Intaglio Dragons All The Way Down

chapter 7: Three Chipped Cups



They sat in the kitchen of Ava and Oliver’s apartment, a steaming kettle, sitting on the counter. Three cups of tea were laid before them on the table. Oliver’s process was always the same: one quarter teaspoon of Darjeeling loose tea topped with boiling water. It had to be drunk black... no cream or honey to muddy his reading. The cups he used were thrift store specials, with the requisite curved-base bottom to let him read up through the passage of time. The cup was turned clockwise three times for the first cup, the next year stretching up the sides of the vessel to the rim. The cup was then tapped out onto a napkin, three turns more, the next cup holding the hints of the year after and beyond.

Ripples reaching backward from the future...

There were only three teacups in total – all of them chipped – though there were four saucers on the shelf. They had a pattern of green and russet leaves. They were vaguely Japanese in design, the porcelain fine enough that light passed through the narrowed edge of the rim. They were remnants of an old woman’s treasure-trove, likely from a wedding trousseau predating the first World War, now damaged and worn through endless use. The veins on their aged surface were a web of grey against the pale blush of forgotten youth.

Oliver pushed a steaming cup toward Cole, his face gentle and persuasive. Ava knew this routine, but Cole felt like he’d stumbled into some arcane Templar practise, his sense of ease disappearing the moment the cups were pulled from the shelf.

“Drink up,” Ava’s father said, head tipping to the side as his daughter’s often did.

It unnerved Cole, the similarity between their two faces – one young, one mature – tonight more than ever. But he didn’t want to be the one to fracture this strange calm after Ava’s panic, so he picked up his cup and drank. The hot liquid scalded his mouth and burned his throat on the way down, leaving him tasting ashes and nothing else. Oliver prattled on about the warm weather, and his hope for more snow. He was only here until the end of February, when the orchestra’s next tour was starting, and he wanted to enjoy the winter before living in the perpetual half-light of late night performances and hotel existence. Cole nodded and drank again, waiting nervously as the three of them slowly emptied their cups of tea, his body pulsing in anticipation.

‘This isn’t real,’ a voice inside him hissed, fingers trembling on the handle of the cup. ‘It’s not possible.’

Beside him, Ava blew on her tea leaves; they lifted and swayed under the surface like seaweed. Her face was scrubbed clean of makeup, curls dishevelled and loose, making her look all the younger for the elegant dress she still wore. Cole blinked and the dress looked grey rather than black, but then perhaps it was just the light in the kitchen. She was beautiful tonight. He longed to hold her and make this thing – whatever had happened! – okay again, but he was afraid he would scare her off. Ava had been abnormally quiet since the gallery, keeping her gaze averted. She’d been shaken by tonight’s events, and he had been, too.

‘This won’t work,’ the voice inside him chided. He stared down at the black leaves swirling under the amber liquid. ‘It can’t work.’



They sipped and Oliver talked. Outside the sound of the traffic dulled as the hour grew late. It was almost a surprise when Cole found his teacup empty. He looked up to find Oliver watching him, a paper napkin in hand.

“Place this on your saucer,” he advised. Cole did as asked, and Ava’s father motioned to the cup. “Now set the empty cup upside down on the napkin. Let it drain, but don’t touch it. I’ll be right back.”

He stood up from the table, wandering into the living room. With unsteady hands, Cole turned the cup upside down as Ava did the same. Oliver’s cup was wiped clean, the leaves in a wadded napkin to the side.

“Why not your Dad’s?” Cole asked, pointing to it.

Ava answered without looking up.

“Because it’s bad luck to read your own future,” she said, staring at the underside of her cup. “Dad will read other people’s tea leaves, but never his own… It scares him.”

Cole nodded, swallowing hard. It scared him too! Behind them in the living room, Oliver shrugged on his grey coat as he stepped toward the stereo, turning on a vinyl record. The speakers snapped and popped before an old big bad tune began to play, hollow with the passage of time. It was a scratchy, faded live recording from many years ago. There was something about it that set Cole’s teeth on edge, as if too many other things were going on in this room. Oliver grabbed a crumpled package of cigarettes from the side table, jogging down to the foyer and heading outside.

“Back in a minute,” he called as the door closed behind him.

There was only the sound of the disembodied music from the other room. Cole stared through the kitchen doorway, weighing the desire to leave against the need to stay. ‘Ava needs me…’ He turned back, surprised to catch her staring at him. She gave him a weak smile.

