Chapter Four
“Interlude: A Study In Predictability”
At precisely 10:24 p.m., November 13, 1990, with Sagittarius in sun, Aries rising, and Jupiter entering the sixth house, on the floor of her Senior Study amidst astrological charts, chemistry notes, and 3 dog-eared copies of Eden Gray's Complete Guide to the Tarot, Shelby Moore lit a single, blue, Woodbury scented candle.
Immediately the wind blew it out.
"Shit," Shelby muttered. She uncrossed her legs, pushed herself to her feet and stepped over three piles of books and a mound of clean (?) clothes to the window.
It was shut tight.
"Shit."
Shelby forced herself to take a deep breath, pushing the air all the way down into her sixth chakra. She relaxed her eyebrows, focused on nothing, exhaled. Reaching over, she switched on the lamp above her desk, scanning for another pack of matches. Obligingly, the bulb flickered, popped, extinguished.
"Shit."
By touch, Shelby found the matches. Her left shin found the books, her right foot caught the pile of clothes. She fell face down directly on top of the blue, Woodbury scented candle.
"Shit."
Shelby sat up, righted the candle. Against the better judgment of her conscious mind, the throbbing of her shin, the vision of her first, second, and third eyes, and her beginning-to-split head, she re-lit the candle. Then, she reached for the deck of cards, already shuffled, lying in wait like a predator, or a lover. She took another breath. The air wouldn't go down past her third chakra. She closed her eyes but the buzzing behind them grew louder. She opened her eyes. The candle flame was perfectly still.
She lay the first card.
Three of swords, reversed.
She lay the second card.
Five of cups, reversed.
She lay the third card.
Ten of swords.
Shelby lay the first card of the second row.
And the magician stared back at her, unblinking in the candlelight.
It was now 10:36 p.m. Shelby knew this because at that moment she glanced up at her digital clock, just as the power went out and the afterimage was burned onto her eyes.
"Shit."
She lay the next card.
Death. Reversed.
And then the candle went out again as the scream from downstairs shattered the glass of her tightly-shut window.
"Shit."
•
Notes for Chapter 4
The "predictability" here referred, in part, to our ugly habit of ignoring others' characters and plotlines in favor of introducing new ones of our own. Fortunately, this chapter represented the end of that trend.Shelby Moore is evidently a Vedic astrologer. According to Western astrology, the sun would still have been in Scorpio on the 13th of November.
•