He did this. She asked for that, the nerve of her. The most beautiful [fill in the blank] came in today, you guys have to see these, and she poked her phone a few times to show them pictures. Usually, it’s “I think I like my job… because, you know me, I like people.” And once in a while, when it’s a blue moon, she might say, “My boss stinks, wants more hours and less pay, I mean what year is this anyway?”

Becca did not have a job. Not into nine to five, or anything remotely near forty hours a week, certainly not going to offices daily. She looks and looks, searches frequently, out of need, but does not find something to her liking. Her common quips, “I’m a free spirit.” or “I’m just not made for this… outdated concept, that forty-hour thing.”

And Dana…

“What’s your week looking like, Dana?” Elena might ask, then change tone and add, “…oh, wait, I bet I knnnnow…

“Of course you know, sweety. It’s the same work I do every week.” Dana smiles. Short hair, not reaching her shoulders, usually somewhere between brown and gray. She’s the senior of the three.

“I wish I worked with you Dana,” Becca would say.

“Well…”

“Why don’t you let me work with you? I just don’t understand.”

“Because you’re a free spirit, Becca. You say so yourself. You’re a creative.” Dana would explain while hiding a smile behind her after-meal tea cup.

But this coming week was different. Dana sensed it. Sensing was her job. Sensing feelings, energy, winds, light. Sensing some aspect of the universe. She sensed this week was different, but was not yet sure. She will be needing Becca’s help after all.

From their lunch table, the three walked away in three different directions, each back to her day. Elena donned a green shirt and headed back to the store, to sit behind a cash register. Becca back to graphics on a computer, a short-term project designing a log, a wave of orange, a star somewhere. Dana back to a room with candles, stones, a cross—for protection—and whatever the universe would allow her to see and request, not demand, that she do.

In that special room in her apartment, Dana sat on a cushion, her ‘magic’ cushion, found a comfortable position, closed her eyes, hummed, and went to work. The clouds she would see would be the work needed. Clearing them meant intention to help. Long before this week, this day, she had welcomed her role as a seer, as a clairvoyant, as one who saw and moved what she saw; one who wanted to be one with the universe and do what her universe needed her to do.

“Moving what I see is my job,” she said to her two friends one Monday some weeks before.

But on this day, the clouds were different. Sure they were always different, always unique. But this day presented her with something new. She would need that help. Because one of them three appeared intertwined and trapped between the clouds, along with at least one other soul, maybe two.

“Becca,” she said to her phone. “I need your help.”

“Hey sister. With what exactly?”

“With my work.”

Becca’s mind bounced from one thought to the next, connecting each with a leap, with happy surprises and fragile hope. Her orange waves and her sparkly star became distant points in her subconscious. “Do you mean… you mean… really?” She waited for answer, then, “Do you mean now?”

“Yes. Now.”

This was Becca’s chance. She asked for it. And here it was. Then again, she had no idea what it was that she had asked for.

Some half-hour later she sat across from Dana, smiling, excited, waiting for instructions.

“Look into my eyes,” Dana commanded.

She tried to look into Dana’s eyes, then burst out laughing.

“Becca,” Dana snapped and tapped her friend’s knee. “Get serious.”

“Okay okay. Couldn’t help it.” She swallowed, cleared her throat, closed her eyes to refocus, then opened them, ready to start.

At first, Dana’s eyes were their usual color. At first they were simple kindness. Easy to look at and talk to. A few seconds passed, and all that changed.

Becca felt Dana like she had never before. “Dana, I don’t…”

“No talking.” Dana interrupted. “Wait for me to tell you what to do. For now just look. Go deeper.”

Becca inhaled as deep as she could. She allowed seriousness to overcome her, knowing that Dana took the work seriously, carrying an attitude as if lives were at stake.

In this case it was Elena’s life, Elena’s soul.

“Who comes to mind?” Dana asked.

“Ah… what do you mean? I was just looking… I mean I wasn’t thinking…” Becca replied.

“Try again.”

Dana tried harder. She put labels to the energy she saw. And a name to the person she sensed. She thought hard of Elena, as if screaming it in her head, screaming to Elena herself.

“Elena,” Becca yelled. “I don’t…”

“No cursing or swearing,” Dana interrupted.

“Elena. That’s who. I mean I didn’t see her. Am I supposed to see? Was I supposed to see her?”

