Recipe for Enemies Read online

  “That’s just a selling point,” Thelma said. “The herb has a lot of uses, and some nasty side effects.”

  “Like seizures, kidney failure, nightmares, dizziness... as well as some others,” the purple-haired woman said. She indicated the bag containing the wax and wormwood. “I put an information flyer in there about the oil. We add those as a courtesy.”

  “What else do we have here?” Thelma put on a pair of glasses that had been hanging around her neck on a gold chain. She peered at the words on the paper, then handed it to her co-worker.

  “Those are all the words that are visible,” Erin said. She hadn’t liked the dark look that had crossed between them.

  Without answering, the woman with purple hair studied the ingredients. “Burnt... oh, my God.” Grimacing, she drew back and dropped the paper onto the counter as if it stung her fingers. “We don’t sell that.”

  “Burnt – what?” Erin looked down at the list. “There’s nothing written there about anything burnt.” But indeed there was, right underneath eye newt. Between this morning at her kitchen table and now, the words had appeared.

  Burnt flesh of sacrificial animal

  Thelma picked up the paper and handed it back to Erin. “Where did you get this?”

  Erin struggled to remain calm under the women’s distasteful expressions. “It’s been passed down over several generations in my family.” She looked at the list. “This ‘burnt flesh’ part wasn’t there this morning.” She didn’t remember having seen this on the list as a child, either. Maybe she’d blocked it out.

  Thelma glanced over Erin’s shoulder as if checking to see if there were any other customers in the store. There were none, but she lowered her voice anyway. “Wormwood oil can be dangerous. And sacrificing an animal is just plain cruelty. I hope you aren’t serious about creating this recipe.”

  “If I were you, I’d burn that paper,” the purple-haired woman said.

  “I plan to,” Erin said with conviction. “Like I said, I was curious. Tell me, what is the significance of sacrificing an animal? It seems so – so archaic.”

  Thelma looked at her for a moment and must have decided she wasn’t a mental case. “Hold on.” She pulled from the lower shelves of the counter a book almost the size of a cinderblock, and grunted as she hauled it up onto the counter’s surface. “You could look for the answer on the Internet, but everyone is an expert and most are dead wrong.” She opened the thick, ornate black-and-gold cover and flipped through pages.

  Finding the page she wanted, Thelma ran her finger down the page and paused, then read, “An animal sacrifice, above all other purposes, signifies one’s determination and intention of demonstrating his beliefs. The sacrifice must be performed with the utmost care to send the animal’s spirit peacefully into the realm of the dead and bring good luck to those involved. The burning of the flesh is carried out over a fire when the moon is at its highest. Even more effective at signifying one’s intention is the burning of—” Thelma paused, then cleared her throat. “The burning of human flesh.”

  Erin recoiled, taking a step back from the counter. “That’s disgusting. And disturbing.”

  “Yes it is,” Thelma said, and closed the book with a thump. “At least there’s an alternative to sacrificing an animal.”

  Erin looked at her. “Yes? What is it?”

  “Road kill.”

  Erin’s made a face. “Ugh. Road kill?”

  “Supposedly it brings the same kind of good luck,” the other woman said. “The fresher it is, the better.”

  “And you can burn it during the day,” Thelma added. “So I’ve heard.”

  “Well.” Not knowing what else to say, Erin placed the recipe back into her purse. “Thank you for your help.”

  Thelma smiled kindly. “I know you said the recipe has been passed down in your family, but please consider destroying it.”

  Erin thanked them again and walked to the door. As she opened it she glanced back to see them both standing stone-faced, watching her.

  Weird.

  She got into her car and pulled onto the road, heading to the grocery store. If she could help it, she’d never step foot in that shop again. Who knew if the women were calling the police right now to report a crazy customer trying to get ingredients to cook up some chocolate-covered animal sacrifice for her enemies?

