“I think I’ll grab a sweater. If we’re going to be outside, it might make sense. Looks like rain is coming,” thought Loretta.
It didn’t yet look particularly ominous, but one can tell when a storm is approaching. The way one can tell is always different. Joan’s left knee starts to give her trouble. Otis, our family’s first golden would pace the kitchen. My wife, however, would just seem to sense it. As she scurried upstairs to grab one of her knit sweaters—if it did, indeed, rain, her cute knit top filled with holes, would be helpless against even a mild breeze—I peered outside; there were no clouds, nor was there any other visible sight or sound to announce impending precipitation. I ran to the mudroom to grab my parka…one can’t ever be too careful, I guess. She is, after all, usually right.

We had intended to go to dinner; it was Tuesday, our typical date night. Ever since we moved out here, for me to start a new job, we promised one another that we would carve out time for just the two of us. Despite the convenience my new job afforded me—I could work from home three out of five days—we were always missing eachother. Physically, Loretta’s job was more traditional in that she left home around 8 in the morning and returned around 6 at night, right as I was graduating into my self-styled “hour of power.” I’d meet her in bed some hours later; sometimes she’d wait up, many times she didn’t. This led to the emotional chasm that developed in our relationship. We’ve been married for only a year, yet the move, the new job, the house, and the weather all collaborated to become forces of ill for us. Date night was the only night that felt like, honestly, we were a married couple; two people who loved eachother. The honeymoon, which was awesome by the way, seemed like a lifetime ago.
By the time we got to the Black Raven—redundant title, no?—the sky was mutating into a deep plum color. If rain wasn’t imminent, something was. I rolled up the windows, which we always kept down—she’s a smoker; I wish she’d quit—and grabbed my jacket from the backseat. The mood at dinner was no more cheerful than the dark purplish hue the sky had recently assumed. She appeared both distracted yet apathetic. She crushed her first gin and soda, ordered another, and spoke, unceasingly about a colleague named Brian or Bryant, whom she deemed to be the most incompetent manager she’d known. We ordered our meals—the Caesar salad with chicken for me, the flank steak, rare, for her—and found ourselves at a bit of an interregnum. We were in between courses, I was awaiting a second jack and coke, and she was without anything slanderous to say about one of her co-workers. We were married, yes but we had not yet figured out how to co-exist as one. You know how married couples can just be in silence, eat in the company of one another without words, or simply share a quick hand-holding saturated with meaning? That was not us. We were more of the awkward high-school couple, the irony of which is not lost on me; we were, by all accounts, high school sweethearts. Had I known the evening’s events would transpire the way they did, I may have prayed for the foresight to have gotten to know my wife more intimately…
I had never truly looked at my wife. I had stared at her, gazed at her, and longed for her, but I can’t say that I ever actually looked at her. In seeing her for the first time during this awkward pause, I froze. I didn’t recognize my wife. Allow me to repeat: I could not make out the person with whom I was out on a date. By most casual appearances, she looked like my wife: neat dreadlocks down to her shoulders, high cheek bones, broad shoulders, small ears, brown eyes. Wait. not brown. How have I never noticed this before? Did something just move in her eyes? Something purpleish?
“Marc, what’s wrong with you? You good?”
“Sorry love, I…I thought I saw something; probably just a piece of bread stuck in your teeth. Yep, right there in the front; got it. All good. Sorry.”
“How was your steak, dear,” Marc probed, trying to backpedal.
“Not great, but wasn’t expecting much to begin with. Can you pay, so we can go? I’d like to try to beat this weather, if possible. Funny, I didn’t see any rain in the forecast for today. The weather out here can be tricky, I guess,” mused Loretta.
She offered no further explanation.
I paid the bill, but hesitated and pretended to pause over some very complicated math, and instead took a second to look, really look, at her eyes. She was texting—rapidly actually—and the light of her screen gave me some much needed illumination; it was quickly getting darker outside and the restaurant had not adjusted from their not-quite-appropriate mood lighting accordingly. Something was there, and it was moving. But it wasn’t moving, really, it was growing in color and intensity. The screen went black; she must be done texting.
“All set, love. Should we get outta here?
“Yes.”

Sometimes on our date nights, we’d stop by the local King Cone to pick up a pint of ice cream to share when we got home. We’d change, get into some PJs, watch a movie, and get to eating. Usually, we were asleep on the couch before the ice cream was gone—sleep sleep; nothing else. I knew tonight would be different. The sky had transformed from the deep purple to black; the clouds moved slowly and dramatically; the wind still warm, yet hiding something. No, it wasn’t rain that was coming, but it was most certainly a storm. I turned on the AM on the radio to try to get an idea of what was coming. “Winston the Weather Wizard,” on AM 1040, made no mention of the meaning of the color of the sky, dew point, or wind speed. All appeared normal for this time of year. I contemplated for a second of trying another frequency, but thought better of it. The restaurant was only 30 minutes from our house. Loretta had, in the 15 minutes since we left the restaurant gone through more cigarettes than normal.
“Everything ok.” I realized I sounded concerned
No response.
She was peering out the window looking at the clouds. Another cigarette was lit.
I asked the verboten question: “Are you mad at me, or something?”
To that she turned and what I saw almost made me drive off the road. Her eyes were a perfect shade of midnight black. Not the black of dark roast coffee, but the type of black that engulfs all things—sound, touch, air, movement: black hole black. When she spoke it took every ounce of adrenaline and poise for me to not shake. I was expecting her voice to be demonic; she certainly looked the part. Instead, it was the same as always: death eyes and a calm voice are more hair raising than you’d think. The words she uttered were equally as disconcerting:
“Just a little off today, is all. Must be the weather. Sky looks ominous. Glad I brought my sweater.”
With that, she went back to her cigarette.

