by Rick Wayne
“It depends,” he said with a hint of impatience, “on whether or not you consider Tibet to be part of China. Tell me,” he added quickly, “is there a dragon?” He nodded to my side.
“How did you know about that?”
“Deduction. The dragon and the phoenix are the symbols of the emperor and empress, whose union begets the state, just as the union of yin and yang begets the universe.”
“No no no no. How did you know about my tattoo?”
“Ah. When you slept, you fell sideways on the sofa. Your shirt lifted some.” He pointed.
I eyed him.
“I replaced it,” he said.
“Uh huh.”
He motioned to my bag between us. “And that?”
I took out the tarot deck I’d gotten at Sour Candy. It was wrapped in plastic, all glossy and ridiculous. I ripped off the covering and read the 2D bar code on the back with my phone. While the app downloaded, he unfolded the little instruction manual stashed with the cards. It took him all of four seconds to scowl, crumple it, and add it to the trash trapped on the ground under the prickly bushes behind us.
“Excuse you,” I objected. “That wasn’t yours.”
He turned his lips down like he’d just drunk heavy bitters.
“Any idiot could invent a better system than any of those, and off the top of his head.”
“Any idiot, huh? Alright, Einstein.” I pulled the deck from the box and handed it to him. “Prove it.”
He gave a little annoyed sigh. Then he actually cracked his knuckles. It wasn’t until he started shuffling the deck that I noticed there weren’t any pictures on the cards.
“Wait.”
I pulled one just as he set the deck down for a third shuffle. There was a classic interlocking design on the back, and on the front, a 2D bar code on a white background with a simple border flourish around the edge. According to a note on the back of the box, it was a mechanism to prevent cheating. You had to draw a random card. You had no choice. They all looked the same, so there was no way to stack the deck to get the reading you wanted.
“That is your first card,” he said. “Set it down.”
The cards were crisp and they snapped loudly as he shuffled. He cut the deck once, shuffled twice more, then cut a second time, at which point he spread the cards on the flat surface between us and directed me to choose six more.
“But do not think,” he said.
“Yeah, yeah,” I objected. “I know.”
After I chose, he placed all seven cards in a kind of pyramid shape: three on the bottom, two in the middle, and one on top, with the final card floating above and to one side.
“The first position,” he explained, pointing to the bottom left, “is the cardinal, the cornerstone of the castle, also called the House of the World. It tells us something about ourselves, our overall personality.”
He directed me to turn it and I did so.
I had the option of using the classic Rider Waite deck or two alternate designs. There were also additional, fancier designs available for in-app purchase. I stuck with the default. I didn’t really have a choice.
I scanned the 2D code with my phone, and a picture of filled the screen.
The Moon.
The orb itself shone in full between two flanking towers. A dog and a wolf howled, while a lobster crawled from the water at the bottom.
“Ah,” he said. “You are a very creative person. Intuitive, as well.”
“That’s the nice way of telling someone they’re artsy and flaky, but thank you.”
He pointed at the cards. “In the first position, The Moon represents mystery, and all that follows will be its unraveling.”
He motioned to the middle card on the bottom row, and I turned it.
“The second position,” he said, “is the House of Water, which flows over the world. It is movement, activity, transition—our life goals and the unexpected changes we encounter.”
I scanned it with a beep.
The Knight of Wands.
A man in shabby chain armor rode an unsteady horse rising on its back legs. His right hand raised a rod sprouting green leaves.
“Impetuosity,” he said, “and the pursuit of a foolhardy adventure.”
“Okay,” I acknowledged grudgingly. “Fine. Two for two.”
“The third position,” he went on, “is the House of Life, which grows from the wet earth. This is the house of family, love, and relationships.”
With some hesitation, I took the third card and scanned it.
The Three of Swords.
A red heart was suspended in the air, pierced clean through by three crossing blades. Blood dripped from the bottom as rain fell from storm clouds in the distance.
“Heartbreak,” he said, “either yours or one caused by you.”
I flipped and scanned the next card without comment.
“The fourth position is the House of Animals, which feed on the plants which sprout from the wet earth. This is our roving passion, our weakness, our foibles and limitations—which can also be our strengths.”
The Tower. I set my phone down where he could see the screen.
Lightning fell from a black cloud and struck a stone tower, like a battlement, which shattered, sending the pair at the top, a man and a woman, tumbling to the ground.
“Ah,” he said. “Your foolhardy quest will end in tragedy, a ruin of the highest order.”
I frowned. When it was clear nothing else was forthcoming from me, he pointed to the second card on the second row.
“The fifth position is the House of Man, both saint and sinner, who was given governance of the animals that eat the plants that sprout from the wet earth. This is our rational mind, our hobbies and activities. Work and career also fall here.”
I turned the fifth card.
The Eight of Cups.
A lone figure dressed in a red hood and cape and carrying a walking stick followed the course of a river. The traveler moved away from the viewer, toward the dark and distant mountains, so it was impossible to say if it was a man or woman. An eclipsed sun hung in the sky, shining only as a thin halo around an otherwise black disc. A scatter of eight gold cups, all broken, lay in the foreground, as if they’d been smashed and discarded by the departing traveler.
