through the study of the palm; pt. 2

[luxuryflower]

When; Sunday, 17th of November
Rating; PG for flirting - will edit if it should, unexpectedly, go up.
Characters; Marguerite Gautier (luxuryflower) and Meyer Lansky (recognize_an_opportunity)
Summary; Cursed for the weekend, Marguerite and Meyer, two former Slytherins who were in the same year, reunite in Marguerite's shop - for a cup of tea and a session of old-fashioned fortunetelling.
Log;

Telling Tales is everything one should expect a Divination shop to be. Intimate. Cosy. The front of the almost too-small area has been left open, framed in only on each side by book shelves running from floor to ceiling and featuring titles on this particular branch of magic – Astrology, Cartomancy, Tessomancy and, of course, Palmistry. Then, there are the flowers. Scattered haphazardly about in large pots. Various kinds, depending on the season and always kinds that are certain not to have a frightening effect on her customers. No odour and no snapping, but plenty of colour. To add atmosphere to the room.

Near the back, where it is darker, because large curtains are keeping the light from pouring in through the windows there, she has placed the large, round table made from ivy – the yellowish wood seeming almost to glow, golden in the light from close to a hundred candles, some floating freely in the air and otherwise scattered as generously about the room as the flowers. A large pot of tea has been left brewing to one side, with a small collection of clean cups gathered on a tray, next to a deck of Tarot cards. Marguerite can certainly do it all, tea leafs and Tarot, but her preference is for reading palms. It is the talent that has gained her her reputation, the reputation which sends hoards of Hogwarts girls through her door. In – and out a little happier.

This afternoon has been quiet, though. She is feeling more sullen for it, too. Sitting down at the table, she pushes her empty teacup aside without glancing at the dregs. One can perhaps claim it to be a principle, that she never tells her own fortune. Marguerite simply likes the idea that she creates it – much as she has created this business. By herself.

Comments

[recognize_an_opportunity]

He hasn't always put much stock in fortune-telling, partially because he's never sure if he wants to know his own fortune, and partially because it never seems like the most logical of magic to him. For someone whose favorite topics in school had been Arithmancy and Potions, the talents Marguerite possesses simply aren't his kind of magic. They'd been in school together, they'd even been in the same house -- Slytherin, of course, what else? -- but they hadn't known each other particularly well. To be fair, he hadn't known anyone particularly well.

But today is one of his rare days off of work, and there's only so much wandering he can do before he gets bored. Maybe that's why he finds himself pushing open the door to Telling Tales, already scoffing at himself for his flight of fancy. It's not that he doesn't believe in palm reading, it's not that he doubts Marguerite's ability to do it, it's just that he's never wanted to have it done before. It's unlike him, and yet, the shop is cozy, somehow, and charming.

When he spots Marguerite sitting at the table in the back, empty teacup beside her, something like a smile crosses his face for a moment. They really haven't seen each other in awhile. She looks good. Maybe that's what his little smirk is all about. "Afternoon," he finally says.

[luxuryflower]

She hears the door open and close, of course, but doesn't move. No, she keeps perfectly still - knowing how her silhouette will be stark in the light from the candles and the heat of the room will add the perfect glow to her skin. She will look like a Seer, mysterious and ethereal, and looks are all that matter in her line of business. Looks are what sell, more so than her skills, more so than her Readings. And as such, she has embraced them, her own looks. How fortunate it is, that she is beautiful and her predictions even more so. Finally, after a long moment, the customer speaks and there is something familiar about his voice, for it is a man who has entered, and she turns her head to look at him. Finding herself coming to a halt. Meyer. Lansky.

"Why," she replies, smile coming to her with natural ease. They could hardly be said to have known each other well at school, where they had both been in Slytherin, but she had been aware of his presence and he of hers. "If it isn't Meyer Lansky! I must admit -- of all people, you were the last, I had expected to see here. Although, you shall naturally be welcome..." The last sentence is not added in haste, but lingers as an invitation in the air between them as Marguerite gestures towards the chair on the other side of the table. Few of her customers are men, but it is a personal preference of hers - reading the lines of a man's palm, the differences in size and wishes for the future intriguing.

[recognize_an_opportunity]

"I didn't expect to find myself here, either, but curiosity got the better of me."

