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CHAPTER TWENTY

The O’Leary’s home in Raleigh is a three-storied, white-pillared, multi-terraced, antebellum mansion with custom-made drapes and fresh flowers in rooms no one uses.

Every morning we’re served a full breakfast prepared by the cook, and each evening I crash in my bed in my guest suite, my sheets turned down by the maid.

Alexander Sr. and Nicole are gracious hosts, and frankly easier to be around than my own parents.

We have one brief conversation about Rush, but other than that, Nicole doesn’t try to convince me one sorority is better than another or lecture me about what to wear or how to act during Rush Week.

Alex even reminds me that no sorority is better than the wrong sorority.

Zander’s response? “O-Chi Sweetheart is better than them all.”

The whole week, the O’Learys keep me so busy I don’t have time to dwell on the weird restlessness that’s snaking between my bones.

During the days, Nicole takes Zander’s brother’s girlfriend and me downtown for lunch, mani-pedis, and boutique shopping.

And in the evenings, when there’s no official event planned, we go out with Zander’s childhood friends.

All the dinner parties, bar hopping, and family gatherings are a bit much for me.

Okay, more than a bit. But Zander is sweet and attentive the whole time.

He sticks close to my side and whispers family members’ names in my ear when I inevitably forget who I was talking to.

And every night, when he sneaks into my room, he asks if I’ve been having fun.

“Yes, of course,” I say. Because sometimes I have had fun.

But only sometimes.

This—all this elegance and hobnobbing—is Zander’s real life, not O-Chi. And yet somehow, as different as they are, he fits in just as well here as he does at the frat house. Me, on the other hand? It feels like nothing in my life fits, not even my own skin.

It’s no better at home in Virginia. The evening I arrive, my parents spend all of dinner drilling me about the O’Learys.

It doesn’t take long for Dad and Jamie to lose interest, but Mom is relentless.

She’s annoyed at me for not taking a million pictures and for not knowing the thread count of the sheets I slept in.

But at least she gets to ooh and aah over my expensive, dip powder manicure.

As soon as I can get away from the table, I dash up to my room and kickstart a Discord chat with the Clairs.

After the exhausting week I’ve had, I desperately need to get my feet back on the ground.

Avery gripes about her sister’s equestrian tournament, even though she’s obviously proud her sister won second place, and Leo tells us his and Robin’s search for the ley line in Asheville was successful.

I assume that means the line was where they thought it would be, but what else constitutes successful?

What does one do with a ley line once one has found it?

As we chat, I notice Leo’s number is coming across in his name, not Robin’s.

Me: L, did you get your own phone?

Leo: Same phone. Robin doesn’t need it anymore.

Avery: Why not?

Leo: She’s gone back home.

Aaron: She left Brownhill?

Leo: Yes .

I’m sure I’m not the only one who wants to know more, but Leo’s curt, formal answers silence us. Robin came and went and none of us got to meet her. She’s a mystery that will never be solved.

Aaron stayed in Alderford for five days before going home to Charlotte.

The night before he planned to leave, he was in one of the Blakely Hall practice rooms when he heard his parents arguing—over a hundred miles away.

They were louder than any note he could play on his sax, fighting about the money his father lent to Aaron’s uncle.

Aaron: I wasn’t going home to that. I let it blow over.

Avery: Did it?

Aaron: Enough.

Leo: Does this happen often?

Aaron: Yeah. Dad’s brother is a deadbeat.

Me: I’m sorry. That sucks.

Although I feel bad for Aaron, I’m jealous of his clairaudience.

It’s useful. Thanks to what he heard, he was able to avoid a toxic situation.

My clairsentience is a toxic situation. Yes, deliberately using it gives me more control over it, but what’s the point?

So I can feel other people’s emotions. Great.

Peachy. Now what am I supposed to do with them?

Call people out on how they’re feeling? I guess, on rare occasions, that could be helpful.

Especially when emotions lead to dangerous actions.

But who’s going to pause in the middle of an argument, say, to give me time to sense if their opponent is about to get violent? People don’t work like that.

