by Keziah Frost
Norbert and the Club looked at one another.
Hermione smiled and stated, “It’s a miracle-fact.”
Carlotta’s eyes opened wide at this inventive use of language.
Edith said, “I’ll share my memory! I was living on a planet with a beautiful green light. I had fingers with suction cups at the ends of them. It was a happy life!” She folded her hands over her belly in satisfaction.
“Yes, some of our lives were on other planets. Lovely, Edith! Stanley?” prompted Hermione. “Would you like to share?”
“I was an astrologer in ancient Rome,” he said. He tossed his apple from one hand to the other, back and forth.
“And you’re an astrologer now!” exclaimed Margaret, apparently forgiving and forgetting how he had crushed her hand an hour before.
Stanley nodded. “Yeah.”
Norbert perceived that Stanley was a cynic. He also saw that Stanley wished to gain control of Edith and the Center for Deeper Understanding. Hermione, on the other hand, was a sincere person, who believed her own spiritual message. Edith, also, was genuine; Norbert could see that. But Stanley was a con man.
“Yes!” beamed Hermione. “Very often we carry the same profession with us from one life to another.” She was having a good time. She had the air of a woman doing what she was meant to do in life. Nodding toward Norbert, she asked, “Norbert? You’re the last one. Would you like to tell us what you saw of your past life?”
Norbert cleared his throat. Feeling silly, he shared his past-life regression experience with the group.
After everyone stopped laughing, Norbert realized they had all been laughing in different ways. Norbert himself, in embarrassment; Hermione, in delight; Carlotta, in scorn; Birdie and Margaret, in amusement; Stanley, in relief from boredom; and Daphne, because everyone else was laughing.
Edith was untroubled. Full of good humor, she sank her teeth into an apple and turned it round and round as she gnawed it, considering Norbert’s experience.
“So you were Rip Van Winkle!” she said in a congratulatory tone.
“But, Edith, Rip Van Winkle is a fictional character!” said Norbert, wondering if Edith knew that.
“Norbert Z, you should know that this whole world is an illusion anyway. So you were a fictional character. What does it matter? Don’t you know—there is a lot of truth in fiction.”
* * *
Carlotta and her Club were strolling down the lantern-lit stone path away from the Center for Deeper Understanding toward Carlotta’s car. The stars overhead were bright, and the group stopped every few feet to admire the night sky, and argue about which planets were in view.
As Norbert prepared to follow the trio, Edith took him aside on the doorstep and whispered, “It will do such good for Daphne’s self-esteem, to know that she used to be Jane Austen. It will give her something to talk about at parties.” She smiled and sighed. She went on, “Here’s the thing—everyone wants to feel special, Norbert Z, and don’t you think that’s very touching?”
“I do, Edith,” said Norbert. And he did. “And I do see how people might be helped by this work you do. Maybe, in the end, it’s all about what helps people to cope with life and be happy.” Norbert looked toward his friends who were walking slowly to the parking lot. “Thank you, really, for showing me around and giving me this experience. And thank you for inviting Carlotta and her Club, too. That was very kind.”
“It wasn’t kind, Norbert Z, and you know it. Don’t pretend with me. You see everything. I wasn’t being kind to Carlotta. I wanted her to stick it in her ear. She didn’t want me in her Club forty years ago, so I went and built a whole Center which has become nationally famous, and she’s not in it. Ah, my friend, maybe I’m not as aligned with my Higher Self as I thought.” She looked pensively after the retreating figures of the Club.
Norbert paused at this confession. Yes, Edith had, in fact, wanted Carlotta to stick it in her ear.
“Be that as it may, Edith, I appreciate your offer to come and work with you, but I don’t need time to think about it. I won’t be the past-life regressionist you’re looking for. This isn’t my...uh...well, it isn’t my spiritual path, I guess we could say.”
“I respect that, Norbert Z.” Edith tapped Norbert’s shoulder in a gesture of esteem. “You are an honest man.”
