Another brilliant piece from a GUNNAS WRITING MASTERCLASS WRITER.
Kathryn knew there’d be a story there. A fortune teller, working with gelato flavours. That’s news.
I’m not Kathryn, and I don’t think it’s news, but my editor at the community newspaper sided with my step-sister.
So here I am, standing outside a nondescript store in a strip mall, half the windows boarded up, at 11am on a Tuesday morning. The daughter of one of Kathryn’s Tennis buddies was meeting me there, along with her fiance, in less than one minute. Unless they’re late. It’s a shitty, rainy day.
But no, here comes Tami, with reluctant beau in teau. Ready to have her destiny mapped out in roasted macadamia, or white chocolate, or oreo. Tami is as sweet and bubbly as I remember. Gooey sweet. Her fiance, Travis, just looks tired. And embarrassed. Good.
Right on the dot of 11:03, Madame Chang opens the door, and ushers us inside. The shop interior is best-described as “folksy”. Wooden apothecary shelving and drawers line the walls, every surface is covered in jars, boxes, old papers. Some kind of incense is adding smoke to the dust in the air. Proudly displayed, right in the centre of the floor, is an ice-cream counter, full of little pottles of multicoloured… something. Madame Chang, dressed for the part as rural witch.. doctor… ess, not ice-cream… parlor…. operator… smacks her hands together gleefully.
“Now” she says, “what do we have here?” She rubs her hands together in anticipation. Tami wades into the silence.
“I’m Tami. I called you? This is Travis. He’s my fiance.”
Travis nods. I’m not sure which part he’s agreeing to.
Tami is very… loud. And she talks fast. And she’s never still. Her tiny, sneaker-shod, foot is constantly tapping a staccato to her commentary. She shrugs and bounces endlessly, and her blond curls just seem to erupt, perenially, from the top of her tiny head.
She pipes up.
“I just know me and Travis are meant to be. We’re getting married next weekend. We’re star crossed lovers” she finishes dramatically.
Travis winces. So do I.
There is silence again.
Madame Chang takes a breath. A deep breath. And begins to speak.
“I used to do chinese medicine. Old medicine. From China. Natural. From my family, going back long time. I had many customers. I see them. I know what they are. I know what they need. I know all of the things, their things.”
She takes a pencil from behind her ear. Actually it’s not a pencil, it’s a piece of cinnamon bark. And gestures, poking it at each of us in turn.
“I see you. I know you. I know what you need.”
She looks at us over her glasses, all three of us, clumped uncomfortably on her floor. She frowns.
“But now nobody come. Nobody want herb that taste bad that make you good. Nobody want feel little bad now but plenty good later. Everybody want feel good now and good later.”
She reveals the ice-cream counter that we already know is there. She beams proudly, her red-stained lips shrinking then spreading across her face.
“So now ice-cream. Everybody like ice-cream.” She states this like it’s perfectly obvious. I suppose it is.
“Feel good now, feel good later, everybody win.”
“You make…. ice-cream” I start, uncertain about where we’re going with this. My pencil hovers, waiting for me to give it something… substantial… to write.
“You make… ice-cream. And it… Fixes… People…”
I’ve got to have missed something, surely.
“Yes” she confirms. Sagely.
“I make ice-cream. No milk. Dairy free.” She winks at me. “I see you. I see you flavour. I know your future.”
She slaps Travis on the back. A big bloke, and yet the slap projects him forward a couple of steps.
“I see you flavour!” she cackles up at him.
“You flavour Pineapple! Very fresh. Very strong. You very active, go long way. Good companions Lime, Coconut, even Caramel. Sweet, to balance you strong flavour. Not get lost.”
“I’m sweet!” Tami bounds into the conversation, which immediately starts to feel cramped. She draws Madame Chang’s steel-trap gaze.
“Yes…” she begins thoughtfully, measuredly.
She gestures at me, then draws me closer, into her confidence. Into her clutches.
“She…” Madame Chang gestures again, the jade beads in her hair-comb clacking ominously.
“You…” She points a bony finger at Tami.
“You no good. You too sweet. You bubblegum. Whoever heard of Pineapple Bubblegum? You no work” she shakes her head.
“No future. I finished. You go now.”
She slumps into a chair, gathers her voluminous sleeves, touches a hand to her forehead.
The little shop resounds with the silence. Tami is opening and closing her mouth like a goldfish. A popping noise comes out, but nothing else. Travis, his expression unchanged, leave a $50 on the counter, secures it with a jar full of blue plastic spoons, collects his stunned bride-to-be. Opens the front door, guides Tami through it, and it closes behind him with a soft thump, cutting off the fresh air I’m tempted to gulp.
I’m standing in the middle of the shop, pencil held above blank notebook, thinking I should probably do something.
Madame Chang looks up, squinting at me in the late afternoon sunlight. I chance a quick glance at my watch, which says 5:15. I’m astonished. Surely we’ve been here for less than ten minutes.
Her scowl fixes on me, and on my pad and pencil.
“Ah,” she nods. “You from the Paper. You interview me.” She sighs.
“Another day. Another time. I’m too tired.”
She contemplates me over the top of her tiny glasses, and sadness washes her face, then sympathy, resignation.
“You don’t believe. I know, but you will.”
She sighs again, dragging her aged frame upwards. Fumbling with her sleeves, she turns to the back of the shop. I guess I’m dismissed then. I start turning my own tired body to the door.
And find Madame Changs fleshless hand clasping my wrist.
“I’m very sorry, my dear. Here.” She hands me the tiny pottle that appears. “You will need this.”
And with that I am dismissed. Madame Chang has disappeared into the late afternoon shadows.