North on Drummond

by K. C. Burn

  Helen seated herself at the table and smoothed her hands over the black crushed-velvet tablecloth while Drew readied the incense that his grandma swore facilitated card reading. Probably patchouli and sandalwood had been incredibly exotic when she had started using them. After lighting a few candles, Drew turned back to Helen, who had a wistful smile on her face.

  “Smells exactly the same as when Marina read for me. I can hardly believe she’s been gone two years now. You must miss her.”

  Drew blinked. He hadn’t expected a personal and maudlin turn to the conversation. And of course it smelled the same. He wasn’t about to futz with a recipe that had worked for his grandma for decades.

  “I do, yes, but she’s in a better place, and even drops in for a visit now and again.”

  Helen blinked, her surprise quickly masked. There was little reason for surprise, considering Drew’s profession and Sandy Bottom Bay’s hauntings. Assuming one believed in psychics, ghosts, and the supernatural.

  Drew sure as hell didn’t, not even when his grandma had sworn up and down that she had the second sight. But he wasn’t about to bad-mouth the source of his livelihood. Perhaps this moral ambiguity was the last bit of shady Drummond he’d been unable to scrub clean, but the readings he gave provided comfort to his clients.

  Time to move things along. He wanted a chance to finish his sandwich before a wandering tourist or gossiping resident happened by his place. Although he felt bad about Andy Wilson’s tragic accident and the fact that his brother Wyatt had discovered the body, Drew hadn’t known the man, and twenty-four hours later he felt the town had already discussed the shit out of it.

  “Ready?” In one smooth movement, Drew seated himself opposite Helen and placed the deck of tarot cards in the center of the table.

  “Shuffle the cards while thinking on what you want to know. When you’re done shuffling, cut the deck into thirds.” No matter how many times a regular came to see him, he always started with the same instructions. Put his clients in the right mindset. He might only be twenty-two, but after being raised by an extended family of criminals and con men, as well as having training from a “psychic” grandma, Drew was a natural at reading people’s expressions and words to tell fortunes.

  Helen picked up the cards and followed Drew’s directive while he sat back and waited. As Drew did each time he read for her, he stared intently at her while she prepared the deck. No matter how hard he searched her features, he could see very little of Cliff in her. Still, she was a covert connection to Cliff, one he wasn’t ready to give up.

  Today tension deepened the creases by her eyes, and the slightly thicker makeup application spoke of something to hide. Helen had exceptional skill at suppressing or hiding her emotions, and she’d proved to be one of his most challenging clients. Even armed with his grandma’s excellent teaching, it had taken him a while to figure out Helen’s tells. He usually only saw the faint hints of stress when she was worried about Cliff, and each time, Drew had had difficulty keeping his heart rate even and his voice properly modulated. Lately, though, something else had been bothering her. Maybe it made him a bad person, but he kind of hoped her stress today was due to the death of Andy Wilson on her property and not anything to do with Cliff.

  They’d get to this week’s question soon enough. Even with Helen’s familiarity with the process, she didn’t like spitting out her question first thing any more than his other clients did. As usual, Drew would start out with some simple probing before getting into the real reason a client showed up for a reading.

  Drew took the stack of cards back from Helen and laid out three lines of seven cards each. Touching a few cards as he spoke, he continued his standard patter about what the cards meant in terms of placement in the three lines. The layout had the most cards, and he used it frequently, sometimes interchanged with a Celtic Cross layout, but Helen always got three lines. He’d get into more specifics about each card’s meaning eventually, interspersed with seemingly innocuous questions. Although her face was still difficult to read after all this time, once he’d realized the majority of her concerns were about her son, his job had gotten so much easier. The past few readings, however, she’d had something else on her mind, specifically a growing obsession with ghosts and haunting.

  “I sense a conflict. Here.” Drew pointed at the cards. “Related to family.”

  “My great-grandmother was reputed to be a witch, and there were rumors she killed her husband after she caught him with a servant girl.”

