By a Charm and a Curse(25)
“Of the performers?” I ask, even though I can’t think of anything else she might be talking about.
“Yeah. You know, the fortune-tellers—I guess one is Duncan? And I’m pretty sure one is of Gin and another is of the tumbler brothers.”
The grin spreads across my face quickly, fully formed before I’m even aware I’m doing it. She saw my paintings. And it sounds like she liked them. “Those are mine.”
“They’re fabulous,” she says, eyes widening. “The way you used color in the one of the knife thrower was perfect, and you made Duncan and his sister seem so creepy. I tried to tell my friend Juliet how great they were, but she’s not into art. Do you get to paint often?”
“Carpentry comes first, but Leslie likes my work, so whenever she needs something painted, she comes to me.”
Her gaze goes soft, distant. “I miss painting. I hadn’t done it before I moved back to Oklahoma, and well, now…” As her voice drifts off, she lifts a hand. There’s a fine tremor in her fingers, interspersed with sharp jerks of her whole arm. She winces, and I don’t know if it’s because she’s in pain or embarrassed, but before she can pull her hand away I take it in my own.
“My name’s Ben, by the way,” I say as I shake her hand. I’m so focused on trying to make her feel more comfortable that I don’t notice right away. There’s a chill to her skin that’s off, and her fingers are unyielding, firm. It’s like I’m not shaking a hand at all but rather a carving of one. Then she smiles, and the cold radiating off her doesn’t even register anymore.
“Emma.”
Emma. Okay, fine.
Maybe Mom was right to worry a little.
Chapter Ten
Emma
I don’t care what Sidney said about the clothes I’ve chosen to wear—I like the dress and the jacket. But for some reason, I’ve kept his stupid hat. There’s something about it that feels important, like it’s a talisman or something.
Ben moved my booth earlier this afternoon, insisting I follow him as he did so to make sure I would be able to find it later. I’d offered to help, but let’s be honest—walking in a straight line these days is hard. Besides, from my vantage point beside him, I could watch the stretch and pull of the muscles in his arms and catch a peek at his flat stomach as he dabbed the sweat from his brow with his T-shirt.
As I’m walking toward the spot where Ben moved my booth, I see Duncan waving at me frantically. He sits in the middle of a tent made of brightly paneled canvas on the outside, plush drapes and colored-glass lanterns on the inside. Only a few patrons are here this early, so I head inside.
It’s everything that pop culture wants me to think a fortune-teller’s tent should be. A small table covered in layers of scarves sits in the middle, but instead of a crystal ball, there are several chunks of quartz set upon it. A few teapots on electric burners sit in the corner, with a teetering stack of mismatched porcelain cups behind them. Loose teas in glass jars cover the surface the next table over. Thin plumes of smoke trail from cones of incense, and I miss the smell. Mom always, always had some burning in her office back home. And lined up neatly on a shelf at the back of a tent, near a loosely closed flap, are dark-green glass bottles that look way too familiar.
Duncan beckons me closer to the table. “Emma, meet my sister.” He gestures to the girl at the back of the tent. A cloud of black curls frames a pretty, dark-brown face with perfect cheekbones. Both siblings have the same mischievous smile that probably did—and does—get them into trouble constantly. Curves strain at her vintage T-shirt, and she has stacks of mismatched bracelets on each arm.
“So,” Duncan is saying, “this is Pia.” As I get closer I realize she has a tiny silver stud at the curve of her nostril. When she grabs my hand, warmth fills it, and I don’t want to let go.
“Sorry about the curse thing,” Pia says as she plops down into the chair next to Duncan. She picks up a worn tarot deck, shuffling the cards between her hands as she talks, her plump fingers nimble and quick.
“Why would you be sorry?”
She shrugs and makes the cards jump from one hand to the other. “Family history says it was our great-aunt who started it.” She points to the corner with the bottles of wine. “We make that. It takes a year to produce one bottle, and according to family legend, it’s our penance. You can take a bottle to keep in the booth if you want, or just swing by here when you’ve got a rube.”
“Is that why you helped me the other day?” I ask Duncan, thinking back on my makeover in the costume trailer.
He waves a hand at me. “Nah. That had more to do with my love of gossip than anything else.”
“I wish I could do a reading for you,” Pia says, grabbing my hand suddenly and running a finger over my unlined palm. “You’ll have to come back when you transfer the curse.”
“There are other ways to do readings,” Duncan says, his eyes alight with interest. “But,” he says with a sigh, glancing past me to the growing flux of customers outside, “it’ll have to be another time.”
I leave and make my way through the carnival, past a woman with impossibly purple hair and a pack of dogs—including the scruffy terrier who cuddled with me my first night here—jumping up and down ramps and through hoops, and past a pen where Gin is riding a horse bareback. There I have to stop for just a second to watch.