Written in the Stars

by Isobel Bird

  The woman turned and looked at her. “Come in,” she said, her voice like honey. “You are welcome in my house.”

  Annie entered the door of the cottage and stepped inside the room where the woman stood. Brigid beckoned her closer, and Annie went to stand beside her. Brigid turned and pointed into the cauldron. “Look inside,” she said.

  Annie bent and looked into the cauldron. It was filled with the brightest light she’d ever seen. It glowed with an intensity so fierce that she feared being burned by it, even though it gave off no heat and didn’t hurt her eyes. It seemed almost alive, rolling around on itself as if it was playing, or dancing.

  “Go ahead,” Brigid urged her. “Reach inside. Take some for yourself.”

  Annie looked into the goddess’s face. “I’m afraid,” she said.

  “Don’t fear it,” Brigid told her. “Be brave.”

  Annie looked again into the cauldron. She was afraid. But she also wanted to accept Brigid’s gift. Finally she reached out and tentatively lowered her hands toward the light, cupping them together. Still expecting to feel her skin burn, she plunged them into the flames.

  She wasn’t burned. Instead, she felt more alive than she’d ever felt before. The light clung to her, filling her cupped hands. She lifted them and saw it pooled in her fingers, still moving. She lifted her hands over her head and opened them, letting the light fall over her. She felt it trickle over her head and down her body. Where it touched her she felt tiny sparks on her skin, like she was being washed in electricity. It left her feeling excited and filled with the desire to do something, to dance, or to sing.

  Or paint, she thought suddenly. She looked around and saw that she was still sitting in her own circle. Her hands were over her head, and she was looking down at her little cauldron, where the candle still burned.

  It felt so real, she thought. For a minute she really had believed that she was in Brigid’s house. And maybe I was, she told herself. After all, she was working magic, and magic could do all kinds of things. That was the beauty of doing a ritual.

  Then she remembered her thought about painting. Where had that come from? Your resolution, she reminded herself. That was it. She had wanted to spend more time with her painting.

  She looked around and spied the painting sitting on the easel by the window. It was one she’d begun a few days before. She’d worked on it for a while and then left it, unsure of where it was going. It was unlike anything else she’d ever done—an abstract piece made up of different shades of red against a black background. When she’d started it, she’d just been playing around. There hadn’t been any particular image in her mind; she’d just been painting.

  But now she knew what it was she’d been working on. The red paint reminded her of the fire in Brigid’s cauldron, burning brightly against a black sky. Looking at it, she had an idea for how to finish it. And she also knew what she was going to do with it when it was done.

  CHAPTER 10

  On Friday night Cooper went to see Jane. Standing outside the Goldsteins’ door, she almost turned around and went home. All she could picture in her mind was the way Jane’s father had glared at her in the hospital. Would he be there, and would he look at her the same way this time?

  He’s just scared for his daughter, she told herself repeatedly as she knocked.

  Mrs. Goldstein opened the door. When she saw Cooper she smiled. “Thank you for coming by,” she said as she stepped aside and Cooper entered the house. Jane’s mother shut the door and turned to Cooper. “She came home this afternoon,” she said. “I know she’ll be happy to see a familiar face. I think she was getting tired of only being around her father and me.”

  “Is she in her room?” Cooper asked. She hadn’t seen any sign of Mr. Goldstein, and she wanted to avoid him if at all possible.

  Mrs. Goldstein nodded. “Go on in,” she said.

  Cooper walked down the hallway to Jane’s door. It was shut, so she knocked. When there was no answer she opened the door and looked in. Jane was propped up in bed, her head on the pillow and her eyes closed. Cooper thought she was asleep, and she started to shut the door again. But then Jane opened her eyes.

  “Oh, it’s you,” she said. “Come in.”

  Cooper went in and shut the door behind her. Jane sat up.

  “I was just pretending to be asleep,” she said. “My mother keeps coming in to see if I want anything, and it’s making me nuts.”

