by Tawna Fenske
Her pants were khaki, her expression was neutral, and her posture was unreadable. Violet sighed.
Ann Marie gave her a perfectly bland, perfectly useless smile. “You must be the psychic?”
“Hello,” Violet said, extending her hand as she approached. “You’re Ann Marie Winston?”
“Yes, I am. Are you Miss Moonbeam?”
“That’s my mother, actually, but I’m filling in for her while she recovers from an accident.”
“Oh, dear… I hope it’s not serious?”
Sympathetic, Violet noted, hoping that might prove helpful. “She’s recovering well, thanks for asking. I hope you’re okay with the substitution?”
“Of course. I mean, I assume you’re qualified?”
Ends all her sentences with a question, Violet noted, not sure what she could discern about Ann Marie from that. And how the hell did one define a “qualified” psychic?
“Of course,” Violet said. “Can I get you some mint tea? I just brewed some.”
“That would be lovely.”
“Have a seat right over there and I’ll be with you in just a moment.”
Violet moved to the corner and began preparing the tea, not bothering to play guessing games with Ann Marie’s sweetener preferences. She grabbed Moonbeam’s small sugar bowl, poured a steaming mug of tea, loaded the whole thing on a rustic bamboo tray, and returned to the seating area.
She set the tray on the small table between them and watched as Ann Marie added a perfect teaspoon of sugar to her mug. She stirred twice, then rested her spoon in its saucer.
Tidy, simple, well-mannered, Violet observed, trying to come up with any way this could help her. She was stumped.
I’m doomed.
“So, Ann Marie, what can I help you with today?”
Ann Marie took a slow sip of tea, her expression unreadable through the faint steam from the mug. She set her mug down and reached into her purse. Pulling out a little blue notebook, Ann Marie flipped it open and looked at Violet.
“Well,” Ann Marie said slowly, “I have some career questions.”
“Career?”
“Yes. Things have been a little rocky, and I’m wondering about the direction my career is headed.”
“I see,” Violet said, not seeing at all. She tried to remember the rules of thumb she’d heard her mother drill into other aspiring psychics over the years. Let the client ask you questions, not the other way around. Spend 95 percent of the reading sharing information with your client, not requesting information from her.
Of course, that made it markedly tougher to fake her way through a reading. Violet took a breath. She had to start somewhere.
“My mother’s notes indicate that you’ve used psychic services a bit in the past,” she began. “How do you usually prefer to have your reading flow?”
Ann Marie gave her a pleasant smile. “Thank you for asking, that’s very kind of you. I’m sure you have your own way of working, so I don’t want to interfere with that, but I really just like to hear what you have to say. Can you… that is, um… are you reading my energy right now?”
Violet nodded. “Loud and clear,” she said, and took a sip of tea. “Okay, then, you want to know about the direction of your career.”
“Correct.”
“I sense that you’re feeling uncertain.”
“Well, yes…”
Violet did a mental eye roll at her own overstatement of the obvious. Isn’t everyone who visits a psychic feeling uncertain?
She gripped her tea mug harder and tried again. “You’re clearly at a crossroads here, with some very significant decisions to be made quite soon, and—”
“Why, yes,” Ann Marie said, looking a little surprised. “I just interviewed for a job yesterday and they told me they’ll make their decision later this week. Are you… can you tell whether I’ll get the job?”
Fuck, Violet thought.
“Well,” she began. “I’m not able to read the energy from the members of the interview panel, but I do have a very strong sense that you did your very best and that the interviewers were really impressed with… with your professionalism and your experience.”
Jesus. Could she get any more vague? Violet wished like hell she’d done a background check. Something to tell her more about this woman, what she did for a living, what sort of person she was.
Kill me now.
Ann Marie looked at her, waiting. She didn’t appear angry or skeptical. Not yet, anyway. She wanted to believe.
Violet wished she’d had the foresight to pay someone to pull the fire alarm.
