Golden Eggs

I didn’t notice the old woman until she sat down next to me on the park bench. Her smell told me immediately what her situation was, and that was before I saw her threadbare coat, the holes in her shoes, and the haunted look in her eyes—the same look I’d seen in the mirror.

“Here.” I handed the old woman the rest of my quiche.

She flashed a gap-toothed smile at me. “Why, thank you, chickee.” Her voice reminded me of sandpaper.

I offered her the fork, too, but instead, the old woman opened her mouth wide and stuffed the entire pastry in her mouth.

A businessman in a grey suit walked by. He nodded cordially at me, but his eyes slid over the old woman as if she wasn’t even there.

I let the old woman help herself to the rest of my lunch—ham sandwich, apple, chips, and chocolate chip cookie. While she devoured the food, my gaze strayed back to the group of college students I’d been watching earlier. They lounged across a picnic blanket, the September sun blazing off the open pages of their textbooks. They laughed at a shared joke. None of their eyes looked haunted, and I bet that none of their feet ached at the end of every day. What must it be like, to be free of worry, to have a future full of opportunity waiting for you?

The old woman polished off the apple, core and all, and sighed contentedly.

I tore my attention away from the students. “Is there anything else I can do for you? I work at a café just over there. I’m sure the manager would—”

“No, no, chickee. I’m quite satisfied.” She stared at me, and I got the uncomfortable feeling that she was trying to X-ray me.

“Tell me, chick, what is your wish?”

“Um, what?”

“Your wish.” The old woman’s lip curled slightly. “You do know the meaning of the word, don’t you? What is your wish?”

“Heh.” My laugh sounded strained, even to me. “I guess I’d like to win the lottery.”

“No.” The old woman jabbed my chest with a bony finger. “That is not it.”

Okay… I glanced around, wondering if anyone was watching, but no one seemed interested in an overworked waitress and a crazy homeless lady.

The old woman leaned in and lowered her voice. “A wish spoken aloud has more power than a wish kept hidden in the dark.” She snapped her fingers. “Now out with it.”

“I want to go back to school and get my GED so I have a better life.” I shut my jaw so hard my teeth clicked. How did she make me say that?

The woman nodded. “There it is.” She pressed something into my hand. “Take this with my thanks for the delicious meal, Latisha.”

I stared down at the plastic-wrapped fortune cookie, my brain still trying to process what had just happened. When I looked up, the old woman was gone.

Dion locked the door of Biscuits and Brews behind the last caffeine-addled straggler. “Well, that’s it for tonight. Thank god.” He sauntered over to the register.

While Dion counted cash and wrote figures in his little black notebook, I wiped tables, swept, mopped, and took out the trash. It wasn’t until we’d finished closing up that I remembered the fortune cookie in my purse.

I almost threw it away. I didn’t much like how fortune cookies tasted, but the old woman had meant it as a kind gesture, and I wouldn’t hurt to at least read the fortune.

I cracked the cookie open and found myself holding not one but over a dozen little slips of paper. Someone at the fortune cookie factory must have really fucked up. I flipped through the fortunes.

You will be offered the opportunity of a lifetime. Say yes!

Believe in yourself and your dreams, for there is magic in belief.

Cultivate your talents. Your potential is unlimited.

And my favorite: A golden egg of opportunity will fall into your lap.

Cute.

“Hey, Tisha, you ready to go home?” Dion paused midway through putting on his jacket. His jaw dropped. “What on earth?”

I followed his gaze to the fortunes in my hand…except they weren’t fortunes. Incomprehensibly, I was holding a thick stack of cash.

“Girl, where did you get that?”

I stammered out the story of the old woman and the fortune cookie. Dion’s eyes grew wider and wider until his face displayed as much bewilderment as I felt.

Dion scratched his head. “That sounds like a straight-up fairy godmother to me.”

“But she was homeless.”

“Nah, that’s just what they want you to think.” Dion snatched a bill from my hand.

“Hey!” I grabbed for the bill, but he held it up out of my reach, tilting it back and forth. Then he handed it back.

“Well, they’re the real thing.”

The number on the bill was bigger than any number I’d seen on money before. I counted the notes and tried to add up the sum in my head, but there were too many zero’s. I bit my lip.

I held out half the cash to Dion. “Here.”

