Witches Don’t Burn

by Alejandra Baccino

Val opened her eyes to the darkness. She could feel the dampness in her entire body, as she waited for her eyesight to adjust so her senses would acclimate even more. It was damp, but not wet. There was a very distinct smell of soil. Despite waiting for a few seconds, everything was still dark, the darkest she’d ever experienced. She suddenly became scared, forgotten. What bothered her most was the sweet smell of something she could not quite identify, but associated with death.

She slowly began moving her hands, her legs. Her body was stiff; her muscles sent shooting pains up her spine. With a lot of patience, she was able to make some room to breathe. It was not an easy task. If she moved a bit too much, the dirt fell on her face.

“Calm down. Breathe,” she said to herself, though her voice was coarse and barely recognizable. She didn’t let this worry her. There were more urgent matters at hand.

After a few attempts, taking her time at moving the dirt above her, trying not to get it in her eyes and nose, she managed to sit up a bit. After a few seconds of relief from changing positions, she felt a shooting pain in her rib that almost made her pass out again. That was one of the many broken ribs she had.

Her fingers bled, and yet she persisted. Her eyes burned from the dirt. Her entire body shouted in protest. More than a few times – when she stopped to rest – she thought about giving up. She wouldn’t have to do anything. In fact, she just had to do nothing. Stay there, breathe slowly until she ran out of air, and pass on to a new life…

“No!” she shouted in thought, suddenly coming to her senses again. So much had been taken away from her already, nobody was taking her life as well.

After a few more hours, she felt the crisp air. The feeling was indescribable – like life itself – freedom, independence. But the lingering feeling was that of uncertainty and fear.

She dug herself out. It took quite a while for her eyes to adjust. It was very dark. The moon was nowhere to be seen and all she could make out was a very dense forest. Not even the sky was visible. She wished she could see the stars, which had always given her peace and comfort.

“What´s that!?” she thought as she turned to where she’d seen the shadows. Nothing there. She wasn’t even sure that what she’d seen had been real. Everything felt so wrong.

She summoned all her courage, more than she ever thought she had, and got up.

“What is this?” she asked aloud, trying to understand. Now that she was out of immediate danger, she realized that she couldn’t remember how she’d ended up in a hole in the dirt.

(A grave).

“What am I talking about? That’s no grave. I probably passed out and fell over…”

(Oh, really?)

That nagging little voice again.

“Fine, I’ll deal with that later,” she said aloud again, as if trying to exert some sort of authority over her own mind. “I need to get myself out of here first.”

She checked her wounds and the rest of her body. Despite a sore throat and what seemed to be a few broken ribs, she didn’t find anything else. She felt slightly relieved.

Val sat down again. She was tired after the whole ordeal and tried to figure out where she was exactly. At first, she didn’t recognize anything. All was black; the soil was dirt; and she was surrounded by trees.

“I don’t even know if I’m in my own district anymore,” she sighed, “but where else could I be?”

As she acclimatized to the darkness, she started noticing a few things. She ran the dirt through her fingers and realized that it was part dirt and part sand, so she wondered if she could be close to the coast. She then focused on listening, trying to ignore the crackling of whatever creature was out there. She thought she heard waves.

“Maybe I’ve really gone crazy,” she tried to laugh, but couldn’t avoid feeling hopeful.

She refocused and started walking towards the sound. She’d grown up with that sound. The sea had furnished some of her happiest memories growing up. Having fun on the beach with her entire family, playing tejo and football, if her older cousins let her, and jumping up and down in the waves. At first, she’d held her grandma’s hand, but after a few years she’d put an end to it because she was almost a grown-up. Then came the first summers she was allowed to go have fun with friends in the afternoon and gossip about what was going on in town. As she grew older, she bonded differently with the sea, confiding in the hopes and fears she couldn’t entrust to anyone, and taking the rough waves of winter as signals.

The sea would also be the last witness.

After a few minutes of walking without really knowing where she was going, but knowing she had to go somewhere, she smelled the salt. That crisp salty wind comforted her as it chased the humidity. So much so that she started crying. She sat for a minute contemplating the vast darkness on the horizon before looking at her surroundings. She believed she was close to her house. Deep in her gut, she felt she recognized the shape of the trees and the familiar shadows created by the moonlight she had once feared as a child. She yearned for that kind of fear, where she knew she could run back to her house and the safety of her granny’s arms.

