I walked through the back alleys of the downtown area and descended to the basement of a deserted building without even a sign. The door bore a simple sign. "Fortune-Telling" Plain and simple. Given my line of work, I often had to deal with shady businesses like this, but I rarely had any pleasant memories of them. When I opened the door, as expected, a faint scent of incense drifted through the dark room. Candles were lit, and I could see a woman sitting at a desk covered with a black cloth. "Welcome, Mr. Odagiri." I stopped in my tracks, my foot caught mid-step. "How do you know my name?" Though her head was covered in a black veil, I clearly saw the corners of her mouth curl into a smile. "You just introduced yourself." At her prompt, I took a seat on the chair opposite her.
"I haven't introduced myself yet." "Yes, you have. And the future in which you did so has now vanished." What is wrong with this woman? Did one of my clients say something to her? No, that couldn't be. "That is why the only reason I know your name is that I foretold my own words: 'Welcome, Mr. Odagiri.'" I stared suspiciously at the woman uttering these incomprehensible words. "Unfortunately, we only have black tea, but it seemed it wouldn't be to your taste, so I won't be serving it. Shall we get straight to business?" "...Yeah," As if to cut me off before I could finish, she pulled two small boxes from inside her robe. "What you are looking for is inside one of these. However, since you were an unwelcome guest to me, I cannot simply hand it to you unconditionally. The box on the left, and the box on the right. Please choose just one. It is inside one of them. However, if I had forseen that 'you would open both boxes,' then as punishment for cheating, I have placed it in neither."
The woman smiled with just her mouth. "Before that, could you please turn off your mobile phone? There are two pieces of news I don't need. No matter how I try to steer things, they'll ring anyway..." Reluctantly, I complied. Before me lay the two small boxes. This woman was apparently playing the part of a clairvoyant. "Did you know what I came here looking for?" She seemed to give a slight nod. Right, or left? If it's in one of them, all I had to do was open both. Without hesitation, I opened both boxes. Both were completely empty. "Hahaha. You must like a joke." How unpleasant. Did she expect me to believe that by opening both, the uncertain future became fixed, and the contents vanished the exact moment I did so? "If I had chosen one box and happened to 'win,' and then immediately opened the other one—since I would have opened both—the contents should have never been there from the start... In that case, would the 'winning' prize that was already revealed just instantly vanish right before my eyes?" I pointed out the flaw in this ridiculous game.
The woman replied as she put the boxes away. "Precisely. And yet, you did draw the winning item, didn't you? Unfortunately, since you opened the other one as well, it was retroactively erased. In any case, it is a world that is no longer visible to you." Sophistry. This woman was an intensely unpleasant charlatan. She simply didn't know what item I wanted. Which was obvious, of course, since I hadn't told her. She was just trying to cover it up with such an elaborate hoax. It was unsettling that she guessed my name, but in this world, there are unique networks of information. Fortune-tellers and the like were invariably master gossips. She had also said the black tea wouldn't be to my taste, and indeed, I hated black tea. Yet the whole premise didn't rely on the other person hating black tea. Depending on the brand, the taste varied completely. As for the mobile phone, since I had turned it off in the end, she could claim whatever she wanted.
"Our business is done. Would you please leave now?" she said, completely unfazed. I was racking my brain for a way to take this fraud down. I wouldn't be satisfied unless I called her bluff. "You seem to possess quite the extraordinary clairvoyant power. Then how about this—what if I were to assault you right now?" Just the two of us in a cramped room. And nobody ever came to a place like this. "Can you see it? Your so-called future. How are you going to deal with it? At this distance, there is nothing you can do." The woman didn't budge an inch. Her mouth was still smiling. Was she assuming I wouldn't dare do such a thing? I fully intended to. I didn't care about acting like an outlaw, but a stunt like this was nothing major to me. Yet, the woman didn't move. This very fact was proof that she was a fraud. She couldn't see the certain future in which I would lunge at her two minutes—no, even five minutes—from now. Then, the woman quietly opened her mouth.
"I don't mind. Do as you please. If you do, I will simply awaken from this precognitive dream, hang a 'Closed for the Day' sign before you arrive, and lock the door. That is all it would take." My breath caught for a second. Only the ticking of my wristwatch echoed in the dark room. I could only feel the cold sweat trickling down the back of my neck. And I kept waiting for the moment when the woman in front of me would smile with just her mouth and say, "Just kidding."
To be continued in "Mermaid"
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