And it always does. There're very few things he's not willing to explore, for the sake of satisfying his curiosity. He has the desire to know everything, to never be satisfied with the meagre knowledge that he already has -- when he'd been sorted, the hat had told him that he'd do well in Ravenclaw, too; of course, he was of the opinion that he'd have done well anywhere. Adaptability was almost as much an inherent part of him as curiosity.

He regards her for a moment, taking in her smile, the way she does, indeed, look quite mysterious. It would be foolish not to think she was beautiful, and foolish was something he distinctly wasn't. Then he sits down across from her, raising an eyebrow. "So," he says, shrugging slightly, "I've never had my palm read before. I thought I should give it a try."

[luxuryflower]

His words remain unanswered for a while as she reaches out for the teapot and pours herself another cup of tea, movements languid and elegant. Without asking whether he's interested, she picks out a cup for him as well - repeating the motion and filling it to the rim with hot liquid. He can drink it or he can leave it to turn lukewarm first, cold later, it shan't be a grave matter to her. For no matter the choice he makes, it changes not his immediate future. That he will spend a good deal of money in her shop, basking in the glory of her company and then, walk away with no definite answers, only answered questions.

"It may be the simplest of the Divination techniques, but it is also the one which requires the greatest --" She pauses, rhetorically. In order to meet his eyes and raise her chin slightly in response to his... willing surrender. In the most literal of ways, he's handing himself over. Marguerite knows that she doesn't master Palmistry due to any inherent talent, but because she masters its primary condition. "-- intimacy." Thus, she puts the teapot aside again and reaches across the table, palms up. Holding her hands out for him to see. To take.

[recognize_an_opportunity]

"Maybe that's why I've always preferred Arithmancy," he replies, picking up his teacup and taking a long sip from it. "It's a way of predicting the future without any..." He pauses for a moment, looking down at her hands with a tiny smile, and then finishes his sentence. "... without any intimacy."

He's always preferred numbers. They're much less messy than divination techniques that require intimacy. The very word intimacy is said with some suspicion, as though he's not quite convinced he should he taking ahold of anyone hands at all. And yet, because this is her shop, and he's here for a new experience, he does, taking her hands and looking at them intently, like he can somehow read her palms instead of the other way around. Truth be told, the practice of palmistry is utterly beyond him, no matter how fond of other forms of divination he is.

[luxuryflower]

With a smile, she turns his hands over. It is a soft motion, soothing almost. Meant to be one such. Every session begins in this manner, whether her customer is a man or a woman - but the weight of a man's hand in her own is always more thrilling than that of a woman's. If only for the rarity of it. In this context. Looking away from his face finally, she glances down at his palm, running her thumb along his very prominent head line. Silence falls over her as she allows herself the time to create a complete picture of him. Head line. Life line. The branching creases. The bridging ones. She remembers, of course, his love for numbers and the focused energy of his ambitions. Such is the kind of person he is and it shows in his hands, too. Yes, she can tell.

"Our past is a shared one, I need not tell you about it, surely." It is said with a slight laughter, without excuses. Then, she leans in, gaining a better view of his hands and casting shadows that changes his fate in the blink of an eye. She pauses. Frowns. The patterns baffling her, in spite of what is now years of practice.

[recognize_an_opportunity]

"No, I think we both remember school pretty well," he says, with a little laugh that matches her own, because in the grand scheme of things, they haven't been out of school particularly long, but they've both done fairly well for themselves. It's the ambition, of course, that's characteristic of a Slytherin -- they'd both been perfect fits in that house, as far as he could tell. She's made a name for herself, even if he's not certain about this whole palmistry thing. There's something legitimate to it, he's sure, but because he doesn't understand how it works, he's skeptical.

His hands are heavily callused, and somewhat large for his height, and he's always noticed that, but he's never spent much time examining the lines on them -- the phrase 'knowing something like the back of your hand' doesn't particularly make sense to him, because he's never bothered to look at them much. He wonders, now, what she's seeing, and why she's frowning so intently. "Something ominous?" he says, tone purposefully light, although he's hoping she won't agree that his fate is absolutely awful, based on what she sees.

