Page 79 of The New Couple in 5B

I can’t help but think about Chad, my book, the life inside me.

“My husband is also a Taurus. May seventh.”

She closes her eyes and squeezes my hands. “Yes, I can feel it. Big things for both of you this year.” She opens her eyes again. There’s kindness there, empathy, wisdom. My mother always said that if you look at people with compassion, they bare their souls. Everyone wants to be seen, to be known.

“People born on your day often have had a lot to overcome. Maybe as a child your family didn’t understand you, or you were given too much responsibility too soon. Your childhood was not carefree. You were not protected.”

I acknowledge this with a nod.

“But this has made you responsible and competent. You have found your way. And—” she pauses, pulls me in and lowers her voice to a whisper “—you’ll be a wonderful mother.”

She smiles when I look at her in surprise. “It was just a guess,” she says, voice still low. “I can see it sometimes. It’s something in the eyes.”

“I just found out yesterday,” I whisper.

“Motherhood will be a healing journey for you. And for others.”

“Others.”

She shrugs. “Just a vibe, an energy.”

We talk more about career and Chad. She’s warm and funny and engaging. “I know you’ve suffered some losses recently,” she says. “Your uncle and Dana.”

“Did you know her?” I ask. But she shakes her head.

“I didn’t know Ivan well, either,” she says. “Not a believer.”

I look around the room. The rest of the group seems to have moved into the dining room. I am hoping Xavier doesn’t leave early. I hear voices and clattering plates. The nausea amps up; my stomach turning a little at the thought of food.

Only Charles remains in the living room, sitting on the couch with his eyes closed. Is he sleeping? He’s normally so powerful, so engaged, the life of the party. Tonight he seems a bit fragile, older. “I’m not sure I am a believer, either,” I admit.

“Maybe not. But you have an open and questioning spirit. And there’s nothing to this life but mystery. Questions to be asked and not all of them answered.”

It’s an echo of something my father used to say, that he lived in the mystery, letting power move through him without questioning.

“Sad about Ivan,” Miranda says. “A tragedy about Dana. Murder, I hear. Not suicide.”

“That’s what the police have said,” I concede, not wanting to say more. “How long have you lived at the Windermere?”

“Twenty years now,” she says.

“I’m writing a book about the building,” I say. The real reason I’m here.

“Ah, yes, I’ve heard. About the murders, the suicides.”

“Do you know the stories?”

She nods. “It was all before my time. But I will say I feel the energy sometimes. There’s something sad on the roof deck—have you been up there? Almost no one uses it. I avoid the basement at all costs.”

“I saw something down there,” I say without meaning to.

She gives me a satisfied nod. “I knew there was something about you.”

I tell her about my family, in the broadest possible strokes—my father the healer, my mother the card reader, my sister and grandmother with their dreams.

“And yet, you don’t believe?”

“I guess I’m not sure what I believe.”