Magic Maggie and the Bright, New World

Maggie put on her coat, threw her pouchy bag across her body, then sat down on a little shoe cabinet next to the door. She just sat there motionless, trying to muster the courage to go out the door. She had thought about it ever since she had heard about the store, the new shiny tarot store, opened right in the heart of Dublin.

She had heard stories about it, about all the wonderful things that could be found there, but a part of her never believed they were actually true, mere exaggerations.

Now though, she had to go, not just out of professional curiosity, but because she actually needed a new tarot deck. Hers, the working one, had just given the ghost the previous evening and now she needed a new one. Of course, like any self respecting tarot professionals she had loads more decks, but they were not for usual readings for customers, they were collection decks, that she handled with care and tried to touch as little as possible.

Unlike her, the cards did not last hundreds of years, especially the ones that had been used frequently, so now, Maggie found herself in a pickle. Go out buy a deck and start making it her own as soon as possible, or order it online, not knowing if it was exactly what they described, wait a few days, and then start the process of syncing with the cards.

No, it could not wait, she had to go there. No matter how much she dreaded it! She was afraid of navigating this new world, that moved so fast that she could not keep up. Needs must!

Maggie had gotten into this situation exactly because of her stubbornness not to interact with the world. She was happy to spend her days in her little worker’s cottage in Sandymount, doing readings for people, taking long walks on the beach, reading her books and sometimes entertaining other witches she had been friends with longer than even she could remember.

It is easy to step out of the world, but then when you get back in, it is so different that you need time to adjust, and adjusting takes a lot of time especially when you are a witch too old and too settled in your ways to want to go with the flow of change.

Maggie stood up abruptly. She was determined to do this! She was a witch after all, she could handle a few nosy people. She straightened her hat in the mirror and smiled at the very young woman looking back. A long time ago she had decided to stick to a young age, it just felt right, and overtime her body, strong and reliable, had served her well.

Other witches, like her friend Teresa, the shapeshifter from Navan Road, had chosen to be middle aged forever, others liked to be older, they felt it suited their wisdom and experience. Maggie had enjoyed her younger years tremendously, so she decided to honor them by never letting her body age.

Still apprehensive about her visit, she pushed on through the busy public transport and then walking confidently the winding streets- she had been there long before they had been built- she got to a little square into which the narrow street opened up unexpectedly.

All around, imposing Georgian buildings stood like fierce guardians of the little central space. In a strange way it reminded Maggie of a very deep well with the sky somewhere far above her head. No, no drowning, not just yet. She whispered to herself while scanning the facades for the sign pointing to the shop. Then she saw it.

A few steps above the ground, with a large curved window full of sparkling incense holders, dream chasers, colorful scarves draped every which way, shiny gems spread everywhere. The window display seemed to beam and beckon. No cards though. Maggie felt a pang of disappointment. What if they didn’t have any?

With small steps she walked over and pushed the heavy door. A little bell announced her entrance and the smell of incense hit her. Maggie looked around for a living being and behind a huge glass pane she could barely distinguish a very thin man. He was standing up but that was noticeable only if you got really close to the glass.

‘Hello!’, Maggie was waiting to get noticed.

The man looked at her through very small, thick glasses, that covered only the eyes themselves, and the thought that, this is how grasshoppers must look like when they take a human form, formed into Maggie’s mind.

‘Hello…’, his voice was even fainter than hers and he seemed unprepared to answer any questions.

‘I was trying to faint a tarot cards shop … Do you know …’

‘Oh, this is it!’, his face brightened and a thin, long arm did a grandiose presentation gesture towards the wall behind her. Maggie turned around.

‘Ohhh!’, she was stunned.

An entire tall wall was covered in shelves and in the middle part there were hundreds, what seemed like thousands, tarot decks. Towards the top, there were endless books on tarot, and the bottom was closed, inaccessible without opening closed doors.

Maggie was in awe. She had been alive for a few good hundreds of years, but never had she seen anything of this magnitude. Up close, she could see there were tarot decks for the strangest and most unbelievable things. Cats, there was not one, but a few tarot decks with cats, white cats, pagan cats. Some linked to Celtic mythology and themes, Maggie was drawn like a magnet to them, but at a closer inspection she did not resonate with the scantily clad fairies depicted in them. Maggie’s head started to spin and felt overwhelmed. How was this possible? While she was out of the world, the world had changed so much!

It used to be that tarot was this arcane trade performed by readers in dark, back rooms. Now it was this expansive, colorful universe she had to get to know to figure out her path.

While she was standing there, trying to get her head around all of that, and gently touching and looking at cards, the Grasshopper came and joined her.

‘Starting out, are you? It is nice to start young, it can take a life to discover the tarot, and sometimes not even that is enough.’, and he gave a wistful smile.

Maggie looked at him waiting for him to go on. Although she was almost three hundred years old, she felt lost in front of all those possibilities.

He opened a hidden drawer and pulled out a beautifully designed box, covered in clovers of shiny green lacquer.

‘This is the last one of these that I have so I set it aside, but I think you should have it.’

From the box, he took out another smaller box and when he opened that one Maggie could see Pixie’s cards.

‘Oh Pixie!’ She said to herself remembering the wonderful friend she had.

The grasshopper took out the cards and when he stretched his arm to show her the cards, Maggie could see on top the card with her cat. In an instant she was taken back to that moment when Pixie, playful, added the black, naughty thing to the card.

‘They are so beautiful! I am so grateful to you!’, her voice expressed the authenticity of her words.

‘I knew you would appreciate them!’

He took the cards and went back to the till.

‘Forty euros please.’

Maggie paid and happily said her goodbye.

With the precious box in her bag she walked dreamily away looking forward to bonding with her new cards.

It is unusual this bright, new world, but there still is place for witches in it, they have been together for so long, for sure they can make things up.