The Tower Card

The Tower Card
I came from accross the ocean, from the land of Egypt. It only made sense that Samantha would be intrigued by the idea of a tarot reading. The ancient Egyptians had believed in divination. They would draw sticks and discern what the gods had in store for them through random chance. There was meaning even in the random. Especially in the random. I stared from across the room, tucked away upon a shelf. For a long time I had been placed in the trunk of her car. There was no other place for me and I brought back painful memories. The fact that I was alone like her was too sharp a reminder.
"Tarot readings do not predict the future," Salem, her coworker told her. "They help you reflect upon your present problem or event. It predicts how you might deal with it, what you fear, and how others perceive you."
Samantha nodded, nervous but excited. She wanted to believe in the sentimental and the mystical but was torn with logic and reason. Both had let her down.
The first card was drawn. The Tower card. Salem's eyes became wide and a smile crept upon his lips. He was not young but wizened with bulging borwn eyes, giving him a slightly crazed look. The Tower symbolized a great and violent change, a resetting. I had witnessed this recent upheaval. I had been with Samantha for over 7 years and in those years nothing exciting had happened. She had dated the same boy from high school for that long, Andrew. She had moved with him to college. She had made love to him and only him. Her universe was set around him.
Until he came home and told her he was not attracted to her anymore. There was no other solid reason even though she looked and looked for it like an archeologist scrapes the snad for clues, reconsturcing past lives and buildings. She was trying to cling to her own life. Shouldn't that have been easy enough? She left the apartment, grabbed me and all her other possessions, and left for good. She left behind a dog they had adopted together and was broke. She lived with a handful of women and changed her major. She had been forced into this change but there was no turning back now.
More cards were drawn. The 7 of wands, the 8 of wands. All of these cards represented creativy and the end of a cycle. 7 years.
"This is the card that represents what others think of you," Salem announced and drew the Lover.
The Lover. I once had a lover 7 years ago. The little Egyptian boy hand made us with paint, string, and leather. Two camels, which was me and my lover. Samantha had ridden on her share of camels by then. She saw the two of us together and thought of her new boyfriend. Her whole trip had been a dream come true but lonley. Andrew was at home and would not be able to experience riding on a camel with her. But she could bring him one and keep one for herself forever. She placed my lover on the bedside of her own lover.
"When we share a bed, they can share the mantle peice too," she said as she kissed him. When they moved in together, she brought me with her. They slept in the same bed for a year all the time. But Andrew had not brought my lover. The promise was forgotten. She began to sleep alone more often. I was always alone. And after he left, another came to her bed for a night. The boy she had secretly loved for the last year but was too ashamed to admit it. I never saw him again.
"This card is what you fear," Salem explained and drew the Fool. "This could mean you fear appearing foolish or acting foolish. It could mean you fear lustful habits."
Samantha blushed. She must be thinking of the boy she had taken to her bed. She thought of the nights she slept alone because Andrew had stopped wanting to make love. She dreamed of the other, a dream so intense and evocative she was glad for once Andrew was not beside her. Again, the mystical and unexplainable kept nudging at her sense of reality. The dream came true almost exactly that night.
Even Andrew had begun to believe in the archaic and the mystical. In those last months they were together he read books about zodiacs and was supersitious at times, even though he claimed not to believe any of it.
"Maybe you are just bored, Samantha. Maybe you should date an Aries," he told her once. "I hear those men want it all the time because of their horoscopes."
"You think I want to make love because I'm bored?" Samantha blinked in dibelief.
"The final card." Salem drew the Chariot card. "It means you will come to the end of the cycle, your life will change, but you will be victorious."
Almost six months later, Samantha was preparing to graduate. She had a loving boyfriend, a lifelong friend named Charles. The boy she brought to her bed was still a treasured friend. She only saw Andrew if she chanced upon him at a bar, drinking alone and bragging that the bartenders knew him by name now. I will never see my lover again. Perhaps my mate is lying in a dump. Perhaps it was never meant to be. As long as Samantha does not care, as long as she is happy, as long as she is victorious, so am I.