The Bad Fortune Teller
Ernie’s Great Adventure
By D. D. Riessen
Copyright 2011
Smashwords Edition
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you are reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
Ernie had been wondering about it. He wanted to know if he was taking the right courses, headed in the right direction, going to be a success. He didn’t want to work his whole life at something that was going to make him a failure.
So, one day, purely on impulse, he went to see a fortuneteller.
The sign read: Madame Nuage, seer of destiny.
Destiny was exactly what Ernie had in mind. He seated himself across the table from the slender, elderly woman with many rings, who studied him for a long time before speaking. During the long silence, Ernie squirmed in his chair, feeling like she was seeing through him.
“Tomorrow,” she said at last, “it begins.”
“What begins?”
“Your life will be a roller coaster. You will have ups, and you will have downs.”
“Everybody has ups and downs,” Ernie replied.
“Not like yours. I see that you will have great fame, and at some times in your life you will have great fortune. Yet I see despair, desperation. I see a life of many paths opening up before you. Some good, some not.”
“What are the not-good ones?” Ernie asked.
“That is not clear. But I do see that the your fortunes come from bad things so, take those paths with caution.”
“How will I know what those paths are?”
Madame Nuage smiled. “You will know. Oh, yes. You will know.”
“Anything you can add to that?”
“I speak twenty-seven languages,” said Madame Nuage. “But I do not have any more words for your tomorrow.”
Ernie decided to go to bed early, just in case. He set his alarm clock for 5:00 A.M., so that he could be awake if the roller coaster started early. He put a bottle of water on the nightstand, just in case there was an earthquake and the roof caved in and he was trapped without water. And then, after second thoughts, he decided to include his Swiss army knife, cell phone, and a change of clothes.
He wondered if he was being overly cautious, even thought it silly to be taking so many precautions just because of the babbling old lady with the brightly colored scarves and many rings.
“How can she know anything?” he wondered. “How can anybody know anything? It’s the future! Nobody can know the future because we’re not there yet! Stupid me. Wasted good money to hear a bunch of fiction. My successes depend on me and my efforts, nothing else. Well…, opportunity and timing help. But everything else…,”
Ernie started to put all of his stuff away, but then decided to leave it until morning, and go for a hike.
Early the next morning, Ernie headed out. It felt good to be ahead of the crowd, huffing and puffing up the trail, getting his exercise while everyone else was just waking up. Besides, this was going to be a beautiful day.
“Look at those clouds,” he thought as he rounded the next switchback. “Lucky I brought my cell phone. I’m going to get some great shots!”
He hurried to get up to the top, still a mile away, where he would take pictures of the city below, great shots with this sunrise.
“I’ll get that A in photography, and maybe I’ll win that thousand dollar prize in the show. That’s what the fortuneteller meant. I have to climb to the top to realize my goals. Hmph. Some fortune that is. Wasted my money.”
But when he reached the top of the hill and was looking out over the city, and just when he was about to call his girlfriend and tell her about the terrific sunrise, at that very moment, a hawk, flying overhead…,
accidentally dropped its breakfast, a very mad rattlesnake, on top of Ernie, who threw his cell phone up into the air.
The cell phone was captured by the hawk when it swooped down to retrieve its prey. Somehow…,
the hawk dialed 911 and shrieked when they answered the call.
That got the helicopters into the air. And the police were put on alert. Had Ernie had time to think about it, he would have wondered what all of the sirens were about.
He would have marveled at how the coyotes howled in response.
He might even have noticed the timing of his cell phone loss and the sounds of sirens far below. But there was one distraction.
The snake had an attitude. It had been sleeping peacefully on a large rock over on the east side, sprawled out in the early morning sun, when it was snatched up by the devious hawk.
They fought in mid-air. The snake wrangled itself free and even though it was fortunate that Ernie broke its fall to certain death, that did not endear Ernie to the snake.
Adrenalin pumping, needing to strike out and kill something, Ernie was the next available target. Dancing backwards, avoiding the snake’s fangs and aggressive actions, Ernie fell off of the trail.
Down, down he went, tumbling through the brush, until he rolled off of an overhang and disturbed a mountain lion…,
who just happened to be nursing her two cubs. Ernie landed on top of Junior, the one who was packing some pretty sharp teeth these days.
Mom let out a roar that was heard all the way to Descanso, a great distance away, as Ernie came to a stop wedged into the manzanita bush that was mama lion’s front door.
Until then, Ernie never thought that he’d be able to beat a mountain lion back up to the trail. Hearing her growling behind him, he leaped up rocks using all fours, plowed through virgin territory and scattered the rabbits and pheasant and whatever else lived down in the brush below.
The cell phone had GPS, and a tracking signal. The hawk flew south, over the border, and this now became an international incident. That got the Border Patrol, the Coast Guard, and the armies of both Mexico and the United States involved. Jets were dispatched.
This was going to cost someone a lot of money, not to mention prison time.
Meanwhile, the hawk realized that its prey was not edible. It flew back to the mountain, spotted the snake, and as it was swooping down, dropped Ernie’s cell phone, which hit Ernie on the head, bounced off, and somehow snapped a picture of the hawk, the snake, the mountain lion, and Ernie.
Best action photo of the year.
The photo was an instant success and earned Ernie a million dollars overnight. The bills, lawsuits, and sentencing will be ongoing for years to come.
Dave’s work revels with the fanciful, ponders the inscrutable and enigmatic, and examines the human character.
Other works by D. D. Riessen:
Light Years Away - a short story
Light Years Away - part 2 - a short story
Not Thirsty for This - a short story
Beds of Kelp - a short story
On Standby - a novel of fiction
You Gotta Have Wings - a novel of fiction
Coming soon: The Bad Fortune Teller - Bill’s Bricks
To hear other works by D. D. Riessen, please visit his website at:
http://www.ddriessen.com
http://www.sdwinvisibleink.org
Thank you