  Drew blinked. The past few readings, she’d brought up a number of deceased family members, and if Drew hadn’t known for certain that she already patronized Eddie Price, the medium, he might have suggested she go visit Eddie. Then again, maybe he wouldn’t. Not only was Eddie one of his most significant competitors, he was an ass, and neither of them had supernatural powers. Drew’s fortunes and readings were designed to give hope, make people feel better about their lives. If circumstances called for it, he encouraged his clients to seek medical or legal assistance. But in his opinion, Eddie outright lied to people. Dead was dead. Spirits didn’t exist any more than psychics, no matter what the neon lights in his window proclaimed.

  The problem was, he wasn’t sure where to go with this reading.

  Helen took the decision out of his hands. She tapped the death card, which came up far too frequently for Drew’s liking. Always required some fancy talk to avoid spooking his clients. Probably should just take the damn thing out of the deck altogether.

  “Do you believe in ghosts?”

  Shit. He didn’t want to out-and-out lie. “The more important question is whether you believe. But the cards aren’t dealt for me.”

  “A conflict.” Helen tapped the card again. “I know the house is haunted. I’ve heard the spirits before, felt their presence. My mother watching over me. My father protecting me. I’ve sensed my grandmother at times too.”

  Despite the muggy heat that remained in the room, a shiver slid down Drew’s spine, like a ghost of his own. This wasn’t the first time she’d referred to ghosts, more so recently. Ghosts weren’t his gig, and he did his best to deflect Helen, but the whole tone of the appointment had changed. Helen wasn’t paying attention to the cards. She wasn’t letting him guide the reading. But she was worried about something, and Drew wanted to help, like he wanted to help all his clients.

  He opened his mouth, hoping something appropriate would fall out, but Helen beat him to it.

  “The spirits have been more restless. More intrusive in their communications.”

  Drew might have grown up in the second-most haunted town in Florida, but he’d never seen hide nor hair of one single ghost. Didn’t change the fact that Helen’s conviction was creeping him right the hell out.

  “How so?” Drew bit his lip. That question wasn’t going to get things back on track.

  Helen quirked her lips up in a tiny half smile. “Louder. Definitely louder. Things moving around. Doors slamming. Usually my family is fairly sedate in their haunting. I don’t know…”

  She broke eye contact and stared down at the cards again, but Drew was certain she wasn’t really looking at them.

  “You don’t know what?”

  “I don’t know what I’ve done to upset them, but I’m very worried they had something to do with that poor man’s death.”

  Drew’s eyes widened. This delusion was getting worse, clearly exacerbated by Andy’s death. Conflicting emotions prevented him from speaking. Should he try to contact Cliff? Maybe Cliff knew already. Then again, maybe she was just distraught and exhausted from everything that had been happening. He’d keep a careful eye on her during the next few weeks. If she got worse, he’d see if he could figure out Cliff’s contact information, but for now…for now he needed to ease her mind. That was what he got paid to do.

  “No. Not your fault. You can’t blame yourself for his death.”

  Drew gathered the cards together, heedless of the unfinished reading. He wasn’t going
to cloak the message in his normal oblique patter.

  “Listen to me. Even if ghosts were responsible for Andy’s death…” Drew just about choked on the words, but he wasn’t about to try and convince a believer she was wrong. Not now and not while she was laboring under the conviction the ghosts might be killers. “You weren’t the one acting. Please do not blame yourself. Besides, have you ever heard of malevolent spirits in Sandy Bottom Bay?”

  Helen took a deep breath and shook her head, tears glittering in her eyes, but not one fell to her cheek.

  “Exactly. Sure, the town’s reputation is founded in a pretty horrific massacre, but even that wasn’t enough to bring back malicious spirits. I can’t believe there’s anything you could have done to make them mad at you.”

  Helen was a nice woman and, despite her money and station, didn’t treat him like he was dirt.

  “Thank you. I appreciate that. There was… I’m the only one in my family who has gotten a divorce.”