It was getting difficult to see. My headlights automatically turn on when it gets dark; we were well past that point. I turned on the fog lights—there was no fog—and the high beams; there were oncoming cars; screw it. If this darkness was a sign of inclement weather, I am quite ignorant of what type of weather it presupposes. It could not be rain—although that seemed the most likely scenario, given the time of year and our location. Could it be snow? Not with these temperatures. A hurricane? Not windy enough. I don’t know. Might as well keep driving; we’ll be home soon. She didn’t want to talk, and I for sure was not going to be the one to temp fate so we traveled the rest of the way home in silence. She had just put on her sweater.
I got out of the car and grabbed the bag of leftovers. As I walked toward the porch, I realized she had made no move to exit the passenger seat.
“You coming in?” I tried to sound calm.
“I can make us some popcorn if you’d like.”
She opened the door ceremoniously, stepped out and began walking toward me; unblinking and staring at me the entire time. I was too scared to move, so I didn’t. I figured, if she stared at me, I could do likewise, so I did. The black of her eyes had, how can I describe this, mutated. It had spread from middle of the eye to, at some point, envelop her entire eyeball, cornea and all. As she approached me, so too did the landscape behind her. In that moment, I could not discern wife from weather; land from lover. She walked and her eyes reflected, mirror-like, the scene both before and behind them. There I was, seeing myself in her eyes, engrossed within the blackness. Was I yelling? There was no sound. Was I on the porch or in the blacks of her eyes? I could not tell. I began to hear a voice equally distant, yet familiar.
“Leave our land…”

Truth be told, I hadn’t really been feeling well all day. Couldn’t place it, you know? Woke up with a feeling. No, a sense. Something was off. By all accounts, the weather outside looked fine; not a cloud in the sky. I went to work and on my way home remembered that it was date night. Think he’ll pick that same restaurant again? I hope not. Maybe he’ll forget that it’s his time to pick.
“You ready to go, love?” He offered.
He had caught me staring out the porch door window. I should grab a sweater.

It’s been some time since the land had one of her own live here. The Africans who arrived on those big ships used to tell of their own spirits—obanjes—who were powerful, misunderstood creatures. They settled here too, in our swamps and cotton fields. Born of the land and born of women; the objane has dominion over both, in equal measure. When they die, they return to the land. Obanje are patient. Obanje do not forget. Obanje have power over the land and her elements. He who forsake the land will incur the wrath of the obanje…

Dinner was fine. Couldn’t shake this feeling that something was off. Yes, I know I need to quit smoking, but when I’m stressed, it calms me down, you know? I caught him looking at me, really looking at me. It was like he was checking me out for the first time. Nice, but creepy. The fear in his eyes made me want to scream. Not what I needed today. I gotta text this to Nicole; she’ll tell me to relax. The first year of marriage is tough, she told me. Packing up and leaving my life for Marc’s new job was tough on me, although I would never tell him that. Agreeing to move down here, to the middle of nowhere, I should be made a saint. He works for some big oil company. Big money opportunity down here, he said. I don’t think we’ll do ice cream tonight. The steak isn’t sitting well with me.

“Loretta, is that you? Where are we?”
…
“You’re the thing that was in my wife’s eye this whole time? What are you?”
“Obanje”
“Whatchu call yourself? You don’t sound like my wife
“leave our land.”
“I can’t, I have a job here. We just moved here”
“You have no right to our land. I am master over this land and have been since our crossing. “Her body is our land and is returned to us, as was foretold . She is master over this land and has been since our crossing.”Obanje return to the land after the death of the body. Bodies die, objane live. We have the power to ward off trespassers, as has been our charge since we arrived here on the big boat full of sickness and bad magic.”
“What is your magic?”
“Storms purify the land. We seek to purify the land you seek to sully.” Her body controls the elements. The bodies of obanje release the flood.” Hers will be a sacrifice to the land. Obanje return to the land after the death of the body. Bodies die, obanje live…”
“ The storm wages; the body will release it soon. Obanje is safe in the eye of the storm. Man is not.

“Loretta, wake up! We need to go!” Yelled Marc as he bent over to grab his barely conscious wife from the dirt into his truck. The instant he touched her arm, she shot up, fully erect, black eyes fixed on her companion. He could sense the floodgates open. He was too late. In words ancient and prophetic, Loretta, with a grin, murmured:
“You should have stayed within the eye. You would have been safe there. It’s coming now. We are to purify the land.”
In that instant, Loretta became one with the rain, wind, dust, and thunder. His final thought was, “We should have gone to get ice cream…”