Page 18 of The Sun and the Moon

Cadence

The great thing about banks—universally—is the fact that they always have large leafy plants in their lobbies.

Perfect for hiding behind. I slip behind the fiddle-leaf fig to the right of the doorway.

It’s healthy, clearly being cared for correctly—I mentally tip my hat to the employee who must be responsible.

My fingers brush the lush oversized green leaves that spring from the thin trunk and make a great disguise for my face and hair.

Even with it pulled back in a bun, I know I’m recognizable to my mother.

From here, I have a full view of Sydney, but only a rear view of Moira.

Sydney’s features have taken on the overexaggerated roundness of a liar.

That bright, too-open expression that is trying to look as if it could never conceal anything in an attempt to conceal everything.

There’s something happening with the banker who was following close behind her as she stops whatever path they were heading on, presumably because she realized it wouldn’t yield her what she wants and decided on a plan B that is probably more of a suicide mission.

It involves talking to my mother, so it must be.

She hands back a cookie and dismisses him, an action that makes his already pinched features turn in on themselves in a sour expression.

Now it’s a back-and-forth between my mother and Sydney.

The man Moira was meeting with stands, moving away from the desk and the papers on it.

My eyes quickly scan the space. There is a clear path through the desks to the one directly behind his.

If Sydney keeps Moira engaged, I could potentially sneak into it and get eyes on those documents before the banker puts them away.

I don’t have time to wait it out, and I can’t send Sydney a message to keep Moira’s attention focused on her. I just have to hope she and I are on the same page about the goal of today’s mission and that she will instinctively know to act as a diversion in any way she can manage.

She’s talking animatedly, and the banker with the cookie is walking away now.

The other one is distracted at a bank of printers and other ancient-looking office machines.

It’s now or never. I step out from behind the fiddle-leaf fig and into the fluorescent lights.

As casually as possible, I walk toward the nearest empty desk cubicle.

There’s a half-wall partition between it and the desk directly beside it, which is occupied.

I catch a few words about percentage rates, a snippet of a woman saying “that does seem high,” and then I’m gone, moving diagonally across.

I have to make a quick pivot over to the next desk when I notice there is a woman sitting at the one I was aiming for, silently eating her lunch and scrolling on her phone.

She is so absorbed in her yogurt parfait and—I glance at the phone, which is propped up against her desktop computer—a cat-riding-a-skateboard video that she doesn’t notice me nearly barreling into the partition separating her desk and the next.

I crouch in this two-sided cubicle, listening. I am closer now to my mother and Sydney, but not so close that I can make out the whole convo over the hum of noise in the bank. There’s something about places that are supposed to be quiet. To me they always feel loud.

Or maybe it’s just the anxiety that I will draw attention to myself in a space where you aren’t supposed to draw attention to yourself that makes the inside of my head feel all buzzy.

“That looks important,” I hear Sydney say, her voice laced with blatant curiosity. I wince. There is no reason to believe my mother’s senses won’t be on alert with the sudden appearance of her future stepdaughter—wow, first time I’ve thought those words. Never want to again.

“Business,” Moira replies. “You and Rick with your day jobs don’t know what it’s like being an entrepreneur.” Insufferable, but okay .

I rise slowly, peering through the little window in the partition between the desks to see that the banker Sydney gave the cookie to is on his way back to Moira and Sydney, leaving his desk—an opportune spot for spying—open.

From there, I expect that I will be able to get a look at the papers Moira came here to discuss.

I shimmy across the carpet in a hurry, momentarily squatting, ear to the partition, listening.

“As soon as I know, you’ll know,” Sydney says. I slide up to see Sydney is taking a business card from the banker whose desk I’m currently hiding in—fuck, fuck, he looks like he’s planning to head back this way—when I feel eyes on me and freeze.

But it’s Sydney. Momentarily our gazes meet through the glass.

“Duncan, could you also grab me a water?” Sydney calls after him.

I catch the tail end of a smirk on her face as relief floods through me.

