CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO Mike
Our eighteenth birthdays were here before we knew it. Coop was excited because he said he felt like a legal adult and everything. I felt old. This was my eighteenth and my twenty-eighth. How to broach that subject?
“You fucking look amazing, Hill,” I joked, studying my reflection in the mirror. Still not a single wrinkle. I noticed facial hair for the first time. Officially the second time, but I couldn’t remember the first.
A knock startled me and I jumped away from my bedroom door.
“Michael, are you up, honey?”
I pulled the door open. “Hello, Mom,” I said, bowing and motioning for her to come in.
She rolled her eyes at me good humoredly.
“I’m glad someone’s happy,” she said before scowling at the dirty clothes thrown about my room.
“You’re eighteen, honey. Could you please pick up after yourself?
” I had bad news for her. I was a decade older than that.
Still hadn’t learned. Doubt I ever would.
I pulled her in for a hug. “What has you all up in arms so early?”
Mom had gotten used to and seemed to love how affectionate I’d become. I was her son. I loved her and I wanted to show her. “I have a mile-long list of things that I have to do before the party,” she said. “I’m falling behind and Druzella just called.”
“What did Madame Druzella want?” I asked, speaking eerily and haunting.
“Why do you insist on calling her that?” she asked, fussing a hand at me.
I wanted to remind her that she had spoken of Druzella long before I’d met her. Or was that long after now? But of course I couldn’t mention that.
“She seems like a madame to me. Very mystical woman, Mom.”
“She’s wise, Michael. Trust me, she knows stuff that hasn’t even happened.”
“I bet she does,” I agreed. Boy did she.
“Honestly, I don’t know why I waste my breath with you.” She began gathering the armful of dirty clothes and ceremoniously dumping them into the hamper in my bathroom. “You’re just like your father. You both think I’m crazy.”
“Aww, come on, Mom. I don’t think you’re crazy. I know you’re crazy.”
She ignored me and pointed at the bathroom. “And clean that bathroom.”
“Why you bustin’ my balls today?”
“And enough with your language,” she snapped, looking around the room. “Now why did I come up here?”
“You’re unhappy. You came up to spread good cheer,” I quipped. “Mission accomplished.”
“Oh yeah,” she began. “Charla and I are going to Hennessy’s bakery in Shelley.”
“You’re going that far for a cake?”
“It’s only 10 miles and they have your boys’ favorite cake. Then we’re going grocery shopping afterward.”
“I’m hearing that you need something from me,” I said. “I’m off today so I won’t be going into the store.”
“Druzella is stopping by at one for a reading. I might be late.”
Yikes. That wasn’t what I’d expected. “Can’t you be back by one?” I asked. “No offense, Mom, but she kinda creeps me out.”
“Just be here,” she stated. “And answer the door, Michael. No loud music either.”
“Moooommmm,” I complained, getting pretty good at remembering what a brat I used to be and scarily slipping right back into my teenage self.
Mom walked out of my room and headed down the stairs. “I mean it, young man!” she yelled.
Perhaps Druzella’s visit wasn’t so bad after all. I had more questions and she’d been full of advice when I last saw her. Even if some of it was delivered with a warning.
* * *
I’d forgotten Druzella was coming until I heard the doorbell ring. I tugged on a tank top and flew down the stairs, answering the door just as it rang a second time.
“Hello,” Druzella said, standing on our front porch in an outfit that could best be described as circus big-tent-esque attire.
She wore a tunic in loud colors with a horizontal striped pattern from neck to knees.
Bright orange leggings were visible from the knees down matched the gumball sized earrings that almost touched her shoulders.
“Mom’s not home yet,” I immediately reported, hoping she understood the underlying suggestion to stay in her purple clown car.
“Good,” she stated before walking past me like she owned the joint. “We need to talk and I’ll need you to get me my green tea first,” she added, walking toward the kitchen. “Oh, never mind. I’ll get the tea,” she said over her shoulder. “I know where Kathleen keeps it.”
“Help yourself.”
“Any idea when your mother will be back?” she asked.
“Nope. She’s been gone about ninety minutes, so maybe another thirty or so,” I explained.
“I’ll microwave the water to save time,” she said, then pointed at the table. “Sit. I have many questions.”