I just can’t think of any good reason to intentionally sense someone else’s emotions. It’s intrusive. Even if someone gives you permission to read them, like Leo did at Avery’s, there are still some things I don’t want or need to know.

I wriggle, my skin suddenly hot and prickly in my fleece pajama bottoms. Kicking off my slippers and freeing myself from my sweatshirt helps, as does shifting my focus.

I agree with Leo and Avery that I need to practice.

It’s the only way to achieve that elusive control they keep going on and on about.

But there have to be other ways to do it than invading people’s brains.

Just because you can do something doesn’t mean you should.

I rummage through the side pockets of my suitcase until I find the Tarot cards Avery gave me.

I don’t know what any of them mean, but there are guides aplenty on the internet.

I text Avery for reliable sites, then try my hand at reading a few spreads—past/present/future, embrace/release—what better way to get to know the cards?

I even tackle a Celtic Cross. I’m not all that confident in my interpretations, but one message comes across loud and clear in nearly every reading I do: Change.

Massive change. The Tower and Death appear over and over.

Every resource assures me these cards aren’t necessarily negative, but they give me a weird feeling.

Like something is lurking just around the corner.

Freaked out, I quit doing spreads and move on to Leo’s guessing game instead.

I hold a card to my chest, write down the emotions it gives me, then look up its meaning to see if I’m anywhere close to its mood and tone.

About seventy-five percent of the time, I am.

And when I really concentrate and keep my focus, when I’m not worried about being interrupted or trying to block out the noise of my family, I guess correctly every time.

The day after Christmas, I leave humanity behind and go for a long walk in a nearby park.

It lacks the wild beauty of the French Broad River, but it’s forested and, because of the cold, nearly deserted.

I draw in the crisp, dry air, willing it to clear my head.

Near-frozen branches pop and crackle in the wind, and the occasional squirrel skitters through the dead leaves alongside the path.

I keep an eye out for hemlock trees, but either there are none or I’ve forgotten what they look like.

And without leaves, I can’t even identify the ubiquitous maple.

A dog barks in the distance, signaling another trail walker, but they’re at least halfway around the lake.

Safely alone, I pause to hug a tree. I can’t tell what species it is, but that doesn’t matter to me.

Its trunk is wide and inviting and its bark tightly woven like a fisherman’s knit sweater.

Sitting at its base, I close my eyes and rest my cheek on the trunk, inviting in its peaceful energy.

There’s plenty of life left in this tree, but it’s an old soul.

A grandfather. As time passes, my skin prickles where the bark digs into it.

My feet have gone numb with cold, but I don’t care. I don’t want to leave this tree.

I dig my phone out of my coat pocket and send a text.

Me: What are you doing?

As I wait for a response, my fingers find their way to the rhinestone faerie holding back the front of my hair.

Leo: Reading. You?

Me: Making a new friend.

I snap a selfie of the tree above me. A selfie without my self.

Me: What kind of tree is this?

Leo: Send me a close-up of the bark.

When I do, he’s quick to reply.

Leo: It’s an ash.

Me: He’s a wise, old soul.

Leo: Yggdrasill was an ash. That’s the tree Odin hung himself from in order to gain its knowledge.

Wait a minute, seriously? I think I just ‘read’ a tree.

I peel myself off the ground and find another friend to introduce myself to—a maple, so Leo informs me once I’ve sent him a picture.

We do the same with two more trees. He effortlessly identifies them both, and I accurately sense their energies.

Fed up with typing, I call him. “How can I sense trees if they don’t have emotions?”

He lets out a low laugh that, despite the miles between us, I somehow feel. “In a way, they do.”

“Trees have feelings?” I’m skeptical, but I pat the sycamore I’m leaning against, just in case I’ve insulted it.

“Not like we do, but each plant species has its own properties. Have you read about that yet in Avery’s book? Anything about protective herbs, maybe?”

“Oh, yeah.” I recall right away what I’ve learned about correspondences, and suddenly I draw the connection. “But not just herbs. Crystals too.”

“Hematite, black tourmaline—” His pitch drops, “Amethyst. They all have protective energy.”

