Chapter Sixteen
Nic
I was really hoping our first random stop would involve an affordable-yet-chic sit-down restaurant with some manner of cheesy
appetizer. Alas, the timer gods have a different fate in store for us:
A tarot café. Inside, it mostly looks like an average café, though with decor that tends toward the modern witchy, crystals-and-houseplants
sort of spectrum. The real difference is with the staff: there are two baristas working the front counter, taking and preparing
orders from their very thin menu of coffee shop basics, but then there’s another pair of employees shuffling and laying out cards at the bar, and traveling table to table with a mat and deck of cards.
“I didn’t even know this place was here!” I say, taking the place in with wide eyes. “I’ve been up and down this street a
thousand times.”
“I’d say it’s probably new, because there’s alwayssomething new, but it sure looks like it’s been here a while,” Kira says, glancing both ways down the street like there might be some kind of explanation
lying around.
Regardless, it’s kind of the perfect stop. Willow has read tarot for me a few times before, but it’s generally not something
I vibe with. Right now, though, I clearly need outside input on my life. I’ve not been doing the best job of running it myself,
and I can’t trust what’s happening in my own head, so why not see what the cards have to say? Maybe it’ll shake something
loose.
Or maybe I’m just doing the same thing all over again: putting my life and fate in something other than myself. Letting someone
else tell me what to do.
I shove that little bit of unwanted insight back into the dark corner from whence it came and grab Kira by the elbow.
“Let’s go in,” I say. “The timer has decreed.”
We pull open the door and place orders at a front counter overflowing with houseplants and cracked geodes, then take a little
tarot card table marker to a small table next to the front window. Each table is hand-painted with a card from the Major Arcana,
and our table shows the Fool: a cheerful-looking figure with a dog at their heels, poised at the very edge of a cliff. A vining
plant in a decorative basket hangs over the table with three pink crystal pendants dangling from its edges by thin silver
chains, the light catching the facets in a hypnotic way. After a moment, a barista brings over an iced mocha for me, a London
fog for Kira, and two enormous, fluffy, flaky crescent moon croissants that we absolutely couldn’t resist. I already have
a giant bite half sticking out of my mouth when the barista asks a question.
“Would you like to reserve a tarot reading with your visit today?” they ask, tapping into a reservation system on a little
handheld card swiper tablet thing.
“Yes!” I say, then shoot a look at Kira. “For me, I mean. Do you want one too?”
Kira shrugs.
“Sure, why not?” she says. “Life is kind of a mess right now.”
“My thoughts exactly. We’ll take two,” I say, looking back up at the barista and their very cute nose ring.
“And how long would you like your reading to be?” they ask. “We book in fifteen-minute increments. We recommend a minimum
of fifteen minutes per detailed question you want to ask.”
“Just fifteen for me,” Kira says. “Nic?”
“Can we get two fifteen-minute blocks back-to-back?” I ask.
“No problem. Your reader will be over shortly,” the barista says, tapping a few things into the tablet, then smiling as they
depart. I look down and find my napkin in shreds and drop the tatters like they’re electrified.
“Ah, sorry, I made such a mess! I guess I’m nervous,” I say, sweeping the scraps into a little pile and shoving it under my
croissant plate.
“Why nervous?” Kira asks, tipping her head with a little smile. Something about that smile makes me flash back to the moment
just before she took my nipple between her lips the other day, and I look sharply down at the table, shoving a piece of croissant
in my mouth—a very large piece. Once I’ve dealt with the fallout of that decision via an awkward minute of vigorous chewing, I glance up with an apologetic grimace.
“I dunno. I guess my life is just such a disaster zone right now that I’m worried I’ll hear yet another thing that will crumble
some fundamental pillar of my existence. Maybe this was a bad idea.”
“Or, maybe you’ll hear just the thing you need to start rebuilding,” Kira adds, removing the bag of loose-leaf tea from her
weird tea latte thingy. “I’m very ambivalent about the whole tarot thing, but whenever Willow has pulled cards for me in the
past, I’ve always walked away with a new perspective and some insight I couldn’t have gotten to on my own. It’s a little like
therapy in that way.”
“You’re right, you’re right. When we walked in here, that’s exactly what I was thinking. I’m not sure my psyche can handle
any more insights, but I’ll stay open-minded.”