Partners . The word, the pinky promise. The thing we’re somehow doing despite the insane circumstances.

I force myself to focus, immediately dropping my eyes to the papers on the desk.

They look vaguely loan-like . Legal paper size.

There at the top is some information about the property address—Kismet’s property address.

These could be loan documents about Kismet, which doesn’t make sense to me.

As far as I know, my mother doesn’t have an active loan on the place.

When I was fourteen, she had a big bash—invited some of her regulars, including Louisa and Lola before Louisa bailed on her whole life.

I remember it clearly because Lola and I hid out on the roof with a thermos full of hot chocolate and some desserts we swiped from the party.

I remember because Moira called it her Debt-Free Dream and made everyone pull cards about their own financial futures.

Kismet didn’t have a loan on it years ago. But does it now?

I’m about to get a closer look when Sydney says, “I am a little curious about what it takes to start your own business and especially to run it successfully for so long.”

The hairs on my arm stand. Alert.

“And I’m a little curious about what your future holds,” Moira says.

No. Fuck. My eyes shoot to Sydney. She looks taken aback but not on high alert. She should be on high alert.

“My futu—Why?” She blinks.

“You seem to have a lot of questions about it yourself—whether you want to move, buy, or sell? Change careers? Love?” I am struck by two simultaneous thoughts.

I didn’t know she was thinking about changing careers.

But maybe Moira did. And the game from last night isn’t over , she’s just been waiting to make her next move.

“I’d love to give you a reading.” Her hand grips Sydney’s. “On the house.”

My heartbeat shoots up, sending a whir of blood rushing past my eardrums.

“I’ve never had a tarot reading before,” Sydney replies. Her voice quivers, a different curiosity laced through it.

“I’d consider it a high honor, then, to give you your first.”

Moira whirls back to face the desk and her loan docs, and I just barely drop below the glass before she sees me. “I think we have what we need here.”

A flurry of texts from Sydney make my phone buzz repeatedly.

I left my purse in ur car

gonna ride to kismet with ur mom

“If you could just forward everything to the email I gave you…” Moira’s saying.

I text back: do not let her give you a reading

“I will happily finish my end of this over the weekend,” my mother’s voice continues.

I have to , Sydney replies back. Follow us

“I Ubered,” Sydney says, and I assume our chance to text has ended. Meaning my chance to talk her out of this disastrous idea is over as well. “I just realized I left my purse in the car.”

“I hope they can recover it,” Moira replies, looking alarmed.

“I’ll have to use the app and see if the driver will meet up with me somewhere,” Sydney replies. “Can I catch a ride with you back to Kismet?”

“Ready when you are,” my mother says.

Oh, I bet she is.

?For the second time today, I find myself hiding behind a plant.

This time I’m outside my childhood home, crouched in the begonias, looking in through Moira’s Reading Room window.

I parked down the street where I could see the front of the house but couldn’t be seen by them as they pulled up beneath the jacaranda tree near the curb and parked.

I still don’t know what Sydney learned about the reason for Moira’s bank visit, since she wasn’t able to text me without drawing the Eye of Moira to her, and now I have the added anxiety of worrying that Sydney has been saddled with the difficult task of surviving a tarot reading without revealing our secrets.

I should have been the one to go in instead of her.

I could have easily walked right up to Moira and asked her what the bank meeting was about. I could have insisted she be square with me, and even if she refused, played coy, tried to dodge, I could have played the indignant daughter and forced myself into the conversation.

I could have, and maybe I should have, but when Sydney suggested she be the scout, it felt logical, reasonable, like teamwork, which isn’t something I’m used to having offered my way.

I wasn’t the girl chosen first in gym class—not because I wasn’t athletic but because I was a weirdo.

I wasn’t the girl people wanted as a study partner or to sit with at lunch.

I’ve always told myself it’s because I prefer my solitude, but even I know that isn’t the whole truth.

I’ve never been seen and loved without condition. Not by friends or classmates.

Not even by my own mother.