by Brenda Drake
“What am I going to do with it?” Aster asked, pushing away the teacup. She didn’t want tea. She wanted to stop the nightmare she was living. And she wanted to get rid of the plague she was holding.
“First, I want to tell you my story. Open the box.”
Aster did as instructed. Inside were notebooks and photographs. “What is all this?”
“Your history, Aster,” she said. “I am your grandfather’s aunt.”
The notebook slipped from Aster’s hand. “We’re related? How come…why didn’t Gram tell us?”
“After I finish telling you what I must, you will understand the reason.” Her eyes glistened, and she turned her head for a moment to compose herself.
“Okay.”
Tillie cleared her throat. “Fate changers run in our family. I’ve been waiting to see if any of Albert’s granddaughters would inherit the gene. Your grandmother knows this. That is why she banned tarot cards. If you never touched one, you’d never realize your power.”
“Well, that was a shitty plan,” Aster interrupted. “Look what happened. I’ve ruined people’s lives. Gram got sick. Iris is with that jealous asshat, and now Daisy could be hanging out with the wrong crowd. Who knows what else I’ve done? Why couldn’t Gram tell us the truth to begin with?”
Tillie lowered her teacup and shook her head. “Such distasteful language you have.”
“Sorry,” Aster said against the rim of her cup as she took a sip of the floral liquid.
“I’m not sure your grandmother thought it through,” Tillie said. “After Albert died, she didn’t want to face it. She thought keeping you away from the truth would protect you all. ”
“I’d say she didn’t think it through,” Aster said. “How could she believe we wouldn’t come across tarot cards? They’re everywhere. And now look at the mess I’ve made.”
Tillie gave Aster a pitying smile. “I agree. And I wanted to teach you, but your grandmother wouldn’t have it. Others have learned how to control changing fates. My grandmother had. That is her hatbox. The loose papers are her notes. They’re in Romani. The journal holds my translations of her words. I keep forgetting what it all says. At my age, my memories get a little fuzzy. Your grandfather had the box all these years. I wish he would’ve shown me it before…” She took her napkin and dabbed at the tears forming in her eyes.
“Before what?” Aster pressed.
“You will hate me,” she said, looking out the window behind Aster. “But maybe it will make your task easier.” She folded her hands in her lap. “It was two years ago. A woman had found me at my small house in Maine. Her son had been cursed. I had him pull a card. When he turned over death, I should have made them leave, but…”
Aster straightened. “But he was just a boy? You had to help him.”
Tillie nodded. “And I did. I changed the boy’s fate. I felt for the mother. I had lost a child. My only one. When he was five. He had died from pneumonia.” She dabbed at her eyes again. “I did this without knowing the consequences. The curse fell on my family. A few months later, your grandfather died. The fate had transferred to him.”
“Wait. What? Gramps died because you changed a fate. You touched him?”
“It was a cursed fate. I didn’t have to touch him to pass it on. The curse transfers to the fate changer’s family. It chooses to kill the oldest first son. Your grandfather.” Emotions clogged her throat, and she coughed into her napkin as Aster processed what the old woman had said. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t know it would happen.”
Aster understood her. She hadn’t known what she was doing when she’d made Gram sick. “It’s not your fault,” she said. “This—this whole thing is insane.”
“I agree.” Tillie blew her nose. “It all goes back to the old country. My grandmother left her homeland to hide from it. But the cursed ones always seem to find us. It’s as if there’s something connecting us to that family. I discovered it in my grandmother’s notes. The woman who initiated the curse was a relative of ours. That is what ties our families together.”
Cause and effect, Aster thought. The woman caused the curse and its effects returned to her family.
“I’m getting tired,” Tillie said, opening a candy dish on the table and removing a bottle of pills. “I want you to give me your grandmother’s fate.”
Aster’s mouth fell open. When she composed herself from the bomb Tillie had just dropped, she said, “I can’t do that. You’ll die.”
