LJ Idol - Week 24 - Auguries
The priestess stood on a hill. Tendrils of dark hair, loosely bound in a braid, whirled about her face as she scanned the sky.
No birds today. Not a single sparrow, swallow, certainly none of the majestic eagles that would please her Caesar.
An ornithomancer, she had spent the morning preparing for divination, wandering the Forum Boarium to find the fattest pig, then returning to her chambers to bathe in scalding water. Anointing her smooth flesh with scented oil, she smelled like a ripe pomegranite when she slit the pig’s throat and its blood flowed scarlet and warm into her open palms.
She knelt and lifted her arms skyward, begging the goddess Minerva to bring her wise council that afternoon, wise council and birds.
Eyes narrowed, she looked into the distance, watching her future disappear as the horizon loomed barren, devoid of even one winged creature. Long linen tunic pressing against her legs in the wind, she touched the eagle's feather fluttering against the purple of her mantle.
When she needed them most, had her birds deserted her?
A soft footfall behind her led her to turn quickly. Sandaled feet made for a stealthy approach and Julius was beside her almost before she ‘d recognized he was coming.
She bowed her head to him. “Salve, Ceasar” she whispered to her king. But he looked upon her with solemnity.
“And what of the birds, Aquilina?” he asked, looking coldly into her eyes.
“There are none, my lord,” she responded, terror growing when she saw his jaw clench. She must tell the truth, no matter the cost.
“My lord, there hasn’t been a single bird to pass this way for hours. The gods are displeased at your decision to take Queen Cleopatra to your bed. They will not send their winged companions to bless such an inauspicious coupling. I believe very bad things will come to you…”
Staring into the distance as she spoke, she didn’t see his fist tighten. But when the back of his hard hand struck her across the face, she fell sideways with a cry.
Lip bleeding, he grabbed her arm brutally and dangled her before him like a plaything.
“What do you know? What do birds know?” he sneered. “Did my wife put you up to this? Tell no one of this!” he roared and then pulled her in close. “No, my little dove, you cannot have the chance to sing of this to another soul,” and he thrust her back toward the palace with a shove.
Dragging her to the subterranean prison, she began to sob.
The only bird she’d ever seen below the ground was a dead one.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I am no goddess, no priestess nor even a psychic, but I have been called “witchy” more than once. I love the ancient arts of astrology and numerology and even the Eastern glory of the I Ching. In times of trouble, you can find one of my three decks of tarot cards sleeping beneath my pillow - one of which belonged to my grandmother before me - so they can pick up on my energy in the night and be warm and ready for divination by dawn.
So why, between a slightly supernatural nature and a strong sense of women’s intuition, did I not recognize the signs that led my lover to nearly break me in a drunken rage one night?
I have always watched birds and taken comfort from their cheerful nature in the worst of times. Living in the country when I was 21, there was a flock of cardinals that lived in my yard that I considered a personal treasure. While I didn’t own a television, I could enjoy their bright company in any season as they fed and flew outside my window. I took their presence to be an auspicious one. They had chosen my yard to grace with their beautiful color and song.
One morning in late December I woke and they had gone. They were always there, the too-whit too-whit of their lilting voices greeting me as I dressed for work. This morning dawned cold and silent, an empty yard beneath a steely grey sky. I was leaving the next morning for my parent's house in Florida but I should have listened to the voice that screamed inside me to gather my things and leave now, while I still could.
I quieted it. My ex, who still lived at my house until he could find another place, was leaving for his family's home in New York, then continuing on out West for a “break.” I had promised him I would have dinner and a drink with him for the holidays before we parted ways. Guilty over the way our relationship had faltered, I felt it was the least I could do.
The day passed in stillness as I packed and straightened and as evening fell, I cooked a last simple meal for us to share. I hoped coming home to chicken stew bubbling in a crock pot, warm rolls on the counter and a sweet Chardonnay chilling in the fridge would encourage a peaceful goodbye.
The sky darkened into a starless night. 6:00 passed, then 7 and 8 and there was no answer on his cell phone. Breaking out the bottle of chardonnay, I sat on my couch and poured a glass. My cat, Indy, curled up next to me and I took a long slow sip.
