The First Soucouyant

Lagahoo

Many years before the events of our story thus far, Ethel fell in love. She had not been Old Ethel back then, simply 'Ethel' or 'Vex Face Ethel'. A young girl with a high waist and a firm backside, round and smooth like a calabash.
She had been a fierce and serious girl, with stormclouds upon her brow and a lips that were set in a determined and perennial pout. And for good reason. Massa De Verteuil and the other whites that hung around the plantation often amused themselves with deflowering the young negro girls as they came of age. Not so with Ethel. Slave as she was, they found that they could never match her gaze, size her up. So they left her well alone.
Even the young, male slaves that toiled with her in the field, full of the muscle that only hard work can provide, found her completely resistant to their advances.

But every man on the plantation, slave and free, black and white, would stare at her as she walked away, her rolling hips making it seem that she was dancing.

"The man to ride that horse ain reach yet." They chorused.
Until one day he showed up.

Louis, the whites called him, a fullblooded African slave from Guinea. He called himself Ayodele, a name meaning "Joy has entered my home". He caught Ethel completely by surprise.

Spectacularly handsome, black as an ackee seed, he seemed to be oblivious to the fact that he was enslaved, but carried himself with the air of one who travelled for pleasure. So charming was his demeanour that even De Verteuil and the overseers seemed to defer to him, tilting their hats in greeting everytime they passed him.

One day he walked up to Ethel, scowling as always, toiling in the canefield.

"I choose you to be my woman." He said.

The rest was history. Ethel herself could never remember exactly how it had happened.
On the day a son was born to them he disappeared. Ethel bore him no grudge. Such men are not meant to stay in one place. Besides, he had given her a reason to smile and had gifted her a son. For that much, she was thankful. De Verteuil and the overseers commented on his disappearance but miraculously raised no alarm. Louis had never truly been their slave, they felt.

The child that was born to Ethel was a beautiful thing, born with a full head of black dreadlocked hair. 'Dada' he would have been called in Africa, his dreadlocked hair symbolizing that he would be able to see and commune with spirits. Ethel named him 'Ayotunde' a name meaning 'Joy has returned'. The whites called him Francis. As fate would have it, it was this name that would come to define who he truly was.

From infancy, Francis showed an uncanny affinity with animals, seeming to relate to them in an almost supernatural manner. Birds would sit in his matted hair, searching for lice, zandolies and iguanas would climb into his lap, rabid dogs would lick his hands lovingly. A black Francis of Assisi he seemed to be, patron saint of all animals. Ethel would watch him playing with his wild friends and smile. But one day he did something that left her paralyzed with fear.

Gamboling with the stray dogs that hung around the plantation, Francis was attempting to bark like they did when something about him shifted. Something was off about the way his feet looked and he barked and slavered from a mouth that had become at least half canine. Ethel beat him that time, commanding him to never do that again, particularly because the risk of being seen by the whites was so high.
Francis, being the child that he was, continued practicing his transformations, sometimes turning into a jackass, braying hilariously to amuse the other slave children as they played among the cane stalks. They would laugh and attempt to climb onto his back. An overseer saw them once and reported it to De Verteuil.

De Verteuil summoned Francis to the big house. Ethel carried him there herself and it was the first time anyone had ever seen her cry. She began to plead for her son, but De Verteuil stopped her with a gesture.