The Beau & the Belle
Page 20

“Yeah, here. This is it.” She nods, shakes out the page and folds it back so she can hold it up to her face. “It says here that they’re merging with the University of Texas. The school will provide them with temporary housing options and classrooms. All the students will continue classes there for the foreseeable future. It’s actually pretty cool—their professors from Tulane will transfer with them and everything.”
No.
My chest tightens and I drop the remote to the floor.
“That’s a relief.” My mom sighs. “I’ve been so worried about what would happen to Beau.”
“Beau?” my aunt asks.
Every time they say his name, it feels like a punch to my gut.
“He’s that student who was renting the apartment from us.”
“Oh right. Well that’s good. It looks like he’ll be taken care of.”
“Maybe he won’t go,” I say suddenly.
My mom turns over her shoulder toward me and frowns. “Why do you think that? He’s so close to finishing his degree. He wouldn’t abandon it now.”
When she says it like that, so matter-of-factly, clarity starts to sink in. I sit back on the couch and stare at the TV screen, letting my eyes lose focus, the news anchor’s red pantsuit becoming a distorted blob. Of course Beau wouldn’t abandon his law degree for me. Of course he’s going to go to Austin. He’d be horrified to learn that I was hesitating about boarding school for him. What was I thinking?
My parents are relieved when I agree to Connecticut during dinner that night.
The planning starts right away.
I’ll need to get my things from back home, but they aren’t sure when the roads will be passible again.
“Why don’t we make a fun day of getting you some new clothes?” my mom asks, squeezing my forearm.
It’s impossible to feel excitement over something as trivial as a shopping spree. My city is bleeding. Hundreds of thousands of families are displaced. I’ll probably never get to see Beau again.
“Do you have Beau’s email address?” I ask her one night while we’re planning the classes I’ll take in Connecticut.
“I don’t know it off the top of my head, but it’s on my computer. Why?”
Because I need to talk to him. Because I feel like life is peeling us away from one another and if I don’t resist, I might never get to speak to him again.
“You guys formed a little friendship, didn’t you?” she prods.
I nod, scared to use words.
“He taught me how to dance,” I whisper.
“I’m sure you’re worried about him, but you shouldn’t be. Your father talked to him yesterday about rental stuff and Beau said he’s in Austin. He’s focusing on catching up on classes and getting his mom settled back in her house.”
“She’s back home?”
“Apparently.”
“How far away is Austin from Houston?”
She laughs. “Hon, we aren’t going to go visit Beau. We have enough on our plate right now, and I’m sure he does too.”
Her cavalier laugh is so frustrating that I push away from the table and storm to the back of the house, to the small room I’m sharing with my parents. I close the door with a loud slam and slide down to the ground, breathing so hard I can see my chest rising and falling.
I feel helpless and forgotten, as if the storm is still raging around me. Everything is changing and I’m just expected to go with the flow. I’m supposed to see this all as one big adventure, but it feels like one big heartbreak. I have no way to contact Beau unless I steal his phone number from my one of my parents or get his email from my mom’s computer, but haven’t I thrown myself at him enough at this point? An email filled with all my thoughts and feelings feels desperate. My pathetic words would live on that white screen forever, and Beau could always refer back to me as the silly girl he once knew.
“I think I keep hoping he’ll turn into something he’s not…someone like you.”
“And what am I, exactly?”
“I don’t know how to put it…someone genuine, someone who tries—a hero.”
“I’m not a hero, Lauren.”
No, Beau Fortier, you’re not.
I’VE NEVER DONE this before. It feels touristy and cliché. Also, at the risk of sounding cynical and cold, I don’t really believe in it. Rose does though. She’s always been interested in the voodoo and mysticism that pervades New Orleans. She’s gone on every late-night ghost tour and has been to the cemeteries around town so many times that the girl is due for a good ol’ fashioned possession, and something tells me she would jump at the opportunity to tote around a demon or two.
“Your energy is telling me you don’t wish to be here.”
Damn, she’s spot on. I draw my attention back to the woman sitting in front of me: Phoebe, the psychic. She looks like a cross between Captain Jack Sparrow and Miss Cleo—big hair, gold jewelry up to her elbows, smudged black eyeliner. She’s one of the clairvoyants set up in Jackson Square Park, the ones I’ve avoided my entire life. We walked by her table and Rose insisted that we stop to get our palms read. I laughed her off because no native is stupid enough to get bamboozled into spending $30 on 5 minutes of bullshit, yet here I sit, palm exposed, energy apparently closed off.
Rose punches my shoulder. “C’mon, Lauren! Focus! If you block Phoebs out, how is she going to fix your life?”
Right, of course—how silly of me. I open my chakras. I expose my inner eye. I scratch my ankle under the table.
“Relax your hand,” Phoebe insists, shooting me an annoyed glare.
I sigh and lean forward on the cheap, collapsible chair. The purple tablecloth she used to cover her card table gets caught in my bracelet. The incense she’s burning is making my eyes water. Mysticism clearly isn’t for me.
Phoebe flattens my hand, dragging her finger pad across the center of my palm. It tickles, which I take as a good sign.
She leans down and furrows her brows. Then, for what feels like an unnecessary amount of time—I’m talking several minutes—she hums in concern, shaking her head, frowning. Then—I kid you not—she mumbles, “No. No. It can’t be.”
“I knew I should’ve used moisturizer today,” I quip. “There are probably more cracks coming off my life line than usual.”
Her brown eyes flare.
Right.
I try again. “Umm, okay, what do you see?”
Her finger traces along my skin. “You’re about to be hit with something big.”
“Wow. Like a bus?”
“Bigger.”
“Two buses?”
Rose delivers another blow to my shoulder. “She’s not talking about freaking public transportation! Now open your mind!”
I close my eyes and tilt my head back.
“Okay. So something big is about to hit me—but we’re confident it’s not related to buses,” I summarize, annoyed with myself for engaging in this at all. “Is it possible that this big thing is figurative? Like, I’m about to be hit by a big heavy-flow month?”
I peek my eyes back open.
Phoebe shakes her head. “I can’t be sure. Just prepare yourself.”
“Prepare myself? How?”
She shakes her head. “I can’t tell you that.”
Oh, all right. Thanks for the help there, Phoebs. Jesus. I look up into the sky just to be sure a plane isn’t careening toward me at this very moment.
“Okay, screw this,” Rose says, leaning down and pointing at my hand. “When is she going to get married?”
Phoebe frowns again. “No. No marriage in her future.” She tilts my palm toward me. “See? Cracks or no cracks, your life line stops here. You die alone.”
Oh, whew. I was worried she was going to tell me something terrible, but this is nothing. I just need to prepare to be hit by a mysterious bigness while also adjusting to my new life as a crusty old maid. Best 30 bucks I’ve ever spent.
“However, the cards may tell another tale,” Phoebe says, dramatically producing a handful of Tarot cards with a clumsy flourish. “For 20 more dollars, you may reveal—”