Chapter 9
Chapter 9
“Do you know a Misty?” I ask Knox when I get home. He’s in my kitchen, cleaning the coffee pot. “I didn’t catch her last name, but I think she’s local. She’s a fortune teller, used to be a nurse practitioner.”
“Can’t say I do. Why?”
“She was at the farmers’ market. I don’t know . . . she seems interesting.”
“How so?”
“She really played the part, right down to the Witchiepoo lace-up shoes to the closed eyes, while she pretended to see my future.”
“Did she have a crystal ball?”
“She may as well have.”
He chuckles. “Not a crystal ball as in a prop. I was being sarcastic.”
“You? Sarcastic? Never. Do you mean a literal crystal ball? Because that would’ve been a little over the top, even for her, though I wouldn’t put it past her.”
“What I mean is did you want her to tell you your future? I was using crystal ball as metaphor. That’s all.
“A metaphor ? You’re getting kind of professorly on me.”
“All I’m saying is if only life was as simple as a crystal ball? If only we could all be assured that tomorrow will be better than today.” He gives me a meaningful look that I can only guess has more to do with me than it does with Misty.
“What if today is already outstanding?” I challenge with a smug grin.
“It can always be better, right? My point being that if we all had a crystal ball telling us that five years down the road, we’d be winning the mega millions of life, we could put up with a lot of crap in the meantime.”
It’s true that if we all knew tomorrow would be better than today, it would make today more palatable. And less heartbreaking. “Yeah, if only I had the power to predict those things for my clients.”
“That’s the point,” he says. “You don’t. No one does. And if you did, it would take the element of surprise out of life.”
“I could live pretty happily without the element of surprise. In any event, I can’t tell if she’s a fraud or not.”
He cocks his brows, as if to say Of course she is .
“Okay, I’m not saying she can really see into a person’s future or past. As you’ve already established, we both know that’s a crock. But I think she actually believes she can.”
“Does that make it better or make her any less of a fake?” he asks.
“It’s a good question. No, it doesn’t make her any less of a fake. But if she really believes in what she’s doing, it makes her less of a con artist, I suppose.”
“Is this about her or about you?”
Knox is more perceptive than I want to give him credit for. Still, I stop to ponder his words. “Do you think I’m a con artist?”
“No, I don’t. I do, however, think the one-size-fits-all approach doesn’t work. But, hey, if you can give people hope, even if it’s only a glimmer, there’s a little bit of magic in that, right?”
I think about what Knox says long after he’s left. Is there really magic in giving people hope or is it just the opposite? A curse.
For dinner, I throw together the salad fixings I bought at the market along with the pasta and bread. It’s a veritable feast for one person, with plenty of leftovers. Tomorrow, I’ll see if Knox wants some for lunch.
I build a fire, curl up on the couch, and call Lolly.
“Hey.”
“How’s Taylor?” I ask.
“As good as new. Kids today, they bounce back fast. What’s up with you?”
“I spent my day at the local farmers’ market. It was a real kick.” I swipe the throw blanket off the back of the sofa and wrap myself in it. “Have you ever gone to a fortune teller before?”
She laughs. “Don’t tell me you did.”
“I did. Her name is Misty, and she was something straight out of central casting. Flowy dress, Victorian boots, long, curly hair, the whole nine yards. It was weird. Sometimes I thought she was making it up as she went. Other times, it was as if she was actually seeing things, real things.”
“Like what?”
“My name, for one.”
“Aren’t there billboards all over the place with your name and face?”
“Billboards, Lolly?”
“Okay, maybe not billboards, but you’re a New York Times bestseller. There’s a pretty good chance she knows who you are.”
“That’s what I thought. But she also seemed to know about my accident.”
“Did the news cover it?”
“Not that I’m aware of. And she knew about you, or at least we think it was you. And about Austin. She said I was running from my pride when I was hit by the cable car, not a broken heart. Do you think that’s true?”
“Only you can know that. What else did she say?”
I take a moment, wondering whether I should tell her, whether it’ll only pick at old scabs. “She talked about Mom,” I say reluctantly, waiting to take Lolly’s temperature.
“What did she say about Mom?”
“That she wasn’t angry that we buried her next to Dad. That she loved us and knew she had grandchildren.”
“Do you believe her? Misty, not Mom.”
“I guess I want to. Do you?”
“How would I know? I wasn’t even there. But if you want to, then believe it.”
“It doesn’t work that way, Lolly.”
“It can if you let it. You’re the one who went to a freaking fortune teller in the first place, so clearly you believe in it on some level.”
“I did it because I thought it would be fun. The truth is, I did it because it was something you would do.”
“So now you want to be like me?”
“More spontaneous, yes.”
