by Darcy Woods
“That’s not what I meant and you know it.” Iri steps out and faces the mirror. She wiggles and tugs at the stunning red dress I don’t at all remember handing off to her.
“Wow. It looks gorgeous on you.” I move in behind her, pulling up on the straps. “I think if we alter it a bit, it’ll be perfect for your artsy-fartsy event.”
Iri looks away from her reflection. Her face pinches. “I hate that you’re being persecuted for being my friend.”
I drop my hands. “Okay, that’s dramatic.”
“Wil…” Irina drops her voice but, unfortunately, not the subject. “That plasticized bitch is always looking for ways to tear into you. All because her douchebag boyfriend made a play for me.”
I groan. “How many times do we have to have this conversation, Iri? It’s not your fault. We stopped hanging out way before that happened. Come to think of it, it was probably around the time her bitchmorphosis kicked in. Anyway, Brittany and her threats can kiss my velour-covered booty.”
The repercussions of crossing Spawn of Satan and her entourage aren’t even a blip on my radar. Because honestly, I’d rather have five good friends than fifty fake ones.
And I’d still choose Iri over any of them.
I meet her brooding gaze in the mirror. “So, are you buying this fabulous dress or what? Because this synthetic nightmare is making me sweat. Not perspire—sweat.”
She pulls in a breath and on her exhale replies, “I think I like Jordan.”
“I know.”
Irina swallows. “I’m scared because I might give a shit.”
“I know,” I repeat, giving her hand a squeeze. “But it’s going to be okay.”
And I pray that it will be. For both our sakes.
Avoidance is a temporary bandage on a situation in need of a tourniquet.
I’m paraphrasing, but that’s the gist of Monday’s horoscope.
Thanks.
My panic is now beyond the reach of modern medicine.
The thing is, I know Seth is the right guy for me. So then why am I still consumed by thoughts of Grant? Why can’t I snuff out this silly infatuation? It isn’t as clichéd as wanting what I can’t have. I don’t work that way. So there has to be another explanation.
Epiphany strikes in the wee hours of the morning on the heels of a terrifying dream. I bolt upright in a tangle of bed sheets with my hair knotted from thrashing and my forehead slick with sweat. Mane of Leo! Could my nightmare be true? What if this goes light-years beyond an unlucky Fifth House? What if I am actually…cursed?
Sure, it’s a long shot, probably nothing more than grasping at supernatural straws. But I have to know for certain.
Heart thumping, I free myself from the cotton restraints and immediately research signs of an occult attack. In the glow of my laptop, I’m awash in horror as I identify many of the earmarks of an otherworldly assailant.
Nightmares: Check.
Health issues: Um…possible check? I had some residual achiness after the tower fall. Come to think of it, my tower tumble reinforces two more signs….
Bad luck: Check.
Relationship difficulties: Double check.
The more I investigate, the more the possibility has me on the verge of forming hives over every inch of my body. And there are only thirteen days left in June; I am officially closer to the end than the beginning. Stars above, I can almost taste the sun-ripe blueberries of July.
So—under threat of blueberries and hexes—I will take drastic measures.
I tug the cord for my stop and jump off the bus the moment the doors open.
Heat radiates off the cracked and littered sidewalk of Dugan Street, a mere six blocks west of Inkporium. While two days ago might’ve been cool and rainy, today it’s hotter than blazes and the air is liquefied. Weather whiplash is but one of the many splendors of Midwest living.
Perspiration dampens the hair at my neck, a combination of nerves and the heat index. I double-check the address—almost there. I ignore the seedy guy chain-smoking outside Pinky’s Topless Bar—he doesn’t return the favor. He crams his grubby fingers in his mouth, producing an ear-splitting whistle. The words that follow are fouler than whatever’s decomposing on the sewer grate. If Gram were here, she’d have half a mind to break those fingers just to teach the man some respect. And normally, I’d have choice words of my own, but I steel myself to stay focused on the important task at hand.
I stop in front of 729 Dugan. The shabby brownstone is taller than it is wide, with barred windows spanning all six stories. I scan the nameplates beside the buzzers until I find the one I’m searching for: LAVEAU.
