Cassie steps off the school bus, her hair the same straight black in a ponytail, her knees the same knobbly bones, her lumpy wrists still lumpy, and all the things she hates when she glances at herself in the mirror. The lion’s hot breath, however, comes from her nostrils, deep heavy controlled breaths. The lion’s battle scars lie beneath the surface of her skin, his claws dig into the palms of her hands, her fists clench.
Natalie and the others lounge outside the science lab. It has been weeks since they sat in Apollo’s together. The quadrangle between her and the lab teems with wild animals, kids who Cassie can never shake the feeling are watching her every move, judging her, sizing up her worthiness and seeing her fail. Her books cut into the crook of her arm; her nails, the lion’s claws, have left grooves on her palms and she unclenches her fists. Hands open, she stretches her fingers and breathes deeply, listens to the roar in her head, steps from the concrete path to the grass. With each step the pressure builds in her chest, she blinks and imagines the maiden, the maiden and the castle that is not hers, the maiden who could subdue a lion, the maiden whose strength drives her thighs to lift for another step and forces her foot to lift again, to close the gap.
The grass, still slippery with dew, flicks wet onto her calves. She steps from the empty space to under the shaded awning of the science lab. Budgie sits on the ground, his back to the wall, his long legs pulled up to his prominent chest. His long arm resting on his knees, he scrapes at his skin with a protractor. Lisa sits on the edge of the porch, her uniform pulled up, her legs stretched out in the sunshine. Mitch, his long hair coming loose from its ponytail, is trapped in a head lock, Paulo’s arms wrapped around his neck.
Natalie laughs and kicks at Paulo’s shins. ‘Let him go, you idiot.’
They ignore Cassie. She is the maiden no one sees.
She takes a deep breath, a hot lion’s breath, and speaks. ‘Hello.’
Budgie glances up at her, then returns to damaging the skin on his forearm.
Lisa squints up at her, the sun in her eyes.
Paulo lets go of Mitch and comes to lean on the post beside her, his startling blue snake eyes looking down at her.
Mitch wraps his arm around Natalie’s shoulder and leans heavily on her. Natalie steps away and he feigns a fall.
Nobody speaks.
Cassie smiles, her stomach shooting firecrackers inside. ‘How was your weekend?’
‘Who are you?’ Mitch leans his weight on Natalie again. Paulo’s eyes never leave her, as though she is an object he is considering stealing from a store.
‘Der, this is Cassie, remember?’ Natalie says.
‘I remember.’ Paulo breathes on her.
Lisa throws a crumbled piece of paper at him. ‘Leave her alone.’
Paulo picks up the paper and throws it back.
Cassie puts her books on the ground and reaches into her blazer pocket and brings out her tarot cards. She turns them around in her hands, hiding them and showing them. ‘Umm, I was wondering if anyone wanted their tarot cards read?’
‘Dead set! You still telling people’s fortunes?’ Natalie snatches the cards from Cassie’s hands and starts to open the packet.
Cassie’s hand shoots forward. ‘Don’t open them.’
Natalie stops mid movement. ‘Why not?’
‘It’s part of how they work. I have to shuffle them first, then you cut them.’
‘I got scissors,’ Budgie pipes up from his concrete seat.
‘Shut up, you dag,’ Natalie says back. ‘That’s not what she means.’
‘I know,’ Budgie groans. ‘I do play poker.’
‘We could play some strip poker.’ Paulo presses his face against the post, grinning.
Lisa sighs. ‘You make me sick.’
Natalie hands the cards back to Cassie. Cassie presses them tight into her sweating hands.
‘We should sit down where it’s comfortable.’
They sit against the brick building. Lisa spins out of the sun to watch. Mitch kicks the lip of the concrete porch, scuffing his shoe like a hand over a drum skin.
Cassie shoves the sound from her mind. ‘We don’t have long. I’ll do a three-card reading.’
‘Have you been doing this long?’ Lisa asks.
‘A fair while,’ Cassie answers.
