October 13, 2015
Today I ventured across the street for lunch, which means braving the Corner of Doom, upon which the charity/politician/social justice cause of the day stops people (usually me) to ask for ‘continuing monthly donations.’ (Read: all the money.) Today, heading back to the office, I managed to successfully disentangle myself from from a save the whales guy and picked my way carefully to the corner, where I wound up waiting to cross between a guy in a three piece suit and a woman who was not in a three piece suit.
She was, in fact, dressed a lot like the stereotype of a bad TV fortune teller. Her head was wrapped in a colorful scarf, giant hoop earrings framed her head, and most of her form was swathed in a billowy coat.
She had Resting Angry Face.
The light said we could cross the street, so I charged ahead, eager to put some distance between myself and the save the whales guy in case he tried to ask me for money again. Suddenly, from behind me, loudly and clear as a bell, I heard an angry voice with a Caribbean accent say, “You need to go to school.”
I glanced back and saw the lady a step or two behind me. It was clearly she that had spoken, but I had no idea to whom–she was staring straight ahead, with an intensity as if to set a little patch of air about five feet in front of her on fire.
I was weirded out, but I shook it off and kept walking.
A second or two later, a clear voice cut through the noise of traffic once more, making me jump. “See? I tell her she needs to go to school, and she just looks at me,” the creepy woman announced to the crowd at large. Again, she didn’t appear to be addressing anyone in particular.
Okay, but that was clearly directed at me.
We reached the corner, and I waited to cross in the other direction. To my relief, the sociopathic Miss Cleo kept walking. I turned back to watch for the light to turn green.
After a couple seconds, the hair on the back of my neck started to stand up.
I turned to look, and the creepy woman was standing in the middle of the sidewalk about ten feet away, board straight and still as a statue, fixing me with the most intensely evil, unblinking gaze I have ever received from anyone.
Despite the busy sidewalk, no one was jostling her. It was as if the crowd was hitting the intense beam of her stare and being split apart to go around her.
“…Were you talking to me, then?” I asked weakly.
The lady didn’t even blink. If anything, her scowl intensified.
“That’s a no, then?” I asked, my sarcasm betrayed by a faltering voice.
I swear I could envision little storm clouds growing in the thickening air around her.
“Just asking.” I tried to ignore her, turning back to look at the traffic signal, but she was still doing it, I could just feel it. Sure enough, when I looked back, she was still trying to explode my head via the Think System.
After what felt like an eternity trapped in a dimension where time had no meaning, but was probably only about thirty seconds, the traffic signal changed. She whirled around and disappeared into the throngs of people. If she’d had a cape, she would have twirled it dramatically as she left, like an old timey vampire.
You guys, I’m fairly certain that what I just experienced was a genuine Evil Eye.
So now I’m cursed for all eternity. We’ll see how that works out. I’m still not exactly sure what I did.
Laura Writes 
I think she was talking to the ghost of someone from the early 1800's who's body was disinterred from the cemetery that was in that area and moved in the late 1840's to near Lincoln Park.
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