“I’m already dying. I’ve only stayed alive to give this box to one of you girls. Now that I know it’s you and have passed this information on, I can leave in peace. My hope is that you’ll find a way to save our families.”
“I just… No, it’s not right. There has to be another way.” Aster shifted in her seat, uncomfortable at the thought. “Can’t I just pass it on to a squirrel or a bird or something?”
“I wish it was that easy.” She glanced into her teacup. “Do you mind getting the kettle on the stove and a fresh tea bag for me, dear? I seem to have finished this already.”
“Sure.” Aster went to the kitchen, dazed.
“Isn’t this tea lovely?” Tillie called. “Your grandmother gave it to me for my birthday. It helps with the arthritis. You wouldn’t know it, but I just turned eighty-three.”
I’d know it. Actually, I thought you were closer to a hundred. Aster took a teabag out of the box on the counter and grabbed the teakettle.
“Here you go.” Aster dropped the tea bag into Tillie’s cup and poured hot water on top of it.
“Thank you, dear.” Tillie touched Aster’s forearm as she straightened. A static charge between the two made the tiny hairs on Aster’s arm stand up.
Aster jumped back, hot water dripping on the carpet. “No! You touched me.”
Tillie picked up her cup and dunked the tea bag up and down in the water. “I’m going to take my sleeping pills, drink my tea, and go to bed. Tell your mother I wish to speak to her when she returns. Don’t let my body rot in here, you hear?”
Tears burned Aster’s eyes, and words clogged in her throat. She couldn’t move.
“Don’t just stand there. Put the kettle away, get the box, and go.” Tillie sipped her tea. “And don’t cry over me. I have lived a long and, at times, wonderful life.”
Aster picked up the box and hugged it to her.
“Oh, I almost forgot.” Tillie placed her cup down. “The reader you’ve been visiting has put a calling on you.”
“You mean Miri?” The reader had said she called for Aster the morning after the freaky reading with Leah.
“Yes, and she continues to control you. She would have had you pull your fate card,” Tillie said, breathless.
“She did.” Aster would deal with Miri later. Right now, she didn’t want to leave Tillie alone. By the look of her, the old woman might keel over any minute. There had to be a way to fix this. She wanted to go back and stop herself from touching fates.
“Check your deck to see if it’s missing,” Tillie said. “You must get it back, and then stay away from that reader. She is not a friend. Your abilities are what attract her.” She unscrewed the top of the pill bottle, wheezing. “Now go.”
Aster took a step toward the door but hesitated. Tillie was acting as if she wasn’t about to die, but was just going on a trip or something. It felt wrong to leave her alone. To let her die in this small apartment without a loved one to hold her hand.
“I can’t leave you.”
“That’s very sweet of you, dear, but I’m a loner. Always have been. Ever since my Renaldo died. There was no one around to warn me about the dangers of fate changing.” It took her some time to stand. “He died of a horrible illness because I touched him. Great tragedies have been written about lovers and their sacrifices. I was fully prepared to join him, but he made me promise I wouldn’t. So now, it is time for death to collect me, and I welcome it. I hope to see him again.”
Tillie escorted Aster to the door. “One last thing… Le
arn to live with your tarot deck. It will never leave you.”
“I don’t know how I’ll get over this.”
She grabbed Aster’s chin, her hand trembling under the effort. “None of this is your fault. I’m older than God’s spit. It’s my time. I just want to go to sleep.”
Aster nodded before leaving. Regret followed her all the way to her room. She slid the box under her bed, then went to her window. Tillie stood at the screen door. With a smile and a slight nod to Aster, she closed the door.
Aster curled up on her bed and cried. None of this is your fault, Tillie’s voice echoed in her thoughts.
Yeah, right.
Chapter Fourteen
Reese
The phone conversation with his mother was dragging on longer than Reese would have liked. Though she tried to sound normal while discussing the elaborate party she was planning for him, her voice broke several times. She hadn’t a clue that he knew why she’d insisted the event be the day before his actual birthday. Planning your son’s farewell to life in a big finale was, most certainly, a grave undertaking.
