Christmas Magic. Cathy Kelly

and the only detail that stood out was that she appeared fond of sensible, lace-up shoes.

      Between customers, Carmel, Gwen and Selena discussed how they didn’t trust fortune telling.

      Carmel didn’t even read her horoscope any more. All the magazines had told her that Geminis and Libras could be a good match, but she and Michael had fought like cats and dogs and now Michael was back living with his brother while Carmel had their apartment to herself.

      She was thirty-four and her mother kept making snide remarks about how living with a man before marriage hadn’t been the gateway to anything but ruin when she was a girl.

      ‘When you come to your senses, your old room is there for you,’ her mother, Phil, said at least once a week.

      Carmel knew she couldn’t afford to pay the rent all by herself for much longer but neither could she face living with her mother again.

      Phil wore her bitterness like an Olympic medal. It was the only thing she’d been left with when Carmel’s father had walked out on her thirty-two years ago. She had seemed almost triumphant when Michael had moved out of the apartment he shared with her daughter.

      History repeats itself, Phil had remarked grimly. Under the circumstances, Carmel had no interest in hearing that red was her lucky colour or that Saturday was her best day of the week. Such frivolity didn’t cut any ice with her any more.

      On the third day, Gwen decided to risk it.

      She was ready for Madame Lucia, she told her colleagues confidently. Fortune tellers were canny and could read clothes, handbags and jewellery with as much skill as they could supposedly read the cards. Gwen’s good leather handbag and her engagement ring would have given the game away.

      She’d left her handbag and the ring with Carmel and she’d taken off her navy uniform jacket with ‘Maguire’s Travel’ embroidered on one pocket, so there’d be none of that ‘I see you going on a foreign holiday’ malarkey. Madame Lucia would get no clues from her.

      Upstairs, lemon aromatherapy oil was heating in a small burner and the air was redolent with scents of somewhere far away. Madame Lucia sat at a table with a crystal ball in front of her. She smiled silently at Gwen, who sat down politely and looked into the crystal ball too. They both gazed at it for ages.

      Gwen did her best to see whatever it was that people saw in them. Fog or swirling mist. Wasn’t that what you were supposed to see? Gwen tried hard but all she saw was a fat globe that smelled strongly of the window cleaner her granny was always using. Madame Lucia was not a million miles away from Gwen’s granny, now that she thought about it.

      Sensible beige cardigan, cream blouse buttoned up to the neck, a kind smiling face and not a jangling gypsy earring in sight. She even had the same sort of gold-rimmed glasses Granny wore but without the gold chain. Behind the glasses, Madame Lucia’s eyes flickered, but she said nothing. Could Madame Lucia see something? Maybe it was all a con.

      ‘You’ll be married within the year,’ said Madame Lucia. ‘I am seeing San Francisco, I think. Yes, that’s it.’

      Gwen rolled her eyes. So much for fortune telling. She and Brian were going to Sardinia on their honeymoon.

      ‘No, San Francisco,’ Madame Lucia said firmly, as if she could read Gwen’s mind.

      Gwen blinked.

      ‘I know you’ve booked somewhere else, but it’ll be San Francisco in the end. There’s a bit of a shock coming and you have to make a decision, but I think you’ll take the right road. It’s all for the best, really. You’re a strong girl.’

      ‘What about other things – money, family?’ Gwen wanted more than this limited vision of the future.

      ‘You came to ask me about love,’ said Madame Lucia simply. ‘That’s what I saw for you.’

      ‘I didn’t say what I came to you for –’ began Gwen, but she stopped.

      Because she had come to find out about her and Brian. Not that she’d have admitted it to anyone, even her closest friends, but there was something not quite right. Brian was so distant these days.

      He looked uncomfortable when she began going through her wedding notebook, listing all the things they’d done and all the things they still had to do. Gwen was worried about the wedding cake. Was it unlucky to have a pyramid of profiteroles instead of the traditional fruitcake?

      Madame Lucia smiled a kind, granny-ish smile. ‘You’ll do what’s right,’ she said.

      ‘Well?’ Carmel and Selena were curious when Gwen arrived back at work.

      ‘Oh, you know, the usual rubbish,’ said Gwen, searching in her handbag for her mobile phone. She might just send Brian a text message about this evening.

      Gwen and Brian met in Mario’s Coffee Shop after work. Brian had pulled a sweatshirt on over his plain bank cashier’s shirt and tie.

      ‘What’s up now with the wedding of the century?’ he said gloomily, stirring two fat sugars into his latte. ‘Don’t tell me: the florist can’t get the exact shade you want for the roses and everything’s going to be ruined. Can we talk about something else?’

      Gwen looked at him, hurt.

      ‘How can you say that?’ she began, and then stopped. He was right. All they ever talked about these days was the wedding. Gwen had dreamed of her wedding day since, aged five, she’d seen Barbie resplendent in her meringue of crispy lace.

      ‘You’re fed up with all this wedding stuff, aren’t you?’ she said.

      The question took both of them by surprise.

      ‘A bit,’ he admitted. ‘I feel as if I’m stuck on a roller coaster and I can’t get off.’

      Brian looked at Gwen to see how she was taking this. She wasn’t gasping with shock or anything, so he took the plunge.

      ‘I always thought it would be nice to get married on a beach or somewhere simple. Without all the fuss.’

      Gwen thought of the elaborate plans for a wedding feast that was going to cost a fortune and which made her break into a cold sweat when she thought about the inevitable drama of the table plans. Imagine her wild uncles sitting beside Brian’s beautiful but shy girl cousins? Or Brian’s brother telling risqué jokes as best man, jokes that would shock Granny and make her reach for her heart tablets?

      ‘If we had a quick, tiny wedding, just for immediate family, we could use the money we’ve saved for a huge holiday. Like …’ she searched for a place ‘… San Francisco. We could tour the area, drive up Highway One, go to LA, everywhere …’

      Brian didn’t say anything. He didn’t have to. The huge smile lighting up his face said it all.

      Selena passionately believed in fortune tellers. She always had, but she couldn’t say that because the girls would tell her to give it a go, and if Madame Lucia took one look at her, she’d know.

      And Selena was terrified that someone would find out.

      She still had the money, hidden in an envelope in her desk under a spare pair of tights so that anybody seeing the tights would know this was her personal drawer, and wouldn’t look any further. Because two thousand euros was a lot of money and anyone with half a brain would realise that Selena, the office spendthrift, could never have saved that much in her life.

      She hadn’t meant to take it, she really hadn’t. She had never stolen as much as a notebook from the office supply box, but that day a month ago that Stanley Maguire forgot to put the money in the safe was coincidentally the same day Selena received the awful letter from the credit card people.

      How could she owe them that much money? Yes, she’d bought the shoes and that long suede skirt that everyone admired so much, but surely she didn’t owe nearly two thousand?

      She’d added it up with shaking fingers