Arcana | 1 – The Fool

Arcanum 1 – The Fool

The Fool evokes an enormous burst of energy and therefore represents liberation, a flight (material, emotional, intellectual, or sexual). In other words, this card poses the question of knowing how the energy of the subject of the reading is going, and toward what end the subject is applying his or her strength.
The Fool sometimes represents madness or inconsistency when he is identified with a
particular person—and, of course, a pilgrimage, a journey, a force that is moving forward. The question is knowing where: The Fool has no personal preference in the matter.
This card, an inseminator of energy, will exacerbate, nourish, or despoil the surrounding cards. The Fool is a mirror of The Nameless Arcanum, which could well be his skeleton. The Fool shows us that the capacity to act is also acquired through the initiatory crossing through madness and death.

Warrington, Escambia County, Florida – January 1988

It all began in a very simple way. With two girls walking through a dark parking lot and toward the colored lights of an amusement park, in a small city near the ocean. It was all in all a quite chilly winter night, and the sea sent its coldish, salt-smelling breeze over the land in waves. Saturday night, a small town, and plenty of attractions. Not.

“Leigh Ann Pester – hold on a minute!” Lisa tugged at her friend’s hand. “Gosh, nomen omen!”

Leigh turned to Lisa and burst out laughing.

“What?”

“Nothing. Just that your last name is so fitting.”

“Why? What do you mean?” She scrunched her eyebrows and stared at Lisa.

Leigh was gorgeous and funny – everything Lisa wasn’t sure she was, despite her friend’s constant reassurance. Tall and slender, with a smooth, velvety brown skin and beautiful curly hair, that night styled in a flawless afro, Leigh was also self-confident and well on her way to becoming accomplished in life, both on a personal and professional level. Lisa always felt like the ugly duckling whenever they went out together, but was not jealous of her friend. If anything, she hoped one day she too would come out of her shell and bloom. And stop being the sulky, sullen, insecure little girl that her mother always reminded her she was.

“Because you’re impatient… and you’re dragging me! Stop it!”

“You’re stalling! And I wanna go see the Ferris wheel!” Leigh didn’t let go of Lisa’s hand and kept pulling her toward the entrance of the funfair. “Isn’t this place amazing?”

Lisa stopped and blinked, noticing how Leigh’s dark eyes sparkled as she stared at the vintage-looking sign welcoming the visitors. She looked like a little girl, not like the twenty-five-year-old that, as of late, had been able to drag Lisa out of her rotten moods more often than not.

“Lise… Did you see that? Looks like they painted the sign by hand!”

Indeed. The UltraFunGames Fair sign was old-style, to say the least. But after all, that was what had thrilled Leigh in the first place. She loved everything vintage, from hairstyles to clothing to accessories, and that night she sported hip-huggers and a boiled wool trench coat that she had borrowed from her very hippy-looking aunt. Straight from the Seventies! For her part, Lisa was freezing and realized that wearing only a leather jacket hadn’t probably been the best idea, given that the funfair was so close to the beach. However, there was still a chance that she would be able to warm up as they played silly games.

Even from the outside they could see so many old fairground classics. It seemed almost unreal: from the ball in the bucket to the hoopla, from the buzz wire to the tin can alley, from the peep board to the high striker. And then, of course, there was the Ferris wheel, painted in bright yellow and blood red, standing out against the starry sky.

The music coming from the carnival reminded Lisa of some old movies about the circus, and what she felt was a mixture of childlike enchantment and nervousness. The place was beautiful, but also alluring in some weird, eerie way. Like a spider calling the fly into its lethal web. Like a slice of timeless time brought back to the present. Sort of like when Lisa would dream about her father, and he was there with her and gone at the same time.

She tried to remember if her dad had ever taken her to a place like this and couldn’t. The mere realization of the void in her mind almost provoked physical pain. The idea that he could slip away from her memory so easily and disappear was way too agonizing to bear, even after all these years. However, at this point she was used to the pain. She had learned that death created a stillness in time, a doubling of worlds: one moving forward, the other staying immobile forever.

“Come on! What are you waiting for?” Leigh laughed and Lisa turned to look at her, chuckling out of habit more than anything else. Trying to push the demons away.

“OK, OK, calm down! And tell me once again why we’re here…”

“Because it’s Saturday night and this is the only thing this dusty-ass town has to offer! Let’s go!”

Hesitantly, Lisa allowed her friend to drag her closer to the entrance of the funfair.

“Yeah. What the hell is this? We should have stayed in Pensacola.”

