Zero Worship: Confessions of a Fake Psychic Detective #6

Chapter 21 - A Squirrel in Every Pot

.././.\\.\//.///\.../

Zandra doesn't so much dance as she pantomimes Bexley's moves—poorly—on her way to shut off the music. A squirrel bolting out from beneath a pile of random shit and into the kitchen assists her foot work. She does all this without the glass pipe in Chad's hand touching her lips.

No time for that shit. Not right now.

"Hey, you're killing the vibe," Bexley says when the music stops playing. "I thought we were gonna unwind, lay low for a while."

"Lay low? No," Zandra says. She thinks back to the stock charts she examined back on the Curd Queen, and how their chaotic movements were so deceiving.

Everything followed an underlying pattern. Contraction, then expansion, then trend. The individual movements and lengths of each phase are unpredictable, but each abided by the same rules no matter what: contraction, expansion, trend.

It's the pattern that underlies everything that can verb. Not just stocks. Everything. Zoom in or out as a matter of scale or time, and it shows the same pattern. If I remember correctly, that's what's called being "fractal."

I get it now.

Holy shit. I get it.

Zandra lights another cigarette. "The trend phase is upon us. I can feel it. If we don't take action now, we'll never get another chance. Trend will swing away from our favor."

"What? There's always another chance. Just chill out for a minute," Chad says, still holding the glass pipe and the pocket torch.

No.

"Put that shit away. There'll be time for it later," Zandra says, motioning at the pipe.

"What the fuck, Zandra?" Chad says.

"We need to act. Quickly," Zandra says. She spots Bexley starting to back away. "You wanted to learn how to unlock your psychic abilities, didn't you? Sit your ass down. School is in session."

Bexley takes the pipe from Chad and sits on the couch.

"No. Put that away. Listen," Zandra says and slaps the pipe out of Bexley's hand.

Chad freaks. "I paid for that."

"It doesn't matter."

"The fuck it doesn't."

"Then snort it off the floor."

From the couch, Bexley crosses her arms and taps her foot. "This better be good, Zandra."

Zandra coughs into her sleeve and clears her throat. For once today, she doesn't notice the pain in her ankle. She takes a deep breath and says, "Individual events are unpredictable. They appear random, right? Like a—I don't know—a squirrel."

"A squirrel? Are you sure you didn't hit that pipe?" Chad says, ass up and nose pressed against the floor.

"Let her talk," Bexley says.

Thanks.

Zandra rolls the slack in her sleeves up to her elbows. She says, "You can't predict the path a squirrel will take while it runs around. It goes over there, over here, up, down, all over. Its movements are chaotic. Even if you had a general sense of where the squirrel was going to, like toward a bird feeder, you still couldn't predict exactly how it would get there. Maybe it takes two steps forward and three back, one to the side, then jumps to a branch to get to the feeder. You following this so far?"