The Ace of Cups [Open to All]

[overdrawing]

It's Mira's mother, he thinks. She's left things in the guest room for him in the past. Little things, really, like a packet of cookies or a book he's never been allowed to read. Today it's a deck of cards with a sticky note explaining that shuffling them might help his nervous fidgeting. He'd been pleased, tentatively grateful, until realizing that these hadn't been normal playing cards.

They had been Tarot cards.

Shuffling them helps, certainly. Gabe cuts the deck, cascades it, shuffles the cards back and forth constantly in his little corner at Quill while he waits for his shift to start at Finn's. In all his shuffling, he's been avoiding actually looking at the cards or the booklet with them to explains their meanings. They're occult, pagan...Wrong. He shouldn't look.

Then a card falls out and Gabe's breath catches in surprise. A golden goblet crowned with a dove. It looks like something he'd see in church except that it's on a tarot card. His brain tries to reconcile the familiar symbolism and he can't help it, paging through the booklet to find the Ace of Cups.

Ace cards always mean new beginnings. The Ace of Cups are a new beginning in one's emotional life, finding love, trust, and blessings. This is a card of happiness.

Gabe is pretty sure it wrong to feel this way, but it's comforting that this is the card that's fallen out.

Curious, he spreads the cards on the table and starts reading through their meanings.

[[Find him at Quill all by his lonesome]]

Comments

[meowhistory]

"Are those tarot cards? They're beautiful."

Oh, of course, they're probably something he's not allowed to breathe around or something. Lena remembers the vibe. "Just shuffle them? For how long?"

[overdrawing]

"Until I stop fidgeting and biting my nails and...all my other bad habits. Mira's mother thought that shuffling cards would help," Gabe says. "But I don't know why she chose tarot cards."

[meowhistory]

"Aha." Her camera is finally in its place again, and she flips her bag closed. "I was going to get some cof- you're not staying in the motel anymore?"

[overdrawing]

"No," Gabe says. He finds another meager scrap of smile. "I think I was kidnapped. Very politely."

[meowhistory]

"What?"

She sits down opposite him. "Your parents? No, I don't think your parents, you wouldn't still be here if it were your parents ..are you okay?"

[overdrawing]

Gabe shakes his head rapidly. "No I mean. Mira was very insistent about letting me stay in her guest room but...at least I can pay for the space now. I have a job."

[meowhistory]

That was a no to being okay, but Lena was kind of sure that that was Gabe's state of being. "Mira is the astronomy girl, right? She's very caring about everyone, as far as I know. And a job done, well done!"

[overdrawing]

"I wash dishes at the pub, bus tables." A funny job for a teetotaler who's never had a sip of alcohol in his life, but it keeps him on his feet for hours until he can't think.

"I can't just freeload."

[meowhistory]

"You got a job quicker than me. Congratulations, Gabe. Really. Does it feel nice, providing for yourself?"
Both Lena's parents had always stressed the importance of taking care of yourself. To have her wander around months after being turned human again.. It made her feel a little bit lazy.

[overdrawing]

"I'm not really providing for myself." Mira's parents won't even let him pay rent, though he tries to make up for it by doing dishes where he can. Between his work and what little he can do at the house, his hands are ruined and aching worse than ever.

"I make minimum wage."

[meowhistory]

"Still m-" On the path of depressing train again. Lena sighs. "Yes, let's not get into that discussion, before the entire student population of this country chips in with their opinion. It's still something, Gabe."

[overdrawing]

Gabe nods, mumbling an apology when he realizes he's said the wrong thing. "It's not a hard job, at least. I'm already used to lots of dishes and laundry."

[meowhistory]

"Don't apologise." Lena feels like one big clumsy monster around this guy. "It was a comment about our economic society, not how you were ruining the entire world. You're not really used to discussion or debate, are you?"

[overdrawing]

"Of course not!" Gabe says. He'd been raised with the understanding that, after God, his parents were the ultimate authority for him to obey. It was, after all, the fourth commandment. "We had prayer and family talks but...that was all."

Wasn't that how it was supposed to be?

[meowhistory]

"Every argument you would use would be ..'The Bible says so'? I'm not trying to be mean, Gabe, I'm just - my mind is reeling. You're like a little ch-" Now she was bullying him.

"Sorry, I'm sorry. I'm going to get my coffee and I'll leave you to your cards."

[overdrawing]

A child. That's what she thinks of him. Nineteen isn't old but neither is he a child.

"The Bible is the ultimate authority, isn't it? God's word." How can he say what he knows is right and yet feel so stupid. "Isn't that the...the truth?"

[meowhistory]

"Is it your truth?" Lena thinks of her coming out as not-straight, how she never really believed in a God or wanted to support one that allowed so many horrible things. "Because it isn't mine. And as long as you're not among those that aren't likeminded, you may have to start gathering arguments that both sides can agree on."

[overdrawing]

"But what other truth is there?" Gabe's not sure what to feel, besides confused, afraid. What he should feel is certain, bound strictly to the moral realities of his religion. So why do they feel so flimsy now?

[meowhistory]

Lena honestly shouldn't be doing this without coffee around. "Yours? The one you discovered through reading and research and experience? Children say " because I said so", y- fundamentalist believers say "because He says so". There is no support, no.. It's not an argument or motivation,just an empty shell. To me."

[overdrawing]

"But that's not right," Gabe protests, distress clear on his face as his brain short circuits. "There is only one truth. That's why it's The Truth."

In front of him, his glass of water starts to vibrate, unnoticed in his distress.

[meowhistory]

"Gabe .." She crosses her arms, uncrosses them. "Forget about it. You are not alone, there are millions of people thinking like you. I'm a heathen, never mind. Don't listen to me."

[overdrawing]

If he's supposed to be the one that's right, why does Gabe feel so uncertain and terrible? Saying that out loud means admitting to his fears and his short-circuiting face.

He doesn't notice the crack that appears in the side of his water glass.

"I don't think you're...I mean that word means savage. You're not."

[meowhistory]

"It does? I didn't know that." There's something in the corner of her eye, demanding her attention, and Lena sees a crack in his glass. "Oh, careful. I think they accidentally gave you a cracked glass. Better return it and warn them, glass cuts are no joke."

[overdrawing]

Gabe flinches when she points out the crack because he knows it hadn't been there before. The water ripples in the cracked glass and Gabe tries not to think about the shattered glasses at Finn's pub.

The crack deepens.

"Must be weak glass."

[meowhistory]

"Weak glass?" She looks at him. Something's very off here. Lena has been living in Siren Cove long enough to know there was always the possibility of there being another layer to things.

"Really?"