The Palm Reader's Warning

Mara sat across from the woman who'd been sleeping with her husband for six months. The **palm** of her own hand tingled where she'd gripped her wineglass too tightly.

"You have a strong life line," the other woman said, apparently mistaking Mara's silence for interest. She reached across the café table, fingers hovering. "May I?"

Mara extended her hand. Why not? Let the universe mock her too.

"I see..." The woman—what was her name? Something soft. Melissa?—traced the lines on Mara's palm with **orange**-stained nails. "You're tired. Something's draining you."

Mara almost laughed. Tired didn't cover it. She'd been moving through her days like a **zombie**, hollowed out by the quiet erasure of her marriage. Her husband had become a stranger who happened to share her bed, his infidelity an open secret they both pretended didn't exist.

"What else?" Mara heard her own voice, flat and distant.

"There's a betrayal." The woman looked up, eyes widening. "Someone close. A **fox**, clever and charming. They've deceived you."

Mara pulled her hand back. The irony tasted bitter, like overcooked **spinach**. This woman, sleeping with her husband, reading her palm and pronouncing betrayal. The universe had a sick sense of humor.

"You're right," Mara said, finally meeting the other woman's eyes. "There is a fox. And she's sitting right in front of me."

The confusion on Melissa's face transformed into horror as the truth landed. She stood, chair scraping against the floor. "Mara, I—"

"Don't." Mara gathered her things. "I'm not angry. I'm just done being the zombie in my own life."

She walked out into the sunlight, palm still tingling where the betrayal had been confirmed and resolved in one strange moment. For the first time in months, she felt something stir beneath the numbness—something like hope.