Ashanti

Chapter 2

Thursday
Father Cassidy’s post funeral dinner.

Ashanti shyly eats the seafood salad offered by Caroline, she notices a large piece of crab meat and pokes it. Once Ashanti prepares herself to take a bite, she feels a crunch. She immediately spits the food out into a napkin and looks at her plate a second time.
It was full of blood and mashed up organs, Ashanti shrieks and slides her plate off the table, causing everyone in the room to stare at her. The earth shattering noise the plate makes is enough to wake Ashanti up from her dream.

She frantically looks around and notices that she’s in her bathroom, taking a bath after a long day. Ashanti feels the slowly burning cigar in her left hand, she slowly brings it to her lips and closes her eyes to take a puff. As soon as Ashanti closes her eyes she sees Father Cassidy’s unconscious body being dissected by her grandmother.
Ashanti reopens her eyes and starts breathing manually, she’s suddenly aware of the bath salts softly scratching her skin. She feels a singular drop of water roll down her nose after she involuntarily dunked her head in the water. Ashanti turns her head and sees her phone playing her favorite RnB idols, the lyrics are distorted since her ears are clogged with bath water.
Ashanti crawls forward to turn off the running water, she slowly turns the knob and hears a child’s scream while doing so. This frightens Ashanti, but she continues to smoke her cigar while cleaning up her bathroom.
Every night, she washes her face before continuing her night routine. Once again, the faucet made the sound of a screaming little girl, this freaks Ashanti out a little more, but she ignores it and dunks her head into the running water. When Ashanti looks up, she sees a horrified little girl standing behind her. She blinks, the little girl is closer, close enough to put her bloody hand on Ashanti’s shoulder before disappearing by the third blink. Ashanti rubbed her shoulder to try and get rid of the blood but to her surprise, there was none.

12:00am

Ashanti reads her bible, after an exorcism, she must read and memorize the exact scripture the “victim” was able to recite, which was the beginning for Father Cassidy. A burned piece of her cigar landed on her bible, and her precious book eventually caught fire.
Ashanti panicked and watched as the fire trailed across  the page, eventually spelling out the letter M.
Ashanti slams her bible shut before reopening it, it was clear, unmarked, Ashanti took this as a sign to go to sleep.

The next morning, there was a funeral.
The funeral was for someone Esther knew while in highschool, Henry P. Shepherd. A dark skinned black man with dreadlocks that reached his ankles, his reason for never cutting them off was simple: “I shall not cut my locs, my lord speaks to me through them and I shall spread is holy word”
Unfortunately, Henry died while in surgery, his doctors found a tumor during his main heart surgery that they couldn’t get out until it was too late.
During the service, Esther forcefully closed the casket despite the family’s wishes to the exact opposite.
What was strange though, the homeless man that witnessed Esther carelessly discard Father Cassidy’s remains never left the church. He successfully disguised himself as one of the family members by using some discarded formal wear he found in the dumpster.  Instead of immediately approaching Esther, he decided to speak to Ashanti after the service was finished.
“It was a lovely service.” The man spoke quietly, but loud enough for Ashanti to hear him and turn around. “My great uncle would be so proud of this”
“I’m glad you enjoyed it, our church offers our deepest condolences.” Ashanti smiles and shakes the man’s hand, unaware of his intentions. “My name is Ashanti, I’m one of the nuns.”
The homeless man hesitates before coming up with a fake name to introduce himself with. “Oliver…Say, I feel like I’ve seen you before…”
“Really? Where?” Ashanti’s eyes practically glow from excitement, she doesn’t talk to many people, and if she does, it’s most likely for the church.
“You live…across from me. Apartment uhh…-” The  man trails off so Ashanti could finish his sentence.
“Apartment 306!” Ashanti gestures for Oliver to sit down in one of the pews, Esther watches the pair from a distance.
“Yes, yes! I’m staying with a friend of mine while I look for a place of my own!” Oliver smiles at Ashanti in a way that makes her smile back.
“I totally get it, finding safe and affordable places is like the needle in a haystack thing! If you need help, feel free to knock on my door! You can also come to our Sunday services!” Ashanti writes her number down on one of the funeral programs.
“Well, I must go, I have a meeting. But I’ll definitely call you.” Oliver squeezes Ashanti’s hand before taking off.
“Bye, Oliver!” Ashanti chirps, practically drooling while watching him walk away with such elegance, when in reality, he was mocking one of the deacons.

“Who was that fellow?” Esther asks, scaring Ashanti.
“That was a nice gentleman, he said his name was Oliver. He also said that Mr. Shepherd was his great uncle.” Ashanti gives Esther the spare programs and walks away to use the restroom, “I think he likes me, mother! You wouldn’t believe how nice he is.”