Fortune’s Kiss
Prologue
London had always thought carnivals were magical places, even when she didn’t get to go. But tonight, on her fifteenth birthday, the flashing lights and sounds of the fairway were enough to make her think anything was possible. Smiling people were everywhere, lending credence to her thoughts of the place fulfilling wishes.
A lone tent sat at the end of the games, on the periphery, just beyond the dart throws to pop balloons.
“What’s that?” Tanner asked, as she tugged on his hand to where the darkened tent, lit only by a lone purple bulb outside stood.
“I don’t know, but I’m just nosy enough to want to find out,” she proclaimed. The enchanted feel of the fair had gotten under her skin like the odor of popcorn and cotton candy, but Tanner sighed, an exasperated sound she was well familiar with. He went along with most everything she said, even when he thought it was a bad idea.
“Great,” he muttered under his breath. “Two teens disappear at the Carnival last Thursday. Witnesses say they were last seen entering a creepy tent.”
“Oh lighten up.” As they grew closer to the tent, a fission of energy stole up London’s spine, as if the air crackled with electricity. She could feel it spread through like a tingle, and the hair on her arms stood up. “Can you feel it?”
“Feel what? That chili dog after the sling shot? Yup. I feel like I could hurl.”
She rolled her eyes and tugged him toward the tent. A pair of eyes surrounded by more hair than London had ever seen peered out at them from the darkened doorway.
“The birthday girl has come to have her fortune read,” the woman stated simply in a voice older than time.
Tanner froze, gripping her hand tightly, while a flush stole through London’s insides. The magic was palpable here, even if she didn’t have the confirmation from the woman’s words. She couldn’t figure out how the woman had known it was her birthday, unless there were spies planted around the carnival that overheard something Tanner had said.
“Come inside, and let me tell your future.” The tiny woman seemed to grow as she spread the tent opening wide for London to enter. She stopped Tanner with a wrinkled hand to his chest. “Not you.”
He looked at London with pleading wide eyes, begging her not to go in by herself. Tanner’s hand stole out and fingered the feather in her ears, the pair of earrings he had given her. “She shouldn’t know that.” His voice was filled with doom and gloom, but London wouldn’t be cowed by his attitude. She only giggled and shook her head.
“I’ll be right out. Don’t be a chicken. What’s she going to do to me?”
“I don’t know. Eat you?” Tanner muttered under his breath as he shoved his hands in his pockets and took a step back.
Inside, the tent was warmer than the November chill outside, but London couldn’t see a space heater, and didn’t think it would be safe anyway. Every conceivable surface was covered with colorful scarves, as far as London could see. She couldn’t figure out where the dim light was coming from either. The air was thick with something though. London could feel it. A sort of presence, or cloud, but it wasn’t oppressive. It was comforting, so she followed the lady deeper into the tent, which suddenly seemed huge.
Her wide eyes couldn’t take in everything, it was an overload of textures and colors. As the woman led her to a chair, she tried in vain to see what was happening. Even as magical as everything seemed, she was looking for mirrors, a latch to something, or even a giant magnet, but nothing was visible besides the brightly colored fabrics everywhere.
She sat at the small round table the woman gestured to, and watched as she glided over to a tall table and lit something smelly, wafting it around the room. It was incense, London guessed, but not a scent she knew. London couldn’t tell how old the woman was, not with all the makeup she wore. Her hair was dark and curly, and went down to her waist in a puffy cloud. She tinkled when she moved, as if she wore bells on her ankles and wrists, and London looked down to see she was barefoot, no adornments she could see.
“Since it’s your birthday, I won’t charge you for your fortune.” The woman smiled, and her eyes glittered in the darkness.
“How do you know it’s my birthday?” London couldn’t help but ask the question, but the woman didn’t answer. Instead, her hand snatched out and grabbed at her necklace, a platinum heart her parents had given her that morning. It had a small diamond in it, and London knew she would treasure this small token.
“Close to your parents? The luck runs out of you in rivulets,” the woman mused as she fondled the necklace. London was frozen, not wanting to move and break it. She really liked this necklace, for its simplicity. It represented something to London, but she couldn’t figure out exactly what, just that it was important and she didn’t want it broken on the first day she’d gotten it. “You lead a charmed life.”
When the fortune teller detached herself from London’s necklace and sat across from her, London breathed in deeply, waiting for more. She just knew this was going to be great. Her lips tugged up at the corners, and she wasn’t sure if it was nerves or excitement.
