The Magnolia League - By Katie Crouch Page 0,69

the garden. (They ward off evil spirits, apparently.) After Madison cast that spell to make my hair grow, she had to put a dime from my pocket into her own shoe.

“You should thank me, dorkus,” she told me later. “I had to wear the same closed-toed heels for three whole days. Everyone knows I never wear the same pair of shoes twice in one month.”

I have to say, even though the whole hoodoo thing really freaked me out at first, I find it pretty rad that the town’s fanciest families secretly derive their wealth and power from African rituals. And once you know the secret, you wonder how you never guessed before. Signs of hoodoo are all over Savannah—from graves decorated with cans of food and bottles of whiskey, to house doors painted haint blue, to signs around town advertising hoodoo fortune-tellers and remedies. Before, I would have just dismissed them as Southern wackiness, but now I’ve learned my lesson: What may seem like nonsense to one person probably makes a hell of a lot of sense to someone else.

Upstairs, Hayes is still lamenting the complexity of her spell. I take the opportunity to check out the Andersons’ house. Whereas Madison’s personal quarters are sleek and highly designed, Hayes has gone for more of a luxurious Barbie’s Dream House look with her room. The carpet is plush and pink; the walls are papered with a pink-and-gold fleur-de-lis pattern; and all the furniture, including the king-size canopied bed, is gilded. It’s the sort of place an old-fashioned courtesan would think up if she were sixteen—and loaded.

Hayes is on her knees in the middle of the room in front of two red candles in brass holders. On one candle, she’s carved the name Hayes; on the other, Jason. She’s busy stuffing two crude-looking cloth dolls with what looks like pine straw, hair, powder, and bottles of fluid.

“Hey,” Hayes says. “Glad you’re here.”

“Voodoo dolls?”

“Yeah. It’s not routine—you know, it’s not a hoodoo thing, really. But Sina wants to try out some New Orleans tricks. She likes to be fluent in both practices.”

While Sam is the official root doctor for the Magnolias, the MGs often circumvent the official channels and hire Sina on the side. Though my grandmother is usually understanding, she’s been known to say no to a spell. Since Sybil’s not such a fan of Jason, chances are Miss Lee neg’d a mojo to help that relationship. It’s dangerous to use Sina directly, of course. When Miss Lee finds out someone’s done it, she gets pissed and has been known to suspend Magnolias from any hoodoo for up to a year. It’s a majorly embarrassing punishment, especially to an older Magnolia, because it means losing whatever you’ve conjured—your age or hair or body or whatever—and looking like your natural self. You’d think they’d be okay with looking like the selves they’d been born with, but hoodoo is like any good drug: Once you have the magic, it’s tough to get off it. Apparently Khaki Pettit’s sister went into hiding when she was caught illegally using Sina to put a Love No More spell on Khaki’s husband—with whom she’d been having an affair. (She was penalized on two counts: illegal spell use and betraying a fellow Magnolia.) She was so horrified by her natural looks that she told her friends she was traveling around the world for two years and secretly had her maid bring her food in a big straw basket to her room.

“Hayes,” I ask now, eyeing a suspicious-looking jar. “Is that… pee?”

She nods.

“It’s Jason’s,” Madison says.

“How did you—”

“Oh, that was nothing. But getting the nail clippings was tough.” She squints at the wrinkled piece of paper. “God, it’s hard to read Sina’s writing. I like it much better when Sam does the spells. Okay, this says saffron. Damn. Alex, can you go down and see if we have any?”

“Sure,” I say. On the way, I take a little tour of the upstairs. Hayes’s mom—Sybil McPhillips’s daughter—has done a bang-up job preserving this house. As far as I can tell, there are two kinds of house owners in the old part of the city: the ones who have given themselves over to Savannah’s weather and rot, and those who fight the good fight. My grandmother’s house, for example, practically crumbles in your hand. Ivy chokes the brick; the walls literally sweat with humidity, causing the wallpaper and paint to peel; weird drafts curl around the corners, slamming doors and blowing papers;