Fate appeared with her laptop balanced on one arm.
“I’m here. No need to yell.”
“What was this nonsense you were telling me about kissing frogs?”
“Haven’t you ever heard about the story of a witch placing a curse on a prince, turning him into a frog? The only way to break the curse was to get a princess to kiss the frog, and then he’d turn back into a prince.”
“But why didn’t you tell me that? I’m not a princess, and all this was for nothing.”
Fate looked like she was about to giggle, but she slapped her hand over her mouth. After taking a deep breath and composing herself, she said, “Did you actually try kissing frogs?”
Gaia put her hands on her hips. “What did you expect me to do? You told me I’d have to kiss a lot of frogs before I found my prince. Was that just a practical joke?”
“Not at all. I expected you to understand it was a parable.”
“Oh fuck,” Gaia muttered under her breath.
Fate cleared her throat. “I have a few more candidates for you to look at. Are you interested? Or would you like to do this another time?”
Gaia let out a deep breath. All the leaves around them fluttered. “Fine, I’ll see what you have, but I’d like to sit someplace warm with a sweet umbrella drink while we do this.”
“Excellent idea!” Fate said. With the snap of her fingers, the two of them were sitting at a hilltop bar, overlooking the Caribbean islands and beautiful sunny spots where the clouds parted. “Okay, I have three possibles for you to look at.” She set the laptop in front of Gaia.
Examining the pictures and profiles, Gaia nixed the politician immediately. She wanted nothing to do with politics and couldn’t understand why Fate would recommend someone like that. She hated being lied to. Politicians seemed to do more lying than truth telling.
Next, she looked at the picture of a newscaster. He was handsome but again too much into mankind’s failings and foolishness. She imagined his job must be depressing, since she had seen the news a few times and it was always depressing.
Then she saw a basketball player, a star, his profile said. Well, he might be a little full of himself, but she could handle that. She was a little full of herself too, or so she had been told, so who knows…maybe it would work out okay. And if he was used to winning these games, he was apt to be frequently in a good mood. “Okay. This one.” She pointed to the tall, good-looking basketball player.
“Excellent choice,” Fate said. “I’ll set something up and let you know where and when to meet him.”
“I thought I was supposed to email or something first.”
“I’ll check him out with Karma, but I want this to go well for you. If you already like his looks and he makes you happy, that’s all that counts.”
* * *
For once, Gaia was encouraged. The date with the basketball player was going well. He picked a lovely restaurant. He was respectful, charming, witty, but kind of dumb. Even so, she wasn’t turned off completely. And then…
Pan showed up in all his half-goat glory.
Crap!She’d have to erase everyone’s memories, including her date’s. “What do you want, Pan?”
“I simply want to help.”
“I don’t need, nor want, yourhelp. Get out.”
“Sheesh. Rude! I won’t forget this, Gaia.” Before he disappeared, he added, “And neither will you.”
Since it was such a short visit, Gaia was able to reset the timeline back to before the interruption.
She swirled her red wine. “So, you were saying?”
“Uh… I don’t remember, but I have something else to say.”
“Sure. What’s that?”
“You really need to dye your hair. I don’t want to look like I’m dating my grandma. And get those eyebrows tweezed. I hear there are a lot of different ways to have them professionally shaped.”
