Nikki Torres

Nine of Cups

Vikki Coffey is thirteen years old. She will be fourteen on August 12, 1995. Her siblings are all showered and in bed. All school uniforms for tomorrow are ironed and ready to go. Lunches are packed in brown paper bags complete with crust-less prosciutto cotto and sliced artichoke sandwiches. She can go to sleep now. It’s 9:45 pm. Today’s her favorite day of the week: Sunday! Every Sunday she takes all her siblings with her to a gathering at her school. It is a peaceful routine compared to the chaotic and unstable household she lives in. Vikki takes them to the park behind the school afterwards too. She attends a non-denominational school in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn. At the weekly gatherings they learn about manifesting, affirmations, astrology, chakras, growing your own food, grounding techniques, herbs, and how to meditate. Learning these tools for life gives her strength and hope. She sits on her bed to meditate. She opens her well-worn journal. Vikki reads a passage out loud that she learned at school: “Whatever you visualize during meditation, believe that you have already received it, and it will be yours.” Vikki starts to purposefully write out her manifestation statements just like they do in homeroom every morning. After meditating, she writes a new affirmation: “Thank you love energy for this, for me, that you financially provide a way for my mother, siblings, and I to all live together without our father in a new home in the best way for me and all involved or something better and thank you love energy for this, for me.” She meditates carefully visualizing her affirmation and opens her eyes to write about her day in her journal: