Braxton Hicks and Bridget Fitch

“That witch come up right outta that creek there. I seen it with my own eyes. It like to spooked me something fierce, the way she come walking up that riverbank, with all that fog slipping off her shoulders all slow-like. She had weird eyes, not even a color exactly. They just looked straight through me on up the path, like I wasn’t there atall.” Braxton Hicks looped his arm over a branch of the chinaberry tree he perched in. “God’s honest truth.”

“I swear, Braxton. You’re scared of your own shadow.” Bridget Fitch shook her head at her brother. “That lady ain’t no witch. Mama just says so cause all the menfolk want to get between her legs.”

Braxton jumped down from the chinaberry tree beside Bridget, the rail fence barely between them. “You think you’re so smart just because you’re a New Year’s baby!”

The fight never ended; the fraternal twins had been born five minutes apart, Braxton at 11:55 PM, December 31, 1999; Bridget at 12:00 on the dot, January 1, 2000. The different birthdays caused some problems over the years.

“I followed her,” Braxton said.

“What’d you do that for?”

“I wanted to see her cat.”

“What cat? That lady doesn’t have a cat.” Bridget narrowed her eyes at her brother.

“Then how come Mama says she’s always throwing her cat on somebody if she ain’t got one?”

Bridget leaned over on the wooden fence, resting her elbows on the top rail. “Braxton, I swear sometimes you’re dumber than Mama.”

“Don’t you call Mama dumb!” Braxton glared at Bridget from inside the fence.

Bridget stood up straight and started walking toward the road, glancing over her shoulder to say, “Oh, shut up and go read your damn bible.” She knew it would send Brax into a tailspin, practically foaming at the mouth and hollering blasphemy at her back, and she smiled as her feet found the road.

Maybe it was mean to call her mother dumb, but for Chrissakes, she named her son Braxton Hicks because when she went to the hospital with contractions, the nurse told her not to worry, it was just Braxton Hicks. Bridget’s name had a similar genesis of stupid misunderstanding, but she just rolled her eyes and understood that she was, even as a child, much smarter than her mother ever would be. Mama and Braxton seemed to think that God wrote the bible instead of men, and they clung to it with ferocious ignorance, seeing everything expressed so literally that they always missed the deeper meanings of the stories, as if they were taking a moral stance against allegory itself.

Braxton was back in the tree by the time Mama shuffled home from her job at the discount store. The sun slipped behind the treeline as Mama approached the house. “Braxton, get your fool self down from that tree before you break every bone in your body.” Braxton jumped down, nearly landing on top of his mother, who swatted him on the backside and asked, “Where’s your sister?”

Braxton shrugged and took his mother’s bag, carrying it into the house to hang it on the coat rack on the wall at the foot of her bed and promptly exiting.

“Come on, Braxton. We gots to get the spare room cleaned out. Company’s coming.”

“Who?” Braxton asked as he approached the door to the spare room, wishing it had a wardrobe like in the Narnia books, but it was just jumbled up with a bunch of boxes and whatnot.

“Your Aunt Sarah,” Mama pushed the door open and instructed Braxton to stack the boxes in the western corner, under the map on the wall but not to block the closet door with them.

“Ain’t she the one you don’t like?” Dust motes swam thick as jelly in the sunlight streaming through the window.

“Maybe I should vacuum up some of this dust first, before you go stirring it all up all over the house.” Mama went to the hall closet and hauled out her trusty Hoover. “Go to the kitchen and get me a glass of tea.”

Braxton did as he was told, pouring his mother a glass of the weak, beige tea she kept in a pitcher in the fridge, slightly sweetened. Mama was vacuuming the walls when he returned with it, and she gulped in down in three enormous swallows. He opened the closet door and asked why they didn’t just stack the boxes in there.

There were a few old coats and some clothes that would never fit Mama again, but other than that, the closest was empty. Most of the boxes fit, stacked one on top of the other in the closet, but there was one box that was longer than the rest, and it wouldn’t fit in the closet.

Braxton was opening it when Bridget returned from her afternoon wanderings. “What’s in that box?” She asked Btaxton, settling down on the floor next to him.

