Answers to Our Future

Kagoatweed’s Rant: R&R, and be inspired, but please don’t steal ideas.

She took my palm into her strong, wrinkled hands and she stared at it. Then she looked at me. She glanced quickly down again, almost ashamed that she and I had looked at each other so directly. Her earrings made small tinkling sounds as she jerked her head around and her clothing made swishing noises as she shuffled her silent, bare feet on the moldy, worn oriental rug.

“Well?” I asked her. I had people tell me that I was too impatient, and I think that that side of me was showing though right about now. “It’s so hard to see in this light…” I mumbled.

“It’s also hard to see what, precisely, the problem is.” the gypsy told my hand. She grasped my hand a little tighter with the hand that held it up for me. She twisted it from side to side, inspecting the side of my hand with unbelievable scrutiny. When she ran her finger over the center of my hand, I felt a chill. It started in the back of my neck, then spread down my spine and into my arms and fingers, a feeling like cold boiling water. It made my hand twitch a little bit.

I heard the gypsy gasp. She pulled my palm so close to her face, I could feel her breath and the tickle of the hairs from the mole on her nose. She sighed and dropped my hand. I pulled it back into my lap, cradling it with my other hand, sorry to it that I had even bothered with this magic mumbo-jumbo. Even though, when the gypsy started speaking, her voice quivering and soft, while she stared at her knees, it was hard not want to believe her.

“You told me that you were worried about your husband. Well, I found something you might be interested in…”