“I’m happy with whatever you decide, Mum,” Reese said, pressing his lips together to hold back the emotions threatening to color his words. He wished he could take this burden away from her. But if she knew he was aware of his impending doom, it would break her heart further. “Yes, I got the email with the flight details.”
“Well, then,” she said, the connection a bit staticky, “I will see you in three weeks’ time. Good night, love.”
He looked at the clock on the stove. It was nearly three and almost bedtime where she was. “Very well, see you in a few weeks.”
Speaking with his mother had put him in a sullen mood, so he decided to go for a jog. The mist in the air freshened his bare skin. He skipped the boardwalk and ran along the streets. It seemed as though Aster was avoiding him. Nearly a week had passed since they last saw each other. His texts and phone calls to her had gone unanswered. Leah had informed him that Aster’s grandmother had recovered from her mysterious illness. And yet, Aster still hadn’t returned his messages. Water sprayed against his leg as his trainers pounded across the wet street. His birthday was nearing, and he’d have to find a way to ask Aster to help him soon.
Jan suggested that Reese take her on a date at the boardwalk and coax her into Miri’s for a reading. Aster would see his fate and would undoubtedly change it. Surprisingly, although it had come from Jan, Reese thought it was a splendid plan. But first, he needed her to talk to him.
The jog wasn’t helping him get Aster off his mind. Tired from his sleepless nights fraught with a recurring prom night fantasy never realized, he cut through the next alley and headed for home. Images of Aster flipped across his mind. Aster’s smile. Aster’s pout. Aster sauntering around the counter and sashaying down the hall toward his room.
He grunted his frustration, scaring a woman walking what looked to be a ball of white fur with legs. The dog yapped at him and the woman scowled. He bounded up the steps to his flat. Leah’s head was on Jan’s lap as they watched a movie on the flat-screen.
“You’re wet,” Leah said, stating the obvious.
“Yeah, it’s raining,” Reese said, reiterating the obvious. Rivers of water ran down the panes of the window directly across from Leah, but she was too lost in the movie, or Jan, or both, to notice. “Is it always this muggy in May?” he asked.
“It does rain a lot here,” Leah said, her eyes glued on the movie.
Reese slipped off his trainers, grabbed a towel from the bathroom, and returned to the living area, drying his hair.
Someone pounded on the door.
“Ah, pizza,” Jan said, grabbing money off the coffee table and plodding to the door.
Leah paused the movie and adjusted herself on the couch. “Did you ask for red peppers?”
Jan drew open the door. On the other side, Aster shifted her weight from foot to foot.
She looked past Jan and directly at Reese. “Hi.”
“Come in.” Jan stepped aside to let her by.
“Hey, Aster,” Leah said. “You’re just in time for pizza.”
“Thanks, but I need to talk to Reese first.” Aster walked right by Reese. Slipping off her hood, she marched down the hall and entered his room.
It hadn’t registered on Reese that Aster meant for him to follow her. Actually, he was still processing her presence.
“Don’t just stand around like a useless lump,” Jan said. “Haven’t I taught you anything? When a girl goes to your room, you don’t dally.”
Reese glanced down the hall. The door to his room was ajar. “Right, of course, carry on then.”
Aster’s jeans, sweat jacket, and trainers were on the floor. She was under the covers in his bed. “I haven’t slept in days. I thought maybe I could with you.”
“We have that in common.” He got into bed beside her, dragging her to him. She draped her arm across him and rested her head on his chest. Her body was warm against him, and he was certain sleep would again evade him.
“I have no one to talk to,” she whispered, glancing up at him, her breath tickling his neck. “Mom and Gram wouldn’t understand. They’d just get mad. My sisters would think I was batshit crazy…and then there are those who would just want to use me.”