“That makes sense, I probably wandered off distracted and fell into the hole.”

(Grave)

She shook her head and started walking home.

Val heard some barking in the distance, but there were a lot of stray dogs and families whose dogs slept outside to ward off burglars. She was accustomed to that, but she noticed a seemingly strange number. A large number. The barking was getting louder.

If you grew up where she did, you’d learned (sometimes the bad way) not to mess with stray dogs. She walked slowly, trying not to scare them, and to see as much as possible.

A few minutes later, she realized that the dogs were accompanied by people with flashlights.

“What happened?” she asked aloud.

(They’re looking for you.)

“Me?!” she replied to the voice inside her head, which was becoming more and more annoying. “Well… I just woke up in a hole…

(grave)

…with fractured ribs… It does make sense.”

“Valentina!” “VALENTINA!” she heard loud and clear.

Something didn’t feel right… something felt very off.

Suddenly Valentina recognized a familiar shape. It was the shape of the shoulders, the head slightly tilted forward, and the clumsy gait she had mocked so many times for as long as she could remember. She was afraid to move, afraid to find out what was going on.

It took all her strength to start walking. She didn’t think about anything else. As always in life, her grandma was North for her; she walked straight towards her.

“Val!” “Where are you?” “Val!” More and more voices joined those first ones until it became an echo of an echo. She knew something was very wrong, she could feel it in her core.

As she got closer to the group, she also saw her mom and her brother. All looking terribly scared. She thought she caught a glimpse of her boyfriend (ex-boyfriend, right), ex-boyfriend, and she felt shivers run down her spine.

“Mom?” “Gran?” “Are you looking for me?” Valentina spoke loudly, and in disbelief. She had to raise her voice. However, disbelief turned quickly into uncertainty and even more quickly into fear.

“I am here! Can’t you all hear me?”

One by one, the search party walked past her, immersed in their own thoughts and fears.

“Where is she… she’s never done this before,” her mother thought. “She knows to always get back home at some point.” She didn’t want to be overwhelmed by fear, but she realized something was very wrong. She was aware that she’d have to live with that for the rest of her life.”

Val couldn’t take it anymore… why were they looking for her and ignoring her? She had done nothing wrong! She still couldn’t remember how she’d ended up in the dirt (6 feet under) by the beach on a cold, and windy night.

*   *   *

I don’t want to go to work! I want to sleep forever!  Well, not forever… knock on wood.

I’m really not a morning person. After getting a job, I thought I wouldn’t have to do this anymore, but here we go again. And I also hate the cold. The cold, the winter, getting up early.

As I made the supernatural effort to get out of the comfort and warmth of my bed, I couldn’t help but think about Val. We’d been great friends at one point… until we weren’t.

I put the toast in the toaster and went to have a quick shower. As usual, I used up all the hot water. I liked living alone and being able to do this, not having to make excuses about the length of my hair or explaining that it had a soothing effect on me, to be able to withstand that. As I saw it, it was an enjoyable kind of pain, like tattoos. How can you explain that to someone who doesn’t feel it the same way, without them thinking you belong in a mental hospital?

As I stepped out of the shower, I looked at the reflection in the mirror. I looked like crap. I could see some fine lines starting to form in the corners of my eyes and a few gray hairs I would unpluck when they became too evident. The concealer would not cover these dark circles anymore.

I went to the kitchen and poured some freshly made coffee. I sat next to the window, deciding not to turn on the TV. I knew all the news would be about Val. Maybe if I had… No. I interrupted my own thoughts, don’t go there.

I knew the dark circles were there because of her. I knew my sleepless nights, or the nightmares – whenever I managed to fall asleep out of exhaustion – were because of her. I missed her, and there were so many things I would want to say to her right now.

Eventually, I turned on the TV.

Another recap of my town… the one I had left years ago and never went back to. Seeing it instantly brought me memories of a happy childhood and a not-happy adolescence. I had sworn to never go back.

There she was on the news. Her candid eyes and her big smile. I could not help but curl my lips.

I remember the first time we met. We were still in college, and I had been so nervous and self-absorbed in exams that I didn’t notice anyone other than my closest friends. Over the last years, as we followed the same career path, we became close. She had a way of being there for you, without making you feel like you needed it. Like those people that just hug you because they say they need a hug, but knowing deep down that it’s you that needs it, and you are super thankful for that.

