Miss Gemini’s Homecoming: Zodiac Opposites Meet on a Journey to True North Read online

introspection and experiencing your roots.”

  Hermetica looked at Athos’s cheerful smile. She felt that she would implode with stress. The last thing she needed right now was more of those wise sayings that she was bombarded with every day on social media.

  “Who are you, the Dalai Lama?” she said. Athos couldn’t resist smiling, but he quickly wiped the smile off his face.

  “I found you in my childhood home,” he said. “Maybe our meeting was meant to be. I think we might just have something to learn from each other.”

  “I’m not sure what I would have to learn from you,” she scoffed. “But you need to learn to live in the real world.”

  “The real world,” he said with a smile. “Is a relative concept.”

  “Oh, you exasperate me,” she said, picking her phone back up and tapping on the Facebook icon. “I don’t have time for this nonsense. Help me get back to South Node City. I’ll show that hussy that she won’t be replacing me just yet.”

  “Do you really plan to present the evening news with your arm and leg in plaster?”

  “My leg won’t be visible, and my arm will remind the viewers of my accident. Hopefully it will give me sympathy and more likes. I really need them right now.”

  “But what about the real you?”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about!” she burst out. “What planet are you living on? Can’t you see that Leonora is taking advantage of my accident?”

  The tears were pressing hard on her eyes. Her usual reaction would have been to erect an impenetrable dam on the inside of her eyes. However now she just allowed the floodgates to swing open.

  In the midst of her sobbing, even as he rushed to move closer and console her, she wondered why she was allowing herself to cry – especially in front of a stranger.

  He bent over her and held her tight in his arms.

  It felt good. It felt great, in fact.

  “There,” he said, sitting back up and looking her in the eyes, still clasping her shoulders. “You obviously need rest. Stay here for at least a few days. I think some introspection will do you a world of good.”

  Introspection? She thought to herself. She could feel herself getting angry again. Who did he think he was? He obviously didn’t understand her at all.

  “My head is hurting so badly,” she said, not without a grain of truth. “Would you ask for a painkiller for me?”

  He immediately went out into the hallway.

  Now was the moment. She knew she had no time to waste. She slid out of the bed, leaning on the bedpost with her left hand. Putting all her weight on one foot and pushing on the bedpost and the wall she made it to the neighbouring bed, where she managed to get hold of the crutches.

  With much effort she put one crutch under the armpit of her broken right arm. She tried to move forward with both crutches, but she soon discovered that it wouldn’t work. So she worked her way out of the room with only the left crutch and a lot of determination.

  She made it out to the hallway. She thanked her lucky stars for not meeting anyone there.

  Hermetica humped hurriedly along, hoping to make it out of the ward before anyone saw her. There was a crash as she knocked over a large potted plant she had been leaning on as she went. She hurried on even faster.

  She got to a staircase. There wasn’t a lift in sight. The stairs would have to do. She started descending, using her one crutch and leaning on the wall. There were shouts behind her by the fallen potted plant. She started humping faster down the stairs, one painful stair at a time.

  “Hermetica! Stop!” Athos’s voice behind her.

  She imploded with rage and pain. She couldn’t abide anyone telling her what to do, especially now. Without thinking, she made a long and hurried stride forward.

  The next thing she knew she was in pain, on her back, Athos’s annoying face looking down at her with a compassionate expression that filled Hermetica with anger, even as she lay there unable to move.

  Ninth House

  “Well,” he said looking down at her in her bed. “Now that you have broken your other leg, you certainly aren’t going back to work any time soon.

  “I know it feels like a bad thing at the moment,” he continued. “But if you ask me these events have destiny written all over them. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that this is happening to you now, or that we have met.”

  They were alone in the room. Her bandaged roommate, whoever he or she had been, was no longer there.

  “I’m not asking you,” she said, grateful her jaw wasn’t broken too. “And you know what? I would never ask you, because I know you would say something annoyingly positive since you have zero understanding of my situation. It’s all very well for you, travelling the world and going with the flow on a spiritual trip. But I live in the real world and have real problems.”