“No, we’re good where we are. Look, Lisa – I know my hometown like the back of my hand. It’s booooo-ring!” Leigh laughed her crystalline laugh and that made Lisa smile. “Next time we’ll stay at your place, ‘kay?”

“Which one?” Lisa rolled her eyes.

She wasn’t goading. Quite the opposite, in fact. She hoped she could soon have her own place to go, and stop bouncing like a ping-pong ball between Los Angeles, Memphis and Clearwater.

“Well… Not the Florida one. I don’t really like your friends over there.” Leigh turned to her and gave her a deadpanned look. “They’re kinda creepy. Sorry, Lise.”

Lisa shrugged. She didn’t think much about the church, nor Leigh’s opinion upset her. As a matter of fact, Lisa was happy she had friends outside of the whole thing. She wasn’t even that convinced about the dogmas, but hey – that place was everything she had known since she was very little. Not that she had a choice, back then. Her mother had chosen for her.

Now, only a few days away from her twentieth birthday, Lisa was starting to chomp at the bit. She needed more space, more freedom. Physically and otherwise. That was why, despite her sulky attitude, she was glad she was staying at Leigh’s for a few days. Pensacola wasn’t the most appealing city in the world, but at least Priscilla wasn’t there, ordering her around as if Lisa was one of her employees and not her daughter. Lisa needed a breather from her mother and many other people, as well. And maybe Leigh was right. Maybe it would indeed be a fun night.

“No, it’s fine. I know you don’t like them…” Surprising her friend, Lisa let go of her hand and went straight to the entrance, looking up at the colored light illuminating the night. The colors – the blues, the reds, the yellows – reminded her of a Van Gogh painting. On acid. “You know what? Now that I look at it, this thing is not even that bad. Better than… nothing, I guess.”

“Hey, let’s put it this way. We’ll pretend we’ve never seen anything like it.”

“That’s because we haven’t. This place looks prehistorical.”

“It’s called vintage. But anyway, like I said. We’ll pretend we’ve never seen anything like this, and we’ll try all the games and rides. Each and every single one of them. Then we’ll eat cotton candy and maybe, if we’re lucky, we’ll find someone interesting to share our fun with.”

“Like?” Lisa raised an eyebrow.

Leigh stared at her suggestively, the look in her eyes mischievous.

“Guys. I love guys. You love guys. Guys are fun. They’re cute. Sometimes they’re even hot. I think we can agree about that.”

“I do have a sorta-kinda boyfriend, you know?”

“No, I pretend I don’t know. Once again, sorry Lise. I mean, I know you and Danny are sorta-kinda together, but had he been so important to you, he would be here.”

There it was again. Leigh did have a point. It wasn’t that Lisa didn’t like Danny. She did. She even loved him in a way. She felt a lot of affection and more often than not, she was comforted by his presence. But not all the time. He and Lisa were like oil and water and at times she wondered if being around him was the right choice. Danny was also a mild dude who pretty much allowed Lisa to reign over him the way she wanted. And that made everything easier in so many circumstances. But not in all of them. Lisa would never admit it out loud, but her most secret taste in men ran in a quite different direction. She liked good guys with an Alpha streak. Unusual, original, unique, and very much able to tame her. As much as a nice guy Danny was, he did not fit in the category. Neither did the assholes who had taken advantage of her in the past. If the kind of man Lisa dreamed about existed, she hadn’t found it.

“Well, you can do what you want, but I cannot pretend I don’t.”

“Didn’t you say that you and Danny aren’t exclusive? Isn’t it more like a… friends with benefit kinda thing?”

“Yeah. I did say that.”

Lisa’s tone went somber. That was the truth in a nutshell: she and Danny were friends and sometimes they fucked. He was in love with her. She was fond of him and that was it. But she was also afraid to lose him. She hated loneliness. Abandonment terrified her.

“You’re confusing. You know what? Whatever you say, Lisa. But hey, maybe it’s my turn, tonight. Maybe I will meet the man of my dreams here.”

Lisa shrugged.

“Could be. I’m sure you’d find a way to keep him hooked.”

“Well…” Leigh laughed. “There are many ways I can do that. I am a great kisser. I am funny, I am smart…”

“And don’t forget humble.”

“Right! And I can sometimes cry on cue, which might always come in handy.”

“You what?!” Lisa snorted.

“Yeah… I mean, I really have to want it, so it’s not really on cue – but…”

Lisa shook her head.

