She should have been ecstatic that she was almost on her way; that the day had finally come. Instead, she was haunted by a sense of loss and uncertainty. Her friendship with Sarah and Jacqui had started to weaken the day she told them she was going to France. As kids, she and Jacqui and Sarah had thought they’d be best friends forever. Caitlyn would never have guessed that those bonds could break so quickly, as they chose their separate paths through life. After she had told them, they’d been surprised and then excited, but as the weeks went by and they’d gotten used to the idea, they seemed to lose interest in both Caitlyn and her plans. It was almost as if they saw no point in investing further effort in her, since she’d be gone soon, whereas they still had boys and classes to worry about.
Or maybe it was the other way around, Caitlyn admitted to herself. Maybe
she’d
lost interest in
them
, for the same reasons.
Were all relationships so fragile at their core?
Her relationship with her family seemed to be. As she’d predicted, as soon as her father had understood that the Fortune School tuition would be free, he’d seen no reason not to let her go.
Joy had wept and asked why Caitlyn hated her home so much, but eventually had admitted that the educational opportunity was too good to pass up. “I just want you to be happy,” she’d said, reproachfully, with the air of a martyr.
Caitlyn’s half brothers cared only that there would now be one more bedroom available in the house, and began fighting over who would get it.
It hurt a little to see everyone’s lives closing over the small hole that would be created when she left. They’d already started to move on.
But so had she, she realized. Part of her had already boarded the plane, flown over the pole, and landed in Europe. Spring Creek was no longer home.
But France was not
yet
home, either. She was in limbo, and it was eerily uncomfortable and disquieting. She was floating, untethered, between two lives. Caitlyn propped the tarot cart at the base of her bedside lamp and curled up on top of her bedcovers, trying not to think or feel. It was easier that way. Her eyelids gradually grew heavy, and between one moment and the next they drifted shut.
The jumbled images of half sleep crowded her mind, and then they, too, gave way, and she slipped gratefully into the dark vastness of sleep. Somewhere in that darkness a dream began to form: a light shone faintly in the distance, and she floated toward it.
It grew larger as she approached, and then resolved itself into a familiar lamp beside an unfamiliar couch. Beyond the furniture there was only a blurry beige blankness hinting at the walls of a living room, but without depth or detail.
I know that lamp
, Caitlyn thought, staring at it, puzzled. She’d seen it before … but where?
Your baby pictures
, her unconscious answered. She had a photo of herself as a baby, being held by her mother, with this lamp in the background. It had been in the house where she spent the first four years of her life, just a few blocks from where she lived now.
Behind her, she heard the shuffling of cards and then the soft
snick, snick, snick
of cards being laid upon a table.
The hairs rose on the back of Caitlyn’s neck, and she slowly turned.
Sitting in an easy chair, a TV tray in front of her, a young woman with hair as long, black, and straight as Caitlyn’s own was laying out tarot cards.
“M-m-mom?” Caitlyn whispered hoarsely, afraid to believe what she was seeing.
The woman looked up, her pale gray eyes gazing straight at Caitlyn. Her face was preternaturally still, no emotion showing. She looked like a wax figure.
“Mom? It’s me. Caitlyn.” She took a cautious step forward, waiting for her mother’s recognition, but afraid of that eerie stillness in her face. A small part of Caitlyn whispered in warning,
You’re dreaming, she’s dead, this isn’t real …
But the voice faded under the power of the dream, and Caitlyn no longer questioned why she was standing in the middle of an out-of-focus living room, talking to her dead mother.
Her mother blinked, a hint of life coming to her features. “I know who you are,” she said, her voice quiet, but with an underlying tension. Then her mouth crooked in a hint of a smile, and with a slightly shaking hand she shoved a loose lock of hair behind her ear. “I can certainly recognize my own daughter. You’ve grown into an attractive young woman.”
“I look like you,” Caitlyn said in mild wonder. She’d known from photos that there were differences in their faces and eye coloring, but in person, the set of her mother’s shoulders and the way she held her head were echoes of Caitlyn’s own posture, reinforcing their resemblance. It was like looking into a distorted mirror, watching another version of yourself moving and talking.
Her mother nodded. “You’re your mother’s daughter. In more ways than one, I think.”
Caitlyn looked at her curiously. “What do you mean?”
Her mother’s lips twitched, and she shook her head. “If you don’t know by now, you’ll know soon enough.”
Caitlyn frowned, thinking about the hints of depression they might both share. “Do you mean the heart in darkness?”
A flicker of surprise raised her mother’s brows. “Do I?”
“I don’t know.”
Her mother laughed, the sound more anxious than cheery. “Then that makes two of us, for the moment at least. No, I thought I meant something else… .”
Caitlyn shook her head, not following. “I don’t know in what other ways we are the same. I don’t predict the future, like you.”
“What
do
you do?”
Caitlyn shrugged, feeling her failure to excel in any particular area. “I draw a lot.”
“Mmm.” Her mother looked at her expectantly. “But what do you do that’s more … unusual?”
“Nothing, really,” she said, feeling that the answer was inadequate, and suddenly fearing that she was a disappointment to her mother. “Well, except that I have strange dreams, but Dad gets upset if I talk about them.”
Her mother rolled her eyes. “He’s never been accepting of things outside his understanding. I mistook that for moral strength when I married him. It’s strange how you can love someone and not be right for him. You’ll figure that out for yourself someday.” She sighed. “Too bad I couldn’t figure it out for myself in time. But then, I never was any good at predicting my own future, only that of others.”
“Is that what you’re doing?” Caitlyn asked, pointing to the tarot cards and coming closer. She wanted to reach out and touch her mother, but something in the situation held her back. It was her mother’s nonchalance, perhaps, or that hint of knowing wryness in her gaze. She offered Caitlyn no welcoming warmth.