“I’m glad to hear that,” someone says just behind me, and I jump, whirling around.
“I’m so sorry!” the person says, holding up their hands. “Didn’t mean to eavesdrop. My name is Gabe, my pronouns are he/him,
and I’ll be your tarot reader today. Are you ready for me to join you?”
“Yes, please,” Kira says, scooting our mess of cups, plates, and napkins to the far side of the table as we introduce ourselves.
I scoot my now empty croissant plate over, immediately revealing a trail of shredded napkin, which I gather up once again
( on the plate this time).
Gabe sits in the third chair at our table and lays out a black cloth adorned with green embroidered botanical designs. Multiple
glittering silver rings pop against the dark skin of his hands, matched by a line of silver studs on the shell of his ear.
He peeks inside a small brown bag, then studies us both for a moment. It feels like he’s seeing straight into my brain...
but that could just be the flawless eyeliner effect, I suppose. After a few seconds, he nods and withdraws a box of cards
from the bag.
“Just trying to pick a deck,” he says, withdrawing the cards from the box and tossing them in an easy shuffle. “This one seems
right for you two. It’s a little modern for some folks, but I find it very gentle and relatable.”
“The box literally says ‘This Might Hurt’ on it,” I say, eyeing the deck with much skepticism.
Gabe chuckles, looking up at me through long lashes as he shuffles, hands perfectly sure in the motions.
“I know, I know, but trust me,” he says, “it’s a loving sort of hurt. More of a healing hurt, if that makes sense. Like how a cut stings when you first apply the medicine.”
“We’ll take your word for it,” Kira says, but even she looks wary now, arms folded and leaning slightly away from Gabe.
Abruptly, Gabe stops shuffling, cuts the deck into three piles, and reassembles the deck. With one last glance between us,
he lays out one row of three face-down cards at the top of the mat and another three at the bottom of the mat. His eyes flick
up and linger on my face briefly. Then he lays out one last card in between the two rows, linking them.
“I know you reserved two separate fifteen-minute readings, but it’s feeling right to me to give them some shared context.
Is that okay?”
Kira and I shrug at each other.
“Sure, why not?” I ask. “Is one row for me and one for Kira?”
Gabe nods, fingers hovering over the first card of the top row. “That’s my thought. This top row is Kira’s. Can we start here?”
We both nod, and I notice Kira’s hands dropping to her lap, twisting restlessly. I expect Gabe to flip over one card at a
time and go card by card, but he flips all three in quick succession, looking back and forth between them, reading the spread
as a whole.
The Eight of Swords. The Six of Swords. The Ace of Cups.
“Well, that’s wonderfully specific,” Gabe says, smiling down at the cards. “It’s nice when things are so clear and consistent.”
“Uh, if you say so,” Kira says with a grimace. “All I see are lots of very sharp knives. Well, and the hand of God holding
an overflowing teacup, I guess.”
“I got you, I got you, don’t worry!” Gabe says with a laugh. “But I’m gonna say something you aren’t gonna like, which is
that you’ll need to get out of your head for this reading and try to feel your way through.”
From the way Kira winces, that’s apparently a direct hit. Gabe continues.
“You are your own worst enemy. More specifically, your thoughts and ideas are your enemy. See the figure in this card? She
looks so stuck, right? What do you see that’s keeping her there?”
Gabe flips the card around for Kira to squint at.
“She’s all tied up and blindfolded,” Kira says. “And surrounded by a circle of swords or daggers or whatever, of course.”
“And yet she could be free any time she wants to be,” Gabe says, raising an eyebrow. “Look again.”
Kira shakes her head, clearly getting frustrated... and then her expression clears.
“Oh my god, her feet aren’t tied. And there’s a big gap in the sword circle right in front of her. She could just get up and
walk away.”
“Exactly,” Gabe says, gently setting the card back down in its place on the table. “The swords are the suit of thoughts, ideas,
and the voice. In this case, specifically the ways our inner voice keeps us trapped. You’re stuck, Kira. But it’s only you
keeping you there. You can get up and walk away at any point. And that’s exactly what this next card is encouraging you to
do.”
He taps the next card, which has a figure in a boat and six knives of varying shapes.
“You’re being called to leave something behind. Again, because this is a swords card, we’re talking about a way of thinking,
an idea, an intellectual pursuit, or something else of that nature. But there’s a level of physical movement in this card.
