“Hello, you two.”
At the sound of Nicola’s voice, April felt her entire body lock up.
“I’m a little early,” Nicola said from the doorway.
She was dressed professionally in wide-legged cream-colored pants, a brown silk blouse, and ivory heels. April looked down at her black jeans and black blazer, feeling suddenly unprepared.
“I’m sorry if I’m interrupting something,” Nicola said.
“No, no,” Daphne said, pulling April’s hands from her face and then dropping them altogether. She straightened her shoulders, smiled. “You’re fine.”
April sucked in a breath as though coming up from the bottom of the lake for air, everything around her blurry for a split second. She glanced at Daphne once more, then managed a smile, which dimmed when she realized Nicola was indeed early, and she wasn’t ready.
“I still need to set up my pieces,” she said after clearing her throat. “I’m sorry, I’m a little behind this morning.”
Nicola waved a hand. “You’re perfect. Like I said, I’m early. I’ll just pop over here and answer some emails.” She motioned to the love seat, but April didn’t miss how her eyes flitted first to Daphne’s paintings, widening a little before looking away.
“Sure,” April said, her voice quiet, but steady. “Thank you.”
And then she went to work. She had to get this done, and if she thought about Daphne right now, the expression on her face right before Nicola walked in, the pained way she’d said April’s name, she’d fall apart, or worse, she’d shut down or get defensive, her scorpion’s tail lashing out in self-preservation.
So she worked.
She gathered the stack of her twenty-two pieces from a file box in the closet, each separated with a sheet of glassine paper to protect the pastels, then set them on eleven different easels just in frontof Daphne’s paintings. She placed them in order, from the Fool all the way to the World, making sure they were straight, unsmeared, perfect.
And they were.
She stepped back when she was finished, keenly aware that Daphne was close by, watching her.
“April,” Daphne said, her tone so different now. Tender and proud. Full of love.
April squeezed her eyes closed, rolled her shoulders back.
“These are exquisite,” Daphne said, stepping up to the Fool, then walking slowly down the line. “It’s you. This is beautifully, perfectly you.”
“Not so perfectly,” April said.
Daphne turned to look at her, her fingers just grazing the corner of the Hanged One, April’s favorite piece. In it, she’d placed herself upside down, of course, and her limbs were tangled with the trees surrounding her, all shades of green enveloping her. Below her, there was a small pond, but instead of her reflection, a tattooed hand reached up and out, fingertips nearly touching the crimson tips of her hair.
“That’s what makes it perfect,” Daphne said.
April smiled at her, then watched as Daphne moved along, finally making it to the World.
The end of the journey.
But this card felt more like a beginning.
It featured April standing in the middle of a road, the pavement dark and straight in front of her. It was a bit of a desert scene, mountains rising in the distance, the sun just peeking over a ridge, flooding the sky with pink and orange and lavender. April had a bag on her shoulder, and even though her back was to the viewer, it was clear she held one of her hands low on her forehead, a shade from the sun’s rays as she looked ahead.
Looked forward.
To her, this piece felt like the partner to the Hanged One, even though many steps in the journey happened in between—from limbo to purpose, even if that purpose was still unformed, unseen, hiding down a long road.
She was upright, untangled, and ready for that road.
Daphne didn’t say anything about the World, but she stared at it for what felt like hours. Finally, she simply glanced at April, a sort of understanding filling her eyes.
April inhaled sharply, then called to Nicola before either of them could say anything else. “We’re ready for you.”