[luxuryflower]

Meyer's hands are calloused, like those of a man who has indeed put them to the test - as well as himself. He is young; they should not look like this, but she doesn't question it, for they have both worked hard to become what they are today, sitting opposite of each other like this. Her reading his palm. His fortune being told by her. Two Slytherins, as always - making use of one another's positions. Gifts. Skills. Possessions. She quickly exchanges the frown with a small smile, a mysterious one, perhaps. When one can't see what she sees.

"Ah, there is no need to worry," she tells him, for it is true. She sees no signs of death, of illness or even ill fortune - she simply doesn't understand what she does see. "The future waiting ahead of you is merely of another reality than the one you're living now." His life line thickens. Bends. Into another realm, not death, but something just as unpredictable. Oh, she has her work cut out for her, with him. With his hands that are growing increasingly warm in her grip. The heat of intimacy, as she promised him.

[recognize_an_opportunity]

"How mysteriously vague," he says, and his comment is tinged with something between skepticism and amusement, because of course the statement she's made could apply to anything at all -- it doesn't have to be taken literally; anything could be a different reality.

"Would you care to elaborate?"

He's curious, he has to admit, and though he's not particularly familiar with or overly fond of the feeling of having his hands in someone else's, he has to admit, her touch isn't necessarily unpleasant, simply unfamiliar and a bit strange.

[luxuryflower]

"I see --" Marguerite pauses and this time it is not rhetorically, she simply doesn't have any answers that will satisfy either of them. Instead, she shifts his hand into her other, her left hand - it is an incorrect way of reading palms, but the shadows cast are different and shed an altogether different light over his lines. Running her fingers over his palm lightly, almost a tickle, she continues her sentence. Keeping nothing hidden from him, for he is here to be told the truth. Which she shall tell him. "-- a business and a woman, the two merging together into one whole."

At this, she looks up at him slowly. It isn't the full extent of what she sees. She sees past, present and future all outlined in hid head and life lines, but this is what intrigues her the most and as she tells him of things he does not yet know, he will in turn - directly or indirectly - tell her even more.

[recognize_an_opportunity]

"Well, I do have a business."

That's not exactly a secret, though, and if this palm reading stuff really is legitimate, it doesn't surprise him that his business would show up somewhere in the lines of his hand. Business has always meant a great deal to him; the ability to make money and to take care of himself has always been the most important thing in his life. It's a means of survival.

But the part about a woman, well... He raises an eyebrow slowly, somehow surprised that he still hasn't pulled his hand away from her touch, because this really is all very intimate, in a way that he's not familiar with. "I can't think of any women that have much to do with it, though."

[luxuryflower]

Oh, this territory is familiar, at least. Smiling, a slow smile balancing between inherently seductive and inherently mysterious - if the two truly have to be mutually exclusive, Marguerite cocks her head slightly, eyes seeking his palm only fleetingly. It is the truth, that she sees a woman in his hand, but which woman - that she shan't be able to tell. She can make guesses, some educated and some less so and she fully intends to. If only for the fun of it. "I am certain it isn't for lack of trying," she says, with an unuttered laughter audible in her voice, "that the woman hasn't manifested herself clearly already. Your paths have only just crossed and she is biding her time, waiting for this other realm to help her course."

The moment those last words have left her lips, it comes to her - not in the lines of a palm, but before her Inner Eye which she otherwise engages so rarely. There's a vision, of herself and of Meyer. However, they are dressed in Muggle clothing, Meyer standing behind a counter with Marguerite on the other side. He says something to her, she sees the words forming but can't hear them, and in response she laughs. Touching her hand to her neck in the manner so familiar to her...

Marguerite quickly withdraws her hands from their hold on Meyer's. Staring at him, sitting in front of her. Looking wholly like his wizard self.

[recognize_an_opportunity]

"I see. In that case, I guess I'll have to keep waiting until she shows up."

He's not sure whether he believes it or not, because it's easy to say, of course, that there'll be a woman someday, at some point, that'll 'manifest herself clearly' in his life. There's the question, of course, of whether she means this prediction to be romantic or not, but from that seductive and mysterious smile, he'd guess she means it to be taken in whichever way he prefers to take it. And then she lets go of his hands.

"What is it?"

He's drawn in, despite himself, by the quickness with which she withdraws her hands, by the way she drops her grip on his hands as though there's something awful in them. Or perhaps simply something very surprising. Either way, he wants to know. He leans forward, slightly.