Should I go try to find him? There weren’t too many places he could be, but anyplace still open had a bar and now I was concerned what sort of shape he might be in when he got home.
Jay’s father was a recovering alcoholic. After his drinking and his temper ran Jay’s mother off, he finally found the strength to quit. Warren hadn’t drank in years, but he’d moved on to what we always referred to as “The 13th Step,” smoking pot several times a day to calm his anxiety and depression. Jay was a decent guy, smart and charismatic, but he followed closely in his dad’s footsteps.
The adult child of a recovering alcoholic, he was prone to bouts of melancholy that would leave him hiding in his bed for days at a time or, in worse episodes, fits of rage that erupted, unannounced, his molten temper seething and scorching anyone in its path - and particularly when he’d been drinking.
I should have realized this parting of ways would bring on a dark mood, after four years I’d have been a fool not to, which was part of why we were no longer a couple. I was just too caught up in my own excitement about heading to my family’s house to pay much attention that day.
I was first amused, then annoyed by his absence. By the time he finally walked, unsteadily, through the door it was after midnight and I was furious. I’d eaten my stew and crescent rolls alone and finished half the bottle of wine while reading Steven King on the couch. Now I just wanted to go to bed.
“Sorry you missed dinner,” I began, in a tone that said I couldn’t have given a fuck if he ever shared a meal with me again.
A little too brightly he told me “Yeah, that…I was at Doc's with the guys. They said they’d buy me a beer after work, and then I bought them a beer and you know…we had some wings…” he drifted off. “I’m really tired now,” he added dismissively and started to amble back to the bedroom.
“Well, I’ll be leaving before you get up in the morning and I need you to carry something out to my car” I demanded. I had a large box of Christmas baskets I’d made for my family that I couldn’t quite carry. I’d asked him to do it the night before and he’d put me off once already. He didn’t respond.
“Jay…I need you to do it now.” I hissed at his back and watched with interest as his whole posture changed.
Before he turned to face me, he straightened his back and widened his stance. Slowly he turned to look, not at me, but through me, and responded “I don’t need to do anything for you.”
He pushed me out of his way and stalked toward the box. “Is this the one you need me to take to your car” he asked pleasantly and, lifting it over his head, threw it as hard as he could on the hearth. I could hear the little jars of peach jam and vidalia onion salad dressing shatter when it crashed onto the bricks.
“What are you doing?” I yelled at him but he was too far gone to even hear me. Like a bull prodded in the balls, he was practically snorting as he swung his head looking for something else to destroy. I pressed back against the wall hoping it wouldn’t be me.
He swept a shelf of books to the carpet and I grimaced. This was going to get ugly. Then he stepped into the kitchen and knocked the crock pot of stew off the counter, muttering something about dinners wasted, the contents now covering the kitchen floor. My cats came to survey the mess and he reached for Indy.
Holding the cat down on his back. he growled, “You…I fucking hate you, you little bitch. And you…” he broke off as he chased my gorgeous tabby Daisy down the hall. She escaped to hide beneath the bed. “I’d fucking stomp on you if I could get my hands around your neck!” he called, kicking the edge of the mattress for emphasis.
Horrified, I swept Indy off the floor and held him close, backing silently into the corner. Jay was like an overgrown child in a tantrum, but at six feet tall with a former military build I wasn’t about to get in his way.
He looked to the left and right and saw another box in the corner. I worked at a magazine publisher and it was filled with our latest edition, which I was meant to deliver on my way out of town the next day.
He dropped to his knees and ripped at the packing tape, giving up and just tearing the cardboard flaps off the top.
“Your job is shit, BULLSHIT!” he screamed at me and started to throw the magazines around the room. He lifted the box and stormed into the yard, flinging it to the left and right and smearing the magazines into the grass with his heel. “This is what I think of your fucking magazine” he cried and then danced on them. If I hadn’t been terrified it might almost have been comical.
Standing in the doorway, I saw my chance.
“Jay” I yelled, unsteadily, “I am locking this door. I think you need to get in your car and sleep this off. You don’t need to be in here right now!” As I leaned in to close the door he dashed back onto the porch and caught it.
