Funny how some place we thought we’d never step into can become a part of our everyday lives.

“Miss Gates! What a lovely surprise.”

Madame Thao says things like this so often that I’m pretty sure she plays into the irony. Someone like her, not expecting a guest? That’s the sort of thing skeptics joke about. She could very well be winking with a smile, but a heavy curtain blocks the doorway.

I push it aside and step through, ducking under the hanging beads that tripped me up my first time here. The lobby’s bubbling fountain muffles behind me.

“Yes, me again,” I say, and slide my hand into my coat pocket, just to check what I need is there.

This is all it should take.

The incense candles smell differently than what I’ve gotten used to - not floral. Vanilla? That seems a bit basic for this type of shop, but I can’t complain. Most scents are better than the sewage the road outside always seems to stink of, a wildly different world than inside here.

Madame sits at her chair like royalty would at a throne, head high, smiling gently like she’s holding back a joke only she would get. On most people, this type of posture would look forced, but Madame looks natural, as if she only ever waits for customers.

She stares into my eyes, calm but unflinching. Her only movement is her chest moving in and out, slowly.

I smile awkwardly and take a seat.

The cushioned chair is so comfortable it turns right back around into uncomfortable territory, like I’m not supposed to be sitting on anything this nice in my old jeans.

I put my feet down firmly and clear my throat. I’ve played this game with Madame before. I have to speak first, and I have to make my intentions clear.

“I want you to know that the tea leaves have helped,” I tell her, just as I practiced in the mirror before taking the bus here. “However, I think I need more for this to work properly. Something stronger.”

She cocks her head to the side so slightly and her eyes gleamed so quickly that I might’ve imagined it, like staring at a mirror in candlelight distorts your face until you blink it away.

“I think that Ame-“ Her jaw tensed. I know I didn’t imagine that. I cough and glance away, then look back. “I think that she gave this to me.”

My fingers sweat inside my coat pocket. I barely keep my face neutral as I pull out the tarot card she gave me last time, some ink stained on my skin. I was already going to wash my hands after being in this place, but now at least I can see what I need to wash off.

I carefully place the card onto the centre of the satin-draped table, like Madame has in other sessions, but I never take my eyes off of her.

Behind her, the candlelight brightens in a flicker.

I jump.

I feel Madame’s hand around my wrist before I see her move.

“Miss Gates…” she murmurs, and turns my hand to face upwards.

I try to think of something to say but my mouth only moves silently. I don’t think she’d let go even if I stood out of the chair and tried to leave.

“Have you noticed…” Her other pointer fingers traces down my palm, following an inky trail, across what she once called the life line. “…that she’s trying to talk through your hands?”

I glance at the card, covered in Amelie’s handwriting, lying forgotten. “But- what-what about-“

“Not the card.”

She’s never raised her voice around me, and this is no exception. Yet, it booms in an otherwise silent shop. Did the fountain in the lobby stop bubbling?

When she finally looks up at me, it sends a shiver through my chest, grabbing around my heart. Her eyes are normally a dark brown, thoughtful and deep, but now, they glow a bright, electric blue.

“I can’t save her,” she says, and her voice crackles in my ears, not like static - like the shock of electricity. “But…”

She lets go of me, and I instinctively hold my wrist in my other hand. I go to grab the tarot card back only to find an empty table. I stand up, chair falling backwards.

Madame Thao breathes in deeply, and the little light around us dims even more.

“I can save you.”