Episode 3: The Queen of Guilt

This episode of All in the Cards Podcast was written by Ashley McAnelly and Morgan Valko.

Theme music for this episode was composed by TheArsonist and produced by Scott Thomas.

Links to Marcus Damanda books and Marcus’s Facebook and Twitter

Cast: Featuring the voice talents of Ashley McAnelly as Jade, Kiana Harris as the Suffering Woman, Nichole Goodnight as Sam, James Solis as Dylan, and Scott Thomas as the book customer.

• Jade – Ashley McAnelly
• Suffering Woman – Kiana Harris
• Sam – Nichole Goodnight
• Dylan – James Solis
• Ad Customer – Scott Thomas

[SFX: several books being dropped on a wooden front desk]
“Do you always ignore paying customers?”
“Only when they decide to take up residence in my bookstore. At that point you’ve made yourself family and think everything is free.”
Oh, yes. The girl testing me the other day is back. She’s been here all morning waiting for me to pay attention to her, or recognize her, or whatever attention teens expect nowadays. She bought some hot tea and set up a nest a couple hours ago, unloading her backpack onto a table in the corner.
“I don’t expect anything to be free. I just expect some help when I clearly need it.” “Clearly? Nothing’s been clear other than your desperate need for my attention.”
“Yes, the attention a customer would want from the store owner. In a store that desperately could use some business.”
“Ouch. You really convinced me to give you my undivided attention with that one.”

“Just sell me these books and I’ll go back to my seat.”
[SFX: three beeps of a scanner, a few seconds in between as she picks up the books to scan them and puts them down]
“To Ride a Silver Broomstick, Ozark Magic and Folklore, The Living Traditions of Santeria, The Way of the Four, How to Read Tarot, and the Modern Witch Tarot deck. Do you know what you’re doing here kid?”
“I’m researching, and the name is Sam.”
“I hope it’s not for actual practice of the Craft. Some of these don’t play well together.” Her snarky smile dips into a frown for just a second.
“Well, I’m sure I can make them. After all, all I need is to read the books and learn. Not like I need a teacher or anything.”
“A solitary witch, that’s at least a good choice, kid. Solitaire practice is the best way to go. No one there to tell you how to practice or what you’re doing wrong. That’ll be $84.32.”
She hands over a credit card and I run it. She collects the books, hugging them against her chest and tapping her foot as she waits on me. This girl has enough attitude for both of us. I hand her the card and her receipt, and she turns and saunters back over to her seat. I return to ignoring her.
Well, sort of. I watch her when she’s not looking. She’s spread the books out on the table and keeps jumping from book to book and writing stuff down in her notebook. She’s studious, I’ll give her that, but that doesn’t mean she can practice openly in my bookstore.
[ad intro music]
[SFX: front door bells jingle as it opens]
“Good evening, how can I help you?”
“Hey there. Maybe you can help me out. This is going to sound weird, but I’m looking for an author who’s supposed to be this mild-mannered teacher type during the day but on the side writes some really messed up shite. I mean, we’re talking, like, ghosts of dead kids looking for revenge, psycho moms who pack lunches that are downright questionable, temperamental redheaded vampire women that fight werewolves, that kind of thing. Sound familiar?”
“I’ve never heard a more concise and on the nose description of Marcus Damanda.” “Damanda! That does sound like the right name.”
“You looking for a particular book of his?”
“Yeah, but again, I don’t know the title or what it’s about. But I think I’ll know it once I hear it.”
“Dearest Summer seems to be his most popular.”
“Don’t think that’s it.”
“Impressions of Death?”
“Mm, nope.”
“Standard Deviations?”
“Nu-uh.”
“The Devil in Miss Drake’s Class series?”
“Not it.”