“Oh, no.” Dion took a step back, hands up. “No, girl. That’s for you. I know better than to get on some fairy godmother’s bad side. I don’t wanna start barfing up toads or something.”

“Take it as a gift, then. Or…an investment in your business. You could buy a new espresso machine!”

Dion folded his arms. “What’s wrong, Tisha?”

“Nothing.”

“Bull. You always bite your lip when you’re nervous. What’s wrong?”

I let my arms drop to my sides. “I…I don’t know what to do with it, okay? I’ve never had this much money before, and I… How is this even real?”

“Tisha, Tisha, Tisha. If anyone deserves a lucky break, it’s you, girl. You’re the nicest person I know. And what do you do with it? Seriously? You get your GED.”

“I can’t miss work. And I have bills.”

“Hey, I’m flexible. We can change your schedule. And isn’t that what the money’s for? Paying your bills? Look, you’ve been wanting to go back to school the whole time I’ve known you. Now you’ve finally got your chance.” Dion zipped up his jacket. “Come on. I’ll walk you home so you don’t get mugged.”

Students prepping for exams crammed the café, leaving tracks of dirty slush and salt on the floor that I’d have to mop up. I was at the register, propping myself up on the counter to take some weight off my feet, when Dion emerged from the kitchen.

“Hey, Tisha, you signed up for those GED classes yet?”

“Uh, no. Not yet.”

“Seriously? Why not?”

I shrugged. “I’ve just been busy, I guess.”

Dion leaned over the counter, craning his neck around to peer into my face. “Then when are you going to?”

I didn’t know. I wanted to. I wasn’t sure why I hadn’t yet. I’d just stuffed most of the money in my sock drawer. I kept promising myself that I’d go back to school…soon. I’d buy new insoles…soon.

I didn’t meet Dion’s gaze. “Look, it’s not like I haven’t done anything. I did look into it. Maryville High has a good program.”

“And?” Dion raised his eyebrows.

“And what?”

“So they have a good program. What are you gonna do about it?”

I turned away from him, trying to keep from biting my lip. “It’s not exactly on my way home.”

“Alright, then.” Dion nudged me aside. “Go home early. Go sign up.”

“But—”

“No but’s. I’ll handle things here.” He shooed me away. “Go on. Go.”

Reluctantly, I exchanged my apron for my winter coat.

The northbound bus would take me down 5th Avenue to Rangeline, and from there it was a five-minute walk to Maryville High School. My sore feet dragged, shoes scuffing the damp, salt-strewn pavement as I ambled towards the bus station. I was so tired. I didn’t want to go anywhere but home.

I plopped down on a relatively dry bench at the station and fished my wallet out of my purse for my metro card. There was a small slip of paper stuck between a crumpled one-dollar bill and one of the crisp fortune cookie notes. It read: Your dreams are worth the effort to achieve them. Hesitation is not your friend.

I crumpled up the paper slip and tossed it in the trash. I waited, slumping forward to rest my forearms on my thighs. All I wanted to do was take a nap.

The downtown bus pulled into the station, tires sloshing through wet, grey snow. That bus would drop me at Main and Market, just a few blocks from my apartment. The northbound bus wouldn’t arrive for another ten minutes.

I boarded the downtown bus. I’d go to Maryville High soon, but not today.

The snow melted, the trees grew their green summer garb, and the snow returned. Customers flocked to Biscuits and Brews, leaving me to limp home on throbbing feet. Dion kept bugging me about going back to school, and I kept assuring him that I’d do it soon. Today, I was too tired. My friend had just broken up with his boyfriend and needed me. I needed to get groceries. My aunt was in the hospital. Now just wasn’t a good time. Eventually, Dion gave up and left me in peace.

One day, I was digging through my sock drawer searching for a clean pair—I hadn’t done laundry in three weeks—when my hand brushed up against a piece of paper. It didn’t feel like the cash I’d stashed there—it was too small and thin to be money. I pulled the drawer right out of the dresser to find a mound of slips like the kind you find in fortune cookies. One solitary bill sat at the bottom. Where was the rest of the cash? I hadn’t spent it.

I scooped the fortunes out of the drawer and read a few of them on my way to the trash can.

When opportunity knocks, answer the door.

Disbelief destroys magic.

A person full of words and not deeds is like a garden full of weeds.

When I turned back to the drawer, the bill was gone. In its place, there was a single fortune. It read: A golden egg of opportunity rots if left unused.