13 July, 2023 - Ginie Russo and Arthur Velnias in the Lounge-room of their shared house on Sycamore street, right after the lecture at which Arthur first sees Madeline

“Gin! I don’t care if you’re feeling like shit, I need to talk,” Arthur proclaimed bravely.

Ginie raised her head and groaned in annoyance. Her eyes were still glued together by sleep and her skin was grey and sweaty. Her mouth hung open, and the smell of cheap vodka seeped out with every shallow breath. She swallowed hard, and raised herself up on one elbow for just long enough to show she was listening.

“Mmm wha?” She droned.

“I downloaded LTRN. What do I do now?”

“Wha?” she closed her eyes, terribly near to losing her ongoing battle with nausea. “Ge’me a glass of water, an’ like four headache pills,” she delivered croakily. “No. Make it ice-tea.”

Arthur hurried off to fetch both items from their poky kitchen; the price for Ginie’s assistance. He returned to her, handing over a bottled ice-tea from the fridge, alongside a couple of Headeez tablets and his iPhone.

“What’am I looking at Arth?” She asked, swallowing the tablets with a gulp of the bitter-sweet brew.

“Do you want the long or the short version?” He asked, standing at a respectful distance from her. “You look wrecked by the way.”

“I hate you for giving me tequila. I worry that you’re trying to kill me,” she joked, taking another sip of the tea and cringing at the welcome bitterness. It dribbled down her chin and onto the couch.

“Sit up Gin, you’re making a mess.”

“If you love me, you’d kill me. This hang-over is punishment.”

“I need you alive for at least a few minutes more.”

“So come on,” she begged. “Give me the short version.”

“This morning’s lecture. Beautiful girl. She found me on LTRN. I need you to tell me what to say to her so that I don’t freak her out, bore her or scare her away.”

“Even though I definitely can’t take the long version Arth,” she said, the tea smoothing her edginess, “I think I need a little more information than that.”

Arthur smiled, and sat down beside Ginie, leaning his head against her leg like a needy puppy.

“Ok Ginie - I’ll give you the short version of the long version. Here goes. I was in a Philosophy lecture this morning. Very mundane - Professor Anderson’s class. I am barely conscious from the boredom, when this girl pops into the lecture. I’ve never seen her before. Moral Philosophy is a second-year class, so I should know her right? Maybe she’s new - transferred in from another college or something. I don’t know. So, while I was sort of watching her screen I caught that she was on LTRN…”

“Bro - this is sounding a little stalky…I don’t know whether to alert the police or listen to the rest of the story.”

“Yeah fair - it’s not my finest moment. But I downloaded LTRN anyway and like literally the second my profile is live, bam this girl matches me.”

“So you got picked-up by some chick on the internet. What do you need to hear from me - or,” she continued sarcastically, clearing her throat, “more to the point - what’s the urgency to wake up a woman quietly suffering through her own personal hell?”

“Ginie. You and I both know that no one knows women like a lesbian knows women.”

“Hmm. On this point you are entirely correct,” she lifted herself into the seated position pushing Arthur away from her. Even though she was in a sitting, she kept her head low, taking a pair of his sunglasses from the coffee table, and placing them over her sensitive eyes.

“How may the master assist?” She said, still struggling.

“I want a guaranteed date Gin. This girl is perfect. I mean she looks amazing, but it’s more than that. It was like staring into the tangle of energy at the centre of a nebula - there is something transcendent about Madeline. Give me the words not to screw this up please. You know I’m a complete shit-show when it comes to real dates with real women.”

“Do you want the words, which may help” she smiled the best smile she could under the circumstances, “…or do you want the cards?”

“Ohh, that’s seriously tempting,” he looked at Gin dead-on, hoping that this meant, after all these many months, another legendary Ginie Russo Tarot card reading.

“Gin - I want the cards and the words to say to her.” Desperation crept into his eyes.

“You selfish bitch.”

“I am so desperate and so selfish - you got me dead to rights.”

“No. Desperation is not enough. Say “I’m a pathetic loser and I would be dateless and alone without you.””

“Is that what it will take?” He asked, a crooked smile belying his understanding of this game of theirs.

“Yes. I want you to admit you’re a loser, and I want one of your secret-stash cigars.”

“That’s a high price Ginie,” he considered, thinking about MG’s face, and the ineffable feeling she caused inside of him after only 20 minutes of a video-call.

“Fine Gin, I’m a pathetic loser and I would be alone and sad without you.”

“Close enough. Go get me a cigar bitch-boy and I’ll grab my cards.”

She went to stand, but quickly reconsidered as the blood rushed away from her head into her feet. She dry-heaved, and sat down again.

“While you’re up, you can get the cards and I’ll try not to puke,” she said seriously.

Arthur ran into his room, careful to close the door behind him. He grabbed a cigar from a box of cigars under a loose floorboard, replacing the board quietly to conceal it from any future raids. Then he ran into Ginie’s room, grabbing her cards from her bedside table, next to the memorial photo of Clara, Ginie’s former girlfriend. It had been almost a year since they’d lost her.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

He placed the cigar onto the coffee table, cleared some junk aside with a single swipe of his forearm, and sat back down beside her with a heavy thump. He placed the Tarot cards into Ginie’s waiting hands. She kissed the box, and removed the cards with care. She treated those cards better than most people, he thought. Maybe even better than him.

She gave the deck a quick, firm tap at their centre and then shuffled them softly and methodically, like they were made of the finest silk. She laid the cards onto the table in a single pile and said a few incomprehensible words in Latin.

“Touch the top of the deck,” she said to Arthur. “Just a single finger, right in the centre. That’s how your fortune carries into the cards.”

Arthur nodded at these familiar words.

“Into her arms.”

This was a rare moment indeed in their little household. Arthur, Ginie and - back when she was still alive - Clara, had lived together since Arthur was just 17 years old - it had been 3 years since he moved out. Arthur was now 20 and in all their time living together, Ginie had only brought the cards out for him on four occasions. These occasions were punctuated by an important moment in his life.

The first of those important moments was when Arthur had landed on her doorstep three years ago crying and lost, like a wounded animal looking for a cave to die in. He had left home at the beginning of year twelve. His father had kicked him out of his home for abandoning the Church. The next moment was when Arthur had achieved a score of 98 percent in his University entrance rank and needed guidance on what course to take, and where. This was followed by the reading Ginie did when Clara was on her death bed – and it foretold the demise of her lover and one of his closest friends. Finally, and the last time, had been six months ago, when his mother, Roberta, had died and he’d never gotten a chance to speak with her before it happened. Cancer of course.

“Are you sure you want to read for me now? Maybe it’s not a good time - maybe this is too trivial…I dunno, maybe like not significant enough.”

She looked around the room, like she was trying to find something hidden in the corners. She reached for a pack of cigarettes she had jammed into one of her pockets, retrieved one, and placed it softly between her lips. She sniffed the air, turning from side to side to collect as much of the atmosphere around her as she could. She lit the cigarette and took a long drag.

“No. This is the right time,” she commanded. “There’s something ancient in the air this morning. Something like magic and electricity. I don’t know how to describe it, but it feels like an earlier time. There is solidity and permanence all around us … You know? Wood, steel, earth - that kind of thing.”

She drew three cards from the top of the deck, and laid them face down on the table. Taking Arthur’s hand, she placed one of his fingers on each card, card by card, and said something inaudible; a chant, a call to something higher perhaps. Arthur wasn’t sure.

“The cards have spoken through me. Today they represent the journey, the challenge and the future. This is the balance of your reading.”

She turned the first card to reveal The Hermit. On the card’s face, an ancient man, stands at the top of a hill, his hood lifted against the relentless winds of adversity. The old man carries a lantern, with a five-pointed star - the inverted pentacle - at its centre. The Hermit’s grey beard is heavy with toil and fatigue.

“To be completely honest Arthur, this isn’t a good start,” she laughed.

Arthur stiffened, “Why? That card looks pretty harmless to me.”

“Well, yes and no. The Hermit is the symbol for wisdom-attained. So that’s good. But his lantern is lit by the ethereal light of nature. That’s bad. It’s the heretic’s light…the pagan light. It’s amoral and carnal. And it’s not something certain or sure - it’s like a torch, that only illuminates the next few steps.”

“So the journey is uncertain?”

“It’s more like the journey is unknowable and treacherous, and you will receive no guidance.”

“Cool cool. Understood.”