Norbert hesitated.
“Edith, there’s something I need to tell you about Stanley. I’m not sure you are aware—”
There was a glint of understanding in Edith’s bright eyes.
“Is it about his obsession with getting control over me and the Center for Deeper Understanding? Ah, yes!” She laughed. “I saw you connecting the dots, Norbert Z. Yes, Stanley thinks he will one day direct me the way Carlotta thinks she will one day direct you! Ha! And isn’t that great fun? That’s why I keep Stanley around. He’s not much of an astrologer, really. He’s a big blustery fake. But he does make me laugh.”
Norbert considered this with some relief. He said good-night and turned to go.
Before closing the door, Edith twinkled her eyes at him and said, “I like you, Norbert Z. You’re the genuine article.”
* * *
In the car on the way back to town, the conversation was spirited.
“Reincarnation!” fumed Carlotta, disappointed that she couldn’t believe herself to be the re-embodiment of her favorite author. “Of all the silly ideas!”
“Not so silly,” protested Margaret. “It’s a spiritual belief, isn’t it? You can’t call it silly, then, if it’s someone’s spiritual belief.”
Carlotta philosophized, “Oh, for that matter, any religious doctrine, once explained, is revealed to be absurd. That’s how you know it’s a religious doctrine.” She laughed. “People trying to make meaning of things. It’s all absurd.”
Margaret added, “It’s people’s faith that makes the absurdity go away. We all need to have faith in something, don’t we?”
Birdie said, dreamily, “People do need to believe in something. Even if what they believe in is the hopelessness of belief.”
The Club and Norbert thought about this for a moment.
Birdie added, “What did the French philosopher say? ‘The heart has its reasons of which reason knows nothing.’”
“All right, that’s enough of not being reasonable for one night,” said Carlotta, irritably.
Birdie said, “May I see that catalog, though? I’m curious.”
Birdie read aloud from the course catalog of the Center for Deeper Understanding. While Carlotta mocked, Margaret and Birdie exclaimed. Finally, Margaret’s interest was piqued by a class that reminded her of their enthusiasms in the ’60s, when astrology was rediscovered by the masses. This was a course that would not conflict with their classes at the Art League: “Astrology: Beyond the Basics,” on Thursday nights.
“Oh, what nonsense!” exclaimed Carlotta.
Margaret said, “Why are you always the one who gets to say if something is nonsense? Can’t there be different opinions?”
Before Carlotta could recover from this rebellion, her other friend joined in.
“Why should it be nonsense?” Birdie challenged. “We always found a lot of truth in it, as I recall.”
Norbert felt protective of Carlotta. She had already suffered enough. He came to her rescue.
“Oh, but aren’t you forgetting that the Fine Arts Film Society shows its movies on Thursday nights? Just the other day, in the watercolor class, you were all so excited about seeing those foreign films and participating in the discussions afterward. Looks like if you take the astrology, you’ll be missing out on all those intellectual meetings.”
By the time Margaret and Birdie were dropped at their respective doors, they had reconsidered, and they were convinced that as interesting as astrology was, it would be even more fun to see the foreign films with Carlotta i
nstead.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
Five of Spades:
A crisis. Seek help.
Summer forced herself out of her lair and into her car. She didn’t like walking in town, but she didn’t like driving, either.
Sometimes, driving home from work, a horrifying thought would strike her: What if she had run someone over? How could she be sure she hadn’t run someone over? She had been listening to the radio. Her mind had wandered. Should she retrace her path, and see if there was a body on the road? Or no, it would make more sense to park her car, and check for fabric or blood on the front bumper, wouldn’t it? Or was she crazy to be thinking such thoughts? That she could have killed someone without knowing she had done it.
The inside of her head echoed like a can. She wanted to shake the thoughts out of her head. She was sick to death of her own thoughts.