A crystal ball sat in the middle of the table, and she stifled the giggle bubbling up as the woman caressed it lovingly, almost dramatically. London didn’t want to offend the woman, but this was a show, and she was eating it up. London knew this woman wouldn’t tell her anything life changing, because that’s not how this game was played. She would tell London something that would make her gush to her friend, who would come in and pay to have her tell his fortune, and she’d charge him twice as much. London may be a kid, but she wasn’t stupid.
In spite of her thoughts, London felt the hairs on the back of her neck rise to attention while the woman lost her focus inside the crystal ball, as if she actually was seeing something in there, but it was far away at the same time. Her eyes glazed over, as if a cloud had fallen. It was fascinating to watch, and the butterflies in London’s belly took flight, swarming around.
“You’re a good girl, but your destiny will be hard to reach.” The fortune teller’s voice changed as she spoke while looking at the ball. London studied it, and didn’t see anything. No lights, or clouds of smoke swirling around. It was just a glass globe. Still, her scalp crackled with goosebumps. “You will have many good friends. Like I said, you are lucky. And you will meet your dreamer on June twenty-third. He is your destiny, my child. Your life will change.” As she spoke, her voice seemed far away, and almost child-like, and London’s skin felt a stroke of warmth, as if someone were touching her. “Be careful with him, though. He’s a runner.” She sat back in her chair. “A beautiful runner,” she mused. “You are a very lucky girl, indeed. Success, fortune, it’s all in here.” She tapped the ball, as she looked at London, her voice returning to normal. “You just have to catch it.”
With that she rose and walked to the tent flap, opening it without a word. London sat there, stupefied. It wasn’t like the woman had told her anything spectacular, but the energy in the tent was unmistakable. Something had just happened, and London couldn’t process it.
Her legs shaky, London stood and walked to the opening of the tent, the air outside cooling her skin. Tanner stood there, a strange look on his face, as he turned toward where she exited.
“Well? Are you in for a ton of money?” London’s voice got caught in her throat, and as she turned, she knew what she would see. The goosebumps were gone, the tingly feelings had stopped, the energy dissipated. She just knew.
The woman was gone, the tent dark, as if nothing was there.
“No,” she managed to choke out. “Let’s go ride the Ferris Wheel,” desperate to change the subject, she tugged Tanner along. She didn’t want to tell him. It seemed like a secret, sort of like a birthday wish. If she told, it wouldn’t come true.
But that night, she marked her calendar for June twenty third with a giant star, so she’d know to be looking for her dreamer.
The next morning, she took up running, just in case.
**
Nine hundred and seventy-three miles away, eighteen-year-old Elliot awoke wearing a thick sheen of sweat. He’d had the regular nightmares, the swirling images of deeds done to secure a bed or food, with his father’s cold, judgmental eyes constantly staring him down. But these dreams had been chased away by a girl, whose deep green eyes warred with his father’s, and won. Her golden hair had woven around the dirt and grime of the streets, cleansing and light. The purple feathers she wore on her ears spoke of a whimsy the serious set of her mouth denied.
He pilfered through the backpack he’d been using as a pillow, knowing there were a few sheets of paper in it he’d rescued from the dumpster last week.
Tongue poking out of the corner of his mouth, Elliot struggled to straighten out the dream, separating the good from the bad, the light from the dark.
Elliot’s life sucked, but he’d just found his sunshine.
So he drew her, before continuing his wake-up process. He needed to hit the road today. It was time.
At dawn, they were kicked out of their night’s shelter, left to roam the streets. Elliot and his friend Logan went first to the city’s transit authority to use the public restrooms and clean up a bit before hanging around outside the mall to wait for it to open.
“You about ready to book it? I think this place has given us all it’s gonna, man.” Elliot and Logan were sitting against the bricks of the building, watching other teenagers mill around the entrance. They blended in here, and marks were prolific. The boys couldn’t do this every day, or they’d be busted in a heartbeat, but they came to the mall about once a week, looking for some quick cash.
“Just need money for a bus ticket and I’m down.” Logan’s reply was, like everything, out of the side of his mouth, as if he never wanted people to hear a word he said. Logan had adopted Elliot pretty early in Elliot’s runaway existence, and Elliot’s loyalty to his only friend was unwavering. At eighteen, the boys were a ubiquitous pair, even two years after meeting. Logan was more mature physically, with almost forty pounds of natural muscle and a full beard on his buddy. Elliot was smaller, and could only grow wispy hair above his lip. He was convinced that if he had the means to shave every day, that would be different, but no way to prove it. So that was how they played things.