“I don’t know. It wouldn’t fit in the closet, so I thought I’d see what’s in it. Maybe the stuff can fit in another box that can go in the closet.”

The flaps were tucked into one another, holding the box closed, and they made a thwap sound as Bridget pulled them loose from each other. There was an off white dress, a bundle of letters tied together, some pressed flowers, and a shoebox covered in floral wallpaper.

“It’s awful quiet in here.” Mama appeared in the door to the spare room and saw the contents of the box on the floor. The color drained from her face, and she gathered it all up in her arms. As she left the room, the shoebox fell from her grasp, spilling its contents on the floor.

A few colored rocks, some printed sigils and talismans, a set of dog tags, and a deck of tarot cards landed between Bridget and Brax. Bridget picked up the cards and gave her mother a cynical look. “What’s all this?” Her eyes didn’t leave her mother’s face while she waited for an answer.

“Don’t you worry about none of this. You just read your bible and mind your manners.” Mama glared at Bridget and picked the rocks up from the floor. “Give me them devil cards. Should have burnt them up years ago.”

The dress was the one Mama had worn when she and Joshua, the twins’ father, had gone to the JoP after the CkearBlueEasy showed two lines, and the letters were the ones he had written to her when he was in Afghanistan. He didn’t come back.

“Why you got devil cards?” Braxton crowded closer, trying to get a better look at the tarot cards.

Bridget clutched the deck to her chest, never breaking eye contact. “No. I’m keeping these. And I’m tired of reading the bible and never talking about what the stories mean.”

“There ain’t nothing to talk about. The stories mean what they say, nothing more, nothing less. Quit looking for more than what’s in front of you.” Mama took the dress, letters, rocks, and dog tags to her room. Joshua had sent those strange, foreign rocks to her from the desert, before his last jump.

“Let me see them devil cards,” Braxton moved closer to his sister.

“They’re tarot cards, not devil cards,” Bridget said as she opened the box and pulled the deck out. The Devil was the card on top.

“If they ain’t devil cards, how come that’s the devil himself right there on that card? He got horns and everything. And look, that next one’s Death!” Braxton was nearly jumping up and down with the excitement of something he didn’t have a name for.

Bridget showed him some of the other cards–minor arcana cards, and explained that while there was indeed a devil card, the cards themselves were not evil or of the devil.

“Okay, then. Show me the Jesus card.”

Bridget flipped the Hanged Man upside down and showed it to her brother.

“Hmmph. His cross upside down.” Mollified, Braxton handed the card back to Bridget and left the room.

Bridget sat there on the floor for the better part of an hour, looking at each card in the deck, some of which she immediately loved, like The Moon and The Empress, but others, like The Hierophant, repulsed her, so she turned them upside down in the deck, then slipped the cards back in the box and hid them under the false bottom in her bottom desk drawer. Mama didn’t know it had a false bottom–Bridget discovered it after Mama commented that she didn’t understand why they used such a thick piece of wood for the drawer, wasting space that could be used.

Bridget and Braxton turned fourteen roughly a month after finding the tarot cards. Aunt Sarah, it turned out, had not come to visit, she'd come to stay, and Bridget had never been happier. Aunt Sarah was as different from Mama as Bridget was from Braxton, if not more so. Aunt Sarah had long hair, didn't like shoes, called the bible "patriarchal nonsense," and she was teaching Bridget how to read the tarot cards--it turned out that the deck belonged to Aunt Sarah, not Mama.

"Where in the world did you find these?" Wonder lit up her face like downtown on Friday night. She tucked a strand of her long, dark blonde hair behind her ear and picked up the deck with unmanicured hands. Memories drifted across her face as she thumbed through the cards. When she came to The Hierophant, she paused and started to turn the card upright.

"No!" Bridget put her hand over Sarah's to stop her. "I don't like him. Leave him upside down."

Sarah put the deck down, took both of her niece's hands in her own, and looked into her eyes, looked so far into her eyes that it felt like she was reading Bridget's secrets, and Bridget blinked. "Tell me how you feel about Sunday school," Sarah whispered. "The truth."

Bridget inhaled all of the oxygen in the room, cast her eyes down onto the iron mark scorched into the heart pine floor and whispered, "I hate it," slowly raising her eyes until they blazed up and into her aunt's.

