Djinn and Tonic

Mrs Melvyn the bomoh (aka Nur Aisah) was only now discovering just what she had let herself in for when she married Melvyn. As well as being a full-time housewife at their domicile somewhere on Pregnant Lady Mountain, Aisah was also expected to perform secretarial duties for Melvyn at his surgery in the kampung.

In the normal course of events that would have been fine, but there was nothing normal about Melvyn’s surgery or some of the beings that frequented it. Aisah was in the process of learning how to say “good morning how may I help you” while simultaneously repressing a scream and/or vomit, not to mention the sudden desperate need to go to the loo. She had yet to get round to the “Have a nice day” Melvyn insisted she say to all his customers, for to say it she had to mean it.

It didn’t help that even the scariest of creatures were always very pleasant to her, in fact in some ways it made it much worse. There was something inherently bizarre, and not to say quite frightening, in bogey men, large, green, hairy and scary enough to strip the paint of a Proton Saga, simply saying “selamat pagi” in the pleasantest voice it could rustle from its growl scarred voice box, then salaaming her in the most respectful way. For the eight hours of every day Aisah stayed in the surgery she constantly felt that, at least internally, her whitening hair was perpetually standing on end and her eyes staring as if on a constant diet of 100% pure caffeine.

Unfortunately for Aisah Melvyn spent half his working day doing his rounds, meaning that she was effectively alone in the surgery. Effectively in the sense that no other member of staff was with her at those times, but that was not to say that she was alone, on the contrary, Melvyn had asked one or two of his minor spirits to keep her company, and even though she couldn’t see them most of the time she could feel their presence as a cat could smell another’s spray. It was a lot to get used to, but she wore her marriage with pride, and experienced a little buzz of electricity when someone referred to her as Mrs Melvyn the bomoh.

“Er, Mrs Melvyn the bomoh”, Aisah’s mind was far away so she gave a little jump when the tall handsome gentleman with a rather dashing little goatee beard, spoke her name. This time Aisah had no problem with her greetings and was almost overwhelmed with relief to see someone (thing) normal, it took her by surprise. There was an odd smell of sulphur and smoke in the room, but Aisah put that down to bonfires outside and didn’t notice the small curls of practically invisible smoke which rose from her visitor.

Ali introduced himself in an accent which Aisah just could not trace, except, she thought, it was most probably Middle Eastern, as most accents she couldn’t recognise turned out to be Middle Eastern it seemed a fair assumption, wrong but fair. Ali asked after Melvyn and seemed sadder when he was told Melvyn was on his rounds, then asked if Melvyn had put anything aside for him. Aisah looked and found a brown bottle with the label ‘Tonic’. “There’s nothing much here she said, only a brown bottle which says ‘Tonic for djinns’, so it doesn’t look like he left anything for you.” “Ah” said Ali “That’ll be it then”. Aisha looked at Ali again, this time with wide open eyes and did see the curls of practically invisible smoke which were now a little less invisible then they had been.

“It’s not all laugh-a-minute being a djinn” Ali said, and no, thought Aisah, I don’t suppose it is, quite the opposite, outwardly she said “ah, er, ga” not being able to get past the concept of djinn in her fragile mind. “Some days the tricks and the petty nastiness’s just wear you down and that’s when I visit your husband Mrs Melvyn, for the pick-me-up, tonic, it soon energises the old fire and brimstone and puts me back on my feet, as it were.” “Ah” says Aisah. “Are you alright Mrs Melvyn” said the concerned Ali “Is there something I can get you, water perhaps?” “No, no it’s alright” she said, but thinking yes, you can get away, that’s what you can get, and continued that thought with – have a nice day. “Thank you I will, and I’ll be off then.” “Ok” said a relieved and somewhat astonished Aisah, “Just one thing you ought to be aware of Mrs Melvyn, for future reference that is, most djinn can, and indeed do, read thoughts” and with that he stepped outside and seemed to disappear leaving a faint smell of sulphur and maybe a little brimstone too, and a very embarrassed Aisah.

Mmmm, she thought, now that was a bit of a learning curve, as she sat back in her chair and tried to do something about the deep red blush colouring her features.