What can I say? Her Craigslist ad caught my eye: “Love Spells by Elvira—Find Your Soulmate in 48 Hours.”
I laughed at first, but I’ll admit, I was intrigued.
Besides, I’d been single since Myra left me, and my love life was drier than toenails in the Mojave sun. Still, I doubted the spell would work.
Would it?
What the hell, I thought, reaching for the phone. What do I have to lose?
__
I ducked into the corner studio as the wind whipped, and leaves tumbled across the rain-slicked streets. Tiffany lamps and crystals glittered in the window, and the name Elvira flashed in neon lights.
A beaded door curtain whooshed and rattled as I pushed through the entrance.
“Micah,” I told the receptionist, keeping my voice low, relieved to see no one I knew.
Moments later, Elvira appeared, bedecked in red velvet and turquoise rings. She was short, mid-sixties, and stout, her unruly gray curls sprouting in all directions.
“Welcome.” She smiled, then led me down a maroon-lit hallway.
The smell of patchouli assaulted my nose as I entered the reading room and sat at a mahogany table piled with crystal balls, amethysts, and New Agey trinkets.
Am I really doing this? I thought.
Elvira sat beside me, then flipped on a nature soundtrack. Ocean waves crashed and sighed and birds warbled through the gemstone-shaped speakers as the love guru took my hand.
“We’ll start with a meditation to summon the love spirits.”
I choked back a laugh but listened.
Elvira took a deep breath, then lowered her voice. “Love spirits, we call upon thee to lead Micah to love and passion.”
After another breath, Elvira struck a match, lighting more patchouli incense sticks. The smoke curled into slow, sleepy spirals and drifted into my nostrils as I coughed and swatted at the smoke.
Elvira tightened her grip, her voice deepening as she continued. “Love spirits, I ask you to lead Micah to love and passion! Let him find love now!”
She waved her arms in elaborate figure-eights like a magician conjuring ancient spirits. “Let Micah find his soulmate! Bring him all the love his heart desires!”
She flailed her arms again, then released my hand.
Afterward, she spun toward me. “Alrighty,” she said, her voice returning to normal. “You should see results in two days. Maybe sooner. Call if anything goes wrong.”
I frowned. “Goes wrong?”
“It’s rare, but some people want the spell reversed.” She glanced at her watch, so I didn’t press further. Instead, I thanked her and left.
Minutes later, my cell phone rang. I didn’t check the number before answering, but I almost wrecked when a familiar voice replied.
“Remember me?”
Myra?
“How the hell are you?” I blurted out.
So much for nonchalant.
We hadn’t spoken in years; last I’d heard, she was married.
“Rick and I divorced,” she said as I suppressed a smile. “I know this sounds crazy, but you’ve been on my mind.”
Her voice quivered, sounding unlike the confident college girlfriend I almost married.
“Wanna have dinner?” I asked.
__
It was the first real meal I’d cooked in ages, but I couldn’t deny how much I’d missed her as we reminisced over homemade linguini and wine.
“It’s weird, but you just popped into my mind,” she said.
I held her hand. “I’m glad you called.”
We stayed in touch after that night but agreed to take things slow. Plus, Myra had broken my heart before.
But around that time, phone calls from other women started pouring in—dinner and date requests, invitations to movies—and my phone rang nonstop. I even had to turn off my ringer.
Women from the bakery, coffee shop, and even the laundromat called. Some women looked up my phone number online, including a drug store cashier I barely recalled meeting.
Did I even tell her my name?
“I have to see you again,” she said, her voice bursting with strange energy.
Is this a joke? I wondered. Is Elvira messing with me?
But how could Elvira know about Myra? I hadn’t mentioned her name, and I avoided social media.
Whatever the reason, I had to face it: I was now in high demand, but I wasn’t sure I liked it. Women called daily and competed for my attention, but I only wanted Myra. And while I was reasonably attractive, I was an average guy, not some heartbreaker. So all the attention felt—weird.
Like the time a lady shoved a woman out of her subway seat to sit beside me.
“Move, bitch!” she said, shoving her rival onto the floor.
Or the time a fast food cashier ignored a crowd of hungry customers so she could flirt with me.
“Let me buy you a coffee,” she said, eyeing me like a prime rib as customers shook their fists.
Even my buddies Carmine and Steve called more often.
But what surprised me most was how Myra changed. Although I enjoyed her attention, her hostility toward my admirers stunned me. Besides, I only wanted to be with her.
“Get it through your thick skull, honey,” Myra shouted at a random woman one night.“ He’s not interested.”
