by Mark Edward
I would come to appreciate the lessons I learned from Chandra more and more over the years. First lesson: Readings can be done with anything, as long as you have a good rap. Second lesson: No matter what you use as a vehicle for readings, if it is something visual and different from what everybody else is doing in the room, you will get noticed and get more work. Third lesson: Putting my own contact information on anything that is handed out to a sitter effectively cuts out the middleman (or woman) and puts one hundred percent in my pocket, not theirs.
Chandra looked over her shoulder and gave me a faint little smile. She must have thought I had been paying such close attention to her for other reasons.
“Nicely done,” I said softly.
“Thanks,” she sweetly replied.
I had made my first friend at Light Path. Whether Chandra was a scam artist (pun intended) didn’t matter. She had something that worked for her and I admired her for it.
The room began to fill up with the rest of the day’s crew. Psychics of all ages and persuasions rolled in with their pushcarts and cases overflowing with mystical wares. I was surprised one psychic sat down with nothing more than a half-empty Double Big Gulp and a half-eaten sandwich. I learned that psychics who chose to partake of snacks and other non-spiritual items under the scrutiny of potential clients were always short on sitters. Psychics may be clairvoyant (which means “one who sees clearly” in French) but not too bright when it comes to customer service.
I did a few readings under the watchful eyes of a neighboring psychic, and then decided to saunter over to her table to introduce myself. She was between readings and shuffling her pack of tarot cards to fill the time.
“Hi. My name’s Mark.”
“So, you’re the new golden boy in town, eh?” she asked with an ancient set of teeth and a smile that looked a million years old. She had that kindly old auntie persona going for her, with a shawl and a tightly coiled, old-world hair treatment that radiated trust. The pearl necklace and a small cameo around her neck made her look so homey, I felt like I was in the presence of a long-lost relative. She could’ve been someone’s sweet old Aunt Sadie.
“Yeah, I guess that would be me.” I offered my hand.
She introduced herself as Edith Anne. Unlike Chandra’s weak-willed handshake, Edith Anne gripped my hand in an unsettling witchy way, as if she were trying to keep her black-cat familiar from slipping away. “Well, I’m glad to meet any of you young people. You have to be pretty brave to put yourself in the middle of all us witches, you know.”
“Do I?” I was a little taken aback.
“Well, yes. I’ve been here for over twenty years and I’ve seen people come and go. Most of my friends have passed on to the Other Side. I still talk to them . . . I know most everybody here today and I can tell you they’re all wondering what you do and why you’re here, as if they didn’t know. I know why you’re here, young man.”
“You do?” I was a bit wary of her now. Maybe she was indeed psychic and knew I was the proverbial wolf among the sheep.
Still, I couldn’t help liking her sure-footed confidence and her charming creepiness. It wasn’t a matter of bravado or psychic ego. She seemed like just a very wise old woman. Later on I met her friend Rosie and together these two witches turned my head around about good versus bad psychics and gave me many moments of sage advice. They were like the two aunts in the movie Arsenic and Old Lace. And they could be almost as deadly to deal with. They knew what was going on, and you found yourself on their bad side at your own peril. But Edith Anne was a truly warm human being who ended up always having a good word for me, never a bad one.
“Oh, yes,” she said to me that first day. “You are here to learn. I can see that. And you will learn from us, then take what you have learned and disappear, like they always do.” She looked down at her cards.
“Don’t be too sure. I’m not in any hurry.”
After I had worked with her for several weeks, I saw why she had a steady list of return clients. Everybody needed an old Aunt Sadie to confide in. Especially if they didn’t have any real family to speak of, which many who came to Light Path clearly did not. There were thousands of immigrants and illegal aliens in this part of town and many of them were quite alone. Women like Edith Anne filled a huge gap for those who didn’t have a shoulder to cry on or a therapist to turn to.
“I’ll tell you anything you want to know, for free.” She chortled. “I can tell you are not like all the rest. I’m not sure why yet, but I think you will be finding out an awful lot about yourself here.”
I realized she was giving me my free reading and I liked that. Edith Anne was a grand dame of the higher psychic realm. She was right, of course. I was there to learn. I would indeed find out so many things about myself by learning about others.
“That sounds great. I’ll do the same for you, if I can,” I offered as gracefully as possible. “Although I doubt there’s anything I can tell you that you don’t already know and have told other people a million times.”
“Oh, don’t you be too sure about that, Mark. I learn something from everybody, and you are young enough to share a whole new generation of things with me. Like all that computer stuff and these fancy phones. I can’t keep up with it all. Not that I want to. I’d rather just sit here and watch.”
Edith Anne sat calmly and watched, deduced, and worked the room, all without lifting a finger to do more than turn over a tarot card.13
“I do have one quick question I would like to ask.”
“Shoot,” she said with a twinkle in her eye.
“Why do some of these people look so threatened? I’m not feeling all that welcomed by a few of them.” I quickly rephrased that sentence to make it sound more psychic. “I mean, why do I get a sense of otherness from some of them? Aren’t we all supposed to be like a sort of close-knit family?”
