"You feel like an ugly duckling and you’re not sure you want to be seen with other ugly ducklings. Right?"
Dawn blushed and couldn’t look Candace in the eye. Boy, did she sound shallow when Candace put it like that. "Not exactly. It’s just that I usually try to hide being psychic. It makes people uncomfortable. It’ll be harder to hide if I’m out there exploring it with other psychics."
"You need to find people you can connect with and who will respect your vibes. If your family is anything like mine, they don’t want to hear about your feelings. Right?" Candace asked.
"Well, yeah."
"When you get a feeling, you’re probably always trying to talk yourself out of it because that’s what your parents want you to do. You doubt yourself. Your mind gets muddled because your intuition says to act on your premonition, and your common sense tells you something else."
Dawn’s pulse fluttered in her wrist. Candace had expressed her own feelings, exactly. What would it be like to get help? Real help? To be herself with no pretending. No lies.
"Serina can make you a swan," Candace said.
Dawn drummed her fingers against the bleacher seat. Candace observed her with a knowing smile. She thinks I’ll say yes. Even though the other kids mocked her, Candace oozed with confidence. If Dawn hung out in her world, maybe Candace’s spunk would rub off on her. It would be a relief not to care what other people thought.
She gulped, pushing aside a stab of fear. "I'll go. Just this once."
Chapter Five
D
awn dug her fingernails into the seatbelt as Candace drove through Covington Center. Maybe she should forget the whole thing. What if she wasn’t good enough for Serina? What if Candace and her friends were into weird stuff? Dawn eyed a pewter dragon dangling from the rearview mirror. Bells tinkled on its curved serpentine tail at every stop light and turn.
Who the heck attached dragons to their mirrors? No one Dawn knew, that was for sure.
"What’s up?" Candace asked.
"I was just noticing how neat your car is," Dawn said. She wasn’t lying, exactly. The Chevy’s spotless interior had surprised her, after riding in Ken’s mess on wheels.
"I have to be neat or my psychic abilities go on the fritz. Organization unclogs the drains in your life. Serina says you need outside order to support inner order."
"Really?" Dawn thought of all the storage baskets and shelves in her bedroom. Had she been acting out that principle subconsciously?
As Candace parked in a driveway, Dawn gaped out the window at the cream cottage she had seen the first day of school. The cottage had spoken to her, sending out warning vibrations. She shouldn’t go in there. She really shouldn’t.
Dawn regretted texting her mother that she was staying for extra help. No one knew who she was with, or where she was.
"This is where Serina lives?" she blurted out.
"Yeah. Why?"
"It gave me bad vibes the first time I passed it."
Candace shrugged. "I wouldn’t worry. You could have been picking up vibrations from the last people who lived here. It could’ve been from Serina, too. She’s had a tough life and sometimes bad memories linger. When you have abilities like ours, it’s easy to jump to conclusions. Serina can teach you to look deeper."
Reluctantly, Dawn closed her car door. Veined yellow leaves stormed down from the birches, gliding across the grass. The wind, the ocean, the smell of salt water, everything seemed magnified.
They trudged up the stone walkway and mounted the porch steps. Dawn examined the hand-painted sign she’d missed from the road: "Psychic Readings Here. Call 555-3990 for appointment."
Candace pressed the doorbell. Shaking off her fears, Dawn pulled a lavender brochure out of a basket on a wicker end table. She skimmed the headings. Serina did tarot, palm readings, meditation sessions and past life regressions.
The door swung open and Dawn blinked at the lanky girl in front of her. She reminded Dawn of a scarecrow, skinny arms and legs hanging out of her clothes.
The girl adjusted her baggy sweater, the fabric slipping down her shoulder. Acne blotches reddened her chin and oily brown hair straggled from a rubber band at the top of her head. "Hi, I'm Jamie. Come on in."
Dawn stepped into a narrow foyer, sniffing the sweet scent of burning incense. A strange sensation overcame her, as if a powerful presence inhabited this house. Dawn grasped the banister, reeling from the impact of whatever invisible force sheathed the air. She gauged how the sensation made her feel. Uncomfortable and a little sad.
