Things aren't always the way they seem

Ma Tantie was a witch.

She was as old as Father Time himself. She had been old forever. She had no relatives and no friends.

My stepfather said Ma Tantie was a witch. Well, he didn't say it to me exactly, but I overheard him saying it to Mom one evening when they thought I was asleep. He was grumbling and he said, "Ma Tantie, that witch." I know, I heard it.

My stepdad wasn't the only person who thought Ma Tantie was dreadfully wicked. Our neighbors thought so as well. One neighbor even went so far as to call her a soucouyant when she refused to let him collect water from the pipe in her yard.

In Caribbean folklore, a soucouyant is a shapeshifter. By day, she appears to be an unassuming old woman, but by night, she is believed to transform into a ball of fire, roaming the night skies thirsting for the blood of innocent children and calves.

On the day Ma Tantie turned our neighbor away, he hauled a cart full of empty bottles all the way up to her gate and started to yell at her in a language so colorful, I was forced to press my hands against my ears.

Of course, I covered my ears, but not before I heard him call her a witch and some other things.

Now, if that wasn't proof enough that Ma Tantie is a witch, I'd have you know that she keeps a wooden mortar and pestle tucked away among the rubble under her house. And everybody knows a witch keeps a mortar and pestle under her house to grind spells and stuff.

So, you see, the evidence against Ma Tantie is overwhelming. She must be a witch.

Ma Tantie even looked like a witch, warts and all.

She was a hunchback, so she walked with a stooped shoulder. She was always dressed in drab clothes. She hid ugly toes in closed toe cloth slippers where they were all bunched together and lumpy, and she went everywhere with a crook stick, leaning on it as though her life depended on it.

As children, we were scared of Ma Tantie. And yet, we were always creeping by her house, trying to catch a glimpse of her and raiding her fruit trees.

It would take a witch to have the most tempting delicacies in her yard, right? All the better to draw kids in. Take Hansel and Gretel, for instance.

Ma Tantie had the best plums, the sweetest tanko beans beans (tonquin beans), best caimets(star apples), best guavas, the best doodoos, Donkey stones, cutlass mangoes. She had the best of everything, but the mangoes were the best!

Ma Tantie's mangoes were sin personified. They tempted you to do the most wicked things. Offering sweet snatches of sunshine wrapped in skins of rose and gold, their perfume made your mouth water. And, oh, the taste of them!

It was almost impossible to resist Ma Tantie's mangoes. Every year we tried to, but every year we caved in, vicariously creeping through holes in her fence to shimmy ninja-like up her trees, steal the best of her fruit and creep back out again, only breaking our cover when we were well away from her yard. Then we would jump and whoop in exultance, another impossible mission accomplished.

It was on an ill fated mission to steal Ma Tantie's mangoes this year that I learned that things aren't always the way they seem.

That morning, I braved the fence, scrambled up a fat trunked tree whose laden branches were just inside the fence, walked sure footed across a thick branch, hand picked a bunch of mangoes, and threw them down to my friends who stood on the strip of land just on the outside of the fence. Then I broke a golden rule.

Had I made my way back out of the yard then, all would have continued as before and my friends and I would have continued as ninjas, for another year at least. This year, however, I was trapped by my own temptation.

My friends were already beating a hasty retreat and I was on my way back down the tree when I saw another mango. It was too large and too tantalizing to resist, too juicy to share. So, thinking to steal a couple more minutes, I grabbed the mango, sat down on the branch and bit into it, skin and all.

Mm! It was heaven!

I closed my eyes. The sticky, yellow juice flowed past my fingers and down my arms. I swayed, and then I almost toppled from my seat as I felt a sharp rap on my ankle.

"Ouch!" I yelped, spitting our pieces of pulp.

Another rap.

"You ask anybody for mango?" Ma Tantie was under the tree. Her crook stick was no longer a walking aid, it was a weapon. "What are you doing up that tree?"

Trembling, I scrambled higher, seeking refuge in the tree branches. Ma Tantie kept knocking.

"That is the problem with you young people," she stormed. "No manners!"

And then, just like that, the steam blew out of her, and Ma Tantie started to cry.

I was shocked.

"Wicked and ungrateful children," she sobbed, loud, racking sobs. From above, I could suddenly see how small and how frail she was. "Always breaking into my yard and stealing things."

Mango juice was drying on my lips, but I was so transfixed by Ma Tantie, I couldn't lick them.

Can you imagine what it's like to see an old lady crying?

I wanted to burst into tears too! Matter of fact, I wanted to take Ma Tantie's crook stick and rap my knuckles myself.

Poor Ma Tantie!

She, on the other hand, seemed to forget me. When she regained her composure, she leaned on her crook stick and tap tapped her way back to her porch, grumbling all the way.

"No one would pass and say good morning Ma Tantie or how do you do Ma Tantie," she said. "No one would even ask to climb the fruit trees in my yard. This is what happens when you get old, people treat you worse than they would a wild dog."

My mouth was hanging open so wide, several fruit flies could have had a feast. Until that moment, I had no idea Ma Tantie even wanted to say hello. She was always glaring!

"I am sorry, Ma Tantie," I ventured. "I really am sorry."

She didn't answer. She just kept tap tapping back to her porch, walking so slowly and painfully, I could imagine her joints creaking.

"Would you like me to pick a mango for you, Ma Tantie?" I offered. "There's a really ripe one up here. You can get it before it falls and gets bruised."

She gave no response.

I picked the mango anyway, and found two more. Then I began inching down the tree, ready to leap and bolt at the slightest odd movement from Ma Tantie.

She paid me no mind. I got to the ground safely. Back on the ground, I placed the three mangoes carefully near the root of the tree.

"Here are three mangoes, Ma Tantie," I called out as I edged backwards to the gate. I was taking no chances with that crook stick of hers. When I got to the road, I turned tail and ran.

Several days passed before I saw Ma Tantie again. When I did, I was sure to greet her and ask after her day.

I had learned a valuable lesson on the mango tree that day. I had learned that gossip isn't just often untrue, it's almost always cruel. After all, Ma Tantie was no wicked witch. She was simply a lonely old woman the village had forgotten. And all she wanted from us children was a greeting, not our blood. From that day, I resolved to set anyone straight who tried to tell me otherwise.