Seven years in the profession. He was exactly my three hundredth customer. And this was our last meeting before the charming.
I held up the glass bottle level with our eyes, giving it a slight swish. The potion danced like a cheating boyfriend’s conscience. Uncertain. Trembling. Guilty.
But Mark was not a cheater.
“We’ve discussed the instructions during your second visit, did we not?” I asked him, setting the bottle down. Mark nodded, and so I prompted him to retell me what those instructions were. After all, one slight mistake in the charming, and everything could never be the same again.
Mark leaned back on his seat. His stare was still fixed on the potion. “The charm may be mixed with any liquid, except tea. One drop will make Sarah fall in love with me for a day. Two drops, she will love me for a week. Three drops, a month—“
I raised an eyebrow to beckon him to continue.
“Three drops, Sarah will love me for a month. Ten drops, and she will love me forever.”
“Until the day she dies.” I finished for him. Mark swallowed a spit, then slid his hand on the table to take the bottle. Smiling, I halted his attempt.
“Note that you have to apply the dosages in series: start from one, then after that wears off and you wish to continue, give the next two drops; so on. There is a stopper in the bottle, and only one drop comes out at each moment. You can therefore never underspill or overspill a charm by mistake. Now, before I give this to you Mark, there are some things I want you to remember,” I drew the bottle closer to me. “Five rules every charmer must know, and must never forget. This is no ordinary act, my dear. Charming another person is a mortal sin.
“The first: for ten drops, the maximum amount a human can intake in one moment, the charmed will love her charmer until the day the charmed or the charmer dies—whichever comes sooner.
“Second rule: a charmed person may be charmed yet again by another charmer—but only if the dosage given is higher than the previous dosages. If the dosages are of identical volume, the prior dosage will persist over its equals. However, if in a given twenty four hours a charmed person intakes more than ten drops from the same charmer—all the charmer’s memories will be wiped clean and any charm he is holding will lose its potency. This shall therefore also result to the charmed person being free from that particular charmer’s grasp.
“Third: if anyone except the charmer, the charmed, and the charm-maker discovers the charming, the charmer will lose all his basic senses, and the potion’s effect on the charmed will be reversed.
“The fourth rule: the charmer's and his charmed person’s child is immune to any charm.
“And lastly, the most important: if a charmed person catches her charmer cheating on her during the duration of the charm, the charmer and his paramour will die a horrible death, and any memory of the charmer and his paramour will be erased from all the Earth.”
Mark nodded, seemingly comprehending the rules. His eyes were still sunken, his cheeks hollow. The man was a mask of depression and anxiety. “How can a potion erase the charmer’s memory? Charmers don’t take in even a drop, after all,” he asked.
“Good question,” I commended, twirling the potion. “Every bottle has exactly three hundred and sixty four drops. Each drop contains an essence of the charmed which you provided by giving me a strand of Sarah’s hair, and an essence of you which you provided by giving me your saliva. Both of your souls are therefore bound in this bottle, Mark. Regardless if you take in a drop or not.”
The man squeezed his eyes shut, and once again wept. He heaved his chest loudly, clenching his fists and gritting his teeth. I’d seen this before. Each one of his visit was colored by his desperate cries—which eventually led me to helping him.
He had come to my condominium three months ago to transact. It had been no easy feat for him, I should know. After all, my clients were usually the elite—businessmen who were dying for a haciendera’s hand, spoiled daughters of politicians, actors and actresses who caught their partners with another. Mark was only an accountant: earning above average, but never beyond plenty. I knew he had to sacrifice a lot of things, beg a lot of persons, spend a lot of money. My services alone had probably cost him a year’s salary.
Mark was desperate. He was about to get married half a year ago, until his fiancé Sarah suddenly backed out.
“Seven years! We had been in love for seven years!” Mark reminisced once again, as he had since our first meeting. “No explanation whatsoever. She just…she just fell out of love after—after what, seven years? How is that even possible?”
“Well, I cannot answer for Sarah,” I replied as I finally gave him the bottle. “But instead of charming her, shouldn’t you just work for her feelings yourself? That’s how love is proven.”
He was about to fumble for an answer when I simply smiled and waved the question away. “You know what, Mark, go. Do what you have to do.”
Grabbing the bottle, Mark stood up and turned to leave. He thanked me with his back. But as he was leaving, he threw me one final, sorrowful question. “Ten drops, and she will love me forever?”
I tilted my head sideways “Forever, my dear. And there is nothing you can do to make her unlove you—except violate a rule, of course. Ten drops. Ten drops, and Sarah will do anything in the world to have you by her side forever. But you know that already.”
Mark opened the door and stepped out.
A hint of sadness swept all over me. “Forever, my dear,” I recalled telling Mark. That was the curse of the charm.
I walked towards my filer. Mark’s folder was there, labelled with his name, transaction date, and all other pertinent information. Including the charmed person’s name. Filling out the rest of the file, I could not help but laugh at the irony of it all.
“Customer Number 300, Mark James Meldas,” I read as I documented the end of our transaction. “One bottle of Love Potion for Sarah Kamille Samson. March 3, 2019.”
Ten drops, and the charmed person will love the charmer forever. Even after the charmer has fallen out of love. That was the first rule.
I grabbed the first folder of my file. My first customer ever, back when I was only eighteen. I did not do enough research on her back then. Did not ensure of her commitment.
“Customer Number 1, Sarah Kamille Samson. One bottle of Love Potion for Mark James Meldas. April 16, 2012."