When they were feeling particularly adventurous, they had a game they played on the marks. Elliot would pretend he was the prostitute, looking to swap sex for cash. Coy and innocent, he could play the part well. Logan would invariably swoop in and roll the John, and the two of them would rob the asshole blind. It was a dangerous game, one that wasn’t played often, yet more often than not, necessary to live on the streets.
When the doors were opened to the mall, Elliot and Logan followed the horde of people inside. Most were elderly mall walkers, but there was an occasional young mother with a stroller, or the random single person there for a quick in and out shopping trip. The massive teenaged crowd would probably show up later, although there were a few for them to blend with now.
Still, the security guard unlocking the door gave them the side-eye as they entered, silently letting them know he was keeping an eye on them. Logan rolled his eyes as Elliot sighed. Maybe this wasn’t the best place to get some quick cash for the bus ticket.
They strolled around a while, cutting up and trying to be normal, neither of them speaking about anything important, yet both of them relishing each other’s company. For the moment, they were normal teenagers.
Elliot didn’t want to admit to his friend he was looking for golden blonde hair like the rays of the sun, accompanied by emerald green eyes, and purple feather earrings, everywhere he looked. His friend had seen him weak, at his lowest, but he didn’t want to look like a totally heart sick puppy dog over some chick he’d dreamed about. Even though the dream had been different, the resulting drawing clear as day.
They circled the mall repeatedly, not seeing a likely mark, until a lady drew their attention. She was yelling at her child, a seven or eight year old, trying to push the stroller with her younger sibling in it. The mother was getting on to her for pushing the stroller wheels over her toes, something the small child couldn’t even see, much less control.
“I told you to push the stroller, not make minced meat of my feet. Get a grip, child. There is no way you can think that’s acceptable behavior.” Surely the woman was a baby sitter or a nanny, but going by the expensive purse on her shoulder and the shoes she was eyeballing in the store window, the woman had money to spare.
And her wallet was hanging out of said purse. Easy pickings.
“Excuse me ma’am. Do you know where the restrooms are?” Elliot was putting on the innocent face while Logan picked her wallet out of her purse, putting his finger to his lips when the child looked up at him. Then he took off, jogging to their meeting spot by the dumpsters behind the mall. After getting directions the opposite way, Elliot took off where she told him to go, then ducked out of an exit to meet his buddy.
“We got bus fare now. How about we hit up a college town? It’s the end of a semester. They throw away all sorts of shit then.”
“Sounds good to me.” Although the golden haired, emerald-eyed girl was probably here, not there. Not that she would want a homeless punk for a boyfriend. Not that he could handle a girlfriend. Not that they could fit together anyway. Elliot tried in vain to put the girl out of his mind.
**
The first year after her birthday, London had gone back to the carnival, with her boyfriend, Colt. She’d felt incredibly stupid when she couldn’t find the tent. In the place she thought it had been was an old, dilapidated storage shed, with rust stains crawling up the sides. A man banged around inside, and she couldn’t help but ask where the fortune-teller’s tent was.
“Insanely pretty red hair? She tinkled when she walked?” He came up at her last words, from behind the old lawnmower he was working on, the entire tableau odd feeling for the middle of the city. But she was determined to find answers.
“Girly, you’re describing my mama, and she’s been dead longer than you’ve been alive, so just git. This ain’t funny.” His words, along with the look in his eyes, chased her off.
Colt didn’t last long, not that she’d expected him to. She hadn’t met him on June twenty-third, but he was on the track team. He ran the fastest two-hundred yard dash in school. He didn’t dream of much though, so she hadn’t been surprised.
By the time she was twenty-one, she’d established a routine with Tanner. They would both go out on June 23rd, just to see if London could pick up any prospects. She was in pre-law at UT, and picking up guys wasn’t hard, but picking up the right guy was absolutely impossible.
Tanner never failed to pick up anybody, relishing college in a way only boys could. London, on the other hand, couldn’t get into the spirit of free love the way Tanner appeared to.
When she was twenty-four, a guy at the new bar they were trying out slipped a roofie into her drink, and Tanner was the only reason she made it out of that escapade unscathed. After that, they started going to a nicer bar, closer to where London’s parents had chosen her apartment for college. She had liked the location so much, she stayed there, even when Tarlton Law Library wasn’t super close anymore.
When she was twenty-seven, Tanner—her oldest friend in the world—offered to be her June 23rd.
“Look, London. I have a job now, a decent one, with benefits and a future and stuff, and you’re my best friend. It only makes sense we should do this. My dad is amazed we haven’t fucked yet, after all the time we’ve been friends.”
