We made a sign on a piece of cardboard because that was all we could find. FREE TAROT! We couldn’t write more because the piece of cardboard was small. “It looks like one of our target’s signs,” I said.
“It does look shitty,” she said, “but we’re not charging so what do they expect?”
“Good point.”
“Okay, Nan, you’re my first client. Come come.”
“Great, let me just take off my”—and right as I said jacket, a young girl with braces took a seat across from Ana. She bounced in the chair and set her twiggy elbows on the table.
“Oh my God,” she said. “I am so excited. Are you going to tarot me?”
Ana was professional. She chose the client over me. “Yes, yes I am,” she said, in a deeper and more prophetic-sounding version of her yoga teacher voice.
The girl couldn’t seem to stop bouncing. And she couldn’t seem to stop rubbing her face or checking her leopard print phone while Ana shuffled the cards. I was surprised when, between her bouncing and rubbing and checking, the girl noticed me staring at her and said, “Hi.”
I promptly returned my gaze to the massage chairs. One person was getting a massage now—a large man. All I could see was the back of his Dallas Cowboys shirt. The maybe Japanese masseur kneaded his shoulders, swaying with his eyes closed like he was playing a piano.
“What’s your name?” Ana asked the girl.
Breathlessly she said, “Mandy.”
“Mandy,” Ana repeated ceremoniously, as though blessing the name. “Here’s how this works. You’re going to ask a question, and then you will choose three cards. So,” Ana shuffled the deck, “what is it you would like to know?”
Mandy bit her nail. She looked suspiciously left and right and then behind her. She scooted her chair closer to the table—so close that it pressed into her ribs—and whispered, “Are Trevor and I going to get back together?”
“Are Trevor and Mandy going to get back together?” Ana asked softly, sensing Mandy’s need for privacy around this issue. After a healthy pause, she said, “Pick your three cards and lay them facedown on the table.”
I pretended to look out at the drizzle while Mandy, who had become completely still, discerningly chose her cards. “They have your picture on them,” Mandy said seriously, as though this were an important piece of evidence she had collected.
“They do,” Ana confirmed, her voice maintaining its new baritone. She flipped the cards over.
“What do they mean?” Mandy was bouncing again. She tried to scoot closer, which was futile and probably bruising her ribs.
“This is your past, this is your present, and this is your future,” Ana said, tapping each card.
Mandy’s nail returned to her mouth.
“Your past is the ten of swords reversed. Did your relationship with Trevor end suddenly?”
Mandy rolled her eyes. “So suddenly,” she said. “It was seriously so sudden.”
“This card also suggests it was recent. Was it recent?”
“Twenty-two days ago,” Mandy said. And then more casually, “Like three weeks.”
“Your present card is the six of cups, which suggests you might still be thinking about Trevor, possibly a lot. A lot of your attention is focused on Trevor right now, and you are feeling lonely.”
“So lonely.” Mandy scrunched her face. “I feel like a hermit crab.”
“And your future,” Ana went on. “Ah, the emperor. This is good. This means you will overcome your feeling of loneliness. The past card mirrors the time frame of the future card, so if you broke up twenty-two days ago, you can expect to feel less lonely in about twenty-two days.”
Mandy sighed. “So does that mean we’re going to get back together in about twenty-two days?”
Ana chuckled. “Why don’t you tell me a little more about Trevor, and then I can tell you how it might unfold.”
“Cool,” Mandy said, bruising her ribs again, “because my friends are so sick of hearing about it. So Trevor and I are in history together, and one day he asked me out. As, like, a group thing.” Mandy went on to explain that she and Trevor had spent a few weeks exchanging super-sweet texts and making out. Then, they had sex—her first time—and the next day he told her he couldn’t be “tied down” right now—Mandy said this with angry air quotes—because he was only fifteen and he had his whole life ahead of him.
Ana, like a good therapist, became completely invested in Mandy’s long story. Then, like a good businesswoman, when she saw the line of people growing behind Mandy and knew it should be someone else’s turn now—Mandy had been there for twenty minutes—she took Mandy’s hands to calm her and said, “Mandy, don’t settle for the crumbs when you can have the cookie.”
At this, Mandy’s face went slack. “Oh my God,” she said, “Trevor is the crumbs.”
“Trevor is the crumbs,” Ana repeated knowingly.
“Whoa.” Mandy was still dumbfounded. “Thank you so much. Can I give you a hug?”
“Sure,” Ana said, but before she could get up, Mandy had darted around the table to squeeze the life out of Ana’s blond head.
“You totally changed my life today,” Mandy said, squeezing harder.
Ana patted Mandy’s back. “Mandy, your future is so, so bright.”
Mandy smiled and checked her phone with a satisfied sigh. Then she fearlessly walked into the rain without an umbrella.
“This was such a good idea, Nan,” Ana whispered, looking toward me but not at me because we were pretending I wasn’t a part of this.
“I agree,” I whispered back. I was moved. Ana may have just saved a girl from years of eating crumbs.
“Next,” Ana said, her voice cutting through the rain.
It was amazing the things people divulged. Sandra, the muscular bulimic woman, wanted to know if she would ever stop bingeing and purging. A very old and barely mobile woman named Dee opened her purse and said, “I just stole this,” glancing furtively at the fruit stand a few stalls over. Her sticky fingers were so impulsive! But they were ruining her conscience. Would she become more honest anytime soon?