The Teller

“In twelve days, you’ll find everything you’re looking for, Ms. Harmsworth. You’ll be able to pay everything back in no time at all,” I told her. The future I saw for her was bleak, unable to pay back the loan the bank was going to give her, so they would foreclose on her house and sell off her assets. It didn’t matter to me, the bank was paying me to ignore the negative visions and use my reputation as the world’s greatest psychic to convince people to take a loan.

“Thank you, Mr. Madison, you are truly amazing,” Ms. Harmsworth said.

“Please, call be Tom,” I said.

“Ok, Tom. Thank you, she said and shook my hand.

The people I helped usually smiled at me and walked out. On the rare occasion they didn’t walk out or would suspect me of fraud, I feigned sickness and asked them to leave.

After Ms. Harmsworth left, someone in a nice suite walked in.

“You must be from the bank. Please sit!” I said.

“Thank you so much. Mr. Madison. We appreciate your services. You’re making us a fortune, here’s your cut,” he said. He handed me an envelope. I opened it, there was few thousand dollars inside.

“Well you certainly know how to show your appreciation,” I said.

“I’ll see you later,” he said. He smiled and walked out.

I decided to treat myself to an expensive restaurant. I deserved some fine dining, scamming people was hard work. I didn’t consider myself a fraud, I really can see the future, I just don’t always share the exact future I see with my client. I recommended they get loans in exchange for a percentage of the banks’ profits, it was up to the customer to make the loans genuinely life changing. If they failed to do so, it wasn’t my fault, even if I was the reason they took the loan out in the first place. I was right about everything else in my client’s future, so one little indiscretion couldn’t be too bad. Then of course there was the money. I would start to feel guilty, then I’d think about all the money the bank was paying me. Money was Novocain for the conscience.

I drove home that night with my foot heavy on the gas. I got thrills from speeding and thinking about all the money I was making. What would I spend it on next? I had swerved into my driveway and pumped the breaks, leaving tread marks across the driveway. Nothing to worry about, Fabio would clean it for me. That’s what I paid him for.

As I was getting out of the car I saw one of my neighbors and waved.

“Nice car,” he said. “Is it new?”

“This piece of junk?” I said and laughed. “It’s three days old. I’m thinking of trading it in.”

“You’re funny. You’re lucky you can afford that thing,” he said.

“Don’t worry. I’m not trading her in just yet. The hybrid Porsche 918 Spyder is the best car I’ve ever owned. She drives like a machine,” I said.

“She is a machine,” my neighbor said. I laughed.

“I like your seventy eight Corvette. It’s a classic,” I said, trying to be nice. His car was so old the name had worn off, and he hated when I brought it up. He told me once he thought I was being condescending, and I tried my best to reassure him I wasn’t.

“Goodnight,” I said and went inside.

I next morning I had drove to work with a minor headache. I hadn’t gotten enough sleep. I wasn’t worried about it, if it going to ruin my day I would have seen it coming. I took a couple aspirin before I left and was now focused on the road.

I got to my office and to my surprise, my headache had gotten worse. I was so distracted, I couldn’t give a read to my first three clients. I was starting to worry that this was going to be a bad day. Why was the headache getting worse, and what happened to my visions? I canceled the rest of my clients for their day and refunded there money and they left.

“That was a waste of time,” one of them shouted at me.

“Sorry sir, I’m not feeling well,” I said.

“You suck. You’re the worst psychic ever, you overhyped buffoon,” he said and hung up.

I needed to relax. I played Vivaldi and dozed off. I didn’t even notice a customer had shown up.

“Aahh, you spooked me,” I said.

“I spooked a psychic? And you’re supposed to be the best?” He said and laughed.

I looked carefully at the clients face, and I had recognized him. He was the man I saw in a dream. If he hadn’t woke me so soon, I might have known why I saw him in a dream.

“I thought I cancelled you,” I said.

“You did. You said you were sick, so I thought I’d bring you some soup,” He said.

“That’s actually really nice of you. I’m actually feeling a little better if you’d like a read,” I said. He nodded. I told him his future and sent him off to the bank. I didn’t know this man well, but he seemed nice. He was nice enough to bring me soup, and I felt bad for sending him off to get a bad loan from a horrible bank.

I reminded myself of all the money I was making, then went home that night satisfied that my abilities still worked.

I started to wonder why they didn’t work earlier. This only happened one other time, right before my mother died. I hoped nobody I knew was going to die, especially the people at the bank writing my checks. This was going to drive me crazy until I could figure it out.

I looked at the clock. ‘2:53… 2:54… 2:55…’ it read, the minutes ticking away like hours. Time was slowing down more and more, the humming of the electricity running through the digital clock amplified by my migraine.

I needed to check on my family and friends, make sure everybody was ok. The first person I called was my father.

“Who is this? Is this another damned telemarketer,” he said sharply.

“Dad, it’s me. Tom. Are you okay?”

I heard him take a breath. “Yes, I’m fine. I’ll call you tomorrow,” He said. Then he hung up. Typical, that rude, arrogant old man. He’s always been like this. He was a cranky, shrewd, unloving, cold bitter petty little person. His callousness is probably what killed mom.

I took a breath as well, sat down and dozed off. I woke up a few hours later in a sweat. I had the worst nightmare. Something could be wrong with one of my kids, I needed to call them. I called my oldest son first, then my youngest. Both of them were fine. I called my daughter next, she broke her finger. That had to be it.

“I’m sorry about your finger,” I said.

