I stood, swaying back and forth in the darkness. I felt the world move on its axis – I felt as if I had vertigo. The letter in my hands felt hot and sticky and my stomach, which had been deprived of real sustenance since the fire, suddenly filled again with the nausea of fear. How did this happen, I asked myself? Had I been so blind as to suspect that I had escaped the man in the black suit?
I remember when I was twelve and my mother brought me to see a psychic. It was right after my father had died in a car accident. He had been driving home after work and a lady with a kid ran a stoplight and t-boned him. None of them made it. The psychic was, apparently, to help us say one last goodbye. We had driven out of the city to find her – she lived in an old tenement building with red shutters and dark, broken-brick siding. My mother led me by the hand, clenching her fist into mine, the entire span of the parking lot. I hadn't wanted to go – I hated anything that had to do with the supernatural. The fact that someone could possibly see into my future other than me had seriously unnerved me.
We approached the door. A sign containing the words “Psychic Readings – Inquire Within” had been duck taped to the door. “This looks bad, Mom. This place is kind of scary,” I said, staring at the dirty carpets and water-stains covering the walls.
“Tina, i'm here. It will be fine,” my mother cooed, “You can sit in the waiting room if you want.”
I saw the room and had no intention of leaving my mother's side. It was a basic living room set – two floral upholstered couches, an uncomfortable looking loveseat, and a coffee table with an ashtray full of cigarettes. It was all of those things and more – it was disgusting. The walls were no better – some of the wallpaper looked as if it had been scratched off and there were, like the hallway walls, water marks scattered randomly throughout the room.
As we closed the front door, a woman, probably around forty years old, slipped out of a room in the corner of the living room. She wore a low cut, flowy polyester shirt and a pair of leggings – I thought that it was odd a psychic would wear such casual clothes. She smiled at us, her eyes wrinkling. “Welcome to my studio. I assume you are here for a reading?”
My mother and I stared at her, unable to speak for a moment. The woman's smile seemed to slide away as my mother finally blurted out “Yes, hello, my name is Madame Percy. I am a spirit whisperer.”
“Madame, yes. Well, I am Liesel ___ and this is my daughter Christina.” she said, pulling our arms up in a swing. The words left her lips cautiously, as if they were afraid to come out in open air. My mother never liked unfamiliar situations.
We followed her from living room into her study. I supposed this is where she did her divination. The lighting was dim and red, pulling a crimson blanket over the room. The walls were lined posters of unicorns, fairies, and dragons; I remembered that the weird girls at school loves all three of those things. Finally, we sat ata round, oak wood table in the middle of the room. The seats were uncomfortable folding chairs which, when I sat down, proved to be unstable.
Madame Percy sat down gracefully across from us, “Ready to begin?”
My mother looked over at me – my face read skeptically. “She can read cards too, you know – you can just do that and go into the other room if you don’t want to hear about Dad.”
I nodded slowly, peering over at the psychic’s pleasant face. “How the hell is she so happy?” I wondered, “She lives in a really crappy apartment.”
“I sure can, Christina. A simple one maybe?” She looked over at my mom who shot her a quick approving smile. Percy nodded, stood up, and walked over to an armoire near the back of the room. From the top drawer she pulled a deck of cards. They were longer than the playing cards I had seen and, as she walked back to the table, I saw little complex pictures on them.
“What I want you to do is pick a card. Any card in the deck. Just look them over.”
Percy handed me the cards. I turned the deck over and looked at the pictures – one by one. They all seemed to have a theme – they were either named cards, or pictures with various scenes of people using either a pentacle, a cup, a sword, or what looked like a big stick, but I think were wands.
I settled on a card called The Fool. I had seen a performance of As You Like It by Shakespear in my literature class and I loved Touchstone.
She smiled gently. “You like to jump off cliffs, don’t you?”
I didn’t understand. “You like new things. You will go where the wind takes you. You don’t hold back?”
I didn’t understand, then.
- - -
David fought them off; I wasn't entirely sure why there were more than one of them to begin with. How had the man in the black suit recruited people to do his dirty work? I grabbed my flashlight and turned it to face my friend and his attackers. They were all men in tattered clothing, with holes and patches as numerous as I had ever seen in the depths. They turned to me – my eyes darted to theirs. Shining brightly, reflecting the flashlight. I was scared, but this was the time where I knew I had to fight. It wasn't just me losing my life, it would also be David losing his.
I wrapped one on the head with my flashlight; the bulb shook for a moment, dying for only a moment before relighting. I moved backwards, flashing my light towards the man I had hit. He was grabbing his head where I had hit, a look of confusion washing over his face.
“Terra, help!”
David cried out, falling to the concrete floor. The men quickly overtook him and I rushed as they kicked his head and his stomach. I could hear the air escape from his lungs in large gasps. That was when I saw him, or his eyes. In the light, I saw them dark upwards to his attackers. As they focused, I could see a calm rise within them. David quickly ran his right hand down his leg, and with a flash, pulled out a serrated knife. I hadn't known he had it.
“Keep the light shining on them – keep it off me!” he yelled, brandishing the knife in front of his foes. They wavered and stepped back, groaning like monsters. David picked himself up off the ground, waving the knife in front of the men’s faces, “You get back, now,” he commanded.
I could still see the glassy eyes of the men, the mirror eyes reflecting the flashlight’s bright illumination. Slowly, they began to back away – it was clear they had expected us to be unarmed. I ran to David, keeping the light shining brightly on our enemies as I ran.
“Get back, you fucks. Get back and get away,” I warned as I reached him. I could see David only slightly in the darkness. His face was fearful – I felt his bravery but I felt his terror as well. I grabbed his free hand as he held the knife in his other.
David leaned over and pushed his face close to my ear, “In a minute we are going to run. Shut off the flashlight until I tell you to. Keep holding my hand – I know the path by heart.”
I was dreading the escape. There were rats and the ground wasn’t entirely level. I could feel the sweat pouring down my face. I had not been this scared since the man in the black suit had found me in my home. I stared at our attackers one last time. They were older, probably in their forties or fifties. They looked tired; their eyes baggy and limbs, while still strong, shook as if their entire body contained some unfulfilled desire.
David squeezed my hand. Under his breath I could hear him counting – “One, two, three!”
I flipped the switch on my flashlight and again we were in the darkest darkness.
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