Rose of China (Chapter Two)

Chapter 2.  

Kathy was out of breath by the time she found lot 56. She now knew the trailer park was a maze, not following any logical pattern. 

She held a dollar general bag in her hand: Two cans of green beans, a box of mashed potatoes, a can of carnation milk, butter and in the other hand, a four pack of Smirnoff. 

Lot 56 was a wonderful sight to behold. Pink flamingos in a flower bed, a bed bordered with purple bricks. Flowers of different sorts, windchimes hanging from hooks here and there. Lots of windchimes actually, and solar fixtures made of butterflies and other lovable creatures. A sign on the front bay window of the trailer read: ASTROLOGY, TAROT CARDS.

A small fountain with colorful rocks was the yard’s centerpiece. A red Tesla was parked in the drive. It had tinted windows and the headlights had eye blue lashes. The license plate read: FRTUNE. 

There was a deck with steps up to the main door. She walked up slowly, still catching her breath. She smelled fried catfish coming through the screen door. 

Kathy knocked quietly. She could see Anora inside the kitchen, holding a steel spatula, a joint hanging from her mouth. She turned at the knock and waved with her hips,“Come on in.”

Kathy entered as awkward girl of the year, transported back to High School. The inside of the trailer mirrored the outside, vastly decorative; Every space holding a mystery: knick knacks, cuckoo clocks, lights dangling, colors bursting, framed art, a lava lamp. 

“I really didn't think you were coming. People are always saying they will do something they don’t have the insight for.”

“Insight?” Kathy said, sitting the items on the counter. “I got the sides. I can cook the potatoes real quick. I got some–”

“Oh, I love these!” Anora said, grabbing one of the drinks, twisting the top by lifting up her shirt, revealing a flat stomach. She rumaged through the rest of the stuff, and chuckled.“I already made some tators, some real ones. Not this box stuff.”

Anora pulled a casserole dish from her oven, sitting it atop a dolly shaped like a cat’s behind. Mashed potato casserole, melted cheese. Green onions. “I used to be a chef–cooked for one of the best and well known country-style cooking restaurants in Chicago." She lit a cigarette and took a swig of the alcohol. “In another life. It's where I met my husband.”

“You’re married?”

“I was. He passed away–thankfully and left me with the insurance policy.”

“Oh,” said Kathy, sucking on her vape. 

The two sat down to a retro table in the kitchen, it overlooked the big bay window and ate. Kathy had to admit that maybe she did like catfish, or maybe it was the homemade cocktail sauce. She ate so much, embarrassed by the amount. “I can tell you really were a chef…” she said, taking another bite. 

“You bet. We won the Michelin award while I was there. They lost it as soon as I left. I ain’t bragging. Really the whole thing is rigged anyways, but it looks good on a resume.”

“Where do you work now?”

“You didn’t see the sign walking up? I am the only licensed astrologist in the area. So that, and I live off dead husbands.”

Kathy hit her vape. She found herself drawn to the woman in front her. The click clank of the bracelets on her arms, the over done glitter on her eye-lids, but also envious. 

Anora smiled, “So what about you?” Let me guess…” Anora tilted her head… “You clean hotels?”

Kahty felt her cheeks blush. “Uh no… I work at the school–the one close by. The elementary school. I am the custodian.”

Anora was pleased. “Okay not hotels, kids classrooms–so do you like it?”

Kathy could tell there was no judgement in Anora’s appraisal which made her relax. “Yeah, I mean…kind of…it's really easy. Low stress.” 

The conversation went on, with Anora insisting that Kathy get rid of the vape and smoke real cigarettes or don’t smoke at all. Artificial was always bad, she had said. Then she scolded her for not bringing the dog. Anora loved dogs and said they could have taken the dog to the pool to play fetch in the water. Said she used to own labs when she lived in Niagara Falls, New York, and man, oh, man did labs love to swim.

They moved outside to the patio where Anora said that the moon was full and that was the best time to do tarot cards, when the moon was full, and even better, under that same full moon. 

Kathy took in the garden at night. “It's magical…your yard–the little stones, the lights, everything.”

The windchimes clanked in the light breeze like wine glasses being cleaned and stacked side by side. The flamingos radiated a glaring pink under the moon’s shine. The solar butterflies burned a pretty blue. 

Anora smiled and Kathy wondered how someone who seemed to smoke so much could still have white teeth–or how despite her weight still have a stomach flat as an iron. “I love color! What can I say!?”

