The Lie of Love (6 page)

‘Still want to see what your
future holds?’ Storm smiled as Darcy went over to thank her, yet again.

‘I’ve got a feeling it holds a
rush home and some slapdash attempt at dinner followed by a moody husband who
was expecting some culinary delight,’ Darcy joked. ‘I’m not sure I need cards
to tell me that much.’

‘What are you afraid of?’ Storm
asked. The smile had gone from her face and the woman that peered out from
under the heavy fringe was an altogether more calculating and formidable
prospect. Was this the real Storm, Darcy wondered. Had the hapless hippy been a
front, to lull people into a false sense of security so she could stealthily
unlock their souls for the reading?

‘Nothing,’ Darcy faltered. ‘I’ve
just never really been into all this stuff. I shouldn’t say that to you,’ she
added with an uneasy laugh, ‘of all people. Not when you’ve been so kind to me
today.’

‘Then indulge me and sit down. I
don’t bite and perhaps I can change your views on
all this stuff
…’

Darcy gave a stiff smile and
glanced across at Amanda. No rescue was coming from that quarter, she decided,
as her friend seemed to be engrossed in a deep and meaningful conversation with
Rachel.  Doing her best to engineer a liaison between her and Harry, no
doubt, Darcy thought.  She turned back to Storm.
‘What
the hell… why not?’
She took a seat across from her, hands twisted
together on her lap.

Storm handed her the deck of
cards. ‘You must shuffle them.’

‘Me?’

‘It’s a way that the cards can
get to know you.’

‘That sounds a bit strange.’
Darcy took the pack and clumsily began to separate the cards, filing each one
back in a different place as she went. She somehow didn’t imagine her card
shuffling looked quite like the deft movement she had witnessed on so many TV
shows over the years.

‘No stranger than training a
phone to recognise your voice.’

Darcy shrugged. ‘I suppose not.
Although my phone never seems to get it right so I gave up on voice
commands after the first few attempts.’

‘Put the pack on the table, face
down,’ Storm said.

Darcy did as she was asked and
looked up for further instructions.

‘Now cut the deck in half and
think about what question you want answered.’

‘I’m not sure I want anything
answered.’

‘There must be something,’ Storm
smiled. ‘Some endeavour that you worry about, some outcome that you wish you
could see more clearly. For example, what about the reason I’m here today?’

Darcy did as she asked. It came
as a shock to her that the question she would have thought was the most obvious
one, the one that Storm had suggested, did not spring into her mind, but
another one, one that had no business being there. Somehow, it had just planted
itself and would not budge. She decided there and then that it was a question
too dangerous to know the answer to and she would take no notice of whatever
Storm told her.

‘Lay out three cards. Keep
thinking of your question. Yours will probably be my most accurate reading of
the day,’ Storm said as she watched Darcy. ‘It’s nice and quiet here now and it
got a bit hard to concentrate earlier on with all the yakking from the corner.’

‘We could have got you a quieter
spot…’ Darcy began.

Storm shook her head. ‘I managed
just fine. Nobody had anything particularly taxing to ask anyway.’

‘How do you know? They don’t ask
out loud, do they?’

‘No. But the answer on the cards
tells me what they asked – at least, I get the gist of it.’

Darcy wondered if she had gone as
pale as she felt. She wished dearly that she could have got that bad, wrong,
dangerous question out of her head as she cut her cards. ‘I think I should cut
again. I don’t think I was focused on the question properly when I did it last
time.’

Storm
turned over the first card and then looked up at Darcy with a slow smile. ‘I think
you were focusing just fine. Although it’s not the question I expected you to
ask either.’