“This symbolizes abandonment of old plans and aims,” he explained. Then he thought for a moment. “But given the prior house, I think it more likely means that magic has been used against you, driving you forth against your wishes and sending you on a journey that you would not have otherwise undertaken.”
I turned the sixth card, at the top of the pyramid.
“The sixth position, at the apex of the tower, is the House of the Devil,” he said “who yearns to replace the divine and who plagues all below. This represents our enemies—the friends that act against us—as well as the impediments and barriers to our own ascension.”
I scanned it. I paused when I saw it on the screen.
Death.
I looked at the image for a long moment. A skeletal figure in black armor rode a pale horse. Over the ground he dipped a long scythe, which mowed a garden of men, women, and children. A priest in a high hat knelt before him, hands pressed together in silent entreaty.
The chef could see the look on my face. “It may not be as you think. The Death card merely signifies an end, not necessarily the end of life.”
“How did you know what card it was?” I asked. I hadn’t turned the screen.
He didn’t answer.
“Why is the last card apart like that?” I asked.
The seventh and final card stood above and to the side of the others, like a sun rising over a castle. Or a moon, I guess.
“That is the House of the Divine, of life and fortune—long or short, good or bad. It is not the future but rather what waits for us outside time, what may or may not come to be, depending on our actions. It is a caution and an encouragement. You are female, so we draw in the converse position, the Sun, on
the right.”
My eyes caught a scattered grouping of people approaching the building across the street. It happened every fifteen minutes or so—after each train. And there was Darren. Heading for the front door.
“Shit!”
I dropped the cards in my hand into my purse. I swiped the last and stuck it in my back pocket as the two of us trotted across the courtyard as nonchalantly as possible. We made it just in time. Darren had already walked into the building, and the door was swinging shut. I made it through. Sometimes it pays to be small.
The door shut hard in front of him. He scowled through the glass.
Darren Tully was checking his mailbox. He’d gained a little weight since the picture I saw was taken. He wore earbuds and wasn’t paying any attention to me.
“She doesn’t know you,” I said from the other side of the heavy door. “Just chill here for a sec. I’ll bring her down.”
I noted the open mailbox number—314—and pressed the button for the elevator. It came a moment later, and I hit the button for the fourth floor just as Darren stepped in, mail in hand. The elevator dinged on the third floor and I kindly held it open for him. He gave me a polite smile—one of those pressed-lips jobs—and stepped into the hall. The doors closed and I got off on four, found the stairs, and went back down to three. I stopped in the stairwell and made a quick phone call. Trap set.
Darren Tully opened the door almost immediately after I knocked, like he’d only been a few steps away. I planted my foot inside immediately. He was bigger than me, as most people are, and if he’d braced himself, I never would’ve made it, but he wasn’t ready, and I pushed past him.
“Hi, Darren.”
Kell was on the couch, which faced the balcony. She turned to see. She stood immediately and backed toward Darren’s big flat screen television. Leaning against the wall next to it was a bulky Calloway golf bag full of sock-covered clubs. A stack of six golf ball boxes sat on the hardwood near the fallen leaves from a large potted plant badly in need of water. Over it was a framed Georgia O’Keeffe print. I guess he wanted to show off his feminine side.
“Nice TV,” I said.
Things were quiet for a moment.
“How did you find me?”
“You must be Cerise,” Darren said behind me.
I nodded without turning. I wasn’t going to take my eyes off her.
“I’ll, uhh . . . I guess I’ll give you guys a minute.”
“You can stay,” I said.
He looked to Kell for approval. She wasn’t having any. I’m sure we both saw the answer in her eyes. Darren grabbed his earbuds off the counter and walked into the bedroom and shut the door firmly so as to announce his intention not to eavesdrop. He wanted us to know he was a good guy.
“You know,” I said, “he’s probably the only guy in the city who’s actually capable of caring for you in some non-trivial capacity.”
“Can you please not do the mom thing? It’s really fucking annoying. I’m not stupid, okay?”
“Then why do you keep using him?”
“I dunno.” She was quiet. The room was quiet. “Because he lets me.”
I bit back a retort. I tried for a middle ground.
“That’s not good enough. And that’s not me being your mom. It’s me being your friend. If you treat people like shit, they eventually get tired of it and bail. But then that’s what this is, right? A test: who will stand by you at the worst.”
She rubbed her palms flat against each other like they were covered in filth. I watched her do it a few times. Her face seemed torn between anger and fear.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
I opened my mouth to say more, but nothing came.
She shut her eyes, as if anticipating what I would’ve said and getting frustrated with it all the same.
“Did you fuck him?” she asked.
I breathed in.
“Tell me the truth.”
Be honest, Cerise. “Sort of?”
“How do you ‘sort of’ fuck someone? If you blew him, that totally counts.”
“I didn’t blow him.”
She looked at me. Her face turned slowly. “Why not?”
We smiled. I walked over and sat on the ground with my back against the couch and she slid down and joined me. She locked my arm in hers.