  The slightly bashful look that battled with her distress was a little odd.

  “Forgive me, but…the divorce isn’t recent, is it?” Drew had never been so direct with any client, but then, he’d never had a client worried her ghosts had killed a man. Maybe considering contacting Cliff wasn’t quite so self-serving after all.

  “No, no. Eight years. But I’m…seeing someone now.”

  Drew smiled. “Good for you.” The stress of moving on might be the reason for her distress. He hoped that was all it was.

  With a little shrug, Helen gave him another tiny smile.

  At the end of her reading, Drew hadn’t given Helen a full measure of relief. But the set of her shoulders was a tiny bit more relaxed and her smile as she pulled out her gold credit card just a little brighter. A success in the world, according to Drew.

  Smiling, he walked her to the door and was about to bid her good-bye when his stomach grumbled loudly, reminding him of the sandwich he had yet to eat.

  Helen smiled at him, a motherly smile, the likes of which he’d not seen since his grandma passed. “You didn’t skip lunch to see me, did you? You need to eat more. You’re too skinny.” She patted his cheek while he blushed.

  “It’s been a busy day.”

  She tsked. “Put up the closed sign, and go eat something, Drew. Don’t make yourself sick over work.”

  Drew gaped at her. He’d never heard her call him by his name, hadn’t even been aware she knew what it was.

  “Um, yeah, I’ll do that,” he mumbled.

  “Good. I don’t want to see you getting sick.” Her attention strayed to his shoulder, and her hand reached out to tuck an escaping lock of hair back under his turban. “It’s a shame you have to wear the turban. Your hair is such a lovely color. I’ll see you in a few days.”

  Helen smiled, patted him again, and was gone in a cloud of Chanel No. 5. If it had been anyone else, Drew might have thought she was hitting on him, but she’d sounded so much like a mother. He couldn’t imagine why the matriarch of Sandy Bottom Bay would bother trying to mother him, of all people, and why now. His grandma had done her best, but Drew had survived without a mother for a long time. As he made his way back to his kitchen, he wondered exactly why it was Cliff never came back to visit Helen. She was so sweet and caring, and Drew was determined to keep an eye on her.

  Walking into his living quarters was like walking into soaking-wet cotton, warmed to boiling. Even for him, it was fucking hot, and sweat immediately dripped down his spine.

  The peanut butter sandwich on his table, one bite taken out of it, looked like a feast, and Drew began salivating. He almost didn’t want to take the time to remove his robes and turban, but he also didn’t want to have to wash his costume any sooner than he had to. He grabbed a dry T-shirt from his clean laundry, swapped out robes and turban for stretchy cotton, and poured himself another glass of milk. Room-temperature milk wasn’t worth the effort of drinking. With a tired grunt, Drew dropped down into the hard vinyl chair and picked up his sandwich.

  He wolfed down half of it before he was able to relax and actually taste what he was chewing. Pounding at his back door had him swallowing before he expected, and he couldn’t determine the identity of his visitor, eyes watering as he coughed.

  After he cleared his throat and his eyes stopped tearing up, he blinked at his best friend, Kyle, who stood close enough to the door that if he’d been a cat, he’d have been hanging from the screen by his claws.

  “You done with your death rattle yet? Let me in already.”

  Defiantly, Drew stood and shoved the last two bites of sandwich into his mouth, chewing while he took the few steps to reach the screen door. He rubbed the back of hand across his eyes to remove the tears that had accumulated, groaning when his hand ended up smeared with black.

  “Hold on, sweetie. Let me fix it.” Kyle dashed to the bathroom and returned with Drew’s eyeliner. Kyle licked his thumb and stroked it under Drew’s eyes before he stroked on more sooty black makeup. “You really ought to get some waterproof stuff.”

  This was an old argument. “I don’t like the waterproof stuff.”

  “With the humidity in this place, you must look like Alice Cooper on a crying jag half the time. I’m so broke I could use a fourth job, but even my apartment has air-conditioning. How can you stand this?”

