Chapter Nine

In Which Our Protagonist Feels Like the College Kid at the High School Party

M onday afternoon comes way too soon for my liking and, before I know it. I’m back at Darla’s incredibly witchy-looking trailer. The pig family is settled in directly on the walking path that leads to the picnic table. I watch in amusement as every teenager entering the yard circles around the pigs, doing their best not to disturb them.

Once we’re all assembled, Darla pulls out a small tray and begins dropping a familiar white box in front of each student. As she walks around the outer edge of the picnic table, Frigg, the not-so-tiny piglet of the pig family, hovers dangerously close to her feet.

“Frigg, you little menace, I don’t have any food. Go sit with Chad.”

Chad lifts his head, hopeful for a moment, only to drop it when he realizes there’s no food either. Porshetta, Frigg’s mom, snores contently in the sun, ignoring us all for her afternoon beauty sleep.

When Darla first brought up the apprenticeship, I imagined something entirely different–a cauldron brewing deep in the forest or late night hours where we learned by the light of the moon, but no. Shania killed that hopeful thought immediately. According to her, since the vast majority of people in their apprenticeship are teenagers, lessons have to be squeezed in between various sports practice schedules, dance team, and marching band.

As expected, I’m the lone weirdo here–a good ten years older than most everyone else.

“Don’t open the boxes until I tell you. I’m Darla, if you didn’t already know, and I’ll be teaching you divination and various introductory skills for your apprenticeship. I want everyone to go around the table, tell us your name, what type of witch you think you are, and a boring fact about yourself.” She starts at the opposite end of the table from me, motioning to a girl with glossy dark hair straight out of a shampoo commercial to start. Between the dark hair and perfect teeth, I’d guess she’s definitely a dance team or cheerleader kid.

“I’m Mariah. I come from a long line of water witches. And my boring fact is I’m cheer captain this year.”

“That’s not a boring fact,” says a girl directly across from her. Both girls have the same eyes and the same adorable nose. The second girl rolls her eyes, readjusting her glasses as she sits tall. “She said a boring fact, Mariah, not a bragging fact.”

“It’s not bragging. It’s boring because everybody knows.”

“It is bragging,” insists the girl in glasses.

“Darla might not know. That lady might not,” Mariah argues back. I try not to snort at being referred to as “that lady.”

“Ladies,” Darla interrupts, “let’s keep going.”

The person next to Mariah is a tall boy named Aiden. “Aiden. My family is all Earth witches, and I hate beans.”

Darla nods approvingly before nodding to the next kid. “Geneva. Earth witch, too, and I am exactly the same height and weight as my mom.”

Next to Geneva is the girl who argued with Mariah. She looks directly at Mariah as she speaks. “Mackenzie, water witch, and my boring fact is that Mariah’s my pain in the ass big sister.”

“Quit being a bitch,” Mariah retorts.

“You quit being a bitch. I’m not the one bragging to everyone when I was asked to give a boring fact.”

“No, but you are the one looking dumb by making a big deal out—”

“Ladies,” Darla interrupts. She nods in my direction. “Sarah, I don’t know what kind of witch I am…maybe fire? My boring fact is I’m adopted.”

“Why do you think you’re a fire witch?” the girl at my side asks. She’s making her way through a peanut butter sandwich with absolutely nothing to drink. It’s honestly impressive. I could never.

“Uh, well, like I said, I’m adopted. I didn’t know I was a witch, but I was at–” Darla shoots me a warning look and I duck my head so she doesn’t see me smile. “I was at work and a guy got a little too touchy-feely and, well, I accidentally cast ethereal fire on him.”

The girls at the table look impressed. “Darla saved him with the counterspell. After he was gone, she suggested I might be a witch and that I should do an apprenticeship with you guys, so here I am.”

“But you don’t know for sure?” the quiet girl asks.

“I know for sure,” Darla interrupts before I can answer. “Your turn,” she tells my interrogator.

“I’m Alyssa. I’m a nature witch. I like butterflies.” Alyssa’s voice is so soft and quiet, I doubt anyone else but Darla and I heard her. She is definitely not part of the cool kids’ club like the rest of these kids are. The clothes she wears are faded, her shirt is way too big. Her long brown hair falls mostly in her face, as if it’s going to hide her from the world. She balls up the baggie that held her sandwich and pulls out another one.

“Alright, let’s get started. Go ahead and open the box of cards I’ve given each of you. This is the only deck you’ll be given. If you lose it, you’ll need to hunt down someone ahead of you in their apprenticeship and get their deck.” All around me, the crinkle of plastic seems incredibly loud as the kids unwrap their decks and open up the plain, slender box.

“Is this a Tarot deck?” Geneva asks. “I already have my own.” She pulls out a deck from her backpack and holds it up for Darla to see.

“The K-Pop Tarot Deck? What is K-Pop?” Darla turns to me to translate teenager. She’s got the wrong person, but this is one thing I’ve got covered.

