"You can take this one over here!" a lady clothed in short purple robes and deep plum pants said. Her round face smiled with ease as she pointed her pudgy finger over at the customer, her clipped, brunette curls barely grazing her kindly lit eyes.
A man in a storm cloud blue suit, equipped with a deep charcoal tie, loomed over the table, which was covered in luxurious gold crushed velvet tablecloth with silver moons on it. His young face, beaten with tiredness and strenuous memories from his haunted past, was solemn and troubled as he fidgeted in his pocket with a smooth, pale hand. The man revealed a large amount of money in twenties and tickets won from the slot machines at the near-by casino.
As he looked away he said, with a cold and heartbreaking tone, "I'd like my fortune told." His crestfallen voice resounded off the gray brick walls and the long, foreboding corridors. And as he looked back, his brown eyes were filled with a glassy coat of eerie dreams. I addressed him to please take his seat and when he did, I turned over his palm to discover painstaking lines that had appeared to have been gouged into his worn hands.
"You've had a troubled late childhood, right?" I made an attempt to deliver it contentedly but, by reading his face, it had not worked. Silence. That was all that surrounded us. I looked slightly away and down at my boot-clad feet and quietly said, "Apparently."
"No, you're right," he replied, as if I'd defeated him in an internal battle of incredulousness. "May I use your phones?"
"Of course," I affirmed.
As I awaited the stranger's return, I was flagged down by an old, peculiar friend.
"Hi!" she exclaimed as she approached me and embraced me as we'd done in our seasoned times. She was adorned in a lovely powder-blue shirt that went exquisitely with her cropped fiery red hair and newly styled denim capri pants. "How've ya' been?"
"Depends on which day you ask me! Come on," I suggested, glancing at my customer on the phone, feet away from us, "let's go over here."
"Do you know him?" she imposed, curiously.
"You have no idea," I smiled.
"Oh, I got it. So how's everything going with this new job? It's a bit different from what you're use to, isn't it?"
"Yeah but, it's going good. I mean, in a way I'm destined and doomed to have this job, right?" I said, secretly addressing myself whether the job was really what I was meant for.
"I suppose. Hey, listen, I'm having a party in a few weeks, you should come. I'll give you a call but, I've got to get back to my own job," she chuckled, meaninglessly.
"Okay. I have to get back to this guy, he's a wreck."
"See you then?"
"Yeah, see ya' later," I forced a smile, still feeling an overwhelming deprivation from my customer whom I'd felt a strong urge for help from.
Slowly, I swayed over to the pay phones, to tired to keep my balance. As I entered the open, gray corridor, I noticed the man was sitting on the ground, his briefcase thrown, and tears flooding from his empty eyes. I crouched beside him, one knee lying on the floor, as if I were praying. But there was no god to pray to, just the opposite, it seemed, his inner demons. I put a cold hand on his back to comfort him, not truly understanding his situation, but trying to give him the aid he so desperately needed. Strangers stared, people looked and glances at us as the minutes drifted by like hours. But then there was a notion that had abruptly reached my mind. Strangers looked but yet, this man, this stranger, lying on the floor, had done just the same as when I'd met him.
The End
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Post script: This story was based upon a dream I once had, about a month ago.