After many turns around the sun in which we laughed, had fun, shared our deepest secrets, and navigated through life, she met him.

Still missing. Damn. This is why I didn’t want to turn on the TV. Ignorance is bliss after all, and now I was faced with the fact that had been two days since she had gone missing. I feared the worst. Never in a million years would she do that to her family, especially not her grandma.

“Thirty-six-year-old woman from Maldonado still missing. Search party organized tonight between friends and family, in cooperation with the police,” – the lady from the news was announcing.

I hope they find her. Whatever happens, I hope they find her.

“It has to be a dream,” Val thought. “A really crappy dream.” She knew it wasn’t a thought. She didn’t think she could ever conceive of the anguish she’d seen in her grandmother’s face. It was impossible to describe the pain it caused her, seeing her gray hair, her frail and loving grandma like that. She just wanted to hug her and tell her she was fine; they could all go back to the house now! But they were like zombies, shouting for her, without seeing she was right in front of them.

“Mari? What is she doing here?”

She had a bittersweet feeling. They’d been such great friends for so many years, but then they drifted apart, and she felt Mari always blamed her for that.

She stood right in front of her and said “Marimar!” that’s what she used to call her. “Mari!”  For a second, she thought she saw Mari’s eyes flicker in recognition. Mari stopped, looked around, and then continued walking with her head down, focusing only on the shadows of her flashlight.

Val heard a chuckle a bit to the left. A very short, familiar, chuckle. It felt so out of place in this somber group of people. She looked back at Mari, and she could see her anger. She knew both had recognized that chuckle. Val followed Mari’s gaze, full of hatred, and her eyes fell on him. Mari fixated on her boyfriend (ex-boyfriend). If many things can be said with just one look, then Mari had written an entire book.

It all came back to her in a flash.

The right fist punching her ribs. The hair-pulling. His hands on her neck, pressing, closing her airways, the fright, the desperation, the disbelief… and the understanding. Everything in recent years had gotten her to where she was now, to where they all were.

Val? What… Val? No, it can’t be. I must be going crazy. Nobody else is looking puzzled, nobody else could have heard her. Isn’t that her perfume? What is happening?

Chuckles? Not only do you have the guts to come here, but you chuckle. How can you find anything even remotely funny right now?

You cannot even look at me, can you? You know I know, and I don’t know how, but I’m going to make sure you pay for it.

Yes, pretend to be desperate. I can see behind your mask, I always could… even if people called me crazy.

*   *   *

“Mari! I’m here! He did it!”

“You have to find me!”

Val knew that somehow Mari had heard her the first time, or maybe detected her presence. She didn’t know how any of this worked. She guessed she would figure it out eventually, but she knew stranger things had happened.

She wished she could cry. But tears didn’t come.

She felt helpless. As helpless as she’d been when she took that last breath of air. How she wished she could go back in time and do everything differently. Move out of the town, live her life, travel.

It was all she could do for now as she tried to put together what had happened.

The search party was called off for the night. It was already too cold, too late, and people were starting to lose hope.

I think that guy is signaling that the search is over for today. I should go and say something to her mom and granny. They look devastated.

The nights are too cold. I don’t think anyone would be able to survive a few days. I just hope she’s disconnected from the world, that she finally realized she had to leave, and she didn’t know how, so she just left. Val, I hope you made it. I hope you are somewhere safe, far from all this, and warm.

I’m here! He did it!

Ugh… that feeling again. It’s like someone else is in my head. I think I need a glass of wine; I’m getting an itchy feeling; something is not right.

“Oh! Sorry! Didn’t see you.”

“Hi, Mariana. It’s okay, I guess we are all very distraught these days.”

“I think I can’t hold down the nausea! Excuse me!”

There’s a tree, go! Oh my, I hate throwing up. That hypocritical, abusive liar… That same feeling again. Something is not right. I’ve worked as a nurse for too many years not to understand that some things have no explanation. It’s like right after a patient leaves this realm, they linger for a while, and you feel their presence. This is too familiar. (He did it.)