  CHAPTER FOUR

  At the grocery store Erin paused, eyeing a trash can near the door. It was time, once again, to put this whole notion to rest. Disposing of the recipe here, away from her home, would be a permanent solution and ensure she wouldn’t find it again and question whether she really did get rid of it.

  She reached into her purse and pulled out the old paper, then gazed it a final time, remembering her great-grandmother’s excitement at finding the recipe and running her brittle fingernail down the page as the words fell from her shriveled lips.

  A barely legible word as well as two blotches of ink remained on the paper.

  How tempting it was to wait, to place the recipe back into her purse until the final words revealed themselves in time with her anger. Then, she could decide whether she wanted to make use of it. After all, if anyone deserved the concoction, it was Jessica. Yes, Jessica was her enemy.

  She looked up from the paper and stared, unseeing, out at the parking lot, imagining her husband in Jessica’s arms. Imagined her kissing him. Stroking him.

  Bitch. Erin wanted to kill her.

  “Hi Erin.”

  Erin blinked back to the present and looked toward the source of the voice. Tiffany Brown strode by in tight jeans, sweater and fashionable heeled boots. She trailed behind her a waft of some spicy perfume, probably expensive. Sudden resentment shot through Erin.

  Tiffany, mother of Stacie, who had made the cheerleading squad over Alyssa.

  Tiffany, who had been Erin’s nemesis in high school, both girls competing for a spot on the cheerleading squad and vying for the attention of the same boys.

  Erin and Tiffany had been good friends in school until they discovered they were both fiercely competitive. Then, the gloves had come off.

  But they were both adults now, and although Tiffany had been prom queen and married Tom, the boy Erin had loved, Erin had moved on. She’d married her second choice, David, right out of high school and then set her life on being the best wife and mom she could be.

  “Hi Tiffany,” she said to the woman’s retreating back. She still held the recipe in her hands, and walked over to the trash can without looking at the paper. She supposed another word had now revealed itself with her angry thoughts about Jessica, and now Tiffany. She didn’t dare confirm this for fear of sinking into another hypnotic trance trying to read the remaining ingredients.

  The trash can had a domed orange plastic lid with a circular opening at the top. Erin folded the paper so she couldn’t see the words, then held it over the opening and tore it into small bits, this time watching them fall into the bin. “Sorry, Great-Grandma Clower,” she said out loud. “You were a crazy old bat and you’re not going to affect me anymore.” She put the blame for her obsession with the recipe fully on the long-dead woman. After all, Rosalyn Clower had started all this when she had shown the recipe to Erin years ago. “We mustn’t hurt people,” she continued. “My children hear that from me all the time. I will not cause harm to anyone. No way.”

  “Well, good for you,” came a dry voice with an underlying tone of amusement. Erin turned to see a bent old man shuffling past her on his way into the store. He grinned at her with yellowed dentures.

  Embarrassed, Erin ignored him, fetched a shopping cart, and entered the store.

  She felt none of the wash of relief she’d expected after tearing up the recipe. Instead, she felt empty and lost, as if a ledge she’d been gripping had crumbled like damp rotten wood, sending her down into a dark abyss. The recipe had seemed like an easy solution to deal with the issues surrounding her family. Reality was tougher: she could help Ryan, but could only look
helplessly on as Andrew and Alyssa faced their losses. And her husband? How could she end his affair and make him faithful to her again?

  The problem, she decided as she bagged a couple of cucumbers, was that she didn’t have a backup plan.

  She needed a purpose, a new plan of action. Yes. A fresh new plan involving logic and reasoning, and no bitterness on her part. She’d start with accepting the fact that the twins would find other activities they enjoyed.

  She’d calmly confront David about his affair and tell him to end it.

  She breathed better, knowing she was a good person, a practical, clear-minded woman, in full control of herself.

  In the dairy section, she scanned the prices and brands. Butter had been on her list, she was sure. She grabbed a box, and when she turned to put it into her cart, she spotted Tiffany further down the aisle, staring at the yogurt. The woman was making a show of trying to decide what she wanted, tapping one long, red manicured fingernail on her pursed lips.