“Hide the Knives—”
“Hide the Knives! That’s it.”
“You know that’s an anthology, a collection of stories, stories like a tenth grade English teacher whose virtual class meetings are hacked by the ghosts of dead students—”
“That sounds perfectly like him.”
“A brotherhood of killers who prowl the amputation tents of Gettysburg by night—” “Oh, always love me some horristorical fiction!”
“That’s not a word, but it also has a besieged government fortress where the last wall separating humanity from the apocalypse doubles as a crematorium.”
“Yep! That’s what I want! Do you have it?”
“Nope sorry. They’ve been selling quickly. But I’ve got a shipment coming in tomorrow around noon.”
“Well, I guess I’ll just have to come back then. Thanks so much!”
[SFX: front door opens and closes]
“You do know you still have one copy on the feature shelf.”
“Yeah but I haven’t had a chance to read it yet and I want to before we sell it.” “What if I want to read it after you?”
“Then you better buy it before that guy does.”
Hide the Knives, the latest collection of 22 horror stories from author Marcus Damanda includes several never-before published tales. Others were first featured on The NoSleep Podcast or on Creepy but are here presented in book form for the very first time. So, let the fire burn low, double check the doors, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. But before you do, no matter what else you do, don’t forget to hide the knives.

“The Fool, beginnings, possibilities, adventure. The Magician, creative, will-power, skill. The High Priestess, wisdom, virtue, purity.”
“Woah, woah, woah. This ain’t no science test, kiddo. You can’t just memorize the proscribed meanings.”
“Got to start somewhere don’t I?”
I let that stand. I am not getting involved with her. I’m not. I’m not. “Death card, someone will die. Lovers, harmony.”
“Oook-ay, that’s it. Enough of that mess.”
She stares up at me as I make my way to her.
[coy] “Whatever is the matter?”
“You know what the matter is. You’ve watched me do one reading and think you’ve got this down but you don’t know shit and won’t know shit just from reading the descriptions.”
She collects the cards and straightens them to put them back in their box. “I guess I just won’t learn the correct way then. As I have no teacher.” “Just ask your question, kid.”
“It’s Sam.”
“You’re obviously burning to ask.”
“I have no question.”

“Everyone has a question they want answered.”
“Not me.”
“Then you’re not living, kid.”
“It’s Sam.”
“Why even buy a tarot deck if you have no questions?”
“Because other people do. I want to help them.”
[scoffs] “And you think memorizing the prescribed meanings of the cards is going to help you do that?”
“What else do you expect me to do?”
“More than just that. Plenty of people are self-taught but you’ve got to know it goes beyond memorization.”
She sits up in her chair and readies her pencil.
“What’s beyond that?”
“Oh, no. No more help from me until you ask your question.”
[excitedly] “Will you teach me?”
“I will teach you the basics to get yourself in the right state of mind and then you can continue on your own. But only on the condition that you get out of here. We’ll start on Monday.”

“Before or after school?”
“Dawn. If you’re late then the deal is off.”
She gathers her things to leave.
“I won’t be late. Thank you!”
Before she leaves, I can’t help myself.
“Hey kid, your whiny friend, did she do what I said to do?”
“She did. It was a little awkward at first, but they’re back to talking and she’s happier for it. Bye.”
[SFX: door bells jingling as she leaves]
Ah, my peace and quiet settles back in. I’ll have at least three days of that before I have to deal with the chaos of that girl again, as long as nothing else pops up.
[SFX: door bells jingle as the door opens and closes]
“Jade, my magic maid, how you doing?”
I spoke too soon.
“Dylan. Just the man I’ve been dying to see.”
Dylan props the door open with a rock and wheels in my vending machine delivery. He comes once a week to restock and collect money, but he never leaves without flirting and reminding me he can hook me up for my more select and acquired tastes of ingredients and supplies. I rarely indulge those connections because I know they’re sketchy as hell. But when I need raw charoite, he’s my man to go get it.

