There were other places I could’ve hung out if I wanted to, but Luka, Seth, and Hutch had the nicest one. It was a 1986 Winnebago Minnie Winnie 24RC, and they’d paid almost thirty grand for it last summer. Considering the sideshow was going broke, that was an exorbitant amount of money.
Luka and Seth had made all the money on their own, though. Between shows, they’d go out to bars and trick drunk guys into betting that they couldn’t do something. Seth was supernaturally strong, and Luka could heal from anything, so he’d swallow glass or pound nails into his hand. It still hurt like hell, but for the right price, it’d been worth it.
They’d made most of their money before Hutch had stumbled upon us. He’d run away from a rough home life with his entire life savings in his pocket, which amounted to a couple grand. It was that final contribution that put them over the edge, so Luka and Seth had let him live with them.
He’d still added the smallest share, so he had the bunk above the cab, while Luka and Seth claimed the bunk beds in the back. It was a chic trailer, and the boys had it decked out with the latest amenities, like a TV and VCR and a tape deck with speakers built in throughout the trailer. Not to mention a top-of-the-line AC and heater, so we all spent a great deal of time hanging out in their camper.
When we went into Luka’s camper, I slid into the dinette bench next to Roxie. Luka went over to the fridge to get out a couple bottles of beer, and Hutch pulled out the deck of cards before sitting down across from us.
“Where’s Seth?” I asked, noticing that their third roommate hadn’t followed us inside.
Luka set four beers down on the table, then sat across from me. “I think he went over to hang out with Carrie.”
“And that’s why I’m here.” Roxie grabbed a bottle and flipped the top off. “There’s only so many times I can put on headphones and pretend that I can’t hear Seth and Carrie having sex over Joan Jett.”
“Yeah, that makes sense,” I said, and took a beer for myself.
“So, what are we playing tonight? Poker? Gin? Blackjack?” Hutch asked as he shuffled the deck of cards.
“How about gin? We haven’t played that in a while,” Luka said.
“Gin it is.” Hutch finished shuffling and dealt the cards. When he’d finished, we all organized our hands. “Okay. So here’s what I don’t understand. Can you see my cards, Mara?”
I shook my head. “Not unless you show them to me.”
“But your mom could see them, right? If she were playing with us?” Hutch asked.
“No.” I looked at him over the top of my cards and saw the bewilderment in his brown eyes. “She’s not psychic.”
“But then how does she see stuff?” Hutch lowered his cards and the furrow in his brow deepened.
“She’s a necromancer,” I explained. “She has contact with the spirits, and she sees what they tell her. Sometimes they give her insight into the future, or into people’s true motives. But that’s only because spirits can see more than we can.”
“And that’s different than being psychic how?” Hutch asked.
Laying his cards facedown the table, Luka chuckled a little. He leaned back in the booth, content to drink his beer and watch Hutch try to sort this all out.
“Hutch,” Roxie said, eyeing him severely. “You’ve been traveling with us for, like, nine months, and you still haven’t figured this stuff out?”
“It’s confusing.” Hutch shrugged and lowered his eyes as he shifted his cards around in his hand. “Maybe you don’t know because you grew up around it or you’ve been playing with fire and shoving swords down your throat most of your life. But for me, it’s all a bit strange still.”
“Where I grew up, there was nobody around who could do the things I did,” Roxie said, her expression darkening.
“They all thought I was a freak and practically ran me out of town,” Luka chimed in. “It wasn’t until I joined the sideshow that things started making sense.”
“Right.” Hutch looked between the two of them. “Because people explained things to you.”
“A psychic can see your thoughts, read minds, that kinda thing,” I told him. “A necromancer talks with the dead. That’s the difference.”
“And Gideon’s psychic,” Hutch said.
I nodded. “Right.”
“So he could read my cards, if he were here right now?” Hutch asked.
“He could, if he wanted to,” I allowed. “But he usually works to keep out of other people’s minds. He doesn’t like invading their privacy.”
“How does he do that?” Hutch asked.
“There’s a couple different ways,” I said, explaining it as I best understood it from what Gideon had told me. “One of them is practice, another way is keeping himself distracted and busy. He’s always reading or talking or doing something. He never just sits alone.”
“Alcohol helps,” Luka added, taking another drink of his beer.
Roxie nodded, laughing in agreement. “Oh yeah, alcohol definitely dulls the extra senses.”
“So then why do you guys drink?” Hutch asked.
“Sometimes, that is why,” Luka said.
“The year before I joined the sideshow, I was on a nonstop drinking binge, trying to make it go away,” Roxie said.
Hutch looked over at her. “You don’t like being able to make fire?”