The impression that she might have run someone over was horrible, but at least it made her feel something. She longed now to feel something—anything. Any feeling would be better than this numbness.
She got in her car and drove out to Route 4, just outside of town, and began to cruise through the countryside. It was beautiful, she knew. Her eyes saw the winding roads, gentle hills and fall colors, but her heart felt nothing at all. Feel something. Feel something. Her foot pressed the accelerator by small, barely noticeable increments, but always downward, downward. Feel something. Even fear.
She was flying over the speed bumps.
Wake up! Wake up!
She went sixty, seventy, eighty, ninety miles per hour. Something kept her foot from pushing even farther. What was it? Anxiety? Fear? Yes, she was feeling something.
The green countryside was blurring into a streak. She told herself to close her eyes and keep pushing, but her eyes and her foot did not obey. Far up ahead, she saw a coyote loping along the road. What if she hit it? She couldn’t hit it. In terror, she brought her foot to the brake and coasted to a gradual stop. She pulled onto the shoulder. She put her hands to her face and felt tears that she did not even know she had been crying. She was still alive.
But she could have killed someone. Again.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
Three of Hearts:
You are challenged to defend yourself.
Norbert at last had the reckoning Carlotta had predicted for him over that eggplant lunch at her house. It was destined to happen sooner or later.
It happened just when Norbert had begun to feel a sense of exhilaration in his readings. It came just when he had been thinking that what had begun as an emergency solution to Ivy’s veterinary bill had now become a path of life purpose that he could never abandon. That is when his suppressed but lurking fear jumped out at him.
He was a man about forty years old, and his black hair was slicked back with some kind of oil, it seemed. He said his name was Mark. He handed over his twenty dollars and shuffled the cards, as all querents before him had done. When Norbert received the seventh card from him and took back the deck, Mark sat back and folded his arms.
“Maybe you could help me with a decision. I have to decide between a job in Philadelphia and another one in Chicago. Which one should I take? My wife says Chicago.”
Norbert studied the cards for a few seconds in silence. He didn’t see a fork-in-the-road decision there. There was no card indicating a move or a job offer, either. He would begin with what he did see.
“This Jack of Hearts is you, I feel, a fun-loving person. The Queen of Hearts is a kind woman who is always at your side...your wife? I see you making a big purchase, something for enjoyment, and I feel it will be something like...a boat?”
The picture of a boat came clearly into Norbert’s mind. Pictures had been coming into his mind during readings, and he always shared those with the querents. Usually, these impressions turned out to be meaningful to them, to Norbert’s unending surprise.
“Now here is the deception card. Someone is lying.”
“What do you mean?” demanded the oily-haired man, leaning in. “Who is lying?”
“Well, let’s see.” Norbert felt blocked. This had never happened in any reading yet. He thought aloud, “Someone is lying to someone, for sure.”
“Oh, for sure,” agreed the man. He nodded. “No doubt. Someone, somewhere in the universe, is lying to someone. That’s useful.”
Norbert looked up at the oily-haired man. Norbert opened his mouth and closed it again.
“How do you do it, Norbert Z?”
As Mark raised his voice, a hush fell over the café. Norbert felt the eyes of customers who were putting aside their phones and tablets, and resting their forks on their plates.
“You fraud,” sneered the man. “Yeah, someone is lying to someone, all right. Every day, right here.” The man’s laugh was more like a spitting sound. “How do you types sleep at night? What bullshit!”
Hope came around from behind the counter, wiping her hands on her white apron.
“May I help you?” she asked.
“You may help me understand why you have this bullshitter in here collecting money fraudulently,” exclaimed the man.
Hope said in a near whisper, “Give him his money back, Norbert.”
Norbert, snapping out of his state of shock, pushed the twenty dollars across the table toward the oily-haired man.
“Damn right. Give the money back to everyone you’ve cheated, Norbert Z.” He was shouting now. “I might buy a boat, huh? In a town on a huge friggin’ lake? No way! You are amazing!” His laughter was harsh and attacking. “You can’t bullshit a bullshitter, Norbert Z. Didn’t you know that?”