  Erin decided to begin her fresh start immediately.

  “How are you, Tiffany?” she asked with a smile, drawing near.

  Tiffany looked at Erin with her beautiful blue eyes. The woman was taller by several inches, emphasized by her three-inch heeled boots. “Doing great, Erin! How are you?” She air-kissed Erin on both cheeks.

  “Fine.”

  Tiffany’s pink lipsticked smile widened. “Isn’t it wonderful about—” She stopped and fluttered a hand near her mouth. “Oh, I’m sorry. I forgot that Alyssa didn’t make the cheerleading squad.”

  “That’s okay,” Erin said. “I’m happy for Stacie.”

  “I am too,” Tiffany said. “She worked so hard to make the squad.”

  “So did Alyssa.”

  Tiffany nodded. “Yes. Well, I suppose not everyone can make it. Maybe if she’d worked a little harder?”

  Erin’s smile froze. “She worked her ass off, Tiffany.” Her voice had taken on an edge. She caught herself. Fresh new start, no bitterness. “I know there are only so many positions open.”

  Tiffany’s smile had cemented as if her lips would break if she moved them. “Yes, there are. And the judges picked the best girls for those positions.” She turned to the yogurt again and selected several to put into her basket. “Well, I’ve got to get home. Stacie is having the other cheerleaders over to roast marshmallows over a campfire in the back yard and then swim in our indoor pool. Great seeing you.”

  “And you.”

  Tiffany moved past her. Erin watched the woman’s shapely figure and gorgeous black hair, still flowing over her shoulders like it had in high school. Tiffany was aging well. Erin, however... she touched her ponytail, mousy brown now instead of the golden blonde it had once been. She glanced down at her slightly protruding stomach under sagging breasts.

  Not aging well wasn’t her fault. She hadn’t had time to take care of herself while raising three children. Good mothers didn’t think about themselves. They always put their children and husband first.

  Tiffany was still the same selfish bitch she’d been in high school, though. She’d divorced her husband and collected child support. She’d probably had sex with the male judge who had scored the cheerleading tryouts.

  Suddenly, all the reasons Alyssa was unhappy, the reasons she hadn’t made the squad, seemed to fall on Tiffany’s firm-looking shoulders. This was all her fault.

  Something shoved its way into Erin’s mind, a torrent of hateful thoughts and images that flooded her head as if delivered by a powerful injection. Images of Tiffany’s face slamming into the dashboard on her way home because she wasn’t wearing her seatbelt, crushing that pink lipsticked smile she only wore to emphasize her dark blue eyes. Images of Tiffany’s long hair catching on fire as she poked at the campfire to get the flames going again.

  The thoughts left as quickly as they’d come. Erin stood leaning on the handle of her cart, head down. She felt ragged, worn, but at the same time strangely cleansed, as if her psyche had just been turned inside out and the dust shaken into the wind.

  Where had all of those thoughts come from? They must have been buried deep inside for years.

  So much for having no bitterness.

  Erin finished her shopping as quickly as possible, hoping Tiffany had left the store. She almost felt like she needed to apologize for what had been going through her mind even though she was still angry at Tiffany’s words.

  Later, she pulled up outside the house, grabbed the bags of groceries, and took them inside. She set them on the counter, then paused. She’d left the house with the intention of driving to Ryan’s school to speak to the principal. The sight of the herb shop had distracted her. Then she’d ended up at the grocery store.

  She blew out a breath. It wasn’t like her to forget about what she was doing or where she was going. Again she considered there could be a serious issue with her brain. An appointment with her doctor was in order. First things first, though. She reached into her purse to grab her cell phone to call the principal, either to speak to him directly or to arrange a conference.

  Her fingers brushed paper.

  Erin stiffened and froze with her hand in her purse. Holding her breath, she pulled out the paper.

  Relief filled her. It wasn’t the recipe. She held the grocery list, the one she thought she’d left on the table, picking up the recipe by mistake. She must have dropped both pieces of paper into her purse on her way out the door.