I ran across the name, along with a phone number, in one of Mama’s old astrology books. A book I was shocked to discover a number of years ago, buried in a pile beside the trunk that used to sit in Gram’s bedroom. Inside the book’s cover was my mother’s large, looping writing with the word “diviner” underlined numerous times.
I took to heart that it meant Miss Laveau was the genuine article—an honest-to-goodness real psychic, and about now I need every branch of metaphysical help I can get.
I press the call button. Fanning my face with my clutch, I unkink the crinoline of my dress with my free hand.
“Don’t take solicitors here. Includin’ religion,” the voice crackles over the ancient intercom.
Second thoughts have bombarded me since before I even stepped off the bus, and I’m sure as the North Star Gram wouldn’t approve of my coming. But I need clarity on this situation. Bad. And if I do have a curse on my hands, well, then it’ll take more than knowing the language of the sky to lift it.
I lean in to the speaker. “I, um…I called earlier this morning. I have an appointment with Miss Laveau.”
“You got a name?”
“Wil Carlisle.”
Caustic laughter echoes from the speaker. “Oh yeah, she been expectin’ you.”
I’m buzzed in and follow the zigzag of narrow stairs leading to apartment 8F. My trepidation rises with each floor. Will Miss Laveau be able to tell by looking at me whether I’ve been a victim of occult activity?
When I reach the top floor, the fluorescent hall lights flicker, and the door to 8F opens. A cloud of incense ambushes me, sweeter than any sage my mother used to burn.
A slight woman stands in the doorway. Her coal eyes probe, possessing both an age and a wisdom that are at odds with her dark, unlined skin. She scratches the silk scarf wrapped around her head. “I’m Angeline, Miss Laveau’s…liaison, so to speak. You bring what I told you, Wil Carlisle?”
I nod, opening my clutch and digging out the single wooden matchstick and a clove cigarette. I add, “I have the money, too.”
“All right, all right.” Angeline impatiently waves me inside. “Put all of it over there.” She points to a bronze bowl sitting on a stack of boxes adjacent to the door in the entryway. As I place the cigarette, match, and fifty dollars in the dish, she elaborates. “Can’t touch what’s not made in offer to me, you see? Muddles the energy of the exchange.”
“Okay,” I reply uncertainly, swallowing the knot of fear in my throat. I still don’t understand what one match and an herbal cigarette have to do with anything. But I didn’t come here to judge the process. I came to know, once and for all, if incorporeal entities are working against me from the otherworld.
Angeline moves over to the cramped kitchen, placing a kettle on the range. The gas pilot tick-tick-ticks before igniting. “There’s some rules you must abide, ’fore I can let ya pass through that curtain.” The swathe of purple velvet hanging to my left ripples from the sudden rush of air from the AC unit.
Since Angeline hasn’t invited me to join her at the chipped, gold-speckled Formica table, I don’t move from my spot next to the boxes and offering bowl.
“Rule Number One: Don’t speak unless spoken to. Got that?”
“Yes, ma’am.” Staying silent is easy, especially when I’m scared out of my gourd.
“Rule Number Tw
o: No touching. She might ask you for your hand, but you never reach first. Ever. That goes for looking, too, she don’t like for people to watch her. Ya hear?”
My head bobs. I will be a mute statue who sees nothing.
“And Rule Number Three: No guarantees on what gets told, so don’t go thinkin’ you can roll in here demanding answers. What gets said is the spirit’s choosing. And it could take five minutes”—the woman lifts a bony shoulder—“could take sixty, but you’ll know what you know when they want you to know it. Understand?”
Umm…
“Can she tell me if I’ve been cursed?”
Angeline rolls up her newspaper, giving it a hard whack on the table. She flicks away the squashed fly. “Girl, did any of Rule Three sink in that head of yours?”
I jump at the sudden scream of the kettle. Angeline rises, smirking at how easily spooked I was. “Well, go on, Wil Carlisle. Miss Laveau’s ready for you.”
Slowly I cross the room until I reach the curtain. My hand trembles as it clutches the soft velvet, and my heart hammers a Morse code warning me of imminent danger. I give my amethyst stone a squeeze.
