Allegories of the Tarot

by Ribken, Annetta

  Electra: you want so much. You’re insatiable

  J.D.: I constantly crave and need

  Electra: I see that

  J.D.: It turns you on, doesn’t it?

  Pause.

  Electra: yes, shows me you’re alive

  J.D.: I’m alive for you

  Electra: Charmer, how did you get to be so cute?

  J.D.: haha, lots of world-weariness, travel, love, heartbreak

  Electra: you’re adorable

  J.D.: so are you, and…

  Electra: yes?

  J.D.: and fucking sexy as hell

  Electra: *blush*

  ***

  I awoke in a cold sweat, breathless. The digital clock beside me read 5:22 a.m. Rolling over, I bumped up against Patrick who stirred and then draped an arm around me.

  Willing him not to wake up, I took several deep breaths and nestled against him.

  J.D. immediately popped into my mind.

  Fuck.

  What the hell was I doing?

  I only had a vague memory of the dream—an angel in a purple cloak watched as I cried. I wanted forgiveness from the man near me, but he refused to answer. I demanded he say something; he wouldn’t or perhaps he just couldn’t. He moved away from me, slowly, until I could no longer see him. That’s when I woke up.

  I grabbed Patrick’s arm and wrapped it more tightly around myself.

  ***

  Electra: hi you

  J.D.: hello

  Electra: did you have a good trip?

  J.D.: yes, it was good to meet up with some old mates

  got pissed every night though

  I’m exhausted!

  Electra: Ha, serves you right.

  I think I know every place you ate at from your updates

  J.D.: yeah, I’m a foodie

  takes a lot to feed this six feet frame

  Electra: I don’t doubt it

  happy you had fun

  J.D.: I missed you though

  thought of you lots

  Electra: I thought of you too

  J.D.: really?

  Electra: yes

  J.D.: I like knowing you think of me

  good thoughts?

  Electra: Of course, only good

  J.D.: I came five times this morning thinking of you

  Pause.

  Electra: now what can I say to that?

  you’re a semen machine

  J.D.: I know

  cum everywhere

  it was a mess

  Electra: you’re a baby

  J.D.: Ha, I’m no baby, but I could be your baby

  Pause.

  J.D.: You still there?

  Electra: Yes, I’m here

  J.D.: crossing the line?

  Electra: if only I knew where the line was

  I’m afraid it’s been blurry the past few weeks

  J.D.: Does that make you uncomfortable?

  Electra: A little, only because our connection is surreal

  J.D.: it doesn’t have to be

  Electra: what do you mean?

  J.D.: Skype? I want to see you

  Electra: no

  J.D.: I want you, and I can’t help it

  Pause.

  Electra: I know but…

  J.D.: but what?

  Electra: we need to take a break

  J.D.: why?

  Electra: James, what we have between us

  all this sexual banter

  It’s….

  J.D.: what?

  Electra: It’s a fantasy

  you know that, right?

  Pause.

  J.D.: what are you saying?

  Electra: I need to end the fantasy

  please don’t hate me

  J.D.: I could never hate you

  Pause.

  Electra: Still friends?

  Pause.

  J.D.: Always.

  ***

  I shuffled the deck as instructed and concentrated on what I wanted to know. The tiny, familiar apartment now comforted where it once spooked me. The Tarot reader nodded as I handed her the cards.

  “Nice to see you again,” she said.

  I offered a sheepish smile. “Nice to see you too, happy to be back.”

  “Good.” She started pulling cards from the deck. “Let’s begin.”

  ***

  Eden Baylee left a twenty-year banking career to become a full-time writer. Incorporating some of her favorite things such as travel, culture, and a deep curiosity for what turns people on, her brand of writing is sensual, sexual, and literary.

  Spring into Summer is her second collection of erotic novellas and the companion piece to Fall into Winter. Her latest release is a book of flash fiction and poetry called Hot Flash.

  She is currently writing a psychological mystery novel scheduled for late 2013.

  Eden's laptop is attached to her hip and she rarely sleeps, so connect to her via her website and other virtual homes.

  ***

  THE CHARIOT

  Squashfest—A Sally Mae Riddley Adventure

  By Annetta Ribken

  The only thing saving my best friend from murder was the fact it was illegal and I din’t want to go to jail.