“I think we need to move on to the next card then,” she said. “This next one will give further context to the journey card, by clarifying the challenge you will face on your way.”

She turned the first card to reveal The Devil. The card showed a winged beast sitting upon a thrown, an inverted pentagram above his head. At the foot of the devil a naked man and woman stand, loose chains around their necks and arms. The man and the woman have small horns on their heads, signifying their fall from God’s grace and their corrupted spirits.

“Umm…” she laughed. “One more like this and you may have to lock yourself in your room forever mate.”

“What is it? What does it mean?” He asked.

“Well,” she said, drawing out the thought for a few seconds. “It’s raw animalism dude. As a challenge card, this could mean so many things,” at this she exhaled loudly, straightening in her seat, trying to find the words. “Without trying to sound too metaphysical here - the devil card is sort of saying that the shell of expectation, of rules and laws and righteousness…I guess what you might call the ‘ought to do’, is paper thin. The devil card is about revealing what sordid things are really inside of us, and the ones we love. What would we – or anyone else – do if there were no rules or barriers, but the ones we choose.”

“What would I do with no rules aye?” Arthur laughed. “No comment.”

“Yeah, please don’t comment – I have a weak stomach and the last thing I need to hear about is your dirty fantasies.”

She turned the last card. The future card, and when it was revealed both Arthur and Ginie gasped.

On the card, Death - a magnificent skeleton, armour clad, sat atop a white horse. Death carried a standard, the five petal rose, the symbol of death and rebirth and of change in his clawed hand.

“Ha,” Ginie whispered quietly, frowning at no one in particular. “These were Clara’s cards. I read her the night after we first met. Do you remember? It was at that record-store in the city. Red Eye I think. We were the real star-crossed lovers,” she said frowning. “A forbidden love for the ages.”

“You two were the best,” he said, resting an arm on her shoulder.

“Death is a good card on it’s own for sure,” she continued, not wanting to cry. “But just to be clear Arthur this combination of cards aren’t great man. I mean, these are an objectively shitty grouping.”

“Yeah,” he said. “So no chance with Madeline then?”

“Just the opposite. These cards are strongly in favour of shameless, reckless, carnal, desire,” she laughed. “This chick is going to test the living hell out of you. She wants you badly, but she is going to lead you astray, and there are no weapons in your arsenal against her. Like me and Clara right? She caught me off-guard, and I was powerless to stop her, but what a ride man.”

He could not help but smile at this turn of events.

“This relationship will mean everything to you. It will divert you from what you now consider sacred. It will buckle your defences and leave you exposed like a cracked tooth. You don’t need any words from me Arth. Just be yourself. You’re the one she wants. It’s already done.”

“Seriously?”

“Both seriously - and unbelievably. Like, honestly, what the hell is wrong with a girl who would pine this deeply for Arthur-friken-Velnias.”

“I’ve still got it,” Arthur joked, rubbing knuckles against shoulder.

“You know I dreamt of her two nights back,” Ginie continued.

“Who, Madeline?”

“Arthur, how do you survive in this world from day to day with an intellect like yours? How could I have had a dream about a person you told me about for the first time 10 minutes ago?”

Arthur withered sheepishly at his stupid comment.

“I saw Clara in a dream. Not Madeline. It was so real - you know, like it was a movie in my skull. We were on the old couch; the one we chucked out a while back. She was lying on top of me in that annoying way she used to; heavy and stiff like a corpse.”

Arthur didn’t know what to say, so he just nodded turning to watch Ginie’s face, but she was looking at the floor.

“Clara was whispering something to me. I couldn’t hear her properly. I could just hear bits and pieces at first, but I remember she was talking to me about you. Ha,” she thought, suddenly realising something important. “Shit man - She was passing on a message. Damn. I totally forgot.”

“A message?” He enquired.

“It doesn’t make any sense to me, and I didn’t catch all of it. But she told me to tell you, What reflects, conceals.”

He snorted, not sure how to react. “What does that mean Gin?”

“I don’t know. Maybe it doesn’t mean anything, but at the time it felt so strong. Like…I dunno,” she blushed slightly “…powerful. We were getting hot an heavy in the dream, and she like stops, and says: Tell, Arthur, what reflects conceals.”

Arthur nodded unsure how to react.

“So there you have it Arthur. The cards have spoken.”