“Bullshit,” she wheezed out in a whisper. “I told you. You’re the new kid. Give it time. Introduce yourself and most of them will probably help you out. If not, don’t worry. If you know too much, they sense it and stay away. Take Estella over there.” She pointed her chin subtly toward a Latina woman who moved about the room like a spider and who was shooting furtive glances our way from time to time.
“She’s a spy for the owners. Watch out for her.”
“Really? She looks innocent enough.” We both tried not to look her way as she swished past us in her multicolored Mexican flounces. I hated not trusting anybody so soon.
Once again I had to remember the inhabitants of Nightmare Alley. I was in a carefully disguised carnival full of con artistes and scam peddlers. There was bound to be professional jealousy, if the word “professional” can be used in this highly unprofessional situation. Not surprisingly, the owners had a system of snitches. I found this out later, when Estella kept chatting me up, asking nosy questions and never offering more than a suspicious look in return. She was sexy and charming, in her own way, but not one of the people I would end up learning much from.
Then there was Byllie. She was a large woman who looked like Jabba the Hut from Return of the Jedi only she was never without a yellow skullcap on her head. Surrounded by dozens of arcane-looking charts and complicated displays of apparently very important cabalistic designs, she had a storefront-like space at Light Path all to herself that measured about five-by-five feet. Her face would be lit by a small banker’s lamp, and she would scowl into a huge magnifying glass, as if examining some exotic specimen of butterfly. Standard playing cards were her stock-in-trade. I never would have thought so much could be wrung from fifty-two pieces of printed card stock.
I was initially a little put off by Byllie. I watched her reedy husband haul in all of her accoutrements and set everything up while Byllie waited in a classic hands-on-hips posture of unyielding power. Byllie was obviously the breadwinner in that family. After she had settled into her massive winged Egyptian chair, she was the picture of an ancient fertility goddess.
She was seldom
without customers, another example of how set dressing can be the difference between a twenty-dollar day and a hundred-dollar day.
Byllie ignored me, for the most part, but I eventually got up enough courage to approach her and ask her about her playing cards.
“I have always wanted to learn how to use regular cards,” I began with, after introducing myself. “They’re less threatening and so much more identifiable for most people than tarot cards.”
“I do a bit of everything.” She shrugged. “But this is what pays the bills—heh, heh. What’s your sign, Mark? I can tell you what your lucky card is, if you want.” She made eye contact briefly to see if I was buying.
“Sure, that’d be nice.” I sat down opposite her. “I was born on May 19, 1951.”
The cocoon-like construction of Byllie’s charts along with her massive body size blocked out all distractions, a very effective way to make the scene private and mysterious. I leaned further into her space to see if she was really studying a magical grimoire or whether it was just the latest Oprah Book Club offering. It looked old and very rare, whatever it was. She handled each page as if it were made from gold.
“My, you don’t look that old. Congratulations on that. Let’s see what we have here. Ah, yes, Taurus the bull. You don’t look stubborn like most Taureans. My book indicates that you are different from the rest of the crowd and march to the beat of your own drum.” Byllie said this with deep conviction as she studiously examined her various hermetic parchments and alchemical graphs. She pulled a chart from beneath a pile of ephemera that featured ancient playing cards stuck all over it and made some sort of quick calculation. “You are the King of Clubs. You are dominant and can be very resourceful when this power is called upon.”
She was right, of course. Byllie managed to push all the right buttons with a minimum of words. This was a solid reading. And it had demonstrated once again that with a only a tiny bit of personal information, an experienced reader can give any sitter the once-over and supply a good reading, heaped with a healthy dose of flattery. Who would not agree with what she’d said?
The reading had taken all of two minutes yet I felt much better than when I had sat down—a plus in any social situation, especially when paying a psychic. Byllie was clearly another old pro who had enough street experience that she didn’t have to think or drone on and on. She’d gotten straight to the point. Burn ‘em and turn ‘em had to be her credo.
“Not bad,” I admitted. “You really nailed me.”
“I wasn’t trying to nail anything. That’s what the book says.” She raised one of her huge eyebrows and pointed a crooked finger at her book while tapping it with her other hand.
This was brilliant. She’d used a master text that couldn’t be argued with but had adjusted her reading to my personality. She was a savvy old bird, dealing in generalities, not telling me anything specific to really knock my socks off.
“Here, I want to give you one of your cards to keep as an amulet.” She peeled a king of clubs from a pack of worn Bicycle bridge cards and slid it across the table to me. “Keep this card in your wallet to remind you of what I told you, and remember that it will never change no matter what another reader may tell you. It’s your card.”
Now I had her advertisement. Carrying it around in my pocket was intended to remind me of Byllie and her reading, and I might tell all who saw it the wonder of her ways and perhaps even refer one or two new sitters to her. It was encouraging that she hadn’t garishly printed her picture and phone number on the back, like so many card magicians do. (I’ll admit I don’t carry it around with me. I put it in a trunk of cards I have at home, along with hundreds of other kings of clubs.)