  “Come on, Sally Mae. It’ll be fun.”

  “Becky Jo McFee, I been to a hundred Squashfests and there ain’t nothing fun about ‘em.” I zipped up my hoodie, grabbed the milk pail, and dashed toward the barn behind the trailer, hoping Becky Jo got the hint. But no, she was right on my tail, even though I knowed for a fact she hated the smell of cow shit.

  “You ain’t been to a hundred Squashfests. They’re only once a year and you ain’t but sixteen. Quit bein’ a drama queen. Oh, come on. I don’t want to go by myself. Think of it as a girl’s night out.” Her voice sounded muffled and I turned to see she’d pulled her sweatshirt over her nose and had to laugh despite my everlasting irritation. Downright comical, that girl.

  “What’s so funny?”

  “You, with your sweatshirt. You look like a damned fool.”

  Becky Jo pulled the sweatshirt higher over her face. “I can’t stand it, Sally Mae. In science class, Mr. Slater said there’s these partic-u-lates in the air from the cow shit and I ain’t breathing them in. Now quit tryin’ to change the subject.”

  “Particulates. That’s what you’re worried about?” I pulled the stool over next to Molly and started milking. “Jeezum crow. You’re gonna nag me until I say yes, ain’t you?” The barn felt warm compared to the autumn chill outside, and the familiar hissing of the milk into the pail sounded a mite comforting.

  Becky Jo shifted from foot to foot, although I knowed the stubborn thing warn’t about to give up. “Yep. Sure am. You need to get out for a night.”

  My face flushed when she said that. She was talking about my mama, who’d been drunk every damned night for the last two months, even if she din’t say it right out loud. Ever since my daddy done run off, leaving me and my sissy, Sue Ann, to make sure Mama din’t kill herself drinking by choking on her own puke or settin’ the trailer on fire with her cigarettes.

  “You just let Sue Ann take care of business for once and keep her hootchie ass to home. Do her good to let that thang cool off a little.”

  I couldn’t help it. First, I snorted, then Becky Jo giggled, and that was it. We busted up.

  Poor Molly mooed and turned her head, looking at us as if we were crazier than Mad Hattie, the swamp witch. That just made me laugh harder, and next thing I saw was Becky Jo rolling around in the hay like she was having a fit, howling and holding her tummy.

  “All right, all right.” I wiped the tears of hilarity streaming down my face with my sleeve and got back to milking, while Becky Jo finally sat up with hay sticking out of her hair. This almost set me off again, but I was afeared if I laughed any more I’d pee all over the milking stool. “I’ll hightail it out after supper and meet you by the creek.”

  Becky Jo grinned and I had to grin back. Maybe this Squashfest wouldn’t be so bad
.

  ***

  “This sucks.”

  Becky Jo swallowed a bite of her battered and fried butternut on a stick and said, “You know, Sally Mae, you got yourself a real bad attitude. I can’t say as I blame you, but damn, girl.”

  Celebrating the wonders of squash was a tradition in Dinksville every fall. Although the array of large zucchini might be fascinating to some people, especially Mabelline Townsend who probably had something else in mind for the vegetable besides what’s for supper, it din’t impress me much. Neither did the Smash The Hubbard With Your Head competition, which Beau Miller won most every year. Seein’ as he had the hardest head in town, that warn’t no surprise.

  We pushed through the crowd down the midway between booths of Pitch-Til-You-Win and Ring-Around-The-Spaghetti Squash with people lined up for a chance at a giant stuffed cucurbita, passing food trucks lit up and probably teeming with all kinds of bacterial life forms. Here’s this girl so worried about breathing ‘particulates’ of cow shit, and she’s eating fried squash out one o’ these death traps. O’course I din’t say this out loud on account just thinking about it made me want to urp.

  “Get off my grits, Becky Jo. You’d be a mite irritated your own self if your daddy up and left with your mama so drunk every night somebody’s gotta babysit her.” Two months now. Two months since my daddy took off and nobody knowed nothing ‘bout where he went. I never thought my own daddy would do us like that.