“I’m sorry, but I’ll have to ask you to leave now, sir,” said Hope.
“You’re not half as sorry as you will be when you hear from the Better Business Bureau.” He stood. “A kind woman who is always at my side! You’re so full of shit! I don’t have any woman at all at my side—kind or otherwise!”
“How is that possible?” Hope murmured, as she accompanied Oily Hair to the door.
The customers, who had been watching the entertainment with a mixture of discomfort and pleasure, looked away from Norbert and Hope, and went back to busying themselves on their phones and tablets.
Norbert was focusing his eyes on the natural design of whorls in the wood on the table. He was flushed and flooded with shame. Something within him condemned him. The oily-haired man was right. While he sat here, day after day, feeling exhilarated with the sense that he was important in people’s lives, the naked truth was that he was nothing more than a—just as the man had said—bullshitter. He was bullshitting all day, just making things up to everyone, and telling himself grandiose lies while he did it. The humiliation was crushing.
Hope came back to his booth. He could not even look at her.
“Hey,” she said. “Don’t worry about it. Every once in a while you get a loony. What can you do, you know? Have a slice of lemon cake. On the house.”
* * *
That night, Norbert did not sleep well. He lay awake in his little white bedroom, mentally replaying the oily-haired man’s accusations. That man had said all of Norbert’s customers should be refunded their money, that Norbert was essentially a crook, a liar, a scammer. He didn’t feel like a scammer. With most of his customers, he felt like an appreciated adviser. But was he only fooling himself? He felt anxious and frightened, like a child about to be discovered doing something wrong. Perhaps this disagreeable man was his warning to stop telling fortunes, before it would be too late.
* * *
Carlotta and the Club were having tea at the Good Fortune Café one early November afternoon. Their booth was near the door, and they received little blasts of cold air every time it opened. They could see Norbert at his booth, in the depths of the café.
Margaret was watching in undisguised fascination as a customer approached No
rbert and sat down. She was dipping her chamomile tea bag up and down in her mug as she gazed in rapt attention.
Carlotta distracted her: “Marguerite, tu ne trouves pas que le thé à la camomille c’est—how do you say—trop soporifique?”
“What are you saying, Carlotta? You know I don’t understand French.”
“Soporifique—it just means ‘soporific’ in English. I’m asking if chamomile tea has a soporific effect on you.”
“Oh, no, not at all. It just makes me a little sleepy.”
Carlotta arched her eyebrows. Poor Margaret never could keep up.
“Regarde notre protégé, Carlotte,” said Birdie, protective of Margaret. “Norbert looks like he’s been reading fortunes all his life, doesn’t he?”
“Mais oui, c’est vrai!” answered Carlotta. “We taught him well!” Carlotta was softening ever so slightly in her attitude toward Norbert. He was still working at the trade she and her Club had taught him. So Edith could just put that in her ear.
“And Edith,” observed Carlotta aloud, with satisfaction, “in spite of the money she offered him, didn’t manage to pull him into her racket. So we see—not everyone can be bought.” She enjoyed the sense of winning a victory over the Aztec warrior.
Birdie said, “But that was such a fun experience at Edith’s Center, wasn’t it?”
“Oh, Edith.” Carlotta waved a smooth, dismissive hand. “C’est la folle du village. She is—Oh! How do you say it in English? I’m so immersed in French, I’m actually forgetting English! Oh, now I remember—the village crazy lady.”
“Really?” asked Margaret, with an edge of challenge in her voice. “You’re forgetting your native tongue, Carlotta, which you’ve been speaking for eighty years. Really?”
How tiresome. Now Carlotta would have to spout a stream of French to prove to her friends that she was not a liar. She searched her teeming mind for some bit of memorized French.
“Oui, vraiment, Marguerite. Des fois, pour trouver le mot juste—”