  She scanned the list to see if she’d forgotten anything while shopping. There was milk and butter, and cucumbers and potatoes – she’d gotten all those, plus more items that hadn’t been on the list.

  But then, further down, she’d written more words. Chocolate. Paraffin wax. Eye newt. Burnt flesh of sacrificial animal.

  Wormwood had been crossed out and replaced by salvia, a word written larger than the rest and circled so heavily that the pen had ripped through the paper in places.

  And then, another ingredient.

  Blood.

  And at the bottom of the paper: After complete, recite the intention.

  “What the hell,” she said out loud.

  This wasn’t happening. She’d torn up the old recipe without seeing the rest of the writing, yet here were the items, written on her grocery list. There was no other explanation than she must have seen the other words, or at least imagined what they could be, and now she had the complete recipe with no memory of having written it down.

  She looked again at the instructions. Reciting the intention must mean her purpose for giving out the chocolaty burnt sacrifice. When it came down to it, the purpose was to make her family happy.

  Curiosity filled her, sudden and unexpected and strong enough to further smash her plan of a fresh new start with no bitterness. Suddenly it didn’t matter that she’d attempted to get rid of the recipe over and over and that it had shown back up each time.

  She wanted to research the ingredients and buy them. She was even willing to find some road kill to cook. Especially intriguing was wormwood changing to salvia. Why? Did it have something to do with her emotions?

  She wanted to create the recipe. Perhaps the act of making it would help her feel she had done something about helping her family. Then she could throw it away and forget about it.

  But she knew she wouldn’t. She wanted to try it out on Jessica first. And then Tiffany.

  Erin put everything away except for the chocolate, which she hid in the butler’s pantry in a tarnished silver serving bowl. If the children found it, they’d be clamoring about when she was going to make a chocolate dessert. But of course, this dessert wasn’t for them.

  Another shopping trip was necessary in order to complete the supply of ingredients. She’d stay away from Thelma’s Herbs, though. Those women would ask her questions if she bought the salvia from there. Perhaps she could order the items online.

  She went to the desktop computer in the den and started it up. The computer was fairly new and fast, used by the kids for writing th
eir essays and doing projects for school, so within a couple of minutes she was on an Internet search site, typing in the ingredients from the recipe. She didn’t find a site that offered the recipe in whole – which was probably a good thing – so she began a search for the individual ingredients.

  Eye of newt was indeed mustard seed. Funny how the term had sounded so sinister in Macbeth. She had some eye of newt in her spice rack.

  All she would need to acquire, then, was a piece of oak, a dead animal, leaves from the salvia plant, and blood. Mix all that with the paraffin and chocolate, and she really might have a recipe made for one’s enemies.

  A branch off the old oak tree in the back yard would do for a piece of wood to burn.

  Finding salvia leaves on the Web was easy enough. She read about its effects to be sure it wasn’t poisonous. It wasn’t, but it could cause hallucinations or confusion when ingested. Overall, she felt it wouldn’t be a problem. She ordered the smallest size – a six-ounce bag.

  She typed buy blood in the search bar.

  She didn’t think anyone would have a need to buy blood, but there it was: bottled lamb’s blood, cow’s blood, pig’s blood.

  She scanned the list of websites. Discussions abounded on vampires, whether they were real and if they needed to ingest human blood. Then she saw several sites with recipes using blood. She clicked one at random and read about black pudding, a kind of sausage made with pig’s blood and spices, and thickened with a filler like oatmeal so that it congealed.

  In another recipe, dried blood was recommended instead of fresh pig’s blood, if fresh was unavailable. Glad to not have to deal with a bottle of liquid blood – the bottle might break open in the mail and she’d have a mess when opening the box – she ordered a bag of dried blood.

  The toughest part about this recipe would be gathering road kill. She pictured herself stopping by the side of the road and snatching up a dead groundhog or possum, and willed away nausea.