The Valley and the Flood by Rebecca Mahoney (10 best books of all time TXT) 📗

me. That voice asking what gives me the right to take chances with a home that isn’t mine.

“Is this my decision to make?” I ask quietly.

Cassie doesn’t need clarification. But a little wrinkle appears in her nose, like the question makes no sense to her nonetheless. “If it makes you feel any better,” she says, “it was inevitable.”

And we ride in uneasy silence to our first stop.

Fourteen THE PREVIEW OF COMING ATTRACTIONS

“SO HEY,” FELIX says. “Thanks for the heads-up.”

John Jonas, second-most accurate prophet in Lotus Valley, blinks like a cat. “I’m not sure what you mean, Felix.”

“You predicted every meal my father cooked last week,” Felix says. “I’m just saying, you could have been paying a little closer attention to the ETA of our cataclysmic prophecy.”

“The whims of fate are unpredictable.” John smiles slowly. “So, too, is the third eye.”

The apartment regards us as John does: sleepily observant. There’s a mirror on each side, elongating the walls, and the curtains hang open, fluttering with every whir of the ceiling fan. But the feel of the place sharpens when my eyes fall back on the door. There are four sets of locks, each heavier and more forbidding than the last.

“There’s such a thing as too much knowledge,” John says, following my eyes. “I’d see anyone coming, of course. I always do.”

I glance back at him. The way Cassie looked at me that first time, the way Mayor Williams looked at me, the way he’s looking at me now—in some ways they couldn’t be more different, but they all have that one thing in common: the recognition.

He looks harmless. But on Theresa’s list of pawn shop customers, he’s easily the most frequent visitor.

“Rose Colter,” he says, like he’s feeling it out.

I try to smile. “Hi.”

“You’ll make the right decision,” he says. “You might not be able to imagine it now. But you wouldn’t have been happy at Stanford. UC San Diego is the far better fit.”

I blink. That’s not where I saw that sentence going. “Hang on. I’m getting into both?”

“What happened to not fair?” Felix says.

“This is the only time I’ll talk to her,” he says, slightly wounded. “I won’t get to tell her later.”

“Wait, wait,” I say. “This is for real, right? Because Cassie says she gets things wrong sometimes.”

“Yes, Rose,” Cassie says with a sigh, “thank you for bringing that up here and now.”

“John is never wrong,” Alex says. “Or hasn’t been before.”

“But you’re still ranked under Mayor Williams?” I say.

“John’s prophecies are more accurate,” Cassie says. “But his predictions have always been decidedly small scale.”

“Jealousy is unbecoming, Cassandra,” John says.

Cassie’s expression darkens. “One drought,” she mutters. “Anyone can predict a drought. The weatherman could predict a drought.”

“And many did,” John singsongs. “You, as I recall, did not.”

Alex, in his own impressive display of foresight, puts out an arm just as Cassie steps forward. “Anyway,” he says, “that short survey . . .”

“Ah, yes,” John says. “But I’m already planning to vote in favor of Ms. Colter. Anything to understand the Great Sea.”

The Great Sea. Hope they didn’t hear that. Don’t want to give them an ego on top of everything else.

“Then,” Alex says slowly, gesturing to the TV, “why do you have Maggie Williams on?”

John regards the low drone of the TV with a sleepy nod. “Don’t you find it sort of soothing?”

Alex tactfully doesn’t answer. But John smiles anyway.

“Don’t be too hard on Maggie,” he says. “She struggles with her gift.”

“She’s never struggled with anything in her life,” Cassie says darkly.

“You know better than that, Cassandra,” John says. “Haven’t you ever regretted what you’ve seen? Maggie came to me once, when she was younger. She told me she saw a future where her prophecies controlled this town, from the laws passed to the decisions we made day to day. She asked me if that meant it would really happen.”

Cassie’s expression flickers but doesn’t lighten. “I didn’t know that.”

“What did you tell her?” Alex asks.

“I told her that she was the most gifted young prophet I knew,” John says, “and that if she saw it, then it would likely come to pass. She never asked me about it again. But when she claimed, years later, that she lost the sight, I wondered if she was trying, the only way she knew how, to stop what she knew would come.”

In the beat of silence that follows, I think of Mayor Williams: her sweater set, her pearls, her beatific smile. A future where she controls this town seems like something she’d kill for. But maybe that’s not always how she was.

I don’t know if what John and Cassie have is something you can wish away. But with enough time and practice, you can bury just about any part of yourself. No matter how big.

“Look at me, chattering away.” John laughs. “You have questions, don’t you? Ask.”

“Right.” Alex digs for his survey. “The first question is, what is your happiest memory?”

“Happiest? My,” John muses. “Next week I’m going to have a particularly good cup of tea.”

“Memory,” Cassie grits out. “Mem-o-ry.”

“Cassie,” Alex warns. But then thinks about it further. “But yes, a past thing. A past thing is better.”

“It’s all the same, isn’t it?” John says. “The premonition came on a Tuesday last year. So isn’t it both past and future?”

“Oh,” I say, in sudden realization. “That’s not going to work.”

“Why?” Felix says.

“The next question is ‘What would you give to live it again?’” I say.

There’s a collection of quiet, rueful noises around the semicircle. John watches us thoughtfully.

“I think I see the problem here,” he says.

“I think there are actually multiple problems,” Felix says. But John shakes his head.

“You’re not on the same page,” he says. “None of you are. If you can’t communicate with one another, how can you hope to communicate with me, let alone the Great Sea?”

“How many people do you know who can communicate with you?” Cassie says.

“I’m going to give you something,” John says. “One prophecy, free of charge.”

“Um.” I raise my