“What he sees, Cole, it’s only an option,” she said, answering his unspoken fears. “Anything can be changed. You should know that before he starts. It’s not a certainty or a sentence. It’s a… a… hint of what could be. Remember that.”

Cole nodded, trying to appear calm even though his body was jittery with unexpected nerves.

‘I don’t believe any of this,’ a voice inside him whined, ‘It’s not real.’

Ava reached out, bridging the space between them. The moment their hands touched, he felt more settled.

‘I’ll stay for her…’

Around them, the music played on, rollicking trumpets and a woman’s breathy voice, heavy bass undertones wrapping them in sounds from another time. Cole shifted uneasily while next to him, Ava hummed along to the music. He waited for Oliver to return, his fingers tangled in hers.

‘It’s a parlour trick,’ he thought, ‘like palm-reading, or tarot cards, or horoscopes... Lucky guesses and gullible people. Nothing else...”

Cole was still running through an endless number of ways that this thing he didn’t believe in wouldn’t work when Oliver came back, the warm cigarette smoke lingering in his clothes like incense in a church. Ava shuffled her chair closer to Cole’s, dropping her gaze to the upside-down cup. Her father rolled his long sleeves up, as if ready to start some yard work. Seeing him approach, Cole pulled his cup and saucer back toward him, unwilling to be the first to go.

“Don’t touch it!” Oliver said sharply, his tone surprisingly unlike the man Cole knew. “Just leave it where it is.”

Cole nodded, putting his hands in his lap. His body was growing tenser with each passing second; the music and Ava’s reaction and the whole f*cked-up scenario were fighting with everything he knew to be true.

‘Things don’t work like this,’ his mind observed. ‘It doesn’t make sense...’

Oliver watched him, his blue eyes dark like deep waters. He seemed heavier than usual; his light good humour was gone. There was no more chatter about the weather or his tour or random quotes, just pensive seriousness.

“Are you okay with this?” he asked. “You can leave if you want to, Cole. No one’s making you stay here.”

Ava lifted her eyes, face drawn.

“Cole?”

“No, no, it’s fine,” he mumbled. “Really... I want to do this.” His voice shook, but he wanted it to be true.

Oliver reached out for Ava’s cup a moment later, his attention falling onto her.

“Make a wish,” he said, taking her hands in his. “Then turn the cup clockwise three times.”

Ava closed her eyes, her face becoming serious and focused. After a few seconds, she turned the cup once… twice… and a third time.

The breath caught in Cole’s throat leaving him gaping like a fish out of water.

‘Not REAL!’

“When I read tea leaves,” her father explained, “it’s like getting a shadow of something from the future. Nothing’s ever set. It’s only ripples of what can be. You know what that means, right?”

“You always have a choice about it,” Cole answered tightly.

“Exactly,” the older man said with a nod, then turned back to Ava. “Alright,” he said, “let’s begin.”

Cole watched as he turned the cup over, his eyes drawn to the interior of the vessel and the splotches of black leaves swirling up in a line from the bottom. Cole wasn’t sure what he expected – some kind of incantation, or for him to suddenly start talking in Edgar Cayce’s voice – but instead it was very much how Oliver Brooks always was. They might as well have been in the coffee shop downtown, for all that he had changed. His tone was quiet and rough, same as always, and he chuckled lightly as he picked up the cup.

“Well, you’ve got your wish,” he said, shaking his head and trying not to smile, “but I don’t know why you wasted a wish on it... I could’ve told you that’d happen anyhow. God, Ava, you just have to look at the two of you to know that—”

“Dad!” Ava yelped, her cheeks flushing.



Cole dropped his chin, fighting down the urge to smile. He wondered if she’d wished what he’d hoped she’d wished… and imagining what it would mean for them both. The noose of panic loosened slightly, and he brought his attention back to the cup in Oliver’s hands.

“Sorry,” Oliver said, scratching his forehead. For a moment, he grinned at Cole, then pulled his eyes back to the cup. “Alrighty then... let’s see... let’s see... the very bottom of the cup is happening right about now...” As he spoke, he gestured with his baby finger, not touching the leaves, but pointing them out as he went. “... and it looks like you’ve made some big decisions lately. Things that’ll affect the rest of your life.”

“The National Gallery,” Ava prompted, but her father lifted his hand, stilling her words.

“Don’t help, please... makes it harder...” he muttered, frowning. “No... no... this is a person. Someone tall, with longish hair. I can see you and Cole... and this guy – pretty sure it’s a man – standing just off from the side of the two of you. Cole has no time for him. See here?”

He gestured again to a splotch.