"You and me are going to get along just fine," Sarah wrapped her arms around her niece, and Bridget knew without knowing yet that she had found her first ally.

When Braxton trudged into the room with Sarah's belongings--a large suitcase on caster, a cedar chest, and two large plastic storage bins with lids, Sarah was explaining to Bridget that the cards themselves were not magical, but they had the power to open her up to the magic in her life. He gave them both a disapproving look as he pushed the cedar chest up against the footboard of the full-sized bed. When he returned with the suitcase, he spoke up. "Aunt Sarah, how come you looking at them devil cards? Mama says they're bad."

Sarah explained, as Bridget had but with the authority of age, experience, and wisdom that were visible in front of him. He stood in silence for a moment, staring at the map on the wall and finally said, "Okay, if you say so. But I don't want nothing to do with them. I get my answers from the bible, just like Mama."

After Braxton left the room, Sarah put an arm around her niece, and said, "It's hard to believe y'all are twins. I know girls mature faster than boys, but there's more to it than that. You and I have a depth that your brother and mother, with their simple, shallow minds, will never understand. I'm glad I'm here. You're going to need me. And I will teach you how to read these cards."

Bridget stayed in Sarah's room and helped her unpack, hitting a snag when Sarah opened the closet door and it was stacked with boxes blocking the clothes hanging bar. Sarah assessed the boxes, then pulled two out of the closet and placed them in front of the slipper chair, then pulled a small tapestry from one of the storage bins, wrapping and tucking it around the boxes so quickly and expertly that Bridget was astonished. Six more boxes and two more tapestries made mismatched nightstands on either side of the maple four-poster bed, and the closet was functional once more. Bridget hung Sarah's long, flowing skirts, dresses, and tunics in the closet while Sarah covered the walls with tapestries and placed photos and knickknacks on the tables they had just fashioned.

"I guess they'll do for now," Sarah touched the once-cheerful gingham curtains, "but I don't like yellow in the bedroom." She opened the last storage bin, and it was full of plants: ferns, ivy, hens and chickens, an aloe plant, a philodendron, and a few flat-leaved cacti. "Some floating shelves and a few hooks in the ceiling for hanging baskets, and it'll almost feel like home."

Bridget was speechless. The room had become the most beautiful one she had ever been in, including the fancy hotel in Atlanta where they had spent one magical night when Bridget and Braxton were seven. Aunt Sarah lit a stick of incense and stuck it in one of the plants Bridget couldn't identify.

Mama smelled the smoke and came running. "I knew you two would be thick as thieves before the sun set this evenin'. Sarah, you know I don't truck with smoking in the house."

"She's not smoking, Mama, see?" Bridget held the incense stick in the air for her mother to see. "It smells good."

"Sarah," Mama ignored Bridget, laser-focused on her sister, "what did we talk about before I agreed to give you houseroom? I ain't puttin' up with no foolishness, especially from you."

Sarah just laughed and said, “Mary, one of these days, you need to have some fun.”

“Joshua used to say that.”

“I know.” Sarah rose from the slipper chair and hugged her sister, who broke down in tears, sobbing on her shoulder. They clung to each other, Sarah soothing Mama and smoothing her hair. Sarah kept whispering, "I know. It's okay, just let it out."

Bridget and Braxton had never seen their mother break down and felt like they were observing something obscene and scandalous--raw emotional outpourings were foreign to them.

Sarah pressed the Hierophant card into Bridget’s hand. “Start with this one since you had a strong reaction to it.”

Bridget looked at the pompous man in red with the sycophants at his feet and said, “I had a strong reaction to that moon card, too. Can’t I start with it?”

Sarah smiled at her niece and said, “No, it will be your last card, one to look forward to as you make your way through this deck, one card at a time. That’s the best way to learn them.”

“So what should I do with it?”

“Study it closely, look at it, and ask yourself why you don’t like it. Make a sketch of it–drawing it yourself will help you focus. First, draw it as it is, then draw variations on it, make it your own. We’ll discuss it and I’ll look at your sketches before we move on to the next card.”

Bridget nodded, and Sarah handed her a sketchbook and pencil. “I doubt your mother would approve of this, so let’s just let it be our little secret, okay?”

