Unable to Say Goodbye

A few days later, Angelica landed home. In the interim, she was curious about how and what Jason had heard about the fight her and Alex had. If everything had gone as she'd planned, then it was a safe bet that Angelica's mother told Brian, who subsequently told Jason. While only having a tiny chance of being possible, Angelica did toy around with the possibility that Alex himself had called and told Brian about the fight. Those two hated one another, and if Alex did that, it would've likely been to possibly learn more about Angelica's own whereabouts and intentions. But for the moment, Alex was the furthest thing from her mind, though she didn't hate him. After she got settled back in her parent's house, she called Shiela, Shiela being the person to whom belonged the phone number that Jason texted Angelica. Shiela requested that Angelica come over to her house for a reading, and Angelica agreed to meet within the hour. Angelica drove up to Shiela's house, and from the outside, it looked rather normal. Shiela greeted Angelica and spoke as they walked through her house en route to the living room. “Mademoiselle, I am glad you've come to see me. I hope this place does not off-put you. I hardly ever have visitors.” It wasn't clear to Angelica why Shiela referred to her as Mademoiselle, because her strange accent was most certainly not French. It wasn't until Angelica entered that the house took on a feel of its own. There wasn't any carpet in sight, but instead, there were rugs on nearly every available floor surface. None of the chairs looked like anything found at an Ikea. Instead, they looked like they were acquired at a garage sale in Hollywood, an antique store, auction, or off some old, dilapidated movie studio right before its doors were shut forever in some sort of fire sale. The chairs were made of upholstered wood on any part that the human body would actually touch. The décor of the house seemed to be . . . paisley. Where curtains purchased from Target were normally featured in any other home, it looked almost as if she'd taken some of the rugs she'd acquired throughout her life and retooled them as curtains. There was also an upright piano. Angelica got the distinct impression that Sheila would've preferred a baby grand piano, but she obviously didn't have the space for it. On the walls, Angelica found memorabilia from the early 20th century, perhaps from the 1920's to 1940's. Some of the pictures seemed like copies of copies, but others seemed quite old, and Angelica touched a few. Nothing in the house reflected the modern era. It was a house made to look like a throwback to an earlier time, and modern times had tried unsuccessfully to encroach upon its interior, and it instead felt like a time capsule. In reality, this house seemed much like Norma Desmond's house from the 1950 movie Sunset Boulevard. As they walked, Angelica said, “I got your contact info from Jason.” “A rather lascivious man, to the extreme, malignant.” “Yeah. That kinda sounds like him.” “Amarosa has some skill in the beyond, but her womanhood drowns out the deeper voices.” “I won't lie, but the feel of this house almost feels as if it was haunted.” “Perhaps, Mademoiselle.” “Angelica. Just Angelica.” “Angelique, haunted is such an ugly word, is it not?” “Just Angelica,” she said, trying to reinsert the correction into the conversation. “It describes a reality in the pejorative, and that's unfortunate, Angelique.” “Have you ever lived in France?” asked Angelica, nearly resigned to Shiela's use of the French version of her name. Shiela smiled. “No, but I can tell that you've been there recently.” “Really, how? Jason?” “No. Let's just say I can, and leave it at that.” They walked by the piano and Angelica asked, “Do you play?”