I don’t really believe this, but I don’t want to press it. “A little hysterical for being a new mom. What’s her story?”

My mom glances at me and slides her cards into their silk bag. “Nan? She’s had a hard life. Good news isn’t always good news, Catia. Know what I mean?”

I let the name thing slide in the interest of gathering information and jump up and follow her into the kitchen. “Not at all. Hard how?”

“It’s Nan’s story to tell, not mine.”

I find this whole buttoned-lip, integrity routine a little difficult to buy coming from a woman who once told our neighbor his wife was cheating on him with the FedEx guy. It is still the only time I’ve seen a man cry. Of course, she was manic then and beginning to get paranoid. She thought the FedEx guy was undercover for the CIA and that the man’s wife was a secret arms dealer. “Right. It’s just, and I hope you don’t mind, but sometimes I listen in because, well, you’re so good at it, and I’m trying to learn how you read the cards.”

She turns to me, a genuine smile lighting up her face, and I feel a little like mud. “Oh, baby, all you had to do was ask. I can teach you all about the cards.”

Wrong answer. I swing again. “You told Nan that the World card meant everything would be okay. But I don’t really know what that means if I don’t know how. Like, what her question was.”

My mother bites her bottom lip. “Okay, but don’t go around telling your friends or whatever.”

The only friend I’d tell is Daniel because he’s the only friend I have right now. And I doubt he’s interested in all of Nan’s problems. “Pinkie swear.”

“Nan’s a sexual assault survivor. It’s taken a toll on her body. She’s already had three miscarriages, and the last one left her so depressed her husband almost walked out on her because she kept refusing help. She was afraid the drugs would interfere with her ability to get pregnant again. Of course, I told her then, ‘It won’t matter if you don’t have a husband to hold up his half of the bargain anymore.’” She runs her hands under a splash of cold water at the sink and rubs them over her face.

I feel a sudden rush of concern. Nan should be consulting with an obstetrician, not a fortune-teller. “You told her everything would be fine.”

“Because it will be,” she says.

“How do you know that?” I try to keep the angry edge from my voice. “I mean, if she’s already miscarried so many times.”