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11-11

Page 16

by Doreen Serrano


  “No. Buddha,” countered Heather.

  They followed the little man to a table and accepted the chairs he pulled out for them. After handing them menus, he took their drink orders and gave them back their privacy.

  “Why are we here?” asked Jade, fi nally. Heather frowned. She had assumed her sister would have been more grateful for the unannounced detour.

  “We’re hungry,” Heather answered fl atly.

  “No, we’re not,” Jade insisted. “We’re scared.”

  Her soft smile and tilt of the head always worked wonders for Heather. She had taken comfort in Jade’s features and had come to rely on her gentle words over the past thirty-three years. The simple smile and almost imperceptible tilt had been powerful enough to help fi ght Heather’s demons away throughout her worst moments.

  She could only hope that her presence in Jade’s life had worked to comfort her sister even half as much. Heather’s heart saddened with the perpetually unfulfi lled wish that Lisa would accept their love as well.

  “What are you so afraid of, Heather?” Jade asked as she pulled her sister’s hand into her own.

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  “Either way, it’s bad, Jade. Either I’m crazy or I’m the target of a violent immortal stalker. I’m not real excited to fi nd out which one it is.”

  Heather dropped her forehead into the clasped hands that waited for it. She still couldn’t believe what was happening. She wondered if the transformation into full blown madness had already begun and if the next step was complete submersion into non-reality. Heather pictured herself walking into the Cheesecake Factory as a customer and then seating the other guests. She feared that multiple personalities would begin to take hold and that she would never again be able to discern who the real Heather was from the ones borne of her insanity.

  Jade’s eyes exuded love but nothing her little sister said or did could diminish the bitter fear that had begun to take hold of Heather. The only shred of hope she had was to force pro-activity in the face of her impending sloth.

  “Okay. Let’s say you’re crazy,” Jade ventured. “So, what? You’ll fi nd the right drugs and you’ll up your therapy with Dr. Angel. I mean, come on, you’ve made it this far right?”

  Though she tried to play it off as nothing, Jade knew the truth. Facing one’s own madness was a challenge not easily overcome. Heather shook her head against thoughts of hallucinations and straight jackets but said nothing.

  “Or,” Jade continued, “what if something supernatural really is happening?”

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  Heather shrugged and raised her eyebrows in response.

  “You’re not alone, Heather. I’ll always be right beside you,” Jade added.

  “That’s the problem,” Heather fi nally said, fear weaving through her voice.

  Jade tried to respond but was cut off by the tiny waitress who suddenly appeared at their table. Her English wasn’t as polished as her boss and ordering was a bigger challenge than the sisters had anticipated. When she walked away, the waitress was still talking. Her words sounded sweet but were delivered in a language unknown to either sister.

  Jade smiled mischievously.

  “I think she just told you to fuck off,” she told Heather.

  “What did we order, anyway?” Heather asked and allowed a small smile to escape the prison her face had become.

  “Mutt stew, I think?”

  “Mmm, delicious,” Heather joked.

  Jade leaned in closer and her tone became serious.

  “Why do you feel like you’re all alone, Heather?” she asked.

  “We are all alone, Jade; both in the beginning and in the end.”

  Anxiety etched her tone but she forced out the thought. If she shared what she were thinking, she 203

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  wouldn’t be alone with her scary thoughts. Heather leaned closer into their secret meeting and continued.

  “Think about it, Jade,” she continued. “I have you, the boys, and my friends and family. I couldn’t imagine living one day here without you guys. It’s hard to believe I even had a life at all before the boys arrived. Mom was my vessel here and hopefully, you’ll both be holding my hand when I leave this place. I’m surrounded by love and by my people but in the end, I’m leaving alone. I have to face whatever is out there by myself. And so do you.” She pictured her boys and her composure started to crumble.

  “And so do they,” Heather added.

  Heather stopped talking. The thought of her boys facing eternity alone caused tears to strangle her voice box.

  She held up a fi nger to say she wasn’t fi nished yet, that she just needed to gather herself together. Jade stayed quiet and allowed her sister to guide the emotion provoking conversation.

  “But the thing is,” Heather fi nally continued, “I feel like I know the answers on some level I can’t reach. This all feels familiar, Jade; like I’ve been here before. So have you. Don’t you remember being here?”

  The question wasn’t a new one. Heather had asked her before. She had also asked her girlfriends and both of her husbands. She had asked her children and her parents what they thought of it. Nobody else seemed to be affl icted with the same overdose of déjà vu and Heather couldn’t understand why she was the only one who still felt her past lives.

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  She had no recollection of a clear life but knew without a doubt that she’d had many. She remembered her deaths more than her lives. The memories weren’t clear and they lacked any identifying information for her to follow up on. The only thing that was clear to Heather was the emotion and the fear attached to her last moments. She remembered how it felt, knowing she was taking her last breath and seeing her last sight.

  “I really don’t remember, Heather, but that doesn’t mean anything. I’ve experienced some strange things and you know how I believe in the things I can’t see,” Jade said.