Shadows distorted her reflection in a mirror beside the staircase, hollowing her cheeks into skeletal thinness. Tongues of candlelight quivered from the branches of a silver candelabra. Venetian blinds caged the sliding glass door in the adjoining kitchen and shut out the ocean view.
Jamie gestured into the next room with bitten-down fingernails. "We were about to have tea."
Candace pushed aside sheer white curtains and led Dawn into a windowless room. Rainforest sounds backed by classical music played from a stereo.
"This is where Serina meets with clients." Candace nodded at a round table and wicker chairs. Flickering pillar candles towered over astrological charts and a deck of tarot cards draped in black silk.
Dawn checked out the rest of the room. Framed paintings of unicorns, gods and goddesses adorned the walls, their colors dark. Terra cotta ceramic pots, stone bowls and brass kettles lined a bookcase.
"You must be Dawn." The quiet voice came out of nowhere.
Dawn spun back to the curtain. Right away, she sensed that the woman before her perceived things that most people didn’t. Her green and gold flecked eyes knew no limits. White blonde hair cascaded down to her slim waist, straight until curling at the tips. An emerald pendant gleamed around her neck, setting off her burgundy dress. Topaz earrings sparkled in the shadowed light.
She was in her early forties, perhaps. Not a wrinkle lined her smooth face and fragrant perfume engulfed her, smelling of roses.
"Hello, Dawn. Pleasure to meet you. I'm Serina." She held out her hand. Her grip felt soft, but firm.
"I don't know why I'm nervous," Dawn said.
"Don't be. Would you like a cupcake and tea?" Serina waved toward a tray on a small bamboo coffee table. Beside the tray, a miniature fountain gurgled over a bed of smooth pebbles.
Relieved she had a task to occupy her hands, Dawn poured steaming water into a mug, dropped in a mint teabag and added a spoonful of honey. She chose a chocolate frosted cupcake with sprinkles, homemade although Serina didn't seem the Betty Crocker type.
"Why don't you sit down," Serina suggested.
Dawn perched onto the oddest loveseat she had ever seen. Since it had no back, the seat rested against the cool blue wall. Jamie sat cross-legged beside her on a plush cushion. Candace sprawled across a geometric-patterned throw rug and flipped through a hardcover book about meditation.
"Tell us how you first knew you had this gift," Serina said, still standing near the doorway.
Gift? Was it really? Dawn licked her lips. Jamie nodded, encouraging her.
Leave. Leave now. As the words thundered in her head, Dawn fought the overwhelming urge to run. She had promised herself she would give Serina a chance.
"When I was around seven and a half," Dawn said. "I remember waking from a nightmare, sweaty and crying. I asked my mother why there was a fire in the sky and people were screaming. The next morning, we heard 150 people had died in a plane crash."
Jamie's hazel eyes widened. "What did your mom say?"
"To ignore it and never tell anybody. Later, when I started picking up people's thoughts, she told me I had to stop. But I couldn't. Sometimes, I think my mother’s afraid of me. Other times, she just seems embarrassed." Dawn wished she could take the words back. Why was she sharing personal things with strangers? This wasn’t like her.
Serina lowered herself into a chair that resembled the loveseat, except half the size, and cradled a teacup between her fingertips. "She was right to teach you about being discreet. We live in a society that doesn't trust anything but scientific evidence. Those with psychic abilities are met with superstition, ridicule and cynicism. It’s best to save your advice for those who are open. But if your mother makes you feel ashamed of who you are, then that’s a different story. Is that how you feel?"
You don’t have to answer that, Dawn’s inner voice said. Stop revealing so much to these people. She brushed a few crumbs off her lips, resisting the temptation to reach for a second cupcake. It was just canned frosting, but Dawn longed for more of its delicious sweetness. Her mom hardly ever baked, except for holidays.
Dawn ignored her instincts again, craving Serina’s advice as much as she desired another cupcake. "Yeah, kind of."
