Page 115 of The Reveal
And once again, I expect ... something. I expect him to mount an argument. I expect to feel that song of his rise in me, whether he thinks I’ll fall for it or not.
Instead, I feel that silver gaze of his move all over me. Instead, he looks at me as if he is committing me to memory, and then I’m left standing there with the mist he leaves behind.
I wait until Augie comes back inside, the tension gone from his body. He looks completely restored.
Though he doesn’t quite look at me. There were times when I would have lit into him. I would have demanded to know what he was doing, what he was thinking, and most of all, why he couldn’t stop.
Tonight, I do none of those things. I walk to my brother, my twin, and hug him.
Hard.
“I made up your bed,” I tell him as he hugs me back. “Otherwise, you know where everything is. Just remember, there could be other people in the kitchen at any time.” I see he’s tucked the gun he commandeered into the waistband of his pants. Though he’s still barefoot. “I didn’t throw your stuff out. Most of it is packed up in the closet off the laundry room, yours to reclaim. I’ll see you in the morning.”
“Winter.” He hugs me again. “I love you. You know that.”
“It is my curse,” I reply, the way I always did way back when.
“You wish it was your curse,” he replies, as is tradition.
His voice is hoarse. I’m not the only one having a hard time with this.
I tell myself that’s something. It’s more than I ever thought we’d get.
When I climb upstairs and lock myself in my bedroom, I reach in and pull the cards out from the pocket they chose to fill. Usually I take them and toss them. Try to hide them, to see if they’ll stay where I put them.
Tonight, I decide to stop fucking around.
I sit down cross-legged on the floor, and I fan the cards out in front of me the way I’ve seen my grandmother do a million times. I run my fingers over them, tracing the runic shapes I see there. I think about tonight, all this hope.
All this wild, foolish, marveloushope.
Slowly, carefully, deliberately, I pick a few cards out, turn them over, and then surrender myself to the message.
The vision comes immediately, and the good news is, it doesn’t take me over like that last one. It doesn’t slam into me, making me feel like my head might explode. It blooms there inside, like it’s a part of me. Like it’s just another way to see.
The bad news is, all I see is death.
26.
While the supernatural among us do their research, I look at the cards every day. When I take Gran her coffee in the morning, I show her what I’m doing, what I pulled, and how I interpret what I saw.
She listens. She gives advice. Sometimes she offers an alternate interpretation.
Most of all, she teaches me. She shows me how she does things, and why she chose the particular methods she uses.
“Everything you need is already inside you,” she tells me, leveling that stern look of hers on me. “All you need to do is access it. Let your blood lead the way.”
I try.
Every day, I try.
I don’t get used to having Augie home, I revel in it. Every day, I feel as excited to see him emerge from his old room as if it’s the first time. Ariel’s vampire shows up regularly, every evening, but it takes me a solid week to realize that what she’s doing is keeping him going along on the same even keel. No ups, no downs. Just Augie.
“I’m not a big drug person,” I say, out of nowhere one day.
“Jesus fucking Christ,” my brother mutters.
We’re in the truck, headed down the hill to pick up various supplies. Eggs. Cheese. With him around again, we have more things to barter—like his labor—and that makes me feel rich. It’s the cash money I have trouble getting a hold of.