“Me too… I'm actually a painter. Well I mean I kind of paint.”

“If you paint, then you're a painter! I'd love for you to paint me something one day.”

Kathy felt uneasy. She was out of canvas. Her oils were dried up. She did have some watercolors left. Maybe some paper. “I can. I can paint you… a flamingo!”

Anora touched Kathy's cheek. “You are the sweetest thing!”

Kathy blushed for the tenth time that night, and in that moment made it her mission to paint Anora the most beautiful and grand flamingo anyone could dream to paint. 

Anora’s eyes danced like children at play as she pulled a deck of cards from a small wooden box with a black cat lounging on the cover. The cards had a celestial motif on them, stars and moons swirling in a dark soup. Kathy could tell the deck had been used liberally. “Let's do these cards.”

Kathy, not knowing a thing about Tarot cards, half heartedly held her right hand out. Anora took her left hand and placed it on the deck. Anora closed her eyes, and whispered, “Repeat after me: I promise to tell the truth and nothing but the truth.”

Kathy repeated as if she had suddenly found Christ and religious prayer. 

Anora spread the deck in her hand, holding it out like a fan. “Pick three.”

Kathy picked three cards, one from the very top, the last card, and a middle one. Anora laid the three cards on the table. Kathy noticed a mood ring on Anora’s ring finger with a gold band, a crown holding the stone. It was a deep green. 

Anora turned over the first card, “This is what you know.”

Eight of Swords. 

Kathy bit her lip. A woman was blindfolded and tied to a broken fence, her hands tied behind her back. She seemed complacent with the situation, no attempt to break free. Kathy tried to laugh, but it came out thin. “Looks like she’s in trouble.”

“She’s trapped,” Anora said, tracing the outline of the swords. “But here’s the thing—she isn’t tied tight. She could slip loose. If she could see. This card says you’ve been living like a prisoner long after the guard walked away.”

Kathy felt her left eardrum throb, an old injury. “Guard?”

“No judgment,” Anora said gently. “But it looks like you’ve stayed somewhere long past the point of it making sense, sweetheart. You know that.”

Kathy felt her throat close for a second. 

Anora turned the second card. “What you don’t know.”

The Tower. 

Kathy squinted her eyes at the startling image. A tower with flames coming from small windows, people flying out of them. 

Kathy frowned. “What does it mean?”

“Look at the card. You have this very stable brick tower and here comes this drastic storm that throws people out of their homes. It’s a card about destructive change, revelation–not a soft change, but abrupt, violent. Explosive.” Anora smiled. “Something in your life is going to change with the sharpness of a knife."

Kathy’s ear was ringing now. “Violent?”

Anora studied Kathy’s face. “You know I pulled this card a week before my last husband fell in a sink hole. Best day of my life.”

The wind picked up, making the windchimes scream. 

“Oh.”

Anora flipped the last card.

The Fool.

A young man wearing a dress with flowers poised at the edge of a cliff, a dog leaping at his heels as if to warn him of the descent ahead.  

“This,” Anora said with a soft smile that melted something inside Kathy, “is what you need to know.”

Kathy leaned forward. “That I’m a fool.”

Well, it takes a fool to have this level of courage, enough courage to walk this close to the edge. To take a leap of faith. But remember, you are the fool before you leap, but after the jump into something better, something more daring, you become the one who rose to the occasion! The success story!” Anora said, her voice ascending pitch. 

Anora touched the card lightly. “The Fool is a new beginning. No baggage. No past weighing you down. Just a leap of faith into the unknown, to something better.”

Kathy looked at the man on the card. The open sky. The clean air. The cliff that wasn’t a threat but an invitation.

“A leap,” Kathy repeated.

“A leap,” Anora echoed. “You don’t have to know where you’ll land. Only that you deserve to jump.”

Kathy’s throat tightened. She blinked fast, hoping the moonlight hid the sheen in her eyes.

The three cards lay between them on the small table.

Trapped. Collapse. Freedom.

A story told in symbols. A map, if she had the courage to follow it.

Anora reached out and tapped Kathy on her fat nose. “The cards are indifferent. They have no reason to lie. Something big is coming for you.”

Kathy didn’t move, even pausing her breath.

The windchimes sang. The flamingos glowed; the moon bearing witness to the whole thing. 

For the first time in years, Kathy felt the faintest tremor of possibility—like a hibiscus bloom opening toward the sun.