“You miss me, Jade? Because I can start coming by more often. I have another route that runs through here on Tuesday.”
“Not so much me missing you but you barely missing some real danger. Remember a man named Damien?”
His face changes, his flirty smile turns into a frown. He starts to do his restock, not looking at me.
“Did he actually come?”
“He did.”
“And did he find what he was asking for?”
“You knew he would, didn’t you?”
“I had a hunch.”
Dylan’s hunches are more often right than wrong. Just like he has a hunch I do shadier things than he does. He’s never outright asked and I’ve never outright confirmed, but he sent Damien my way, he knew what would happen.
“Did you have a hunch of what he was looking for?”
He shrugs.
“Yeah. And that it had to do with Linda.”
Linda is another one of those girls that had gone missing a few months ago. Dylan had grown up with her in Fianna Hills. It did something to him for her to go missing, so it doesn’t surprise me that once he had a hunch about her, he went with it.

[carefully] “I was relieved to see her family given some closure.”
“Many families were given closure the night the cops found that mass grave.” “Too bad they haven’t found the killer.”
Dylan removes the coins from the machine and stares at me for a moment with a knowing glare.
“Too bad. I’m sure he got what’s coming to him, though.”
“I’m sure he did. [pause] Dylan, you just be careful out there, okay?”
The serious shadow on his face lifts back to his flirty smile.
“Always, Jade. I gotta be able to come check in on you every week don’t I?” He shuts the vending machine and readies to leave.
“Of course you be careful, too. I hear there was another ritualistic murder last night over off of 22nd street. Police ain’t let it slip yet to the public the details but, my connections tell me it was gruesome, left the bodies in pieces. Any one of these nights those murderers could walk in here.”
“As long as they pay well.”
[chuckling] “I’ll see you next week, Jade.”
“See you, Dylan.”
[SFX: doorbell jingling]

The afternoon lull is going strong when the front door opens. Setting down the books I was stocking on the shelves, I make my way to the counter, hoping it is a paying customer and not the kid back to give me more attitude.
I almost wish it is her when I see the woman standing there, a gray cloud around her like the buzzing of flies, angry and swarming.
“Good afternoon. Can I help you find anything?”
She whirls around fast, startled by the sound of my voice.
I can see why she’s nervous about coming to me for help. Judging by the khaki pants and sweater set that probably cost as much as my rent, I must be a last resort for her. Whatever is causing that cloud around her, she has already tried every logical thing she could think of before coming to my store. And this is definitely not the place she wants to be seen by her fellow WASPs.
Once she realizes we’re alone she takes off the oversized sunglasses that are hiding her face, dark bags hanging beneath her red and bloodshot eyes.
This woman is definitely going through something.
“Hello. I… have been told that you help people. That you…[whispers] can see things.” “I’ve been known to see things from time to time.”
I give her a clear once over, letting her know just how much of her I was seeing now. “Are you looking for a tarot reading today?”
Her eyes go wide, and I can tell she hasn’t considered the type of help she would have to receive from me to solve her problems.

“I guess so. Is that what you do?”
“It’s part of what I do here. Come on back to the reading room and we can get started.” [SFX: footsteps, one clearly in high heels]
She walks through the beads vined with vervain and I stare at them for a moment, making sure this woman hasn’t brought anything with her unknowingly or otherwise. My vervain stays the same green and purple shade they usually are, so I walk in behind her. She settles on the edge of her seat like a bird ready to take flight. The cloud of gray that had been around her in the front of the store follows us, wrapping itself around her shoulders like an angry storm.
I pull out my personal deck and set the cards onto the cloth-covered table. Her eyes lock on them, wary but out of options.
“What kind of answers are you looking for today?”
Her hands fly to her throat as if I had tried to rip the pearl necklace from her body.
“I don’t see what that has to do with anything. Can’t you just… tell me how to stop it?”
[Sighing] “I need a question in order to do a reading. The more information I have, the more accurate a reading I can give. Now, do you want to tell me what made you so desperate that you came into my store for answers, or should I go back to stocking shelves?”
Her watery blue eyes dart around, but there is no one else in the room, let alone in the entire store. It’s just me, her, and the cloud she brought in. Realizing that this is as much privacy as she could hope for, she lets her hands drop into her lap, still clutching each other desperately.