“Doesn’t matter. What matters is what thoughts come to you next. Look again.”

The problem for Dana was that she knew Elena and cared for her too much. This care, as benevolent and kind as could be, stopped her from discerning details, from clearing and moving those clouds, because her physical mind wanted to scream for Elena to get out of the way. But screaming to another person was not how it worked. The ‘clouds’ needed to be cleared, ‘moved’ and changed and reformed. She usually did this simply by focusing and thinking it through. But now the wanting to scream part was distracting her too much. And the danger she sensed was too soon, too much, too heavy, happening soon, maybe this week, this day, maybe even within hours. Details she needed but could not afford to learn. There was urgency. The work needed to be done. Now.

Precious minutes passed as the two worked.

“Becca,” she started again. “What is around Elena?”

“I don’t know.”

“You have to, Becca. You have…”

“I don’t know, okay. I just don’t…”

“Try again.”

More of those minutes fluttered and evaporated. Dark clouds grew and moved closer and seemed to wrap around Elena. Another hovered above her.

“Two. There are two,” Becca yelled.

“Two what?”

“Um… I’m not sure…”

“Okay… I’m worried we don’t have too much time.” Dana closed her eyes, wanting to think in solitude. She pulled in a breath, energy, life. “Maybe we don’t need that detail,” She said, her eyes still closed. “We can do one of two things.”

Becca gazed at her friend, eyes shifting from one part of Dana’s face to another, wanting to yell again, “what, what…” but not giving in, not saying anything, not wanting to disturb wherever Dana happened to be. She held back and waited.

“There are two… right… manageable,” Dana started again. “When I open my eyes, I want you to look again, through me, look for clouds, forms that look like clouds.” It was a seed. A seed placed in Becca’s mind. A seed that would grow into an idea, into a thought, into an image that Becca would work to transform. “Once you see them, change them. Change their color. If you can, make them white. Change their shape. Maybe then, we can try to move them away from Becca.”

A clock nearby, in a different room, ticked time away. Becca, saw a pair, a pair of something, could have been clouds, could have been something else, but, tried as she may, could not affect their color or their form or their proximity to Elena. Instead, they only felt heavier to her. They only became darker and seemed to creep closer.

Exasperated, she cut her connection and reached to touch Dana’s left arm. “I can’t, Dana.”

It took a few ticks from the clock before Dana refocused and brought herself back to the room. “You can,” she finally said and nodded. “We have to.”

Becca turned her head away and closed her eyes. She felt a magnitude, not a burden, but like Dana an urgency. Elena was a dear friend. They had years together, behind them, and in front of them.

She turned back to Dana. “Is there something else we can try?”

“Like what?”

“You said earlier that we can do one of two things. What’s the other thing?”

“Elena.”

“What about Elena?”

“We give Elena power, back support. We add to her strength, her insight.”

“And?”

“And, we hope that she would handle those things herself.”

“Hope? We rely on hope?” Becca shot back.

“It’s not a sure thing. There is only so much I can do here. I’m too attached to her.”

Becca nodded a few times, more churning for thoughts, for options, than in affirmation. “Okay, well, then we give her all the weapons she could need.”

“No. No weapons. Weapons complicate things. Give her eyes. Power to see. Back support.”

“Fine. Eyes. Power.” She wanted to be ready. Wanting to send all the power in her to their friend, their sister. “Our sister, Dana.”

Dana chocked in shock and went into a coughing fit. “Getting dramatic I see.” Her voice hoarse, sounding like she was already in a trance. “Whatever helps.”

The following Monday, Dana and Becca waited at the same lunch table, waited for Elena. They alternated between exchanging glances and staring at their table.

“You won’t believe what happened last week,” Elena screamed from yards away.

The other two looked at each other, then toward the approaching Elena. The two examined their friend, looked from that distance, for changes, for harms, for cuts, anything that was not right.

“These two…” Now by the table, she pulled the third chair and sat.

She was in one piece for sure.

“Both had knives. They showed them to me. Can you believe it?”

Elena looked down at the table, unready, unsure she wanted to hear what had transpired.

“I mean seriously… each had a knife…” She turned from one to the other, demanding a reaction. “Hello! Knives!”

Becca smiled. Her friend was good.

“Becca. What the heck? How could you be smiling?! I mean did you hear me?”

Her smile grew a bit more. She got up from her chair and hugged her friend.

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