‘My nanna would have fit. She thinks fortune-telling is witchcraft sent by the devil to tempt us into evil,’ Lisa says.
‘Your nanna thinks chocolate ice-cream is the devil’s handiwork,’ Natalie replies.
Lisa laughs. ‘True, she thinks Enid Blyton corrupted me.’
‘Nasty Faraway Tree.’
They laugh together. An old insider joke.
‘The three-card reading is about the past, present and future,’ Cassie says, shuffling the long cards in her hands. She closes her eyes, tries to imagine the tickle of incense in her nose, the warmth of a flame, the smoothness of water, the saltiness of her sea shell, and the earthiness of her rock. She breathes deeply and hands the cards to Natalie.
‘Think about the things you want to know about and cut the deck three times.’
Natalie holds the cards reverently, knocks them gently on the concrete to even the edges, and takes her time to choose the first cut.
Cassie turns the first card. The Two of Cups. Upside down. Then the Three of Wands and finally the Seven of Pentacles.
‘This card,’ Cassie fingers the two figures of the first card, ‘is like the romance card or partnership, but it is upside down, so it is more likely about the ending of a partnership. In the past.’
‘Your mum and dad,’ Lisa whispers.
Natalie nods. ‘Yes.’
‘The middle card is the present. The Three of Wands. It is a good card. Umm … established strength. You are a natural leader, you like to take risks. You have a good business sense.’
‘From my dad.’ Natalie nods.
The hooter for class sounds like a ship’s horn. Nobody moves.
‘The last card is the future card. The Seven of Pentacles. You are going to spend the next little while waiting, hoping. You might feel like you are getting nowhere.’
‘Oh my god, yes, another three years of school. What a waste of time!’
They all laugh.
‘Will I be rich?’
‘I haven’t looked that far ahead. It is less reliable the further ahead I look. Pentacles are good though. They can be about money. But not yet.’
‘That sucks, I wanted to buy the Cold Chisel record, and I’m skint. Mitch, lend me some money?’ Natalie says.
Mitch grunts.
A grey-haired man steps up beside him. ‘Are you in this science class, Mr Mitchell?’
‘No, sir, I’ve got manual arts.’
‘Get a move along then or you will all be late.’
He eyes Cassie pulling her cards together into the box. ‘Miss Shultz, not appropriate for school, you can leave your games for the weekend. I don’t want to see those cards here again.’
‘Yes, sir.’ Cassie stands up and grabs her books.
‘Get to class then, all of you.’ He stares down at each of them before turning, his heels crunching on the concrete, and saunters down the path as though looking for more trouble to outwit.
Lisa stands and wipes the wet grass off the back of her legs.
‘What you got next?’ Natalie asks.
‘English,’ Cassie answers.
‘I’m going that way. You coming, Lisa?’ Natalie links her arm into Cassie’s elbow. ‘That was so cool. You can do Lisa’s cards at break.’
Lisa steps in beside them. ‘I don’t want my future read.’
‘Why not? It’ll be fun,’ Natalie says.
‘What if it’s something bad? I don’t want to know if it’s something bad.’
‘Maybe if you knew
something bad was going to happen, you could change it,’ Cassie says.
‘Or go mad wondering when it will happen. Do you think you can change what the cards say?’ Lisa asks.
‘I don’t know. How would we know if we did? It’s like …’ Cassie searches for the words.
‘Good fun.’ Natalie almost skips and Cassie is reminded of the Natalie of old with her fierce long mane of unruly red hair.
The three of them walk to class, Cassie hoping someone, everyone, is noticing them together.
~ 19 ~
Athena Visits
Athena and Cassie pass by Alex on the veranda.
‘That’s your brother?’ Athena asks as the screen door bangs behind them.
‘That’s Alex. I’d introduce you, but why bother?’ Cassie shrugs.
‘He looks like you,’ Athena says.
‘He looks nothing like me.’
They step into the kitchen. Cassie’s mum looks up at them from the kitchen table.
‘Mum, this is Athena. She’s come to teach me to play chess.’
