Love Power

by Martha Reed

  “Is Dee’s best friend,” Gee quickly corrected. “I am Dee’s best friend.”

  “But of course.” Pulling a single card from the crescent, Aunt Babette flipped it over.

  “Very good.” She leaned in.

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  “Queen of Pentacles. Bien. The Tarot is already trying to help us.” Aunt Babette slid the wide card to her left. “This is a good card to represent our friend Delilah, I think. This queen is very sensuous. She loves gardens and wine and all the good things Mother Earth has to offer.”

  Flattening her hands on the table, she mixed the cards up again. “Now, girls, put your thoughts to the other side. Focus your energy on being helpful, good, and kind. Ignore the dark thoughts; send them away. Concentrate your intent on finding Delilah. We’re trying to create a unity between us, the universe, and the deck.”

  Gently gathering the cards together again, she squared them up and flipped the top card over.

  “Nine of Swords. The nightmare card.” Babette snapped it down on the center of the table. “This card looks bad, but don’t give it too much thought right now because the other cards will influence this one. It may mean that Delilah is caught up in something she doesn’t understand.”

  She flipped the next card over. It was blank.

  “Yes,” she slowly hissed. “That confirms it. This blank card represents the unknown.” She placed the empty card on top of the Nine of Swords. “I’m seeing a lot of uncertainty here.” Reaching up, she wiped the corners of her mouth. “This next card represents the unconscious.”

  Flipping the top card over, she carefully placed it below the blank one. “Six of Swords. Now, this card is good. Delilah is moving forward. Yes, she may be uncertain, but she’s moving in the right direction. That’s fine. Let’s look at the past.”

  “Reversed Justice.” Frowning, she slid that card to her left, clipping it thoughtfully with her fingernails. “This card is a trickster. I’m never certain with it.” She waggled her head. “It represents karma, bad karma, something that has happened in the past. Something dead, decayed. Something buried.” She nervously glanced at the colored bottles blocking her windows. “Something that may be trying to come back to haunt us.”

  “Let’s see what the consciousness card says.” She firmed her lips. Turning another card, she slid it over the green felt to the top of the cross. “Judgment. Now this is interesting. Judgment represents a call to action, but that blank card,” she tapped it, “is impeding forward movement. All of this is very interesting. Let’s see what the outcome card says.”

  She flipped the seventh card over.

  It’s Satan. Jane gasped at the depiction of a goat-headed devil seated on a throne.

  “This doesn’t represent M’su Diable, child.” Aunt Babette smiled gently. “It means Delilah is a prisoner, chained by her fears.” She circled her right palm over the Celtic cross display. “This is all a very positive reading, filled with energy. I’m seeing a lot of Major Arcana represented. Take heart. The cards are pointing us toward success.”

  Sounds like complete hoodoo to me but look at their faces. Jane shifted uneasily. Gee and Babette look entranced. They’re buying into every bit of this.

  “Now, I’ll set out the wand.” Babette laid a single card down on her right. “Six of Wands. Tres bien. Something will be resolved or become clearer in six days.” Pinching the top card, she flipped it over. “Knight of Cups. Here we go.” She smoothed the row with her fingers. “This is the environment card. You’re being directed to pursue your quest.”

  Gee leaned in. “Pursue it how? What should we do?”

  “Let’s ask the Tarot.” Aunt Babette tapped the deck. “This next card is the ‘want’ card. Concentrate on it, girls. This is the place of hopes and emotion and of powerful devotion.” She plucked the card. Studying the card silently for a moment, she slowly reversed it and set it down. “The Fool card, reversed.”

  “That’d be me.” Jane scoffed, time checking her phone. “I’m feeling foolish.”

  “Don’t mess around,” Gee stated severely. “This is serious.”

  “Gigi is right, Jane. This is serious.” Aunt Babette studied her with troubled eyes. “Someone is standing on the edge of a cliff. There is a big moment ahead,” she inhaled, “not necessarily bad. Trust in the future will be supported.” She sucked in another breath. “The problem with this card is that it’s reversed. Because of that blank card, we’re still seeing uncertainty.”

  “The only uncertainty I see,” Jane stated, “is that we’re not getting any hard intel on where Delilah is.”