London wanted to laugh at him, except she could see exactly how serious he was. His eyes looked into her the way nobody else’s ever had. So she looked back.
And she tried. She really did.
London remembered all the times Tanner had been there for her, picking up the pieces on June twenty-fourth, after she hadn’t met the one. She remembered all his laughs and jibes, as he made fun of her idealism as she prepared for the upcoming June twenty-third—putting on her pendant in an effort to reclaim some of the fortune teller’s magic. She felt all his friendly hugs, all the kisses on the top of her head.
And she felt nothing but affection for him. But she had to handle this carefully, because he was her best friend, and she would be devastated if she lost him.
“Tanner, I love you.” She watched his face harden. “But I don’t think you’re in love with me. Not really. We’re the best of friends, and nothing can change that. I cherish our friendship and I don’t want to do anything to wreck that.”
He’d left then, and it had taken a couple of weeks for him to call her back and agree with her, even begrudgingly. Those weeks had been hell for London, honestly.
The following June twenty-third, their twosome had become a threesome, as London had gotten a job and invited her Administrative Assistant to their outings. It took another two years to explain to her why the date was so special.
It wasn’t that London didn’t date other nights of the year, but she just didn’t hold much hope for those guys. And there was really no reason to. Like every other woman, London believed there would be a spark of something special when she met the man she would be with the rest of her life. And that never happened.
**
Elliot went back home one more time. Some part of his mind was hopeful to see that girl there, the one of his dreams that he kept drawing. But the biggest part was confronting his dad. He’d been touching Sarah in ways that were disgusting and inappropriate. Elliot had only found out because Sarah was the only person he’d stayed in touch with when he left.
Her current boyfriend had told him. It was enough to put Elliot on the first bus back home, sans shower, because all he cared about was letting dear old dad know how he felt about things.
And that hadn’t gone over well at all. After the disastrous reunion that left him in a cast almost as big as the one he’d left with originally, Elliot caught back up with Logan in Pamona Gulch, but they soon moved on to Santa Fe, as their charity hospital was the closest place Elliot could get the cast taken off his thigh.
Good times.
When they were twenty-three, Elliot finally asked Logan when he was going to be tired of being homeless.
“Man, I thought you’d never ask.” The bigger guy had admitted.
“Why didn’t you say something?”
“Because I thought this was something you needed, or some shit, man.” Logan actually blushed, or that’s what it looked like, at least.
That night, they didn’t even try to get a shelter. Besides, it had gotten tougher, the older they looked. They would be passed over for chick with kids every time, and neither one of them felt bad about that. They figured the kids needed beds more than they did.
Besides, what sort of shitty situation would make a kid homeless with their mother? Elliot had heard some stories, had seen even worse, and wouldn’t wish that shit on anybody.
“So, what do we do?” They sat on the sidewalk in front of a nightclub, trying to be inconspicuous and not get arrested, and they plotted. Logan was really smart in things Elliot wasn’t. Like, he spent a lot of time in public libraries. While Elliot perused the action and adventure novels, Logan was looking through the periodicals, reading current events, staying up to date on tax law or some shit like that. He was really smart, so Elliot looked to him for answers.
“We get our GED. There are free tests online we can take at the library. Then we get some sort of training in something that will pay.” Logan shrugged as he spoke, as if the answers were clear as glass.
So that’s what they did.
Logan wanted to be a firefighter, and Elliot also wanted to save people, but he wasn’t as physical as his much larger friend was. He didn’t want to be on the forefront of rescuing people, preferring to be the silent partner who stood in the background. After meeting with Sam, he was sold on paramedics.
Sam was a man who had gone into a bar where Logan and Elliot were celebrating their first jobs. Part time, yes. Unskilled labor, yes. But real money, absolutely. Sam ambled in, smelling faintly of wood smoke, which perked Logan’s curiosity, and feeling loose, they’d bought the man a beer.
Skilled in getting stories, they tag teamed the man until he’d finally spilled. A night on rotation, Sam was a paramedic, and that night, he’d had a rough one.
It was everything Elliot wanted. Well, everything except the green-eyed girl he still dreamed of.
One night, after he’d gotten his GED, while he was still studying for the Emergency Medical Technician License, he dreamed of her again. Her hair flowed around her like a golden halo, her emerald eyes gazed up at him dreamily, her ruffled blouse pulled down in disarray, and he knew. He knew without a doubt this was how she would look when he met her for real. The knowledge of dreams was absolute, and he felt it deep in his bones that someday, he would really know this woman.
It was fated.
Elliot had no idea it would take years for his fate to come to fruition.