A door creaked in the hallway, and both women turned to look. Drew emerged from his shop and crept discreetly toward the storage closet. He was moving quietly, evidently remembering Violet’s scolding about making noise during her readings. As a matter of fact, she hadn’t heard him playing music all morning. She hadn’t even known he was around.
Now that she knew, she felt every nerve in her body snap to attention. She tried to look away, but her eyes were fixed on Drew as he unlocked the storage closet and reached onto the top shelf for a pack of lightbulbs.
From the corner of her eye, Violet saw Ann Marie frown. She leaned toward Violet, her voice a conspiratorial whisper. “That man should know it can be harmful to his auditory health to listen to music that loud.”
Violet tore her eyes from Drew and looked at Ann Marie. “What?”
“Those iPod earbuds he’s wearing—they’ve been known to damage hearing when someone listens to music at that volume.”
Violet looked back at Drew. She hadn’t noticed it, but there were the telltale wires, the little earbuds tucked in place. Maybe that’s why things had seemed so quiet.
“Honestly,” Ann Marie whispered, “how can people stand to listen to music at that volume?”
Violet listened, trying to hear the dangerous decibels that had caught Ann Marie’s attention. Her eyes were fixed on Drew, on the rumpled hair, the faded jeans, the way his head nodded in time to the beat.
“Nothing but noise, anyway,” Ann Marie was saying. “All those electric guitars and that horrible hammering.”
Violet barely heard her. She was focused on the music, picking out the familiar drumbeat, the recognizable pulse of the chorus. The hair on her arms began to prickle. Something niggled at the back of her brain. Something completely crazy. Something so ridiculous that Violet couldn’t even form the thought.
She focused on the distant buzz of the music, Ann Marie all but forgotten. What was that song, anyway? It was on the tip of her tongue.
Van Halen, Violet thought. She listened harder, trying to remember the name of the song. Her pulse was starting to gallop as the tickling at the back of her brain became an irritating scratch.
The song. It was from the 1984 album. If she could just remember what it was called…
Violet turned to Ann Marie. Her heart was pounding hard against her ribs, and her hands had started to shake. Surely there was no way—
“‘Hot for Teacher,’” Violet blurted.
“I beg your pardon?” Ann Marie looked alarmed.
Violet took a breath and looked down at her hands. They were shaking, making her mint tea slosh onto her knee. She could hear Drew relocking the storage closet, moving quietly down the hall and back into his shop, completely oblivious to the havoc he’d just unleashed behind him.
“Ann Marie,” Violet said slowly, looking back at her.
Ann Marie nodded, her expression wary but curious. “Yes?”
“This job you interviewed for… Are you… that is, were you interviewing for a position as a… well, are you a…”
Violet set her tea down and took another breath. “Ann Marie, are you a teacher?”
Ann Marie looked startled for a moment. Then a slow smile spread over her face.
“Why, yes. Yes, I am.”
Chapter 8
Somehow, Violet managed to muddle her way through the rest of the reading. It helped that Ann Ma
rie seemed sufficiently awestruck by Violet’s ability to name her profession and pinpoint the fact that Ann Marie had left her last job after an obsessed male student began stalking her.
It probably didn’t help that Violet was even more awestruck than her client.
Even so, Ann Marie tipped generously at the end and promised to book another full-moon reading the next month.
“Psychics are just so powerful at that time, don’t you think?” Ann Marie asked.
Violet only nodded, still too stunned to even stand up and see Ann Marie to the door.
When the woman was gone, Violet reached into the drawer and picked up a spiral notebook and pen. Her hands were still shaking, and she glanced over at the door to make sure she was alone.
Okay, this was ridiculous. Really, there was no way—
“Love in an Elevator,” Violet wrote. She frowned down at the paper. Okay, fine, so that’s the song that had prompted her to accidentally direct Detective Smeade to find the missing money. The song Drew had played right then, at the precise moment she was giving Detective Smeade his fake reading.