Darcy couldn’t get the tarot reading out of her head. All
thoughts of what the event had really meant were pushed to the back of her mind
as she negotiated the twisting hills out of the town and home. Storm had said
that a rift was coming, and a choice. Darcy almost fainted when she turned over
the Death card, until Storm told her that it really didn’t mean death at all,
but that some huge change that was imminent. The thought of that was almost
more terrifying than Darcy’s own more literal interpretation. Every card told
the same story: of an event that would change her life forever, an event that
would tear it apart and hurl it out of orbit.  What it meant more
specifically, Storm couldn’t say, and that was even more unsettling. Did she
really know and wanted to spare Darcy the pain, or was she telling the truth?
 The one comfort that she did offer was that Darcy could influence the
outcome herself. The future was not written in stone, she said, and Darcy’s
actions could force any one of a number of futures into being. That much, to
Darcy, seemed obvious. Perhaps, she told herself as her mind ran over the day
for the umpteenth time, she was placing too much stock in something that really
was as arbitrary as what amounted to a pack of laminated, mass produced
pictures with about as much psychic ability as the sausages she was planning to
cook for supper. She tried to focus on the positives of the day: with extra donations
and what the psychic event had brought in, they had made over four hundred
pounds. Amanda had taken it to put into the special bank account they had
opened – Darcy just didn’t trust herself not to lose it or accidentally use
some if it was lying around the house, thinking it was hers.  It was
important to keep everything above board, so they had counted their takings in
the presence of the proprietor of The Sugar Cube, and Amanda would return in
the morning with a payment receipt showing that she had paid the whole lot into
the bank account so that it could be witnessed. They had agreed that it was the
way to go for all their events where they could, so that everything was as
transparent as it could be. The bank account couldn’t be accessed without special
permission and proof that the money was needed for something connected to the
cause – like an invoice from the US
hospital where they hoped Sophie would have her surgery.  At times like
these, Darcy couldn’t help but reflect on how lucky she was to have Amanda; her
friend was worth her weight in expensive perfume and designer dress jewellery.
 

Closing the front door behind her
with a sigh, Darcy was about to unset the burglar alarm when she realised that
it wasn’t set. She had either forgotten or someone had beaten her home,
although it was only just gone two. The kids weren’t due to be picked up for
another hour and
Ged
was
supposed to be at work. She almost jumped out of her skin when his voice came
from the living room. 

‘Is that you, light of my life?’

‘
Ged
!
You nearly gave me a heart attack. I thought we
had intruders.’ Darcy followed the voice and found him sitting in a chair with
his feet up on a stool reading the morning papers.

‘Intruders?
Would they get in-
tru-der-window
?’

‘Very funny.’
Darcy kicked his feet from the stool and perched on the end of it. ‘What are
you doing home?’

‘That’s a nice welcome.’

‘Seriously.
You don’t look ill.’

‘I forgot some drawings so I
nipped back for them.’

‘You’re reading the newspaper.’

‘I know. I thought I’d grab my
break here instead of at work, seeing how I’d come all this way…. so, how was
the psychic?’

Darcy
beamed,
certain he would be pleased with her first efforts. ‘We made over four hundred
pounds today.’

‘
Yay
… only another forty-four thousand, six hundred to go.’
Ged’s
voice dripped with
sarcasm.

‘I can count,’ Darcy shot back,
her tone matching his. ‘We have raffle money to add to that, don’t forget. And
we’ve only just started;
there’s lots
to do over the
next few months.’

‘Hmmm.’
Ged
buried his head back in the paper. ‘Some kid
called Harry Simmons phoned here after you.’

‘Oh, Julia’s son,’ Darcy said,
glad that
Ged
was now
reading the paper. She was certain she was blushing and just hoped her voice
sounded neutral enough not to arouse his suspicion. ‘Julia Simmons… you
remember her?’

‘Not especially,’
Ged
replied without looking up.
‘Should I?’

‘I used to have a little bit to
do with her…
PTA
stuff at Jake’s school.
I haven’t seen her for a few years
though. But we ran into her and she’s helping out with the fundraising. I did
tell you.’

‘Probably,’
Ged
agreed carelessly. ‘You tell me a lot of stuff.’

‘Well, Harry is organising a
Lifeguard Olympics to raise money.’