“I haven’t been sleeping well. Every time I try, every time I close my eyes and settle in for the night, I get so close to sleep and then…” [pause]
“And then?”
“The screaming starts.”
[SFX: a woman’s scream]
I hear it, clear as day, but the woman doesn’t seem to notice. I look over at the gray cloud, but it stays where it is, hovering around her shoulders like an old cardigan.
“And this happens every night?”
She nods.
“Every time I go to bed. Over and over again.”
“When did the screaming start?”
[nervously] “It started the night of my mother’s funeral.”
[shaky with desperation] “She… she had been sick for a while. Cancer. She had time to get some of her affairs in order, get her will updated, but when it actually happened, I was stunned. I couldn’t believe she was gone. [sniffs] I was moving on autopilot, but we got the funeral all planned out just like she had written, had a service, enormous bunches of lilies, everything. By the end of the day I was so emotionally wrung out, I was sure I would fall asleep as soon as my head hit the pillow. I thought I would sleep for days.”
“But then the screaming started.”

[SFX: woman’s scream again]
The cloud around her moves angrily, writhing around itself. It lifts from her shoulders and stretches out, long and lithe, until it looks almost like a person standing behind her.
[shaky with desperation] “That very night! I was laying down, exhausted from being on my feet and putting on a fake smile for everyone who came to offer their condolences. I felt like I had been scraped out and left to wither, and all I wanted to do was sleep. I closed my eyes, and just as I started to drift off, I heard the scream. It sounded like it was right in my ear, like someone was being tortured in the bed next to me. I jerked awake, so hard that I shook the mattress, but there was no one around that could have made that sound. And my husband was still asleep beside me – he never heard anything! I thought it was a fluke, like my brain was too tired to go to sleep and was trying to keep me up, but it kept happening. Over and over again, I would get so close to falling asleep, and then the screaming would jolt me back out of it, my heart racing so hard I thought it would burst in my chest. It happened at least ten times that night, and it keeps happening. I don’t know how to make it stop.”
“Are you sure you want to know what is causing the screaming?”
[SFX: cards shuffling]
[manic] “I don’t care what’s causing it, I just need it to stop! [takes a breath, voice slightly calmer] I’m afraid if I don’t get some sleep soon, I’ll do something awful. I’m running out of excuses to get out of doing the carpool for school, and I’m worried I’ll fall asleep while driving. I even took the bus to get here.”
“[unemotional] That sounds awful. Let’s see what the cards have to tell us.”
I lay out a four-card spread, what I like to call my Bullshit Detector. Whatever is manifesting that cloud, it isn’t as simple as she’s saying. Something is up with her.
Setting the rest of the deck aside, I tap the first card.