That was weird. Weird, but not completely out there. Not proof of anything, really.
What else? She tried to remember the first song she’d noticed, maybe something the day she’d moved her desk in.
“Photograph,” she jotted.
Okay, fine. Drew had come in right after that to help her hang that picture of Mount Hood, but that was just a coincidence.
She thought back to the rest of the day she’d met Detective Smeade. Dinner at Portland City Grill with Chris and Drew and—
“Jenny,” Violet said aloud. “867-5309.” The song Drew was playing that afternoon, even though he didn’t seem to know that was his date’s name.
Eerie, definitely very eerie. Still, not proof of anything.
What had Drew played on her iPod that night when he’d dropped by and fixed the stereo?
Peter Gabriel, “Mercy Street,” Violet wrote on her pad. Howard Jones, “The Prisoner.” Sarah McLachlan, “Train Wreck.”
She stopped writing and tapped her pen against her teeth. What the hell did those songs mean?
Nothing, obviously nothing.
But Drew had auditioned Jerry the very next day, and Jerry had mentioned spending time in prison.
And then there was the light-rail train wreck that had delayed her meeting with Chris later that evening, and the detour she’d had to take was on Mercy Street, and—
Stupid, you’re being completely ridiculous, Violet told herself. You’re worse than Moonbeam.
And then there was the Van Halen song, right when she would have given anything to know her client’s profession. “Hot for Teacher.” Who the hell played that song anymore?
Okay, so even assuming there was something to it, it wasn’t as if she was the only person who could hear the music, so clearly it didn’t mean she was psychic. So maybe it was something with Drew? Maybe Moonbeam had noticed it before?
Coincidence, Violet told herself. Nothing more than that.
She heard her mother’s voice in her ear. “There are no coincidences in the life of a psychic, Violet.”
“Shut up, Mom!” Violet said aloud.
Someone chuckled in the hallway. Violet’s head snapped up as Drew walked into the room, smiling at her with that same cocksure expression he’d worn from the moment she met him.
“Are you communicating with your mom telepathically?” Drew asked. “Or do you always tell her off when she’s ten miles away and highly medicated?”
Violet stared at him for a few heartbeats.
Then she burst into tears.
***
The instant Violet started crying, Drew felt like a jerk. He hadn’t meant anything with his comment. Hell, he was just trying to make her laugh.
Tears were not the reaction he’d expected.
“Violet, hey, I was just kidding. I talk to myself all the time. It’s not a big deal. Sometimes I carry on full conversations.”
Violet just shook her head, sobbing harder as she dropped her pen on the floor. Drew knelt down and picked it up. He remained there at her feet, kneeling in front of her as she struggled to stop crying. He touched her knee.
“What’s the matter?” he murmured. “Was it something I said?”
Violet shook her head and sniffled loudly.
“Your mom? You’re worried about your mom?”
She shook her head again and wiped her nose on the back of her hand. Very unhygienic, and her face was all blotchy, and…
Then she looked at him.
All the air went out of Drew’s lungs.
Her eyes were striking under normal circumstances, that hazy shade of violet with sparks of silver. But now, shimmering with candlelight and tears and all that raw emotion…
“Jesus.”
Drew winced. He hadn’t meant to say it aloud. Violet seemed unfazed, focused as she was on collecting herself. Drew handed her the pen and tried a smile.
“You okay now?”
Violet nodded, but still didn’t speak. Drew’s hand was still on her knee, and it took every ounce of strength he had to keep himself from gathering her in his arms and kissing her senseless to make her forget her troubles.
“Look, I’m sorry I startled you,” he said. “I just came in to apologize about walking through in the middle of a reading. I was trying to be quiet, and I would have waited until you were done, but I had an inspector coming and—”
“What were you listening to on your iPod?”
Drew frowned. “When?”
Violet took a shaky breath and looked straight at him. “When you came through to get the lightbulbs. You had your iPod on then. What song were you listening to?”
