Then she reminded me how our papaw died younger than he should have from a lifetime of death-talking. That hit home. Every gift has a price.
“I’m just insurance really,” I tried to explain to her. “A confidence booster. He thinks if he has me as a backup, then he won’t worry about the risk and go all in. It’s a head game for him. Truly.”
“Give him the money back and tell him no. I’m not scrying for you.”
“I already spent the money.” I winced. A second round of swears were flung at me. Even after Adaire gave me an earful, she still didn’t seem like she was going to budge, so I added, “I thought we were going to the ocean.” It was a mumble, really, but I was doing my best to ply some feeling out of that cold dead heart of hers.
By summer’s end, I was supposed to have enough money saved up to fix my car’s clutch and replace the starter...and get a new battery. Adaire asked me to road-trip with her from ocean to ocean, before she left for that fancy art institute in Charleston she’d got into, where she’d be able to design all the clothes her heart desired. I said it sounded like a plan.
Her plan, not mine.
There were responsibilities that came with death-talking. A town full of people we’d grown up with that depended on me—when they weren’t fearing and hating me. How could I leave knowing someone back home needed me? Enough deaths slipped through my grasp as it was. I couldn’t live with myself knowing I could have saved one more.
“So you’re just gonna stay here until Grandmama dies?” Adaire had asked when I didn’t commit to leaving. “Just keep kowtowing to the church folk. Trying to keep in their good graces. For what? A one-way ticket to Heaven?” The echo of her words still made me wince.
Adaire leaving at the end of summer felt a little bit like that, too. But she and Davis had plans, and I wasn’t interested in being a third wheel.
Adaire screwed a side-glance my way. “So you used Dickie’s money to repair your car? Davis didn’t tell me you paid him.”
“It was a...surprise?” I lied. Instead, I mailed a check to that fancy art institute to help out with her tuition and student loans. It was a forgive-me-for-not-going-with-you goodbye gift.
Adaire stood abruptly, then stared down at me like I needed to be throttled and she was volunteering to do so. “The shit I do for you,” she said.
I popped up on my feet and followed her out the door. “Does this mean you’ll help me?”
She growled in response. Like her facial expressions, I had perfected interpretation there as well. She would help me, but she wouldn’t like it.
“I’m going to need to borrow your car Saturday night, too,” I hollered behind her. She grumbled something rude, but it wasn’t a no. “The race is all the way in Mercer. You can ride your bike to work one time.” Though it was the third time that month; my car was busy growing a grass beard until I could afford to repair it. But she worked the late shift at Clementine’s; it wasn’t like she needed the car Saturday night, and I’d be back in time to take her home.
Downstairs, the kitchen was sadder than Adaire’s room, if that was possible. The cabinets splintery thin pine veneer seemed thirsty they looked so dry. The flimsy faded curtains hadn’t seen a good washing in years. Twangy old country music from the radio drifted in through the window—Aunt Violet and Joe had moved the party to the porch, it seemed.
Adaire dug out a cast-iron skillet from under the harvest-gold stove that had somehow always been missing its bottom drawer. The faucet sputtered awake as she filled the pan. The familiar smell of boiled eggs that always accompanied well water permeated the air.
Some folks used mirrors or water in a bowl for gazing. Any shiny surface would do for most. One time, Adaire said she saw a doorway to another world in the reflection of a crystal candy dish. She wouldn’t even so much as look at a candy dish after that, said she might cross over and never come back. That was why she was fickle about scrying.
Carefully, she sat the pan on the table, the surface a black mirror. Her scrying skillet. A single bare bulb hung over their mismatched kitchen table and chairs, reflecting in the dark water—the cheap glass shade broke years ago when Wyatt had thrown a football across the kitchen.
Adaire held out her hand, expectant. When I didn’t clue in, she said, “You want me to scry or what?” Now she was really annoyed. “You know how this works, I need something of Dickie’s.”
“I don’t have anything. Can’t you just do it by thinking about him or his car or the race?” Having something tangible to hold on to when you were scrying helped. But a memory would serve in a pinch.
Her face soured at this minor setback. “It isn’t much to go on.”
Adaire sat in the chair and released a long exhale, readying herself. Then she stared into the black glassy water. Her eyes softened as she started to zone out. Unfocusing, that blurry vision where one minute you’re staring at something clear as day, but as you relax, your eyes lose focus. Then your mind opens up to seeing what you want to know. I tried it once before, but gazing isn’t in my blood.
I watched her as she slipped into that other place. Looking over is what she called it. Even though she was physically here, her mind was looking over into the elsewhere for the right answer—though it’s not always clear what they mean.
Out on the front porch I heard a crack, then a burst of laughter from Aunt Violet and Joe. Adaire didn’t flinch. I leaned back and snuck a peek out the window. The porch swing hung cockeyed to one side, its chain broken.
After a few long quiet minutes, Adaire gasped, as if jarred awake, but her eyes were open the whole time.
“It went black” was the first thing out of her mouth. A troubled look shuffled across her face.
“Black? You mean like lights out for Dickie?” This was not good.
Adaire dumped the water out into the sink, her thoughts chugging over what she saw—or didn’t see. “No, not that. When I try to look at Saturday, it’s just black.” She dried the skillet with a dish towel in slow circles.
“What does that mean?” It sounded like a load of crap. “Are you messing with me? You were thinking about Dickie and the race when you were scrying, right?”
At the sound of Aunt Violet’s and Joe’s voices shuffling closer, Adaire glanced in their direction.
“I know how to scry, Weatherly,” she said in a sharp whisper.
“I didn’t say you didn’t, I just mean—did you see Dickie? Does he wreck his car and die?” I followed her over to the couch.
“No, I didn’t see Dickie die. But I couldn’t see anything on Saturday. Like, at all. But there’s a key.”
“A key? Like a car key? If Dickie loses his car keys, he’s going to want his money back.”
“It’s not that. Help me with this.” She shouldered up against the brown-striped couch, wanting to move it.
For the love of God, that sucker was heavier than a Mack truck. But we managed to scoot it over enough for Adaire to find what she was looking for.
“Mama used to hide her liquor here when Daddy was alive.” She pried up a loose floorboard. Aunt Violet wasn’t a closet drinker. She just didn’t want Uncle Doug to steal her booze for himself.
“The race is only a few days away, so I thought I would try forward-looking,” Adaire says. “It’s where you comb through today, tomorrow, the next day until you get to the day you want. It works sometimes, if it’s happening soon.” She felt around in the hole. “Except every time I tried to push past Saturday, the visions got murky, like they were shrouded in this fog. Didn’t make no sense. Then it would flip me back to my house. To a vision of this.”
Adaire pulled out a little drawstring bag, something made from scrap quilting squares. She dumped the contents into my hand.