It’s not just changing your perspective or letting go of something intellectually, but actively leaving behind the structures
in your life that have been built up by those ideas. The figure in the boat is sailing out of choppy waters into a horizon
of calm, with a variety of new potential paths before them. But you have to be willing to cut your losses, leave your trauma
behind, and get your ass in the boat. And you can’t just shove your thoughts down and pretend they don’t exist either. That’s
a good way to get stabbed. Don’t fall for the sunk cost fallacy.”
He taps one more element on the card: the snake swimming right behind the boat. “And don’t be tempted to turn back, either.”
Kira’s hands are visibly shaking. She must notice me looking, because she quickly drops them into her lap and summons a weak
smile for Gabe.
“Please tell me the last card is a good one,” she begs.
Gabe shrugs. “I mean, I’d argue they’re all good ones. You have the power and agency in this situation. A new path is yours for the taking, if you can be brave enough
to make the hard calls. But yes—this last card has some potent new beginnings energy. If you’re willing to follow through
on the callings of the previous two cards, then a whole new emotional landscape opens up for you. Your cup runneth over, as
you can see. The aces contain all the essential energy of their suit—in this case, emotions and human connection, among other
things—and they often represent a new opportunity opening up before you. So you’re sailing out of the choppy waters of your
rigid thoughts and ideas, right into a new and brighter emotional landscape. And those things are indelibly connected. There’s
no getting the Ace of Cups, your shiny new outpouring of love and connection, without going through the Eight and Six of Swords. You gotta clear out some space before you can bring in something new.”
Kira sits back in her chair, lost in thought and looking exhausted. I don’t blame her. I’m emotionally exhausted just hearing
all that... and I haven’t even seen my own cards yet. As if hearing my thoughts— can he hear my thoughts?—Gabe turns to me with a gentle smile.
“Ready?” he asks.
I shake my head with a helpless laugh. “No, not really. But yes. Let’s do this.”
I squeeze my eyes shut for a moment as he flips my three cards, but a sharp inhale from Kira has them flying open again.
Lightning striking a lighthouse. A grim reaper figure on horseback. Anubis the jackal-headed Egyptian god holding scales as
souls float skyward in the background... laid out upside down.
The Tower. Death. Judgment reversed.
“Breathe and forget every preconceived notion you have about these symbols,” Gabe says, laying a hand gently beside mine without
touching it. “Hear what the cards have to say, okay?”
Gabe pauses for a moment, seemingly collecting his thoughts, his eyes flicking back and forth between the cards. Finally,
he nods.
“You have three major arcana cards here. That’s a lot of big-picture energy, life themes and grand patterns and such. The
Tower here is past, not future, so don’t panic. You’ve very recently been through a massive upheaval, the kind of event that
changes the context of your life in a very big way... and that event happened because you had a chance to change your old
patterns, but couldn’t—or wouldn’t. So, they were changed for you. Ultimately, that’s a good thing. The worst is behind you. You had your Tower moment. Now it’s time to figure out what to do next.”
He puts one finger on the card with the grim reaper and slides it up an inch from the rest, tapping it.
“The Death card isn’t literal. There’s no grim reaper hovering over your shoulder, waiting to take you or a loved one.” He
cocks his head, then adds: “Not that you should walk into traffic or anything. Important disclaimer: this is not carte blanche
to do something dangerous.”
“Oh, no,” I say, waving my hands in denial. “I’m more the overly cautious type. No danger of that here.”
“Yeah, I’m kinda seeing that,” he says with a wry grin, tapping the first two cards of my spread. “With this Death card, you’re
being called to pick up the pieces from your Tower moment and build something new. The old way of being, of doing, is dead.
It’s gone, and there’s no bringing it back.”
My throat goes tight, blocked by a sudden painful lump. It’s... true. And it hurts. And damn, that’s a blunt way of putting
it—but not a bad way. Sometimes, you need an outside perspective to tell it like it really is.
“I’m sorry if that’s hard to hear, but it’s what you need to accept to be able to move forward. The Death card is just as
much about new beginnings as it is about endings. Something is over, but with that comes the opportunity for change and growth,
a new direction. A total transformation, even. You’re entering a new phase of life, and that’s scary, but it’s also exciting.
