“She and her mother were always performing rituals and talking about the evil eye, or some black cloud hovering over them. “I realized later it was all pre-planned,” said Kansal. A lemon is what you curse, burn, or mutilate and leave at an enemy’s home if you’re too chicken to follow the proper tradition of chopping off and depositing a black rooster’s head. Wildlife researchers sometimes protect their cameras from thieving villagers by strategically placing vermilion-stuffed lemons near them. Practically everyone in India knows that the lemon is a potent conduit for kala-jaadu, black magic - so much so that, even in Bangalore, the country’s tech hub, lemons are banned from the legislative assembly. What Kansal found the next morning while cleaning under her dresser was impossible to ignore: a charred lemon. I had to drop it straight into her bag.” Kansal was puzzled, but ignored the queasy feeling in the pit of her stomach, just as she’d ignored the mutual friends who warned her to keep her at a distance, the housekeeper who muttered “that woman isn’t right,” the normally friendly pet dog who growled at SJ and rejected treats from her. When I tried to hand it over, she didn’t want to touch it.

She called me back from the lobby and asked me specifically to bring it to her. She had forgotten a giant crystal locket on my dresser. The second odd thing happened when it was time for her to leave. I remember joking that she should tell me if she was growing a new limb or something. We were comfortable changing in front of each other, but this time she insisted I step out.

It had to be in my bedroom, and not hers. “She came to stay with me as usual and said she wanted to try on some clothes. The last time the two women met, SJ wasn’t acting like herself.

SJ, on the other hand, was navigating financial struggles and a divorce. Vaishali Singh Kansal, a glamorous Indian entrepreneur in her 30s, owned a clothing line and enjoyed a happy marriage. Towards the end, though, good fortune was shining on only one of them. They’d giggle over private jokes, swap party dresses, cry with each other through dark hours. They had been best friends since college, as close as sisters, maybe even too close.

Hindu black magic removal