“It’s ok, the doctor wrapped it up,” She said.

“Love you, bye,” I said and hung up.

I was relived.

“Gross,” I said when I looked down and realized I was soaking in sweat, and decided to take a shower and put a clean shirt on.

I turned the shower water on, and after a few minutes, I noticed a pool of water began to amass and felt sick. The drain must be logged.

I started to cough up blood and grabbed my phone to call my doctor. After making an appointment, I laid down in bed and the migraine came back. I took some more pills and fell asleep. When I woke up a few hours later, my head was still spinning and in pain, but not as bad as before. Something was very wrong. I called the doctor and told him my symptoms and he said to go to the hospital. This migraine was bad for business, without my psychic abilities I was as useless as a one legged race horse.

I got bored waiting for the ambulance and had no idea why it was taking so long. It was frustrating not being able to see everything that was going on. I turned on the television. I flipped through the channels then shut it off and began to read my book. I got about half way through when my eyes started to feel heavy, and eventually I dozed off.

The buzzing in my head woke me up and was relentless. I hit the alarm clock, forgetting I had even set it. Even after I slammed the off button, the sound still echoed in my head. I wasn’t sure where the damn ambulance was and decided to take bus to the doctor. Despite my new car being faster than the bus, I was in no condition to drive. I got to the hospital and got a weird feeling when I entered. I had an overwhelming urge to call my son. I called him and told him where I kept my cash and some account numbers I had kept secret, just in case he needed them.

“You’re going to be ok dad. I’ll meet you at the hospital,” He said.

“Right this way sir,” A doctor said and showed me to a room. I went in and the doctor said “I’ll be back shortly,” and left.

I laughed a little when a pudgy, ugly little women in a nurse’s uniform walked in the room.

“Name” she said.

“Huh? What was that?”

“Name!” she repeated, perturbed.

“You haven’t heard of me? I’m Tom Madison,” I said. She stared at me blankly. “You know, the famous psychic. You’ve probably seen my ads on TV? Maybe a billboard with my face on it?”

“The doctor will be right out, sir. Please have a seat,” She said. That was a blow to my ego. I sat down feeling deflated.

I was waiting for an hour before a nurse finally came out.

“Right this way,” she said and I followed her to a private room. Her face reminded me of a picture of an angel I have hanging over my toilet.

“The doctor will be right in,” she said. I was disappointed she left, her beauty distracted me from the throbbing in my head.

I put my head in my hands and waited another ten minutes for the doctor to come in. He knocked on the door.

“Come in,” I said and lifted my head out of my palms.

The man that came in was dressed like a reaper.

“Who the hell are you?” I shouted.

“I’m your doctor, who else would I be,” The man said. All I could see was a smile under his dark hood.

I was nervous and my palms were sweaty. I backed into the wall.

“Do you remember me?” he said. He took off the reaper suit and was wearing doctor’s scrubs underneath.

“You scared the crap out of me. I’m already feeling sick, why would you do that? Was that a prank? Do you think you’re being funny?” I asked.

I studied his face carefully and said “oh yes, I know who you are. You’re that intern with an ego I hired a few years ago. So you decided to get a medical degree?” I asked.

“Well, yes, but that’s not what I was talking about,” He said.

“What was your name again?” I asked.

I continued to study his face, then I remembered what happened. My veins turned to ice.

“Look, that was a long time ago. I’m sorry, kid. I shouldn’t have shouted at you, I was wrong” I said.

“You’re the worst kind of bully. You’re just apologizing because you have too, not because you want to. You’re an arrogant narcissistic piece of garbage and you always have been. I have great abilities too, and with the proper guidance I could have been even bigger then you. You ruined my life” he said and locked the door.

“I’m really sorry. I’m a changed person, give me a second chance to teach you, you’ll see,” I said. I could have made a better apology if my migraine wasn’t so bad.

“You said it was a long time ago, but I relive the cruelty every day of my life. It feels like everything just happened yesterday. I gave you migraines knowing you’d come here, to this hospital. It’s time for revenge,” he said.

“Wait, you can push? You pushed these migraines into my head. How you’ve grown, I’m so proud of you,” I said.

“Shut up, piece of crap. I don’t need your pride, I need you to die,” he said.

He took a needle out of a drawer.

“A funny feeling tells me that’s not medicine,” I said.

“Oh, don’t worry. This is just a muscle relaxer. It should make it easier to push my abilities in your mind,” he said.

He plunged the needle into my neck and my body had started to relax.

“I truly regret what I did, read my mind and you’ll know that,” I said.

“Shut up. I don’t need to read your mind to know an arrogant narcissist like yourself has no feelings,” He said.

All those poor souls I made miserable, allowing the bank to loan them money with an inflated interest rate so they could default on their houses. How many of them felt like him and wanted me dead. Maybe I had been arrogant and deserved this. I couldn’t do anything now but apologize.

“I’m sorry, please read my mind before you kill me,” I said. Those were the last words to come out of my mouth. He reached inside my head and looked shocked. He said, “Wow, you really are sorry. But I can’t let anyone find out what happened here today, I’d lose my medical license. I worked to damn hard to get it,” he said.

The last words I heard were “I’m sorry, too.” He reached in my mind and put me into a coma. He called for the nurses who put me into a hospital bed, were I remained to the day I died. The only thing I did until then was have nightmares about how arrogant I was.

© Copyright May 1st, 2007 By Alex H. Mittelman. All rights reserved.