Death calls you to purge toxic bullshit—which can include both things and people. Break out of your bad habits or patterns and look at yourself as a fertile garden ready for new growth.”
Wow. And... now I’m gonna cry? This is wild. This is the most intimate and intense interaction I’ve ever had with a stranger,
and that includes random one-night hookups. Gabe shoots me a small smile.
“Do you need a minute?” he asks. I take a long breath in through my nose, then shake my head.
“No, I’m good. I need this. What about the Judgment card?”
He picks up the card and flips it in one hand, seeming to study the artwork.
“This is another card that, on its surface, feels kinda doomy. Makes you think, ahh, I’m being judged! Again, it’s not that
literal or straightforward. Here, I think you’re being called to honestly and deeply learn from the experience you just went
through and live in alignment with your highest self. What does it mean for you to live according to your values? What would
your life be like if you allowed yourself to be the person you wished you were— truly —and held yourself accountable? You have a lot of soul-searching to do to find what that version of yourself looks like, and
this card showing up reversed feels a lot like blocked energy in that department. You need to do this sort of deep contemplation,
this sort of tough love look at your past, your reality, and the core of who you are, but something in you flinches away from
that.”
As if to confirm, I literally flinch away from him. This is brutal . I know I’m terrible at looking directly at myself, at my own behavior and all the ways I’m complicit in my own issues. But, exactly
as Gabe said, I don’t like to look at it. I don’t want to acknowledge it. I just want it to be someone else’s fault, something
outside of myself I can blame or rely on. But as the saying goes: wherever you go, there you are.
Fuck.
Gabe picks up his tablet, and I sit up with a start. Is he leaving already after dropping these bombshells? I’m about to ask
about the final card linking our spreads that he hasn’t flipped yet... but beneath his tablet are two more cards, face
down. How did he lay them there without me noticing?
“These cards are optional,” he says with a sheepish grin. “It’s completely fine if you don’t want to flip them. With these
cards, I asked for a warning for each of you. What’s something you could use a heads-up about? What awaits if you don’t change
course? That’s what’s here—a warning for each of you. Do you want me to flip them?”
“Yes,” Kira says immediately. She’s the brave one, after all, charging into her burning buildings.
“Yes,” I agree, not wanting to be shown up, but the quaver in my voice gives me away. Also, if I’m going to... you know,
live up to my highest self or whatever, I guess I need to know how I’m most likely to screw up.
Gabe nods and flips both cards without hesitation.
The Ten of Swords on top for Kira. The Three of Swords on the bottom for me.
“Oh goody, more swords,” Kira says with a groan.
“Hoo-yeah, and these are some good ones. You managed to get the two bloodiest cards in the deck. But we’re not talking literal
blood here or anything, promise.”
Gabe zeroes in on Kira first, tapping the Ten of Swords, which shows a figure lying in a puddle of their own blood with ten
swords sticking out of their back. Does not look like a good time.
“This card is a crisis point. It’s learning the lesson you’re called to learn in the hardest possible way. You could have
changed course but chose not to, doubling down on your rigid way of thinking instead. The only good thing about it is the
clearing clouds and rising sun in the background. There’s nowhere to go but up when you’ve got ten swords in your back, you
know? Everything will collapse one way or another. If you choose to stick it out as long as possible instead of burning things
down yourself, then this is the result.”
Gabe’s eyes slide over to me, and I slip down further in my seat, hands at the sides of my face, poised to cover my eyes.
“Rip the Band-Aid off,” I say, eyeing the card with trepidation. It shows a bloody goose falling out of the sky, its heart
pierced by three swords. “How bad is it?”
“I mean...” Gabe says, drawing out the word. “It’s pretty much the same as Kira’s. The Three of Swords is often called
the heartbreak card, but you’ve already been through your big heartbreak.”
He taps the first card in my spread, the crumbling lighthouse that’s literally on fire, with a sympathetic look.
“With this one, I’ll ask you to remember that the swords also represent your voice , the way you communicate your thoughts and ideas. You’re being cautioned to use your words carefully and in alignment with your highest self—” he taps
the Judgment card this time “—or else you’ll be breaking your own heart next time instead of having it broken for you. And
that’s no fun! Very avoidable! Remember, both of these are just warnings, not predictions. Nothing is set in stone. You have
free will, and your fate is always in your own hands. No card is ever a certainty.”