  A snort escaped Drew’s lips. Like he could afford to buy another window unit, never mind power it up. He wasn’t religious, but he prayed every day that the units his grandma had put in the client areas didn’t crap out. They were getting more aged every day, and he dreaded having to replace them. The part of his business that involved selling incense, candles, and herbs had required more outlay than he’d anticipated and was only just beginning to get some traction.

  “You get rid of your fat butt, and you’ll be perfectly comfortable in the heat.” Drew playfully slapped his friend’s ass.

  Kyle sniffed. “Quit feeling me up. My ass is perfect, as we both know. We can’t all be broomsticks like you.”

  True. He was skinny enough that he rarely had issues with the heat, but today was exceptionally hellish.

  “Don’t tell me you came over to bitch about the temperature and give me makeup tips. Aren’t you supposed to be…” Actually, Drew wasn’t sure where Kyle was supposed to be. The guy held down three different part-time jobs. This was a busy time of year for him because not only were his evening ghost-walk tours in great demand, but he was also in the beginning stages of preparing choreography for the high school cheerleading squad’s trip to Orlando for the national championship competition. Somewhere in there, he also squeezed in time to teach little girls ballet at the dance studio, but he usually cut back on his dance fitness classes in the fall.

  “Whatever. They won’t even miss me, I bet. Those girls will never be ready for February. This year, they’re all graceless, more concerned with texting than anything else. Of course, they’ll be even more hopeless when I go to New York.”

  Drew laughed because Kyle was twenty-two, just like him, and yet he always sounded like a world-weary technophobe whenever he discussed his charges.

  Kyle’s life wasn’t what he’d dreamed, but when he’d blown out his knee partway through his dance degree at Florida State University—while Drew was eking out his two-year business degree at the local college—Kyle’s dreams of dancing in New York had changed. Despite the fact that he still spoke about going to New York as though he was poised to leave at any minute, Drew thought Kyle was mostly happy being back in Sandy Bottom Bay. No one besides Drew and his family knew why Kyle had suddenly switched majors to return to the bay and take up his odd assortment of jobs while he finished his degree online; he refused to admit to the physical impossibility of being a professional dancer. Drew was happy Kyle had enough mobility to teach dance. If Kyle had had to give it up altogether, his friend would have been even more devastated.

  “Did you want a sandwich?” Drew was going to make himself another one. It was possible Kyle wasn’
t here for any other reason than to vent or chat.

  “All those carbs? No, thank you.” Kyle opened the fridge and rummaged around for an apple while Drew prepped another sandwich. They both sat at the same time, and Kyle used Drew’s plate and knife to cut his apple and smear tiny bits of peanut butter on each of the segments.

  After a few moments of silence while they ate, Kyle threw his hands up in the air. “I can’t believe you didn’t tell me Helen Somerset was one of your clients. Is that new? Did it have something to do with Andy’s death?”

  “What if today was her first visit?”

  “Was it? So, then, it was about Andy.”

  Drew caught himself before answering. He made a point of not discussing his clients. Most of them came to him for help with things that were upsetting them. They didn’t deserve to have him gossiping about them to all and sundry, although that particular pastime ran rampant through Sandy Bottom Bay’s residents. No one needed to know Helen’s visit was about Andy.

  “It wasn’t, was it?” Kyle’s tone was accusing. “What did she want to know?”

  “You know I don’t talk about that, not even with you.”

  Kyle rolled his eyes. “What, the clairvoyants’ ethics committee will suspend your tarot-reading privileges? C’mon. Spill.”

  Drew couldn’t be mad at Kyle, not when the guy made him laugh. But he did shake his head, causing more dramatic arm flourishes.

  “Okay, okay. Don’t tell me. But I came over because I heard some of the girls talking.”

  Yeah, Kyle could bitch about working with the cheerleaders all he wanted, but this wouldn’t be the first time he had imparted some tiny bit of gossip that had helped Drew provide a more accurate reading for someone.