  Aunt Babette frowned. “Focus your intent on this card, the last one, the outcome card.” She flipped it over. “Page of Pentacles. Tres bien. This card is favorable, even lucky. Page cards represent youth and vigor. This particular page serves the Queen of Pentacles.” She nodded decisively. “There’s your answer. You will see a positive outcome within six days. As for Delilah, the Tarot is telling you to go look for her. Have you checked that club you’re always running off to? Have you looked for her there?”

  Gee scratched her stubbly jaw. “I’ll ask around again tonight. I’m thinking we should go check her shop.”

  “Why?” Aunt Babette blinked. “She wasn’t there when I locked up.”

  “I’m not sure. I have an odd feeling, a presentment.”

  “Then you must follow it.” Bending down, Aunt Babette reached for her purse. “The Tarot doesn’t care where you start, cherie, as long as you get started.” She handed Gee a crystal skull key ring. “These keys will get you in. You might need to work the door a little, it gets sticky after it rains.” She slid the cards back into their sleeve. “Now, girls, quickly. I know you’re in a hurry. Let’s see what the Ouija has to say.”

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Rain began to softly patter against the windows as Aunt Babette stood. Where’s she going? Turning sideways in her chair, Jane watched the elderly woman drift across the room toward a mid-century teak console. Carefully raising the latched lid with both hands, she ran her fingers over a row of well-worn cardboard sleeves.

  “Which one do we play today?” Tapping her lips, she caught Jane’s eye. “Music helps with Ouija. Spirits like hearing a strong beat.”

  Selecting one album from the collection, Babette shook the black disk out of its sleeve, twirling it between her fingers before settling it onto the chrome spindle.

  This should be good. What’s Babette going to play? I can see the spirits tapping their feet to a snappy zydeco beat. Jane smiled. If spirits have feet. She blinked in genuine surprise as a remembered set of tinny chords leapt off the record like a spinning helicopter blade with the very first note.

  “The Rolling Stones?” Jane gasped.

  ““Gimme Shelter”.” Babette displayed the birthday cake album cover. “Let It Bleed, 1969.” She ran her hand across the colorful image. “I bought this album at F.W. Woolworth on Canal Street the day it came out. Heard they had it in stock and grabbed the first streetcar I could. Stood in line for over an hour.”

  She laughed, and Jane suddenly saw the vibrant girl Aunt Babette had been.

  “Cost me $3.49, plus tax. Ha! What you kids pay now for a cup of coffee, but that was real money back then.” Picking a boxed board game up, she held it to her chest. “Listen to that Merry Clayton sing! What power! What a voice!”

  “Best Stones song, ever.” Gee agreed.

  Aunt Babette shuffled back to the table. “I’m willing to argue that Merry’s actually singing lead vocal over Mick’s harmonica if anyone cares to debate me about it.”

  “Won’t get an argument out of me,” Jane said.

  “Music is the one thing, Gigi, that your father and I agree on.” Her eyes twinkled as she set the Ouija board down. “I’d play it loud enough to rattle the roof if Leslie would let me.” Shaking the brown lid off the box, she set it aside. “But Leslie likes her peace and quiet and this is her house. She’s the queen bee.” Catchi
ng Jane’s eye, she snorted. “What, Jane? You’re surprised I like rock ‘n roll? That’s because you met me when I’m old, like you see me now, and that’s sad, because you’ll always remember me like this, but I bought this record when I was 25, younger than you are now.”

  Unfolding the board, she snorted again. “All this talk of racism and hating women, you think that’s new? Shit. We had that thrown in our faces when I was growing up with Jim Crow laws ruling the land.” She smoothed the central crease. “You think you’re the first ones to resist? The first sit-in protest happened right at that Woolworth’s lunch counter where I got this album in 1960. Oh my, yes. Early days. Seven students, five black and two white sat together in the white-only section.” She leaned across the table. “Can you even imagine that? Having white-only seats? Or a white-only drinking fountain?” Shaking her head, she laughed brightly. “What am I saying? You kids buy your fancy water in bottles hauled in from Fiji. No free American water for you.”

  Jane recalled her training day photographs of white law enforcement officers using German shepherds on black civil rights protesters in Alabama. “Was there trouble in NOLA like in Selma? Were those kids arrested?”