‘Athena! I thought we would never get to meet you.’ She rises and steps forward, her hand held out as if to shake.
‘Mum, you don’t shake hands.’
Athena holds out her hand and they shake.
‘Cassie talks about you all the time.’
‘I do not.’
‘Why don’t you two go into the dining room?’
‘We were going to my room,’ Cassie says.
‘I’ll bring you in some tea. This way.’ Cassie’s mum places her hand on the small of Athena’s back and steers her towards the dining room.
‘Mum, we don’t want tea.’
‘Tea is good. I like tea.’ Athena smiles.
Cassie pulls out a dining room chair and slumps into it. ‘Then we’re going to my room.’
‘Of course,’ her mother replies, heading back to the kitchen.
‘You have the same eyes.’ Athena sits straight up in her chair, the posture of a ballerina.
‘What?’ Cassie asks.
‘You and your brother, you have the same eyes.’
‘They’re not even the same colour,’ Cassie replies.
‘They don’t have to be the same colour,’ Athena says.
‘Do we have to talk about Alex?’ Cassie leans on the table.
‘I’d like a brother. Or a sister. I can never decide. Both maybe.’ Athena tilts her head as though thinking.
‘That’s because you don’t have one. It would be different if you had one,’ Cassie says.
‘Hey, can we go look at the famous chicken shed later? Have they started building the new one yet?’
‘It’s pretty boring. It’s just chickens,’ Cassie says.
‘I know. I’ve been reading about hypnotising chickens. It’s an ancient art. I don’t think it’s really hypnotism. I think they’re playing dead. Tonic immobility. Cool hey? I’d like to try it.’
Cassie grunts. ‘Yeah well, Poppy can show you.’
‘He can do it?’
‘I’ve seen him do it.’ Cassie watches Athena’s eyes widen. ‘Just before he chops off their heads.’ She slams her hand on the table. Athena jumps and they both laugh.
‘Is he here today? Your poppy?’
‘I think he’s out helping Dad with something.’
‘Oh.’ Athena nods.
Cassie’s mother enters carrying a tray and places it on the table. ‘Cassie, why don’t you go and get the chess set?’
‘Mum,’ Cassie groans.
‘Mind if I join you for a little while?’ her mother continues, laying out three of her second-best teacups with saucers.
‘Yes, I do mind actually,’ Cassie replies.
Her mother ignores her, unloading a fruit cake onto the table.
‘Fruit cake? Where’s the chocolate cake?’
Her mother glares at her.
‘I love fruit cake,’ Athena pipes up. ‘It looks homemade.’
‘It is homemade.’ Cassie’s mother smiles and picks up the knife.
‘Can I be mum?’ Athena asks, reaching for the teapot.
‘Oh course, you can. Are you having a piece of cake, Cassandra?’
‘No thanks.’ Cassie crosses her arms across her chest.
‘Then how about you go and find that chess set? It’ll be under some dirty clothes, I expect.’
Cassie thunders into her bedroom and kicks a pile of dirty clothes out of the way. The chess set sits on top of her bookshelf, where it always sits, under the jar of coloured sands Poppy bought her on their only beach holiday to Tewantin. She picks up the bottle and wonders if she should show Athena the carefully layered muted red, brown, yellow, and white grains of sand. She wipes the dust off the curved glass. She always wondered how they had sorted the sand into its colours. Now for the first time she questions how the sand got to be so many colours. They were real. She had seen the colours in the dune cliffs along the beach. Athena would know, and if she didn’t she would find out. She puts the bottle back on the shelf and picks up the chess set.
It rests heavily in her hands as she carries it back to the dining room. Athena and her mother’s heads huddle over the fruit cake, her mother’s eyes fixed on Athena as though she cannot pull away.
‘Cassie,’ her mother looks up at her, a sparkle of excitement on her face, ‘Athena’s been telling me about her subjects at Girls Grammar. They are doing things way ahead of your school.’ She places her chin in her hand and looks back at Athena.
