“Why wouldn’t you tell me?” Nora asked. “Why wouldn’t you tell me about Mom or what happened to her? Is she truly dead or did she leave you!?”
“Your mother would never leave me! She loved me and I loved her as well!” he raged. “It was those darn things! Those darn voices and that bloody card deck!”
He suddenly halted, almost as though he had said too much. He looked away and slowly began to breathe so he could manage his anger. Nora straightened her expression and approached the man immediately.
“What cards?” she asked.
Muzin shook his head and slowly began to weep. “It came back… the darn thing came back for you like she said it would”.
Nora was even more confused than ever, and she wanted answers. She tugged at her father’s cloth and watched him turn around with swollen eyes tempting to let down copious amount of tears.
“When I saw the deck, I couldn’t tell you, but I don’t care how you got it or from where it came”, he sniffed and held his breath for a while before continuing. “It isn’t going to get you too. I will not watch you dally into taromancy”.
He walked past her without a smile or anymore words, but left the girl with many in her heart in form of questions. She stared out the window, wondering if her father wasn’t becoming delusional or if he is simply trying to scare her off using the tarot card.
Yet, there was without doubt, an underlying fear in every tone with which he had spoken. He was terrified and that alone, he could not hide regardless.
“How did mom die?” Nora asked herself for the umpteenth time.
Her world suddenly felt darker and absent of any proper illumination. Her father was without doubt hiding something from her and she could sense the tarot card she had ignorantly gotten, which the man now had in his possession, had something to do with it.
“I need to get those cards back”, she mumbled to herself.
Nora headed back for the dining table.
***
Hurrying down the hallway and towards the bickering sound that threatened to cause her sleepless night, Nora stopped just a few feet from the door, and peeled her ears towards the words emanating from her father’s bedroom. The duo had been at it for the past hour and their argument didn’t seem like it was about stopping anytime soon.
“She found it or at least it found her!” her father yelled. “How do you explain that?”
A long and odd pause soon followed, before a resounding hiss to dispute what the man had said.
“People buy things online all the time and the package clearly states that it is from EBay, so why bother yourself in such nonsense?” her step-mother adder.
The man sighed aloud and growled. He stomped his feet across the room and walked to the door to slam it shut. Nora stepped closer, hoping to pick up everything they were speaking about.
“I know you’re scared and the traumatic experience with your late wife’s passing still haunts you, but I don’t believe some tarot cards have anything to do with her death”, the woman inside the bedroom spoke softly. “You’re at a critical point where you could lose that young lady if you don’t start trusting her”.
Nora couldn’t help but feel surprised as her lips tightened. Her stepmother was on her side and the feeling was somewhat odd. She waited to hear her father’s response, but nothing came from the man. She figured he was probably not going to hand her back the card, but that wasn’t Nora’s major concern. In one day, he had spoken about her mother more than he did for years.
“How did she die?” she wanted to ask and hopefully get a good answer for it.
It would definitely help soothe her world and maybe, fill the hole she continued to feel inside her chest since she came home to the sight of blue and red lights and blaring cops siren outside their home that night.
“Your mom is dead… she is dead”, were the words her father said on that night, and nothing more.
The cops found no bodies, and they never recovered any till the current day. It had left her life toiled in misery and mystery ever since, and now, the presence of those dingy old looking tarot cards had found a way of exhuming talks and memories of the incident in their house. She heard the door slowly begin to creak open, and Nora took to her heels immediately.
She slammed her door shut and hurried to her bed to bury herself underneath her sheets.
“If you’re going to keep being a child and choose to ruin our night with your late wife’s issues and talks, then you should sleep in the bed alone tonight!” Lama’s voice rang aloud and along the hallway as she marched to the living room.
Nora closed her eyes and hoped to find some sleep; there were secrets being hidden in her house and she was going to get to the bottom of them without fail.
***
Endless screams mixed with haunting laughter soon filled the air. Nora tossed to the side of her bed and began to roll from side to side as she tried to blot her ears out. The screams were from her father; they were exactly as the man had yelled upon finding out his wife was dead in the most bizarre of manners. Nora clamped her hands over her ears once again, trying to nullify whatever it was that was bringing the eerie sound.
Yet, it persisted, followed by an aggressive gust of wind threatening to tear down the curtains, while it also hammered into the window pane. She sat up hurriedly, breathing heavily and sweeping her gaze around the room in the most frantic manner. Something swept around the room in maddening speed and she could hear its movement, but seeing it felt impossible.
She clenched her fists into