“Yes, I’m fortune-telling.”
“Dad won’t let me buy a set of tarot cards. He says they’re evil.”
Her mother laughed again. “They’re just pieces of paper and ink. The pictures help me give form to the future that I already know. The cards have no power of their own. But I see the future through many methods, not just the cards.” She gave Caitlyn a sly look and set down the deck. “Tell me where life has taken you, Caitlyn.”
“You don’t know?”
Her mother shrugged one shoulder. “In some ways, I do. But I’d rather hear it from you.”
“Oh. Well … Life hasn’t really taken me anywhere, so far. But tomorrow I’m going to France. To boarding school.”
Her mother’s eyes opened wide. “
Really?
I didn’t see
that
coming.” She was silent a moment, as if unable to process the information, and then quirked a doubtful brow. “Really? France?”
Caitlyn nodded.
“I’ve always wanted to go to France,” her mother mused. “But boarding school?”
“It’s called the Fortune School. It’s named after the castle that houses it, Château de la Fortune.”
Her mother tilted her head, her gaze questioning. “You’re happy about going?”
Caitlyn nodded. “Yes. A little scared, too,” she admitted. “It has to be better than Spring Creek, though, doesn’t it?” she asked hopefully.
Her mother’s laugh was bitter. “It wouldn’t take much, would it?”
Caitlyn chuckled, feeling a bond of like minds. She reached down to the TV tray and ran her fingertips over the cards that had been laid out, feeling curious and shy. “Could you do a reading for me?” she asked tentatively.
In answer, her mother gathered all the cards together and started to shuffle. Caitlyn inched over to her mother’s side and perched with one hip on the arm of the easy chair, watching her manipulate the cards with practiced hands. And then, suddenly, everything began to fade into transparency. A dark blankness began to show through the scene, and a flush of panic went through Caitlyn.
No, stay!
her soul cried.
Stay with Mom!
The scene solidified again, and Caitlyn found her mother staring at her, a fresh wariness in her eyes. She held the deck of cards out to Caitlyn. “Lay your hand atop it.”
Caitlyn obeyed, and after a moment her mother took the deck back and started to lay out cards, facedown. When she was finished, she set the deck aside and closed her eyes for a long moment, breathing deeply. She opened her eyes, glanced up at Caitlyn, and then turned over the first card. “This card represents you, and the primary force working upon you.”
It was the Nine of Swords. A woman sat up in bed, her face in her hands as if she’d been woken from sleep by an unutterable grief. On the black wall behind her were nine immense swords. “That doesn’t look good,” Caitlyn said doubtfully.
“Mm. Not good. Not necessarily bad. The cards have no set meaning; it changes based on what I feel in here,” her mother said, holding her hand over her heart, “and what
you
feel in
there
.” She reached out, her fingertips hovering an inch above Caitlyn’s own heart. “You tell me: What do
you
think the card means?”
“The Screechers,” Caitlyn said, the word coming out of its own volition.
Her mother raised a brow in question.
Caitlyn grimaced, embarrassed, obscurely afraid that her mother would think less of her. “It’s what I call the nightmares I have.”
“Those nightmares are important. Pay attention to them,” her mother said pointedly.
Caitlyn frowned and bit her lip. Thinking about the Screechers made her tense and fearful. She’d rather forget them as soon as she woke and pretend they didn’t exist.
“These next two cards are the people coming into your life.” She turned the first one over: the Queen of Swords. A stern-looking woman with a crown of butterflies sat on a throne, holding a sword. “This is a woman of cold, efficient intelligence. She can help you, but if you cross her, she will cut you down without a second thought.” Her eyes narrowed. “Be careful around her. She is seeking something. A heart that she does not have.”
“Great,” Caitlyn muttered.
Her mother flipped over the next card. “Maybe this is more to your liking?”
It was the Knight of Cups. An armored knight sitting astride a horse held up a golden goblet, a smile touching his lips. There were wings atop his helmet and on the heels of his feet, and his surcoat was patterned with water and fish. “A guy?” Caitlyn asked hopefully.
Her mother gave her a mischievous, knowing look. “A guy. A young man of imagination and emotion, who offers love.”
Caitlyn grinned. “Yes!”
Her mother smiled, then pointed to the next three cards. “The upcoming situation, the near future.” She turned them all over: the Three of Swords showed a red heart pierced by three swords, with storming rain in the background; the Fool depicted a young man with his eyes on the sky, about to step off the edge of a cliff and into an abyss; and finally, a skeleton in black armor rode a white horse, with the body of a king beneath the horse’s hooves: Death.
Caitlyn squeaked in dismay.
“It’s not quite as bad as it looks.”
“What do you mean that’s not as bad as it looks?” Caitlyn cried. “How could it be any worse? It ends in
death
!”
“It’s not always literal. There are figurative deaths as well. But we have to look at the three cards together.” Caitlyn’s mother laid her hands over the cards and closed her eyes. When she opened them again, her pupils had dilated, giving her a look of blindness. Her face had gone slack. It was as if no one was inside her body. Or as if something
else
had entered it. Caitlyn shivered.
Her mother pointed to the heart struck through by three swords. “They seek to destroy the heart,” she intoned, “but you must not let them.” She pointed to the Fool, the young man about to step into the abyss. “The abyss waits for you. You stand upon its edge. To survive its depths, you must fully awaken to what is happening.” Her hand moved to Death. “Death is the force that will create your new life. It is the mechanism of transformation. Welcome it.”
“I
won’t
welcome it,” Caitlyn protested. “When has death ever done anything good for me?”