“I can’t even remember the last time I cried…”

Which was a lie, of course. She did remember. Only, she didn’t want anyone to know that she was way more sensitive than she appeared. How many layers of disguise did she have to wear, to look the way she thought she should look?

If she had given something away, Leigh hadn’t noticed.

“Well, I can remember the last time I cried on cue. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not that I didn’t feel it… It’s just a bit manipulative sometimes because I amplify it. Like…” She grabbed the tickets from the booth near the open gates and started walking arm in arm with Lisa. “… I’m sensitive as hell and it’s not a problem to cry… It’s more of a problem not to cry. It’s just that sometimes I channel it, because I know it can get me what I need if I keep going.”

“You’re too much, Leigh…”

“…With my big eyes all wet and red, I’m irresistible!”

This time Lisa laughed and followed her friend inside the carnival. Guys or not, she would indeed try to have fun.

“Mike!”

Michael kicked Alan lightly, without even turning his face to look at him. His eyes stayed focused on the game. He wanted to hook the damn plastic duck – it didn’t matter if it would be the last thing he did. He was competitive by nature.

“Ouch! What the hell?”

“John. My name is John. For tonight.” This time he glanced at his friend who, standing by his side, was smoking a cigarette and scanning the surroundings. Alan wasn’t interested in hooking ducks at all. He had another type of hunting in mind. Well… fishing was probably a more fitting term.

“OK – John be it, then. Sorry. I tend to forget.” Alan stared at Michael and raised an eyebrow. “Do you really think it makes any difference? I can’t even see your damn face! Nobody’s gonna recognize you.”

“It’s enough that we’re here without any security detail, Al. Bill was not impressed. But I told him-”

“You told him that nothing ever happens in this small town and that you’ll be safe. And you know why you did, John? Because it’s true. People don’t care about the outside world here. Not even if your name is Michael Ja-”

“Cut it out…” Michael giggled and then shook his head. No hooking. No plastic ducks. No prize. Damn it!

He was trying very hard not to attract any attention, and so far it had worked pretty well. However, considering how indifferent everyone at the little funfair looked, Michael was starting to think that his disguise was possibly a tad bit much. He wore a long coat and a beanie, and most of his face was covered by bandages – as if he had just had an accident. He also wore a scarf for good measure. He felt uncomfortable as all hell, but the upside was that the temperature had dropped with the darkness, and at least he wasn’t freezing. However, he probably could have done just fine without the whole thing, as nobody paid attention to him. Everyone seemed enamored with the vintage funfair and its traditional games. Like a bubble from the past, momentarily dropped into the present. And he loved every single minute of it!

It had been Michael’s idea to spend the Saturday night there, and Alan had just tagged along. He was an old friend and Michael hadn’t seen him in quite some time. The tour and all that jazz had rendered him unavailable to pretty much everyone for over a year. However, Michael now had some impromptu free time, since he had decided to move to Pensacola days before rehearsals began. The perfect occasion to catch up with his buddy who, at least, didn’t treat him like a superstar – but more like a moron most of the time.

“No, but seriously, Mi- ehr, John. How do you think a girl could ever be interested in you? You look like the invisible man!”

“You’re such a dick. A blind dick! At least half of my face is visible. My mouth is free, see?” Michael gave Alan a sly smile, his perfect white teeth fully on display. “So I can eat cotton candy. And chocolate. I’m not here for the girlies, just so you know. I’m not like you.”

Alan rolled his eyes. He knew his friend. He liked him, very much. He also appreciated his childlike nature – which was what had brought them both there at the carnival, after all. However, he also knew that Michael didn’t always act like a teenager. And that he loved women, no matter how much he tried to brush it off at the moment. Speaking of which…

“Oh, hey – about that…”

“About what? Cotton candy?”

“Nah – you shithead. About girls. More specifically, that dancer of yours… what’s her name again? Tiana?”

“Tatiana.” Michael blinked. His face, behind the mask, stayed utterly still.

“Right, her! She’s hot! Did you bang her yet?”

Michael shook his head and scoffed.

“Ah… Nope.”

His poker face was in place and would have been unreadable even without the bandage. He was not a kiss and tell kinda guy. And Tatiana… well. He knew she wanted to sleep with him, and surely she was beautiful – to the point that at times he had even thought about giving it a go. But there were several reasons why he hadn’t, at least for now. First of all, he treated business as business and she worked for him – he didn’t like imbalance of power. And then she was clingy. Michael had a feeling that she would never let him breathe again if only he gave in. So, despite admiring the girl’s absolute beauty, to him the whole thing was a braindead idea.