  His smile dimmed. He scratched his chin.

  “No. No, I am human too,” he said. “Positivity was a choice I made some years ago.” He sat down beside her.

  “You see,” he continued. “I am the man you are looking for. I am King Jupiter’s illegitimate son. That is why I introduce myself as Athos Sagittarius, even though I’m not authorised to do so; Sagittarius is my father’s house.”

  “Can – can I interview you? On the record? With my phone, for now?” she asked.

  “Look, that’s beside the point right now. I’m trying to tell you something. I had a difficult childhood. I was brought up in Hierophant Hall.”

  She knew the place, of course. The boarding school for boys.

  “The brothers were strict with me. I don’t know if they or even the abbot knew who my father was. But they all knew I was the result of a sinful union, and they treated me as such. I became ashamed of who I was. I guess I always felt something was wrong with me.”

  She listened, her gaze trained unfalteringly on his face. His story reminded her so much of her own.

  “After leaving school,” he continued. “I kept to myself for a long time. I felt that religion was all wrong. However I wasn’t sure I would be able to reject God. I felt like I had a hole in my soul where God was meant to be.

  “I felt that what the monks had told me was all wrong, although their words still tormented me. I went on hikes for days in the countryside. I slept in caves. I got to know nature around here so well that every tree, bush and hilltop became my friend as I shunned human companionship.

  “At one point, though, I started interacting with people again. But from my centre, from my truth. I still wasn’t sure what that was, but I felt it and I held onto it.

  “Then I went to Asia. I travelled from country to country, and went on many meditation retreats. That helped me strengthen my inner peace. I resolved to choose to be positive while seeing reality for what it is. Gradually, I freed myself from my anger with religion. I started to see what it was good for.

  “You know what?” he continued. “I think meditation can really help you too. If you like, we can meditate together.”

  “All right,” she said. She was surprised at her own words. She wouldn’t be caught dead meditating.

  “You can do it lying down. Close your eyes,” he said, closing his own eyes.

  “What?! Right now?”

  “Yes,” he said, keeping his eyes shut. “Feel your breath.”

  He guided her through the meditation. She opened her eyes every so often to see if he was looking at her. But his eyes stayed closed. She lay through the entire meditation without complaining once. She was very proud of herself.

  When he finally told her to come gradually out of the meditative state, she grabbed his hand and squeezed it. She couldn’t restrain herself any longer.

  “I relate to you so well,” she said. “Now I understand why you look at me like a human being and not as a freak of nature, like everybody else does. I was brought up in The Hall of the Cross.”

  “Oh,” he said. “So you’re a survivor too.”

  “Yes. N
ow you see what I mean! The sisters saw me as an abomination, far too tall for a girl, and much too big in all the wrong ways. A temptation, a source of sin. I guess I started to feel that way about myself too.”

  “I knew our meeting was meant to be,” he said. He leaned in and kissed her lips. She kissed him back.

  His next kiss was deeper, and she hungrily embraced it.

  They looked at each other. She giggled, marvelling to herself that this time she was the one who couldn’t handle the tension of silence.

  “You should come and see me in South Node City,” she said.

  “I told you, that is not my place. It really isn’t. Come and see me in my cave, either the one in Lunar Mountain or my childhood home that you turned into a cave.”

  “Sorry about that,” she said.

  “No, I’m grateful that you did. It’s time to make a new start,” he said with a smile. “It’s time to hit the road. Prolong your leave from work and come with me to Asia when you recover. We will climb mountains together and meditate at sunrise. I will show you a beach where the waves move in every direction and their sound is like the hissing of a mermaid in a golden city below the South Sea.”

  She wondered if that beach had Wi-Fi. And she wondered if he would give her that interview soon. But then she stopped herself and felt her breath.

  Thank you for reading

  I hope you enjoyed this story. It was lots of fun to write. I planned it together with my students in a creative writing workshop I held at an astrology camp in Transylvania.

  On my website, robinwildthansen.com, you will find my blog and my writings on the