For around 8 months when I lived in New Orleans from 2000-2005, I worked two interesting jobs. One was a part-time graveyard shift bartender in the backroom of a popular French Quarter watering hole. (Oh, the stories I could tell, and probably should tell. Someday, maybe.) The other job I held simultaneously was also part-time, but in the afternoons: a tarot reader at Bottom of the Cup Tea Room, also in the French Quarter.
The Cup had a row of private booths that housed a regular staff of readers. Phone and in-person appointments were sent through by the amiable woman who ran/owned the place (a family business). We all preferred the in-person sessions. Phone readings were challenging as those sessions often came in quick succession for three or four hours straight. This could be psychologically exhausting even though we were diligent with our spiritual hygiene.
We had a handful of obsessives who called at least once a week (sometimes more), and the scramble to come up with variations on generalized guidance so the reading sounded fresh to these callers generated constant frustration. These individuals would hop from one reader to another in a never-ending cycle. After closing, sometimes we readers would have tea together and share our latest tales of woe (or amusement) about these repeat characters. (Yes, we had nicknames for them. No, I’m not going to share that information. Truthfully, while I recall a few of the individuals, I don’t recall their corresponding nickname.)
The following story from my employment at The Cup is true. An uncanny experience and one that still fascinates me, although at the time I’d been pretty shaken. Much of this piece is pulled from a journal I kept during that time, and modified slightly for clarity.
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One fine afternoon at The Cup, the owner notified me she was sending an in-person client to my booth as soon as the payment processed. I arranged my decks, closed my eyes, and performed grounding breathwork. Upon opening my eyes, I saw the client had already entered the booth. The woman stood inside the room and hugged a white vinyl purse to her chest as though afraid someone might reach out and snatch it. Unsmiling, she stared at me. Her bright-green eyes seemed to emit an unnerving gleam. Tinted contacts, I assumed.
After gesturing for the woman to have a seat, she did so, moving with abrupt, uncoordinated movements which were as peculiar as her intense, shiny-eyed gaze.
By way of welcome, I introduced myself and asked her name. She narrowed her eyes, gave a raspy laugh, and said, “No names.” The woman then began to inspect the three decks I’d arranged on the table, and things got weirder. She ran her tongue back and forth several times over her lips, narrowed her eyes, and leaned over the table to sniff each deck.
My apprehension increased. The owner usually excelled at spotting the random unstable or intoxicated person and sent them away. Had this one slipped under her radar?
I studied the woman more closely. Average in height and build, she wore a nondescript beige sweater set over brown slacks. The chunky gold necklace around her neck called to mind armor instead of jewelry. Brassy, shoulder-length hair, a weathered complexion, and age spots dotting her hands meant she could be anywhere from age 60 to 80, or so I guessed. She wore no obvious makeup except orange lipstick applied with a wobbly touch. Those eyes, though. Maybe it was just lamplight reflecting onto tinted contacts, but they had an unnerving effect on me when I looked into them, so I decided to avoid direct eye-contact as much as possible.
“Need to handle them,” rasped the nameless woman.
I wondered if the client were drunk or high, and impatience started to overcome my discomfort.
“Sure, go ahead.”
After dropping the purse to her lap, the woman went through the decks and studied certain cards. She sniffed them, held them up to her ears, and pressed them against her forehead. Finally, she settled on the Dali deck.
Restless to get this session with a potential lunatic over with, I asked the woman if she wanted a general reading or if she wished to focus on a specific concern.
The eccentric client again clutched her purse to her chest, tilted her chin downward and stared up at me. “I’m going to the casino. Which section has the weakened money machines? The ones almost ready to pay.”
At this point, I’d begun to believe this client was a practical joke being played on me by a friend or one of the other readers.
“No, I won’t give you gambling advice using the tarot. How about a general reading?”
The woman smacked her hand on the table and said, “I want to make money today. Lay the cards and I’ll read for myself.”
The air in the room instantly seemed to develop a dense, claustrophobic pressure, and it became ice cold even though I could hear the air-conditioning wasn’t currently running. Physical sensations familiar to me as announcing a spirit presence became amplified, and I’d had enough experience to trust these alerts. I tentatively concluded this woman was likely being ridden by something, and this went a long way toward explaining her abnormal behavior and manner of speaking.
Startled by this realization, yet surprisingly, not overly intimidated by this fresh perspective, I simply got down to business, planning to remain silent while the client deliberated on the spread.
I shuffled, cut, and arranged the cards into of my own tableaux layouts. The client bent to peer at the cards, and sniff them. (What was with all the sniffing?) After a few moments, she exhaled a sort of grunt, and swept the cards to the side.
“Not enough. Use a different deck.”
Same process: shuffle, cut, layout. Client fidgeted, peered (and sniffed). Also wheezed, grunted, and made what sounded like burps or gurgles. This spread was also swept aside. “Again, with the other deck.”
This went on for a few more spreads, with me re-using whichever deck the client chose until the table was littered with cards. This unexpected incident had made me nervous, but I didn’t feel threatened in any way. By now I’d shifted into “zoom out and observe” mode, and wasn’t even paying attention to the cards in the spreads. I don’t know what the client was seeing in the spreads, but I got the impression answers were indeed coming through.
Finally, the client sat back in her chair and wrapped her arms more tightly around her handbag. The green of her eyes seemed brighter as she gave me a creepy smile and said, “Right place. Bad timing.”
The bell sounded to signal the end of the session, and with the same uncoordinated movements, the client departed the room carrying the aberrant atmosphere out with her.
Minutes later, before I’d completely shrugged off the experience, the owner came back looking at me with concern. She told me that the odd woman had wandered in a staggering circle around the parlor, muttering something that sounded like “bad timing” and then bolted out the exit.
As far as I know, this particular client never made a return visit, but this eerie episode was only one of many experienced by the readers, and another to include in the Bottom of the Cup “weird client hall of fame.”
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