Flight from the Mystic Moon
I was never allowed to touch my mothers cards. She said it was the one thing she needed to hold onto if she was to keep 'everything together'. So, when I was tired of not being allowed to touch a simple deck of cards, I stole them. I knew once she figured out they were missing she would find me and she would yell. Also that she would beg for them to be returned.
"So these are the mysterious cards your mother gets all upset about? Jeeze… there's nothing special about them… I can buy this set of tarot cards anywhere… sorry to say, but your mother's a loon…" Akari was my best friend. "Keori… she's gonna freak when she finds out you stole them." Akari looked at me, she wasn't so innocent as she think of my well being…
"Yes, but that's too bad, she'll have to eat her words if she wants them back…" I never looked at Akari directly when we got on the topic of my mother. Akari was my bestfriend, but she knew nothing when it came to my mother.
"Why don't you leave them at my house… she'll never find them that way." I shook my head. There was no way I was leaving the thing that was going to get me in huge trouble at someone else's house… What'd be the point of taking them if I wasn't going to get to admire them?
"Maybe tomorrow… I want to play with them tonight, once mother's gone to sleep." I took the cards and placed them in my backpack as we both rounded the corner of the street.
"Uh-oh…" My house was the fifth down the way and already I could see my mother standing outside the door… she was waiting and her hands clenched her skirt tightly.
"I guess I'll leave you to deal with Hitomi…" Akari… was never so innocent as to think of my well being…
"Hello mother…" I walked up the stairs and stood before my mother, one step below her. My head reeled to the side as her hand made impact with my cheek. This was a first and we both knew it. Mother had never struck me before. She was really serious about these stupid cards.
"Where are they Keori! Where have you put them?" Even if I'd not taken them, my fascination with them as a child was enough for her to blame me.
"Where is what mother?" She raised her hand again and I could see her cheek puff out as she began to grinned her teeth. She did not hit me again. Of all the things my mother had become over the years... abusiveness wasn't one of them. Mother loved people to much to inflict that on them. Father had been the same way.
"You know what I am talking about… Don't play your mind games with me…" As mother grabbed my shirt sleeve I stepped into the house. The door slammed behind me and she let go. "Tell me where you've put them…" She was always like this when it came to those cards… I'm not so sure why… I think after years of having believed in such things, she actually started to trust in them… Then again... she was right about a few 'predictions'. Father had asked her not to play with them while he was in the house. I think he believed in them a bit too.
When I was 11, my father died. Mother and somehow knew in advance and had me stay with my grandmother. So I did'nt know he had died until a month later. I'd asked where he'd gone and she would just say 'away'. When I asked Grandmother, she was kind enough to tell me the truth.
"I don't know where your cards have gone mother… I've been at school and it's too much of a hassle to walk home to misplace paper and ink… I'm not so cruel." And I was telling the truth. I'd never come home during lunch to ruin my own time just to toy with her stupid cards. Instead, I had taken them before I'd gone to school.
"Tch…" Mother turned around and stormed up the stairs. The door to her room slammed shut and then I could hear her toss things around.
"She's seriously out of it…" How can a girl be allowed to stay in the presence of a mentally deranged mother … shouldn't some kind of authority step and intervene? "Dammit…" I kind of started to feel bad when I could hear her begin to cry… not enough to tell her I had her cards though.
A few hours passed and I ended up having to make dinner for my-self. Mother never once came out of her room and I knew tomorrow I'd have to clean it up for her. I walked up the stairs and glanced at her door as I passed then closed the door to my own room. Walking over to the window I opening it and threw my school bag at the bed.
"Dammit…" The top flap opened and a card from mother's deck slid out. I grabbed it and threw it back in my bag, but again it slid out. Mother had once told me the significant of a single card 'straying' from your hand. So I grabbed the card and flipped it over and laughed. "The fool, un?" Pity I knew nothing about tarot, I figured my mother was crazy enough without me following suit.
I pulled the rest of the cards out and the card at the top was the three of cups. I slide the cards into my pocket so even if mother looked in my room, she'd never find them. As soon as I did so though my eyes began to tingle and i heard fists hammering on the door of my room.
"Keori! Let me in! Hurry! Don't' touch those cards, please!" I started at the base of my door and could see my mother's shadow and a very bright light. Instinctively I took the cards back out of my pockets and threw them under my pillow before opening the door.
"Mother?" The door swung open and I saw only saw her outline. My room was too bright.
"Where are they?" I tried to focus on her, but I couldn't see her well and I was mind-shocked by the tingling in my head.
"Under the pillow…" I answered her just to make her happy. I could hear her tossing things around and then silence. "Mother…?" Something cold touched my hand and then my hand was forced closed.
"I tried to tell you! I TRIED TO WARN YOU!" I wanted to call my mother's name. I wanted her to stop the feeling over being hung upside down. What was going on? The light was too bright and my eyes teared while they sqeezed shut.
"Mother?" I felt lighter suddenly and when I opened light-stunned eyes I was looking down and was grasping my mother's hand, she was also crying. "Mother?" I didn't understand what was going on.
"Find Van if he still lives! Tell him to send you home!" I couldn't hear her at all and her hands began to slip from my own.
"Mother!" She let go. She stood with her hands gripping her skirt again. She looked like she had some how seen this coming even. She just stood there as the light around me consumed me and left me in oblivion. And in the back of my mind I said it.
You never should have touched those cards.