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Published October 30, 2026

Am I The Witch?

My dreams help connect me to my family—they're invincible to distance and immigration laws.
Title: Am I The Witch? The title is written in yellow linework and is surrounded by a floral ornamental border. White linework against black background. The entire comic is rendered in white, black and yellow. It is rendered using hand drawn linework against flat digitally colored shapes.The two characters are two south asian women. Page 1: Text: “My mother and I have been meeting in our dreams. The first time it happened was during the 2020 lockdown. Between visa troubles and lockdown I hadn’t been able to travel home to see her in 4 years. But one night when I was asleep in Boston and she was having a Sunday afternoon nap in Thane, we met inside our shared dream.” Description: The image on the page shows us sleeping with our backs turned to each other in the top and bottom opposite sides of the page. And between us in a cloudy dream space, younger versions of us step out of doors into a long corridor without walls and with shapes cut out of the floor. So it looks like a platform suspended in space, with stars, meteors, the moon and planets in the background.
Text: “In the dream it was 2003.” The text levitating in space over a wooden dollhouse. The dollhouse is tall and skinny. It has three floors, and it is missing two opposite walls, so you can see clean though it to the space behind it. Text hovering in the top floor of the house: “I was six. She was thirty-four.” This room is filled with ornamental pillars organized from the tallest to the shortest. The middle floor of the house has 2 rooms separated by a central wall. In the room on the left, a small arrow points at a cluster of pillars and the text says, “room full of pillars?” In the room next to it, the image shows my mother coming in through a door, both hands holding an overstuffed bag full of groceries. The text says, “She had just come home from work.” In the lowest level of the house, there are two feet wearing flip flops, coming out from under a bed. A guillotine hangs over the bed. The feet are way too large to be associated with a person who could fit under this bed. The text says, “ I was hiding.” Text floating in space under the house says “I don’t want to tell you what happened, but we both woke up in a panic.”
The first three rows of panels in this page are divided into 2 columns. On the left, Sanika’s character wakes up and tries to call her mother. On the right, Sanika’s mother tries to do the same. On Sanika’s side the text says, “I called her as soon as I opened my eyes.” The image is Sanika, with the phone against their ear, eyes still closes and a little drool on her face. On the right, Sanika’s mother looks at her phone which says, “the number you have dialed is currently on another call.” On the left Sanika in darkness of the early morning stares directly into the bright screen of her phone which says, “Please stay on the line…” On the right Sanika’s mom hears the continuation of that message, “…Or call later”. Followed by a voice in Marathi that says, “The number you are trying to call is busy at this time. Please stay on the line or call later.” When you call someone in Maharashtra, you hear the “currently busy” message in English followed by Marathi. On the left in the third row Sanika looks at their phone turned on their side. On the right Sanika’s mother trying calling her again. Then 4th row is a single long panel with Sanika and her mother facing each other from opposite sides. The text says, “When we finally reached each other she said,” In a speech bubble Sanika’s mother says, “ You were so young. I’m so sorry.” The text says, “She was apologizing for something I had never held against her.” The fifth row is a long panel all in black with yellow linework. Sanika and her mother watch stars and planets and meteors in space from a park bench. The text says “Ever since then we’ve been hanging out.”
“I am not completely surprised that this is happening. My family has always been visited upon by prophetic nightmares.” The two people continue sitting on the park bench next to each other looking out at the vast expanse of space. There is grass under their feet. “In 2013 my grandmother had a terrible dream about my father. The next day, his work camp in the Sahara desert was bombed. He survived.” The image includes a house on fire slowly disintegrating with a car on fire next to it. In 2005 my father called my grandmother at 5 am. A speech bubble coming out of a landline phone says “She is in danger.” “Within a few hours, I had tripped over a ridiculously sharp edge of a rusted metal stool and nearly lost my toe.” There is a picture of a rose almost completely clipped and the text says “What my toe looked like after.”
“In 2021, I had a dream that John was dying. I saw him lying in a hot field covered in bugs. That night he was diagnosed with lime disease.” There is an illustration of a giant deer tick, and a drawing of Sanika at their drawing board frowning, saying ” Please don’t make me draw this.” In this next section the page becomes sheets of paper blowing in the wind framed by stars and planets and moons and meteors in space. The text says “My mother, the most accurate of us, has predicted many of my freak injuries.” A flying panel holds an image of a bicycle bent out of shape in the grass next to a brick wall. The text continues by saying, “illnesses” next to an image of a hand hooked to an IV with a saline solution connected to it. The text continues to say,” a break-in, a fire,” The two overlapping panels folding in the wind slightly hold pictures of a broken window and smoke escaping out of a partially opened window. Text levitating in space says, “all from the other side of the world.” All of this hovers over a yellow earth revolving in the black expanse of space.
The text narrates while a pair of hands spins and stops the model of the earth’s globe. The text says, “The dreams never stop the disasters from happening.” The hand is about the spin the globe. “But I have always felt grateful for them.” The globe is spinning and the hand reaches to stop it. “My family has never really lived together.” The hand starts spinning the globe again. A yellow spot on the globe marks the location of Boston, Massachusetts, USA. “Like families are supposed to live together.” The globe spins faster and faster. The cropped angle of the drawing, and speed of the spinning almost causes the globe to lose its meaning. “Growing up, my parents and I lived in three separate countries.” The globe has now been stopped by a single finger. And a yellow spot on the globe marks the location of Thane, Maharashtra, India. “We still live on opposite sides of the planet” Two fingers belonging to two different hands coming in from opposite sides of the panel are now holding the globe still. Two yellow spot mark the location of Thane and Boston.
“The dreams help me feel affirmed of our connection. Invincible from distance and immigration laws. I like to imagine us tied together with invisible strings.” The entire page is a single image. It shows Sanika and their mother sitting on a park bench with dense tropical bushes banana trees and coconut trees growing and overgrown behind them while they seem engrossed in conversation. Their body language is comfortable in each other’s presence but they seem to be speaking in different tones. Sanika’s mother seems to be speaking in a direct and sincere tone from her facial expression. Sanika seems defensive or judgmental. Maybe they are disagreeing or having a cathartic conversation. Or maybe they are gossiping. Or maybe it is all of the above. This park bench is an exaggerated version of a real park bench my mother and I would sit down and catch up on, at the end of our nightly post-dinner walk when I was in high school, when we did live together.
A giant cratered moon hangs in space. Now completely devoid of any other celestial bodies. Yellow text says, “ Until I can hug my mom again, at least we have this.”

This comic was initially published in the comics anthology Witch Window published by Sanika Phawde, Kyle Canyon, and Sophie Page. 

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