That voice again… is it my subconscious? Is he Val’s boyfriend? Is that why I suddenly got sick? I know he hates me; he knows I always disliked him because of how he treated Val. And that was even before things got worse and I stopped talking to her. I couldn’t stand it anymore. His charm may have worked on everybody else, but I’m immune to him. If only I had something to start…

“LISTEN TO ME! I’M SERIOUS!”

What was that? Did I hear that? Why does it seem nobody else did? I knew this whole thing had affected me quite a bit but… to the point of hearing voices?

“MARI! IT’S ME, VAL. I DON’T UNDERSTAND ANY OF IT EITHER, BUT IT’S ME. I NEED YOU TO HELP ME!”

Val? I don’t understand. How can I know it’s you and not me going crazy? Who am I even talking to? I need to get out of here. I’ll walk back home.

About 15 minutes later, the wind had settled, and the voices of the search party had vanished. Val knew she had somehow connected with Mari, and she would not waste this opportunity. She looked at her mom and granny one last time and turned the other way. She had understood that she was not coming back from this, but she hoped, at least, to make sure the person responsible for causing all this pain would pay.

“Mari, I need your help. Please, trust me.”

That voice again. How difficult it is not knowing whether you can trust your mind.

“Val? Is that really you? Where are you? Should I speak aloud, or can you read my thoughts?”

“It’s me, yes. I don’t know, I don’t think I can read your thoughts, no. I’m so glad you can hear me!” Val said in excitement, forgetting for a second where she was.

“What happened? Where are you? Are you…” Alive. I cannot even finish that sentence.

“I don’t know, Mari… I don’t think I am. I woke up a while ago in what looked like a… grave, on the beach, and it’s like I’m a ghost, nobody sees me, nobody, except you, hears me. But I’m in pain, my whole body hurts, my ribs, my throat…” Val was trying to explain as much as she could in the shortest time possible, afraid that, somehow, the connection would break.

“Do you know where? On the beach, I mean. And… do you remember who?” – I was sure he did it, but I needed to hear it from her.

“Yes, I think that by tomorrow the search party will find me. I’m right under the old eucalyptus tree we used to talk under, down the road from the mini market. You need to be with my granny when they dig me up. You need to let them know I am fine. Please.” Val started sobbing even though no tears rolled down her face. How could someone feel so much pain and be unable to let it all out?

“I will, Val, I promise. I don’t think I’ll be able to stand it, but I will.”

“Thank you. And I’m sorry.” There was so much to say, and yet it was not the time. Or maybe it was just too hard.

“It was him, wasn’t it? That’s why I kept hearing ‘He did it’ in my head.”

“Yes,” Val replied succinctly, but it was loaded with so much regret, understanding, and despair. She knew how many times her friends had warned her, had tried to help her out, had even fought with her over falling for his charm and manipulative tactics.

“None of that matters now, Val. You are the kindest and most open-hearted person I ever met. Even though I was so mad at you for falling for his tricks, I also admired you for believing in the good in others, even after they showed you their darker side. What matters now, is that he pays for what he did.”

“I don’t remember much. The details are a bit blurry,” slowly things from that final night started coming back to her, but Val’s mind was still foggy, and some details did not make much sense yet.

“It’s okay. Walk me through what you remember, and we’ll put it together.”

For the next couple of hours, they went over and over all the details Val could remember, piece by piece, as she tried to get the whole story straight, and, most importantly, to figure out what would be helpful for eventual prosecution. This was tricky because they needed to be very careful. If Mari knew too much, she would be the prime suspect when they found Val’s body.

Val recalled how they met, their first dates, and how caring he was. She had fallen head over heels for him.

Like most young adults, they were all working, moving to other cities, some even starting their own families, so Val and Mari slowly drifted apart.

After a while, however, not meeting stopped being a matter of scheduling. Instead, it became: He didn’t want her to go out; he felt lonely; he wanted them to be together; she was a whore who was seeing other men. That was the first punch. Val swore that there was nobody else; she had eyes only for him; and he was the only one she loved. After that, the abuse became obvious. Her friends turned into acquaintances, and whenever she would visit her family, he was with her. He just loved her too much!

Many people tried to intervene and convince her, but slowly, seeing their failure, they eventually gave up. After the first miscarriage, she went to the police. She must have done something to provoke him, they said. A couple of months later, she went again to file a restraining order. The judge granted it, but her ex owned the town. He was so charming, and it was such a small town. She couldn’t expect him not to leave his house to avoid running into her. Young love, they even called it.

