I knelt on the worn carpet of my bedroom floor, the silence around me thick enough to taste—dust and anticipation on my tongue. The tarot deck sat before me, a neat rectangle of potential answers, each card a door waiting to be opened. Three white candles formed a triangle around my kneeling form, their flames steady in the still air. I needed clarity. I needed truth. Most of all, I needed to know if Jason Green was genuine, or if his email was just an elaborate prelude to disappointment.
I’d spent the hours since receiving his message vacillating between hope and suspicion. One moment convinced he was a legitimate seeker, the next certain he was playing some elaborate game. Why would anyone watch all of my barely-viewed videos? Why would someone offer a hundred dollars upfront without even a preliminary conversation?
It could be entirely innocent. It could also be that he’d seen my face in the videos—my too-wide eyes, my tendency to gesture expressively when explaining card meanings—and decided he wanted something more than spiritual guidance.
It wouldn’t be the first time someone confused my empathic openness for another kind of availability.
The night pressed against my windows, a black velvet curtain occasionally illuminated by passing headlights that sent brief, distorted shadows dancing across my walls. In those flickers, the ordinary objects of my bedroom—a laundry basket, a stack of books, a half-empty mug—transformed into watching figures then collapsed back into mundane shapes.
I adjusted my position, crossing my legs more comfortably beneath me. The first candle—positioned at the apex of the triangle—represented clarity. The second, to my right, symbolized protection. The third, to my left, stood for truth. A simple ritual setup, but effective for the question burning in my mind.
From the dresser across the room, a small statue watched with blank stone eyes. Behind it, a print of the tree of life hung slightly askew on the wall. A string of dried herbs—rosemary and lavender—dangled from a thumbtack beside it. My sacred space was cobbled together from secondhand finds and gifts, nothing matching, everything meaningful.
I closed my eyes and took three slow breaths, in through the nose, out through the mouth. With each exhale, I imagined my suspicions and hopes flowing out, leaving only the pure question behind.
“Help me see clearly,” I whispered to the empty room. The words felt dry in my mouth, a practiced incantation that lacked power. I tried again, this time letting my genuine concern color the words: “Help me see clearly. I can’t afford another disappointment.”
The air shifted to my right, a subtle change in pressure that made the candle flames waver. I kept my eyes closed, recognizing the sensation of a spirit’s arrival.
“Trust your intuition, not your fear.”
Mister B.’s voice materialized before his form did—a whisper of sound like pages turning in an old book. When I opened my eyes, he sat cross-legged opposite me, his translucent figure rippling in the candlelight. The bow tie at his throat was perfectly straight, as always. His eyes regarded me with patient amusement.
“Hard to tell the difference sometimes,” I replied.
His smile deepened the creases around his eyes. “Precisely why we consult the cards. They bypass the mind’s chatter.”
I nodded, grateful for his presence. Of all my guides, Mister B. was the most practical, the least prone to mystical vagaries. If he believed this reading was worth doing, then perhaps I wasn’t merely indulging in paranoia.
I spread the deck in a fan before me, the cards forming a gentle arc across the carpet. The backs displayed a pattern of stars against a navy background, the gold foil worn away in places from years of handling.
“Is Jason Green genuine?” I formed the question in my mind, letting it crystallize into specific clarity. “Or does he pretend to book a reading but wants something else?”
My hand hovered over the cards, moving left to right, letting my fingers drift an inch above their surfaces. I wasn’t actually feeling heat or energy or vibration—not physically. But there was something, a subtle pull like gravity, drawing my hand toward certain cards and repelling it from others.
Mister B. watched silently, his form occasionally wavering like a reflection in troubled water.
I made three passes over the spread, each time narrowing my focus to a smaller section of the fan. Finally, my fingers stopped above a card slightly right of center. Without hesitation, I plucked it from the array and held it face down.
“Moment of truth,” I murmured, and flipped it over.
The Ace of Pentacles gleamed in the candlelight.
A celestial hand extended from a cloud, offering a golden coin. Below it, a lush garden path led toward distant mountains. Lilies bloomed along the path’s edges—symbols of purity and rebirth.
I stared at the card, absorbing its meaning. The Ace of Pentacles: new beginnings, prosperity, opportunity. The seed of material abundance. The first step on a path of growth.
Relief washed over me, cool and sweet as spring rain. Not a date, then. Not a trap or a joke or a scheme. A genuine client. A real opportunity.
“Well,” I said softly, “that’s unambiguous.”
“The aces usually are,” Mister B. replied, his voice rippling like the air above hot pavement. “They represent pure potential, undiluted by human complexity.”
I traced the outline of the pentacle with my fingertip, feeling the slight texture of the card stock. The gold foil caught the candlelight and reflected it back, creating tiny stars on my fingertip.
“Not a date,” I said aloud, confirming what the card had already told me. “A genuine client.”
“Perhaps the first of many,” Mister B. suggested, his voice like distant wind chimes.
I considered this possibility—that Jason Green might not be just a single reading, a momentary respite from financial worry, but the beginning of something sustainable. The first domino in a sequence leading to actual stability doing what I loved.
The flame of the clarity candle jumped suddenly higher, as if responding to my thoughts. A good sign. An affirmation.
“You’re pleased,” Mister B. observed, gesturing toward my face.
I realized I was smiling, a genuine expression that felt foreign after days of forced neutrality and suppressed disappointment.
“I’m relieved,” I corrected him, though it wasn’t entirely accurate. The feeling expanding in my chest was more than relief—it was hope, tentative but real.
I gathered the cards back together, shuffling them with practiced hands before returning them to their silk pouch. The reading was complete, its message received. No need to press for more details or confirmation.
“Will you meet him, then?” Mister B. asked, though surely he already knew my answer.
“Yes,” I said. “In public, during daylight hours. Basic precautions.”
He nodded approvingly. “Intuition with boundaries. Wise.”
I began extinguishing the candles, starting with protection, then truth, saving clarity for last. With each pinched flame, the darkness in the room deepened, shadows growing longer until only the single light remained.
Mister B.’s form had grown fainter as the light diminished. Now, in the glow of the final candle, he was barely visible—more suggestion than presence, a ripple of consciousness in the corner of my eye.
“What if I’m wrong?” I asked suddenly, voicing the doubt that lingered despite the card’s clear message. “What if I’m reading what I want to see? Pentacles stand for family, the aces for beginnings. Families come with long-term-relationships. What if this means that Jason Green hopes that this will be a date that will lead to a long-term-relationship and later a family?”
“Then you’ll learn from the experience,” he replied simply. “Every card is a teacher, every experience a lesson.”
It was the kind of mystical platitude I usually found irritating, but coming from him, with his no-nonsense demeanor, it felt grounded in practicality. If this went well, I gained a client. If it went poorly, I gained knowledge.
I extinguished the final candle, plunging the room into darkness relieved only by the glow of streetlights filtering through my thin curtains. Mister B. had vanished completely, though I hadn’t seen him go.
In the sudden darkness, the Ace of Pentacles remained clear in my mind’s eye: a golden opportunity extended from the heavens, a path leading toward distant mountains. New beginnings. Prosperity. The seed of something that might, with care and attention, grow into stability.
I rose from the floor, my knees protesting after the extended ritual. Tomorrow I would craft a response to Jason Green. Professional but warm. Cautious but open.
And perhaps—though I hardly dared to believe it—I would take the first step on the path the Ace of Pentacles had revealed, a path leading away from pathetic view counts and desperate job applications, toward something that felt like purpose.
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