“This card symbolizes your problem.”
Turning it over, I see a man and woman, flags of pentacles crossing over the two of them.
“The Ten of Pentacles reversed. I think this represents a lack of family ties, and the loneliness that comes from being cut off from people you were once close to.”
She leans closer to the table to study the card, keeping her hands tucked tightly away in her lap. When she looks up, her face has gone ashen.
“My mother.”
“Very likely, considering this all started at her funeral. Did anything strange happen that night, other than the screaming? Anyone say anything weird to you, or act in a way that you wouldn’t expect at a funeral?”
She shakes her head slowly, thinking.
“To be honest, I felt numb the whole time– there were so many people going in and out of the place, so many people who tried to talk to us, but I couldn’t tell you what anyone said or did. Nothing felt unusual, other than putting my mother to rest.”
I lay my hand on the table and try for a reassuring smile. I certainly know the numbness that comes with a parent’s death.
“My mother was killed when I was sixteen. I don’t imagine it gets any easier when you’re older.”
She nods and looks away, embarrassed either by my sharing or her own. I pull my hand back and turn over another card, revealing a man with a chisel working on an archway, a trio of pentacles over his head. Her use of “us” makes more sense now.
“The Three of Pentacles. This usually means teamwork and collaboration, people building something together. Do you have siblings that you worked with to plan the funeral?”
She nods, her bottom lip firmly tucked between her teeth.
“Yes. Mom had a will for her assets, but she didn’t include any money for a funeral, so my brother and I had to work out how to pay for it all.”
I nod again, but I’m not looking at her this time; my eyes are drawn to the gray cloud, which begins to solidify as she mentions the money. It now stands tall over her, more like a glass vase filled with putrid smoke than the buzzing cloud it had been.
I turn over the third card, and the shape gets more defined, filling out at the center and narrowing towards the top until it took on the semblance of an elderly woman.
“This one represents the truth of the situation. The Seven of Swords.” I look up at her, but her eyes are on the card.
“It means that you’re not being entirely honest here, with me or yourself.” Her head flies up and she stares at me, stunned.
“I haven’t lied! She really passed away, and we did everything that she listed in her will. We played Spirit in the Sky at the memorial, we put her to rest with Pops – we did everything she wrote for us to do!”
[SFX: woman screaming again]

This time the woman jumps at the sound, leaving her chair completely for a second. Over her shoulder I watch the smoky figure as her mouth opens wider than it ever could in life, letting out that horrendous scream again. Her hands are claws as they reach toward the woman in the chair, trying to touch her, to hurt her.
“Is there something she didn’t write down that she expected you to do? Maybe something she told you in person? Because this card isn’t just dishonesty – it can also mean that there was a theft or a betrayal. It’s not me that’s suffering for it but telling me the truth will help me help you.”
An angry flush rises up her neck and takes over her cheeks, mottling her skin an ugly shade of red.
“We did everything she put in her will, but she never specified what she wanted done with her… remains.”
The gray woman behind her grabs at her daughter’s throat, but her ghostly hands slide right through her. In frustration and rage, her head tips back and she lets out another unearthly scream.
[SFX: woman screaming]
The woman jumps again, searching the room for who or what could be making the sound, but she cannot see her mother’s presence behind her, and I’m not telling her. Not yet.
“What did you do with her body?”
[dejected] “We had her cremated. It was the easiest option, and then we could put her ashes in the same plot as Pops – we didn’t have to pay for another one, and we could just update his headstone to include them both. [pleading] You have to understand;
she said she wanted to be buried beside him, but she hadn’t even bought the plot beforehand! And if we had used the money from her estate for that, then my brother and I would have basically gotten nothing. Can you imagine getting nothing from your mother when she passes?”
I only stare at her as she tries to justify her actions, forcing my face into a neutral expression despite the anger burning in my eyes. I understand why this piece of her mother stuck around, now, and am almost willing to let her live with the screams.
That is, until I see her mother’s face.
I don’t believe in ghosts, at least not the way most people do or the movies do. When you die, your soul goes somewhere else, but that doesn’t mean pieces of you can’t stay behind. The gray figure leans closer to her daughter, her expression one of pure hatred, the features twisted and vile as she gnashes her teeth and bares her claws once more. This isn’t a woman who is upset that her children betrayed her; this entity is one that feeds on pain and has taken what’s left of her mother and turned her to focus on one thing: being livid that her children have stolen from her, gone against her wishes to benefit themselves. This thing is prepared to make her daughter pay for it for the rest of her life.
[SFX: suffering woman crying]
Huge drops roll down her sallow cheeks as she begins to cry. Great. Now I have to deal with her crocodile tears.
I reach beneath my chair and pull out a box of tissues, setting them on the table between us. After a few seconds, the tears slow and she composes herself.
“I’m so sorry. It’s just been very emotional, and with not being able to sleep, I feel like I’m always on the verge of crying.”
“You’ll be okay. We have one more card to look at.”