  She finished off that butternut on a stick in two bites and said, “Hey, you just need somethin’ to take your mind off your troubles. What about the Tilt O’ Whirl?” and followed up with a belch worthy of one of them no-good delinquents who hung out at the pool hall and were currently whooping it up at the beer tent.

  “You sounded just like Beau Miller with that belch. And your snack there is likely to make a reappearance if’n we go on a ride right now.”

  She nodded and looked a little green around the gills. I knowed how she felt. The stench of fried summer squash mixing with cotton candy was making me feel a bit queasy my own self. “I think you might be right. I know! How ‘bout we get our fortunes told?” She pointed to a ratty tent set up yonder from the squash festivities with a hand-lettered sign, which read, FORTUNES TOLD.

  I sighed. “You know that ain’t for real. It’s your Aunt Tilly in there and she’s knowed us since we was babies.”

  “Nuh-uh. Aunt Tilly’s back in Stillwater.”

  I looked at Becky Jo, whose eyes were full of tears. “The crazy house? Oh, sweet pea, why din’t you tell me?”

  She just shook her head. “You got enough goin’ on with your own, Sally Mae. I don’t know who’s in there, but it ain’t Aunt Tilly. You never know. Maybe you can find out something ‘bout your daddy.”

  I grabbed Becky Jo’s hand and squeezed. I knowed Becky Jo was scared stiff of ending up like her Aunt Tilly. The Sight was strong with the McFees, bein’ related to the air elemental and all, but the bloodlines were so muddled in some families those with a gift sometimes din’t run true, especially if somebody along the line hooked up with the wrong elemental. Then you had people like Aunt Tilly. Or Beau Miller with his hard head protecting nothing inside. My family, the Riddleys, could trace back the fire line direct quite a ways. The McFees warn’t so lucky.

  I felt a little glimmer of hope. Maybe Becky Jo was right and I could find out something about where my daddy was and why he took off. “If’n it makes you feel better, we’ll go in,” I said. “But you come with me, okay?”

  She smiled. “I wouldn’t let you go alone.”

  The best friend ever.

  ***

  Inside the tent, the stank of fried squash faded in favor of some fancy incense stuff. Smelled pretty good, actually, especially compared to outside. I kept a hold of Becky Jo’s hand and peered into the dimness. It looked a lot bigger on the inside. Made me feel right dizzy. A beaded curtain dangled in the doorway to what seemed like another room, and while the candles on a low table glowed, the darkness beyond the doorway was pitch black.

  I couldn’t tell if it were Becky Jo’s hand sweating or mine. “Maybe this warn’t such a good idea,” I muttered, trying to swallow past the lump in my throat.

  Becky Jo backed up a step and I was right willing to go with her when a woman emerged through the darkness, pushing aside the beaded curtain.

  She warn’t nothin’ like I’d ever seen before. What I expected…well, I din’t really know what to expect. She was lovely, with long dark hair shot with gray, a curvy figure, and pouty red lips. All decked out in colorful fringed scarves, showing a flat belly and tinkling bangles all up and down her arms like she was some kind of fancy-schmancy belly dancer or something. Big hoop earrings I knew Mabelline would kill for.

  But it were her eyes what caught me. Big, black as night, fringed with the thickest eyelashes I ever did see. Sue Ann would slit her throat for those eyelashes.

  “Hello, girls,” she purred. “What can I do for you?”

  I exchanged a quick glance with Becky Jo. Sure warn’t Aunt Tilly…but I din’t recognize this woman a’tall. I figured it’d probably be a townie, but she din’t look like anyone I knowed, and I thought I knowed everyone in this damned town.

  I cleared my throat. “Well, ma’am, I’d like to get my fortune told. Like it says on the sign.”

  The woman nodded and gestured toward a pile of pillows settin’ next to the low table. “Of course. Have a seat, ladies.” From the twist of her lips I gathered the last thing she thought we was were “ladies”, but at this point I din’t care. I felt a burning need to sit and hear what this here fortune teller had to say.

  She settled on one side of the table and me and Becky Jo flopped to a seat on the pillows. The woman’s eyes never left my face, which I found a bit disconcerting. Like she was studying a bug on a pin. She reached out toward a covered object and moved it away. “Not the crystal ball,” she said. Squinting her eyes, she pulled out a deck of old, worn cards and placed it in the center of the table. “No, for you it will be the cards.”

