Dawn #2
“Focus on that. Hold the question in your mind; then pick another card and set it down face up next to the stave.”
Prince of cups.
“Two princes in your spread. My, my.” Remi sounded pleased. “Do you see how this handsome young devil is holding the cup out to you, asking if you’d like a drink? A drink of the very productivity his partner card indicates you want. Are you waiting for an invitation?”
“I think…I’ve already accepted one.” More than one. From Carol, to design the party that set all this in motion. From Audrey, to look for the Vineland author and to sit here with Remi. From myself, to stop drinking. From Dennis, for a date. From my conscience, to call Clark and speak in a meeting.
“Good, good. Then we are on the right track. What else would you like to know?”
I glared at the woman on the card at the very center of my spread, the cowering woman held in place by eight swords—my mysterious connection to my aunt.
Or maybe, it occurred to me in a rush, an equal connection to my mother. Did she, too, feel held in place by the mistakes she’d made?
Tell me more, I dared that woman as I pulled one last card, then laid it directly on top of that other woman: king of swords.
“Well,” said Remi with calm and authority. “It would appear you have the ability and authority right now to say what you need. And to get it.
“Since four of your seven cards are swords and you drew a progression that included the prince and the king, it’s clear you are undergoing a major life change.
This spread also shows that you have it in you to be brave and articulate and that your future is bright if you embrace the challenge.
Summon your courage. You are able to get what you want if you rest and tune in to what you need.
Listen to yourself, Dawn. And don’t turn on yourself.
You need you. Your aunt, it would appear, needs you. Don’t deny yourself what you need.”
I welled up in tears at this.
“Tears are very cleansing,” said Remi. “They are our body’s natural pressure release. Do you know why you are crying?”
I nodded, took a shaky breath, and said, “I know exactly what I need to do to tame the swords and get unstuck.” I needed to stop drinking. For real. “And it requires a lot of courage and a lot of honesty. I’m not sure how it will help me find my aunt, though.”
“You have everything you need,” Remi said as she tapped the king of swords again.
What you seek is seeking you.
When I saw Audrey in the waiting room, I smiled and said to her, “That was amazing.”
Audrey beamed. “What did I tell you?”
Back out on the street, Audrey said, “How about lunch at Chateau Marmont? It’s nearby.”
“Do they have a burger? I’m dying for a burger.”
“They have something called Damn Good Burger, and I’ve heard it’s exactly that.”
“Perfect.”
We managed to get seats outside on the lovely stone patio that was bursting with pots of flowers and colorful vines coiled around trellises.
Bono was at a corner table with two men I didn’t recognize, like it was the most normal thing in the world.
I immediately recalled seeing him onstage my senior year of high school during the Zoo TV tour, and how every nerve in my body vibrated at his magnetic stage presence, and how I thought how much I wanted to make something that people might recognize like they recognized his voice.
For so long, I’d buried that wish as silly and unattainable, but somehow after Remi’s reading I was filled again with the same desire. And it didn’t seem so silly anymore.
And here was Bono to remind me.
After Audrey and I placed our orders, I reported on my tarot reading.
When I was done, and I felt a gummy lump of excited emotion in my throat that I swallowed down with the cold fizzy Coke that had arrived for me, Audrey exclaimed, “I love this for you! Everything you need is inside you. ‘What you seek is seeking you.’ You’re practically glowing.”
“I feel different,” I agreed, as our waitress set dishes down in front of us—my gorgeous burger and Audrey’s practically fluorescent tricolor salad. “But how is getting sober going to get me to Winnie? How will it break me out of my creative rut?”
“It won’t,” Audrey said, picking up her fork with a flourish. “But the clarity of mind you have in sobriety will make it possible for you to figure out the rest of it.” Then she stabbed her fork into her beautiful bowl of leaves and beans for emphasis.
Clarity…the prince of swords.
I sunk my teeth through the brioche bun into the beef, releasing its flavor into my mouth in a burst of hot, viscous juice. Oh my god it was good. I washed the bite down with more soda, then asked, “What about your reading?”
“It confirmed that I’m on the right path, which I took to mean not seeing Jed, helping you find Winnie, and generally following my nose.”
“That seems vague.”
“Well, I also pulled the Tower, which is often associated with death. But not literal death. More like a spiritual death.” She plucked a fry off my plate and ate it contemplatively, then said, “I think that what both of our readings reveal is that you and I are in similar positions, both of us trying to remake ourselves without the crutches we’ve used to get us by so far. ”
“What do you think needs to spiritually die for you? Just Jed?”
“Unfortunately, no. When I asked the deck to tell me more about my acting, I just kept pulling cards telling me to look elsewhere.”
“So Jed isn’t standing in the way of your acting career?”
“I think it’s more like he’s standing in the way of me figuring out what I should be doing instead of acting. He’s keeping me tethered to acting when I need to be doing other things.”
“Like?”
“That’s where I pulled the Tower. I think I need to burn it all down first, then rummage around in the ashes.”
“Does that feel ominous or exciting?”
“Both. One of my sponsors once said to me that the best part about your life falling apart was getting to put yourself back together again, however you want.”