Burning by Elana K. Arnold

provide it.”
    Ben’s brows knitted together. Clearly he did not believe that I could provide any such thing; he was not as easily swayed as his fat friend.
    “Do you wish the cards, or shall I read your palm?”
    He shrugged. “It doesn’t matter.”
    I was about to suggest that he let me read his palm—it would be an excuse to touch him—but Hog Boy said, “Do the cards.”
    More reason to dislike him. But they could not see my disappointment as I nodded and reached to the table’s edge for my Tarot deck, sliding it from its velvet bag.
    I began to shuffle the cards. All three boys watched as my fingers turned and splayed the cards, as they arched between my hands and fell one by one into a tight stack again.
    “What are those?” asked Pete.
    “These are Tarot cards,” I answered, passing them back and forth between my hands.
    “What do they do?”
    “There are many answers to that question,” I began. “I like to say that the Tarot allows the Questioner to come into contact with his own unconscious, higher self. The best information, the truest answers, are those we already know. The cards act simply as an aid in seeing oneself—one’s past, present, and future—more clearly.”
    I placed the cards on the table and pushed them across to Ben. He sat still, but with the tightly wound energy of one who is happiest in motion. “Shuffle,” I said. “Your own hand will choose your cards.”
    He looked at the cards and then up at me. Our gaze held for a moment that stretched longer and longer, neither of us looking away. His eyes were blue, but very dark, almost gray.
    At last he looked down at the cards. His right hand rosefrom his lap and hovered over the deck. Then he tapped the cards and pushed them back to me.
    “Do you have a question you would like to address?”
    Again, his brow furrowed. This boy was a stranger to me. I did not know him. And yet already there was something in that expression—intense, focused, disarmingly beautiful—that made me wish to know him, made me want to hear his stories.
    He shook his head. “No question,” he said. “Just—”
    But then he stopped. “No question,” he said again.
    I took up the cards and began to place them, starting with the card on the top of the deck—the Tower—until I had laid out ten cards in all.
    “Hey, Ben,” said Hog Boy, tapping his thick white finger against one of the cards I had dealt. “That one must be your brother. Check him out—he’s got a rainbow flag.”
    I thought then that there was going to be a fight in my tent. I felt the energy shift, as if all the air in our small, hot space had been sucked out. Ben’s body stiffened and I could see even more clearly the athlete in him—a panther, poised to strike, quick and clean and deadly.
    But Pete leaned in and muttered, “Take it easy, man,” and Hog Boy said, “Jeez, can’t take a joke, can you, Stanley?” and soon the boy across from me was a boy once more. It was interesting to watch him, and informative—the way he took measured breaths, in for several counts, then out for just as many, in a way that was forced and unnatural but seemed to calm him.
    When peace was reestablished, Ben turned back to the cards. I could tell he wanted to say something, to show that he was in control of himself. What he asked wasn’t important to him, but asking it calmly most certainly was.
    “Why do you lay them out like that?”
    “Do you know anything about Tarot?”
    He shook his head. So did Hog Boy and Pete.
    “The Tarot is an ancient form of divination. Each card has a meaning, and each place a card is laid has meaning, as well. The same card in two different places would mean two different things. Do you understand?”
    All three boys nodded. I waited to see if they would ask a question, and then continued.
    “There are seventy-eight cards in a deck.” I should begin at the beginning, I decided. And though I usually did not do so much explaining, I felt content to fill