Finally, Gabe turns to the lone card still face down on the table, the one that links our two card spreads.
“Hey, let’s end on a good note, shall we?” he says, slipping his thumb under it, ready to flip.
Kira sucks in a breath and draws back, wary. “But how can you be sure there’s a good card under there?
Gabe shrugs.
“Eh, call it a vibe. But like I said before, they’re all good cards because they deliver something you need to hear. It just depends on the context and how you act on their messages.”
He cocks his head, then laughs. “Also, you’ve already gotten most of the worst cards in the deck! If this is the Ten of Wands,
I’ll eat my words.”
Before we can stall any further, Gabe flips the card with a swift, decisive motion. A brilliant smile blooms on his face.
It’s the Star. The card features a nude woman with one foot in the water and one leg kneeling on land. She holds a jug of
water in each hand, carefully pouring from both so one stream runs over the rocks and the other splashes into the pond. Eight
stars shine over her head.
“I love this card,” Gabe says, his look soft. “It’s so much more complicated than it first seems. The Star often gets simplified
to a single keyword: hope. And that is accurate in a very straightforward kind of way. But more specifically, it’s a card of rebuilding after trauma. When you line
up the major arcana in order, it’s the card that comes right after the Tower.”
He taps the Tower card again, his finger covering the tiny figure leaping out of the burning lighthouse.
“The Star is finding your way again. It’s regaining your equilibrium, regaining the balance between the emotional and the
practical that’s needed for healing. But it’s not a passive card. You can’t sit back and wait for things to work themselves
out. It takes a lot of active effort for the woman on the card to maintain her balance, to keep those streams of water hitting
right where they need to be. It takes focus and belief in yourself, enough inner strength to embrace hope, and a willingness
to adjust and let things go when they no longer serve. But if you’re willing to do the work, the energy of the Star is there
to meet you both halfway. Remember, this is a shared card. So, it’s not just that you’re receiving the same message, but that
this is a shared work. There is vulnerability in the aftermath of crisis, in hope, and in rebuilding. If you can care for
each other in that vulnerable state, build together instead of staying siloed, you can avoid constructing an exact replica
of your previous cage. You could balance each other. You could build something entirely new together .”
Silence reigns over the table as Gabe’s final words resonate between us. I glance up and catch Kira’s gaze, then look away
immediately, back down at the cards. It’s too intense, this moment, the intimacy of everything we’ve just shared. But as I
watch the cards disappear back into the deck one by one, I also feel a tiny flicker of that Star energy. A little hope. An
urge to rebuild.
I leave Gabe a larger tip than I can really afford. He deserves it.
I have a whole lot of thinking to do.
After having our souls plucked from our bodies and tacked up on the wall for all to see, Kira and I resolve to move on with
the evening as if none of it happened. We don’t actually say that, of course, but by unspoken agreement, we exit the tarot
café, set the timer for five minutes, and stop at the closest restaurant when the timer goes off. Then we go to the Vietnamese
place next to it instead, because thirty dollars a plate is not our speed.
But we don’t talk about the tarot reading.
The food is incredible, and the company is good, of course, but it’s like there’s a gray cloud over our heads the whole time.
It’s hard not to silently play Gabe’s words over and over as we eat, as we walk to Kira’s car, even as we arrive back at Kira
and Grace’s empty apartment and stand awkwardly in the living room, our keys nestled together on the low table just inside
the door. There’s a weird tension in the air that takes me a moment to identify.
I don’t want Kira to go. She’ll go to her bedroom, I’ll crash on the couch, and a taut thread of something will keep me awake with its insistent pull, I can already tell.
What we shared today was intense. We picked through every possession I’ve accumulated in my adult life and trashed most of
it. We walked the campus of my former university as I admitted my secrets. We had the depths of our psyches plumbed by a tarot
reader. A fantastic dinner, good conversation on the ride home...
And now, we’ve gone back to the same apartment... but not to continue that closeness. Not to cuddle and talk more over
a drink, which would lead us back into dangerous territory. Not to sleep together. Just... to separate and pretend the
other isn’t there. To let this little bubble of intimacy pop and sleep off the effects. That’s how it has to be for now, though.
I’m too much of a mess for anything else.
“Good night,” I make myself say.
My voice comes out rougher than I expect, but if Kira notices, she doesn’t mention it. All she says is:
“Good night, Nic.”