Hekserij

Hekserij by Ciaran R. Maidwell

Clay expected coming out to be more dramatic. No one at school called him any derogatory names or ostracised him from social circles. Walking through the town with his mother, no parents whispered under their breath or crossed the street to avoid them. Instead, everyone was much nicer to him, greeting him by name and nodding their khaki hats in his direction. He knew he should be grateful. n most other places where communities of people like him existed out in the open, they were bullied and murdered for being who they were, even in big cities like Cape Town. His mother had told him that.

Hekserij was a small town in the Karoo with a history of safeguarding women accused of witchcraft. His mother had chosen it specifically for their escape. In her past, she'd faced judgement and persecution for being different - "as if it were a crime to be powerful," she would say. The townspeople welcomed her as a resident towenares, once she promised to use her abilities to bring rain and keep them healthy. They were also terrified of her, she explained; "and fear is power. Other people's fear can be your downfall or your protection. It all depends on how you leverage it."

To make money, his mother sold homemade poultices and tinctures out of a makeshift stand on the stoep of their cottage. A series of looking glasses arranged throughout the house meant she always knew when someone was approaching and could appear right before they rang the bell for help. That little detail seemed to delight and terrify customers in equal measure. Another witch may have felt it beneath her, but his mother liked that it gave her a role in the community. Some of her wares were genuinely magical, while others were simple herbal remedies. The effect was the same: they believed it helped them, and thus it was true.

Clay was 16 when he told his mother (before people had started being weirdly kind to him). They were sitting at the kitchen table, his mother crushing rose geranium between a mortar and pestle while he labelled the tiny glass bottles and homemade ceramic vessels. It was the end of May and the townspeople would soon begin stocking up on the cold and flu remedies.

"Mom," Clay said, setting down a temperature-regulating tincture he had just labelled. "I don't know how to say this."

"Oh God," she put the mortar and pestle down. "You're a Christian, aren't you?"

"Mom, please -"

"This is not how I raised you. I suppose you'll want to burn me at the stake now?" She put the back of her hand to her forehead in mock disbelief.

Clay laughed; "You never take anything seriously."

"Tell me then, what's on your mind?"

"Mom," he took a deep breath. "I like boys."

She smiled at him and laid her hand over his; "I know, my sweet Clay."

"You know? What do you mean? You didn't -"

"I didn't do the mind traversal thing, no. Remember when you were young, you were having dreams about big snakes closing around your neck and emerging from your throat?"

Clay remembered - his mom had told him never to discount a dream. They carried messages, either from your subconscious to your conscious, or from yourself to the world; "You can only hope for a quiet subconscious. Look what happened to Joan of Arc, poor thing," she had said.

His mom had always been obsessed with his dreams. Once, in primary school, he had dreamt of a veld fire in which a small animal was trapped in a circle of flames, hiding beneath a thick brush of fynbos. His mother was convinced it portended the imminent danger of a child in the town. Several weeks later, a house at the edge of town caught fire.

His mother, upon seeing the smoke, rushed over screaming that a child was trapped inside. Side-stepping the firefighters, she cleared a path through the fire with a wave of her hand and dashed in. Moments later, she emerged holding a small, ash-covered kitten. The townspeople clapped benignly as if she had won a friendly chess game.