Eagerly, I connect more dots. “So that’s what correspondences are all about? The energy things give off?”

“Yep. Think about—oh, I don’t know—cinnamon or dragon’s blood. They give off the energy of strength. Jasmine, attraction. Selenite, cleansing. I’m sure Avery could tell you all about it, how she uses correspondences in spells.”

Like the mugwort and white sage she used in our charging ritual. She was adding their protective energy to my amethyst.

“But you don’t have to be psychic to sense correspondences, do you?” Surely not everyone who practices witchcraft is psychic. Or do most witches just memorize the charts?

“No. Some people, with years of practice, can sense energies. But only a fraction of what you can.”

“So, the difference between a psychic and a normal person is just a matter of degree?” I like the thought of everyone being at least a little psychic. It makes me feel less alone.

“Not quite,” he says, letting me down, but with an obvious smile in his voice. “Look at is this way: you have extra receptors that a ‘normal person,’ as you call them, doesn’t have. So there are certain types of energies they could never pick up, no matter how hard they try.”

“Like how humans can’t hear a dog whistle.” Or how I was the only one who felt Jason’s panic.

“You got it. And different types of psychics have different types of receptors.” I swear I can hear him stretching and getting comfortable; can picture his crossed feet rocking.

“Let’s say we took Avery and Aaron to the spot where the mill-workers died.

There’s a good chance Aaron would hear the accident. ”

It takes no effort at all to imagine what he’d hear: crashing logs, shouts and screams, splashing water. Crushing bones.

I shudder and press my back firmly to the sycamore’s trunk.

Leo continues, “And Avery would probably have to touch something—a log, or the train car, or one of the worker’s shirts or something like that. Then she might see flashes of what the worker saw.”

And those visions would be just as heart-wrenching as what I experienced.

I think aloud, “So it’s like the three of us pick up the same energy, but interpret it differently.”

“Exactly. You each have your own psychic language, and yours is emotion.”

I think of the Tarot cards, how they whisper to Aaron and flash images for Avery. But like trees and crystals, they don’t have feelings. “Am I picking up other energies, then, besides people’s emotions?”

I get another one of Leo’s deep chuckles. God, I miss him. “All the time. It’s just that human emotions are the loudest to you. They’re the most accessible because they’re already in your language. You don’t need to interpret them.”

Hmm. For such a metaphysical topic, this makes an awful lot of sense.

“You know,” I say as I tip my head against the sycamore trunk with a satisfied sigh, “I never paid attention to trees and plants until I met you. Now I can’t get enough of them.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment.”

“Good, because I meant it as one.”

Spurred by the warm fuzzies this conversation is giving me, I shift the subject, hoping maybe I can find out more about him. “How’s it been going at home? You know, with your family and all?”

“We’ve been ships passing in the night, but I guess that’s a good thing.”

“Even your sister? ”

His voice takes on a detached tone. “It’s not like it used to be.”

I stop prying.

He asks, “How is it going for you?”

I tell him about the visit with the O’Learys, all the seeing and being seen. But when I notice he’s making sympathetic noises, I realize I’m whining, and I don’t like it. So I get him laughing instead, as I tell him about going shopping with Mom for Rush Week outfits.

“She wanted to buy me this atrocious pink suit.” Because pink and gold are KPT’s colors. “It made me look like a Jordan almond.”

He laughs. “You didn’t let her buy it, did you?”

“No. I put my foot down on that one.”

Before Leo and I say goodbye, his tone becomes serious. “Betts?”

“Yeah?”

“You know you’re not an ornament, right?” I have no idea what he’s trying to say. Something about Christmas trees? But before I can ask, he adds, “So don’t let people treat you like one.”

He hangs up and leaves me alone with my tree.

What the hell?

For all his steady, comforting energy, Leo has a way of unsettling me. Why does he always have to be so cryptic? The first night I ever talked to him, he had me parsing his every phrase. Is he coming on to me? Criticizing me? Helping me?

Now, months later, I’m still confounded. What does this man want from me?

And how much of myself am I willing to give him?