“Since when?”
“Since I had a brush with death.” It’s an exaggeration, but there’s also truth in the fact that getting dumped by my ex-husband, getting hit by a cable car, is a wake-up call of sorts. A wake-up call to mend fences with my sister. A wake-up call to make friends. A wake-up call to have balance.
A wake-up call to get a life.
“I wish you would come back and talk to her,” I tell Lolly.
“The fortune teller? What in heaven’s name for?”
“To vet her.”
“Chelsea, you’re the brain trust in the family, not me. If anyone knows whether this Misty woman is full of shit, it would be you. Did you Google her, look up her reviews?”
“Do you think there are reviews for fortune tellers?” The idea of it sounds absurd.
“Why not? There are reviews for everything else. Have you ever looked at your own?”
“No, I never even thought of it.”
“Well, I have.”
“Really? For me? Were they good?”
There’s a long silence.
“Lolly?”
“They were a mixed bag. But who cares? Even Adele gets bad reviews.”
“You’re contradicting yourself. What’s the point of reading someone’s reviews if you don’t believe them?”
She laughs. “You’re too literal, Chels. Lighten up. All I’m saying is you can get a feel for this Misty woman’s credibility by reading her reviews. For example, if the vast majority say she was busted for check kiting a month ago, she’s probably not too reliable.”
Her logic may be twisted, but oddly enough, I see the wisdom in it.
“My personal trainer is here, so I’ve got to go. Chels, try to relax, okay?”
“I’m doing my best.”
“Do better.” And with that, she hangs up.
I go in search of my laptop, curl up again on the couch, and search for Misty the fortune teller. Believe it or not, she’s got reviews. Lots of them. And they’re pretty good, a 4.5 out of 5. I scroll through the reviews, reading.
“ It was as if she could see straight inside of me .”— Nick C. of Nevada City .
“ Misty said good news was on its way. And boom, two days later, I found out I was preggers .”— Josephine R. of Ghost .
“ I’ve seen Misty on three different occasions, each time I was in a slump in my life. She helped me narrow down the source of my unhappiness and see into a bright future. I highly recommend her to anyone who is feeling a little lost .” — Carol M. of Auburn .
“ Misty told me my husband was seeing another woman. Who does that? Seriously, who the hell does that? If I could give her zero stars, I would .”— Sandy T. of San Francisco .
I click out of Yelp, having seen enough. Before I close out altogether, I consider looking at my own reviews, then quickly shut my laptop down.
It’s only seven o’clock, though it feels later. It’s pitch dark outside, not even a sliver of light from the moon, which is hidden behind the mountains. Most nights, I can see even a partial moon glowing off the lake like a beacon. But tonight, the darkness is eerie, even foreboding.
I tell myself I’m being ridiculous and pick up the phone again. Uncle Sylvester picks up on the first ring, which catches me off guard. Usually, I get his answering machine.
“Chelsea, how are you? I’ve been meaning to call, honey, but my phone never stops ringing. Did Lolly tell you I’m casting the new James Bond movie?”
I don’t think she did, but I say yes anyway. “Who’s going to be the Bond girl?”
He chuckles. “That’s classified. But that’s not why you called. What do I owe the pleasure?”
If I didn’t know better, I would think he was taking a jab at me for being MIA this last year. But between Austin leaving me and my tense relationship with Lolly, it’s been hard. Sadly, Uncle Sylvester and I don’t have a whole lot to talk about. His world is making movies, and mine is saving marriages. The two rarely collide.
“Lolly went to Mom and Dad’s grave for the anniversary,” I blurt.
He doesn’t say anything at first, then, “I know. She told me. After the fact, otherwise I would’ve gone with her.”
I could take that as another jab, because I should’ve been the one to go with her. But he doesn’t mean it that way, that much I know. He’s never pressured us to do anything we weren’t comfortable doing.
“Do you think we made a mistake burying them next to each other?” I ask. “Was it cruel? Or worse, was it denial?”
“Honey, you were twelve. Of course you were in denial. Thank God. No kid should ever have to go through what you and Lolly did.”
“But was it wrong of us to bury them together?”
“They were dead, honey. All that’s in those graves are their bodies. Their souls are long gone. Burial is for the living, not for the dead. And that’s what you and Lolly wanted. It gave you peace, and that’s all I wanted. I wanted you girls to have peace.”
“If it was just you, though, would’ve you done it that way? Would you have buried them side by side?”
“Yes,” he says without hesitation. “Because they loved each other. Even in the very end, they loved each other, and I believe that’s how your mother would’ve wanted it. Why are you doing this to yourself, Chelsea? Why now?”
“I guess it’s the anniversary. It brings it all back, everything about that day.”