“Not what we expected, is it?” she asked.
“Fuuuuck . . . Not at all.”
We were quiet for a long time.
“You stole something,” I accused. “Didn’t you? You and Bastien.”
She didn’t answer right away. It took a minute.
“He’s got so much money, Cerise. You don’t even know.”
“Yeah . . .” I said.
“I’m serious.” She sat up to look at me. “He’s got a wristwatch that cost more than all my student loans. It was like sixty thousand dollars or something. For a watch.”
“I believe it.” I nodded. “And I hope it sucked his dick every night.”
“And you know how he made his money? He created some kind of online market for patents. People buy and sell patents, did you know that? I didn’t. They buy and sell other people’s ideas. It’s so fucked up. And sometimes they buy them for no other reason than to sue someone else for using it.”
“I know what a patent troll is.”
“He’s not even that!” she objected. “He invented a troll market. My dad worked for fifteen years or whatever for this company in Minneapolis that made some kind of software routing thing. I remember he used to come home all the time and complain that there was a company in China doing the same thing, only cheaper, so everyone was buying from them even though they didn’t have the rights and the Chinese government wouldn’t enforce our patent laws. Eventually it got serious enough that Dad’s company sued to keep any Chinese product out of the US market. But it wasn’t his company’s patent. It was owned by some troll. Dad’s firm had the US license, which they paid for out of sales. But rather than fight the lawsuit, which would’ve been expensive and which probably would’ve cost them all their American business, the Chinese company bought the patent and then canceled all the licenses. They used the money they made illegally to put honest people out of business. The troll got super-mega-rich. And nobody did anything. Nobody cared.”
I didn’t know what to say. Kell hated her dad. Everyone knew that. Even Lykke.
“Is that when things got bad?” I asked.
“I know what you’re thinking.”
“I’m not thinking anything.”
“Yes, you are. You’re thinking that I’m blaming Lykke for what happened with my dad.”
I shrugged. “No wants to believe their parent is capable—”
“Just stop!” she yelled.
She shook her head and we sat next to each other in silence, heads turned in opposite directions.
I think that’s when it hit me—the extent to which her life was run on impulse. Kell was winging it, all the way through, from blood to bones. She even said so. If Darren got tired of her giving him blue balls, there were ten other guys who would take her in, for a night or two anyway. The persistent prevalence of easy options like that overwhelmed every worthwhile avenue in her life. It was the real reason she’d quit school—she couldn’t wing that, and she had no idea how to be different. And no incentive to try. Any kind of regular job would’ve been mostly eaten up by student loan payments. Years and years of it. By then, her youth would be spent.
And there was Lykke, flaunting a life of leisure, positively leaking surplus cash. In her mind, she was simply doing what he did to others.
“So what happened?” I said after a minute.
“He kicked me out. Or threatened to.”
“So you told him you were pregnant.”
“I thought it would buy us a couple days. Bastien’s people had a buyer. People with money. Real money. We had a plan, okay? It wasn’t just some stupid thing. But Lykke didn’t believe I was pregnant. The way he was talking, Cerise . .
. He wasn’t just worried about having a kid. He was worried about having a kid with me. He kept saying how it would pollute the line, and the others would kill him. He was frantic. Paranoid. He wanted a pregnancy test right then. That night. He wanted to see it for himself. He sent William to the pharmacy and kept alternating between screaming at me and begging in tears. He kept saying it would ruin him.”
“That when he hit you?”
She nodded.
“Did you know you were pregnant when you told him?”
She seemed surprised by the question—surprised that I had figured it out.
She shook her head meekly.
“So. You both got a shock.”
Her eyes clouded. “They held me,” she said softly. “William came back with like eight boxes. Cleaned the place out. I think he was worried I wouldn’t make it easy for them. But what could I do? They pulled my panties off. They pulled my legs open. I tried to fight them, but . . . When I wouldn’t go, they hit me in the stomach until— The pee went everywhere. Down my legs. All over William’s hands.” She curled up tighter next to me. “It was so humiliating. Like I was a dog . . .”
She shivered as if from the memory of cold.
“The next night, I took it. I wanted to make him feel as powerless as I felt. He was so terrified. I didn’t even know of who. But I wanted him to feel what I felt. It was in the middle of that big empty room, the ball room, in that big empty house. It was in a small stone casket, like a tiny vampire or some shit.”
“Is the baby even Lykke’s?” I asked.
Her eyes turned back to me again. She shook her head.
I ran my hands through my hair. “Fuck, Kell. This is a mess. I mean, this is a serious fucking mess. The cops are gonna say that’s extortion.”
“Extortion?”
“They don’t know anything about a dagger. Okay? Or Bastien’s people. They’re ghosts. They only know about you and me and they’re not gonna believe anything about magic and shit. We need proof. What did you do with it? Where is it now?”
“I hid it.”
“Where? I hope it was somewhere really fucking good because you and I are being set up. Do you see that? And that thing is just about our only way out of this.”
“Don’t get mad.” She waited a moment. “Okay? Promise.”