He shifted uneasily. Did she know what he wanted from her? Would she hate him later when she learned the truth? He may have set out to betray her, but now it was different. He loved her. And if she loved him, it wouldn’t matter.
“I care,” he said. “Besides, I already think you’re a tad insane.”
“Not funny.” She pinched his chest, and the excitement it caused made him uncomfortable. “I’m serious.”
“I know.” He gently rubbed her back. He was certain he’d end up the insane one if they stayed under the covers together much longer. “You’re safe with me. You can tell me anything.”
She rolled on top of him, and their bare legs brushed against each other, sending more heat through Reese’s body. She gave him a soft kiss and spoke against his lips. “First, I want to pick up where we left off on prom night. Then I want to cuddle and sleep with you for hours.” She stretched over to the nightstand, snatched up a box, and held it out for him to see. “I’ve come prepared. There are twelve condoms in here.”
“I’m flattered you think I’ll need that many.”
“And you’re delusional. I asked for a single, but they didn’t have any.” She dropped the box and kissed his neck before nibbling his ear.
He rolled her over onto her back and searched her eyes. “We don’t have to do this. Taking a nap together is fine with me.”
“I want you to be my first,” she said. “For it to be a sweet memory that I’ll cherish for the rest of my life. Something special I’ll cling to when I’m an old woman drinking floral tea alone in my apartment and death comes for me.”
“Such silly thoughts you have going through your pretty head.” He kissed her nose. “I want many memories with you, not just one. And when death does come, I want to be holding you, so you don’t have to face it alone.”
She swallowed. “I think I love you.”
“You think?” He kissed her deeply this time, his tongue finding hers, a fever rising between them. She wrapped her legs around him and he was gone. All thoughts of betrayal and death dissipated into passion and exploration.
She was quiet afterward, her breathing steady in sleep. The act had been somewhat awkward at first before they found their stride, but tender nonetheless. Lying on his side, he watched her. The freckles on her nose made her look innocent.
Guilt stabbed at his chest. He should have asked her to reverse his curse before getting intimate. Surely it wouldn’t matter now, he told himself. She had to know how he felt about her. He brushed a stray strand of her auburn hair away from the corner of her mouth.
Not wanting to ruin things, he decided to tell her about his curse in a few days. If he was completely honest with himself, h
e needed to muster up the courage. Though he hoped she’d understand, he wasn’t fully confident she’d react well to his request.
Sleep weighed on his eyelids. He dropped his head on the pillow. Aster’s nearness and the sound of her breathing lulled him to sleep.
…
Something tickled Reese’s nose, and he swatted it away. He opened his eyes when it returned. Aster leaned over him, a white feather in her hand.
“Where’d you get that?” he said groggily.
“From a small hole in your pillow.”
“That’s curious.”
She got out of bed and slipped her clothes on. “It’s dark out. I should get home.”
Reese flung the covers off and searched for his shorts.
“Will you come with me? There’s something I want to show you.”
“All right, but I have to say…” He slipped on a pair of underpants.
“What?” she asked, peeking over her shoulder at him, one eyebrow raised.
“I’m famished.” He pulled a T-shirt over his head. “Perhaps there’s some pizza left over.”
“Have you seen Jan eat? He’s like a Hoover.” She smirked. “We might be lucky to find some crust in the trash.”
But surprisingly, there happened to be one large slice left in the box. Reese and Aster split it before making the drive to her home. The lights in the house were warm and inviting. As they crossed the driveway, Aster’s eyes kept going to the door beside the garage. The corners of her mouth slanted downward.
“Are you all right?” he asked.
“Yeah.”
“Is this the sort of thing where you say the opposite of what you truly mean?”
“Yes.” Her lips turned up in a smile. “The woman who lived there died last week.”
“I’m sorry.” So that’s the reason she’s been absent lately.
“I want to show you what she gave me. Keep an open mind, okay?”
A woman’s scream came from the beach, cutting her off. “Help me! Help!”
