The Unfortunate Fortune-teller

The mysterious fortune-teller waved her hands above the half glowing crystal ball, humming a tuneless drone. A couple sat opposite, crammed together inside the dark, stuffy tent. The fortune-teller pushed some enormous sunglasses back up her nose with oddly masculine-looking hands, drawing the customer's attention to a large sneezer. The young man absent-mindedly touched his own and wondered if it was that big.

"Aha!" cried the old woman, startling the couple and leaning closer to the dull glass ball.
"I see...I see...a large stack of newspapers. The headline reads, 'Now Is The Time."
The young man sat up quickly, his eyes alight.
"Yes? The time for what? Tell us!" He squeezed his girlfriend's shoulders. "Cayla, this could be it. A cosmic sign that the universe is ready for us to be married!"
The girl looked like she wanted to roll her eyes but couldn't be bothered. Instead, she stared incredulously at her boyfriend, the way that a child would look at a plate of roast parsnip, before closing her eyes jadedly.

The oracle continued their droning, whispering, "Wait! I see something more. A chivalrous knight, a broody hen and eleven little moccasins."
The young man drank in the fortune teller's words.
"Chivalrous knight...well that's me. And Cayla, you're represented by the broody hen...wait, broody hens are the ones that hatch eggs, aren't they? Oh my God, we're going to get married and have kids! Eleven, for eleven moccasins. Oh how adorable. Hold on, moccasins come in pairs, so really we'd only have...what's half of eleven?"
Cayla stood up suddenly, a thunderous yet strangely calm expression on her smooth-skinned face.
"Enrique, if you actually grow up and made a decision for yourself one day, you might find that the world has a whole lot more to it. In the meantime, I'm going to drive all the way back to Albury, right now, whether it goes against my weekly horoscope or not." She glanced down at the suddenly silent physic with distaste, before crawling out of the tent flap with admirable dignity.
"Cayla, please! I'm sorry! Come back! It's alright, we're supposed to experience conflict this week because Aries is aligned!" called Enrique desperately, as he scrambled after her. "Alright, never mind, but please don't take my car. Cayla! That's my...car." The sound of an engine starting echoed in the distance.

"Oh, thank God." 'Madame Destina' whipped of her sunglasses, revealing a rather square face, with a strong jaw and many freckles.
"I can't see a bloody thing," muttered Alix as he unwrapped the many scarves from his head and shook his hair. Stumbling out the hidden back entrance of the tent, he immediately put his hand over his eyes to block out the blazing four-thirty sun. He secured the ties on his purple silk dressing gown, grabbed a Fanta from the Esky and collapsed into a camping chair. Chugging down the fizzy liquid, Alix sighed and relaxed into the canvas.

Two and a half weeks of humiliating hell. Of musty tents, living out of a Mitsubishi Magna, stale corn chips and weird people who actually pay five dollars to hear a bunch of lies. Creative and quite ingenious lies, if he said so himself, but lies all the same.
But now his ordeal was over, at least for today.
He was about to drift off, when a great gust of wind swept through his little camp, picking the pile of scarves and dumping them right onto the woodwork stall next door. Or rather, the woodwork stall's holder. Alix froze, crushed the can in his hand and ran over to gather them up.

"What the flamin' hell..." grumbled the very large, very tattooed carver, waking up from a doze in his chair to find slippery pieces of silk covering his body. Catching sight of Alix, scampering around in a bathrobe, he growled.
"What's all this rubbish, kid? Think you're funny, do ya? Thought I told you to keep yourself and all your fancy fairy junk in your fancy fairy tent?"
"Oh, yes sir...? Sir. I, um, I'm very, very sorry about this. Wind, you know? I-I promise it won't happen again," stuttered Alix, his arms full of material. The big man sneered.
"I'm tellin' you now kid, it better not. You and your crazy grandma stay off my grass. Got it?"
Alix shrugged, mumbling, "Crazy aunt, actually," before saying more audibly, "Yes, um, sir. Got it."
"Good."
The carver threw the scarves in his lap at Alix. Some landed on his face, causing him momentary blindness. As he reached up to pull them off, he lost his balance and fell, knocking over a table of wooden ornaments.

"Dad, what was that? Are you okay?" the woodworker's daughter poked her head around the sales marque, her caramel curls tied up with a green ribbon. She looked from her fuming father to Alix, flushed with embarrassment and lying sprawled on the ground. Her mouth formed a small 'o'.
"Jamie, it's alright, get back to the shop," seethed the carver. "I don't want my innocent daughter's eyes being burned by the sight of a weasel in a dress."
"That's a bit rough, Dad." the girl chided gently, shooting an apologetic smile at Alix, who was scrambling to his feet, before going back to the stall to serve a customer. Alix didn't wait for further mortification. He sprinted back to his tent, dumped the scarves and began to hunt for his red Nokia flip phone.

"That's it, I've had enough. You'd better answer, Auntie Florrie, or I'll - where is that stupid phone?" In actual fact it was the toughest, most indestructible mobile he'd ever come across and he was immensely proud of the fact that he'd had it for 7 years without getting a single repair. However, at this point in time Alix wasn't feeling particularly affectionate towards anyone or anything, including loyal flip phones. Eventually discovering it inside a Noodle-Box cartoon on the floor of the Magna, he stabbed in his aunt's number. The call went straight to voicemail.

"Hello, you've reached Florrie Redmund. Right now I'm probably meditating in the bath, designing henna tattoos or -"
"Crikey, learn to answer your phone Florence," Alix groaned and slumped back into the driver's seat, staring out at the dribbling crowds of the festival. Why had he ever agreed to do this? He knew the answer, deep down. When Florrie decided to take a four-week latte art course, he'd jumped at the job offer. For a confused kid finishing Year 12 with average marks and absolutely no idea what to do with them, a summer spent as a fortune-teller seemed exotic. Exciting. What an idiot. He burped unenthusiastically, still staring unseeingly through the windscreen.

Then all of a sudden, he was seeing, very clearly. He sat up and leant forward, squinting. That figure sitting slumped behind the vegan ice-cream van - was that the guy who was in his tent before? Enrique? A splendid idea popped into his head and before he knew it, he was making his way over with a half-eaten packet of Dorito's.