Drew stared at her, trying to figure out what the hell she was driving at. Had she found Moonbeam’s stash of magic mushrooms in the back of the cupboard?
“Are you feeling okay?” he tried.
“What song?” Violet demanded. She winced, seemingly startled by the forcefulness of her own voice. “Please,” she added.
Drew stared at her for a moment before he began to rack his brain for an answer. “I have no idea. Mötley Crüe, or maybe Van Halen. I was listening to the 1984 album earlier, so that’s probably it. You couldn’t hear it all the way over here, could you?”
Violet nodded and clutched the pen in her fist.
“Sorry about that,” Drew said. “I didn’t realize I had it up so loud.”
“‘Hot for Teacher’?” Violet said in a husky, tear-soaked voice that made him a little dizzy.
“What?”
“Is that the song you were listening to?”
Drew shrugged. “Probably. That’s on that album. Why?”
Violet just shook her head, looking numb.
“Okay. Right, well then.” He was suddenly at a loss for words. What the hell was Violet up to?
He glanced down at the notepad in her lap. “Love in an Elevator?” What was that about?
Violet covered the page with her hand before he could see anything else she’d written there. He looked back up at her and gave her knee a friendly squeeze.
“Hey, if you’re jonesing for eighties music, you should come on by tomorrow evening. We’re doing a theme night.”
“Theme night.”
“All eighties, all night. It’ll be fun. Bring your mom’s friend… was it Butterfly?”
Violet nodded again. “Sure. Eighties night. I’ll think about it.”
Drew eyed her for a moment, not sure it was safe to leave her alone. “You sure you’re okay? You want me to call someone for you or—”
“No. I’m fine. Really. Just tired, that’s all.”
“You should go home early, maybe eat pancakes in bed and go to sleep at seven p.m. watching sitcoms. That always makes me feel better.” He tried smiling again, hoping she might follow suit.
Violet just shook her head and looked down at her hands. “I can’t. Moonbeam booked all these full-moon appo
intments. I’ve got two of them back-to-back at Council Crest Park just after sundown. I’ll be too busy for pancakes and sitcoms.”
“Some other time, then.”
“Sure.”
Drew looked down at his hand that still rested on Violet’s knee. He should probably move it. Any minute now. Just as soon as he stopped enjoying the solid warmth of her thigh through the thin fabric and—
Drew pulled his hand back and stood up. “Okay then, I’m going to get back to work. You sure you’re going to be all right?”
“Positive.”
“Promise?”
Violet laughed, a dry, humorless sound that made Drew want to pull her into his arms.
Then again, was there anything about Violet that didn’t make him want to do that? Even the snot hadn’t deterred him.
“Promise,” Violet repeated, shaking her head and giving him a sad little smile. “Sure. I promise. You can believe me, I’m a professional.”
***
That evening, Drew was even more distracted than normal. That was saying something. He’d been wiping the same spot on the bar for fifteen minutes, just rubbing and rubbing and rubbing and—
“You got a hot date or something?”
Drew looked up to see his business partner, Sam, peering at him over a tray of empty cocktail glasses.
Drew frowned at her and tucked his rag beneath the bar. “No. Why?”
“You keep looking at your watch.”
“Right. Just wondering about the time.”
“It’s about two minutes later than it was the last time you looked.” She grinned at him and set the glasses down.
Drew looked away, not wanting to get drawn into this conversation. On the corner stage, Jerry was performing his first show of the night. Drew watched as a cluster of women celebrating a coworker’s birthday began shrieking with delight as Jerry tore open his shirt.
“Jerry’s doing pretty well for a first-timer,” Drew said. “Thanks for getting that background check done so fast.”
“No sweat. Nice of you to give him a shot, with the prison record and all.”
Drew shrugged. “He’s done his time. Everyone deserves another chance. Besides, once he explained the circumstances, how could I not give him a shot?”