That wasn’t the Myra I remembered. Still, I didn’t blame her.
As the weeks passed, date requests and marriage proposals poured in with alarming frequency, and my phone rang around the clock. I even changed my number without success. I’d gently let the other women down, but nothing deterred them. And the more I pulled back, the harder they fought.
I never expected the spell to work. And even if it did work, it was only supposed to attract one soulmate, not all women.
What have I done? I wondered.
But more trouble loomed ahead.
__
The real problems began with Penelope, the drug store cashier. She called daily, even after I told her I was seeing someone. If anything, Penelope doubled down, chasing harder, after that.
“It’s me again,” Penelope said in her seventh voicemail one night. “Stop dodging my calls, honey. I need to see you.”
She sounded nervous—hungry—like an addict jonesing. One rejected call away from a breakdown.
A million thoughts raced through my mind: What do I do? Should I reverse the spell? But what if I lose Myra?
I was backed into a corner.
But Penelope wasn’t my only problem. As time passed, other women followed suit, pursuing me with more ferocity, and I felt like a hunted deer, defenseless in the wild.
One day, a woman I’d met at the laundromat raced after me as I left work.
“Micah!” she said, chasing me through a busy intersection as a taxi screeched to a halt.
“Why won’t you call me back?”
I sprinted through the parking garage, dodging her.
Enough is enough, I decided.
Talking to the women didn’t work. Nothing worked. So I did the next best thing and sped off. But the woman flagged a cab and followed me home.
At home, I paced across the living room, contemplating my next move, as the woman pounded at the door.
“I see you!” she shouted. “Open up!”
I called the police, my last resort.
“Sir, we can’t do anything if she hasn’t robbed you or damaged property,” said the compassionless policeman.
“So someone has to destroy my house or die before you’ll do something?”
“Correct,” he said, chomping on something crunchy.
I growled and slammed down the phone. Meanwhile, the unknown woman kept pounding on the door.
Before long, another woman joined her. And another, until seven women stood on my porch shouting and pounding on the door. One lady hurled eggs, and another threw a rock at my living room window, prompting another call to the police.
“Dude, they’re throwing eggs and rocks. Can you come now?”
Police arrived hours later, and the angry mob dispersed.
But how long until they returned?
I had to do more; I called Elvira.
“Let’s see what we can do,” she said after I arrived at her studio to reverse the spell.
She held my hand, lit the incense, and recited the reversal spell. But this time, she stopped mid-chant.
She paused, then frowned as she squeezed her eyes shut and communed with unseen forces.
“What’s happening?”
Elvira looked at me, sympathy flooding her eyes. “I’m sorry, but the love spirits won’t listen.”
“What do you mean?” My heart thumped. “What do they want? More money?”
But she shook her head. “Sometimes they don’t cooperate; unfortunately, this is one of those times. They won’t reverse the spell.”
“Why not?”
She shrugged. “I wish I knew. Sometimes, the spell works too well, but once a crush turns to obsession, there’s nothing you can do. And this spell has made these women obsessed. Let’s just hope the same doesn’t happen to Myra.”
My heartbeat doubled, threatening to burst from my chest.
Elvira put her hand on mine, then said. “My advice? Hide.”
__
Afterward, I checked my cell phone: sixty-seven missed calls in one hour.
All from Myra.
I played the voicemails, my hands trembling: “Micah, it’s been an hour.
Where are you?”
Uh-oh.
I fast-forwarded to the next message: “What’s going on, Micah? Call me.”
And the next message: “Micah, if you keep ignoring me, you’ll be sorry.”
And more calls flooded in.
I raced home, packed a bag, and followed the first idea that popped into my head. I drove for what felt like eternity, then checked into a sparsely occupied roadside motel in a remote town. I parked in a back alley behind a dumpster.
After I checked in, I called the phone company and changed my phone number, giving my new number and location to no one but my boss.
No one can reach me now.
I sighed, relieved, as I peeled back the drapes, feeling calmer for the first time.
Shadows danced under the crimson sky before the moon and stars moved in, and visions of the future I almost had with Myra whirled through my head.
I kicked off my shoes, sprawled out on the rock-hard bed, and ordered a pizza.
Minutes later, a knock sounded at the door. I opened it, looking down as I searched my wallet. But I froze when a familiar voice greeted me.
“Hey Micah.”
Myra’s eyes gleamed as she stood in the doorway, and a cold smile crept across her lips. “Did you really think I’d give up so fast?”