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The Prophet of Prospect Park

Patrick Trotti

    At first it felt kind of weird, but after a while I got used to it. Some people actually called me gifted, but I like to think of it as common sense. I can still remember the first person that gave me their palm, turned upward, and allowed me to “read” their future. Of course, I had no formal training and no real clue as to what I was doing.
    It was a sunny Saturday afternoon and I had set up shop right next to the last stand at the farmer’s market in Prospect Park. I usually played some music; I still had my trumpet that my mom bought me when I turned seventeen. That was the last birthday that I spent with her before she died. Recently I had read in the paper that a man down in Union Square was making a hundred dollars a day or more by telling people their fortune. It was some slice of life piece done half assed in the Times but it seemed simple enough.
    I’d like to think that I got the idea from my grandmother. I do remember her, when she was living with me and my mom when I was younger, always fiddling around with her various decks of tarot cards. All day she would sit by the window on the first floor with her cup of tea, pack of Marlboro Red’s and her cards half prognosticating our family’s collective future, half surveying the neighborhood.
    All I had to do was put up a sign on a cardboard box saying, “Have your fortune read by a real person, not some psychic freak!” and a cup for change and I was ready to begin. A middle aged Spanish woman knelt down across from me and smiled.
    “Tell me a little about myself so I know that you’re for real. Then you can name your price for the fortune telling. Deal?”
    I simply nodded and asked for her hand. What she failed to realize was that it had nothing to do with the lines on her palm, although she did have a lot of them. As I pretended to read her callused hand I was really scanning her for any clues. Tucked beneath her jacket I could make out scrubs with the name “Windsor Terrace” stitched on her breast along with the head of a dog and on her left forearm she had a tattoo: “R.I.P. Jacob- 1/13/03-7/24/06.” I had more than enough information to get lunch and cigarettes out of her.
    “I see that you’ve had tragedy in your past. I’m sensing that you lost someone very close to you, possibly a son or a nephew, that was young. And ever since then you’ve kept busy by focusing on your work. You love your job as a veterinarian assistant because you love animals.”
    She just stood there frozen in time looking back and forth between my two eyes half like she was trying to figure out if we’ve ever met before. Finally, she cleared her throat.
    “How did you, how did you know all that?”
    “What can I say? I have a gift. Now, twenty dollars and I’ll read your future. Do you have anything in particular you want to know about?”
    “Umm...no, not really. Just tell me whatever you can.”
    I could see by the look in her eyes and her body language that I had her before she even handed me the money. Whatever I told her now was just icing on the cake. She looked beat up and tired, as if she lived a very hard life so I decided to give her a positive proclamation. It was the easiest money I’d ever made.
    The rest of the day was relatively easy. I had another thirteen customers, most of whom already looked as though they wanted to believe in me before saying a single word. I guess confidence was the key to the whole thing, well that, and a burgeoning line waiting for my services. By sunset word was spreading quickly, I was the boy with all the answers, a prophet of sorts.
    It became a regular gig and eventually I had made enough money to put a roof over my head, albeit at the local Y, and get a few hot meals in me every day. Things were good, real good until one day this man approached me with a look of both anger and sadness that scared me.
    “You the fortune boy?” He muttered as he came closer.
    “Fortune teller.” I weakly responded fearing that it would be someone looking for a refund.
    “Yeah my girl, she came to you a few weeks back. Well she told me that you said she’d be fine and that even though she was sick she’d get better. Guess what? She died the other day and do you know why she died? Because she refused to go get her treatment at the hospital! No matter what I said to her she wouldn’t listen, she just kept saying that you told her that everything would be fine. You’ve got blood on your hands!”
    Then he spit a ball of clear phlegm in my direction, hitting me in the shoulder. I’ll never forget those eyes; piercing through me as if he could see through to my soul, scorching the little hairs on the back of my neck and deflating the weeks of self confidence that I had built up. I remained silent fearful that I would just further upset him if I tried to defend myself.
    “Look, I’m pretty busy sir, so if you don’t mind?” I hoped that he wouldn’t see through my thinly veiled attempt at getting around a potentially awkward argument.
    “You got no customers that I can see and as long as I’m in the neighborhood I’ll make sure that it’ll stay that way!” The look of anger had morphed to a call to arms as I feared that he may attack me at any moment. I had few options and even fewer good ones.
    “Look, I admit, I fucked up. I’m human and I make mistakes but it’s unfair to blame me for what happened to your wife. Unfortunate as it is, and it is a tragedy, what am I supposed to do?”
    “You should be held accountable!” He declared. His eyes grew bigger.
    “Maybe you’re right but that won’t bring her back, will it? How about this, I give you your money back and we call it even.”
    “You think you can sweet talk your way out of this?”
    “No, I’m just offering a solution. What about me giving you half of my profits for every day that I’m out here working? You can come and meet me every night and I’ll split my money with you.”
    The man stood there motionless as if a movement would somehow derail his thought process. After a few minutes he stepped closer for what I feared would be the start of a fight but instead he extended his right hand.
    “You got yourself a deal.” He mumbled as a lone tear rand down his cheek.
    I exhaled promising myself that I would never rip off another person again. Later that day I applied for a part time job as a door to door community canvasser for a local politician. And even though it still has to do with me fabricating facts and bending the truth at least I don’t feel as guilty. Oh, and I never stepped foot in Prospect Park again.



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