Bridget, delighted at the idea of having a secret of her own, beamed up at her aunt and clutched the sketchbook to her developing chest.

When Sarah hinted that she could use a nap, Bridget tucked the card in the back pocket of her jeans and set off for the creek with the sketchpad and a pencil.

She found her spot about halfway down the bank, a small hollow cradled by river birch roots. Bridget nestled into it, leaning back against the clay of the bank, and pulled the card out of her pocket. She sketched the pillars flanking the hierophant's throne first, then the bald men at his feet. The doves were next. Although Bridget wasn't much of a giggler, she had to suppress one when she noticed how much his headdress resembled Mama's centerpiece on the dining room table, where they ate special occasion meals. Bridget hated the dining room with its cold, unused air, table always set but no one eating.

While she was sketching, she saw the woman Brax had followed. She was walking through the woods with a basket, stopping here and there to cut a growth of mushrooms off a tree or pick some berries. Bridget watched with such intensity that the woman felt her eyes and turned her attention to the creek. When she saw Bridget nearly camouflaged into the bank, she approached her.

"That's a great spot to sit and sketch or write, or whatever. Which are you doing, sketching, writing, or whatevering?" A mischievous smile teased the corners of her wide, pink mouth under a freckled nose.

The adrenaline prickling Bridget's everything subsided when Bridget saw the smile, the good-natured crinkles at the corners of her eyes, fine lines of mirth rather than crevices of grief put parentheses around her mouth when the smile abated.

"I'm Jane," the woman said, sweeping a mane of auburn hair over her shoulder. "I hope I'm not intruding." A jackrabbit skedaddled out of the brush at the top of the bank when she approached.

Bridget smiled back. "You're new here, aren't you?"

Jane nodded. "Just getting settled, haven't met much of anyone to speak of."

"My Aunt Sarah just moved back. I bet y'all will be good friends."

Jane smiled at the child's idea that this was enough common ground for grown women to build a relationship on, but who knew, maybe this Sarah would turn out to be a kindred spirit. "Do you know where I live?"

Bridget nodded.

"Why don't you bring her over for tea Sunday afternoon?"

Bridget agreed, and Jane continued foraging for mushrooms, herbs, and berries. When she disappeared, Bridget returned to her sketch.

Sunlight streamed through the open curtains in the living room Sunday morning when Mama woke everyone for church, fussing that they couldn't be late today of all days: what would the new pastor think?

Bridget waited until time to go to put on her stockings. Mama insisted on them for church and said they would be required on any dates Bridget thought she might be going on. It wasn't exactly a chastity belt, but every layer of clothing between her daughter and those nasty boys was a layer of insulation against pregnancy, and it was strictly enforced.

Once, Bridget took off her tights in the bathroom when she got to school and forgot to put them back on before she came home. The repercussions were severe.

When they arrived at the Methodist church, Mama quickly inventoried the cars in the parking lot before carrying a poundcake into the fellowship hall for the reception for the new pastor.

They took their seats in the fourth pew from the front on the groom's side of the church. Pew hierarchy wasn't as strict and rigorous as in the Baptist church, but Mama prided herself on always knowing her place, even if she was wrong half the time. The fourth pew was close enough to the front to be respectable, but safely behind the scrutiny that first trilogy of pews was subject to. There was a difference in making yourself seen and opening yourself up to the judgment of the congregation. Bridget peeled away from her family in the narthex and took a seat in the back with the youth group.

"Who's your mom's friend? She's HOT," Paul whisper-shouted into Bridget's ear as soon as she sat down.

Bridget elbowed him in his flannel-sheathed ribs. "She's not her friend, she's her sister. That's my Aunt Sarah, and she's waaaaay out of your league, even if you were old enough. Stop being a prick and swap seats with Lucille."

Soon, the opening chords of the first hymn sounded from the piano, and the choir, behind the pulpit as this church lacked a proper loft and pipe organ, belted out the first verse of "How Great Thou Art" and the procession began. The new pastor was vested in red, and when he took the pulpit, Bridget gasped.

Braxton leaned forward from the pew behind her and whispered, "He looks like that man from Aunt Sarah's devil cards without the fancy hat!"