  Cooper laughed. “Good move,” she said, happy to see that Jane at least sounded like she was back to her old self. She handed Jane the bag she’d brought with her. “For you,” she said.

  Jane took the bag and raised an eyebrow. “Dare I look inside?” she asked. “It’s not a fuzzy pink teddy bear, is it? I’d have to be sick.”

  “You’ll just have to look,” said Cooper, pulling up a chair and sitting down.

  Jane opened the bag tentatively and peered inside. Then she reached in and pulled out some comic books. “Industrial Mermaid and Banshee,” she said approvingly. “Very cool.”

  “There’s more,” Cooper said, sending Jane back into the bag. This time she pulled out two CDs and several candy bars.

  “I figured everyone needs Patsy Cline, AC/DC, and chocolate when they’re laid up,” said Cooper.

  Jane looked at her, grinning. “You’re the best,” she said. “Thanks.”

  There was an awkward silence as the two of them looked away and didn’t speak. Jane put Cooper’s gifts to the side and sat with her hands on her lap, nervously rubbing her fingers together. Cooper pretended to be engrossed in pulling a stray thread from her shirt.

  “I’m sorry I freaked you out,” Jane said finally.

  Cooper stopped playing with the thread and rubbed her nose. “I’m sorry I told Annie and Kate about you,” she said.

  “And Sasha,” added Jane.

  “And Sasha,” echoed Cooper, rolling her eyes. “Man, do you ever hold a grudge.” She looked at Jane. “Did you do it because of me telling them?” she asked. It was the question that had been weighing on her mind ever since she’d heard that Jane had tried to kill herself.

  “No,” Jane said, and Cooper felt something in her chest release like a balloon being set free. “And to tell the truth, I wasn’t really trying to kill myself. I knew I didn’t take enough pills for that.”

  “Then what was it?” asked Cooper, not understanding.

  Jane sighed. “It was more like I wanted to kill myself, but I knew I would never do that, so I did the next best thing.”

  “To tell the truth,” said Cooper, “it did seem kind of unlike you. I mean, you’re one of the toughest people I know.”

  “Do you really think so?” Jane asked, sounding truly surprised to hear Cooper say that.

  Cooper nodded. “Definitely,” she said.

  “I don’t always feel that way,” Jane said. “I mean, I try to be. Sometimes I think I try too hard, you know? I keep people away because I don’t want to give them the chance to hurt me. When I let Max in, it was a big deal. Then when she . . . did what she did, I felt like a fool. I felt like I’d stood in front of the whole world and had my pants fall down. And worse,” she added. “Not only did my pants fall down, but I was wearing panties with little flowers on them.”

  Cooper couldn’t help but laugh. “You’re too much,” she said. “And I know what you mean. I felt like that when I said yes to going out with T.J. You don’t know how close I came to telling him I wouldn’t.”

  Jane nodded. “That’s how it was with Max,” she said. “And then, when she broke up with me, it was like every fear I’d ever had was confirmed. I told myself that I’d never let anyone do that again, even though, when I really think about it, I want someone to ask me out again.”

  “Someone will,” Cooper said. “Someone better than Max.”

  “Maybe,” Jane said. “Anyway, I just didn’t want to be here anymore. And then when you told me about telling the girls, all I could think about was that now everyone would be
talking about it.”

  “So it was because of me,” Cooper said, suddenly feeling terrible again.

  “No,” Jane said. “No, it really wasn’t. It was just that I’ve kept this to myself for so long, and suddenly it was out in the open. I couldn’t take it back. And that made me think about telling my parents and my sisters and—”

  She stopped, looking down at her hands. She sat that way for a minute, then resumed speaking. “Did you know that during the Holocaust the Nazis put gay people in the concentration camps?” she said.

  “No,” said Cooper. “I didn’t know that.”

  “Hitler believed that they were a threat to the pure race,” Jane continued. “He made them wear pink triangles on their clothes. If they were Jewish they had to wear the Star of David and the triangle, but the triangle was considered more shameful. No one really talks about that when they talk about the Holocaust. No one talks about their relatives who were killed because they had pink triangles on their clothes.”