  “Oh no, honey. No. This is N’Orleans! We’re every damn tint there is.” She stroked her bronze arm. “We’ve been protesting over color a good long time, ever since they pulled us into the Union. Gov’mint never could figure us out, especially Creoles because we were mixed race from the beginning.” Her eyes shone with pride. “A free and independent people of color with fine businesses and legal property.” She rapped the table. “That’s what throws them, all those puckery old white men in Washington. That’s what all this is really about. Owning property. Who owns what, or who.”

  She pointed a purple fingernail. “This mess in Washington ain’t nothing new. You two are just too young to remember it, but I remember Selma and Montgomery and Dr. King getting shot.” She grew fierce. “And those Washington men should be afraid because it wasn’t just marching back in the day, it was riots, mob riots! They set Los Angeles on fire! That’s what they’re really afraid of, all of those men, because we still got the numbers and they know it.” She squinted. “We just need to get ourselves organized somehow. Figure it out and start using that power the right way ourselves instead of being told what to do.” She sat back, gasping. “And we can’t ever run away, girls, because the day we stop fighting, they win.”

  She’s right. Jane shuddered. I just plowed my way through the court system. Nothing about it was easy, but I had to believe that at least the court was neutral about my case. Due process was my only hope. Jane swallowed thickly. What if I had walked through that courtroom door straight into bias because of the color of my skin? Or because I wore a hajib or my gender? What then?

  Aunt Babette cocked her head as “Gimme Shelter” ramped up. “Get on with your bad self, Merry, girl. You keep screaming until things truly change.”

  She started sliding the Ouija board back and forth across the felt cover, creating so much static electricity in the air the hairs on Jane’s forearms quivered.

  “Merry Clayton was sixty years ahead of her time, girls. Listen to that sound. That’s the sound of the angry female energy being unleashed on the world today. ‘Rape, murder’.” Aunt Babette sang. Reaching up, she wiped flecks of foam from the corners of her mouth. “All of those holy rollers who say they walk in fear of God had better pull up their pants, because this, girls, this is the voice of God the Mother, she who sows and reaps, she who has been silenced and ignored and shunted aside. She is re-entering our world and she is pissed at what we have done with her legacy.”

  Shit. Jane grew concerned. She sounds fucking nuts. She sucked in a shallow breath. Mom said spirit boards are demonic and Aunt Babette sure sounds possessed. Jane glanced nervously across the table. Gee looked unfazed. Okay, Gee, I’ll play. But if this gets any weirder, sorry, I am not comfortable with this. You are own your own and I am outta here.

  Blinking repeatedly, Aunt Babette pulled a notepad and a sharpened pencil from the box. “Now, Jane, think. Never ask Ouija a question if you don’t want an answer. The spirits are active and they are listening. This is not a joke or a silly game. This is serious, and our intent is real.” She tightly shut her eyes. “We are gathered here today to seek help finding our lost friend, Delilah Gardere.”

  Jane quickly scanned the tan Ouija board. It had two curving rows of block capital letters in the middle over a straight line of numbers from 1 to 0. The sun was pictured in the upper left-hand corner of the board over the word YES. A crescent moon with a single star was shown in the upper right corner over the word NO. Along the bottom of the board were the words GOOD BYE.

  Aunt Babette blinked her eyes open. Reaching into the box, she pulled out a cream-colored plastic heart-shaped planchette. Turning the pointer over, she gently blew away the dust between its tiny tripod rubber wheels before polishing its crystal lens with the hem of her purple blouse.

  “Gigi already knows this, Jane, but you’ll lightly rest your fingertips on the edge of the planchette, like this. Now, clear your minds, and focus. We’ll circle the board three times, once for each of us, and oh! Always remember to say ‘Good Bye’ when you’re done or a spirit may follow you home.”

  I am really not comfortable with this. Jane hesitated as the tripod pointer skated over the board. YES. NO. YES. NO. The planchette rapidly swung between the sun and the moon images. YES. NO.