The funniest moment with her and her sisters in The Craft occurred one afternoon after a particularly long and busy day at Light Path. The chapel had finally been cleared of its last customers and I was sitting drained and dazed with Edith Anne and Byllie. The last incense stick had dwindled down and the sun was setting through the church windows. Then Byllie leaned back on her throne and yelled at the top of her lungs, “Where’s the beer? I need a cold one!” And in a slightly lower voice, “Someone roll me a joint.”
This coming from a septuagenarian with her hair in a tight bun was an anachronistic moment. I was sure Byllie was letting me know that I was now very much “with it.”
Saturdays became a pattern of learning, and one soon turned into another. At the next giant Camelot-themed Saturday I was once again confronted with dozens of people gathered outside the chapel. I spent a delightful minute or two that morning getting to know Sunny, whose table in the outdoor Psychic Marketplace was chockablock with New Age goodies. I decided to play dumb and see what I could gather from her.
“If I can help you with anything, just let me know,” she chirped when I wandered over to a pile of runestones and crystals. Sunny had evidently worked in retail before.
I stopped at a large quartz crystal sitting on top of a pack of tarot cards. “Nice crystals,” I remarked. “What’s the meaning of their use?”
“The crystal is a powerful focusing mechanism that allows me to channel all my psychic energies into it and then multiply those energies through its many facets and chambers, which condense and amplify not only the light bodies and spirit entities that reside within its crystal compartments, but also store valuable psychic memories and vibrations inside its mineral makeup. It’s sorta like a car battery that can store my energies and give them back to me when I need them.”
I put on my best scientifically interested expression. “I see.”
Sunny smiled and added, “It also keeps the wind from blowing my tarot cards off the table.” She noticed my attention on the large quartz crystal. “Would you like to touch it?”
“Oh, yes.” I feigned enchantment. “May I?”
“Sure. Here.” She picked the crystal up casually and put it in my hands.
Never one to waste an opportunity to ham it up, I held it for a beat or two, then closed my eyes as if it were sending me something. “Wow, this crystal is sending me some strong American Indian vibes, like it came from near a reservation or mountain that was a power center. I’m getting a lot of images of feathers, birds, and snakes. It’s all very colorful. That’s amazing.”
I handed it back to her with that solemn reverence I reserve for believers.
Sunny acted shocked. “Well, I can tell you right now it didn’t come from any Indian reservation. My husband bought it and he wouldn’t get near anything that was sacred like that. But you’re right about the Indian vibes you were getting. Most of these crystals came from Arizona, near Sedona. It’s a very powerful center for psychic things, you know.”
Later that day, with a few cash tips in my pocket, I bought a medium-sized phallic chunk from her that to this day I still use as a paperweight. Women seem particularly attracted to it. I also make use of her eloquent treatise on the metaphysical properties of my crystal whenever asked.
Betsy greeted me when I eventually made it inside the church and was given my usual table. Posters lined the walls telling of an upcoming “demo” by Sylvia Browne, one of those luminaries in this business that Peter had mentioned to me.
“How much are the tickets for Sylvia?” I asked Betsy as she prepared to retire for the day to her sanctum sanctorum.
“Thirty to fifty dollars per seat. We’re selling out fast and may have to find a bigger venue.” She looked exasperated by this possibility.
I passed through the bookstore and on to my table. Chuck, my first sitter, was already seated, waiting for me. Chuck would become a regular for me. Each weekend he had readings from at least three or four of us, always asking the same questions.
Chuck was having a terrible time in his relationship with a much younger fellow who was in a Mexican gang, an illegal alien dealing drugs and totally out of control. I felt sorry for Chuck.
“Tell me what to do with Pedro,” he begged with his usual despair. Chuck never listened to any of my suggestio
ns, and was usually more interested in predictions of how his weekend would turn out. I frequently told him versions of “The cards say Pedro is using you and you have a hard time saying no to people.”
“You’re right about that. He’s got me right where he wants me. I had to bail him out of jail again last night. Is he coming home tonight?”
“I see him there but also very distracted by someone else, a brother or relative of some sort.” I tried in vain to help him steer Pedro away from drug dealers and back to more stable ground, but Chuck never listened to anything he didn’t want to hear. This could have degenerated into an ugly legal issue if any of us wanted to spill our combined beans to the local authorities, but none of us wanted to lose the steady money that came in almost every week from Chuck. He was one of those wealthy but pathetically oblivious OC residents. He’s probably still showing up at Light Path and being told the same things.
On another Saturday I noticed a new addition to the chapel. In one corner a large wooden box stood, much like Dr. Who’s legendary police box that doubled as a time machine, only this one appeared to be cobbled together with plywood and spare hardware. I found out it was called a psychomanteum.
“So, what’s in the box, Betsy?” I asked her as she passed. I was guessing it was some sort of isolation contraption.
“That’s for seeing your spirit guides or communicating with the dead. It’s a portal between this world and the next.”
“It looks like an outhouse without a window. What’s inside?” Betsy looked aghast at my cavalier attitude.