  It was true. Jade was a true believer. She kept her mind open to the theories most people closed themselves off to. Heather credited their father with the open-mindedness they’d both been gifted with. She forced her mood to lighten, despite bodily functions that begged to react to emotional pain.

  “All right, let’s eat,” Heather said randomly. “We’ll go see the damn psychic and then cap off the night with a séance and a glass of blood, okay?”

  Jade squeezed her hand and smiled.

  “Sounds good,” she answered.

  They went to the long bars of food and let the delicious smells invade their nostrils. Heather grabbed a plate and said a short pray that they’d actually ordered the buffet during their garbled conversation with the waitress. They fi lled their plates with Crab Rangoon, rice and veggies.

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  Dead fi sh eyes stared back at Heather from their icy grave and she turned away quickly.

  When they fi nished, they leaned back against their seats, properly ashamed of their gluttony. Heather asked for the check and glanced at her watch. Their appointment was for eleven o’clock and the tiny clock’s big hand had just struck the hour, announcing their tardiness.

  “What happens if you’re late for a psychic appointment?” Heather asked.

  “I don’t know. I mean, wouldn’t they know we would be late anyway?” Jade asked.

  “Good point,” Heather retorted.

  The waitress dropped off their check and pointed out the two fortune cookies sitting in the little black check tray. Heather pushed the bill toward her sister and cut her eyes to the ceiling as she whistled innocently.

  Jade laughed and reached into her bra. Both shared the same secret hiding spot that Damon referred to as their chest of drawers. The private compartment held more than just money. Lip gloss, licenses and pills had all found cozy homes in their cups, safely snuggled up to a warm breast.

  Jade pulled out crumpled bills and dropped two twen
ties onto the tray. Heather noticed she had left about a thirty percent tip and she approved, despite the fact they served themselves at the buffet. They were both generous with wait staff because they understood what it felt like to depend on gratuities for survival.

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  Jade tore into her fortune cookie. She crunched into the middle of the odd shaped snack, using her teeth to pull out the little slip of paper and read it out loud.

  “Blessed Be the Child,” she read.

  Jade looked down, rubbed her swollen belly and made a face that said the irony hadn’t escaped her. Humming the tune to the Twilight Zone, she carefully folded her fortune and dropped it into her purse. She looked across the table at her sister and motioned to the other cookie with her eyes.

  Heather crossed her arms and turned her head. She didn’t want to open the cookie any more than she wanted to see the psychic but Jade inched it closer and closer.

  “You’re so annoying,” Heather said.

  “Open the cookie,” Jade commanded.

  “No,” Heather answered defi antly. “I don’t want to be rude to the psychic,” she added.

  “What?” Jade shrieked. “I can’t wait to hear this.”

  “Reading your fortune before seeing a psychic would be like eating a burger on the way to a dinner party. It’s rude.” Heather stated. She could feel her cheeks blush at her own feeble excuse.

  “Open the friggin’ cookie, Heather,” Jade insisted.

  “No. Fortunes as entertainment are fun. Fortunes dropped on me while I’m looking for answers to the universe, not so good.”

  Jade picked up the cookie and slapped it down in front of her sister, ignoring the fact that it smashed into pieces.

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  “Read it,” Jade ordered.

  Heather’s lips curled downward and she frowned.

  She feigned a hurt expression and adopted a sad voice.

  “You broke my cookie,” she said.

  Jade continued to stare at her and she didn’t move an inch. Heather snatched the cookie from the table and opened it, knowing she wouldn’t be allowed to leave the restaurant until she did.

  “The road to Hell is paved with good intentions,”

  Heather read reluctantly.

  Jade bit her bottom lip. “OOPs.”

  “I feel better now, thanks.”

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  Chapter 14

  Like a Prayer

  They stood facing the plate glass window. It was beautiful with its display of intricate designs etched into every square. The front door pictured a woman lounging on a cloud; her arms outstretched as she welcomed lost spirits. The sisters turned to look at one another slowly.

  “Oh my God,” Jade said fi rst.

  “I know. Do you feel that?” Heather whispered.

  An icy chill and strange heaviness hovered around the spot they were standing. Its origin was unknown and the anonymity of it made their bones feel weak. The smell of roses blew its sweet scent into their faces though there were no fl owers in sight.

  “Bye!” Heather said fi rmly, turning back toward the direction from which she came. She only made it one step before Jade pulled her back by her ponytail.

  “Stay! God, you are such a pussy!’ she said emphatically.

  Jade always marveled at how her older sister could be so brave in the face of real danger but such a coward 209

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  about the things that couldn’t touch her. She would opt for a drunk designated driver with a lead foot over a simple game of Ouija.

  They had located the psychic through a diligent yellow page search but both sisters were both more skeptical than hopeful. They didn’t doubt that real psychics did exist but they also didn’t believe a true psychic sold her gifts.

  Throughout their strange lives, the sisters had happened upon many seers when they weren’t looking and none had ever tried to charge them for delivering messages from the spirits.

  “Nobody’s here,” Heather insisted.

  “We haven’t even knocked yet!’ Jade laughed.

