She stopped in front of the crafts shop, examining something in a display basket out in front of the store. I wondered if she planned to swipe it. I walked around her.

Before that: “No thanks,” I said.
“Is powerful talisman,” she said. “Will protect you from your enemies, who caused your traffic accidents with their bad wishes.”
“Seriously, no thanks,” I said. She shrugged and walked off, not really in a huff, but I wondered if now I had made a third enemy, a fortune-teller who was going to curse me now.

Before that: She extracted a little embroidered coin purse from her larger purse and removed a pinch of herbs, held them up for me to smell. I smelled nothing. “See, smell that? Powerful herbs, brother” she said.
I nodded. “Powerful, okay,” I said.
She put the herbs into the little square of paper she had begged from the cleaner and folded it up into a tiny package. “You add a little salt and a little bread. You don’t eat it, just carry it in your pocket to protect you.” She took out a little wooden rosary, asked me my name and said a long prayer over the package, including my name. “Here,” she gave me the package. “How much do you want to give me for it? It will protect you.”
I shook my head. “I already gave you five Euro,” I said.
“That was for the palm reading,” she said.

Before that: She didn’t let go of my hand. “There’s more. You are happy now, but you have enemies. No, you have two enemies. Intriguing against you, wishing you ill.”
“No fooling?” I said.
“Wishing you and your family ill. You need protection.”

Before that: Over the woman’s shoulder, I saw the dry cleaner cashier wore a bemused expression on her face. We both ignored the cashier. The fortune-teller took my hand. Her hands were warm. “Don’t worry, my color won’t come off on you, my hands are clean,” she said.
“Same here,” I said. “My hands are clean too.”
“You have a happy life,” she said. “You don’t have a lot of money, but you don’t care about money. Family, happiness are more important to you.”
“That’s correct,” I said. “How do you know that?”
“It’s all in your hand,” she said. “You are not too worried. You don’t have worries. Your forehead is smooth.”
I can tell your fortune too, I thought. You are an outcast, I thought. You have had a run-in with the police — I had seen her picture in the newspaper a couple years ago, when she (or someone a lot like her) and an accomplice had been arrested for bilking a woman out of thousands of Euro with a protection-from-bad-luck scam. You have lost children, I thought, to death, or to life. You are very short, and very old, and very scary-looking, I thought.
“You have a scar,” she continued. “Is it on the left side or the right side?”
“Amazing, dude, I have scars all over,” I said.
“You have had a traffic accident. No injuries, only damage to the car.”
“Twice,” I said. “My fault both times.” So much of my heart wanted to believe this woman.
She nodded sagely. “You are married, but not to your great love.” Wrong, I thought, but I played along.
“Why not? Divorce? Something else?” she asked.
“They let her husband out of prison and she lost interest in me,” I said.
She nodded some more. “You had worries about your children. Health, or school.”
Boy, bulls-eye, I thought. They were both tiny preemies. “They’re fine now, though,” I said.
“You have golden hands, you can do anything with your hands.”
“Thanks,” I said. Who could resist believing such a thing? I sure hoped she was right, I had to make a bunch of sushi later in the day for guests who were coming over. And gyoza, and yakisoba. The other customer left and the cashier turned to me. I picked up my suits, paid, palmed a five Euro bill from the change. “Here, come outside, I’ll read your palm some more,” the fortune-teller said. I gave her the money.

Before that: I went into the dry cleaners to pick up my suits. I was third in line, two ladies were in there before me, a sixtyish Austrian woman who picked something up, and a tiny old Gypsy. The Gypsy was taking sweets out of an Easter basket on the counter and the cashier was trying her hardest to remain polite. “That’s enough, now,” the cashier said.
“Just a couple more,” the Gypsy said with a thick Eastern-European accent. “I have kids, kids have to eat sugar,” she continued shoveling chocolate eggs and bunnies into her purse until the cashier removed the basket. “Could I have a bag for the candy?” the old woman asked. No one looked at her. We all avoided eye-contact. Then I found that a crappy way to behave, so I stopped avoiding eye-contact, and she noticed immediately.
“We don’t have any bags.”
“Give me a piece of paper, then.” The cashier gave her a tiny square of note paper. The old woman turned to go, then appeared to think better of it and approached me. “Give me your hand,” she said. Yay, I thought. Gypsy palm-reader.

Before that: “Your eyebrows are turning white,” my hair stylist said.
“I noticed,” I said. She held up a big hand mirror so I could see my hair all over. I nodded sagely. Big deal, a pig shave is a pig shave, even if it takes forty-five minutes and includes a soporific scalp massage and is called a styling. Main thing is: it’s short because my youngest daughter loves to run her hands over it when it’s good and short. Nothing like a six-year-old girl running her hands over your scalp with an expression of glee on her face, is there?
My cell phone rang. It was my wife. She told me to go here and there to get some stuff; “and you could pick up the drycleaning too,” she said. “But hurry, we have a lot of cooking to do.”

Before that: She wasn’t happy I was leaving to get a haircut, because we had guests coming over later in the day. “It will only take a jiffy,” I said. She looked skeptical. As if she thought something unusual happened whenever she let me go out by myself.