"Here’s my advice," Serina said. "Stop caring what your mother thinks. If your abilities make her uncomfortable, don’t discuss them with her. You don’t need her approval or her input. It only gets in the way and makes you unsure. You keep hearing her voice instead of your own."
Dawn rested her teacup onto a saucer. "You really think so?"
"I know because I've been there. I've had my perception since I was a child, too. My father would hit me and say the devil was speaking to me. He thought if he punished me enough, I'd stop getting visions and hearing voices. But as you know, it's not that easy."
"He hit you? That's horrible. My mother would never do that."
"But she’s hurting you in a different way," Serina said. "It's hard when your loved ones want you to be someone else. You must be talented for your abilities to have stuck with you. Everyone has the aptitude for some level of psychic skill, but intuition isn’t nurtured in most families. Children get bad vibes about a person, and their parents tell them to be quiet and stop acting rude. Eventually, most children tune out those thoughts. By the time they get to school, their abilities are gone. Like unused muscles, they weaken."
Serina’s brow puckered. "You’ll hear absurd rumors about me, Dawn. That I put curses on people. That I worship Satan. Yet I have a steady clientele. Some of my customers don’t care what people think, but others do phone consultations as they don’t want to be seen here. It makes no sense to me why people interested in the sixth sense are scorned or feared. Why would you ignore a flashlight and stumble around in the dark? But unfortunately, the majority of the world is not open-minded."
Candace rolled over on the floor to face Dawn. "I thought my parents would be proud of my abilities. They always knew I could sense things, but a few years ago, I started reading about it, and gave them a scientific explanation. We all have five physical senses and four psychic ones: hearing, visual, feeling and intuitive. I get a lot of visions and intuitions."
Dawn tingled all over with nervous excitement. She’d found people who understood, and even valued, what was happening to her. As strange as this house made her feel, in some weird way it was like coming home. "How did your parents react?"
"My mother told me to stop talking weird, and walked out of the room. It wasn't something she could brag about to her country club friends, so she didn't want to hear it. I didn't expect much from her, but my dad's a doctor. I figured he'd have me tested, but he said he doesn't believe in the paranormal, that it was all coincidence."
"Do your parents know you come here?"
A spasm of irritation flitted across Candace’s face. "They don’t ask where I go. They’re too obsessed with my older sister. She can do no wrong."
Serina smiled. "Your sister doesn't have what you do. Your gift will bring you such rewards, and has a value that your sister can't comprehend." She regarded Dawn. "When Candace first came to me, she felt much as you do, that something was wrong. But it's quite the opposite. You're meant to use this talent, and with the proper training, you'll feel much more confident."
"What kind of training?" Dawn asked.
"Getting centered, so you control when these feelings come over you," Serina said. "We play games to build our abilities. I often equate it to music. Everyone can strike keys on the piano, and with lessons, they’ll learn to play a tune. Of course, only a small portion will have the talent to become concert pianists. It’s the same with psychic abilities. You will progress, and in time we’ll find out how much."
"It's like practicing for a sport," Candace said.
Serina nodded agreement. "Exactly. I've asked Candace and Jamie to bring in something personal tomorrow. It can be a ring, a photograph, anything. They were instructed to bring it concealed in a bag and to give it to me privately. I'll hide the objects in a box, then they'll guess what each other’s items are. You're welcome to join us."
"I don’t think…" Dawn faltered for an excuse. It wouldn’t hurt to come back and get a better idea of what the group did. But maybe she didn’t belong, even here. "I
am
curious. But I’m afraid you’re all a lot better at this than me. I must be doing it wrong. I mean, a lot of times when I have a feeling, I can’t do anything about it."
"Give me an example," Serina said.
"I knew that boy at school, Scott, was going to get run over. And there was also Mrs. Frazier, this nice lady who lived in my apartment building." Dawn flinched as the image of cracked horn-rimmed glasses and a lifeless body flashed into her mind. "With Mrs. Frazier, I had this strong urge to call 911. I dragged my mother next door. We had a key and found Mrs. Frazier unconscious. She’d had a heart attack."