Page 78 of Cackle

“That’s the thing about a revenge dress, darling. You can wear it anywhere, everywhere, whenever your heart desires.”

I sigh.

“You don’t seem like a vengeful person,” she says. “I am.”

“No,” I say. It seems like the polite response.

“It’s true,” she says. “You should know that about me, Annie. I don’t mean it, like, you know . . . It sounds a bit cryptic. It’s not a threat. I’m just saying it’s my personality.”

“You’d wear a revenge dress?”

She laughs a little. “Among other things.”

“Yeah,” I say. “A bit cryptic.”

She laughs again, then turns up the volume on the TV.

We spend the afternoon like this—side by side on the couch. At some point she goes into the kitchen and comes back holding two caramel apples.

“Where did you get these?” I ask her as she hands me one. It’s on a long wooden stick.

She winks at me. That’s her answer.

I don’t have an appetite, but I eat it anyway. It’s delicious. Worth the risk of getting sick again.

It actually makes me feel better, somehow settling my stomach.

“How do you always know what I need?” I ask Sophie.

“I’ve told you,” she says. “I consider myself very intuitive.”

A memory crawls out of a cobwebby corner in my mind.

“On my birthday, I went out with this girl from my old job, and she insisted on taking me to see a psychic.”

Sophie nods slightly to signal that she’s listening. Juice from her apple streams down her chin. She wipes it with a small black cloth, then tucks the cloth into her cleavage.

I wonder what else she has hiding in there. How deep it goes.

“Yes,” Sophie says. “What happened?”

“Yeah, so we went to this random psychic in the Village. She told me that I had a dark fate or something along those lines. Actually, she said she sensed a darkness. She couldn’t see my fate.”

“Why are you telling me this?” Sophie asks. I thought she’d be more interested in the story.

I shrug. “I don’t know.”

She smiles. Boops me on the nose. “You want me to tell you that she was full of shit?”

I laugh. “I guess. Maybe, yeah. That’s what I’m after.”

“She probably was, yes. It’s very likely. Or it could be that your future is uncertain. That you’re in a place where your path diverges, and not even fate itself knows which way you’ll go.”

“Oof.”

“Don’t despair,” she says, running a thumb under my pouty bottom lip. “I’m also full of shit. To be honest, pet, I don’t even believe in fate.”

“No?”