Val continued her story. There were so many warnings, so many chances to stop this from happening if someone had listened to her and done something. Not the empty promises, not the male camaraderie.

“I had finally left him. I told him I didn’t want to be with him, and I was moving away. I was back with mom for a few weeks to get my things and figure out where to go. He called me that day, from a new number, since I had blocked his old one. He was very calm and understanding. He apologized profusely and said he’d been an idiot, that he knew he’d hurt me. He seemed so real. I felt that this had been the person I’d fallen in love with. That person was still in him. He told me he had accepted that I was going to leave, but he wanted to see me one last time, to say farewell and not part in resentment. To be honest, I wanted, I wanted to feel that he couldn’t control what he’d done to me, that it was all because of his upbringing, that he was not a monster protected by the likes of his own. Also, I was afraid of what he might do to my mom and gramma once I left. So, I agreed to meet him.”

Despite Mari’s silence, Val could sense she was quietly listening to her story. So, she took a deep breath and continued. This part was going to be the hardest.

“We met right after noon. The day was quite nice, but only a few people were out and about. I remember that we stopped by the mini market to buy cigarettes and ran into Sofia, the hairdresser. Yes, she saw us both, and we discussed the weather and told her we were going to the beach,” Val added, anticipating Mari’s question.

“There was nobody on the beach, except a few people kite surfing, but they must have been too far out to see anything. We sat down and started talking, quite politely and pleasantly. I was fairly happy; I remember thinking how mature we were. The next second, though, he started blaming me for the miscarriage, adding that the baby was probably not even his, accusing me of being a whore… and he just snapped. I was trying to reason with him, but he became that person I guess he knew to keep under control and unleash only when it was just the two of us.”

Val stopped for a second to let this sink in for both of them. She knew what was coming, her mind was clear now, and she knew that saying it out loud would make it real. She needed to do it.

“I tried to run, and I tried to yell, but I only managed a drowned-out gasp. He punched me a few times in the ribs and left me gasping for air, and then he choked me with his own hands. I remember looking at him and knowing that was it. Like in the movies, I always believed that you see a short film of your life when you are dying, but I didn’t get that. Maybe because I didn’t die… I was killed.

The weight of the words lingered in the air, and neither of them dared to break the silence.

If they were going to get justice for Val, and maybe even others, they needed to be able to carry the weight of the words and shout them if need be. Val had not died; it had not been a passive action. She’d been killed; she’d been murdered for daring to take back her life. She’d been murdered for being a woman. She’d been murdered by a man who, if he couldn’t have her, nobody else could. As so many others, in all other places, she’d been a victim, not only of a man, but of a society and a judicial system that worries more about not disrupting the status quo than educating the perpetrators and accomplices and protecting the victims.

They cannot tell their story themselves, so we tell it for them. All the Marianas, Alejandras, Javieras, Brunas, Lindseys, Despinas, Ammas, Zahraas, and more; all the mothers, sisters, aunts, friends, grandmothers and granddaughters across the world, every year, we carry the burden in our hearts and the responsibility in our heads to fight for justice and fight for a system that truly treats us all as equals.

*   *   *

March 8, 2024.

After a long tedious trial, Val’s killer was convicted. The case had caused so much outrage that after the evidence and testimonies had been gathered, the court quickly determined Val’s boyfriend was the murderer. The crime was femicide. The sentence, however, fell short. Ten years in prison seemed to be the equivalent of unpremeditated murder.

This, as in so many similar cases, did not stop women from flooding the streets. In Maldonado, Montevideo, Brazil, Iran, Italy, India, Japan, and countless other places. Each city and country has its own stories of Val and Mariana. If there’s something that all women know, across culture and language, it is that feeling of unity against a common threat. Call it patriarchy, call it sexism, or, simply, hatred. We’ve all experienced it, and it has only encouraged us to fight for a better future for those younger than us, and for justice for those who are here no longer.

That day, Mariana, along with Val’s mother and granny, walked together hand in hand, wearing purple from head to toe, and carrying Val’s photo, so no one would forget. They would not let them forget.

Chanting “Ni una menos; vivas nos queremos!” (“Not one less; we want to stay alive”), they joined thousands of other women fighting their own battles and seeking either justice or peace. Maybe, if they are very lucky, they will get both.