  The door opened, causing the hinges to play out a slow creaking tune. It felt like a typical horror movie setting and Heather thought it unfair that fate chose to amuse itself at her expense.

  A Spanish woman with a small build and a very big presence appeared in the doorway. Heather noted she was striking; beautiful in an exotic way. When she spoke, her thick accent gave away her Hispanic roots even more than her appearance did.

  “Hello,” she said softly, making eye contact with each sister for longer than was normally acceptable.

  “Hi,” Jade answered. “We’re here for a reading.”

  The woman fi nally smiled and they felt as though they had passed her fi rst test. She backed up to give them room to pass but maintained her post at the door. It forced the sisters to head into the shop ahead of her and Heather 210

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  recoiled at the feeling of leading the strange woman into her own lair. They heard the door close and both of them froze in their positions.

  “Go on, down the hall,” directed the psychic.

  As they walked slowly down the small hallway, each sister stole frequent backwards glances. Jade needed to reassure herself that the woman hadn’t morphed into a vampire or werewolf. Heather wanted to prove to herself that she didn’t have the barrel of a gun to her head.

  She feared people the same way most people feared monsters.

  They passed an apothecary that boasted loving care and serious devotion. It smelled of aromatic candles and Heather was overcome by the familiarity of the scents. She was struck with a memory that had been in a coma for thirty years. In it, she was little and she was taking comfort from the scent of a cedar music box in her parent’s bedroom. The little ballerina had twirled around repeatedly to the song, Music Box Dancer. With no further clues to help her color a clear picture, she shook it out of her head.

  They knew they had reached their destination when they saw a round table with three waiting chairs. The psychic waved them toward the seats and they sat down obediently.

  The table held nothing but a single white candle and its fl ame stood up, sturdy and proud.

  “You’re pregnant,” the psychic told Jade.

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  “Wow, you’re good,” her sister retorted. She clasped her hands around her huge stomach and offered her sister an apologetic look that said they could leave soon.

  Heather didn’t want to waste time looking in the wrong direction but she had no way of knowing what the wrong direction was. Unfortunately, it wouldn’t be a lesson learned until she had already screwed up. She moved to stand but stopped when the psychic asked her a question.

  “You two are very close. There is another sister, not as close, right?”

  Heather looked over at Jade and they stared blankly at one another. A grandfather clock in the corner seized her attention and she focused on the direction of its hands. It was 11:11 a.m. and she nodded recognition to whomever

  – or whatever – was watching.

  “Yes,” Heather fi nally answered. The instinct that had instructed her to leave took a backseat to curiosity.

  “My name is Soraya,” the psychic fi nally said.

  They sized her up more as they traded introductions.

  Soraya was about fi ve feet tall and all of ninety pounds.

  When she spoke, something in her voice made them want to listen.

  “Traumatic experience and a signifi cant geographical distance are the reasons for the weak bond, right?” she began.

  Heather pictured the angry child that Lisa had been.

  Their eldest sister had often misplaced her anger but Heather always managed to fi nd it for her. She knew 212

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  that Lisa had simply been projecting her res
ponses from whatever abuse she suffered and she didn’t hold it against her. She reminded herself that Lisa was also the fi rst to defend and protect her little sister from neighborhood bullies.

  Heather had a sudden vision of Katie and King, the niece and nephew Lisa had given them and then taken away with her deep-seated hatred. Heather missed them and her heart felt their loss every day. They didn’t know how much she loved them and that only heightened the pain. Heather had been angry with Lisa and had included her family in their last fi ght. It was a fatal move on Heather’s part and had sealed their separate fates forever.

  She wished the kids had been able to remain the two little tow heads who had once loved her unconditionally.

  Heather realized her thoughts were distracting her again only when she noticed Soraya and Jade staring at her, expectantly.

  “What?” Heather asked.

  The psychic repeated the request she had evidently missed.

  “Could you please cut the deck?”

  “Oh,” Heather paused. “Sure, sorry.”

  She split the deck into two piles and watched as Soraya dealt them to herself in a circular pattern.

  Some, she turned face down and others, she lay face-

  up, exposing the pictures that would narrate the future.

  The images were artistic and intriguing but neither Heather nor Jade knew how to translate them.

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  “Before we do your future, we’ll do a quick overview of the past,” Soraya explained.

  The way she referred to them all as a team conjured up images of Dr. Angel and Heather gradually warmed up to the psychic.

  Soraya picked up the fi rst card and smiled at what she saw. Heather thought it was a great sign and scooted her chair in closer to the table. When she turned to gage her sister’s expression, Jade gave no more than a quick shrug of the shoulders. She knew it meant that her sister hadn’t fi nalized her fi rst impression yet. Heather turned to Soraya and nodded toward the card.

  “What does it say?” she asked hopefully.

  “It says you’ve known a lot of love,” the psychic answered gently. Her voice took on a note of respect.

  Heather felt like crying but not from sadness. She knew that even though her life had been diffi cult and that she’d known a lot of pain, Soraya was right. She had known a lot of love throughout her life and for that, she was so grateful she could cry.

 

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