Justice

Those stupid tarot cards ruined everything. And not in the sense that I got a bad reading, that I could have taken. Who had not had a bad reading? Both in the incompetent tarot reader way but also in the ominous bad omen way. Usually those were not hard to turn around, bad cards does not mean that something bad will happen. The cards are there to guide you, not predict dooms. No, getting Death does not mean you will die. Of course, the card can sometimes have a more literal meaning, but it is more often the end of something and the start of something new. If you are going through a hard time then congratulations, death is a great card for you!

My usual way of life was to just trust myself. What will be, will be. Everyone is on a journey, life is unpredictable and things will have a way of not turning out the way you would have thought. Judging by the fact that I was still alive, healthy and with a roof over my head, I would say that I was doing okay so far. The cards were a lovely tool that I learned to use early in life. My mom taught me and then I got books and studied the art of reading them. It gave me a sense of comfort, some guidance but mostly self reflection. I even started reading other people’s cards, something that became very appreciated. Not by everyone, but even the skeptics were easily entertained and ended up talking about themselves, reflecting over their situations and their journeys. I felt lucky to be able to be there for those moments.

Never in my life could I have imagined that it would be the cards that ruined it, ruined me. I had gotten by just fine as I was, my life slowly moved forward. I focused every day on getting to know myself, who I was and why. Drawing cards, taking them in, thinking about everything that could tie into me and my situations, my thoughts and worries. I even kept a journal where I wrote down the things worth nothing. Discoveries, cards that came up a lot or patterns that I noticed. Cards that I could not make sense of but that would make sense to me later. Sometimes it was easier to not dwell too much on something and just come back to it.

It was getting cold. Heavy rain like daggers from the sky hit me over and over, soaked through my clothes and into my boots. It did not matter if I moved around, there was nowhere to hide from it. Streaks of hair stuck to my face and everything around me almost seemed to be in a blur, as if the rain unfocused the surroundings. How long had it been? One hour? Two? Could be just twenty minutes, it felt impossible to tell. Long enough to feel my skin getting numb from the cold, long enough to feel an icy ache in my head, to hear the sound of my teeth chattering in my brain. I swore that I could physically feel every single bone inside my body. Could one die from standing in the cold rain?

Almost all sound was drowned out by the rain, but something was getting closer. A sound of footsteps in the moss. I peered into the trees, squinting my eyes as if there was a bright light on me. Heavy, slow steps towards me, I counted them. After sixteen, I saw her. She walked with purpose and once she reached me our eyes met. I nodded, not sure what I was supposed to do. Her eyes did not reveal anything but she wordlessly put her hand in her pocket, retrieving something. Not even shaking from the cold, she held it up in front of me. The card was dripping wet, already getting soggy in the edges. When I did not say anything, not sure what was expected, she finally spoke.

“Yours?” she asked, her voice notably raised so that I could hear her through the rain. I quickly nodded my head. She put the card back in her pocket and gave a quick nod in the direction of the trees before turning around and starting to walk. I walked behind her, feeling my boots sinking into the soaked moss with every step. The only thing that was repeating in my mind was me cursing myself for ending up in this situation. Ruined. How could the cards, of all things, be the thing to actually ruin my life? Could it not be anything else? There were people in my life that I could have at one point or another seen ruin it. Like the girls I had loved who broke my heart. They came close, but I had been able to put myself back together. Even after my heart had been so shattered that I had to search for, find and pick up the sharp pieces one by one, cutting my fingers with each piece, and slowly mending them back together. The heart had been able to be put back in the place where it belonged and my life had still been mine. Moving forward, just another part of my journey.

I thought back of all the times when I had almost forgotten myself in the past. When life had become too reliant on other people, on work that needed to be done. Times when it took me weeks of looking at myself in the mirror before realizing that my outline was already fading. Just in time I could put the focus back, go back into my own body and ground myself. That would not be the end of me either. The cards could even help me in the process of finding it again. Connecting the person that I had been getting to know to the person I saw in the mirror. Soon enough the reflection was solid and opaque, the air was easier to breathe and my thoughts were not as fuzzy.

She was still walking in front of me. If the wait had felt long, the walk felt even longer. I was starting to think that maybe we would never stop, maybe this was my end, when she stopped. I did the same, the moss making a squishy sound when I firmly put down both feet.

She turned to me once again. Her eyes were softer this time and she nodded. I nodded as well.

“And this will be it,” she said simply. I looked around, felt the rain hit my face when I tiled my head up. Nothing but gray.

“Can I say something?” I asked. She seemed to think about it for a few moments and tiled her head.

“Okay,” she decided.

“Could I have the card?” I asked. It might be a risky question considering, but she did not seem to take offence. Instead, she reached her hand back into her pocket and pulled the card out and handed it to me. It felt like it was breaking apart in my hand and I quietly studied it. Justice, the card of fairness, truth and law. I put it to my chest and held it there. Breathed in deeply.

It had been my own fault for losing it. My own fault for not even realizing that it was lost. Shuffling through the deck over and over, putting down cards in front of me. How could I not notice that one card was nowhere to be found? Had I gotten that distracted from myself and the parts of me that were holding me together? Had anyone been able to see right through when they watched me? No one warned me. It was easy to put the blame on others, but the truth was always there. No point in trying to run, the point of no return had already arrived.

I slowly lowered myself and sat down in the moss, the card still pressed to my chest. She looked down on me quietly for a few seconds before nodding.

“It’s done,” she said, the rain almost drowning her out. I closed my eyes.

“I’m sorry.”