Druzella somehow knew where the mugs, the tea, and the sugar were located. She hastily moved around the kitchen like she’d been here many times before. Strange thing was that I didn’t recall meeting her before last week.
“I’m not into Mom’s sort of stuff,” I said. “You know, the astronomy stuff.”
“Astrology,” she corrected. “So time travel, parallel universes, and rips in time stuff, those are more your thing?”
“Hardly,” I replied, leaning against the island while I watched her. “Don’t blame me for Mom and your handiwork.”
“Not me,” she argued, tossing a tea bag into her nuked water. “That was all Kathleen.”
She pointed toward the table again. “Hurry and sit.”
I begrudgingly sat across from her and watched her pull out spirit toys or whatever one called the baubles and cards. She looked up after arranging her tools of the trade between us, a serious look on her face. “So, when exactly did you arrive?”
“That’s a tough one if you’re talking about what I think you’re talking about.”
“Cut the shit, kid.”
“Jesus, lady,” I huffed. “You’re the so-called expert ain’t ya?”
“Like I told you, I didn’t do whatever this is,” she replied, waving her hands around while gesturing toward me. “Dates,” she insisted. “Give me dates.”
“So, you’re buying my story?” I asked. “No questions asked?”
“Trust me, I’ve got questions, but I don’t need convincing that you’re a visitor to this realm. I knew that the moment I held your hand last week.”
I stood and crossed the open space to the front window to check if Mom was home.
“You didn’t hear this from me,” I began before returning to the table.
I leaned forward and lowered my voice hoping the crazy I was about to drop on her wouldn’t get me committed.
“I left this same house on September 7, 2023, and woke up in my bedroom upstairs on June 13, 2013, three and half weeks ago.”
“No shit?” she asked. Not the reply I’d expected. “How’d she do it?”
“With your help I was told.”
Druzella leaned back in her chair and stared into space for what seemed an hour but was maybe three minutes tops. “Was September an important date?”
“No, August 30th was the important date for Mom, but the ritual or whatever, had to take place seven days after according to both you and Mom,” I explained. “You know,” I whispered. “Mom and her illness.”
Druzella went white and clutched at her odd necklace that she was wearing the first night I met her. “No . . . oh no, no, no, no, no,” she moaned in shock. “I can’t believe this and I haven’t seen any signs of her illness in my visions. And of course you’re sure because you were there.”
I nodded.
“So she sent you back to warn her? Try to save her life?”
“Not exactly,” I said.
Druzella let go of her necklace and spread her tarot cards out, breathing loudly and wincing when she touched a card.
I watched intently as she mumbled and reacted to certain cards until she held one up for me to see.
“Who else died on August 30th? Your father? A relative? There’s a third loved one coming through,” she began before dropping the black card suddenly and lowering her voice to a tone that seemed otherworldly, which honesty was how she seemed to me from the jump.
“The trinity is dead,” she stated. “And what about the jewels I keep visualizing?”
“Dad died but not in August. The other person . . . well . . . he’s not dead . . . yet,” I said. She looked at me like I was a ghost. “And I came through holding the ring that you keep seeing.”
“The three Cancers,” she mumbled. “You, Kathleen, and who else,” she asked.
I pointed across the street.
“The boy,” she stated.
I nodded. “He’s eighteen today, like me.”
“So, both of you were born on the same day,” she mused, speaking to herself and staring at Coop’s house.
She reached for the dark and foreboding card she’d earlier dropped.
“Let me guess,” she began, rubbing the card between her palms. “Kathleen and the boy?” she asked without saying the word died. “On August 30th?”
“That is correct,” I said.
“And the jewels?” she asked.
“A ring that Cooper and I gave to Mom after Dad died,” I explained. “All three stones are ruby. Our shared birthstone.”
“Of course they are. There’s the trinity,” she whispered. “Of course that is it.”
“What is?” I asked, but then I heard a car door. “What is what?” I insisted, realizing Mom was probably home.
“I’m not exactly sure.”
“Are you kidding me?” I raged.
She shoved a card at me that had her contact information on it. “Take that. Hide it. Call me tomorrow and I’ll have more,” she stated.
I heard the key in the door. Mom was home.
“And, Michael. Be careful what you affect by being here,” Druzella advised.
“What the fuck? Tell me now,” I demanded.
Druzella held up a hand and brought a finger to her mouth, shaking her head no just as Mom walked through the door.