  “Excellent!” Aunt Babette leaned over the board, obviously thrilled. “Sometimes the spirits prefer Tarot, sometimes they prefer the board.” She nodded eagerly, her dark eyes bright. “I don’t usually see such a strong response so quickly. Quick! Gigi! Ask your question.”

  “We are seeking my friend, Delilah Gardere,” Gee stated carefully. “She’s missing from her home. Her friends and her family who love her miss her. Spirits? Can you help us find Delilah Gardere? Do you know where she is?”

  The planchette skated to a dead stop in the center of the board.

  Gee looked up, horror reflected in her eyes. “Aunt Babette?” She whispered. “Why does it show us nothing?”

  “That’s a good sign.” Aunt Babette waggled her head. “It means that Delilah is still with us on this side of the divide. She lives, still free from death’s clutches.”

  The planchette slowly inched toward the crescent moon. NO.

  Gee choked. “She’s dead?”

  The tripod circled the block lettering before creeping back up toward the moon, where it chittered to a stop. NO.

  “Fuck! Dee’s not alive and she’s not dead? Where is she then?”

  Jane gasped as the planchette began to swing wildly between the letters.

  “Write this down!” Aunt Babette stared. “B-I-G-P-I-G.”

  “What the hell?” Jane sputtered.

  “P-I-G,” Babette repeated. “M-A-N.”

  “Big pig man?” She released her pent-up breath. “Are you fucking kidding me?”

  “Jane, please. Man? What man?” Gigi demanded from the board. “Which man?”

  “T-H-E-M-A-N.”

  The pointer skittered to at stop at the bottom of the board. GOOD BYE.

  Lifting both hands, Aunt Babette released the pointer. Her shoulders slumped and she dropped her hands into her lap. “Do we know who Dee’s men friends are?”

  “She doesn’t really have any.” Sweat had gathered in the hollow of Gee’s neck. She wiped it away. “Except for my dad. Dee prefers the company of women.”

  “She has you, Gee,” Jane stated. “Technically, you’re a man friend.”

  “Fuck off.” Gee looked hurt. “Why? Because I have a cock? Don’t be stupid.” Turning away stiffly, she faced Aunt Babette. “Try again but ask for Fancy this time. She’ll help.”

  “As you wish.” Re-centering the planchette, Aunt Babette waited patiently until Jane had replaced her fingertips on the pointer. “Thank you, kind spirits, for your guidance in our quest. We seek more help finding
our friend, Delilah Gardere. This time, we ask our friend Fancy Abellard to guide us, if she can.”

  The pointer remained still, leaden and unmoving.

  “Fancy?” Gigi implored. “Can you help us?”

  The planchette started crawling toward the doubled rows of letters.

  “She’s here.” Tears sprang into Gee’s eyes. “I can feel it.”

  “H-E-Y-G-I-R-L.”

  “Oh, Fancy.” Gee wept. “I miss you so much! I’m so sorry about what happened.” She sucked in a ragged breath. “Who did it, Fancy? Who hurt you so bad?”

  YES NO. The planchette swung rapidly back and forth. YES NO. YES NO.

  “Gigi! You’re asking too many questions.” Aunt Babette scolded. “Focus your intent. You’re causing confusion.”

  “Got it.” Gee’s Adam’s apple bobbed as she swallowed heavily. “Fancy? Are you there?”

  “S-H-O-W-M-E-T-H-E-M-O-N-E-Y.”

  “It’s her.” Gee giggled, blinking away tears. “Fancy? Where’s Dee? Help us find Dee.”

  “W-I-T-H-M-E-N-O-W-S-A-F-E.”

  “With you? But you’re dead!” Gee released the planchette like it was white hot. The pointer skated to a stop. She quickly returned her fingertips to it. “Fancy? Answer me! Where is Dee?”

  The pointer sat unresponsive in the middle of the board.

  “You broke the connection.” Aunt Babette’s breath rattled in her throat. “She’s gone.”

  “Is that it?” Jane asked. “Are we done now? Is it over?” There’s nothing supernatural going on here. Everything about this can be explained by the three of us sitting around this table. Most of these answers don’t even make sense. Her innate sarcasm reasserted itself and she snorted at the preposterous situation. “Anyone else care to speak up while we’re sitting here?”

  She immediately fell forward over the board as the pointer started picking out new letters.