I flip over her last card, but I already have an idea of what will be under there. There’s only one solution I can see for this situation, and it has nothing to do with the woman in the chair before me.
The High Priestess. My own face looks up at me, enshrined in the robe of the High Priestess and carrying a large book. I had drawn myself onto the card when I made this deck, back when I decided that this card was mine, my own significator.
I nod to myself and look at the ghostly woman. Her focus is entirely on her daughter, fingers trying to claw at her skin and pull her hair, but they continue to simply pass through.
[SFX: ghostly grunts and cries of anger]
A part of me still wants to say there was nothing I could do and leave this brat to her miserable life, but her mother’s rage, collecting itself the way it is, is strong. Stronger than I’ve seen in a long time. There’s nothing left of her but that rage, and that power is something I could use for a better purpose.
“I’m sorry, I think this card is more for me than for you. But I still think I can help.”
I stand up, stepping closer to the woman so I can put my hands on her shoulders. She looks up at me, eyes still full of tears, but she nods anyway.
“I will do anything to make it stop.”
“I need you to sit very still, right here, and close your eyes.”
She does immediately, taking in a shaky breath.

“Now I want you to remember something happy from your childhood, something involving your mother. It can be a trip, or a birthday, or anything like that. Just a happy memory, where you two were together and you felt loved.”
Her brows draw together as she searches her memory but settle as she finds one that works. I get a brief flash of white lace and pink roses, smiles so wide they hurt your face, and then it’s gone.
She bobs her head once, sharply, and I go on.
“Now keep that memory in your mind. Put yourself there and relive it. Remember what it was like to be loved by your mother.”
My eyes dart to the ghostly woman, now standing beside me. We lock eyes. “Now hum Spirit in the Sky. Loudly.”
[SFX: woman humming Spirit in the Sky, off-key]
I watch as the mother looks me up and down, and I can just see the beginnings of a cloudy smile as she judges me to be beneath her.
I’m going to rip that smug smile right off her face.
[SFX: rushing air, inhaling breath as Jade sucks the life force out of the ghost]
I take her in, all of her; her pain, and anger, and disappointment in her daughter. I take it into myself and let it power me, sustain me, nourish me. She tastes like dust and mold, an old trunk left to rot in someone’s attic. I gag, but I don’t stop. I drink her in until she is gone, only a happy memory left in her daughter’s mind.
[SFX: woman humming Spirit in the Sky, still off-key]

I sit back down, watching as the woman fully smiles for the first time since coming into the shop. When she opens her eyes, she stares at me in wonder, her shoulders no longer carrying the weight of her mother’s guilt.
[relieved] “Wow, I can already tell a difference. I don’t feel it anymore. I think you actually helped.”
The woman stands and slings her purse over one arm, ready to walk out of the store and leave this whole mess behind her. But there’s one last thing I have to do, if not for me, then for her mother.
“I’m glad to see I’ve made a believer out of you. Now let’s go back to the front – there is still a small matter of payment.”
The smile slides off her face, and her skepticism returns.
“How do I know it really worked? What if I pay you, and I still hear the screaming tonight?”
So much for being a believer.
[exasperated] “If you hear the screaming tonight, then please feel free to come back tomorrow and get a refund. For now, you still have to pay for your reading.”
The woman huffs as she stands up, but still follows me out to the counter. [SFX: footsteps, one in high heels]
She tosses her credit card onto the counter, the metallic slap of it ringing in my ears. When I tell her the amount – ten times my usual rate, but she can clearly afford it with her new inheritance – her head turns back to me so fast I thought she would get whiplash. She doesn’t argue, though, and signs for the payment with a fast and jagged signature.

“Have a blessed day!”
I smile as I hand her the receipt, and she rips it from my fingers. Putting her giant sunglasses back on, she walks out the door, glancing both ways down the street as if someone she knows could be watching for her.
[SFX: doorbell jingling]
Some people are never happy. I almost regret helping the woman. [small burp] Almost.