  I shivered. Becky Jo sat all quiet-like, her hands clasped in her lap. I wondered what she was picking up from all this.

  “But first,” the woman continued, “there must be payment.”

  Oh, hellfire. I hope Becky Jo din’t spend her last dime on that butternut. “How much, ma’am?”

  “Give me what you have in your pockets. Both of you. Because I can see you’re closely tied together.”

  I warn’t too impressed by that, considering we’d come in hand-in-hand. She’s probably nothing but a big faker.

  She tsked. “I assure you, I’m the real deal.”

  I pert near swallowed my tongue.

  I turned to Becky Jo who looked white as a sheet. She pulled out a dollar from her pocket without even looking at me. With trembling fingers, I took it then dug for what I had in my own pocket. Sixty-two cents. Pitiful.

  I handed it over and the woman snorted. “For this, you get one card.”

  I nodded. “I’m right grateful, ma’am.” And I was. Mostly.

  The money disappeared and her long, delicate fingers wrapped around the cards. “I will shuffle, and you will cut. Then we’ll see what fortune has to tell you. Think hard about your question.”

  After her little demonstration about the faking thing, I felt a bit nervous, to be honest. Becky Jo pulled on my pants leg and when I looked at her, she shook her head ever so slightly. But in for a penny, in for a dollar and this weirdo already had my money. Besides, it’s only a card.

  I watched as Miss Fancy Pants Fortune Teller shuffled the cards so fast all I saw was a blur. I thought about my daddy and where he might be. That was my question. After what seemed like hours, she plunked them in the middle of the table.

  “Cut.”

  The word seemed to hold so much weight it kind of hung in the air. Becky Jo’s hand twisted on my pants leg, and I almost smacked her one because it pinched. I reached out and separated the cards into tw
o piles.

  The woman’s gaze was as keen as a hunting knife. “Are you sure?”

  “Yup.”

  She flipped over one card. Her face blanched.

  I peered at the card but all I seen was a strange looking figure riding in what seemed to be a donkey cart.

  “What in tarnation is that?”

  “You need to leave. Now.” I coulda sworn I heard a clap of thunder and Becky Jo ‘bout jumped out of her skin. The woman gathered up the cards and got to her feet. Her face din’t look so pretty anymore. As a matter of fact, she seemed right pissed off.

  “Go on. Git.”

  I scrambled to my own feet, feeling a bit of righteous anger. “Hey, I paid you good money to answer my question.” Becky Jo hung on to my arm for dear life, her fingers digging into my arm. Girl was about to get a slap.

  “You don’t want to mess with me, Sally Mae Riddley,” the woman said, her face twisting. “You want to remember that. Now get out of my tent.”

  I opened my mouth to give this cheating bitch a piece of my mind, when Becky Jo practically dragged me outside, panting like a huntin’ dog. She pulled me along until we was next to the beer tent, me sputtering the whole way. I was so plumb mad I wanted to kick something hard, and even seein’ Beau Miller puking up his guts full of beer and summer squash just outside the tent din’t make me feel better.

  Well, maybe a little better.

  “You just shush now, Sally Mae,” Becky Jo huffed. “You was about to get yourself in a mess of trouble.”

  “Girl, you want to just let go of me right now,” I huffed back. “That faker took our money and I got nothin’ out of it but a pure case of I’m Gonna Kick Your Ass. That’s stealin’ where I come from.”

  I turned to stomp my way back to the ratty old tent and then stopped, my breath catching in my throat.

  The tent was gone.

  ***

  Back in my room with Mama snoring like a truck driver and Sue Ann out cattin’ around, Becky Jo and I curled up on my bed. I was still fuming.

  “That cheatin’ bitch. If I ever see her again, I’ma kick her ass good and proper.”

  Becky Jo just shook her head. “I don’t think you want to do that, Sally Mae.”

  I peered at her face and said, “What are you talkin’ about? She stole our money. For nothin’. Say, you look a mite peaked, Becky Jo. Like you almost got hit by a bus.”