Superstitious Identity

I ran under the blistering heat down the intersection to a narrow barangay road stately lined with giant acacia trees. Cold breeze touched my skin while serenaded by the never ending rhapsody of insects and birds.
I followed a faint trail covered with bermuda grass and walked with ease amidst the increasing thicket that surrounded me then – I saw her. She was kneeling in front of a small mound attached to a trunk of an ominous looking tree with cascading vines and tiny violet flowers. I tiptoed closer wanting a clearer view; her back at me she appeared to be chanting gibberish.
She was old and thin; bent with age, hair as white as the pristine beaches in the island an odd contrast with her sun burned saggy skin that hanged loosely on her arms, her shoulder blades stuck out in her shabby flower printed duster dress. She bowed sporadically her forehead touching the ground, her chanting increases in tempo as she raised a dead chicken and spilt its blood on the mound. I wanted to bolt as fast as my two feet will take me but my feet were glued to the ground. I looked away in fear. The next thing I knew, she was facing me with the dead chicken on her left hand and a bolo on her right smiling. All my fears evaporated at the sight of her sad, yellowish kind eyes. She was completely harmless. She took one look at me and started filling my curiosity. She talked and talked like she had no one to talk to in hundred years. It was fascinating.
In her world, superstition is a way of life wherein skin rashes are punishment for angering the unseen and animal sacrifice is a must to appease their wrath.
I was right; she had no one to talk to for years. She was rumored an aswang, a flesh-eating vampire like monster shunned and constantly getting threats from the locals. As I look back at that beautiful and paradise-like island of Camotes, I can picture her tending her small garden, alone yet happy. Regardless of what other people think about her she still knows how to smile.