Cassie bangs the chess box onto the table. The pieces inside rattle.
‘Careful,’ her mother says, laying her hand on the box as if to steady the kings and queens.
‘I remember this one,’ Athena says, dragging the chess set towards her. ‘It’s wattle and red gum. It is one of the best one’s Father carved. You’re lucky.’ She looks up and smiles at Cassie. Athena opens the box and spins the rook in its slot. ‘Beautiful! I wanted to keep this one. Father said we needed to sell it.’
Cassie’s mother leans over and picks up one of the bigger pieces. ‘He must be clever, your father. This one is the queen, right?’
‘The matriarch—one of the most powerful and flexible of pieces. They didn’t underrate women in those days.’ Athena and Cassie’s mother nod together. Cassie sighs and cuts herself a piece of cake.
‘I thought you didn’t want any?’ her mother says.
‘I changed my mind,’ Cassie says.
‘This is the king.’ Athena picks up the intricately carved wood and turns it in her hand. ‘The point of the game is to protect the king. He is a weak player, can only move one space at a time, but in any direction. The king is the thing.’
‘Typical man.’ Cassie’s mother laughs. Athena laughs with her. The sweet cake dissolves in Cassie’s mouth and crumbs fall on her lap. She wipes them onto the floor.
‘Cassie,’ her mother nudges her. ‘Don’t make a mess.’
‘We’ll start by learning how each of the pieces work.’ Athena unpacks the rest of the pieces and lays them on the table.
Cassie slurps some tea and adds another teaspoon of sugar. Athena opens the case and turns it to become the chequered board. ‘First we will start with just the pawns and the king on the board. The goal is to get the pawns to the other side without getting captured.’
‘That’s not the game,’ Cassie complains.
‘I know,’ Athena continues. ‘But we start this way and you learn how each piece works before it all gets put together.’
‘Right.’ Cassie nods, leaning forward in the chair, but Athena turns the board towards her mother and Cassie sits back. Athena holds the pawn up in front of Cassie’s mother. ‘The pawn is expendable, but also a barrier. It goes forward two spaces in the first move, but only one space thereafter. It takes other pie
ces by moving diagonally.’ She sets the pieces on the board. ‘And you must use them to protect the king.’
‘Cassie.’ Her mother watches the pieces being placed on the board. ‘There’s a roast in the oven. Can you check if it needs turning yet?’
Cassie scrapes the chair noisily across the floor and thuds into the kitchen. She leans on the kitchen bench and fights the burn of tears wanting release.
‘Stupid,’ she mumbles to herself and picks up the oven mitt. The blast of heat dries her skin and evaporates her tears. The slab of beef sweats pink juice. She pulls the tray from the oven and uses the tongs to lift it. The bottom barely brown, she returns it to the oven and whacks the oven door closed.
In the dining room, Athena and her mother both watch her enter.
‘She’s back. We can start now,’ her mother says, laying a hand on Cassie’s knee when she sits down. ‘This will be good.’ She looks at Cassie, a huge grin on her face. ‘We’ll be able to play together.’
Athena’s colourless hair shines gold in the muted light. Her fringe hangs in her eyes combed by her long eyelashes. Cassie glances from Athena to her mother and notices the same dark gold through her mother’s hair.
Cassie stands and walks around the table, pushes Athena out of her seat and faces her mother. ‘You will never be able to beat me.’ She smiles.
They play two games before Cassie’s mother says she has to go and see to dinner and Athena says she needs to get home before dark. Cassie packs the teacups onto the tray and her mother steps in front of Athena and wraps her arms around her. Athena stiffens like a three-day-old corpse.
‘You come visit anytime,’ Cassie’s mother says, stepping back, her hands on Athena’s shoulders. Cassie stops, the cup mid-air.
‘Ah ah.’ Athena stumbles over the sound barely on her lips.
‘I’ll do that.’ Cassie’s mum takes the cup from Cassie’s hand. ‘You walk Athena up to the back fence.’
Cassandra Page 11
