Crystal ball

'“Show me the future,” she said, holding the crystal ball in her hands.

She paused and took a pull from her vape to add atmosphere, expecting nothing to happen.
“Did I ruin it by not believing hard enough?”

The crystal ball rested on a pillow. She picked it up, along with the rest of the clutter on the table.

As she walked toward the room, she felt a prick on one of her fingers. A drop of blood was absorbed by the ball as she held it.

She put it away and picked up a book. Her room was illuminated by the soft glow of Christmas-like lights hanging around the bed.

Inside the closet, the ball began to glow red and started showing images. The glow shifted to white, and a hand reached out from inside the ball.

The hand lifted the ball to about elbow height and moved toward the door.

Pushing slowly, it noticed there were no lights on in the bedroom anymore. Without making a sound, the hand opened the door and dropped to the floor.

The crystal ball shattered. A cloud of smoke expanded, growing larger and larger.

She woke up with a start to see a human shape emerging from the smoke on the ground.

Before she could speak, the figure moved fast toward her and covered her mouth.
“Shhh. I’ve come to warn you.”

Her eyes wide, she looked down and saw the broken pieces of the ball scattered across the floor.

The woman removed her hand from her mouth.
“Shhh. I don’t have much time.”

She grabbed her hand and began writing on it with a marker.

From the smoke on the floor, another hand emerged—a shadow of a long arm with elongated fingers.

It stretched upward toward the ceiling, bending slowly at the elbow, searching for leverage to pull the rest of its body free.

“Cover your eyes,” the woman said, turning toward the shadow.

As she closed them, she began to see through the woman’s eyes.

A curved back emerged from the smoke, as if something were pulling it downward while it tried to rise.

The woman extended her left hand. Symbols carved into her fingertips glowed as a light burst from the center of her palm. The shadow squirmed, revealing beneath it the body of a man.

The shadow tightened around him as the woman stepped closer, her hand still pointed forward.

She kept her eyes closed, as instructed, but felt the flash of light ripple through the room.

The man opened his eyes and looked at her. Before he could speak, the woman pressed her hand to his face and forced him back into the smoke.

She clenched her fist, holding it as if in pain.

“You can open your eyes now,” the woman said.

She lowered her hands and looked at the smoke on the floor, still flickering faintly.

The woman opened her jacket and pulled out a dog-eared notebook—old, worn, and filled with loose pages.

“I can’t show you the future,” she said, handing her the book, “but I can give you this.”

A guttural growl rose from within the smoke, growing louder by the second.
“You’ll need the book sooner than you think,” the woman said, turning back toward it.

She raised her other hand. The star tattoo in the center of her palm came alive and began to rotate.

The smoke was drawn toward it, thinning until it vanished completely.

The last trace disappeared. She closed her hand, opened a pocket inside her jacket, crushed the remaining ash, and let it fall away.

“Don’t ask to see the future again,” the woman said.

She grabbed the space around her, pulled it over herself like fabric, and vanished.