She suffers too...

“You wouldn’t do that if you really loved me.”

“But, I just had to Mira, I had no choice.”

Aliff remembered the last conservation he had with his ex wife last December. It seems that the month is the month that sky cries a lot. It had been six months since they split, but he still couldn’t get over it. Aliff was deeply in love with Mira, she was his first love, his first high school sweetheart he married to.

It was three years ago when Aliff and Mira were solemnised, he was one of the happiest men on earth. They were blessed with a pair of twins and now since they’ve divorced, Mira took the children with her. Aliff didn’t fight for his kids when their marriage case and custody of children were being settled in Syaria Court. He thought it was useless to raise the kids without a mother, so he just let Mira took over.

Aliff was fired last month for bad attendance and performance at work. He was warned for thrice but he ignored it. He had turned to a complete miserable man after five months his marriage collapsed. He realised that he had lost everything he used to have.

He took a deep breath and stood up from his bed. He walked to a long mirror and told himself that he had gotten skinnier. He could only see bones.

“I still love Mira. Mira. But she moved on. Aliff, why Aliff? Why are you torturing yourself?” He asked himself.

***

There was something infuriated Aliff this morning. A provocation. A provocation that he never thought would hit him. Aliff was working again, he was a mechanic at a car workshop near to his house. Mingling with most guys especially, and to add, same-minded people.

His friend, Johan, suggested him to go to bomoh so he could be with his ex wife again. Johan suggested this because he knew that Aliff was still thinking about Mira and his kids, mostly Mira.

“I know a bomoh from my kampong, I heard about his success of reuniting couples, or making girls you like to fall in love with you. He’s a legit professional. You want to try? ‘Cause I see you’re so sick with your ex wife.”

Aliff gave a killing look to Johan. He was extremely shocked and mad.

“You are nuts. I am still a Muslim. I know my limits. Johan, I thought you were my friend. You are fucking stupid.” He shouted at Johan and threw the wrench he was holding on to the floor. It sounded like a bowling ball fall from the sky and hit the floor. Everyone was looking at them. Stunted.

“Like I don’t know you, Aliff! I fucking know you!” Johan replied but Aliff was leaving the workshop.

***

Aliff couldn’t sleep that night. He remembered how lovely Mira’s hair smelled, her beautiful, sometimes awkward smile she gave to him and her seducing voice and laughter. He missed getting laid with her.

He closed his eyes and what he could see was sweet memories he had with Mira. Aliff and Mira kissed for the first time when they were sixteen, it was behind a school block after school, a sin, a pleasant sin that Aliff thought was fine to commit.

Not a day went by without remembering Mira.

***

Aliff woke up at nine in the morning. He missed fajr, morning prayer again. He had neglected God, his responsibilities as a servant, and mostly, to himself.

After taking a quick shower and putting on his work uniform, Aliff rushed to work with his kapcai motorcycle he bought for RM 250 last month.

It was almost 9.45 a.m when he arrived and saw Johan was fixing a punctured tire of a red Proton Wira. Suddenly Aliff remembered his suggestion about seeing bomoh, this time, he didn’t get raged because he had decided to take Johan’s idea. To bomoh his ex wife.

“Johan, I’m sorry, I was stupid for saying that yesterday.”

Johan didn’t respond, pretending he didn’t hear what Aliff was saying.

“I am sorry, Johan. You hear me? I’m fucking sorry. Now let’s me get something straight. Just bring me to the bomoh you told me yesterday.” He told him, half whispering.

“I thought you were still a Muslim?” Johan asked sarcastically and laughed but before Aliff could interrupt and get mad, Johan added, “but it’s okay if you changed your mind. As long as you have some money, it’d settle.”

“OK.”

***

That night, Johan drove Aliff to the bomoh’s house he told Aliff. Aliff hadn’t had much money to spend on a bomoh’s service, but he just had to. He had barely enough money to eat but he had missed Mira terribly, the urge to be together with her back was high.

The bomoh’s house was fifty minutes from Ipoh, the town they lived and worked. It was in Johan’s kampong but he didn’t even worry if any people saw if he was heading to the bomoh’s house.

They didn’t talk much in the car. One of the questions that played in Aliff’s head was why Johan was willing to help him but he would rather just shut his mouth before Johan changed his mind.

***

Mira grabbed a newspaper on the coffee table in her house. After the divorce, she stayed with her parents because she had no job to support her own kids on her own.

“Two men found dead bloodlessly on a road” was the headline on the day after. Mira didn’t find it interesting until her eyes skimmed on the deceased’s names.

“…victims are Muhammad Johan Bakri and Aliff Osman…”

Mira was shocked that she almost fainted. Her head was dizzy, her eyes started to be watery and at the end, she shouted calling her mom.

After Mira woke up from the faint, she shouted her ex husband’s name, Aliff countlessly. She started to cry after awhile, even though she was comforted by her mother, she couldn’t stop. Then it became worse. She shrieked, like a pontianak. Her kids were watching, their eyes were opened wide, barely understood what was happening.

Mira’s mother tried her best to calm her down. Nothing seemed to work.

That night, Mira’s hair was standing, miraculously, in a strange, scary way. She stopped shrieking, shouting and crying, but she started smiling. Eerily.

Mira’s mother remembered fine, Mira once told her that she had enough with Aliff. It became a question when she acted that way after she knew Aliff’s death. She would be sad that the father to her kids passed away, but it shouldn’t be terrible, as terrible like this.

***

The next morning, Mira’s condition became even worse. She peed around and tried to scratch anyone who came near to her. She laughed hysterically and murmured in a language no one in the house knew.

***

Mira’s mother called an ustaz, to treat Mira. When the ustaz arrived and saw Mira’s condition, he instantly said that she was under a spell. Mira’s mother knew she would have guessed that but she put it down because she hated to accuse anyone for her daughter’s sickness.

The ustaz said that he couldn’t help Mira to threw the demon that was sent to her because he had zero knowledge on it but he told her about a case similar to hers where a mad guy who was obsessed with his ex wife bomoh her, but he died some time after that and his ex wife suffered the same thing Mira was suffering.

The rule of the spell: if the sender dies, the receiver dies too, but slowly…