“With all due respect, buddy, I know there’s a dog hiding there somewhere. Deep down inside of you. Hidden beneath layers and layers of… whatever the fuck else you build around yourself. You forget that I know you… John.”

He sure did. But Alan didn’t live the life that Michael lived. And Michael didn’t expect him to understand or fathom the nuances and consequences that a career like his involved.

“Yeah, you know me. Then you should remember how serious I am about my work.”

“No, I mean, yes. I do. But still… I know I’d bang her.”

Michael chuckled.

“Oh, I know you’d do it.”

“Man, don’t get me wrong. I do get your point. Not mixing job and personal life and all that stuff. But still, you’ve been touring for how long at this point?”

They were moving over to another booth as they spoke. Michael pushed his hands into his pockets.

“Come on, Al! Bucket game! God, I love carnivals…”

“Mike?”

“John.”

“So, John? How long have you been touring? About a year?”

“Yeah… about a year…” Michael extracted a few, crumpled dollars from his back pocket and placed them on the counter. The guy behind it, hair slicked back and an impressive handlebar mustache, put the money in a small tin box and kept chatting to a busty blonde, without even glancing at his new clients.

“And you want me to believe that you never had sex? Not once during your tour?”

“Peep down and toss the ball, Alan.”

“So?”

“Oh my God. I don’t want you to believe anything. Or you can believe whatever you want, really.”

Which was the truth. No, Michael hadn’t had a lot of sex in the past year and certainly not with Tatiana. Despite having the chance to. It had been mainly because he was very much focused on what he was doing, but also because casual sex wasn’t really his thing. It had happened maybe a couple of times, with girls whose names – and faces – he had already forgotten. Forgettable nights, but at least he had managed to release some of the adrenaline and tension of the aftershow.

“OK – be all secretive, then. Be all prude, only you ain’t like that for real, are you, buddy? But whatever. I’ll tell you what. I have a feeling, tonight.”

“What feeling? Toss the darn ball, Alan.”

“I don’t wanna toss the darn ball. I hate this shit. Why don’t we go visit the witch’s cave? I mean, maybe she’s hot. What about some hand reading, buddy?”

Michael scoffed.

“You know I don’t believe that stuff. Everyone is the maker of their own fate. Nothing is really predetermined… God gave us a beautiful thing called free will. The sky is the limit.”

“Possibly. Hey… don’t you want a girlfriend? Like, a real one? Aren’t you tired of being alone? I mean, I know you and Brooke sometimes fuck, or fucked… but still… It’s not serious, though. And you’re what, now? Almost thirty? …Dude!”

Actually, he had turned twenty-nine a few months earlier. But whatever.

Michael chewed on his lip. No, he and Brooke weren’t serious. And whatever had happened between her and Michael was over. It had never been anything as important as at one point he had pretended it was, and he knew she would never talk about it anyway. She would always play the friend card. He felt like a naive fool for having believed, for a second, that there could be something else between the two of them. She was now nothing but a fleeting presence in his life, willing to walk on red carpets with him because it was convenient to both. There was nothing else.

“Let’s not talk about that. Your turn, Alan…”

Alan laughed and did his best to hit the bucket. He missed it and Michael shook his head.

“We ain’t gonna win anything if you carry on like that.” Gosh, the damn bandages were not exactly comfortable. “What feeling do you have? I’m all ears.”

“Nosy guy. I have a feeling we’ll meet a couple of girls tonight. I mean, take a look around…”

Michael tossed the ball and got it in the bucket. Yes! Another couple of dollar bills on the counter. Another glance by handlebar-mustache-guy, still busy flirting with his girl.

“I have. There are many pretty girls…”

“Indeed, my friend. Indeed. And with your charisma, they’ll flock to you – and me too, by default. Despite your stupid disguise.”

“Lower your voice…” Michael was about to shove Alan playfully, and then – as it would often happen with the so-called magical thinking, something created the casual relationship between actions and events. Or better yet, Alan’s hope became a reality.

Among the rarefied groups of people who had been brave enough to go the funfair despite the cold January night, Michael saw them. Two girls walking through the entrance and looking around, as if they were assessing the place. They were both gorgeous, but one of the two in particular caught Michael’s attention. She was petite, with long dark hair, and lips and a body to die for. But that wasn’t what startled him and stopped him in his tracks: it was the fact that the girl looked familiar, and he tried hard to place her in her memory as, with her friend, she entered the “Witch’s Cave.”

Alan was still talking, but at that point Michael had already stopped listening.