Please don’t let this be a mistake.
Then I force myself over the threshold and to the other side.
I enter what looks to be a sparse living room made crowded by the curling wisps of burning incense. Votive candles in glass holders are on the floor along the perimeter. Stifling a cough, I immediately spot Miss Laveau in an upholstered rocking chair facing a barren wall. But I can’t really see her, only the top of her wiry black hair threaded with streaks of silver.
I remind myself I can trust this woman. After all, my mother wouldn’t have written her name in one of her books if she were some conjurer of evil. Those books were Mama’s bibles.
“Sit.” Miss Laveau’s deep voice slithers like smoke through the icy air.
I take wobbly steps to the lone chair, stationed at the back of her rocking chair, and dutifully sit, staring at the threadbare fabric smack in front of me. Then I can’t help staring at the top of her head, curious about the body attached to it.
“Child of Grace Carlisle, you’ve come for insight, just as your mother before you. Are you prepared today to receive it?”
“Y-yes, ma’am.” Even with the chilly air, I’m damp with nervous sweat.
And a strange hum begins. At first I think it’s the old AC unit, but soon discover it comes from Miss Laveau. Her head has tipped forward and she shakes something in her lap. A bunch of somethings. Whatever she’s holding makes a clicking sound like dice being shaken. The continuous hum in her throat joins the clicking in a mystical melody. The rhythm of her shaking speeds up faster and faster and her chair rattles and rocks in time.
My heart races as I slide to the edge of my chair, afraid to stay but more frightened to leave.
Then Miss Laveau freezes, and all sound and movement in the tiny room ceases instantly. Her weathered hand slowly stretches out from the chair and drops an object on the black cloth covering the table at her side. It tumbles across the surface.
Chewing my thumbnail, I lean in closer to see. A rune of some kind? It’s roughly the size of a domino and is etched with black markings—it must be a rune. The clairvoyant pauses, drawing her arm back to her lap. She then drops a second and, finally, a third tile on the cloth.
“Chaos,” she murmurs, without close inspection of the runes. “And temptation—I see two suitors.” A shiver runs the length of my spine at her prophetic accuracy. “But one brings suffering, devastation…you have been warned of this before.”
Startled, I draw a breath to speak.
“You needn’t answer, girl, I can feel its truth.” Her hand hovers above the ivory tiles, flat and still. “Love…trust…forgiveness…that is the crux of your solution. But fear warps your perceptions, child of Grace. If you ignore the voice—that wisdom inside you—then eventually it will stop speaking.”
My mind spins as I bite my nail, trying to piece together Miss Laveau’s perplexing reading. “So…the solution is…inside me? Is that what you’re telling me?” If so, then I’m totally screwed. “Wh-what about a hex? Do you see any of those? Any curses, I don’t know, plaguing me?”
The old woman bristles. “The only curse you have is the one you’ve placed upon your own head. Now give me your hand,” she demands. “The spirits will do the asking now.”
Not wanting to piss off Miss Laveau and the spirits more than I already have, I lean forward, stretching out my shaky hand.
The diviner’s chapped hand grips onto mine. I tense, squeezing my eyes shut, waiting for whatever happens next. Will there be voices in my head? A bolt of psychic lightning that will strike my third eye, causing it to flutter open? Oh my God, I haven’t even considered the possibility of soul invasion! How would I explain a soul possession to Gram and—
Miss Laveau’s body begins to shudder. She’s…laughing? She releases my hand and her alto laughter reverberates in the room. What the hell? The old psychic shakes her head. “You amuse the spirits, girl.”
“Peachy,” I grumble under my breath, my angst and fear now transformed into spiritual annoyance. Without a care for speaking out of turn, I ask, “Can you at the very least see the outcome?” Regardless of the metaphysical medium, there’s usually some sort of outcome. Please tell me fifty bucks would—at a minimum—buy me that.
She turns, although not enough to glimpse her face, and nudges the little table with the runes toward me. “See with your own eyes.”
I lean forward. “What about that one?” I point to the blank ivory tile on the left. “It doesn’t have anything on it. Is it turned over or something?”