  Jane had begun to cry. Tears slipped down her cheeks and fell quietly onto the bed. She didn’t make any move to wipe them away. “I kept thinking about that,” she said. “And it made me really sad.”

  Cooper moved to the bed. She put her arms around her friend. Jane hugged her back. “I didn’t know how to tell them,” she said, and Cooper knew that she was talking about her family.

  They sat that way for a while, Cooper rubbing Jane’s back while Jane let out her emotions. Then Jane sat back and wiped her eyes. “I knew they were coming back,” she said. “I knew they’d find me. I thought if they were worried about me it might make telling them easier.” She sniffed. “Pathetic, huh?”

  “No,” Cooper said, shaking her head. “Sometimes it’s easier to be a drama queen than it is to just talk. I know how that is.”

  Jane gave a half laugh, half sob. “You?” she said. “I can’t even imagine.”

  Cooper gave her a warning look. “Don’t start with me,” she said. “I’ll take those comic books right back.”

  There was a knock on the door and Mrs. Goldstein looked in. “Everything okay?” she asked. “Do you need anything?”

  “I’m fine,” Jane said. “Thanks.”

  “Okay,” her mother said. “You just call me if you want anything.”

  She shut the door. Jane sighed. “Well, I got their attention, all right. I think maybe I overdid it.”

  “I take it from your father’s reaction in the hospital that things did not go well,” said Cooper.

  “Not exactly,” Jane replied. “I’d say his reaction was somewhere in between the way he reacted when my sister totaled the car and when Bush was elected president.”

  “Yikes,” Cooper said. “That must have been tough.”

  Jane shrugged. “It was about what I expected,” she said. “My parents are your all-too-typical upper-middle-class liberals—they’re very open-minded when it comes to other people, but when it comes to their own families they don’t always cope well.”

  “How are they treating you?” asked Cooper.

  “Well, my father has gone off on another business trip,” answered Jane. “That’s his way of dealing with it. And my mother, as you can see, has become Nurse Jane Fuzzywuzzy. She’s resorting to the old Jewish standby of trying to fix everything with chicken soup. Which, by the way, she can’t make at all.”

  “And your sisters?” asked Cooper.

  “They haven’t told them, of course,” Jane told her. “I think they’re hoping that this was a onetime thing and now I’m over it.”

  “It was a onetime thing, wasn’t it?” Cooper asked, concerned.

  “Oh, the pill thing was,” said Jane, waving her hand at Cooper. “I’m talking about the whole lesbian thing.”

  “Ah,” Cooper said, understanding. “What do you think is going to happen there?”

  Jane shook her head and let out a puff of air. “Who can say?” she said. “Probably we won’t talk about it.”

  “Are you okay with that?” asked Cooper.

  “Yes and no,” answered Jane. “I don’t think I would want to talk to them about my personal life even if I was dating guys, so on that level I don’t care. But I do want them to know who I am. I don’t want to have to hide it from them. And I’m not going to. I’m still going to go to the center. I’m still going to have the same friends.”

  “What if they tell you you can’t go?” Cooper said.

  “They’re never here,” Jane said. “How will they know? Besides, I think they’ll calm down. My father just needed to blow off steam. I think he feels guilty about being away so much.”

  “What did your grandfather say?” Cooper asked. She hadn’t seen old Mr. Goldstein when she came in, and she wondered how he had reacted to his granddaughter’s hospitalization.

  “They told him that I had an allergic reaction to something I ate,” Jane said. “Of course they think he can’t handle the truth. I mean, the man was in a concentration camp for two years and survived, but they want to protect him. They don’t know him any more than they know me.”

  “I think there’s going to be a lot of talking going on around here in the next couple of weeks,” remarked Cooper thoughtfully.

  Jane groaned. “Please,” she said. “No more talking. I just want to go back to being little old antisocial me.”

  “I think you’re on your way,” Cooper joked. “So, does this mean our band is still on?”

  “Most definitely,” Jane said. “Are you kidding? With all of this new material to write about, I’ll be piling up songs left and right.”

