2. Tallus

2

Tallus

I t was late. I tidied the wine glasses and shut off the TV before heading down the hall to get ready for bed. More awake than expected, I curled under the covers with my phone and pulled up Madame Rowena’s Google reviews. The whole thing was ridiculous. I was not a believer in psychics, nor was I convinced spirits could attach themselves to people and cause them health problems, but Mac’s review about his sister piqued my interest in a different way.

His sister, like me, had been a longtime migraine sufferer. By the sound of it, she’d had a harder time dealing with them. I knew that pain. I knew how desperate a person could get when dealing with a bad episode.

But how bad did a person need to be to seek help from a psychic? It sounded like a last-ditch effort. I couldn’t fathom Amber had expected results, but she’d been willing to try anything. She’d paid the big bucks for several cleansing sessions—or whatever they were called.

Because I shared a bond with poor dead Amber and didn’t believe she had been lured over the balcony through mind control, I ended up venturing down a rabbit hole. It started with a Google search of natural remedies to cure migraines—the results were eye-rolling. Acupuncture, piercings, herbal concoctions, hypnosis, changes in diet. Some cures I’d read about in the past. Others were new to me and laughable.

Hitting too many dead ends, and because my morbid brain was drawn to stories about unexplained or unexpected deaths, I wound up searching for information about Amber’s suicide instead.

Mac’s review claimed his sister had killed herself last week . His review had been posted six weeks ago, on July eleventh, which meant Amber had died in the first week of July. I typed a search into Google using Amber’s first name, the month, year, and city of her death, and added the keywords suicide and balcony before hitting Enter. They were oddly specific search terms, and despite living among a population of millions, I got a hit right away.

Eighteen-year-old Amber Wells jumped from the fifteenth floor of her family’s apartment building.

I cringed reading the articles.

True enough, the reports about her death claimed Amber’s family and friends had seen a drastic change in her behavior in the weeks leading up to her death. Her mother said she’d become reclusive and moody. Withdrawn. Her best friend claimed she was distant and edgy. Her brother, Mackie, was ridiculed by the press for claiming his sister had been mind-controlled and that she would never kill herself.

Apart from her questionable mental health, there was nothing about her migraines. The story sounded like a tragic end to a suffering teenager’s life. Amber likely couldn’t deal with her chronic pain and ended things.

Not much mystery there.

Disappointed, I returned to Madame Rowena’s Google reviews and changed the filter to display three-star ratings. I figured it would eliminate the quacks on either end of the spectrum and give me something honest to work with. If my best friend was trusting this woman with his mind, I had to do my due diligence and be sure she wasn’t suckering him into some fraudulent scheme—which I already knew was the case. It was what these people did.

If I could find more proof that Memphis was wasting his time and money, maybe I could convince him to save his ninety-five bucks for our next shopping spree. Plus, I didn’t want this woman sweet-talking him into an unnecessary cleansing . It would drain his bank account even more, and I’d never hear the end of it. Memphis was gullible, and this woman seemed to pray on the weak and na?ve.

I found more claims to back up Mac’s voodoo theory. In fact, a surprising amount of people stated that Madame Rowena was able to get inside their heads.

I have to be honest. I was a nonbeliever when I made my appointment with Madame Rowena, but since seeing her a few times, I can honestly say I might be a newly devoted fan of her work. I had a lot of anxiety and negative thoughts after my marriage ended. I was spiraling into a deep depression and considered ending my life. Madame Rowena said it was due to a negative spirit that had latched onto my soul. It was sucking the positive energy from my body and leaving me depleted. In a few sessions, she successfully removed it, and I feel like a new man. I had no idea spirits could control you like that. But it worked. No more thoughts of suicide. No more toxic antidepressants. I was looking everywhere for answers, and I finally found them. Three stars because two hundred bucks for a cleansing session was steep.

“Two hundred bucks? That’s insane.” I scrolled and read another.

I knew Madame Rowena in the eighties when she worked alongside her husband to alleviate ailments via psyche cleansing. TBH, he did better work. He was the real deal. She’s okay. Average. I paid for a standard reading—no cleansing for me, tyvm—and pretty much got what every psychic in the city delivers nowadays. Probably won’t go back.

And another.

Ever had someone finger fuck your brain? Well, that’s what this shit felt like. It’s mental rape that I paid way too much money for. No thanks. Way too invasive. I felt violated after she was done, and for weeks after too. Like she was still inside my brain. But she was right about one thing. In my original reading, she said I would come into a windfall. Well, I got promoted at work, and it came with a raise. So I guess that counts, right? Anyhow, don’t get the aura cleansing! That shit is sketchy, and I didn’t like how out of control I felt. Stick with standard readings.

I skipped back to the review that claimed she used to work with her husband in the eighties. Curious, I Google-searched Madame Rowena, but apart from her current business and the few times she had taken out advertisements in the local newspapers, nothing stood out. I tried several search parameters, including keywords eighties and psychic cleansing .

None of the results seemed to pertain to Memphis’s psychic.

Returning to the woman’s website, I discovered her full name under the contact details. Rowena Fitspatrick. I implemented a new search using her full name plus psychic plus eighties and hit Enter, skimming the results. Again, they were utterly beige, so for fun and because I was tired and quickly losing interest in Memphis’s quirky excursion the following day, I added mind control to the search bar, assuming I was ten seconds from slamming the laptop closed and calling it a night.

When the results appeared, I paused. New articles filled the screen, ones I hadn’t previously dismissed.

Ones involving a sideshow hypnotist named William Hilty, who happened to have been arrested in the eighties for manslaughter. One who happened to have been married to a woman calling herself Madame Fitz. A woman who had also been arrested for the same crime.

I clicked the article and read.

Then I read another.

And another.

Closer to dawn, the rabbit hole had turned into something from Alice in Wonderland , and I was so deep underground, so entrenched in the outlandish story, I couldn’t find my way out if I tried. I was more awake than ever, the hairs on my arms standing on end, and with phantom fingers crawling up my spine and over my scalp.

I may not believe in magic and psychic readings, but I had radar when it came to suspicious deaths and criminal behavior— thank you, CSI .

What I was reading was implausible, yet theories and ideas spun wildly around my brain. Red flags flapped in the wind. Twice, I considered if I was losing my mind. Twice, I dismissed it.

All I knew was Amber with the migraines, who had apparently taken her own life, whose older brother was convinced she’d been psychically manipulated by Madame Rowena, wasn’t sounding as crazy as it once had.

And that in and of itself made me question my sanity.

The theory was so far out in left field that I considered if my feeling of dread had something to do with lack of sleep or a few too many glasses of wine. I was subject to an overactive imagination, but I would be a horrible friend if I sat back and did nothing with the information I’d learned. Right?

First, I texted Memphis a resounding, Do not go to the psychic!!! Call me when you wake up , hoping my urgency was properly translated with my use of exclamation points.

Then I stared at the curtain-covered window in my bedroom, recalling the dozens of times I had peered out and found a Jeep Wrangler parked on the street below, with a tortured man sitting behind the wheel because he was too fucked in the head to act like a normal guy and ask me out.

He wouldn’t be there now. He was never around in the early morning.

But I needed him.

I needed Diem.