“If you lock me out I will break every goddamn window in this house to get to you.”
The look in his eyes told me he was serious so I stood back fast.
He came back inside looking for something else to destroy and grabbed my antique wood rack from the hearth, swinging it over his head. Suddenly I was angry. Frightened, but no longer scared of the consequences, I squared off in front of him.
This wasn’t my life! This crazy, "call the cops on my ex" bullshit was not allowed to happen in my life! I didn’t have to live like this!
“Hey, why don’t you break your own stuff?” I yelled at him. “Put that down!”
He glared at me but didn’t drop the wood rack.
Stepping closer to him, I glared up at his red face.
“Put it down, WARREN” I said coldly, invoking the name of the man he promised me he’d never become. He grimaced and threw the wood rack to the ground then turned on me.
When I looked into his blank eyes I realized there was nothing left of the Jay I knew in this drunken madman. I took a hurried step back and tripped over the coffee table, falling on the floor.
Falling on my ass had a great result. It hadn’t occurred to me, much in the way that horror movie starlets run upstairs to escape a serial killer, that there was no reason for me to stay inside the house with a crazy person. Let him tear it apart, let him fucking burn it down…I was getting out of there.
Barefooted, I rushed to the front door, to the key rack, and grabbed my keys in a trembling fist.
Jay was right behind me.
“I’m leaving!” I screamed “I don’t have to stay here for this!” and reached for the doorknob.
“You’re not going anywhere,” he said and leaned his shoulder against the door while holding it shut with the weight of his body. I scratched at his hands on the door frame, trying to drag them away while yanking madly on the doorknob.
Drunk, his equilibrium was off-balance. Had I not been panicked, I could have probably kicked his feet out from under him. In his boots, his feet were already sliding across the linoleum as he forced his upper body against the door. I gave his chest a push and he faltered, just long enough for me to get the door open a few inches.
Trying to get a better grip, I slipped my hand through the door frame and pulled frantically.
“Oh no you don’t!” he roared and threw his body against the door, slamming my grasping hand between 200 pounds of drunken fury and metal. I screamed in pain, and the image of a thousand brilliant cardinals took flight across my mind. Whimpering, I slid to the floor, landing on my knees, my head pressed against the wall and my arm raised above me from my hand still caught in the door.
I started to sob. He was so much bigger than I was. How could I get away? What would he do next?
On my knees, I looked up at his face, silently pleading to be set free.
When he saw my tears, it was like he finally remembered who I was. Who he was. He stepped away from the door and slid down the wall behind him, burying his head in his hands before he even hit the floor.
My hand fell out of the door and I clutched it for a just moment, absently wondering how many bones were broken. Not taking the time to look at Jay, I scooped up my keys in my good hand and ran, barefoot, to my car and threw myself inside.
Hands trembling, I got the key in the ignition and spun my tires in the gravel, so great was my hurry to escape.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Aquilina lay on the cold, damp ground of her cell. Eyes closed, she listened to the clank of keys and boots as guards passed around her. She didn’t need birds to tell her what her fate would be in this airless place.
When they came for her, she went without fighting, her once creamy tunic muddied and dragging on the ground behind her. She prayed for crucifixion, pain made bearable as she fell into the sky, but instead they took her deeper under the ground.
Forced to her knees in the dark, she looked into her executioner’s face and met eyes as cold and black as a ravens.
‘So I’m to be strangled,’ she thought. ‘Like a common thug. Neck wrung like a goose, how appropriate.’ She ran her hand one last time along the eagle’s feather at her breast.
When his cool hands closed around her throat she swallowed and closed her eyes. A quick prayer to Pluto and then strong fingers tightened around smooth skin and she inhaled in horror, struggling to take a breath. His hands pressed harder and there was no more air, just the burning of her lungs as they screamed for relief, her heart a frightened bird fluttering against her rib cage.
Losing consciousness, the room around her turned from black to blue and she was flying, lost in a flock of doves as she often had been in her happiest dreams.
‘So this is what it is like to die’ she pondered lazily, as though she had all the time in the world to consider the thought. A smile parted her purple lips.
‘I should have known.’