  Cooper laughed. Then she cleared her throat. “I know we joke about a lot of things,” she said seriously. “But I want you to know that you really scared me there. And I also want you to know that you can talk to me about anything.” She cracked a smile. “And next time I won’t tell my friends about it.”

  Jane nodded. “I’m sorry I scared you,” she said. “And it’s okay about telling your friends. I think I’m glad that they know. And I know that I’m glad that I can talk to you. I haven’t had a real friend like you in a long, long time.”

  There was another knock on the door and Mrs. Goldstein looked in again. This time she was carrying a tray. “Dinner,” she said. “Chicken soup.”

  Jane and Cooper looked at each other and laughed. “I should go,” Cooper said. “But hey, we’re having a birthday party for Kate tomorrow. It’s at Annie’s house. If you feel up to it, we’d love to have you come.”

  Jane looked at her mother. “Is that okay?” she asked.

  Mrs. Goldstein put the tray on Jane’s desk. She looked at Cooper, and seemed to be thinking about something. Then she nodded. “I think that would be all right,” she said.

  “Great,” said Cooper cheerfully. “I’ll write down the address.”

  She got a piece of paper and a pen from Jane’s desk and wrote Annie’s address on it while Mrs. Goldstein arranged the tray with the soup on it on Jane’s lap. Cooper waved the paper at Jane. “Here it is,” she said. “The party starts at five. Don’t be late.”

  “I won’t,” Jane said, looking unhappily at the soup on her tray. “Will there be food?” she asked plaintively. “Good food?”

  Cooper tried hard not to laugh. “Piles of it,” she said. “See you tomorrow.”

  Jane waved and Cooper left the room, followed by Mrs. Goldstein. Jane’s mother walked her to the door, where she paused. “Can I ask you something?” she asked Cooper.

  “Sure,” Cooper said.

  “My daughter,” Mrs. Goldstein said uncomfortably. “Is she okay?”

  Cooper looked at the woman’s anxious face. She tried to imagine what it must be like to be in her position, dealing with something she really didn’t understand and being so afraid. Then she thought of her own mother, and how unhappy she seemed to be lately.

  “Yes,” she said. “Jane is okay. She’s a good person, Mrs. Goldstein. Maybe she’s a little different—and I don’t mean the gay thing, I mean just
in general. But she’s okay.” Cooper paused for a moment, thinking. “My mom would probably ask Jane the same question about me if she could,” she added.

  Cooper heard Mrs. Goldstein laugh for the first time. She sounded relieved, as if she’d been wanting to laugh for a long time. She put her hand to her forehead. “I worry about her so much,” she said. “Sometimes I feel like I’m looking at a stranger.”

  “She’s a great person,” said Cooper. “You should get to know her. I think you’d like her.”

  Jane’s mother looked at her, and for a moment Cooper wondered if she’d said too much. Then Mrs. Goldstein shook her head. “I think you’re right,” she said.

  “I’ll see Jane tomorrow,” Cooper said.

  She left the house and drove home. She was glad that she’d been able to talk to Jane, and that they were still friends. And she was glad that she’d been able to talk to Mrs. Goldstein. She seemed like a nice lady, and Cooper hoped that things between her and Jane worked out. As for Mr. Goldstein, he seemed like a bigger challenge. But she had no doubt that her friend would be up to dealing with him.

  She looked at her watch. It was almost eight o’clock. She was supposed to meet T.J. for a movie at nine, and she wanted to change first. She drove to her house and went inside. When she opened the front door, she heard the unmistakable sound of Joni Mitchell still playing on the stereo. Had her mother been playing the same CD over and over? Cooper walked into the living room to see.

  Her mother was on the couch, stretched out with one arm hanging over the edge. The glass she’d been drinking from sat on the floor beside her. Cooper surveyed the scene, a sick feeling growing inside of her. Part of her wanted to just go upstairs, change, and go out with T.J. She knew they would have a good time, and she knew it would make her forget about seeing her mother this way.