“I’ve always told you girls to focus on the good, to remember the happy times. There were more of those than the bad ones. For a long time, I couldn’t forgive your father for what he did. But I always knew that my sister would’ve wanted me to. And eventually, I did forgive him. That’s the way you’ve got to look at this, Chels. You’ve got to forgive and let go.” He takes a long pause. “Lolly and I are so proud of you. You channeled what happened with your parents into something good. You turned all that pain into something productive.”
It’s definitely why I became a psychologist, a marriage counselor. I suppose I thought I could save people from the same trauma my parents couldn’t save themselves from. But somewhere along the way, it became more about me than me helping people.
“I miss them,” I say.
“I miss them, too. And I miss you. I know you and your sister have your problems, but it would be nice to see you every once in a while.”
“Did Lolly tell you about my accident?”
“What accident?”
I tell him about being hit by a streetcar, leaving out the stuff about Austin.
“Chelsea, you need to slow down, take a vacation. All this constant work is grinding you down. It’ll kill you if you let it.”
I let out a snort. “Now isn’t that the pot calling the kettle black?”
“I didn’t get hit by a cable car, kid.”
“Touché. If it’s any consolation, I’m on vacation now. Up at the cabin.” I start to tell him that Lolly came for a visit, but this thing between my sister and me is still tenuous. I don’t want to jinx whatever progress we’ve made.
“Good. I still have to see that cabin of yours. It sounds like a special place.”
“My door is open twenty-four-seven,” I say. “I love you, Uncle Sylvester.”
“I love you, too.”
Our call leaves me a little melancholy but at the same time, a little consoled, if it’s even possible to be both at the same time. Twenty-four years is a long time to hold on to guilt over something I insisted on when I was twelve. Something that, as my uncle pointed out, could only matter to my parents’ survivors.
At the time, I believed that my parents would forever be soulmates, even in the afterlife, despite what my father had done. Despite that he’d shot my mother three times in the heart before turning his service weapon on himself. I believed they needed each other as much in death as they needed each other in life.
Was it the romantic delusion of a young girl to help her sleep at night? Or was it something only a child of their DNA could intuit? I no longer know what I once so solidly understood about them, about their love for each other. Age has a way of making you skeptical. It has a way of making you question yourself.
But Misty said my mother wasn’t angry. Misty. The woman is either wanted in fifty states or a complete nutjob.
I go to the kitchen and make myself a cup of chamomile tea. Supposedly the herb binds to the benzodiazepine receptors in the brain and makes you sleepy. I travel with a box whenever I’m out of town, because I find it difficult to sleep in strange places. Who knows if it really works? I remind myself to ask Knox about it. It seems like something a biophysicist might know about.
Tonight, the tea is useless. I don’t nod off until well after midnight, and it’s a fitful sleep, filled with bizarre dreams. I see the fox again. This time, it’s curled up at the foot of my bed on top of my feet. When I try to kick it away, it bares its teeth.
The big orange pumpkin balloon from the parade is hovering above me, clinging to the ceiling. Every time I reach for its string, the balloon moves, its candy-corn mouth laughing at me. I laugh back. Soon, both of us are giggling until we’re gasping for breath.
Austin is here. He keeps kissing my forehead and my cheek, which is wet from my tears. The fox growls at him, and he starts to sob. A woman in white, maybe Mary, tells him if he doesn’t get a grip, he has to leave. And I feel at once grateful and sad.
Uncle Sylvester is here, too. He’s on his phone, pleading with someone. I think it’s the new Bond girl, because she’s so pretty.
The only one I want is Lolly, but she’s nowhere to be found. I keep calling her, but she doesn’t answer.
Then I see my mother, my beautiful mother. I reach for her, but I can’t move my arms; they’re too heavy, like bricks. My father is here, too. He’s in his policeman’s uniform, more handsome than I even remember. I try to talk to him, tell him I forgive him, but my mouth is so dry, no words come out. Just squeaks.
They’re leaving, and I want to follow them. Maybe if I follow them, we can be a family again. Mom, Dad, Lolly, and me.
“Wait for me,” I say, but no one hears me but the fox. Its ears prick up, and it cocks its head to one side before running off into the forest.
I try to get up to go with Mom and Dad, but my body won’t move no matter how hard I try. I look down at my feet, willing them to carry me away, but they are blue, and I can’t see my toes. I start to cry, but no one notices.
Then out of nowhere, Knox is here. He’s holding my hand and I feel better, safer.
“I want to go with my parents,” I tell him.
“Not today,” he says.
“Misty says it’s okay,” I whisper back.
“No, she doesn’t. She wants you to stay. Please stay.”
That’s when I wake up in a cold sweat.