The boy walks down the empty boardwalk. It’s a foggy, rain misting down. The only sound was of the waves lapping against the shore and his steps creaking the wooden boards beneath his feet. He’s small and thin, with a mop of blond hair so covered in dirt it has a dirty straw like color. A torn and grimey jacket, 4 sizes too large covers him. He slows his feet to a stop. He is standing in front of an old wooden structure, with chipped purple paint and a mystical gold font reading ‘Fortune Teller’ on the front of it. He pulls the parts of his past out of his pocket. He stole them a long time ago from his file in the cupboard of the orphanage. The picture is of a handsome young man and a beautiful young women standing on the boardwalk grinning with carefree smiles right at the camera. The first clipping is a small piece, which is entitled ‘NEW FORTUNE TELLER IN BOARDWALK BOOTH’ with a picture of the same young man in a fake, but fancy looking turban. He has a mysterious look on his face, that hides a faint grin, like he is trying on an act. The other clipping is big, a front page story. It holds a large headline ‘FIRE DESTROYS HOME, KILLING 1, LEAVING TODDLER AN ORPHAN’ and a picture of a destroyed house still smoking under it. The boy carefully puts the pictures back into his pocket. He is sure he is here. He has been waiting for this a long time.

He enters the shop. Dark tapestries cover the wall. And sure enough, here he is, at a covered table, adorned in a purple turban, a crystal ball in front of him. “Ah, my first coostomer of ze day. Zit vill be 2 dollars and I can tell you everyzing you need to know about zyour future.” He says, with a fake, yet well perfected accent.

“Actually,” says the boy, “Could you tell me a story? Maybe particularly a sad one? About your past?” He has planned this out exactly.

“Vhy vould you want to know zat?” Said the fortune teller, a suspicious look about his face. But the boy is prepared.

“I’ll make it 10 dollars. And drop the accent.”

The fortune teller grins, amused. “I’ll tell you a story, boy. But I’ll warn you, it's a real sad one.” He says.

“Perfect.” Says the boy.

“A long time ago, there was a young boy and he was madly in love with a young girl, and she was madly in love with him. They had met when they were 14 and spent every second of their free time with each other. All through high school, they would spend weekends together, by the boardwalk, going on the rides, playing the arcades, sharing funnel cakes. They would do worse together, too. They would drink, go to parties, fool around with drugs. They were just kids, but foolishly in love. They decided not to go to college. They got married and with the help of the girl’s sister, bought a cheap apartment over a corner store. The girl had a job as a waitress, and the boy worked at a new fortune teller’s shop on the boardwalk. They liked their jobs. They were fun. They still fooled around, drank, had good times. They were still the foolishly in love kids, living in adult bodies, carefree, without any responsibilities. Until the baby came. It was a little boy, and the girl loved him, she loved the baby. She stopped waitressing to take care of him. She grew out of herself, grew out of the foolish love stricken girl she was before. She grew up. The boy didn’t know if he loved the baby. The girl didn’t acknowledge him much anymore. She obsessed over caring for the baby instead. He wished things would just go back to how they were before, before the baby came. Now, it gets cold around here, and in their apartment, they didn’t have a heating system. One night, the temperature was below zero. The girl and the boy piled jackets on and gave the baby a hot bath to warm him up. But as soon as they dressed him, he started wailing. He wouldn’t stop. The girl picked him up and started rocking him. “Oh, baby, baby…” the girl moaned almost in tears herself. The boy stood and watched. He got a blanket and tightly swaddled the baby. The baby still kept crying. “It must be because of the cold,” the boy said, after a minute.“Oh,” said the girl, “I wish we had the money for a heating system. Or maybe just some kind of portable heater.”

“Well,” said the boy, “we don’t.”

“If you would just get a better paying job, maybe…” She trailed off.

“I like my job.” He said, annoyed.

“Yeah, well, I know you do. But it isn’t enough to take care of our needs, of the baby. There are plenty of people willing to hire a capable person at a higher rate than you make being a stupid fortune teller.” She said.

“I like my job,” He said again.

“Well, sometimes you have to make sacrifices. You need to just grow up. You think you have no responsibilities. You think you are still a kid.” Her voice rising.

“Well, if you’re so grown up, if you think getting a job is so easy, why don’t you go get one.” He mumbled, disgustedly. As soon as he said it, he knew he shouldn’t have.

“Why?” The girl shouted, “because I had to quit my old job that, let me remind you, I thought was just as great as you think being a fortune teller is, to take care of OUR baby! That’s why! And if you aren’t going to provide for us, if you are just going to criticize how I take care of my responsibilities, then you can just LEAVE.” She points at the door. Everything is quiet, except the baby’s continuous wailing. The boy looked at the door, and looked back at her, the girl he had spent cherishing so many hours with. He looked at the door, and looked back at the tiny being in her arms, what they had created together. He looked at the door again, but this time, when he looked back, all he saw was the girl he used to love, the still wailing baby that had ruined their blissfully carefree lives, and the tiny apartment with no heat. And he left, slamming the door, without looking back. That was the last time he ever saw her, or the baby.

The fortune teller looks up from his hands. The boy is shocked but he tries not to show it. This was not how the story was supposed to go. The fortune teller was supposed to know about the fire. Supposed to be in despair that his first love was lost, that his son was now an orphan. Supposed to feel remorse and regret for not being there to save the boy’s mom. The boy is supposed to say, “Dad, it’s me. Really, it is! I have proof.” He was supposed to show him the picture and the clippings, and his dad was supposed to cry and say, “Oh, it really is you! I’m so sorry for leaving.” and take him home.  But the boy feels a burning anger instead. Anger that the fortune teller didn’t take care of him and his mom. Anger that he left them, anger his mom died and he ended up in the orphanage. But then he feels a pang of sadness. The man in front of him left his wife because of him, the baby. It was his fault. The fortune teller is watching him closely. “That will be ten dollars,” he says. The boy digs in his pocket, but before he pulls out the wad of one dollar bills, he tucks the picture of the carefree girl and boy into it. He hands the stack to the fortune teller, and walks out without looking back.