An (Un)fortunate Telling

He met me at the door and ushered me into a dim room. It was cluttered with an assortment of wooden trinkets and had patches of black mold growing on the ceiling. Two chairs sat on either side of a tiny white table that was furnished by a lone candle and one of those acrylic shields they have on the counter at the bank—a sneeze guard, if you will. It struck me as slightly out of place amongst the dusty bric-a-brac, but I cast that thought aside and sat down feeling unexpectedly excited. 

It was a breezy afternoon and I was in a terrace house nestled between Salisbury Road and Campo. I was there to see a psychic. The session was a gift from my woo-woo but well-meaning friend J. 

In my awkward tween years I identified as a witch myself—I’d charge my crystals under the light of the full moon and took a strong interest in seeing into the future. I suspect this was symptomatic of underlying anxiety; nevertheless I was desperate to have my future read. By the time I was old enough to do so my interest had waned, but when this opportunity with the psychic arose, I knew my younger self would curse me if I didn’t go. 

In a deep, melodic voice, the man asked me to lay out my palms. I did as told, eager for the reading to start, but received a generous pump of hand sanitiser instead. “There's a bit of a virus going around,” he exclaimed sheepishly as I rubbed it in, smiling in confusion.

As the hand sanitiser soaked in, so did the first problem. Why was the psychic sitting across from me an ordinary middle-aged man instead of a beautiful woman wearing furs and chunky silver rings? Could a man really possess the intuition needed to see into the future? None that I’ve met seem to. My tween self flashed through my mind, I reminded myself to stay open minded in her honour. 

He traced the creases of my palm with a stubby lead pencil. “You have a good life line, a very good life line. Your career line is also strong, I’m seeing you have the potential to make a lot of money. Happy to hear that?” 

I gave him a nod, temporarily casting aside my anti-capitalist values.

“You have a very plump quality to your hands.” He prodded the fleshy bit of my palm below my thumb. “That suggests you’re going to have a girl career.” 

My earlier smile dropped. 

“Sorry?”

“What I mean is you’re not going to do something that men tend to do. What do you want to do when you’re older?”

“I’m not sure yet, but something in the arts.”

“See, that's a girl career.”

I began to interject, but he cut me off. “There are of course exceptions; every once and a while you get a female carpenter, but it’s not common.”

All hope of this man being genuinely clairvoyant, let alone having a vaguely 21st century attitude, drained out of me. A horrid feeling swelled in my gut; if the psychic session hadn’t already been paid for on my behalf, I would have demanded a refund and marched out then and there. 

He continued. “Your love line has three knots in it, which signifies different partners you’ll have throughout your life.” 

More than anything else he’d said so far, it felt difficult to believe that information of this nature lay in my palm. I scrunched my nose and furrowed my brow skeptically. 

“Now, Amelia, I’m seeing here that you’re going to marry a man. Are you okay with that?”

I hesitated.

Feeling my silence he added, “We’re in Newtown after all, so if you think you’re gay I understand.” 

Taken aback, I mumbled it’d be fine. 

“This man is going to be VERY attractive, more attractive than you. Not to say you’re not good looking, but this guy will be close to a 10.”

Feeling incredibly uncomfortable now, I wondered about the kinds of standards this middle-aged man measured attractiveness with, and whether those standards were the same for all genders. 

I asked if we could talk about my family.

“No, that’s too difficult,” he replied indignantly. 

I didn’t think psychics were allowed to say that. 

Shifting his weight in his seat, he removed the pencil from my palm and for the first time in the session looked into my eyes. He frowned. 

“Do you get itchy?”

“What?”

“You know, your skin, does it get itchy?”

“Sometimes.”

“How often do you get itchy?”

“Maybe slightly more than average.”

“Do you have any food allergies?”

“No…,” I say. 

“Are you sure?”

“I’m pretty sure.”

“When do you get itchy?”

I felt like Elijah Wood in the “Do you wear wigs” interview. 

“I don’t know, in the evenings, I guess?”

“So after you eat dinner.” 

“Well, yeah.”

He twiddled the pencil in his fingers. “I’m just sensing something here. About you being itchy. Keep an eye on it.”

The rest of the session continued normally. Or as close to normal as you can get in a psychic consultation. With the help of a deck of tarot cards, he walked me through the next decade of my life. “By 22 or 23 you’ll be engaged to the very good looking man I mentioned earlier. At 24 or 25, you’ll be married, you’ll have a house by 27, and two kids by 29. It’ll be a boy and a girl.”

I couldn’t believe I was still sitting there. Has this guy ever heard of the cost of living crisis? Or an independent woman? 

“Oh, that’s great!” I said sarcastically, crossing my arms in front of my chest. 

“Another thing. There’s something coming up here about some dishonesty with your friends. Do you have any very good looking close friends?”

(????!!!!)

“I think all my close friends are good looking.”

“Do you have a photo?”

The friend that sent me had warned me he likes to see photos of the people you’re talking about in the session. “It helps him read with more accuracy,” she’d said. Reluctantly, I showed him a few photos. 

“Mmm, no. None of them,” he declared as he swiped through my camera roll. He passed me back my phone. With his elbows on the table and fingertips touching, he said “There’s a female friend that you trust who’s going to betray you. I would advise you to be careful about what you tell your girlfriends. Come back to me in six months.”

By the time the session was over, the rising outrage I’d felt sitting across from him had morphed into a laugh-out-loud disbelief that I’d been profiled as a conventional, itchy young woman who only desires what the patriarchy prescribes to live a happy life. Although my belief in psychics had petered out since my days of witchhood, I couldn’t help but feel disappointed that it wasn’t even slightly believable. 

“How did it go?” My friend asked when I saw her the next day. 

“It was total bullshit!” I explained what happened. 

“That’s so strange!” she said. “He’s never said anything like that to me.”