WITNESSING CECILIA’S FOOLPROOF METHODS

Into the third year of knowing Cecilia Steyn, she had insisted that we go to the Netcare Hospital, on Burger Street, which was across from her flat. There she went to the pharmacy and bought a pair of gloves and a diabetic syringe. At first, I thought the pharmacist would inquire as to why Cecilia was wanting these things, but there appeared to be no question or concern about it at all.

After we left the hospital, Cecilia asked for us to drive around Krugersdorp, to find a quiet street… a street where there was absolutely no one present… no cars, no pedestrians. I was confused and asked Cecilia what she was planning to do. She replied, “I’ll show you when we get there.”

Confused and somewhat curious, we drove around to find a street that was quiet: Human Street, Krugersdorp. What happened next was definitely not something I was ready to witness, nor could I believe what my eyes were seeing.

Cecilia took out the gloves and snipped the finger pieces off of them. She then proceeded to tie a belt around the upper part of her right arm and pumped her fist several times, until her veins started to show. Then, without hesitation, Cecilia took the syringe and inserted it into her vein with incredible accuracy. With the very first attempt, she had pierced her vein perfectly. Then she proceeded with draw her blood.

I was dumbstruck. Confused. After all that I had seen in my years of knowing Cecilia, this was the strangest behavior I had seen from her. I remained speechless as I watched her, also being fearful that she was going to harm herself because she was piercing a main vein in her arm.

After Cecilia had managed to draw a syringe full of her own blood, she then untied the belt around her arm, and proceeded to fill one of the fingertip pieces with blood carefully, until it looked like a little ball of blood. When there was just enough blood inside of it, she twisted the end of the fingertip piece a few times and inserted it into her mouth. I gasped in horror and my stomach turned in disgust. Cecilia clenched her teeth on the edge of the fingertip piece, in order to hold this ball of blood carefully inside her mouth, and then she proceeded to pull the ends and twist them enough to make a knot to solidly tie it. Proudly, she pulled the little ball of blood out of her mouth, which looked like a miniature blood balloon. She continued this same process until all five fingertip pieces were five little balloons of blood.

Questions were racing through my mind, among the confusion. I asked her why she was doing this. To which she casually smirked and replied, “In occult practices, we use blood for protection. So, for tomorrow’s occult high night, I am going to drop these onto the floor surrounding my flat, so that the blood will protect me from any occult attacks.”

Confused still, I asked, “But you’re not in the occult anymore. So why are you doing this?”

Again, she smirked and said, “Because occult practices work better. Ria’s prayers aren’t doing anything to protect me, so I need to protect myself.”

I was at a loss for words. Cecilia was clearly adamant that she was going to do this no matter what I said, and then sternly warned me, “Don’t tell anyone about this. You know that my father can use his abilities to read everyone else’s mind in the group. You know you’re the only one I can trust because my father can’t read your mind.”

The two days that followed, I was due to see Cecilia again. This was the day after the occult high night, where Cecilia said she would have put the splatters of blood around her flat. When I arrived, my first thought was to search the ground to see if she had actually done it. However, there was absolutely nothing there.

When Ria left and I was alone with Cecilia, I then found the courage to ask her if she had put the blood around her flat the night before. She smirked and replied, “Yes, why?”

Hesitantly, I said, “Because I couldn’t see anything on the ground when I was outside. So I was just curious to know if you had done it or not, that’s all.”

Cecilia laughed and replied, “That’s because I used magic to make the blood invisible to ordinary people. Only occult people can see the blood, so you definitely would not be able to see it.”

I did not know what to say. By this point, I was even more confused. Cecilia had claimed to have given her life to God, and to have completely walked away from the occult… but why was she then using magic and blood from occult practices for protection? This did not make sense to me at all.

As the weeks progressed, this would become a weekly trip to Human Street, where Cecilia would draw her blood to repeat the same scenario again. No matter how many times I had witnessed this, the confusion and the disgust never lessened.

In one scenario, while Cecilia had the ball of blood in her mouth, trying to turn the edges to make a knot, the ball accidentally slipped from her teeth and the blood splattered into her mouth, dripping down the sides of lips and face. I was horrified. My stomach turned. Cecilia, however, had absolutely no disgusted response at all. It was as if water had splattered into her mouth. Confused, I asked her, “Aren’t you disgusted? I mean, a whole lot of blood just splattered into your mouth.” Cecilia laughed and reminded me, “You know I’m a werewolf, you know I’m a vampire… I’m used to the taste of blood. I love the taste of it.” I could not argue about her statement for being used to the taste of blood or liking it because the response on her face proved it. To further demonstrate, she even licked her lips clean from the blood that was on it. Turned even more.

As these scenarios panned on, and the confusion still continuously trying to make sense of it all, I started to take more detailed note of how Cecilia would do things when it came to making these little balloons of blood. They were always drawn the day before an occult high night, and they were always situated in the pocket of her hoodie.

Then came the scenarios of starting to piece the truth of this together. On numerous occult high nights, I was present. On those specific days, I had seen Cecilia draw blood and make the usual blood balloons and slip them into her hoodie pocket. Once we had gotten back to her flat, she would take off her hoodie and put it on the floor next to her side of the bed. Even when it came to the evening, her hoodie remained lying on the floor next to her bed. As it came closer to the hours of the night where the occult attacks would usually take place, and while the weather was exceptionally hot, Cecilia would suddenly grab her hoodie jacket and put it on and then go to the bathroom.

Then two different scenarios would pan out from here…

In numerous scenarios, where it seemed like Cecilia had been in the bathroom for an extensively long period of time, Ria would go knock on the door to ask if she was okay. Cecilia would groan and say that she thinks something is wrong because she’s bleeding, and that the toilet is full of blood. She would then abruptly open the bathroom door and ever so proudly show Ria, and the others, the toilet that was full of blood. Instantly, this would send Ria and the others into a panic state because this meant that Cecilia’s health was in a bad state. However, Cecilia seemed unconcerned while the rest of the group was in a panic. She would then casually go back to her side of the bed, take off her hoodie and lie it down on the floor again, to where she would go stand by her windowsill and smoke, watching the others who were now panic stricken.

In numerous other scenarios, Cecilia’s trip to the bathroom would be abrupt and short. She would then come out motioning that she is battling to breathe. Ria would become panic stricken and ask Cecilia what was wrong. But Cecilia would not say a word. All she would do, during that moment, is groan and moan as if she was in incredible pain… and then, within a few seconds later, she would then collapse onto the floor, where she would start chocking and blood would start spilling out of her mouth, dripping down the side of her face. Instantly, everyone was in a panic state because Cecilia looked like she was dying. However, after much fuss and paranoia from the group, Cecilia would be perfectly fine. And yet again, once Cecilia was perfectly fine, she would take off her hoodie and lie it on the floor next to her side of the bed.

During the times where I had not taken Cecilia to Human Street to draw blood, there were never reports of Cecilia choking and coughing up blood on an occult high night. The reports that came back were that Cecilia had been badly attacked, but that at least there was no blood spilt from her mouth.

After having witnessed these repeated scenarios: with having taken Cecilia to draw blood, resulting in a blood-spilt occult attack, and not having been able to take Cecilia to draw blood, resulting in no blood being spilt during an occult attack … questions started posing themselves in my mind: were the balloons of blood used to fake these attacks? Were these attacks fake? Or am I just overthinking all of this? Ultimately, the scenarios were too obvious to sway away. I wanted to believe Cecilia but, from what I had witnessed, my mind was telling me otherwise.

Foonotes

[1] Recreated using marbles in fingertip pieces. Food color dye in syringe.