[ WP ] A fortune teller perfectly predicts the future for thousands of people of what will happen to them in exactly 24 hours . When it 's your turn , she says `` You are going to die '' .

`` You are going to die,'' she said, curling one of her pink locks absentmindedly. Of course, she tried to give it an air of mysticism but with so many customers waiting for their fortunes to be told, she had n't the time to really give them the full experience. 
 
 `` Thanks for wasting my money,'' I got up, disgusted by her morbid analysis. I did n't even know why I was here - it was a disgrace to who I was. An avowed skeptic, I took little stock in the ludicrous claims of psychic hacks. 
 
 Until that day. 
 
 The national news picked up her story and ran with it. Scientists conducted a battery of tests over the course of six months. It was true - this woman was real psychic. No thugs went looking for dirt she could push on people, no placebo effects were in place. Her words were specific, her predictions eerily correct, and her methodology impossible to fake. She was the real deal. 
 
 After a few months, even as the researchers ran their tests, word of her talent began to pick up speed. I myself took it as a personal mission to disprove her ridiculous claims and ventured to Tacoma to dispel her power. Quite a far ways for a Cali boy, but I figured it would be worth the wait. 
 
 As I emerged from her tent, a rather drab affair set up near the East 34th Bridge, people swarmed around me. Many were starry-eyed, asking me how it went and how excited I was for my future. I brushed them off, `` She's full of shit. Go home.'' 
 
 Whispers began to arise that I was marked for death, as some were when they came. Many were, emerging from her shack-like tent in tears or as hollow, emotionless shells of their former selves. I tried my best to be neither - dismissive, if anything, of her claim - and I smiled reassuringly at those who said they were sorry I was going to experience misfortune. 
 
 `` She's not going to ruin my day,'' I told them, to try to put them at ease, `` Some old hag ca n't say what's going to happen to me.'' 
 
 After falling out of the crowd - a good twenty minutes of wading past old men, young women, children, scientists, mystics, and a whole carnival of freaks and misfits - I sat in my car and rolled my fingers on the steering wheel. 
 
 A part of me, ever the rebel, wanted to kill myself right then and there. Prove her wrong by beating her to the punch. Of course, that would just show that I put some stock in her claims and wanted to actively oppose them, but a little voice at the back of my head told me I might be wrong. It was my skeptic's voice, and it served me well. At least, I figured so until it started telling me I might die because this old bag told me I would. 
 
 I hummed a nonsensical song as I cruised down the road, over the bridge, and homeward bound. I had a long route ahead of me to make it back to LA - back to work, my friends, and my family. They questioned whether I was sane - some called me a pilgrim, stated in tones of derision as I followed many seekers to her tent - but I reassured them that this was just a little experiment. My boss even said I might get to write about it if I get back - an opinion piece on what `` LA's Toughest Skeptic'' had to say about the fortune teller craze that was sweeping the nation. 
 
 As I drove onto the main highway, I cranked on the radio and fiddled with it, passing several loony fundamentalist stations until I settled on a nice soft rock channel to fill the air. It was 8:33 in the evening, and I did n't intend to stop until I passed the Washington border and was safely back in my home state. 
 
 A thump. 
 
 I shook myself awake as I felt the road bumps warning me of my slumber. 11:55. I'd been drifting in and out of consciousness the last hour or so, exhausted from the long drive up the previous week. My phone was ringing. Good. Conversation always wakes me up. 
 
 `` Hey, babe...'' her sweet voice crackled out of the speakers. Shame the signal was so bad. I loved it when she talked. 
 
 `` Hey,'' I replied, smiling, `` How's everything going?'' 
 
 We talked through the night, and it was a little over 12:33 when our conversation was finally winding down. 
 
 `` Hey... So, I need to tell you something, okay?'' she sounded nervous. 
 
 `` Sure, anything,'' I braced myself for the worst. Most likely she was cheating on me. My fault, partially, never being home and all. Always out finding the latest dirt, or on the occasional crazy road trip like this one. 
 
 I was n't wrong. 
 
 I hung up, not responding. There was nothing to be said. We were something and now we were nothing. I checked the clock. 12:37. 
 
 Rage welled up within me. I had the sudden urge to veer off the freeway, to be done with this life that was n't fair to me. I worked hard. I put food on the table. I made sure she understood I did n't avoid her because I did n't love her. I just did n't have time. Why did n't she understand that? 
 
 I pulled over to the gravel edge of the highway. 
 
 My fingers rolled on the steering wheel. 
 
 Rage. Then contempt. 
 
 Contempt welled up within me. 
 
 That's what that fortune teller had been foreseeing, that I would kill myself in a fit of rage. Well, fuck her. I was going to live. I was going to live and write that article and spit in her stupid, manipulative, wrinkle face. 
 
 I thought all this and it's a shame I did n't look behind me when I was merging back on the highway. If I looked behind me I might've seen the big rig speeding across the asphalt at a good seventy, far too fast to stop. If I looked behind me, I would n't be lying on that same asphalt right now, dying, my vision blurring as the truck driver bled out in his own cabin. 
 
 Funny how things work out.