“Korean pop music...you know, like boy and girl bands but from Korea,” I answer. “The music might not be your thing, but you really should check out the K-Dramas. You’d love them. The girls and I watch them backst–back in our, uh, living room.”

Darla takes the box from her and studies it. It’s covered in drawings that look like they came from a manga. “Hmmm,” she says finally. “Well if that deck calls to you, you should use it, but we won’t be using the Tarot here. Not yet. If you decide to specialize in divination, you can always come back to me and we can work on your Tarot skills with it, but your apprenticeship is about getting a good general overview of the witch arts in a short amount of time. We’ll be using a deck I created for that called the Choracle.”

Geneva puts the deck back in her bag as everyone dumps out their deck onto the table in front of them.

“Is this that pig over there? The handsome one?” Mackenzie asks, holding up her deck of cards. On the back of each of the cards is an illustration of a pig that looks suspiciously like Chad.

“Yes, of course it is. It’s the Choracle: the Chad Oracle.” Darla tells us, as if it’s obvious.

Skepticism crosses the face of every kid sitting at the table. Mariah goes to open her mouth only to be kicked under the table by Mackenzie. If Darla notices, she completely ignores it.

“Now,” Darla continues, “I’ve included a few cards in the deck that have specific spreads–Chad’s spread and Porshetta’s spread. I expect you to have those memorized by the end of the week.“

“With this deck?” Geneva asks.

Darla nods. “Yep. By the time you leave here, you should be able to pick up any oracle deck and be able to give a decent reading–even if divination isn’t your strong suit. Your first steps right now are to look through each face card and read the information I’ve written on each one. We’ll be looking at how the picture and information are connected later this week and how to use that in your readings. Tonight, when you go home, you’ll need to create a pouch or bag out of natural materials for your deck, then sleep with it under your pillow.”

“Can I use paper?” Adrian asks.

“Will paper survive under your pillow? Will it keep your cards safe?”

He sighs, “No, Darla.”

“Then there’s your answer. Alright, look through the deck. Take a second to see how each picture relates to the words written along the outer edges of the cards.”

Much more dutifully than I remember being at the age, the baby witches all begin looking through their decks. Mackenzie even takes out a notebook and begins to take notes for each card. Everyone seems focused on the task, while I am utterly lost.

“Why aren’t you studying your cards?” Alyssa asks quietly.

“I don’t know what I’m supposed to be looking for,” I whisper back.

She sets the cards with the spreads down next to me. “These are the spreads. When you read for someone, you put the cards down in a certain order depending on what you want to know. You see this one? Chad’s spread.”

I nod.

“It’s simple, so it’s like it says on the card, when you’ve got a lot of choices, but you want to narrow it down. So you ask it a question…what should I do with my life, then draw two cards.” She hasn’t mixed up the cards, but she puts the next two cards down, anyway. A picture of Chad standing on a stack of blankets is on a card titled “Acceptance.” Next to it is a card with a picture of Chad approaching a fancy chair with the title “Necessity.” “If this was a real reading, I’d look at these cards and try to interpret what they mean in my life. What would acceptance in my future mean for me?”

This kid is way too smart for me. I nod.

“What would it mean for you?” she asks.

I have to think about that. “I’m not sure. Probably growing up and getting a steady job with insurance and stuff. What about you?”

She sighs. “It would mean this,” she says, motioning around her.

“This?” I ask, not sure what she’s talking about.

“Living in the trailer park forever.”

I’m about to press because I can’t help myself when Darla asks us to pause what we’re doing and focus on her. Alyssa pulls out her third peanut butter sandwich. God, to have the metabolism of a teenager.

We spend the rest of the afternoon analyzing the cards. To my surprise, the kids are pretty astute with their observations. Even Mariah “I’m not bragging about being cheer captain” has some insightful things to say about the connections between the pictures and the words.

“It’s getting late, and y’all,” she looks at me and grins, “well, most of y’all have homework. Tonight, you’ll need to start working on your pouches. Even if you don’t get it done, you need to put your deck under your pillow. That deck needs to make it back here tomorrow. We’ll be working on card divination for the next few weeks. Until then, make good choices.”

The kids begin to gather up their belongings. Only Alyssa lingers. As the last of the kids hurries off, Darla pulls out a shopping bag from under the table and hands it to her. “If you need anything else, let me know, okay?”

Alyssa nods and hurries off with the bag.

I’m about to ask what that’s all about when Darla turns to me with a smile. “How do you feel now that you’ve been to your first session?”

“Old, so very old.”

Darla laughs. “It’ll get easier as you get to know them better.”

“Yeah, Alyssa was a big help. I’ll be honest, I don’t know anything about divination or tarot.”

She smiles, “Don’t worry, stick with us another few weeks and you’ll be an expert.”

I bet I’ll be an expert in being old and out of touch, but I just smile. It’s kind of her, but there’s no way I’m going to wrap my head around being a witch in the next few weeks but we can pretend.