Capricorn, Meet Scorpio

Jess tapped the eraser of the pencil against her bottom row of teeth. Completing the newspaper’s crossword puzzle had become a morning ritual, along with reading her daily horoscope. She didn’t believe in astrology, but could no more resist its generic predictions than she could resist gobbling down an entire quart of strawberry ice cream. Her muddy brown eyes widened and she bit down on the eraser as she read what the day held for her.

Scorpio - A new crush will need you just the way you are.

A bitter laugh escaped her thin lips, which seemed as out of place on her chunky round face as a zipper on a pumpkin.

Jess thought back to when one of her crushes almost worked out. While visiting her grandparents in a neighboring state, she first saw Rollie whooshing across the town’s frozen pond like an Olympic beanpole. He abruptly stopped in front of where she sat, showering her with tiny ice particles. They both laughed and that was the beginning.

He wasn’t the man of her dreams, but he was a man. A man who said he liked her despite her looks. She’d earned ridicule in high school because of her weight, but Rollie charmed her with his never-ending platitudes.

More of you to love. Opposites attract. I like a woman with meat on her bones.

The affair lasted until her grandmother gently broke the news that Rollie was married and had three children. She fled that long ago crime scene, but perhaps today could be different.

Jess put down the newspaper, waddled to the bedroom and stood before the nightstand, its surface covered with paperback novels, bottles of sleeping pills and a half-empty glass of water. She reached past the clutter, pulled a black onyx and diamond necklace out of a dusty jewelry box and held it up to the ray of sunlight squeezing through the crack in the curtains. The heirloom sparkled as if to celebrate its release from years in solitary confinement. Jess placed it around her neck and laughed at her faulty memory. She recalled the necklace being much longer.

She pulled a black sleeveless dress with a scoop neckline out of the closet and struggled into it. Pudgy feet wedged into a pair of matching sandals completed the ensemble. She picked up her purse and headed to work.

As she stepped out of the parking garage and began walking to her office, an earsplitting pop from above startled her. She looked up and tried to run, but the heel from her left sandal snapped off and caused her to sprawl on the sidewalk. Before the pain from her scraped knees could register, the screaming started. Jess had just enough time to realize her horoscope was about to come true.

* * *

Charlie headed straight for the refrigerator to grab a beer. He sank into a chair at the scuffed kitchen table, unscrewed the cap and took a long pull. The slender young window washer shuddered as the memory of the explosive sound the cable made when it snapped kept reverberating in his mind. His first thought had been of terrorists, and time ran out for second thoughts as he mindlessly squalled like a scalded cat past eight floors to the sidewalk.

Thank goodness that fat old chick broke his fall. Charlie felt terrible about her, but a cop told him she had no family, so it wasn’t as if she'd be missed.

Charlie opened the newspaper and on a whim, decided to read what his horoscope had predicted for the day he cheated death. His hazel eyes widened and he knocked over his beer. The amber liquid spread across the newsprint and turned his recent past into pulp.

Capricorn: You’ll fall hard for someone who isn’t your type.