Tina, according to the name tag pinned to her shirt.
As a lover, I’d like to win this Tina over.
“Having a nice Valentine’s Day?” I give her a wink. The ladies always love a wink.
Tina looks at me, eyebrows raised, and says, “Oh yeah, I’m having the time of my life.” She blows a bubble; it pops loudly. “Are you ready to order or not?”
Damn, I thought my mystery bombshell was a tough nut to crack. Tina here could stare down Hades without blinking aneye.
“Just, uh, the coffee for now,” I tell her. Tina just rolls her eyes and tucks the pen and pad back into her apron.
Well, that interaction brought me down a peg. I pop the collar of my jacket and fix my hair in the reflection of the metal napkin holder. Still look like a million bucks, though.
My fingers drum on the table top as I look around the establishment, taking it all in. Can’t say I blame Tina for being a bit standoffish, considering some of the customers in this place.
A man at the end of the counter is playing a harmonica between bites of egg (even worse, he ordered them sunny-side up). There’s a group of mimes piled into a booth near the front door who appear to be in a silent standoff with a group of clowns across from them. And a woman sitting behind me ordered the bottomless ribs special, which is…brave, to say the least.
But that’s all completely normal compared to what’s about to come rolling through this diner. Their clientele is about to get much, much weirder in T-minus—I spin around to check the clock behind the counter—one minute.
Nothing I can do about it now.
When I turn back to my coffee, I nearly jump out of my skin; three women have appeared in the booth opposite me.
“Fuck!” I yelp. “Don’t sneak up on me like that!”
Six identical eyes look up at me, wide and watery, gray as choppy seas. Their heads cock to the side, one after the other in quick succession.
“Hello, Cupid,” the women chorus from across the table in unison. The Fates have finally decided to grace me with their presence.
I’ve known the Fates my whole life—and they’ve known me even longer. Yet they never getlesscreepy. It helps a little to call them by their nicknames—Clo, Lala, and Attie—because it makes them seem less…ethereal, I guess. But they’re stillveryspooky.
“You came,” says the first—Clo, the oldest of the three. “Yes, you’re here,” says the second woman, Lala. “At last,” says the third, Attie.
I cross my arms. “At last? You’re kidding me. I got here before you.” Grumbling under my breath, “And on my day off, too.”
Three heads angle to the other side in unison. Gods, I always forget how freaky they are. Must be some sort of defense mechanism to avoid nightmares.
“You’ve been avoiding us,” says Clo with a blink of her disconcertingly wide eyes. “We have called on you several times.”
“Yes,” comes Lala’s affirmation. “Several times.”
“Why?” asks Attie.
The obvious answer—thetrueanswer—is because the Fates scare me. I’ve never gotten used to their whole woo-woo triplets who can see into the future and finish each other’s sentences thing. But I opt for the polite answer instead.
“Ladies, you know Iloveseeing you, but I’ve been up to my ears in work lately. Absolutely drowning in paperwork.”
Silence, then: “He’s lying,” in unison.
You know what? That’s on me for thinking I could get one over on them.
The Fates just stare at me, and I become an unwilling participant in this silent staring contest. We sit like this for several moments, interrupted only by Tina walkingup to the table, taking in our strange tableau, and turning on her heel without a word. Fair enough. I wouldn’t be here either if I didn’t have to be.
“Sooooo,” I break the silence, “what’s up?”
Clo clasps her hands and sets them on the sticky table’s surface, leans forward. “We’ve seen something. Something that could change the destiny of humanity.”
“Oh, so nothing major then,” I quip.
