6/15/17

A tangled bramble of malcontent.

Ten of Wands. A tangled bramble of malcontent. August was… fuming. His isn’t a victim mentality, he WAS, in truth, a victim. Or so he spewed, the bitter rhetoric of the doomed and liminal. Can one be a victim of an accident? It wasn’t an accident, he said, it was Deadwater. I’ve visited Deadwater, the tiny town in northern California where he lived at the time, and it is an unsettling place, but did it kill him? Could a town send a gust of wind to push August off the cliff? Only time, and maybe the cards will tell.

I tried to tell August that the cards are telling him to let go of his bitterness. That he’ll never find Evelyn if he wallows in self pity.

“In what, then, shall I wallow? Gravy?”

“Peace, hope, gratitude for things you've learned along your journey, maybe?”

“Rubbish. Shut up.” August stood up from where he sat on the now empty and bleached rabbit cage, his face contorted. At his full height August is an imposing figure, lean, well muscled, his water-logged pallor and fine Victorian era fashion give him an air of Miskatonic authority.

He grabbed a book from the shelf and hurled it at the wall.

“Oh, August.” I turned from him and went back to my work. From behind I felt a creeping coldness wrap around my shoulders.

“I’m sorry, writer, I know you’re only trying to help.” He rested his head on mine, painful cold drilled into my spine wherever he touched.

“Ok, August, apology accepted.” I shrugged him off, “I have work to do.”