There was a guffaw from behind
the paper.
‘
Lifeguard Olympics
?
Is it like
Lyme’s answer to Baywatch? If it is I’d pay to see it.’

‘I don’t know,’ Darcy answered, a
defensive note creeping into her tone. ‘But you don’t turn down an offer of
help, no matter how lame it sounds… besides, I happen to think it’s a fantastic
idea.’

‘Yeah, I’m sure it is. His number
is on the pad.’

Darcy got up to find the message
pad.

‘Oh,
Darc
,
there’s some money in a tin on the mantelpiece. I sold some raffle tickets at
work.’

Darcy pulled down the paper and
kissed him on the head. ‘I knew you cared really.’

‘Just don’t tell everyone, I
don’t want people thinking I’ve gone soft.’

‘Your secret is safe with me.’

Ged’s
paper went back up to hide the grin that was
spreading across his face. Darcy went to the phone table and ripped the top
page from the pad. She stared at the number. It was a mobile number, not the
Simmons’ house number as she had thought it would be. The idea caused a strange
kick of excitement in her guts. She shook herself, feeling ridiculous. Her gaze
travelled to
Ged
, half
obscured by the
Independent
.  He could be a pain but he deserved
her loyalty, didn’t he?

‘I’ll call the house, speak to
Julia. I’m more likely to get him there anyway.’

There was
nothing more than a grunt from
Ged
in reply. Darcy wondered if he had even been listening to her.  She
checked her watch. There wasn’t really time to do anything before the school
run except grab a quick glass of juice and put the recycling out. Whatever
phone call she made, it would just have to wait.

No matter how many times Darcy squeezed her eyes shut tight
and tried to empty her mind, no matter how many times she plumped her pillow,
turned it over, kicked
Ged
to break the steady snore
that rolled from his throat, sleep wouldn’t come. She looked at the clock on the
bedside cabinet yet again, and the digital display showed
3AM
in mocking red digits. Only twenty minutes had passed
since the last time she had looked and yet it felt like a year.

It was rare to see the house so
utterly still and quiet, and as Darcy made her way down to the kitchen, she
could almost imagine it had somehow been frozen in time.  She couldn’t
remember the last time she had drank a plain glass of milk, she reflected as
she poured herself one, but it tasted good, like the only thing that was right
for the mood she found herself in. Not since Sophie had first been diagnosed
had she felt so vulnerable, so lost, only this time she couldn’t put her finger
on what had dragged those old fears to the surface.  All the things that
had happened that day – the tarot reading, the phone message from Harry,
Ged’s
apparent disinterest in the event – seemed to point
to a runaway train on a path to disaster. Only now it was too late; she had
already boarded. She didn’t even know where this idea had come from, but she
couldn’t shake it.  She had phoned the Simmons’ house and spoken to Julia,
who told her that Harry was out and not answering his mobile anyway (she didn’t
know where but was fairly certain large amounts of alcohol would be involved)
but she filled Darcy in on what she knew of his plans for his fundraiser
Olympics and they decided that an update was probably all he was phoning Darcy
for anyway. Nothing of note, nothing to cause her concern had happened for the
rest of the evening – dinner had been eaten without remark or thanks, as
always, and Jake had fallen foul of
Ged’s
temper, as
he seemed to do every night lately, but Darcy had spent it in an uneasy and
sombre mood, more than those regular family events warranted. She was almost
glad when bedtime had come for the children so she could stop pretending mummy
was alright.

She had left the kitchen lights
off. Through the wooden slats of the kitchen blinds, a sliver of pearlescent
white peeked in, cutting through the gloom.  Darcy went over to open them
and the full disc of the moon branded itself on her eyes. It was the
fundraising, she told herself,
the
mountainous climb
she had set herself, that was making her doubt everything. And life would be
strange and challenging, she reminded herself as she stared up at the inky
night sky and sipped at her milk, but this was a path she had set now and
already too many people had committed to back out. Whatever the next few months
held, she had to go and face it head on.