“They have a conflict... it’s you, Ava... you know him, somehow... but this guy here... this other guy, not Cole, he’s got a whole different path leading off from him. You might’ve gone that way, I think, maybe at a different time. But in the last few weeks you’ve decided something, severed those ties, made some decision that had changed all that. It’s unravelled it as a choice... he’s going away now. That’s a good choice. Everything after that point becomes clearer based on the decision. You and Cole here, see?”

Ava had already told Cole about the meeting with Kip when she was shopping with Suzanne. Remembering it, the hair on Cole's arm prickled with apprehension.

‘Her dad might’ve already known that...’ his mind hissed, but he couldn’t dispel his rising trepidation. ‘But why would she tell him...?’

His thought went no further; Oliver was talking again. Cole’s heart was pounding harder with every word. It felt like the floor beneath him was moving, his balance unsettled like a boat on the choppy sea.

“So as the cup goes up, you can see it heading into the future. The next year is very busy. There’s a trip coming up; I can see you snorkeling.” He squinted, pulling the cup nearer. “The Caribbean maybe? I’m not sure, but I see a sea turtle. Anyhow, there’re all sorts of family-related items too. There’s a woman here – looks like she’s a writer or something.” Oliver laughed. “The image here is of a pile of books on a desk... maybe not a writer... perhaps a librarian? But anyhow, she becomes important to you, Ava... and to Cole too.

“There’s an older man there too – not me – but he’s important too. There’s a symbol next to him: it’s a flag. He’s sort of a father figure, I’d say, but I think he has something to do with Cole more than you... though there’s conflict there too. Good Lord, there’s a whole mess of it! Just awfully muddy in this one part of the cup... shadows around the two of them... Cole and this man... so much anger...”

For a moment, Oliver stopped talking and looked at his daughter, voice growing serious.

“I don’t want you worrying about it,” he said, “the conflict isn’t because of you, Ava. Don’t think that. It’s just that there’ll be some moments when you need to step in, and you should be ready for it. It’s going to be a hell of a fight... but I think you’re up to it.”

He winked. Across from him, Cole’s eyes darted to his own upside-down cup, wondering what Oliver would see in his future.

‘Cold calling...’ his mind whispered, but the voice inside was less sure than before.

“You’ve got big events coming next summer... graduation, of course: here’s a cap and placard... but there’s also money in this cup: dragons and good fortune.” He chuckled. “God help me, but I think you might actually be able to support yourself on this Arts degree.” He laughed and Ava giggled, and then his voice settled back into its regular pattern.

“There’s a show at a gallery... and yes, it’s probably the National Gallery, but then I knew that anyhow.” He frowned, leaning closer. Cole found himself leaning in, too. “I want you to be watching for someone that night. This sounds foolish, but this image I’m getting is a mandarin orange – whatever that means – who knows, could be nothing. But there’s someone there, and he’s really, really important, Ava. Remember that. For some reason, that’s the image I’m getting with him. An orange.”

Ava nodded. In the other room, the music had shifted to another song, low and plaintive.

“Whoever it is, he’ll be a kind of mentor to you. Next to him is a plane... and more dragons, and a map of the far East... and that’s almost at the top of your cup. Perhaps a trip or a show... everything leading into the future... And more dragons... everything just leading up and away from there. There’s Cole there too. He’s standing next to you. The two of you together.”

Oliver sighed tiredly, turning the cup over and over again in the palm of his hand. Cole let out a relieved sigh, his hands unclenching.

“Now, we could stop here,” her father said, “or we could go forward another year...” his voice grew quiet. “But I don’t want to do either.”

Next to Cole, Ava straightened up in concern.

“Why?” she asked warily.

“Well, here’s the thing,” he said, gesturing to the bottom of the cup. “There’re all these swirls in your teacup. Things I’ve never seen before... like knots of rope or seaweed... snarled... not troubles, per se, but some kind of links to you... and they’re all coming from the very bottom of your cup. All of them tethered together.”

Oliver cleared his throat, his fingers covering his mouth for a moment, brushing over his lips distractedly.

“I don’t know, Ava,” Oliver muttered, “but I’d almost say that what happened to you tonight with Cole’s sculpture had nothing to do with what’s going on with you right now at all.”

“What do you mean?” she asked, fear creeping into her words.

Cole glanced into the cup, and sure enough, the bottom was a web of swirling lines... almost like Ava’s painting of the snake and the coins. These threads reached up from the bottom, touching bits and parts of the other images.

Entangling them...

“If it’s okay with you,” Oliver said, “I’d like to do a reading from your past, rather than your future.”