“No,” Miss Laveau sighs, the air of humor dissipating. “That’s the symbol of the Fates, girl. A precursor to an end…or a beginning—a birth or possibly a death. It means the outcome is so fixed nothing can change the course of things to come. It is inevitable.”
My outcome is…inevitable? And involves possible death? Could there be a worse fortune? Obviously, this has to be a mistake! Some sort of astrophysical lines of communication that got crossed. Or misread.
Her wrinkled hand floats over the runes momentarily before pulling away. “You won’t wait long for your outcome. All will come to pass before the seventh month.” The psychic’s chair begins to softly creak with her rocking. “Go now. The spirits have said all they will say on this matter.”
“What? You must be kidding!” I exclaim. “But that can’t be it?”
Miss Laveau stops rocking and stiffens in her chair. The air charges with her displeasure, causing all the little hairs on the back of my neck to rise on end. Suddenly I’m recalling Angeline’s Rule Number Three, about knowing what I know when the spirits want me to know it. I was given three rules to follow, and I’ve broken two.
Somehow knowing that doesn’t make me any less pissed.
I snatch my purse from the floor and stand. But the good manners Gram’s instilled come involuntarily, whether I feel them or not. “Thank you, Miss Laveau.” For nothing. “You’ve given me a lot to think about.” Assuming I can make sense of any of it. “Goodbye.” To you and my cash.
I pass through the velvet curtain. Angeline doesn’t so much as glance up from her newspaper crossword, engrossed in her land of puzzles.
So I mumble my farewell and show myself the door.
Walking back out into the blistering heat of Dugan Street does little to distract me from the irritation brought on by the fruitless session with Miss Laveau. No. It’s the scuffle outside of Pinky’s Topless Bar that plunges me back to reality.
And I run. As fast as my high-heeled feet will carry me, believing the image ahead must be a mirage.
It isn’t.
It really is Grant. And he has the foul-mouthed creep who yelled at me earlier pinned against a brick wall.
The creep wheezes, lips stretched tight over his nicotine-stained teeth, scrabbling at Grant’s iron grip at his collar. “Let me…go…”
&n
bsp; “Stop!” I shriek. “What are you doing?” But Grant doesn’t respond.
“If I ever hear you talking like that to a girl again, you piece of shit,” Grant snarls, “I’ll knock every last tooth from your worthless head.”
My gaze catches on what I presume to be the girl in question, hurrying in the opposite direction much as I’d done.
Grant’s hold manages to tighten. “And I swear to God, that isn’t a threat…it’s a promise.”
The creep’s blotchy face bounces up and down. “N’kay.” His voice comes out a strangulated whisper.
“He hears you!” I grab Grant’s arm, attempting to pry him away. “Let go,” I say firmly when he doesn’t budge. Wedging myself between the pair, I place a hand on Grant’s flushed cheek, directing his wild stare to me. “Grant, you need to let him go now.” I shake my head. “He’s not worth it. Do you hear me? He’s not worth it.”
Somewhere my words must reach him, because Grant drops the guy and slowly backs away.
“Come on,” I say, slipping my hand in the crook of his elbow. He doesn’t resist as I pull us in the opposite direction. Tremors of rage continue rippling through him, making his skin hotter than the sidewalk.
“Are you okay?” My voice sounds foreign to my ears, almost as foreign as the boy beside me.
“Yeah, I just need a few minutes to…calm down.”
I start to let go of his arm. “Alone or…”
He stills my hand, holding it in place, making my adrenaline spike even more. “Stay with me?” It comes out more plea than question.
I nod. Already I’m breaking my decree against being alone with Grant. It lasted less than forty-eight hours. But how can I tell him no?
We walk two blocks without speaking. Grant inhales and blows out slow, steady breaths.
“Any better?” I ask, squinting up at him.
“Yeah.” He gently disengages me from his elbow. “Um, thanks for being my anchor. I don’t invite trouble, but disrespect is sort of a hot button. Always has been, but it got worse after A—” He clamps his mouth, and his jaw muscle twitches. “It just bothers me.”