father prepare Communion. Not one stirred despite a snake hanging off a shoulder, or sniffing their hair, biting at the Bible in their hands. No one noticed the snakes but her, as usual. Watching the snakes bored Matea even when the rattlesnake heads watched the Father with interest.
As people rose for Communion, the snakes rode along on top of heads, on shoulders, some dangling from arms. All the snakes were eager for mischief, mischief Matea never found amusing. Each snake that went with a parishioner did its best to take a communion wafer, snapping at it like a hungry dog. All the snakes failed. Matea rolled her eyes again.
Shaking her head Matea, watched a snake sitting on the shoulder of a woman in front of her, bowing its head to pray with her, as if it was her spirit animal. Angry, Matea flicked the snake away with her fingers. The snake looked back at her, shaking its rattle in warning to not interrupt the Mass.
Matea hissed at the snake, glaring at it. Matea felt the velocity of rage rise in her cheeks. She also felt a pinch on her leg from her mother, who heard the hiss leave Matea’s mouth. Matea gave her mother a side look, wishing her mother could see the rattlesnake that wrapped around her rosary beads, sticking its mocking tongue out at the Father like a spoiled teenager.
When Matea believed this trip to church could get no worse, the congregation started singing, and the snakes all swayed along to the music. Matea could hear some of them sing along in high-pitched voices that sounded like abuelas trying to sing opera. The snakes singing was meant to be comical. The snakes always mocked and stirred up whatever trouble they could to get a rise out of Matea. She knew this. So, she averted her eyes and tightly clasped her hands to keep them still. She would not allow them to once again get her in trouble.
The snake she’d flicked suddenly turned its head to look at her. It looked away quickly, focusing on the Father, who continued with Communion, and back at her. Finally, tolerating no more, Matea whispered “What?” to the rattlesnake.
“Our Santa Muerte,” the snake said in a hissing whisper.
“Shut up. Cállate,” Matea responded, but too loudly, alerting Amparo that something was happening with her daughter.
The rattlesnake looked at Amparo with a glint in its eyes then brazenly said, “Glory be Holy Death.”
The other snakes turned to look at Matea, all repeating, “Glory be Holy Death” with a sliver of menace in their tone. The snakes repeated “Glory be Holy Death” over and over, growing angrier with each hiss.
Matea fell to the floor, convinced there were a thousand ants on her skin. Screaming, Matea kicked at whoever had grabbed her feet.
The rattlesnake voices rang out, “Hail the Santisima,” but it sounded not in Matea’s ears but in her throat, choking her.
Someone has her. Someone holds her. She won’t open her eyes. She doesn’t want to look the snakes in the eye, and she doesn’t know why.
“Help me!” Matea screams and in response feels a slap against her face.
She can finally breathe again. Her face stings. Matea opens her eyes to see not her mother, but the Father holding her, his eyes full of tears.
“My child,” he says, placing a gentle hand on her head and smoothing Matea’s hair.
Matea relaxes, hands release her, she sees the Father’s mouth quickly moving in prayer but she does not hear him. Someone beats a drum in the background. There is singing. The song isn’t Spanish. It’s not English. The music is pulling Matea, as if a hand reaches to save her from drowning.
The drum beat and the song twirl together as if dancing partners. The singing is of many people together as one.
The drum beat tells Matea to sleep and that they, her people, will watch over her.
Chapter 3
Calexico, California
Matea 19 years old.
La Casa de Doña Lupe
According to Amparo, Doña Lupe was the closest thing to a living saint on earth. If the sun fell from the sky tomorrow, Doña Lupe is who you would go see. Armed with a few powerful prayers and a white pillar candle, Amparo was sure Doña Lupe could fix the world.
Matea didn’t think that was true, but she liked the old woman. Doña Lupe had always treated Matea with kind words, followed by stern ones.
