VII. The Jack of Clubs Speaks to His Queen

I am leaving now.

I am coming back to the city to find you.
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V. The Jack of Clubs Speaks to His Faithless Queen

In this place, I like to think that I don’t need you. One day flows into the next, and I hardly give you a second thought.

I come here because it consoles me. Breathing the city means breathing you. The day-to-day bewilderment, the randomness of the billboards along the highways that rise to meet the stars, the daily struggle for a seat in the train, a window of five minutes to avoid a deduction for tardiness, the glamorous Dionysian parties on weekend that I read about in magazines - I cannot abide by such cosmopolitan madness.
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III. The Jack of Clubs

I made my decision purely on sleight of hand, purely on games of chance.

I took the bus back to my hometown, carrying a couple of ATMs and credit cards that would be useless here. I presented myself to a distant relative and asked to stay for a few days, and may I not be disturbed, I requested.

I was home coincidentally in time for the town fiesta, which is more of a bizarre Mardi Gras really, than any community affair celebrating the town’s patron saint. I’m not one to visit fortune tellers, but passing by this quiet booth in this provincial town, I had an irresistible urge to guess at the future. It was the one thing I never associated with the city - the mystery and the fear of the unknown, already foretold and waiting to happen.
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II. The Queen of Clubs

I have neither riches nor power, and so I bear the loneliest of pursuits - the fate of the clovers, dependent on luck, imprisoned by the occasional whims of fate. Because fate is unkind, we learn to be resilient. We know how to endure.

I ply my trade as one who can divine the past, guess at the future, and perhaps, control the present. It is certainly a lonely gift, one that alienates friends and one that forebodes an unhappy future for the one who sees.
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I just came from a broken hearts meeting. One of my friend recently broke up with his boyfriend. (Yes that’s not a typo. They’re both men.)

Post VDay blues? But nothing a good meal can’t cure.

This part of the story is for him. May he smile again.

~Annabs

I. The Jack of Spades

I have a confession to make.

I visited the station the other day, oblivious to the rest of the world, pushing past the crowds during rush hour, thinking of so many other things, the image of you interspersed with random conversations around me, trying to discern a pattern, a workable theory I could mull over, while I steadied myself, braced against the steel post not meant for more than two people.
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